Punishments - 1700-1900

End of the Bloody code

Ideas

• 1770, Sir William Meredith complained to parliament - too harsh

• Campaign started by Mackintosh and sir Samuel Romily

• 1808 - no death penalty for pick-pocketting

• 1822-1840 Peel reduced hanging crimes from 200-5

• public hanging ended in 1868

Didn’t work

• people got the day ff work to see executions - factories closed

• people made executions a day out - laugh and drink

• increase risk of protest riots

Juries

• took pity on people - especially children

• 1700’s 40% of convicts were hung, by 1800 10%

• juries though it was unfair

• more likely for crime to be committed if can get away with it

Transportation

started in 1717 as an alternative punishment to the Bloody Code

162,000 convicts were transported to Australia

including Tolpuddle Martyrs, Luddites, Chartists, and Irish Nationalists

convicts worked building roads, bridges or on farms

if there was good work, convicts could get a ‘ticket to leave’

but any stayed as it was better than the crime and poverty in England

ended in 1857

How Successful

• less harsh than death penalty - more likely to convict

• but still harsh enough to be a deterrent - if committed further crimes flogged / more rural settlements

• reduce crime in Britain - remove criminals

• claim Australia as British - but settlers didn’t want convict to be left - protests

• reform criminals through hard work - only get basic needs if do good work

Why it Ended

wrong to offer convicts new life in Australia while some paid to go

no effect on crime rate

prisons were becoming bigger and more popular

Australians began to object that criminals were being left

Problems with Prisons

• staff - short staffed meant serious criminals had to mix with debtors

• prisoners - serious criminals were teaching petty criminals had to preform serious crimes

• accommodation - Gaols were small rooms, with possibly no windows - hulks were emergancy after end of transportation

• health - disease spread quickly

Changes in Prisons

John Howard

• fresh water

• hygienic conditions

• prison doctor

• provide food

• don’t have to pay fees for essentials

• regular visits from churchmen

• occupied by hard work

Elizabeth Fry

• rule for women to obey in prison

• female wardens, 1823

• clothes and furniture

• schools for women and children

• regular work

• inspectors supervised conditions,1835

• Brixton prison solely for women, 1853

Children

• Pankhurst prison solely for young offenders, 1838

• reformatory schools, 1850

• 1870 Education Act - children under 10 had to be schooled

• 1899children couldn’t be in the same prison as an adult

How far they were revolutionised

Why they changed

• fear of crime - media made it worse than actually was

• end of Bloody code - needed alternative punishments

• end of transportation - benefitting more than punishing

• Social reformers - John Howard, Elizabeth Fry

• Humanitarianism - treat people equally

• Government actions - Peel

• Problems with separate system - mental problems

Pentonville Prison

• small cell for each individual prisoner

• thick walls

• isolated during day

• up to 23 hours in cell

• harsh labour - up to 12h a day

• deliberately bland food

• wooden beds

• opportunities for improvement

• self-reflection

• not influenced by other criminals

• deter people from committing crimes

• retribution - have to ‘pay’ for the behaviour

• mental illnesses

• high suicide rate

• 22 went mad, 26 nervous breakdowns, 3 suicides

Dates Involving in Changing Prisons

• 1896 - mentally ill prisoners got treatment

• 1900 - Separate system declining

• 1902 - no pointless tasks

• 1907 - probation officers to check offenders outside prison

• 1922 - no solitary confinement

• 1922 - better food and conditions

• 1933 - first Open Prison