No. 8
As we have already intimated, the house of correction at Singapore was under the management and control of the Convict Department; and there were frequently from thirty to forty Europeans confined in this prison, chiefly seamen on short sentences for neglect of duty on board ship.
When Sir Robert McClure was commanding a vessel of war[18] in Chinese waters about 1859, his ship was on the Singapore station for some little time; and upon his arrival he sent in to the house of correction a very incorrigible man-of-war's man named John —— (we will not give his surname, for he may be yet alive). This man had been several times punished while the ship was in China, and had been twice sentenced to be flogged. We heard all about him from the officer of the ship who had brought him ashore.
His sentence was three weeks' imprisonment: the first week in solitary confinement on bread and water, and congee or rice gruel diet. Upon his receipt into the prison, after the usual routine, he was placed in one of the penal cells, and bread and water set before him. Before the cell door was closed, he looked hard at the chief warder, saying, "Take away that filth; I won't eat it." The chief warder reported to the Superintendent that the man in the cells was a dangerous-looking character, and he was afraid we should have trouble with him, for he had never seen a man with such a hang-dog look. The morning of the second day he had touched neither bread nor water, though fresh had been given him, and in a churlish manner he said to the chief warder, who had remonstrated with him, "I'll eat the tail of my shirt first, before I eat what you bring me." The doctor visited him, and made his report to the Superintendent that he was a strong man, and in excellent health, and that he might be safely left until hunger obliged him to eat, but that he would see him twice a day.
Upon the afternoon of the second day the Superintendent himself, upon his inspecting the prisoners in the penal cells, entered this prisoner's cell, and the following dialogue ensued: "What is your name?" "What is that to you?" "But I am the Superintendent of this jail, and I ask you a simple question, and I want a simple answer." Then looking at the Superintendent with a disrespectful air the prisoner said, "Look at my warrant if you want to know it." "But I want to hear it from yourself." "Well, if it is any satisfaction to you, my name is John ——" The Superintendent then said, "Now I want to know what part of England you come from." "Well, what do you want to know that for? but I say again, if it is any satisfaction to you, I come from Saltash." "So you are a Cornishman, are you?" replied the Superintendent. "I know Saltash very well. It is a fine old place. And I know the Viaduct, and the cottages over against it. I wonder if you were born there in one of those cottages? Perhaps you were, and have a mother now living there; and if you have, and she knew that her son was now in an Indian jail, you would break that old woman's heart, that you would." This ended the conversation, and the cell door was shut.
Late in the evening the chief warder sent a special messenger to the Superintendent's quarters, asking him to visit the prison before nightfall, for the prisoner in the cells from the man-of-war in the harbour had something to communicate. So before it was yet very dark the Superintendent went down, and the cell door being opened, and the bull's-eye lantern turned upon the man, the Superintendent at once noticed a change in the countenance of his prisoner, for the reckless, devil-may-care expression had shifted, and as if by some good influence within. "Well, you sent for me, and I have come; what do you want?" said the Superintendent. Then in a faltering voice, and with tears in his eyes, the prisoner said, "I only want to say, sir, before I go to sleep, that you are the first man that has ever overcome me, for you spoke to me of my 'mother'; and now, sir, you can do anything you like with me, and I'll carry out my sentence properly, and go back aboard my ship and do my duty as a British sailor ought to do."
And he did; and after his release went in the ship on to Bombay, from whence the Superintendent heard from Sir Robert McClure that John —— was as well behaved a man as he had on board, and that the treatment he had received in the Singapore jail had quite altered his nature, and he would like to know the prescription for it.
Very often, when a long course of positive punishment has ceased to have its effect, a contrary treatment may lead to quite a change in the character, and if anything will touch the heart of a vicious Briton, it is to bring him to think upon the early counsels of a godly mother.
Footnotes:
[15] Major McNair.
[16] Literally gouged the animal.
[17] Shreds of tough rope are better.
[18] H.M.S. Esk.
Chapter XI
ABOLITION OF THE CONVICT DEPARTMENT AND DISPOSAL OF THE CONVICTS
On the separation of the Straits Settlements from British India in 1867, it was arranged that the Indian life convicts at Singapore should be transferred to Port Blair in the Andaman Islands. In the course of correspondence which took place on the subject, His Excellency the Governor of the Straits Settlements proposed, in respect of those convicts who were to continue in the Straits, that a liberal use of the power of pardon should be made in the case of such convicts, the nature of whose crimes and whose subsequent character warranted it.
