Alma record. (Alma, Mich.) 1878-1928, 1888-02-17
a TRAFFIC IN TRAMPS.
a Profitable business Carried on by
Sherins In Pennsylvania.


4 Profitable Business Carried ON by
sherins In Pennsylvania.
The tramp question has been for
years one of the most serious difficult
ties the administration of Cumberland
county has had to contend with, writes
a Carlisle, Pa, correspondent of The
Philadelphia Times. Every fall hordes
of Migrants flock up through the valley
from Delaware. Maryland, and the
south, where they have been employed
during the summer months in peach or
berry picking or in the bay fisheries.
These all 90 into winter quarters IN the
various a%lmshouses and jails of Penn
sylvania. As the county allows SO
much per capital for the support of
these gentry, former sheriffs have rot
failed to perceive their opportunity
and TO profit by it. A year OF so ago
the farming of tramps had assumed
such proportions that the better ele-
ment in both political parties became
alarmed, and steps were instituted TO
suppress it. The county Jail here has
only thirty-six cells of ordinary size,
and yet as many as four hundred va
grants have been crowded into them.
As many of the cells were occu-
pied by prisoners condemned TO
solitary confinement it necessitated
the herding Of as many as thirty men,
women. and ch ldren into one cell,
where the most abom nable practices
were carried on. The sherin's bill that
year was some $40, 00O. The returns
from the almshouse also showed that
thirteen thousand people had been fed
during the year. BY judiciouS manage
ment a profit of 10 or Is cents a meal
could be made by the sheriff, whose
Office has sometimes been worth $4,000
or $4,000 a year. The Justice who
committed these prisoners also received
a considerable fee. 1t has been n COM
mon practice TO commit persons to
thirty days and after ten days to take
them out and rccommlt them. thus
making a clear profit of twenty days.
The constables have been specially in
structed TO hunt up characters OF tins
kind, and it is a well-known fact, 10y the
atteStation of the prisoners themselves,
that they have been offered induce
ments in the shape of tobacco, whisky,
and other creature comforts, to consent
to take up their abode in the county
house for the winter.
Within n year these practices have
been in a great measure suppressed.
Judge Sadler, however, in the term of
court, a il was the commencement of
the season, specially called the atten-
ton of the grand jury to the subject.
In their report to-day they find that the
ventilat. on, illumination, and sanitary
arrangements of the Jail are bad, and
recommend the building of an addition
or to erect a new Jail. The sexes are
not properly separated, with attendant
results. The jail proper is II long
corridor. with the cells in two tiers.
~ IA lN'il'AN NOH-i'ENNf ~ VIZ NVi
ridors during the day, and wordy alter
cations and vulgar and profane
language are often INDUCED in. The
tramps in the lower t er mingle freely
during the daytime. and at night all
ages and sexes are often herded to-
gether.
There arc now about fifty Migrants
in the Jail, twenty-nine of whom were
committed by Justice j. b. MARTIN and
sixteen by Justice James A. Green,
both of Carlisle. Among them are
Willie Abr ght, aged ? years; j. Cro-
mer. aged 9 years; Louisa Kotl, aged 4
years; Martha Davis, aged II years,
and Laura Davies, aged 4 years. All
these children were committed by the
justices with hard labor. and are forced
to mingle with the most hardened
criminals and witness the most horrible
sights day by day. The jury do not re-
fleet upon the sheriff and his assistants.
of whom the prisoners all speak in the
highest terms, but strongly recommend
a change in the jail arrangements and
a breaking up of the tramp traffic.