The Daily Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1860-07-27 00:00:00

THE TOMBS OF NEW YORK.

In New York curiosity is so strong, that it has there
quite overpowered even the interest of the recent mur-
ders, and the fast approaching execution of the pirate
Hicks, whose last diabolical assassinations on board the

oyster sloop, some two months back, your readers may
possibly recollect. Long before these lines reach
England, this ruffian will have gone to his last account.
If his confession is to be relied upon it is a heavy one
indeed, for the circumstances he has detailed leave no

doubt that he has actually murdered between 60 and 60
persons, many of whom were women, whom he had
captured in ships off the coast of Cuba, and to whom

death must have been a mercy, if his ghastly narra-
tive is to be depended on. It seems almost a kind
of wonder that in this age a man so bloody and so
remorseless could have pursued his career of murder
with such impunity, and still carry his last for blood to
the very verge of eternity. I saw him before I left

New York, and was told that even at that dreadful time,
when the very minutes of his existence were numbered,
and fast passing away, he seemed to derive a dreadful
satisfaction in detailing crimes from which the mind

recoils in amazement and horror. I had heard much

of the strict discipline of the American prisons, and wa4
anxious to see the chief one of New York, where, down
amid the worst parts of the city, the great gaol, known

as the Tombs, now stands. With the utmost courtesy

the chief warden at once granted my request, and took
the greatest pains to show all that was to be seen inside the
dreadful building. The Tombs stand near the Five Points
—a vile part of the city, the St. Giles's of New York.
The building itself is in the Egyptian style, massive and
colossal in its proportions as those rock-hewu temples
which appeal with such silent grandeur to the tourist who
"does" the Nile. The very aspect of the huge structure
is mournful. Not a window lightens the monotony of it!

huge granite walls, which have a blind impressive appear•

ante that well becomes the name, and makes it seem

like what it is in truth—a great sarcophagus of crime.
All its terrors, however, are external, and in this,

unlike our Penitentiary at Millbank, where everything is
gloomy and silent as the grave, and where when the

great gates clang behind the visitor he feels it jar upon
his heart as if hope and happiness were shut out for
ever, and knows at once, by the cautious vigilance of
the well-armed warders, that he is within the walls of

a prison where the worst and most dangerous of Lon-
don villains are crushed into a temporary submission.
The entrance to the Tombs is nothing like this. Th 6
way in is open enough, and a turnkey merely sits tit
a door to take checks from visitors, or passes from
those who have leave to visit their friends, and
which, to judge from the numbers inside the prison,
seem rather liberally given. Passing across a stone
courtyard, in the midst of which a little fountain playgi
and where an American eagle, chained by the leg
(though less vicious than any other inmate within the

walls), sits and droops his rusty wings all day, the
visitor enters another yard spanned above by the
Bridge of Sighs—a light iron path so named from
the fact of murderers after trial being led back over
it to their condemned cells. Entering a narrow
doorway, he at once finds himself in a handsome

lofty passage with rows of strongly grated doors at
either side, with two light galleries above communi-
cating with similar cells in the walls. Little slates
over the entrance to each cell mark the prisoners'
names, for there are sometimes two or three inmates•

" But are they prisoners, and is this a prison ?" is the
first thought of the visitor as he looks through the bars
into the carpeted cells, and sees their occupants, in
every style of dress or undress, lounging on their beds,
smoking their pipes and reading the morning -paper&
or laughing merrily through_ the grating with friend'
(just then at liberty), who have brought them in what-
ever they may want. It seems incredible, but it is a
fact, that these miscreants are- supplied with the daily
journals, with novels, or with prayer-books, as their
tastes may lead them ; are allowed to smoke ad

