A convict named Fury, who recently confessed to a murder
declared that he welcomed death as a relief from the persecu- tions of prison warders. His statements were brought before Sir W. Harcourt by Mr. Talla,ck, Secretary to the Howard Association; but the. Home Secretary, in a letter published in the Times, entirely repudiates them. He has, he says, the reports of competent and independent Visiting Committees, and he trusts their reports sooner than the statements of "per- jured thieVes and murderers." He, indeed, thinks the prisons "the best conducted institutions in this country." Mr. Tallack retorts that the warders are filling the Civil Service Gazette with complaints of their own harsh treatment from their superiors, and prison arrangements are therefore not perfect, and asks Sir W. Harcourt to account for the perpetual outbreaks in prisons. The truth seems to be, that while English prisons, as a whole, are well managed, the warders, who live in constant danger and are wearied with groundless complaints, do constantly contract spites against prisoners who are insolent and unruly. They.know that most prisoners will not complain to the Visitors, and that those who do, being, as they often are, the mo3t unruly, will be dis- credited. The Cornhill Magazine some few years since published a paper which showed that defects involving positive torture to the convicts could and did exist in English prisons, without any one being particularly to blame. Only, there was no remedy.
Previous page
