Chapter XX

CAPITAL PUNISHMENTS--I RECEIVE MY LICENSE--STRANGE BED-FELLOWS--MY LIBERATION.

During the last year of my imprisonment a bill relating to the crimes of murder and manslaughter was brought before Parliament, and the discussion in the House of Commons which ensued was much commented upon by the prisoners. About the same time I read a lecture touching on the same subject, which had been delivered to the Young Men's Christian Association, at Exeter Hall, and it may not be out of place here if I venture to express my opinion on the subject as well, possessing as I do the advantage over most of those who have discussed it out of doors, in having heard the opinions of those likely to commit such crimes, and having a familiar acquaintance with their habits, and the motives from which they act. The reverend lecturer to whom I have referred, based his argument for the continued infliction of capital punishment on the perpetual obligation of the Mosaic law: "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." He also maintained, if I understand him rightly, that the office of the hangman ought to be considered the highest object of human ambition, and that the hangman himself should take precedence of archbishops, kings, and emperors, inasmuch as he occupied the position of Almighty God, taking vengeance for the shedding of human blood. I confess I can scarcely conceive of a Christian man occupying such a position, neither can I agree with the reverend lecturer that the command given to Noah was intended to extend to all generations and societies of men. When it was promulgated there were only a few individuals left to people the universe, and the command was made _absolute_. There is no intimation of any distinction between the deliberate and the accidental shedding of human blood, and until some such distinction is made our conceptions of the eternal rectitude and justice of God, must be of a very peculiar and imperfect kind. That some distinction ought to be made is a fact which men in all ages and of all degrees of civilization have recognized, and have found their authority for making such a distinction, not in any spoken or written law, but in a much higher and older law than these, the universal conscience of mankind. That such a distinction was found necessary as the race became more numerous, is conclusively shown by the promulgation of the Mosaic law: "He that smiteth a man so that he die shall be surely put to death, and if a man lie not in wait, but God deliver him into his hand, then I will appoint thee a place whither he shall flee." (Ex. xxi., 12, 13.) This was a great modification of the original injunction, and also shows clearly, to my mind at least, that all human punishments should be regulated by the condition of the people for whose benefit they are designed. Again, in the same chapter from which I have already quoted, I find the following, "Thou shalt give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, &c.," a law evidently designed for a semi-barbarous people, and admitting of prompt administration and summary execution. Turning to the Christian law on the subject we find, "Ye have heard that it hath been said an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth, _but I_ say unto you that ye resist not evil." This would appear to introduce a new principle of forbearance, and if we refer to the case of the woman taken in adultery, where the legal penalty was death, we find that mercy, and not vengeance, is the principle on which our penal code ought to be based.

But leaving scriptural grounds and descending to those of expediency merely. Does capital punishment deter men from committing murder more effectually than perpetual imprisonment would? I believe that 999 out of every 1000 of our convicts even would not commit deliberate murder, although the penalty was only a few months' imprisonment and detection _certain_, unless under peculiar temptation or provocation. It is a crime naturally abhorrent even to the thief, and the majority of those men capable of committing wilful murder would on the whole, I believe, prefer to be hanged out of their misery, than remain in prison all their life. If all hope of release could be utterly extinguished, very few of such men would chance perpetual imprisonment, if they had it in their option. Of course we could not banish hope from the minds of all, and therefore many would at first cling to life, and after a few years seek death as a release from bondage, and even commit suicide rather than endure such suffering longer. I knew one prisoner who pleaded to be hanged, and others who would certainly prefer execution if they had no hope of ultimate liberty. The general opinion of those who had been in prison ten or twelve years out of a 'life' sentence was in favour of execution at once, as being the less dreadful alternative, so that with respect to punishment as a deterring influence, I have no doubt that perpetual imprisonment would be more efficacious than the capital sentence.

Those who are capable of deliberately taking human life with the view of obtaining money, may be divided into two classes. The one class comprising such as prisoners who perpetrate the crime cunningly and in secret, in the firm belief that they will escape detection; the other class are the highwaymen and garotters, who go daringly and violently to work, pretty sure in their own minds that they will be clever enough to escape.

