Throughout the long nights of the dreary winter months these disturbances continued; a time of the utmost anxiety and annoyance to worthy Captain Chapman, who was invariably the foremost in the fray. Nothing can exceed the pluck and energy with which he tackled the most truculent. When a prisoner, mad with rage, dares any man to enter his cell, it is Governor Chapman who always enters without a moment’s hesitation; when another, armed with a sleeveboard, threatens to dash out everybody’s brains, it is Captain Chapman who secures the weapon of offence; when a body of prisoners on the mill break out into open mutiny, and the warder in charge is in terror for his personal safety, it is Governor Chapman who repairs at once to the spot and collars the ringleaders. Perhaps it would have been better if so much resolute courage had not been tempered with too much kindness of heart. No one can read of Captain Chapman’s proceedings without admitting that he was brave; but for his particular duties he was undoubtedly also amiable to a fault. Had he been more unrelenting it is probable that the worst offenders would never have gone such lengths in their insubordination. A word or two of contrition, often the merest sham, was sufficient generally to secure his pardon. Thus when a man has worked himself into a fury and appears ready for any act of desperation, the mere appearance of the governor calms him, and the prisoner, softened, says, “You, sir, use me much better than I deserve. Put me in the dark.” “I left him,” says Captain Chapman, on one occasion, “saying I trusted my lenity would have a much better effect than a dark cell. I therefore admonished and pardoned him.” Had such kindness been productive of good results no one could have questioned his wisdom; almost invariably it was worse than futile, and the malcontents soon worse than ever, and devising fresh schemes.
It was in this winter that the superintending committee became convinced that the methods of coercion they possessed were hardly so stringent as the case required. They reported to the House of Commons that “there were among the prisoners some profligate and turbulent characters for whose outrageous conduct the punishments in use under the rules and regulations of the Penitentiary were by no means sufficient.” They found by experience that “confinement in a dark cell, though in most cases a severe and efficacious punishment, operates very differently on different persons. It appears to lose much of its effect from repetition; it cannot always be carried far without the danger of injuring health; and on some men as well as boys it has no effect.” Many of the ringleaders in the disturbances just described were subjected to twenty-five, twenty-eight, and even to thirty days of uninterrupted imprisonment in the dark, and certainly with little effect. In view of this want of some more salutary punishment the committee expressed a wish for power to flog. They were convinced that “the framers of the statute under which the Penitentiary is now governed acted erroneously in omitting the power to inflict corporal punishment when they re-enacted most of the other provisions of the 19th Geo. III. And they are satisfied that a revival of this power (a power possessed in every other criminal prison in this country) would be highly advantageous to the management of this prison, provided such power were accompanied by regulations adequate to control the exercise of it, and to guard against its being abused.”
Soon after these lines were in print, and presented to the House, it became more than ever apparent that to tame these turbulent characters some serious steps must be taken soon. During the early months of 1827 there had been no cessation of misconduct of the kind already described, but the cases were mostly isolated, and generally succumbed to treatment. But as March began a storm gathered which soon burst like a whirlwind on the place. It was heralded by a riot in chapel on Sunday, the 3rd of March. Previous to the sermon, during evening service, a rumbling noise was heard, as if the prisoners assembled were stamping in unison with their feet. The sound ceased with the singing of the psalm, and recommenced during the sermon, and increased in violence. It was discovered that the noise was made by the prisoners knocking with their fists against the sheet iron that separated the several divisions. As the uproar continued to increase to a shameful and alarming extent, the governor left the chapel to fetch the patrols, and other spare officers, all of whom, with drawn cutlasses, were posted near the chapel door. The prisoners were then removed to their cells, and, in the presence of this exhibition of force, they went quietly enough. The ringleaders were afterwards singled out and punished: the chief among them being a monitor, long remarkable for his piety, who on this occasion had distinguished himself by mimicking the chaplain, by commenting in scandalous terms upon the sermons, and using slang expressions instead of responses.
After this, in all parts of the prison there are strong symptoms of mutiny. Loud shouts, laughter, and the thieves’ whistle on every side. For the next few days there is much uneasiness; and at length, about midnight on the 8th, the governor is roused from his bed. Pentagon six is in an uproar. As Captain Chapman hurries to the scene he is saluted with the crash of glass, interspersed with loud cries of triumph and of encouragement. The airing-yard below is strewed with fragments; broken window-frames, fragments of glass, utensils, and tables smashed to bits. Two notorious offenders in B Ward, Hawkins and John Caswell, are busy at the work of destruction, and already everything is in ruins. The tumult is so tremendous, so many others contribute their shouts, and the thieves’ whistle runs so quickly from cell to cell, that sleep is impossible to any one within the boundary wall; and presently all officials, chaplain, doctor, manufacturers, and steward, have joined the governor, and are helping to quell the disturbance. It is quelled, but hardly has the governor got back to bed, at two in the morning, when the uproar recommences: the same noise and loud shouts from one side of the pentagons of prisoners, inciting each other to continue the riot. Next day, from various other wards come reports that a spirit of insubordination is on the increase; and the offenders in the dark, ten in number, are violent in the extreme. Again, at midnight, the governor is aroused by a tremendous yelling from Pentagon six, followed by the smashing of glass. The offenders are seized at once, and, the governor remarks, “from what I could learn, were pretty roughly handled by their captors.” During this night, too, in noise and violence the several prisoners in the dark exceeded, if possible, their accustomed mutinous conduct. One, by some extraordinary effort, broke the part of his door to which the lock was attached, and got it into his cell, swearing he would brain the first person who approached him. There was much answering to and from the dark cells and the upper stories of the pentagons opposite. There was evidently discontent also in other parts of the prison. Those prisoners who had no hope of gaining any remission of their sentences, having no inducement to behave well, were on the point of insurrection. In addition to these alarms, on the night of the 14th it was reported to the governor that the prisoners were making their escape from the dark cells. The noise was so tremendous that it could be heard all over the prison.
