The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1874-11-07 00:00:00

CONVICTS IN ENGLAND.

The Report of the Directors of Convict Prisons in
England for last year, which has just been issued in a
Parliamentary volume, is an interesting document on
the statistics of crime and satisfactory as to its diminu-
tion.

--Tiae chaplain of Portland Prison, in speaking of the
disposition of discipline officers, the maintenance of a
high moral and religious tone among them, and a
correct estimation of the position of the unhappy men
under their control, and their quiet influence for
good, states that it is clear that no extensive and
permanent good will be wrought among prisoners
where these important features are lost sight of :
"In their sorrows and confinement a kind word has
a magical effect. The more the law ot kindness is
carried out the more will prison discipline be strength-
ened, to say nothing of some attempt on the prisoners'
parts to discipline their own spirits." Industrial
occupation in gaol, with means of gaining an honest
Hying when released, will influence the prisoners to
amend their lives. The directors (Lieutenant-Colonel
Du Cane being chairman) report that the number of
male convicts received into Government prisons under
fresh sentences during 1873 was 1,489, besides 103 re-
committed to serve out the period remitted from their
former sentences. The number of female convicts
received tinder fresh sentences was 255, besides, 36 re-
committed to serve out the period remitted of their
font:el. sentences.
The great decrease in crime which commenced in 1870
has continued through 1873, which now takes the place
of the previous year as that in which crime (as
measured at least by convictions fir serious offences) has
been less than in any year during the present genera-
tion. Judging from the number of convicts received
under sentences of penal servitude in the present year
(the Report being dated in July last), there was no
reason, in the opinion of the directors, to anticipate any
important change in the numbers. Thetotalnumberof
convictions and sentences to penal servitude during the
quinquennial periodscommencinglBss would be for the
five years ending 1858, 15,212; for the five years end-
ing 1864, 15,549; for the five years ending 1869, 10,741;
and for the five years ending 1874, 8,852. The decrease
of nearly 6,000 which occurred in the period ending
1869, as compared with the two former periods, was
no doubt due to the abolition of sentences shorter than
five years, and was partly counterbalanced by the
consequent increase in sentences of imprisonment ; but
the decrease of nearly 2,000 in the next period had
not been affected by any such cause. Whatever, the
directors state, may be the causes which combine to
produce an increase or decrease of crime, the system of
punishment is certainly one, and, as a matter of fact,
the records of past Commissions of Inquiry tend to
show that an increase in crime has generally been at-
tributed principally to defects in the prison system.
Punishment should be carried out so as to make im-
prisonment a terror to evil-doers, as well as the means
of bringing those subject to it into better habits
of minsi by placing them under the influences which
they would not come under if left to their own courses
outside. In fulfilling these objects the directors eon-
Bider they may claim to be fairly sue .essfuL They
refer with satisfaction to the reports of the chaplain as
to the moral condition and the advances made in edit-
cation of the prisoners; there would remain, however,
a certain class whom it would be hopeless to influence,
and who must be dealt with in course of law, not for
much result on them,. lees, but to carry out the prin-
ciple of justice and mainly to deter others. -Such
characters might be probably set down as in a certain
sense mentally deficient,- and the subject is cllscusseti
on medical etatementa contained in the Report.