With regard to the former class, the deterring influence is detection. Capital sentence, perpetual imprisonment, or even a less severe sentence would operate equally in preventing the commission of the crime in their case, because the idea is not generally present in their mind when they premeditate it, or is completely outweighed by the fear of detection or discovery. With reference to the second and bolder class, a lingering imprisonment would appear more horrible in their estimation, and exercise an equal if not a greater deterring influence than the scaffold. Some of those men with whom I have met would glory in dying 'game' as they term it. Those who commit murder in order to gratify feelings of revenge, usually, I believe, find the gratification of the passion so sweet that they are for the time quite regardless of their own lives; and when jealousy is the cause of murder, it often happens that the murderer takes the law into his own hands and visits upon himself the penalty. I met cases in point, and in none of them did the fear of the death sentence operate against the perpetration of crime. They had made up their minds to lose their lives, and did not calculate on escape. Such cases are not common, however, and perhaps it is not possible to prevent them occurring.

Those murders perpetrated for the love of money might to some extent be prevented by the general elevation of the mass of society, and by increasing the swiftness and certainty of detection; and I have come, after long study of the subject, and from frequent contact with those saved from the gallows, to the conclusion that capital punishment may now be safely abolished in this country. In all countries where secondary punishments are severe and capital punishments rigorously inflicted, murders are numerous, and in countries where the machinery for the detection of crime is defective it may be the same. Earl Russell, in a late edition of his work on the constitution, expresses opinions on this subject with which I coincide, but I disagree with him when he prescribes imprisonment and hard labour as being the most suitable method of dealing with criminals not capitally punished; I refer, of course, to imprisonment and hard labour as generally understood.

There are three systems of imprisonment: the solitary, the separate and silent, and the promiscuous association of all prisoners at the public works.

The solitary system feeds the lunatic asylums, the separate system has its advantages, if not too long continued, and of the promiscuous association system I have already at some length given my opinion.

In my humble estimation a prison ought to be a place for extracting as much usefulness as possible out of a prisoner for the benefit of that society whose laws he has offended; but the "hard labour" in our prisons is not useful in any sense of the word, either to the prisoner or society, it is sheer waste of energy, which is in itself an evil, and it gives the prisoner an aversion to labour of all kinds, which is another and a much greater evil. Moreover, long imprisonments are injurious to the prisoner under any discipline. If you take a bird, and place it in a cage, and next day liberate it, it will ever retain a dread of confinement; but, if you keep it in a prison for years, and then open the cage door, instead of the sudden eager flight to freedom, it will hover round its little prison, perhaps it will even re-enter it, preferring it to that liberty which it has lost the power to enjoy. So it is with many prisoners, keep them confined, and accustom them for years to prison life, such as it is in the most approved "models," or indeed under any conceivable mode of discipline consistent with unshortened life in such a place, and they will re-enter the world in a great measure, unfitted for the business of life.

I remember having a conversation with an intelligent prisoner who was by no means a criminal at heart. He asked me what means would I recommend for the destruction of these schools of crime?--for so he called the convict prisons.

"Sentence Charles Dickens to ten years' penal servitude, and allow him to use his pen," I replied.

"Well," he said, "I daresay that might do, especially if those intended for our future judges were sentenced along with him; but why should we not try to enlighten the public when we are liberated?"

"You might do so," I replied, "and I sincerely hope you will do so; but I fear, like the down of a thistle on an elephant's back, so would the words of a convict fall upon the public ear!"

"Look at Napoleon III.," said my friend, "he is an ex-convict, and do his words fall lightly on the public ear?"

"His is hardly a case in point," I said; "the greater the criminal, or rather the higher the object he endeavours unlawfully to obtain, the less prejudiced is society against him. They regard these Fenians for instance in a different light to us, yet these men at bottom are or would be wholesale destroyers of human life, whilst we had no intention of doing anyone any injury either in person or property. We are loyal, they are traitors. We would willingly lay down our lives to regain our lost characters and attain to an honourable and useful position in society; they will go out of prison rebels, ready to take up arms against all authority save that of their misguided chiefs, whenever they can do so with apparent safety! Yet these men will be more favourably received by society than you or I will be. You will find when you get free that your position will be very different from what it was, and that anything you say will be viewed with suspicion, as coming from a prejudiced and untrustworthy person, and a well-told falsehood by an official will far outweigh the whole truth if related by a prisoner."

