What was the background to the opening of Pentonville?
The movement for reform in the late C18
Many historians have argued that the opening of Pentonville Prison in 1842 represents
the end result of the movement for prison reform that had begun back in the 1770’s.
Pentonville was hailed as a ‘new model prison’ that was to set the tone and standard
for the type and purpose of prisons as a reforming institution in Britain.
The movement for prison reform and a move away from the idea of punishment as a
deterrent to a tool for reforming the prisoner had begun in the mid C18 with the work
of Jonas Hanway and John Howard.
Howard published a book called ‘The State of Prisons in England and Wales’ in 1777
and this had a wide impact upon government attitudes to the purpose of prisons.
Howard had visited many prisons and had made some disturbing findings; He found
some prisons had no sewers while others had open sewers running right through
them! His own clothes smelt so bad after such visits that he could not travel in his
coach. He pointed out that prisoner’s moral behaviour was worsened, not improved by
such conditions. In his visits to Gloucester prison he found that 3 times as many died
of fever as were hanged. He found prisoners gambled and drank heavily, and the
wardens were corrupt.
Howard argued that prisons needed to be healthy and efficient in order to reform the
prisoner. He wanted a prison to be less like the actual world.
Despite Howard’s significant work, actions taken to reform prisons across the country
remained variable. Further movements for reform were initiated by the architect
William Blackburn. He believed in the analogy of moral corruptness as a kind of
disease which would continue to spread in prisons as long as the architecture of
overcrowding and slum conditions remained. Blackburn initiated the idea of prisons
as needing to fulfil 3 requirements: 1) security 2) healthiness 3) Separation of
prisoners
The next significant person who continued the move for reform of prisons was
George Paul. Paul strongly believed that the cure for criminal behaviour was solitude:
because a person is corrupted by bad company. Paul managed to secure parliamentary
legislation to build five new county jails and five houses of correction along the lines
of the three principles.
In 1791 Bentham designed his own plan for a model prison called the ‘Panopticon’
which would incorporate the ideas of hard work, religious teaching and periods of
solitary confinement to reform the criminal. Bentham also wanted to reform the habits
of the prison guards and suggested that prison guards should also be monitored. In
1794 Bentham was given the go-ahead to build his vision at Millbank, but the funds
were never actually released.
1800-1820’s
Despite the humanitarian reformist movements of the late 18th century, by 1800 there
was still no national programme of prison administration and variations at local level
were vast. Conditions in prisons did not reflect the idealism of the reformers. There
was still disagreement over how prison could work as a method of reform and many
critics of the reformers argued that prisons would lose their role as deterrents of crime
and end up treating prisoners too well.
The Gaol Act of 1823 passed by the Home Secretary Robert Peel did mark an effort at
creating uniformity throughout the country as it forbade the use of alcohol in prisons
and called for the appointment of a prison surgeon and chaplain. But in most respects
the act was a compromise. It left a wide measure of latitude in the hands of local
authorities and no effort was made to close small jails. Thus by 1830’s the
government had listened to the ideas of the reformers but they had failed to act
effectively upon them.
1830-1842: the Great Debate over the ‘Silent’ and ‘Separate’ system.
By the 1830’s there was a sense of crisis over the direction of policy towards prison.
The number of prisoners was increasing and there was a general increase in crime.
Transportation were clearly not working and growth of organised working class
protest (including the Chartist riots) was putting pressure on the government to retain
order in society.
In 1835, greater national coherence was introduced to the prison system in the form of
the creation of the first prison inspectorate of 5 prison inspectors. It was clear that if
transportation was not going to continue then prisons would need to be able to cope
with the long-term sentences criminals would be completing in them.
As a result the reform movement gained pace again by arguing that to solve the crisis
and reform criminal elements, prisons would have to be become far more structured
and prisoners would have to be prevented from communicating altogether. It was
argued that if prisoners could be prevented from communicating then they would be
less able to seduce others to a life of sin and idleness.
Two main ideas for how prisons should be run emerged: The Separate System and the
silent system.
The Silent system offered a structure where prisoners would complete work and
prison life in absolute silence and reinforced punishments for those who violated the
rules. Even guards were to look out for the slightest gesture amongst prisoners. The
silent system placed chief emphasis on the idea that prisoners would need to develop
work habits.
The separate system, however, attracted more support. The system would isolate the
convict for hours in his own cell to allow him to communicate with his conscience.
The skills of architects were to design prisons which would prevent communication
between the prisoners in their cells and deprive them of any glimpse of the outside
world. Advocates of the separate system argued that it better prepared the mind to
receive impressions and the soul to hear the message offered by the prison chaplain.
English supporters of the separate system argued that prisoners should be set to work
like in the silent system, but that labour alone would not be sufficient. The separate
system supposedly offered a true conversion of the prisoner.
The building of Pentonville, 1842
As a result of the prison inspectorate and increasing pressure from prison reform
groups, coupled with the need for central control of prisons in the fact of a growing
mass of prisoners, Lord John Russell authorised the building of a brand new national
prison in London which would encompass the values and ideals of the separate
system.
Thus in 1842 Pentonville Prison was opened and the use of the separate system was a
product of the all of the years of the reformist movement. This was a new, model
prison, which was created with the purpose of morally, socially and spiritually
reforming the criminal. It was to stand as an example to the nation. It was intended to
become a model for the construction of local prisons.
The main features of Pentonville Prison were:
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It held 520 prisoners in separate cells
It had a structure designed with 4 wings radiating out of a central point from
which one could observe each cell door
Walls hindered communication between prisoners
Guards wore padded shoes and were forbidden to talk to convicts and made to
do a steady patrol which was controlled by a clock
Each cell was exactly the same – 13 ft deep, 7 wide and 9 high.
Prisoners wore hoods when they emerged from their cells and names replaced
numbers.
Prisoners had separate stalls in the chapel as well as separate exercise yards.
When they took exercise the prisoners walked in silent rows, holding a rope
that had knots tied in it at five yard intervals to keep each man apart from the
next.
In essence Pentonville was the direct creation of the idea that by producing a totally
controlled environment, you could produce a reformed and autonomous individual.