Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1860-06-29
THE TORTURE IN NAPLES.

In the kingdom of Naples the spirit and
the practices of the tenth and fifteenth GEN.
turies still survive. The publication of Glad
stones pamphlet on the Neapolitan prisons
made the government proverbial through
out the world, but the details of the sys-
tenn were still imperfectly known. Within
the past month, however, a book has been
issued In Paris, entitled "La TorteHe es,
Sac,ls, par III. Charles de la Fare,me, +"
which discloses its minute horrors, The
entire government of the country has been
committed into the hands of the police,
whose chief director, 'Maniscalco, is the son
OF waiter at a hotel in Naples, and who
was nominated to the dictatorship in con-
sequence of his diabolical ingenuity in the
application of the torture. M. de la Va
renne says in one place:
Every commissary, every jailor has his
own method of applying torture. 1t is re-
voting to come to details, but they are
unhappily exact and confirmed by official
authority. The famous Pontillo owes his
reputation to the species of torture which
he applies to his own Commissariat, max
ing the victim set down in rallied arm
chair set with razor blades, under which
is placed pan of bnrning Goals. The in
spector, Louis Maniscalco, the namesake
of the General Director, applies to the ac-
cused, little iron hands provided with a
closing screw. This is called, in the Ian
guage of the police, :" the angelic instru-
ment." The jailor, Bruno, belonging to
the Police Commissariat of the odious Car
rega (there is prison in each Commissa-
riat, } tortures by stripping the victim of
his clothes and binding his head between
his legs. Others employ the torture of the
tosnipaet, drawing cord, with a stick in
serted in it, tight round the head of the ac-
cused till the eyes start out of the head
and the skin cracks. Others have recourse
to starvation, to blows, to the priyation of
light and breathable air. But the one
satellite of the Director-General who out
strip all the others is the notorious Cap
tain Chinnici, born peasant in the village
of Belmonte, robber by profession, and
now an officer of police and rich proprietor.
Sent by Maniscalo into the town Of Nico-
sia, in order to discover the assassin of q
certain Gorgone, "a captain of this district,
killed in consequence of incredible excess
Of ferocity, from among thirty individuals
thrown into prison, on the vaguest suspi-
cion of completely in this crime. Chinnici
chose.two, at hazard. to make an example of
them, and to slake his thirst for torment
These two unfortunates were Rosario CHM
era, of the Vale d'Olmo, and Pizzolo.-
They underwent the most atrocious tor
lures, such as the silence hood the an
gelic instrument, hunger, the bastinado in
excess, without choosing to confess an ac-
tion which they had never committed
The police agent then got hold of the wife
of Chimera, young and beautiful woman
TWENTY-FIVE years old. After heaping upon
her all manner of violence, he caused her
to be tied naked on a bench, and gave her
up to the brutality of his men, She re-
mained three days in this state, without
food, till, half dead, the unhappy woman
deposed that her husband had formerly
said that he would kill the Captain Ger
gone. This evidence, extorted in this
manner, is Immediately received by Judge
sent for the purpose, and Chinnici, delight
ed at having got his first piece of evidence,
returns to the dungeon of the two wretch
es, to tell them the confession of Chimsra' s
wife-and as they persist in their denials,
he has recourse this time to a torture of
such monstrous obscenity that IL is impos-
sible to describe it. The victims at last
give in and confess all he wishes. Cinnici
has them dragged with all the due prepa-
raticns, to the place where they committed
the crime, in order to renew to the judge,
and before the crowd, the confession of
their guilt, and their designation of the
place where they had stood to fire. But
when they found themselves again in the
open sunlight, and in the presence of their
fellow citizens, little energy returned to
the two martyrs. They lifted up their
heads, and with feeble but firm voice
they proclaimed themselves innocent, and
denounced the infamous means employed
to torture them. A cry of horror arose,
and the police, throwing themselves upon
them, carry them back, gagged. to priso n.
The same torture is again applied. Chi
mera and Pizzolo confirm their first confes-
sion, and are conducted to Catana, the
chief town of the province. There the
great Criminal Court, seeing the too evi-
dent marks of all tho tortures they had
endured, received their explanation, orders
them to be visited by commission of ply
sicians, whose report courageously confirm
ed the sad truth, and at the risk of invol-
wing themselves in very disagreeable affair
with the police. the judges cancel the con-
fessions of the pretended culprits, and
proceeding to new and more regular ad-
judication, by sentence passed on the
goth December, 1859, declared the two
accused innocent, and order them to be
Immediately set at liberty In spite Of
this solemn decree, the unfortunate men
are still kept in prison by the direction Of
Maniscalco."
MISTAKES OF PHYSICIANS.
Oliver W. Holmes, physician, philoso.
pher, and poet, in a lecture upon physi
cians gives the followino account of sonne