In view of this episode, Tom Brown determined to undergo the horrors of the “Jail.” To this the prison warden very reluctantly consented. It was agreed that he should be treated exactly like a convict under punishment except that a “jail suit” should be cleansed for his use, whereas the ordinary prisoners use them interchangeably, without cleaning. Accordingly, Tom Brown suddenly knocked off work, declaring that the material furnished was unfit and he wasn’t going to work any more anyhow. His shop captain, finding him obdurate, had no option and was obliged to send him to the Principal Keeper who, finding him still obdurate, reluctantly ordered him to the “jail,” which Tom Brown describes as follows:
“A vaulted stone dungeon, about 50 by 20 feet, having on one side the death chamber for electrocuting murderers, and on the other side the prison dynamo with its ceaseless grinding, night and day. It is absolutely bare, except for one wooden bench along the north end, a locker where the jail clothes are kept, and eight cells, of solid sheet iron; floor, sides, back and roof. They are studded with rivets, projecting about a quarter of an inch. At the time that Warden Rattigan came into office there was no other floor; the inmates slept on the bare iron and the rivets! The cells are about 4½ by 8 feet and 9 feet high. There is a feeble attempt at ventilation—a small hole in the roof of the cell, which does not ventilate. Practically there is no air in the cell except what percolates in through the extra heavily grated door.” Two windows in the vaulted room outside admit some light but, except on a bright sunny day, an electric light is necessary in order to see the inside of the cell. “Up to the time of Supt. Riley’s and Warden Rattigan’s coming into office the supply of water for each prisoner was limited to one gill for 24 hours.”
There is a sink in the outer room but “the sink was not used for the prisoners to wash for the simple reason that the prisoners in the jail were not allowed to wash.”
On entrance, Tom Brown was instructed to take off his clothes and put on the jail suit which had been cleansed in anticipation of his coming. He says: “If these are the clothes which have been carefully washed and cleaned for me, I should like to examine—at a safe distance—the ordinary ones. They must be filthy beyond words.” He was carefully searched by the captain to discover whether he had any weapon or instrument upon his person. His handkerchief was taken from him, presumably to avoid danger of suicide, because a prisoner once strangled himself with his handkerchief. He was given a small tin water can.
The cell contained no seat, bed, mattress or bedding—nothing except a papier-mache bucket. A convict trusty handed in through a slot in the door a slice of bread and inserted the spout of a tin funnel through which he poured into the prisoner’s can exactly a gill of water to last through the night. The officers and the trusty departed and very soon five other prisoners in adjacent cells made themselves known. Then followed an animated discussion on prison fare; ethics of the jail; comparative merits of transatlantic liners, politics, prison reform, etc. Tom Brown says: “On the whole, more intelligent, instructive and entertaining conversation it has seldom been my lot to enjoy.” To his surprise he finds that these men, presumably the worst in the prison, are human and even sympathetic. One has been sent down “because he had talked back to one of the citizen instructors;” two others for a little scrap which involved no special bitterness; a fourth for hitting a convict with a crow bar because he had called him a bad name; the fifth was a sick boy whose ear was still discharging after an operation. He had been sent down for making trouble in the hospital and was not allowed a handkerchief to take care of the discharge from his ear. All prisoners punished, whatever the character of the offense, received the same treatment and in addition to confinement on bread and water were fined 50 cents for each day of confinement; the fine to be worked out at the rate of 1½ cents per day, allowed each prisoner as “earnings.” The prisoner also has to wear a mark upon his sleeve from that day forward indicating that he has been punished and, if he has previously earned a good-conduct bar by a year’s perfect record, that bar is taken from him and, finally, some portion, if not all, of the commutation time which he may have gained by previous good conduct is forfeited. Manifestly a prison punishment is a serious matter to the convict.
After four hours confinement Tom Brown was visited by two prison officers, it having been understood that he would not stay longer, but to their astonishment he refused to go, having determined to experience the full limit of jail life. They left him very reluctantly. As the night wore on he says:
“Now that all chance of escape is gone I begin to feel more than before the pressure of the horror of this place; the close confinement; the bad air; the terrible darkness, the bodily discomforts, the uncleanness, the lack of water. My throat is parched, but I dare not drink more than a sip at a time, for my one gill—what is left of it—must last until morning. And then there is the constant whir-whir-whirring of the dynamo next door and the death chamber at our backs.”
The prisoners seek to mitigate their misery. One asks: “Say fellows! what would you say now to a nice thick juicy steak with fried potatoes?” One “sings an excellent ragtime ditty;” another “follows with the Toreador’s song from Carmen, sung in a sweet, true, light tenor voice that shows real love and appreciation of music.
“This is the place where I had expected to meet the violent and dangerous criminals; but what do I find! A genial young Irishman, as pleasant company as I have ever encountered, and a sweet voiced boy singing Carmen.”
These entertainments over, the night drags on. The wooden floor proves a hard bed until a prisoner instructs him how to make a pillow of his felt shoes and his shirt. Bed bugs infest the place and after killing one, he imagines multitudes. The sick prisoner accidentally upsets his water can and soon becomes delirious, seeming likely to become a raving maniac. There is no way to summon an officer, but one of the prisoners with amazing tact and patience soothes his agitation until he finally falls asleep.