Instantly the room was in havoc. The guards brought from the male prison fell upon us. I saw Miss Lincoln, a slight young girl, thrown to the floor. Mrs. Nolan, a delicate old lady of seventy-three, was mastered by two men. The furniture was overturned, and the room was a scene of havoc.
Whittaker in the center of the room directed the whole attack, inciting the guards to every brutality.
The whole group of women were thrown, dragged, and hurled out of the office, down the steps, and across the road and field to the Administration Building, where another group of bullies was waiting for us. The assistant superintendent, Captain Reams, was one of these, armed with a stick which he flourished at us, as did another man. The women were thrown roughly down on benches.
In the meantime, Lucy Burns, fighting desperately all the way, had been deposited in a cell opposite.
As always, when she was arrested, she took charge of the situation. In her clear, beautiful voice, she began calling the roll one name after another, to see if all were there and alive. The guards called, “Shut up!” but she paid no more attention to them than if they had not spoken. “Where is Mrs. Lewis?” she demanded. Mrs. Cosu answered: “They have just thrown her in here.” The guard yelled to them that if they spoke again, he would put them in strait-jackets. Mrs. Nolan and Mrs. Cosu were so terrified that they kept still for a while.
But Lucy Burns went right on calling the roll. When she refused—at the guard’s orders—to stop this, they handcuffed her wrists and fastened the handcuffs above her head to the cell door. They threatened her with a buckle gag. Little Julia Emory could do nothing to help, of course, but she put her hands above her head in exactly the same position and stood before her door until they released Lucy Burns. Lucy Burns wore her handcuffs all night.
Mrs. Henry Butterworth, for some capricious reason, was taken away from the rest, and placed in a part of the jail where there were only men. They told her that she was alone with the men, and that they could do what they pleased with her. Her Night of Terror was doubly terrifying—with this menace hanging over her.
For a description of the rest of that night, and of succeeding days, I quote the account of Paula Jakobi:
I didn’t know at the time what happened to the other women. I only knew that it was hell let loose with Whittaker as the instigator of the horror. In the ante-chamber to the cells, some of the guards were standing, swinging night sticks in a menacing manner. We were thrust into cells; the ventilators were closed. The cells were bitter cold. There was an open toilet in the corner of the cell, which was flushed from the outside. We had to call a guard who had previously attacked us to flush them. The doors were barred, there were no windows. The doors were uncurtained, so that through the night the guard could look into the cell. There was no light in the room, only one in the corridor. Three of us were thrown into every cell. There was a single bed in each room and a mattress on the floor. The floors were filthy as were the blankets.
In the morning, we were roughly told to get up. No facilities for washing were given us. Faint, ill, exhausted, we were ordered before the superintendent. It was eight o’clock and we had had no food since the preceding day at twelve. None had been offered us, nor were any inquiries made about our physical condition. Whittaker asked my name; then whether I would go to the Workhouse and obey prison regulations and be under the care of the ladies. I told him I would not. I would not wear prison clothes, and I demanded the rights of political prisoners. He interrupted me with, “Then you’ll go to the male hospital”—he emphasized the “male”—“and be in solitary confinement. Do you change your mind?” I said “No!” and was taken to the hospital by a trusty.