The jail was built in 1846 and operated for 150 years, closing in 1996. It was built with 4 wings radiating out from a central core, apparently the design being copied from Pentonville's ‘Radial Cellular System’;
I described something similar in the prison in Port Arthur in Tasmania which I visited and wrote about earlier in this blog, though thankfully Pentonville was only intended to keep prisoners isolated – there were no measures to keep prisoners fully isolated and completely apart from other human beings, as there were out in Tasmania.
During those 150 years the Gaol has housed murderers, suffragettes and both loyalist and republican prisoners. It has witnessed births, deaths and marriages and has apparently been the home to executions, escapes, hunger-strikes and riots. Women were also held in the gaol until the early part of the 20th century, in the prison block house located at the end of D-wing (although suffragettes were housed in A-wing during the 1913-1914 period). In the early years of the gaol, children could also be imprisoned, usually for stealing food or clothing.
Sentences for children ranged from one week to one month and could include a whipping, and the sentence could increase to up to 3 months if this was not a first offence. This child is having a medical examination.
The cells were built 13 feet long and 7 feet high, and were designed for a single prisoner.
However, by the 1970s the prison population had exploded and it was not uncommon for there to be up to 4 prisoners in each cell, which must have been dreadful.
The prison population peaked at just over 1400, in a jail designed for 500; and there were still no sanitation in the cells, with chamber pots being still in use.
There were many stories of the difficulties of having prisoners from both sides of the sectarian divide being housed in the same jail. All the prisoners had to be kept locked up while somebody was out of his cell so he wasn't attacked by people from the other side. People must have spent most of their time locked up in those tiny crowded cells.
Eventually prisoners from different sides were housed in separate wings, but there were still difficulties with prisoners being taken out of the wing - to see a lawyer, for visits or to go to court. The jail is connected to the court house by a tunnel, and we were able to walk part of the way down the tunnel towards the courthouse (it is now derelict and closed off) and it was really quite unpleasant. I did take photos, but the light down there was very strange and yellow, so the photos are quite unpleasant too.
The most creepy part of the visit was going into the condemned cell and then the execution chamber. The condemned cell was larger than the others, since two prison staff also lived there with the condemned man. The cell also had had a small adjoining room which was like a dressing room with a wooden cupboard at the back of it. The cupboard could be quickly slid aside and the prisoner taken through to the execution chamber which was just the other side of the wall. This way, the execution was over in seconds.
There was a noose hanging up, and a glass panel over the trapdoor through which the prisoner fell. Our tour guide told us the whole execution procedure, then we went downstairs into the chamber below where the body would be left hanging so they could be certain it as dead. There was a coffin nearby, ready to receive the body to be taken away for burial in an unmarked grave in the prison grounds.
It was all quite creepy and the stuff of nightmares. What my friend and I found most shocking of all though was the number of people who had taken their children there. I could understand teenagers liking to go and have their blood curdled, but I was amazed that people would think of taking their 8 or 9 years olds.
Our tour contained many fascinating details, and, though I couldn't have described it was enjoyable, I'm certainly glad I went. It was a real education.
We were back home on late on the Monday night, and, though I enjoyed my visit very much, I was also relieved to be back because I was worried about my sister. She had been taken in to hospital with severe intestinal bleeding just before the holiday weekend, and though I couldn't have done anything for her while she was in hospital, I was worried all weekend so it was a relief to be nearer to her.
The bleeding was probably caused by reaction to the anti-inflammatory pills she had been taken for her knee pain, so she has had to stop taking those and rely only on painkillers. Walking about has become even more difficult for her.
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