_
tibiersel at all hours, are even supplied with drink, should
their profligate lives have rendered such stimulants
necessary to their comfort. In a word, they are less
felons than pensioners boarded by the State. lam told
that in the lilands in the river, where the prisoners for
life (always pardoned -after a few years) undergo their
sentences, the . rules and discipline are more rigid.
This may and should be true.. I have not yet visited
these islands, and can only speak of what I saw at the
Tombs. On the lowest floor of the passage whiCh the
visitor first enters the cells are all occupied by. thosithicie
sentence of death, of whom there are generally but tee
many. Over one of these was written the name of
Albert Hicks, alias William Jackson. Our.conductor
tapped at the bars, and, sliding back an iron door
beyond, in answer to the summons, a 'tall, thin,
athletic mau,- dressed in a loose blue suit, came grin-
ning forward, from whose appearance, prisoner as he
was, I shrank back almost in fear. .In all my life
I had never seen a human face -on which the worst
vices of our nature were so terribly impressed. It
seemed almost like that of a baboon. The ietrealigg
forehead and projecting month, the restless, erne-
small black eyes, can nard, merciless grin upon •th 6
features, more dangerous and fearful looking thee
any flown, were awful to look upon. He seemed.. to
enjoy the evident sensation of loathing and distial
which he excited, and as he stepped forward, with hid
hard stony smile and rapid shifting look, hanging his
head on one side to get a better view through the bars, ,
his appearance was more that of a wild beast than s
human being. His long lean hands clutched the bars •
eagerly, and, drawing himself up close, he seemed
suddenly to disregard us, and looked at the bolts
and fastenings with an eager kind of gaze that was
painful to watch, then, loosening his hold, shrank back
into the cell and shut the door, almost as one could
fancy in despair at being so powerless for evil. What,
he may do eventually Heaven alone knows, but up to
the day I saw him he gloried in his crimes, and dwelt
boastfully upon them to any one who had nerve enough'
to listen to the awful tale. A few minutes 'afterwards
his wife and child came to visit him, but two Sisters of`
Mercy were then in his cell, and it may be hoped he
was attending to their exhortations, as after a few.hurriea
words with the'poor little woman, and without casting i.
glance on the child, who held on to the bare and looked up
at him with a joyous smile, he shut his door and retired.
again. - The wife remained there, mute and apparent*"
absorbed, rocking her child to and fro, and staring un- s
meaningly with red swollen eyes at her husband's name
over the massive grating. Beyond there- were two or
three others under sentence of death, and many of. ~
whom deserved death as well as Hicks, but they almost'.
laughed at the idea of being hanged. . And. they were
right ; for the mistaken leniency of the law of the New
York State requires that twelve months shall elapse
between the sentence and the execution. During thii,
interval a spurious philanthropy is sure to be exerted
in behalf of the unfortunate wife and children of,
the malefactor, and a commutation of the sentence
and subsequent pardon after two or three years
become almost certain. Hicks wilt be hang under
the Federal Law, and but for that, and his being
vagabond, without friends or money, even his execu-i
tion would be almost doubtful. The case
one Felix Sanchez, a half-negro, who occupied a cell
near Hicks, was peculiar. He had murdered a man
in New York, but escaped, and went out west. Here.
he made some lawless acquaintances, who persuaded him
to travel south, and where, waking up one morning,
after a riotous 'debauch? he found that his
companions
had done- a neat stroke of business during his intoxicas. -
tion, and sold him to a dealer for $1,500. He ;vas already
on his way to a sugatplatitatiOn. He resisted,and was
sent down to another dealer (rather more strict with
at'New Orleans, where he managea
refractory subjects)
to communicate with the police, and gave himself
murder rather than remain for• life' -thfet was a wise choice, for he, too, it is: nowno
liacepsrltaater,- will not be hanged, nor, perhaps, considering
the circumstances under which he killed the man, is it,
altogether right he should be, though he is quite unde-
serving of the pardon he will no doubt succeed in gets
dug- Near these wet young Jeffers, who is accused of
shooting dead his stepfather and another gentleman,
who strove to capture him .after committing the
act in the streets of New York, only a , few days
back. He had the appearance of being a mild, quiet-
looking lad, apparently only intent on his morning
paper, in which he was perusing an account of his
own arrest, examination, and personal appearance and
general antecedents, given with all the reiterated head-
ings, italic emphasis, and minute detail se peculiar to
the American, journals. Above these Cells were the
prisoners awaiting trial for manslaughter, arson, for-
gery, burglary, or smashing, all comfortable alike in
their cells, lolling, reading, and smoking, and better
taken care of, apparently, than ever they were in their
lives before. On the women's side- there were very
few criminals. The prison van—the. " Black Maria,' •
as it is termed—came in every now and then, disgorging
its 'fifteen or twenty persons of' both sexes and
all ages. All the , wretched, outcast men, thtis
brought to gaol were voters, it must be remembered,
and, as far as voting is concerned, have as much polie
tical influence in New York as the President or Heenan
himself. The women, as might be expected, were of every
grade of misery and infamy,- some so young as to be mere
children, some so old as to be all but helpless, drunk and
sober, magnificently dressed, or with scarcely enough to
cover them ; bnt all were brazen and unsubdued, and
pa
yard, where they basked in the sun,
,
Gammon
of their upper garments,
quietly s
proceededsd iia
denudingto
l
pin
u p
the tawdry finery which had been
rent off their backs in some midnight brawl: On the
whole the "Tombs," though curious and well worth Z
visit from a stranger, is, after all, a fearful place, and it
is with a feeling of positive relief that one emerges from
its massive walls into the bright sunshine, and tries to
forget the load of guilt and misery which it encloses.--,-
Times' correspondent.

HOLLOWAT'S PILLS ANY) OINTAIENT.—LONVIIeSS of Spirits,
Hypochondriacism, Insanity. These formidable diseases are
usually caused by a disordered condition of one or more of the
digestive organs, and most deplorably commence at the meri-
dian of life. The distressing symptoms need no enumeration
they are known in some degree to the wisest anti best of man-
kind, as well as the weakest. Whenever the liver, stomach,
and kidneys are roused, the morbid feelings and ideas vanish.
To effect this happy result, nothing more is needed than fric-
tion over those organs with Holloway's Ointment, whilst his.
Pills are likewise taken. The change of thought is immediate,
happy, and lasting. Those whom these medicines have curet
confess that their influence over the mind is magical. _

Printed and Published by WALTER. HENRY PEAT, of No.
8, Wesley-street, in the Parish of Toxteth-park, at his
Printing Establishments-3, Bnusswxcic-srazer (corner of
Castio-street), and 40, Litton-srnsar, Livorpool.
JULY 27, 1860,

1