One hundred years ago
A pathetic case was heard before Mr Justice Hawkins yesterday week. John Edwards, a prisoner in Coldbath Fields Prison, sent there for uttering counterfeit coin, had tamed a mouse as a companion, and formed a great friendship for him. The warders had taken this mouse from him and killed it, the prison rules not, of course, allowing the prisoners to keep pets. The prisoner, enraged at the death of his favourite, had assaulted one of the warders, and was indicted for the assault. Mr Justice Hawkins charged favourably for the prisoner, expressing a good deal of sympathy for him, and the jury acquitted him. The truth is, that this was just a case which judicious prison authorities would have winked at. Of course, it would never do to permit prisoners to have favourite animals with them, but a mouse would not be often found in such a prison, still less the patience and gentleness requisite to tame it; and there could have been nothing but good in ignoring this slight and exceptional breach of prison rules. But warders, dressed in a little brief authority over a very rough set of men, are almost always tyrannic at heart. If the prisoner had not been enraged by the cruel killing of his little companion, he would have been a worse man than he is.
Spectator, 3 December 1881
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