A Letter on the Nature and Effects of the Tread-wheel: As an Instrument of Prison Labour and Punishment, Addressed to the Right Hon. Robert Peel ...

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J. Hatchard, 1824 - Convict labor - 174 pages
 

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Page 133 - ... imprisonment, during which the tread-wheel is an appropriate punishment. But in bearing this testimony in its favour, they feel no hesitation in declaring their opinion that its value may be over-rated, and its discipline misapplied. Notwithstanding the acknowledged excellencies of the tread-wheel, it ought not to form the punishment of those whom the law sentences to imprisonment only. To inflict it on this description of prisoners would be to change the character of their sentence. To subject...
Page 123 - Every such chaplain shall on every Sunday, and on Christmas Day and Good Friday, perform the appointed Morning and Evening Services of the Church of England, and preach at such time or times...
Page 47 - Defend me therefore, common sense, say I, From reveries so airy, from the toil Of dropping buckets into empty wells, And growing old in drawing nothing up...
Page 104 - The sufferings of the poor are, indeed, less observed than their misdeeds; not from any want of compassion, but because they are less known; and this is the true reason why we so often hear them mentioned with abhorrence, and so seldom with pity.
Page 104 - Nearly fifty years after the date oi the above details the Prison Discipline Society remark, that there yet. exist, many prisons in the same condition as that, in which Howard left them — monuments of the justice of his statements, and of the indifference with which his recommendations had been regarded. (Fifth Report, p. 16.) In 1818 it appears by parliamentary returns, that out of 518 prisons in the United Kingdom, to which upwards of 107,000 persons were committed in that year, 23 prisons only...
Page 130 - And Whereas Persons convicted of Offences are ' frequently sentenced to Imprisonment without being sentenced ' to Hard Labour ;' Be it therefore enacted, That it shall be lawful for Two or more Visiting Justices of any Prison, to order that all such Persons confined in such Prison, in pursuance of any Sentence or Conviction, except such Prisoners as shall maintain themselves, shall be set to some Work or Labour not severe...
Page 25 - Religion will, I am satisfied, have a strong influence in correcting the morals of men ; and I am no less persuaded, that it is religion alone which can effectually accomplish so great and so desirable a work.
Page 115 - ... of long standing, and were so at the time of admission into this place ; and I do most solemnly declare that I have as yet witnessed no bad effects on the legs, arms, or bodies of the prisoners from the use of the Tread-milt.
Page 125 - Prayers, to be selected from the Liturgy of the Church of England by the Chaplain, shall be read at least every Morning by the Chaplain, the Keeper, -or by some other Person, as by the Rules and Regulations shall be directed ; and Portions of the Scriptures shall be read to the Prisoners, when assembled for Instruction, by the Chaplain, or by such Person as he may appoint or authorize.
Page 118 - ... to pay to such prisoners any such wages, or portion of the same, and at such periods as shall be directed by such justice.

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