The Government of India agreed to this proposal, with the proviso that pardon should be conditional on convicts not returning to India, or in the case of Burmese to Burmah, without the special sanction in each case of the Government of India; and that this sanction would not be given in any cases in which the crime was "Thuggee" or "Dacoity," or robbery by administering poisonous drugs, or other form of organized crime, or in the case of mutiny or rebellion accompanied with murder.
Accordingly, the Straits Government authorities submitted lists of convicts whom they recommended for pardon. After consulting the local governments concerned, the Government of India issued orders in each case, authorizing the release and return to India of some of the convicts, granting conditional pardon to others, and refusing release on any account to the remainder.
This decision did not commend itself to the Straits Government, and His Excellency the Governor suggested the deputation of a special officer from India to inquire into the matter.
Mr. Brodhurst, of the Bengal Civil Service, was accordingly deputed. This officer extended his inquiries to the cases of other convicts brought specially to his notice by the Straits Government; and on receipt of his report, the Government of India granted unconditional releases in certain cases, while in others the convicts were pardoned conditionally on their not leaving the Straits.
On this representation by the Straits Government, His Excellency the Governor-General in Council, having reconsidered the subject, decided that any Indian or Burmese, who had completed twenty-five years' imprisonment and bore a good character, should be released, with permission to return to India or Burmah, provided he, or she, as the case might be, was not convicted of one of the offences enumerated below, viz.:—
1. Thuggee.
2. Dacoity.
3. Professional poisoning.
4. Belonging to a gang of Dacoits.
5. Belonging to a gang of Thugs.
6. Mutiny or rebellion with murder.
Of those who did not come under this category, some were pardoned unconditionally; others were released after they had completed twenty-five years' imprisonment, on condition that their conduct continued satisfactory. Of those who were pardoned unconditionally many returned to their own country; but when they arrived there they found things so uncongenial that they returned to the Straits and settled down as shopkeepers, cowkeepers, cartmen, etc., and most of them sought and obtained employment either with private individuals or in the Public Works Department. Several of the skilled artificers, who had been petty officers, were employed as sub-assistant overseers and gangers on public works, where their services proved to be of great utility, their prison training having rendered them much more to be relied upon than free men, and, as far as we have been able to ascertain, none of them have been reconvicted.
Of the total number of convicts in the Straits at the time when the convict establishment was broken up in 1873—
| 256 | had been transported for | Thuggee. |
| 581 | " " " " | Dacoity. |
| 21 | " " " " | Professional poisoning. |
| 269 | " " " " | Robbery with murder, includinghighway robbery and gang robbery. |
| 1,127 |
The remainder were nearly all for murder, for being accomplices in murder, or for robbery with violence, and for felony.
Chapter XII
DISEASES AND MALINGERING
Perhaps a few observations on the principal diseases to which these Indian convicts were liable may be found useful; and we take for the purpose the statistics of the year 1863-64 as given in [Appendix No. 2], when nostalgia did not occur. In alluding to these diseases, we shall at the same time notice the locality of the Singapore jail, and the composition of the soil on which it was built. It is now universally recognised that the soil on which communities reside continuously does in a measure influence their health.
So many works on hygiene have, however, been written, and so much has been said by medical experts on this subject, that we may almost say that it has been exhaustively treated. What we wish to show is simply that soil and locality do not influence all communities alike.
The site of the Singapore jail in Brass Basa Road was originally a piece of low ground saturated with brackish water; and the convicts themselves were, as we have elsewhere stated, employed in conveying red earth from the side of Government Hill to reclaim most of this marsh, in order to erect thereon the necessary buildings for their occupation. The site had to be raised from two to four feet, and the red earth was what might be called disintegrated laterite or clay ironstone. When the finished level was completed, it was about two feet above high water mark S.T. The surface of the enclosure had been so thoroughly trodden down, rolled, and graded to the drains and into the adjoining canal, that, with the periodical coatings of pure white sand from the Serangoon sand pits that had been laid over it, it had become almost impervious to water; and this we would notice particularly, for it had much to do with the sanitary condition of the jail and its inmates.
The dormitories were further raised slightly over two feet above the general surface, and their floors were carefully laid, so as literally to be as dry as a bone.
