VII.
On my return to my Western home, I lost no time in commencing my double life. I organised a Fenian “circle” or camp in Lockport, Illinois, and took the position of “centre” or commander of it, thus becoming the medium for receiving all official reports and documents issued by O’Neill, the contents of which documents were, of course, communicated by me to the Home Government. I went to work with a will, and was soon in the very thick of the conspiracy, organised a military company for the Irish Republican Army, and eventually attended the Springfield Convention in the position of a delegate.
While so engaged, I entered the Chicago Medical College, and commenced my medical studies in earnest. I was much assisted in this direction by the kindly help of an old friend, Dr. Bacon, who had been attached to my regiment in war times as surgeon. He was then surgeon to the Illinois State Penitentiary, and through him I obtained the position created at this time of Hospital Steward, or, in other words, Resident Medical Officer in that institution. There was a comfortable salary attached to the office, which I found to be in every sense a useful post. Although, as matters turned out, I was only to spend some few months there, I gained even in this short time a vast amount of experience in almost every branch of medical study.
Life, indeed, in the Illinois Penitentiary gave me experience in many ways. It brought me for the first time into direct contact with many of the evils which then affected official administration. Things, of course, are different now, though it must be confessed still anything but perfect; but when compared with the usages of olden times, the shortcomings of the present system are of no account whatever. At the time of which I speak, money could accomplish everything, from the obtaining of luxuries in prison to the purchase of pardon and freedom itself. Everything connected with the prison administration was rotten to the core. Corruption was in every place. The penitentiary contained some fifteen hundred prisoners, and the whole management of affairs affecting these men was vested in three Commissioners, as they were styled, whose proceedings were of the most flagrant and jobbing character. So great did the scandals of their doings become at one period, that one of the three had to abscond; but so demoralised was the condition of affairs that no attempt was made to arrest and bring him back. These three men had no object save that of gaining money. They were the proprietors of a general shop inside the prison, from which the prisoners purchased luxuries at usurious rates; and the work of the prisoners themselves was let out to contractors, who paid heavily for the privilege of remaining undisturbed in their monopoly. Everything was turned to money. In one case I knew of a prisoner, failing to win his cause on appeal, and having thereby to undergo a period of seven years’ imprisonment, being offered his release for a sum of 10,000 dollars, which offer he refused, stating in the most business-like way that he would only give 7000. This was not considered satisfactory, and so the negotiations fell through.
No popular idea of prison life now indulged in at all fits in with the actual condition of affairs five-and-twenty years ago. Money was useful for the purpose of commerce in the Commissioners’ interest, and therefore was allowed free circulation amongst those confined. Those who could afford it, and whose cases were not finally decided—appeals were constantly being heard—were allowed to board at the Governor’s table, to wear their own clothes, and in every way conduct themselves as if in a private house. In those days the prisoners were not shaved—they wore their hair and whiskers as they pleased. Those who could not afford to live the lives of gentlemen had the store to go to for petty luxuries; and so, no matter how matters turned, the Commissioners were the gainers. The Governor, or Warden, as he was called, was their nominee, dependent upon them for office; and everything was governed by their wishes and desires.
In such a vast assembly of criminals there were many whose characters and careers formed subjects for very interesting study to me. I was fortunate in being connected with the prison at a time when some more than usually clever and facile scoundrels were temporarily resident there. Towering head and shoulders over the whole crowd was that king of forgers, Colonel Cross, perhaps the most daring, successful, and expert penman of our time. About forty years of age at this period, a man of fine commanding presence, splendid diction, and gentlemanly demeanour, Cross attracted me from the first day I was brought into contact with him. The son of one of the most prominent Episcopalian clergymen in the United States, he was possessed of a wide classical education, and discoursed with intelligence and wondrous fluency on theology, medicine, and every kind of science.
He was no ordinary criminal. Even in prison he commanded admiration from his fellows, and I was often amazed to see how respectful were the salutations accorded him as he moved about. He boasted, I learned afterwards with truth, that he had never robbed a poor man; and, strange being that he was, he had borne almost all the cost of the education of his brother’s children. Indeed, at the time I met him, he was educating in the most expensive manner a poor little girl whom, in a moment of generous caprice, he had adopted as his daughter.
When I was first brought into contact with him, Cross had his case before the courts on appeal, and, pending the decision, he was living in the most expensive way in prison, boarding at the Governor’s table, dressing in the most fashionable way, and smoking the best of cigars. Having no work to do, he interested himself in the affairs of his fellow-prisoners; and so clever and capable was he, and so great a knowledge of law did he possess, that he succeeded in preparing the cases of many of them for appeal in such a way as to allow of their regaining their liberty.
I had not been in the prison very long before he appealed to me to take him as my assistant in the hospital; and attracted by the man as I was, I acceded to his request, to discover subsequently that I had a most valuable attendant, whose knowledge of medicine was both extensive and practical.