Victorian Prisoners Of Gloucester Gaol

Compelling mugshots of prisoners and the stories behind the pictures...

It is a commonly held assumption that all Victorian prisons were grim, abhorrent places, loathed by their inmates. This is undoubtedly an accurate description of many English prisons in the nineteenth century However, because of the way in which prisons were run, there were two distinct types: convict prisons and local prisons. While convict prisons attempted to reform their inmates, local prisons acted as a deterrent. This meant that standards of accommodation and sanitation were lower than in convict prisons and treatment, particularly in terms of the hard labour prisoners were expected to undertake, was often more severe. Whichever type of prison they were sent to, for many prisoners and convicts from the poorest classes, prison life compared favourably with their own miserable existence at home.

It is a commonly held assumption that all Victorian prisons were grim, abhorrent places, loathed by their inmates. This is undoubtedly an accurate description of many English prisons in the nineteenth century However, because of the way in which prisons were run, there were two distinct types: convict prisons and local prisons. While convict prisons attempted to reform their inmates, local prisons acted as a deterrent. This meant that standards of accommodation and sanitation were lower than in convict prisons and treatment, particularly in terms of the hard labour prisoners were expected to undertake, was often more severe. Whichever type of prison they were sent to, for many prisoners and convicts from the poorest classes, prison life compared favourably with their own miserable existence at home.

Victorian Prison Lives is the first account of the process of imprisionment in England between 1830 and 1914 to be drawn largely from the writings of prisoners themselves. The period was in some ways one of great change, beginning with an astonishing penitentiary experiement when prisons were seen as moral hospitals. But this approach eventually gave way to the idea of penal servitude and created a legacy of harshness and suffering still preserved in the reputations of Portland Chatham and Dartmoor. It was only towards the end of the period that the concept of modern prison administration began to emerge. But while statutary changes where taking place there was an underlying continuity. This is examined in a series of chapters on every aspect of prison life - from admission procedure, fellow prisoners and the nature of hard labour, diet and discipline to the process of release, which for a long-term prisioner could be as daunting as entry into prison.

This book gathers together the stories of the 123 prisoners who were executed at Gloucester between 1792, when the first prisoner was hanged on the roof over the entrance gate of the newly-built prison, and 1939, when the last convict was executed within the prison's walls. Infamous cases include the Berkeley poachers who shot and killed the Earl of Berkeley's gamekeeper; Rebecca Worlock, who poisoned her husband with arsenic; notorious robbers Matthew and Henry Pinnell; Charlotte Long, the last woman to be hanged for arson in England; and Herbert Rowse Armstrong, the Hay-on-Wye solicitor who was found guilty of poisoning his wife and attempting to murder a fellow solicitor. Famous executioners - including William Calcraft, William Marwood, William Billington and the Pierrepoints - also played their part in the history of the prison.Also included in this volume is an appendix listing all the men and women hanging at Over, near Gloucester, between 1731 and 1790. Fully illustrated, Hanged at Gloucester is sure to appeal to everyone interested in true crime history and the shadier side of Gloucestershire's past.