And now mysterious documents emanating from the prisoners were picked up, containing complaints mostly of the treatment they received, and full of terrible threats. As time passed, the worst of these threats found vent in the hanging of the infirmary warder’s cat. The halter was a strip of round towel from behind the door, and a piece of paper was affixed to it, with these portentous words:—
“you see yor Cat is hung And
you Have Been the corse of it
for yoor Bad Bavior to Those
arond you. Dom yor eis, yoo’l
get pade in yor torn yet.”
Next were several closely written sheets, full of inflammatory matter, which gave the authorities so much uneasiness that several hundred prisoners were closely examined as to their contents. As these letters afford curious evidence of the importance prisoners arrogate to themselves, it may be interesting to publish one in extenso. It was found on the road back from chapel. There was no signature attached. It was addressed to the visitor.
“Sir,—Four instances of brutality have occurred in this Establishment within the last week; the which we, as men (if we do our duty towards God and man), cannot let escape our notice, and hope and trust you will not let them pass without taking them into your serious consideration. We will take the liberty of putting a few questions to you, which we hope you will not be offended at. Who gave Mr. Bulmer authority to strike a lad named Quick almost sufficient to have broken his arm, indeed so bad that the lad could not lift his hand to his head? and who gave Mr. Pilling the same authority to smite a lad to the ground, named Caswell, with a ruler, the same as a butcher would a Bullock, without him (Caswell) making the least resistance? On Saturday night last there was brutal and outrageous doings, Mr. Pilling as desperate as ever, assisted by that villain Turner (we cannot give him a better term—we wish we could). Who would have thought a man could have been so cruel as to lift a poker against a fellow-creature? A ruler, we have heard, was broken into two pieces, a thing that is made of the hardest of wood. Was there ever, in the annals of treachery and oppression, facts more scandalous than these! No. To hear their cries was sufficient to make the blood run cold of any man, if he was possessed of the least animal feeling (‘For God’s sake have compassion, and do not quite kill me,’ etc., etc.). And we do not hesitate to say, had not the wise Creator, that sees and hears all, put it into the heart of a man to be there and stop them in their bloody actions, homicide would have been committed: then God knows what would have been the result. We will admit that these men committed themselves in the most provoking manner; but still, who are, what are these men, that they should take the law in their own hands? You are the person they should have applied to, and we are satisfied you would not have given them such authority. Many men have committed as bad, or worse crimes than either of these, and in less than one minute afterwards have been sorry for it. How did these men know but this was the case here? but without speaking to them, as Christians would do, knocks them down, as we have stated before, as a Butcher would do an Ox—we cannot make a better comparison—Messrs. Pilling and Turner in particular. The governor, too, who professes to fear God, we think if he would study the great and principal commandment, that is, to do to others as he would be done unto, it would be much more to his credit; especially, sir, as you and other gentlemen of this establishment expect when there is a discharge of prisoners (and it is to be hoped that soon will be the case) that they will give the establishment a good name. They cannot do it, unless there is a stop put to such brutal actions; they will most likely speak the sentiments of their hearts; they will say they have seen some of their fellow-creatures driven like wrecks before the rough tide of power till there was no hold left to save them from destruction. That will be a pretty thing for the public to hear. And, sir, we do not wish to be too severe, but unless Pilling and Turner are dismissed from the Establishment, and that shortly, we will fight as long as there is a drop of blood in us; for it is evident, many men have expired from a much lighter blow than either of those delivered; therefore necessity obliges us—we must do it for our own safety; but depend upon it, sir, it is far from our wish to do anything of the kind, for your sake, and for the sake of what few good ones we have (and God knows it is but few). There is 3 good men in the Pentagon—Messrs. Newstead, Rutter, and Hall, and we wish we could speak well of the others—but we cannot.
“N.B. We do not wish to give the last new warder a bad name, for we have not seen sufficient of him to speak either way, but what little we have seen leads us to believe he is a good man. We hope, sir, you will excuse us, but we will ask you another question. If you were in Mr. Pilling’s situation, and a man committed himself, would you not reason with him on the base impropriety of what he had done? We know you would. Instead of that, Mr. Pilling takes a delight in aggravating the cause with a grin, or a jeer of contempt, not only before you see him (the prisoner), afterwards the same; which, without the least doubt, makes a man commit acts of violence which at other times he would tremble at the idea. We hope, sir, you will take this into your worthy and serious consideration, and by so doing you will greatly oblige,