From [Appendix No. 2] it will be seen that the principal disease from which these Indian convicts suffered was "fever," but not of a dangerous type; for, upon comparing the admissions to hospital with the deaths from this disease in all three settlements during the year referred to, we find that in Singapore and Penang they were nil, and but seven in Malacca. The next ailment which presented numerous cases were abscesses and ulcers, and the deaths from this cause amounted only to one in Singapore. Many of these ulcers were on the legs, and were caused by grit getting between the skin and the leather band worn under the fetter rings of convicts in the fourth and fifth classes. Stomach and bowel complaints rank next on the list, but we find that the deaths here only amounted to units. Rheumatic affections were numerous, caused perhaps in that damp climate from working on extra-mural duties and returning to jail in wet clothes with the wind blowing on them. A few cases of dropsy appear on the list, the largest number occurring in Penang, three only at Singapore. There were ordinary cases of œdema.
The death-rate to strength per cent, from ordinary diseases for the year given was 2.20 for Singapore, 3.82 for Penang, and 3.17 for Malacca. Perhaps the special attention to sanitation in Singapore may account for the death-rate being lower here than at the sister settlements.
After the convict jail had been broken up, and the convicts had all left it, the jail was handed over to the prison authorities to be converted into a criminal prison for the whole settlements. Not long after this change had taken place a very peculiar disease broke out amongst the inmates. It was known as Beri-beri, or, as some call it, the "Bad sickness of Ceylon." It is a very serious disease, and some think it arises from extreme exertion without sufficient sustenance to the body. In 1878 the ratio of mortality in the prison had risen to 16.20 per cent.; in 1879 it was further augmented to 20.63 per cent. The Local Government deemed it necessary without delay to appoint a Committee of Inquiry into the possible causes which had given rise to the spread of this disease. The conclusion at which they arrived was that it was due to the want of proper drainage of the site, so that the soil had got water-logged, and had generated malaria; also, that the prisoners needed a more nitrogenous diet. They advised the erection of an entirely new prison on a better and more elevated locality. These suggestions were all adopted, and the Committee in their judgment were greatly aided by Dr. Irvine Rowell, C.M.G., the Principal Civil Medical Officer, who formed one of the Committee.
There was no time lost by the Government with the Colonial Engineer (Major McNair) in preparing plans and erecting on the west side of Pearl's Hill, near the old civil jail, a prison on the cellular system, and after the most approved English model; but the change of site did not effectually remove the disease, for as late as the year 1884 "there were 262 cases under treatment. In the first nine months of that year the deaths were comparatively small, but during the latter three months they increased, constituting nearly one half of the total deaths during that period." Dr. Kerr attributed this increase to exacerbation in the type, and epidemicity of the disease.
It is not necessary, nor is it within our province, to attempt a description in detail of this disease; and happily it is mostly confined to Ceylon and the Malay Archipelago, though it occurs occasionally in China and Japan, where in the former country it is known as "Tseng," and in the latter as "Kak-ki." It is referred to in a book we have quoted in the body of this work, viz., that written by "Godinho de Eredia" in 1613, reproduced by M. Leon Janssen in 1882. It is called there bere-bere, which in the Malay language signifies a "sheep," or a "bird which buries its eggs in the sand," and is not now known by the Malays under that name, as far as we can gather, as a "disease." Godinho de Eredia says that the Malays cured it by the use of a wine made from the nipa palm, from whence we know a saccharine fermentable juice exudes from the cut spadices of this and other species. They call this juice "tuaca." Marco Polo alludes to the same wine in his second book, chapter xxv.
Some authorities say it arises from malarious exhalations, favoured by damp, or over-crowding in buildings improperly ventilated. To this latter cause we are inclined to attribute the outbreak in the Singapore prison; for when the prison was occupied by the Indian convicts, the area of open space round the different wards and buildings was well exposed to the action of sun and wind, but after its conversion into a criminal prison, this open space was divided off by high division walls, and for the purpose of shot drill and work sheds the enclosure was still further crowded. Perhaps the disturbance also of the soil may have had something to do with it, for we have known instances in the town where the excavation of subsoils had liberated noxious gases.
It was, however, very remarkable that during the period of over twenty-five years when this jail was occupied by the Indian convicts, not a single case of beri-beri was known to have occurred. The medical officers were quite unable to account for this, and of its non-occurrence in other parts of the town.
The Rev. Wallace Taylor, M.D., of Osaka in Japan, attributed the disease to a microscopic spore found largely developed in rice, and which he had also detected in the earth of certain alluvial and damp localities.