Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1879-10-26
The Dead at Sing Sing.

State prison in Sing Sing an entry il
made Of the name under which he i!
sentenced, the crime of which he is con
victed, the name of the Judge that sen
fenced him; also the age of the prisoner
his birthplace, and other particulars. II
often happens that the man has been alb.
sent only few months, and that whereas
his name was Jacob Schneider when he
went away, it is Patrick Houlihan when
he returns, and Houlihan IS not more un-
like Schneider than Schneider is unlike
the name under which he was sent up a
few years previously. But he remains
Houlihau until his sentence or be expires,
and he is SO we'll known to the prison
officers and so infinitely described in
their books that the name is wholly imma.
terial. He never tries to deceive the Of
Acers as to his identity; his object is ac-
cemplished if he has deceived the Judge
and passed for a new offender instead of an
old one. He docs not always succeed in
doing that. Among the questions asked
him when he is booked at the prison Of
zee is whether he desires to mention the
name of some relative or friend to whom
word may be sent IN the event Of his death
while in prison. A large percentage of the
prisoners decline to give any name, saying
that they do not care to have any of their
friends know what has become If them if
they die before getting out. 1t is pro-
bable that that these have gone by as
sumcd names during the criminal ca
ccer that brought them to the prison,
that their kindred are ignorant Of their
whereabouts, and that the prisoners
aope to spare their parents or
their relatives the pain Of ever knowing
that they have committed a state prison
offence. In cases where name with an
address is given in response to the usual
inquiry, the name is seldom that of the
prisoner, and the address is not often the
prisoners address. For instance man
who is sentenced under the name of Hen
~ Wilson Ito take name that appears
10 be fayorite one with criminals III
search Of a new designation, and who
claims to come from Troy, will request
that word he sent to John Brown of No.
- street, New York, declining to say
whether the person named IS relative OF
his. The prison authorities naturally in
Ter that the prisoners name is Brown,
and that the person named is his father,
brother or some near relative-that is,
when they think 1t worth their while to
make an inference.
There are now N Sing Sing prison be-
tween 1000 and 1,7OO prisoners. Less
than twenty of them are living in cots in
Iba wilson hDcni4al ko
say. Last year seven convicts died. The
youngest was 10 years old, the oldest was
43. The average age of the prisoners
last year was between 90 and IS wears.
The death rate was less than one-nalf OF
one per cent. Nearly all the deaths &C.
cur from the same cause "a disease which
Is called consumption, for short. The
prisoner has lived life of excuses; often
he has contracted blood disease that has
passed into third stage, and is under
mining bis constitution. He takes cold
easily, and the cold in his system pro-
duces waste that his impaired vitality
cannot endure. He goes into the hospi-
tai and dies when the leaves come out,
or fingers till the leaves TALL So
said Warden Davis the other day while
ne and the writer we're climbing the
ridge to the east of the prison, where the
dead convicts are buried "These were
harvested last spring." he said pointing
10 70" OF five or six graves over which
the turf has not grown. 1--WE shall not
be likely to lose any more-by natural
death-till the leaves fall; but. unless
there is some casualty, and some man
IS shot in desperate attempt to escape,
there Will be no more than one new
grave before the leaves fall" Since War
den Davis took chargt fof the prison, nearly
two years ago, there has been but one
death from an acute disease. The man
caught Geld, his lungs assumed the con-
dltion OF the brain in apoplexy, and he
was dead within a few hours.
All OF the sick convicts lie in the same
room IN the hospitals large hall
with cots for perhaps sixty men.
The floor 10 kept clean, the walls
white, the room lighted with oil
lamps. Occasionally, kwhen a convict
IS sick with disease that makes him Of
tensive to the others, he is removed to a
small room kept for the purpose elsewhere.
The sick are attended chiefly by convicts,
most of whom, detailed for that PURPOSE.
are themselves on the sick list They SIT
by the side of the sick, attend to their
wants, give them medicine according to
the doctors instructions, and call the doc
tor when it seems to be necessary. The
sick generally appear to be patient, and
they arc we'll taken care of. Sometimes
IN the night a nervous, sleepless patient
weary OF the scene around him, and per-
haps thinking Of the tender care he
had received from his mother or a sis.
ter at home, Will draw deep sigh and
gasp. ooh, this Is horrible place to be
sick I'M" But they all have good atten-
ton, and even the most nervous cannot
say that the condition of the sick there is
any more horrible than 1t is made bv the
necessities Of their situation. There is no
officer of the prison that does not tiptoe
through tho room when he goes among
the sick, lest he should give them pain.
The duties Of the prison physician are
strangely different from those If the physi-
clans outside. He mutt see that he is not
imposed upon by men who want to shirk
work, or to be transferred to work of a
different nature. They feign sickness and
ne must determine whether they are real
~ Ill. The prisoners feign sickness more
frequently In the hope of being transferred
toa different line of work than to escape
work Nearly all of them prefer to work,
and nearly all Of them would like to be
frequently changed from one kind of
work to something else. Frequently the
physician finds it necessary to take the
prisoners at their word and apply rene
dies that are painful, but not I'M furious.
Not long ago prisoner was transferred
to an easy job in consequence of an all
ment common to those who lift heavy