Known to the Police

by Thomas Holmes

So much misapprehension and uncertainty prevailed as to the kind and sex of the persons who would be affected by the new law that the London County Council, after acquiring a valuable property in Surrey for the purposes of the Act, prepared for the reception of males. For this there was no excuse. A glance at the annual criminal statistics would have shown to what sex the oft-convicted inebriates belonged, and an inquiry among the police would have revealed their true character and condition. A considerable time elapsed before these reformatories were ready, local authorities being very reluctant to use their powers, but at length the task of trying to cure London's grossest women of inebriety began. It was a hopeless task from the first. After eight years' experience its futility has been fully demonstrated.

In the Contemporary Review of May, 1899, I ventured to give a description of the men and women who would be dealt with. The women, I said, would consist of 80 per cent. of gross unfortunates, dominated by vice or mental disease, homeless and shameless women; 10 per cent. old women who live alternately in workhouses and prisons, with occasional spells of liberty and licence; and 10 per cent. of otherwise decent women, the majority of whom would be mentally weak.

The men I described as idle, dissolute, and dishonest fellows, or worse. Eight years' experience of the working of the Act has verified my analysis. The report of the Government Inspector for 1906 amply proves it. Dr. Branthwaite (the Government Inspector), a properly qualified medical officer, has taken infinite pains to ascertain the mental condition of those committed to certified reformatories, and who became his special charge. I quote from his report for 1906:

"During the eight years the Act has been in operation 2,277 men and women had been committed to reformatories. Of these, 375 were men and 1,902 were women." He thus classifies them as to mental condition: 16·1 per cent. as insane, defective, imbecile, or epileptic; 46·5 per cent. as eccentric, dull, or senile; 37·4 per cent. as of average mental capacity. This means that out of the total admissions for the eight years, 62·6 per cent. were practically insane, and therefore hopeless from a reformatory point of view. The remaining 37·4 per cent. were, he says, of average mental capacity. But the Inspector can only speak of them as he finds them; he cannot speak of their mental capacity when outside his reformatories. I can; therefore I wish to say here something about them. There exists a large class of men and women who, when placed under absolute control in prisons or reformatories, submit themselves quietly to the authority that controls and the conditions that environ them. They obey orders, they display no anger, they offer no violence; they are not moody or spiteful, but they fulfil their duties with some degree of cheerfulness and alacrity. Those who have charge of them naturally look upon them as the most hopeful of their prisoners. A greater mistake could not be made. It may be vice, it may be drink, it may be dishonesty, that is the master passion of their lives; it may be, for aught I know—and in reality I believe that it is—some inscrutable mental disease that causes their passions or weaknesses; but whatever the passion, and however caused or controlled, when these people are under absolute authority in places where the vice, passion, or weakness cannot possibly be indulged, then that passion, vice, or weakness is absolutely non-existent for the time, and its victims appear as normal people.

But a far different state of mind and body exists when they are released from authority, for with liberty the old instinct or passion comes into fierce existence, and instantly demands gratification. While the released person has on the one hand gained considerably in health of mind and body, the sleeping passion too has gained in strength during the time it has hibernated. These persons, I am happy to believe, are not of normal mind, for they are helpless before the stress of temptation. In fact, decent as they may seem while in custody, the gratification of their particular vice is the only thing of importance in life to them. These unfortunate people, when at liberty, are in reality under authority of a different kind, and their obedience to the dark, mysterious authority that controls them is as implicit as if they were detained in prison or reformatory, for they do not question or gainsay its imperious demands. Small wonder, then, that nearly all the women who have been committed to inebriate reformatories revert to their old habits of life. To speak of their relapse is wrong, for in reality there is no relapse about it; they have only been held by force from their old life, which they resume when that preventive force is withdrawn.

But it has been a costly experience so far, at any rate, as London is concerned. The Government led off with a capitation grant of 10s. 6d. weekly. For the first few years it cost about £1 10s. per week, in addition to the outlay on land, buildings, and appointments, to keep each of these demented women. Though this cost has now been considerably reduced, it is even now about £1 weekly. No one, I feel sure, would begrudge this outlay if there was the remotest chance of these extraordinary women living decently when released from the reformatories.

Sadly, but emphatically, I say no such chance exists. Let it be clearly understood that I am not making this terrible statement about inebriates generally, but only with regard to those women who fall into the hands of the police four times in one year, thus qualifying for committal according to the Act. The very hopelessness of these women excites my deepest pity, and because I pity them I point out plainly their condition, in the sincere hope that more satisfactory methods of dealing with them may be provided. The Inspector claims that it is better for these women to be detained in inebriate reformatories than to undergo a continual round of short terms of imprisonment, varied by spells of liberty spent in gross orgies upon the street. He says, too, that it is the cheaper course. There is some truth in his contention. Of the exact proportion of the monetary cost of the two methods I am not concerned, but undoubtedly, for the good of the community and the purity of our streets, lengthened detention in inebriate reformatories is infinitely better than short detention in prisons. I am not objecting to their lengthened detention, but to the method and objects of detention. If their detention is to be for the good of the public, let it be understood that the common weal demands it. But as they are a class altogether apart from ordinary women, even from ordinary drunken women, they ought to be detained in institutions adapted for women of their condition only, and the absurdity of trying to cure vice-possessed women of the drink habit ought to cease.

But the legal advantages attaching to the life of a gross and disorderly woman are considerable—far greater than the advantages that are attached to a life of virtue and honest toil. "Only be bad enough, gross enough, violent enough, and you shall have your reward. Only get into conflict with the guardians of law and order four times in one year, and three years' comfort in an inebriate reformatory shall be your reward. There your work shall be limited, your leisure shall be certain, your food shall be plentiful and varied, and your recreation, indoors and out of doors, shall not be forgotten. There you shall live lives of comfort and comparative ease." So the State seems to say to the women of the class who at present fill our inebriate reformatories. And some are not slow to accept the invitation. I remember one massive young Irishwoman, who had a strong aversion to anything like honest work, saying to me one morning when she was again in custody: "Mr. Holmes, I am about sick of this: I'll go to a home for a year. Ask the magistrate to send me; it will do me good."

I declined to be the intermediary, so she appealed to the magistrate to send her away under the Act.

There being some doubt as to the requisite number of convictions, the magistrate added to the list by giving her fourteen days. At the expiration of her sentence—indeed, on the very day of her discharge from prison—she got into collision with the police, and next day was again before the magistrate. She again asked the magistrate to send her to a reformatory. But she had another grievance this time: she told the magistrate that Mr. Holmes had insulted her. On being asked for particulars, she said that I had refused to help her to get into an inebriate reformatory, and further (and this was the insult), that I had said that she was big enough, strong enough, and young enough to work for her living. I pleaded guilty to the insult, and pointed out to the magistrate the physical dimensions of the prisoner. He smiled, and said there was some truth in my statement; but as the prisoner was young, there was hope of her reformation, so he committed her for two years. I ventured respectfully to tell him that he had but allowed her one of the legal advantages of an idle and disorderly woman.