Horace N. Pym

"Give them strength to brook and bear,

Trial pain, and trial care;

Let them see Thy saving light;

Be Thou 'Watchman of their night.'"

—Sabbath Evening Song.

Armed with a special order of the then Lord Mayor, Sir Robert Nicholas Fowler, I sallied forth one lovely blue day in June, and timidly rang the little brass bell beside the little green door giving into Newgate Prison.

The gaol is now only used to house the prisoners on the days of trial, and for executions on the days of expiation; at other times, save for the presence of a couple of warders, it is entirely empty, and empty it was on this my day of call.

Presenting my mandate to the very civil warder who replied to my summons, I was (he having to guard the door) handed to his colleague's care, to be shown the mysteries of this great silent tomb, lying so gloomily amid the City's stir.

The first point of interest was the chapel, with that terribly suggestive chair, standing alone in the centre of the floor opposite the pulpit, on which the condemned used to sit the Sunday before his dreadful death, and, the observed of all the other prisoners, heard his own funeral sermon preached—a refinement of cruelty difficult to understand in this very Christian country. Then followed a visit to the condemned cells, two in number, and which are situated far below the level of the outside street. They are small square rooms with whitewashed walls, enlivened by one or two peculiarly ill-chosen texts; in each is a fixed truckle bedstead, with a warder's fixed seat on either side. The warder in attendance stated that he had passed many nights in them with condemned prisoners, and had rarely found his charges either restless or unable to sleep well, long, and calmly!

There is an old story told of a murderer, about whose case some doubt was raised, and to whom the prison chaplain, as he lay under sentence of death, lent a Bible. In due course a free pardon arrived, and as the prisoner left the gaol, he turned to the chaplain saying, "Well, sir, here's your Bible; many thanks for the loan of it, and I only hope I shall never want it again."

Then we visited the pinioning room; this process is carried out by strapping on a sort of leather strait-waistcoat, with buckles at the back and outside sockets for the arms and wrists. While putting on one of these, I found the leather was cold and damp; it then occurred to me, with some horror, that it was still moist with the death-sweat of the executed.

The scaffold stands alone across one of the yards, in a little wooden building not inappropriately like a butcher's shop. When used, the large shutter in front is let down, and the interior is seen to consist of a heavy cross-beam on two uprights, a link or two of chain in the middle, a very deep drop, with padded leather sides to deaden the sound of the falling platform, a covered space on one side for the coffin, and on the other a strong lever, such as is used on railways to move the points, and which here draws the bolt, releasing the platform on which the culprit stands; a high stool for the victim, should he prove nervous or faint—and that is all the furniture and fittings of this gruesome building.

The dark cell is perhaps the most dreadful part of this peculiarly ghastly show, and after being shut in it for a few minutes, which seemed hours, one fully understood its terrific taming power over the most rebellious prisoners: you are literally enveloped in a sort of velvety blackness that can be felt, which, with the absolute and awful silence, seemed to force the blood to the head and choke one.

Upon asking the warder to tell us something of the idiosyncrasies of the more celebrated criminals he had known, he stated that Wainright the murderer was the most talkative, vain, and boastful person he had seen there, that his craving for tobacco was curiously extreme, and he was immensely gratified when the governor of the prison promised him a large cigar the night before his execution. The promise kept, he walked up and down the yard with the governor, detailing with unctuous pleasure his youthful amours and deceptions, like another Pepys. "But," added my informant, "the pleasantest, cheeriest man we ever had to hang in my time was Dr. Lampson, full of fun and anecdote, with nice manners that made him friends all round. He was outwardly very brave in facing his fate, and yet, as he walked to the scaffold, those behind him saw all the back muscles writhing, working, and twitching like snakes in a bag, and thus belying the calm face and gentle smile in front. Ah! we missed him very much indeed, and were very sorry to lose him. A real gentleman he was in every way!"

It was pleasant, and a vast relief after this strange experience, to emerge suddenly from this dream of mad, sad, bad things into the roar of the City streets, to see the blue sky, and find men's faces looking once again pleasantly into our own; but, nevertheless, Newgate should be seen by the curious, and those who can do so without coercion, before it disappears.