The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1889-04-07
TURNKEY AT THE CELL DOOR
Humanity Teaches Him that His Duties
Can Be Made Pleasant by Kindness.
Prisoners Not Troublesome When Taught ODE
dience Through Firmness Without Cruelty
Queer Things Noticed in a Jail Record.


recently remarked that the majority of peo-
pie are inclined to believe that ~iailers are
an abandoned set, and that life in a Jail is
almost a perfect bedlam. Although" he
continued, 1T may not be such as would,
perhaps, suit some of the more fastidious,
it is not wholly devoid of its bright sides.
Of course, to the fellows behind the bars
these things may appear a little differently,
but ever they can't complain when they
stop and think that their W work put
them there, and that they might be in much
worse circumstances if they were IN a dun
geon or had a life sentence hanging over
their heads. But to US who are on the out
side, and yet in one sense as closely confined
as they, there are many things that happen
every day that relieve the monotony of our
duty in sitting here, and opening and shut
ting the barred gates"
Your work, then, is in some sense pleas
ant. is itf"
"Yes. it can be truly said that it is. You
know the great awe that many people have
for a man as soon as he is pointed out as a
jailer. and / often laugh to see the wonder
that fills the faces of visitors which not un-
frequently amounts to fear. The first
thought that comes into the mind of the
ignorant is that my hands must necessarily
be stained with blood and that my business
makes me q villain that would do credit to
a wild West show. And then. too. there is
a general impression of horror against a
Jail of any kind. 1t is not only a place of
many it is looked at as a place of torture,
where we club the prisoners into submits
sion and think no more of q ball and chain
thar a dog does of his collar. The people
who have such ideas would form a far
different idea of Jail life if they could come
here and see how things are managed on
the sid
Are you often troubled with refractory
~prisOnersl"
mo. oh, once in n while they get into q
fuss among themselves, but all / have to do
is to step to the door and tell them to be
quiet. The one great fear among them is
Imprisonment III the dungeon. aud prisoners
will obey our orders implicitly before they
will go down there. But as long as / have
been here i have never had occasion to send
q man down. Once and only once, have /
been compelled to punish one severely. and
that was with a prisoner who attempted to
escape from the guard while going over to
the courthouse to be tried. ] put him in
shackles and left them OF him for a night
or two, just to teach him a lesson. i have a
mixture of criminals here almost all the
time, but they are invariably an order
ly set. Right in there now are
from assault and battery up to murder,
and yet i manage to live here and enjoy
life, too. l tell you, it is not all in a mans
surroundings that makes happiness-it is
O great deal with himself"
mo doubt you see some amusing char
acters, do YOU not!"
"Yes, in the time l have been here / have
had som rather queer experiences, espe-
cially with men who have come here on
sentences that were not of the usual kind.
i remember one case where a man was
brought in from one of the suburbs, by a
constable who wanted him locked up. h
constable gave me what he thought was
the correct papers of commitment, but l
saw at a glance that they were not for the
man he had in charge and 1 told
him that / could not hold
the prisoner unless the right documents
were presented. The officer insisted so
strongly that / saw l had to do something
to settle the dispute, and so 1 told him to
give me the papers and his ma which he
did. L suppose he thought it was all right,
for as soon as he had turned his prisoner
over to me he left. Well, what did l dog /
simply had the man slip inside the first
cell, when / turned the key on him, after
which / unlocked the door again and set
him free. / lad no authority to lock him
up. because l had no papers that would
Justify it. That was a short sentence. but
~ fao nv oAt tA0N - A1Ca ny tlO
court. | recollect one man, though, that
was sentenced by the court who was only
in Jail an hour. He was convicted
of some felony-I. have forgotten exactly
what-and fined SIS and costs, with one
hour Imprisonment here. The crime that
he had committed admitted of no punish
ment without some sort of a sentence, and
one hour was the least he could get. He
came in a few minutes before IL o'clock,
and just as / locked him up the courthouse
clock was striking. Promptly at IL / let
him out, and haven't heard of him since,
but he can say that he served a jail-sentence
any way. / have had men in here who have
had to pay pretty dearly for some trifing
act. There was a man in New Albany who
ventured to sell q glass of beer on the fair
grounds, and before he had been paid for
the beer he was arrested. When his trial
came off he was fined $50 and given thirty
and was here sixty days for selling that
one drink. Another instance that was a
little peculiar was one in which a man had
been fined So for violating a State law, and
to serve it out"
"Are violators of the government laws
as frequently imprisoned as those of the
State lawsf"
."No; and yet we often have them. Some
time ago q man was brought here from
Hendricks county who had violated the
| internal revenue laws, and he was given a
thirty-days' sentence. He had trades some
notions for a caddy of tobacco, which he
| afterwards sold without q license to a
tobacco dealer. The whole thing was worth
only q few dollars, but the court recognized
no distinctions and the law was enforced.
| AS a general rule the sentences in the
United States Court are much lighter than
those IN the State court. For instance there
was n man last year convicted of counter
felting and Nven two years in the State
| prison, w~hil$another, who forged a post
office money order. went up on a three
years sentence. Now, in the State courts
men are frequently sent up for ten years
for stealing a suit of clothing. or for even
receiving stolen goods. The punishments
are much heavier than they are in the
United States Court"
Can you account for thisw
1T is based entirely upon the difference
in the kind of criminals that are tried in
the United States Court. Almost all of the
crimes against the government are COM
mltted through ignorance, and the punish
ment is accordingly lightened. Take the
man who sold the caddy of tobacco,
for instance; he did not know
the provisions of the internal rev.
enue law, or else he probably would not
have attempted to violate them. In the
State cases, however, the criminals are gen.
orally indicted for deeds that are uni
versally known to be in direct opposition
to law and ORDER. A great many men may
not know that it is a crime in the eyes OF
the law to use a cigar-box without first
canceling the stamp, but you will not find
many who believe they are justified in com
hitting a murder or q robbery"
Death of Mrs. Caroline f. Gall.
Mrs. Caroline f. Gall. who died on Friday aft