Within Prison Walls / being a narrative during a week of voluntary confinement in the state prison at Auburn, New York

by Thomas Mott Osborne

When the Chaplain spoke to me about saying a few words to you this morning—words of farewell, because here for a time at least we must separate—I did not realize that it was going to be so hard. Probably I am the only man, in all the years since this prison was built, to leave these walls with regret.

It is not necessary to give every word of my utterly inadequate address. I was in no physical or mental condition to speak; my audience was almost too moved to hear. From a mere reading of the words that fell from my lips no one would understand the situation. But the prisoners understood; they listened with emotions which few can appreciate to my words of greeting and farewell and my prophecy of the new day soon to dawn for them.

First I spoke of the value of my experience to the Commission on Prison Reform as well as to me personally, for I knew that they had seen the doubts expressed in many of the newspapers as to the usefulness of my “experiment.” I thanked the officers for their coöperation, and the prisoners for the way they had received me.

I must confess that I was unprepared for the way in which you men have carried out your part of the bargain. I consider that the restraint, courtesy, and loyalty to me and to my experiment have been very wonderful, and never shall I forget it. There has not been a word or look from beginning to end that I would have had otherwise. You have received me exactly as I asked you to—as one of yourselves.

I believed that a wide popular interest had been aroused, which could not help working for good.

In fact, with the aid of our friends the newspapers, we have had considerable advertising this last week, you and I. The personal part of this advertising I do not like—it would be pleasant if I could know that I should never again see my name in the newspapers—but doubtless it all works out for good in the long run. Certainly in this case I believe that more people have been thinking about the Prison System in New York State within the last week than any week since Auburn Prison was built; and while much of that interest will of course evaporate, for we need not expect the millennium yet awhile, nevertheless the ground has been tilled for the work that is to come.

Then I dwelt upon the tasks which lay before us to do—before them and before me. It was my task to go out in the world and help in the fight against human servitude in the prisons, but they had a much harder task.

Your part is the most important of all. It is just to do your plain duty here, day by day, in the same routine; but accepting each new thing as it comes along and striving to make of that new thing a success. Men, it is you alone who must do it. Nobody else can.

So then give to the Warden and to all the officers your hearty support; aid in the endeavor to make this institution all that it should be, all that it can be.

An old poet, Sir Richard Lovelace, once wrote: