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FEMALE LIFE IN PBISONV 5
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
» A Remarkable Book Has Lately Been Runn...
We recommend this chapter on the Matrons to all our readers who be interested in the organization of the higher and . more
res may ponsible kinds of female labor . Mrs . Jameson mentions the Brixton and Fulham establishments , into which the convicts
successively pass from Millbank _, and gives several _j ) ages ° _^ . " Letter to Lord John Russell " to the subject of the
superintendence of female convicts . They should be re-read in connexion _^ with this book .
Of the prisoners , numerous biographical stories are told , and many of those whose names were once familiar in the newspapers
_% re-appear here under their own or assumed names . Among the former is Celestina Sommer , who stood her trial for the murder of
her daughter in April , 1856 . The " circumstances of the murder were peculiarly bold and cruel , and the sentence of the court was
death—a sentence that , to the surprise and dissatisfaction of the publicwas commuted to penal servitude for life ; and Celestina
, Sommer , in due course , became an inmate of Millbank Prison , Westminster . " She is described as being a pale-faced , fair-haired
woman , of spare form , and below the middle height ; a quiet , wellordered risonerwitha horror of the other womenand partial to
her own p celland , her , work therein . She behaved well , and after a time was draug , hted off to Brixtonwhere symptoms of insanity , began
to develop . The author does not , believe she ever fretted much about the murder ; "it was the peculiar method in her madness to
_tfbrget it , or if not to forget , at least to regard it as an event of no importance to her future welfare . " Her particular forte she
considered to be singing , and used to inform the other invalids in the infirmary that she had been one of the opera chorus before
her marriage . The bulk of the prisoners , however , are not darkly mysterious
beings of an intelligent or reflective order , but wild women , in whom a certain uproarious violence seems the uniform characteristic *
A sort of incontrollable desire for excitement seizes them at intervals , which , as they cannot get spirits to drink , or indulge in fighting or
merry-making , as they did in the world , results in " breaking out , " or " smashing . " Many womenin defiance of a day or two ' s bread
_& one nd cell water to , another will suddenl with y a shout noise , all across the more the vehement airing-yard for , the or from long
, restraint if remonstrated to which with they have is generall been subjected followed ; and by such a " a smashing proceeding of * ,
windows affect half , and a ward a tearing with , a up similar of she y ets and le blankets if the delinquent , that will is often not
speedily carried off to refractory examp quarters , . " In fact , " breaking out" or " smashing" is a hihlcontagious diseaseand flies like
wildfire , . So great is , the need g of y excitement in these , unregulated natures , that the prisoners are occasionally known to arrange
beforeof hand windows , "in a and quiet tearing , aggravating of sheets manner and blankets , " for a ; systematic such conv smashing ersations
Female Life In Pbisonv 5
FEMALE LIFE IN _PBISONV 5
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Citation
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English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Sept. 1, 1862, page 5, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01091862/page/5/
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