After Prison--What?

by Maud Ballington Booth

Many of these women have not been accustomed to work for a living, and when left to their own resources they have no trade or any means of livelihood, while such work as washing or scrubbing often proves far too heavy for their strength. They are not the kind of women who can beg. They dread making an appeal to public charity, because they would have to tell of the husband's whereabouts and of his crime, and in their loyal hearts they long to shield him, so alone they battle on, trying to keep the wolf from the door and to hold the little family together, until they almost drop with exhaustion or are driven to desperation, when faced with temptations that are worse than death itself.

I remember a letter I received one day from Sing Sing with a special delivery stamp announcing its urgency. The man was at that time a stranger to me, but he turned to us in this darkest moment of despair. The letter was written as the gray light of dawn crept into his cell. It told how all night long he had walked back and forth and how in his anguish and helplessness, he felt as if his brain would give way. He had a young wife and baby; she had had a hard unequal struggle, and was not a woman of strong nature or any skill as a worker. At last he received a letter in which she said she could stand the struggle no longer. She was at the end of her resources; she and her child could not starve. Anyway, an easy though evil way, was open and she was going to take it. "For God's sake," he wrote, "go and find her and save her from what would be worse than death." Before many hours were passed we had her in our care. She was sent to a position and her little one watched over and the good news flashed back to that anxious heart behind the bars.

Another man who was serving five years in prison, wrote to us to say that he had heard his wife and five children were in dire need. I copy the report of the case as it stands on our books from the pen of our representative who investigated and afterwards watched over the family: "We took hold of this case about two years before expiration of sentence. Eldest child, a girl, was eleven years of age; next a boy of nine; all the rest were little ones. Baby was born three days after father went to prison. Mother worked from five in the morning until dark in the summer, picking peas and other such work for sixty cents a day. I have waited until eight o'clock at night for her to come home. Children were all locked out in the street for fear they would burn the house down. They spent their time making mud-pies in a lot. The neighbors used to help them sometimes, but they were poor themselves. They reported that the children often came at night under their windows and cried for bread when they were starving. When first found, they were half naked and very hungry. When fed, which had to be done at once with what could be purchased at a near-by store, they fell on the food like little wild beasts, literally tearing it in their hunger." For two years we helped them with clothing, food and in many ways. Then the father came home, found work and has written us very grateful, happy letters.

Here is another story: The husband was an almost prosperous man, keeping a county hotel and having an interest in a factory. He was murderously attacked by a man whom he afterwards shot, as he thought, in self-defense. Had he shot the man on his own property, he would have been guiltless in the eyes of the law, but as he shot him after he had forced him from the gate, he was sentenced to five years' imprisonment. For four years his wife fought bravely with starvation. When we found her, the three children were down with scarlet fever; they had previously had measles. The mother worked at the hardest kind of labor for a living, and was herself sick, first with malaria and then with hemorrhages of the lungs and was often found in a fainting condition. We took this family on our list, and Mrs. McAlpin also helped them generously. Had they not been tided over the hard places during sickness, severe cold and in other emergencies, this family must have gone under in the unequal struggle. On his return from prison, the father found work and was enabled to provide them with a home. Now they are comfortably off, and the mother with proper care is regaining her health.

A German who had held splendid positions before his incarceration, wrote us in great distress about his wife and children. She had with indomitable courage maintained herself and the little ones, but at the time of writing, he informed us, he had just received news that the children were down with diphtheria and that she was quarantined with them, which meant of course, that she was unable to work, hence the necessary money for rent and food would not be forthcoming. We sent at once to investigate, paid the rent and sent in a supply of groceries, with some of the nourishing food which the sick children so much needed. From that time we kept them under observation, until the father's return made them independent.

Another letter sent from prison led us to hunt up a family where we found the woman helpless with a new-born babe, and she had besides a boy of seven and a girl of three and had just buried her eldest child, a girl of nine years. They had gone behind in rent and as she was in no condition to work, we sent her with her two little girls to our Home. The boy was placed in a school where he is having a good education and every care. We have watched over and provided for the family ever since, and hope shortly to get the father paroled so that he may again make a home for them.

I found the following report of a case on my desk the other day: "Husband ... has five years' sentence only just commenced. Wife is a young woman, has a boy four years of age and very shortly expects another little one. She has lived with her newly-married sister, a mere girl, whose husband is now out of work. Wife has been sick lately, and is very delicate. Rent due and liable to be dispossessed any time. Has had nothing to eat to-day. Borrowed a little coffee from a neighbor. We gave her two dollars to meet immediate need. Woman was very grateful, said that two dollars was just as if she had fifty, she was so glad of it. This is a worthy case. The woman was clean and neat, though both she and the child have practically no clothing. Clothes should be furnished immediately from our storeroom. These are really brave people."

Entering my office one day I found a very young girl waiting to see me. She was clad in a cotton gown, though it was bitter winter weather. She seemed to be numbed, not only with the cold, but with the awful lethargy of despair. On her lap lay what looked like an old blanket, but as she talked, the blanket fell back and disclosed the naked body of a tiny babe not three weeks old. It was blue with cold and cried in the weak, gasping way that speaks of starvation. "Yes, I suppose it is hungry," said the child mother, "but so am I; I have had nothing to eat for twenty-four hours." The father was in prison and her people had turned her out because they could not be burdened with the unwelcome little one.

Another young mother came to see me, but she was of quite another type. Not the helpless apathetic girl, whom sorrow robs of feeling, but a woman young, strong and beautiful, but maddened by despair. As she pressed her tiny babe to her heart she said, "What am I to do? We must live. I cannot see my baby starve and yet I can't get work, for nobody wants me with a babe at my breast. It is a hard, hard path in this great city for the woman who wants to keep good and do right, but it seems, for the one who goes wrong and does evil, that there is plenty of good food, fine clothes, warmth and shelter. I don't want to do that, I can't sell my soul, so I was on my way to the river, which seemed the best place for baby and me."

In just such cases as these the friend in the hour of need can save the misstep and point out the better, safer way to the weary, stumbling feet. We have two Children's Homes, to which not only children, but mothers can be sent, to tide them over until strong enough to work and get a little home together.