Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1896-09-29
CRA2ED By SOLITUDE.
How Close Confinement Affects
the Minds of Prisoners.
FATE OF THE IRISH DYSAarTEEs.

The Course of Treatment That Drove Gal.
lagher and Whitehead Insane Is Com
mon Enough In English rTisons-Most
Prisoners Are Glad to Work
The release of the Irish dynamitcrs,
Whitehead and Gallagher. from the Eng
fish prison at Portland, together with the
fact that both men were insane when re-
leased, has set the expert crininologists to
pondering over cause and effect.
Almost every one agrees that the direct
cause OF the insanity Of the prisoners was
solitary confinement. In the Portland, as
In most other large English prisons, tie
convicts are confined separately at night,
although during the day they labor ON the
congregate system. During labor hours,
however, they are not allowed to speak
The same rules pertain in u modified form
In this country.
There is nothing in this system calculat-
cd To produce or develop insanity. In ev-
cry large prison, however, convicts can al
ways be found who simulate insanity for
one purpose or another. Sometimes it is
to obtain rest or change of employment:
at Others it is with a hope of being trans
ferred to some hospital or insane asylum,
where the chances for escape are better
The keepers and prison officials generally
are familiar with this feature of sham
| ming" and they are constantly on the
lookout for it. Owing to the fact that
nothing is 50 difficult to detect as u simu-
htion Of insanity, the keepers, prison off
Gals and prison physicians sometimes
make mistakes that are natural, but griev-
Gus in results.
From all that can be learned it was
such mistake as this that overturned the
mental balance of both Whitehead and
Gallagher. Both men Were nervous and
high strung and full OF resentment gainst
the sentence imposed upon them. Your
habitual criminal will take his sentence
with "a smirk and smile and will welcome
his prison associations as Il matter of
course. He recognizes the fact that he is
among his equals. He looks upon his fel-
low convicts from criminal standpoint.
Those who are greater criminals than him.
self he regards Us his superiCrs There is
fellow feeling among them, and conse-
quently an easy mental balance There is
very little danger of IA habitual criminal
with a hobnailed brain going crazy
According to all the evidence obtainable
Whitehead and Gallagher felt II bitter re-
sentiment against their surroundings from
the iirst day of their Incarceration. Instead
| VI this resentment wearing away with
time, it increased and was fostcred by per-
petual silence and restraint No restraint,
however, could prevent their looking about
them at the beetle brows. shock heads and
evil faces of their companions.
First came grief, then resentment, then
alteration. The eternal silence and the
strange association with habitual criminals
were too much for them. They began to
| act strangely. The keepers, knowing that
the two men were slirowd ard TO Il tain
extent refined imagined that they were
shammiEg. They were warned, but the
warning had no effect
| "A few days solitary confinement on
bread and water will bring them around ~
was the argument of the physicians Then
came what might have been expected in
any other prison under similar circum-
stances. The two men were put into soil
| tary cells away from the 81 light or sound OF
any of their kind on n bread and water
diet, which was showed through the small
| barred grating without II word. On sun
days they were conducted separately and
by dark and solitary corridors to the chapel,
where they sat in deep stone pews in such
a position that they could see nobody but
| eAS 'i'A,A 'Au 'hu stIti'iIui i)Ticst tnTOueu
| high above them; then back again to the
solitude, silence and gloom of the small
| stone cell
How much of this sort of thing can the
human mind endure without giving way:
a mentally dull man might stand such a
confinement indefinitely He would bear
it just as tiger bears solitary captivity,
banqueting silently on whatever might
come through tine grating, sulicn and lone
ly, crouching like a wild animal in its cave.
10 men of the stamp of Whitehead and
Gallagher, however, such punishment,
meant ultimate idiocy pure and simple
When the mind feeds upon itself, with nc
extraneous relief of sights and sounds, i,
Is only a matter Of time before it snaps
80 1t was with the two dynamiters DAYS
OF solitude, weeks of silence, months OF
gloom, in an endless round, with no sound