Recollections of Windsor Prison; / Containing Sketches of its History and Discipline, with Appropriate Strictures and Moral and Religious Reflection

by of Vermont John Reynolds

ATTEMPTS TO ESCAPE, AND SUICIDES.

The prisoners have many inducements to attempt their escape. The eternal gloom that hangs over their minds—the regulations of their unfeeling rulers—the instinctive love of every human soul to liberty—and the deceptive appearance of the surrounding country, are constantly tempting them to some violent or crafty scheme to elude the grasp of their tormentors and be free. These, however, produce but little effect on calculating minds; but they keep the rash, the young, and the romantic in a perpetual ferment; and I wonder that more attempts, of this kind, have not been made. The various insults of the keepers, are sometimes sufficient to inspire a rock with indignation, and call up the dead to resentment. The walls appear a trifling object when the mind is inflamed. What appears a boundless forest, inhabited only by tigers and untrodden by man, comes within a few rods of the prison, and nothing appears easier than to reach it. Why, then, more attempts are not made to escape, is to be accounted for only by presuming that the prisoners have more judgment than rashness. I shall mention a few of the attempts of the prisoners to effect their escape, for the purpose of making some remarks on them.

The first successful attempt of this kind, was made by a man named Palmer. The prison wall was not finished, and he found means of secreting himself, breaking off his fetters, and effecting his escape. He was not absent, however, over a year, when he was apprehended and brought back. He stayed seven years after his return, and that completed his sentence.

Another, though unsuccessful attempt, was made by a man named Fitch. He went over the wall, and was fired on by the guard, the ball just missing him. He got but a few rods when he was arrested and returned to the prison. He was severely punished for his temerity.

An entire cell effected their escape one night by removing a large stone; and they kept the freedom which they regained at so much peril. At another time the hospital was broken, and an escape effected by four individuals, in a way which evinced the greatest wisdom of contrivance, and strength of limbs. Three of these got away, and one returned.

Soon after this, a violent rush was made over the wall by five men, who were determined to effect an escape by daylight. The guard fired on them, and wounded one slightly. They enjoyed their liberty only a few minutes, when they were all safely deposited in the solitary cells. They were punished according to the laws of the prison, and I know not that they ever found fault that they were punished too much.

A man named Banks contrived to escape one Sabbath, by climbing over the wall, and he was successful in getting into Canada; but committing a crime there and fleeing back into the state of Vermont, he was apprehended on an advertisement, and remanded to Windsor. After three or four years, he found means to repeat the same experiment, and like the raven from the ark, he returned not again.

Another attempt was made to escape from a cell without success; and another to force a flight over the wall. In this, one of the prisoners fired one of the buildings, and brought down on his head a weight of punishment that might have crushed the constitution of Lucifer. But he survived it, and lives a pleasing evidence of the fact, that the vilest of sinners may reform and become good men.

I know of no instance of attempts to escape, which might not have been prevented by the keepers. If they had done their duty, the chance of success would have been so small, that no mind would have indulged the thought for one moment. The guard can hear the least noise that is made in the cells, and the keepers can see all that is going on in the shops; and not an attempt has ever been made in which the officers have not been more or less criminal. They are not attentive to their duty. The guard often get asleep on the wall, and the keepers in the shops; and on these occasions the prisoners calculate and act, without which they would do neither.

But this is not the extent of the keepers' guilt. They not only nod on their posts, they also permit the plans of the prisoners to ripen into effect, when they know them, that they may shed blood, rivet fetters, and take life. Witness the case of P. Fane. Every incident in the history of that place, which fell under my notice, left an idea on my mind, that a quorum of the keepers and guard are always contriving to multiply the miseries of the prisoners; and while I saw them sinning daily with impunity, in the sight of their superiors and of each other, and at the same time tormenting the convicts for the merest nothing, I often exclaimed in the language of Jacob—"O! my soul, come not thou into their secret, unto their assembly, mine honour, be not thou united."