"I could now prove," said my friend, "by the Blue Books, that most of the reports sent to the Home Office regarding these establishments are unreliable, and calculated to deceive and mislead the public as well as the government."

"You will require to be very guarded," I replied; "and above all things adhere strictly to the truth, and if you can gain the ear of some eminent man who takes an interest in the question, you might be the means of doing your country much service."

In consequence of such conversations as the one I have just related, I was led to form the idea of giving this narrative to the public. If it should lead to any change or modification in our criminal law, conducive to the welfare and security of society, I shall consider that my labours have not been altogether vain and unprofitable.

A change of government having taken place during the last year of my imprisonment I had the good fortune to get a few months' more remission of sentence than might otherwise have been the case.

While I feel truly thankful to those noblemen and gentlemen and other friends who interceded for me, my special gratitude is due to Mr. Walpole, for the promptitude he displayed in acknowledging my claim to the few months' mitigation of punishment it was in his power to bestow.

On a Friday morning I was unexpectedly called before the governor, and informed that my license had arrived. I was asked certain particulars in reference to my future intentions and address. I was next measured for a shoe, the only decent and honest article of clothing I ever received in prison; tried on a suit of clothes, and had my portrait taken. On the Saturday morning I was weighed and measured, and taken before the chaplain to receive a few formal words of parting advice. On the following Monday I was again taken before the governor to hear my license read. On Tuesday morning I was removed to Millbank Prison, and lodged there for the night, in a cell along with two other prisoners going to liberty like myself. We slept on narrow dirty mattresses, laid on the floor, so close as to be touching each other. One of my new companions had been nearly four years in the lunatic asylum at Fisherton, and had recovered. The other was a young professional thief, belonging to London, whose mind was just on the verge of insanity, through long confinement in separate cells. To sleep on the floor of a dusty cell, between two such companions, was not quite so comfortable as a bed in the Hotel Meurice, at Paris, where I had spent my last free night. Every moment that divided me from the hour of my liberation now seemed magnified into days. Wednesday morning at last dawned upon me. I was taken out and placed before a regiment of policemen, who each scrutinized me, and that done I received my license. With feelings of inexpressible thankfulness and gratitude to God I heard the heavy prison doors close behind me, and once more I inhaled the sweet free air of Heaven!

Tears streamed down my cheeks as I trudged along the streets, in my shabby clothes and with my deal crutch. I felt a new punishment creeping over me, even whilst the glorious sun of freedom was shedding its welcome rays on my dishonoured head.

With nineteen shillings and threepence in my pocket, but with my reputation lost, my health ruined, alone and a cripple, whom no "Prisoners' Aid Society" would assist, I was expected to begin anew the battle of life!

While I write these lines the bitterness of my new punishment has already visited me. Repulsed from every door where I seek employment, waiting patiently for the replies to my applications for advertised situations, which never come, the brand of the convict has indeed become the very mark of Cain, and I feel as if my fellowmen shrink from me as they pass. Fortunately I found at the post-office a few pounds sent to me from my brother, which, with slight additions, have enabled me to procure a mechanical leg, and to live till I have completed this narrative. But what is the fate of the many so situated, with no friends to help them, save the workhouse or the prison once again? A dreary life amongst paupers, or a short life of pleasure and crime, and long years of bondage to atone for it. Do you wonder if some choose the latter?... May you, gentle reader, never know what it is to lose your limb, your liberty, your character, or your home. May my history prove a beacon to warn you from the quicksands of ambition, on which so many human souls are wrecked, and may your little barque, wafted by gentle sunny gales, be safely steered across the great ocean of life, and at last be securely moored in that haven where blessedness and peace for ever reign!