Weekly expositor. (Brockway Centre, Mich.) 1882-1894, 1893-06-09
A WOMAN FOR A JAILER.
MRS. EVELYN e.. SMITH OF
RHODE leland.
Sac Keeps the County Jail. and Her
Prisoners Are Glad to Remain i'm
Her Charge-Fo Ir Prison
crs Have Il capped.

sition ever held by woman, requir-
ing an indomitable will and courage,
is that of jaileress, and all Rhode
Island is proud of Mrs. Evelyn G.
Smith the keeper of the county Jail
of historic old Warwick, says an East
Greenwich correspondent OF the
Philadelphia Times.
The records of the institution
show that Earl Place was the jailer
way back sixty years ago, and that
John +. Place, the grandfather Of
Mrs. Smith, followed him as keeper.
In the order of succession came John
5. Place, her father, and since she
was three years of age she has made
her home in the gloomy Old building.
Smith, her husband, was appointed
to the place, which he held for eleven
years.
Mrs. Smith was appointed to the
position thirteen years ago, on the
/ demise of her husband, and she has
proved very successful jaileress,
managing the institution without
! =
courage, and upon many occasions
has shown her pluck and strength,
much to the discomfort Of the des-
| perate and restless spirits under her
supervision.
The Jail is by no means country
| lookup, for the last year alone there
were at different times 250 under her
personal care, and some Of the rough
est criminals have been behind its
bars. Only four prison birds have
| flown during the time Mrs Smith has
been the keeper
1t was several years ago that the
/ first break was made A Swede,
placed under arrest for high crime.
| for which he was waiting trial, was
in danger Of being lynchel.
The whole Swedish colony in War
wick had been aroused, and as they
had sided in their openly expressed
sentiments with the prisoner, the
townspeople had risen in arms pre-
pared to take the law into their own
hands. Early that evening a Swede,
who turned out TO be q confederate
of the prisoner, had been permitted
to visit him in his cell. When the
townspeople appeared late that night
to execute their threat Mrs. Smith
Gained them by the statement that
the bird had flown. she having but q
few moments before appraised herself
of the fact.
1t appears that the confederate
supplied the prisoner with a false
key with which he unlocked his cell,
which in those days was secured by
an old.fashioned lock, and that he
had made his way to the top of tier
of cells, whence he had burned hole
in the roof of the building large
enough to crawl through, and had
lowered himself by rope made out
OF strips of bed clothing to the ground
below.
In the next break three of the most
desperate prisoners got away. They
made big hole through the wall by
taxing out brick and stone. Only
one was recaptured, and he happened
to be not OF the gang that planned
the job. The other two men were
never captured, but one OF them af-
terward wrote letter to Mrs. Smith
in which he expressed his regrets at
having taken so hasty departure
from so congenial a boarding place,
and trusted she would ever hold her
"nice position
A good story is told apropos OF the
insecurity of the institution of those
days. 1t was no unusual thing for a
prisoner, on being released, to allude
to the loosening stones of the prison
walls and the weakness of the iron
bars On the windows, but they in
variably said that they were treated
so we'll they did not care to escape.
One prisoner made remark Of this
tenor to Mrs. Smith and she told him
that she had presented the matter
to the state authorities, and that she
had been promised an appropriation
with which she could and would make
the Jail so secure that whole weeks
digging and filing would not allow an
escape
The prisoner thereupon asked for a
pen. ink and paper, and his commune
cation to Governor Van Zandt is one
of the treasures in the archives OF
the secretary of state. 1t Is headed,
East Greenwich Jail" and reads as
follows! "Unless you send some one
down here pretty quick and patch up
this place for Mrs. Smith, as she
wants it, I'll leave"
Mrs. Smith has had under her
charge many murderers. She says
that, as rule, they are well-behaved
men. Occasionally one has en-
deavored TO overawe her, and, as
Mrs. Smith puts it. "they get very
funny, but before they got away from
here the fun was all knocked out oil
them" She has solitary cell in
which she places the obstinate ones
and she is deaf TO their appeals until
she is convinced that bread and
water diet has efTectually disciplined
them.