Prisons & Prisoners: Some Personal Experiences

by Lady Constance Lytton

And beckon’d, smiling sweet;

’Twas the soul of Judas Iscariot

Stole in, and fell at his feet.”

As I looked upon that dreary scene I saw the prison walls, the cell windows, looking more like tiny shutters, the infinitesimal small windows of the punishment cells in the ground below where we were. The Matron stood on a ledge above us. She was considerate and kind in all her ways. We were either alone and quite unguarded or else she was with us. One evening, when a wardress was letting me back into my cell, I heard the most melancholy sound of a woman calling out to herself again and again, in a tone of uttermost misery. As always, I thought, in a prison, no one answered her, no one said anything. Presently there came the Matron’s consoling voice. Very gently I heard it on the floor above ours, it sounded almost like a mother’s voice: “Oh! there is that poor woman again. Can’t you some of you go and comfort her?” And some one did, for all was quiet after that. I watched at my gate all day, and was pleased to notice that the prisoners who worked outside the cells moved happily, ran about with a springing step and seemed like ordinary servants about their work. How different this was from Holloway!

The first morning the Chaplain came to visit me. He was a pleasant-looking man, with a fine beard. He laughed as he told me he was the father of fifteen children; he said this as he left. I longed to tell him I hoped that he had had at least two wives to bring them into the world!

The second morning, Wednesday, October 13, when the doctors came, I stood in the corner of my cell with my arms crossed and my fingers caught in my nostrils and my mouth. It was the best position I knew of for them not to be able to feed me by nose or mouth without having first a considerable struggle. They came, and after I saw that they had no tube I came out from my corner and let them both look at my heart. They thumped, each of them in turn, and felt my pulse as well. Then they appeared to be agreed and went out. I said to them, “You seemed to be puzzled by my heart; I can tell you about it if you like.” But they had made up their minds about something, and did not want any help from me. Later in the day they came in again with another man in their company. I was again in the corner, my hands in my mouth and nose, but they brought no feeding things. At first I thought the third man was another prison official; but soon, from the way they talked to him, I gathered that he was an outside doctor, apparently from London. He was very civil. He tapped my heart repeatedly and then brought out a tube, which at first I thought was a feeding tube, but it was only another way of testing the heart. He was about a quarter of an hour or twenty minutes over the whole thing, then they went out.

As I had no answer from the Home Office, though I had written on the Monday of my arrival in the prison, I thought I would begin to wash some of my things, as the doctors would not come back unless to feed me, and that would be nearer six o’clock. I washed my brush and a few other things in the large pail of my cell, then asked if I might empty it, and as I did this, I held the things some seconds under the tap. It was only cold water, of course, but I was glad of even that. I then put them on the chair to dry as best they might, and lay down on my plank bed, for the pain in my back was terrible, when a wardress came in and announced that I was released, because of the state of my heart! Though this was fairly evident from the visit of the outside doctor, I had not realised it. I gathered my things together and went out. I called to Mrs. Brailsford; she was released too. We were put to wait in the Governor’s room; he was not there. We wondered if we were the only two to be released, and if so, why not the others? How about the heart of Nurse Pitman, who was close on sixty, or of Miss Brown, who had only just been released from a recent hunger-strike! Mrs. Brailsford had seen a doctor before she came on this expedition to Newcastle, and he had declared her absolutely sound in every way, so we did not know why she was released, except for the fact that she was, through her husband, closely connected with Liberal journalism and herself had the noblest reputation for public service in Macedonia. I had heart disease, though only slightly; it had been marked in me since the Deputation on which I had been to the House of Commons, at the beginning of this year. But I was not in so bad a condition as either Nurse Pitman or Miss Brown. After a time the news came that we were the only two released! Poor Mrs. Brailsford was so overcome at this news that she was unable to drink the glass of hot milk that was given to us before we were let out. The Governor came back to his room. He had always told us how keen he was for the vote, and he seemed very glad for us that we were to be released. The cab was ready and we drove away, I think at about 3.30 in the afternoon. It seemed appalling to go and to leave the others in prison, to the hunger-strike and to forcible feeding.

Nurse Pitman and Miss Brown were released the next day. It was not possible to understand for what reason they should have been kept twenty-four hours longer on hunger-strike than Mrs. Brailsford and myself; the only reason that we could see was that our names were known, theirs were not!

The only thing which made an impression on me, not told in the above, was that once the wardress led me out to one of the lavatories. Just in front of it a woman had been sick, and I was taken away to another. It showed the great loneliness of prison life. There, in rows thickly set all around me, were the cells, in each a prisoner. One had been taken out immediately before I had, but she was put back and all the cells were locked before I came. The mystery was intense, the silence, the loneliness as great as they could be.

My sister, Betty Balfour, came from Scotland to see if she could do anything to help me when she heard that I was in prison. She was convinced that I should not be forcibly fed because of the state of my heart, but that I should be let out after a day or two of hunger-strike. It was delightful to be with her, and the next day we travelled south together to my home.