Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1888-07-19
NUMBER 263.
A True Story OF the bad Man" of
the Prison.

"Be of with you and your tractm
1t was prisoner who spoke these
words with an angry gesture, and the
voice that gave them utterance rang
with a peculiar harshness.
l was only a young man in those
days, fresh from the university, and
sadly wanting, l fear, in the tact
which experience gives in later years
to men who follow the sacred calling
of the priesthood. My old friend, Mr..
-, who was chaplain to - convict
prison, had been attacked by fever;
and being devout and earnest man,
full of energy, and with his whole
heart in his work, and unwilling that
his duties should remain unfufilled,
had asked me to take his place in the
prison until he was again able himself
to visit it. That is how l came in the
o first instance to minister to the wants
and necessities of the criminal classes.
SO serious did my friends illness prove
itself to be, so uncertain his recovery,
and so long the period of his conval-
escence, that 1 was left for close upon
on work. You may imagine that dur
ing that period 1 met some strange
characters, saw some strange sights,
and heard some strange stories.
What a funny world it was-a world
within a world, and peopled by the
dregs and scourings of humanity.
What ferocious instinct, brutal hate
and savage fearlessness were there;
what mean distrust; what petty jeal-
ousy; what wizened, battered faces;
what wrecked and loathsome bodies.
What moral rottenness pervaded and
leavened the bulk of these unfortu-
mates. 1t was curious, too, to note the
rigOr with which certain points of pris-
on etiquette were observed, and the
manner in which a species of classical
ton was arrived at by the prisoners
themselves.
It would be no difficult matter, in
deed, to write a paper, interesting
enough in detail concerning the inner
life of large prison from the convicts'
point of view. To the spotless passer-
by who has never transgressed the ma
tion's laws, and whose acquaintance
with the prison is limited to a view of
its gate as he passes it by, it may seem
that there is little difference indeed
between most of the jail-birds who con-
gregate within; but if this is his opin-
ion, it is by no means shared by his
less fortunate fellows. There are in
every prison at least three classes of
society, constituted, be it remembered
by the prisoners themselves, and rigor-
ously recognized. The third or
lowest class consists of common
drunkards, ordinary Migrants, wife
heaters, and such-like; and these
are the despised and rejected ones
who come in for abuse and villifica-
ton, and are considered unworthy to
consort with their ''better" brethren.
The second class consists of such gen.
try as sneak-thieves, petty-larcenists,
and cattle-thieves, who consider the
wife-beater and the drunkard too low
to associate with; but who are them
selves in turn beneath the contempt of
the frst-class swells, who are bank
burglars, adroit pickpockets, and life
sentenced murderers; always provided,
In the case of the last mentioned, that
Jn0y are nOI Wlle-pOlSOnerS, u SeI OI
men who even in prison are not tole-
rated, although why distinction
should be made in the case of any de-
liberate murderer seems Incompetent
sible. There is always also the bad
man" of the prison, a curious appella-
ton, surely. where all are supposed to
be bad. 1t is about the ''bad man. of
the prison am writing this sketch. l
found his name in the prison register
after this fashion: ''Murton, Joseph,
No. 263, Wing ID, Tier Al and opposite
the entry in the book was the word
'sIncorrigible" in large red-ink letters.
There had been other men similarly
indexed, as l could see by the red af-
fixes to their names; bat all of them
had passed out to other prisons or to
the busy world again. Joseph Muir
tan, strange to say, was the only in
coerigible according to the books) in
the institution.
Why he was bad, no person knew.
The keepers feared him, the governor
hated him; he was continually In hot
alter, and as often in as out of the dark
cell. He had been fogged more than