The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-11-10
VISITORS TO STATE PRISON
OBSERVATIONS OF 4 TROLLEY
 CAR CONDUCTOR.

Hearts" Basket Heavily Laden Shame She Leaves the Car a Half Dozen Blocks Before It Reaches the Prison.
 A handsome young woman carried a basket on the Wethersfield, Conn.,, line of cars. She handled it awkardly, as if mot accustomed to such burden, and there was blush in her cheeks. She dropped her veil to hide her agitation, and before the car reached the curve that swings around to the grim State prison she signailed the conductor and got off. This young woman has made this trip every two weeks for a year. The conductor said:
 She doesn't seem to get hardened like the rest of them. She has friend in the State prison, husband or sweetheart, and faithfully she visits him, but her modesty or shame or deli lcacy leads her to walk half a dozen city blocks carrying that heavy basket when she might get off at the very gate, l know the basket is heavy, for l held it for her once, and I'll guar antee it's filled with dainties, but nev- CT after the one time when I surprised | her would she allow me to assist her. She leaves the car from the prison to disguise the fact that her visit is to be made there. That's why I say she doesn't get hardened Most persons who have friends behind the walls for the first time approach the entrance with evident trepidation and reluctance but those feelings soon wear off, as we who are accustomed to watch them well know, and soon they go up that long walk to the front door as uncon- cernedly as If they were in their own front yard.
 "They often talk, too about their friends, but the delicate blushing wom- an that just left us--I think she would collapse if she dreamed that her mis- sion was known. She hugs the deluson that she is keeping her pride without a stain. and respect her for it. would J not for the world recognize her as l do others who frequently use this line. q pretend she is an utter stranger each time she rides, and each time sig nal the nrotorman as if taken unawares when we reach the curve, although I know perfectly well that she will signal i to get off there. This little deception I do for her sake and to preserve the E fiction that she Is unnoticed.
 After the first visit to the State prison the man or woman who has friend or E relative there knows what is to be en- countered. The interior of the building can never seem unfamiliar after the \ first visit, nor can the first visit be for N gotten The man or woman interested \ in a life prisoner accepts the prison as some have to accept scar or deform- \ ity, a thing ever to be reckoned with, but also ever to be accepted as part of 5 the natural order of things.
 3 An inmate of the prison in a letter to ( a relative termed it Ia mansion of < broken hearts" The writer of this VI sentiment might have gone a step fur v fher and added that the broken hearts X due to the misconduct of its inmates are not all included in the prison cen- sus, but that good many of them are A outside the walls.
 Friday of each week the broken heart ed ones outside may visit those with in the walls for limited time and each Friday sees between forty and fifty visitors who are permitted to call on the convicts. For two hours in the
 morning and equal period in the after noon the prisoners may receive calls according to their grades
 The trolley conductors know more about the sad-faced visitors than oth-
 CTS, for all information ceases once the visitors pass the gate The prison walls < have kept secrets for more than seven-
 ty years and the outside world knows little of what is going on within their shelter.
 The prison officials may know the
 identity of those who call on the con- yicts, but they do not impart it tc
 others. The conversation between pris- oner and visitor must take place in the presence of some prison official First
 grade prisoners, who wear blue suits
 may recive visitors once in two weeks second 2Tdu6 pIlSULtIoy dl Ssf7SN' III 6lpS
 may receive them once a month. The
 convicts of the third grade, who art
 dressed in stripes, can have no callers
 at all.
 Practically all the life prisoners have
 callers, John Warren, who began lift
 sentence in 1859 for drowning his beau
 tiful young wife in brook, is still pot
 tering about in the prison yard, spend
 ing much of his time in the care O
 flowers. He is an expert in growing
 plants. He entered the prison nearly
 half a century ago and most of thu
 men and women who were his contem
 poraries are dead.
 But somewhere in the State there re
 main those who are interested in Ok
 Man Warren. To-day his interest il
 life is centred in his flower beds, anC
 no one who sees him would dream fol
 a moment that he was guilty of com !. mitting one of the foulest murders il
 the history of Connecticut.
 Visiting is encouraged by the officials
 for more than one convict looks for
 ward to the visit of some friend or re
 lative as the one break in a monotonou
 life and the visits are one of the thing
 that stand between the convict and tn,
 hospital for the insane.
 There are now in the prison Jhre,