NEW YORK PRISON ASSOCIATION.
On November 23, 1844, a company of gentlemen gathered in a private parlor in New York City “to take into consideration the destitute condition of discharged convicts”; then a circular was issued, calling for a public meeting on December 6, at which time the following resolution, among others, was offered by Isaac T. Hopper: “Resolved, That in the foundation of such a society (the New York Prison Association), it would be proper to have a female department to be especially regardful of the interests and welfare of prisoners of that sex.”
Public meetings were held, and in June, 1845, a house was taken, two matrons placed in charge, and a committee of ladies organized to superintend and control its operations. A sewing department and school were established, and at a later day a laundry.
In 1854 the women dissolved all connection with the New York Prison Association, and were incorporated as “The Women’s Prison Association and Home.” Up to this time the Home had averaged about 150 inmates per year. We quote from one of their reports: “We will not dwell upon the many years of up-hill work through every possible discouragement, but proceed at once to the results of a pre-determined endeavor to take by the hand the unfortunate of our sex and lead them to a better life, where by patient industry they might earn an honest livelihood.”
In 1859 the association adopted as a distinctive name for its house department that of “The Isaac T. Hopper Home.” The work has gone steadily on, the women of the association having been to the front in every effort for prevention of crime, and reform of the criminal girls and women, and in their forty-fourth annual report, we find, “During the year 119 women have been sent to service in families in the State, and 31 out of the State; 4 were returned to friends.” Only those who can read between the lines can understand all that these items mean. To those who talk glibly about “abandoned women” and the “utter hopelessness of trying to save them,” the subjoined lines from the same report might seem “mere sentiment,” but to those with clearer vision it is the secret of their success. “We believe that woman, in her deepest degradation, holds something sacred, something undefiled; and, like the diamond in the dark, retains some quenchless gleams of the celestial light.”
The prison committee, through its chairman, gave in 1887 an exhaustive report upon the condition of prisons and station houses, and in 1888, through their prison visitor, a female M.D., a careful report, both of which contain items which are strange reading for nineteenth century civilization and progress.