The Washington herald., 1914-06-03
OLDEST VESSEL
AFL0AT NOW HERE
British Prison Ship Success
on Exhibition IN the
Potomac River.
REPLETE WITH HORRORS
Relic of Brutal Days. Its Dungeons
Unchanged Since 1870. Has Visited
Every Port in the World.

Slowly tacking up the Potomac River
toward the Capital City of the Land OF
the Free" the British convict snip
Success, her masts straining under
full spread of canvas, floating parable
of mans inhumanity to man. dropped
anchor in Washington Harbor yesterday
afternoon of the foot Of M street
Doomed ike the Flying Dutchman OF
old to sail everlastingly upon the seas,
this survivor of England's feet OF feion
transports has visited practically every
port of any size in the world since sne
set sail in 1890 to carry her object lesson
to all nations of the earth. Incidentally,
she is the Oldest vessel afoat, having
been launched at Moulmain. India, in
1870, and unchanged in any OF Its grim
details, it presents a terrible reminder,
in these enlightened days OF prison re-
FORM of the barbarities Of Engiand's
overseas penal system.
Arrives from Baltimore.
The Success arrived in Washington
from Baltimore and will remain here on
exhibition for two weeks. Visitors viii
be allowed aboard, beginning Friday. She
is commanded by Capt d. H. Smith, and
Z. W. Nottingham Is navigator. A crew
of nineteen sailors man the vessel The
Success is rs feet long, q feet beam, 1S
feet draught and is $50 tonnage. Leaving
England April IA, the day Of the Titanic
sailed for New York, it took ninety-six
days to cross the Atlantic, and while In
this country the convict ship has visited
Boston, New York. New London, Conn;
Norfolk and Baltimore
Everything aboard the ship is left in
tact as in former days when It carried
its human cargo of felons. Only wax
figures have been placed in the cells and
ships dungeons to add reality to the
scenes that transpired in these torture |
chambers.
Is 1.3 Years Old. |
Built in 1870. at Mculmain, by the old |
Pagoda looking eastwards to the sea-
the Success is now 123 years old. No |
ship of anything like her great age to- |
day is seaworthy. yet this old hulk under |
her own sail has succeeded in crossing |
the Atlantic.
Massively built throughout of solid |
Burman teak, the Success was first
launched as an armed East India mer-
chantman with beautiful brass guns
bristling from her sides and fitted hand
somely for the reception of princes. na-
bobs and the wealthy traders of the ORR
ent, whose goods, spices, aromatic teas,
worries. jewels and other costly luxuries
she carried over the seven seas to the
ends OF the earth.
Her square-cut stern and quarter gal
leries stamp her at once with the hall
mark of antiquity, and her BLUM bow
shows that she could never have dis
tinguished herself for a high rate of
speed-Yet pains were taken to make her
trim and smart, and fit to hold leading
place smopg her sister-shtpssof the An
glo-Indlan feet.
Made a Prison ship.
Broken only by an occasional conflict
with pirate craft, the Success had an
1N-,Nf1 hon =
she was first chartered by the British
government to transport to Australia the
overflow of the home jails. the unfortu-
nate wretches who at that time were
sentenced to from seven years to the
term of natural life for offenses that
would now be considered trivial and
petty, warranting at most but small
fine.
Some of the greatest writers of the
nineteenth century devoted their pens to
horror-compelling descriptions OF the
VOYAGES of the felon feet, of which the ,
Success was in her day the commodore
or principal devil-ship. The Convict {
Ship described by Clark Russell in his
novel of that title is in every detail an
exact picture of the Success as she 10
today In ''Moondyne,' too, John Boyle
O'ReiIly described at first hand the Hugo
mont, q sister-ship to this ocean he'll.
with faithfulness which any one on ,
visiting her must realize. The human
cargoes on these convict ships died on
like rotten sheep.
Description of Cells.
Engaged in this hideous trade the !
Success" continued to serve until 1851 ,
in which year she was permanently ,
stationed as a receiving prison in Hob !
sons Bay. Australia.
Cells, strong and gloomy, were con- :
structed on the tween and lower
decks, and in these the most desperate ;
criminals that England and Australia ;
could produce were accommodated"
The lower deck was devoted to the
prisoners Of the better class were con- :
fined in the tween deck cells.
The corner cells on either side Of the y
lower deck are the dreaded black :
holes" in which prisoners, who had
been guilty of some breach of disci-
piine or fractious conduct, were pun
jshed by solitary confinement lasting
from one to one hundred days and by
of torture. These small
and -tapcring torture chambers meas
ure only two feet eight inches across.
In 1851 the disclosures that had been
made of the brutal and inhuman treat +
nent meted out to prisoners created c
fierce outcry in Australia amounting to d
revolt against the English government In
and resulted in the abandonment of the G
hulk system. For some years later-from I,
$50 to 1s6Ithe Success was used as a q
prison, then she became sue
a reformatory ship and am d
nunition store, and later all the prison n
1ulks were ordered to be sold on the
express condition that they were to be b
broken up. and their associations lost 4,
% the recollection of the residents of e
Melbourne. n
sole Survivor Now.
BY a clerical error, however, that con-
lition did not appear upon the terms
If sale of the Success. Hence she be-
anne the only British convict ship
float 1t was not until 1890, however,
hat she appeared before the public as q
IN exhibition ship. In 1892 a gang of
'ydney, New South Wales, residents, y
boarded her to revenge them
elves for the outrage on their pride y
aused by the exhibition of their an
estors. and all the figures were mutt q
ated beyond repair.
The. figures were replaced. but in order y
o make their work more certain she =, :,
vas again attacked. scuttled and sunk in :,
sydney Harbor, but after the lapse of
ONE years her owners raised her, and
ince then she has been on exhibition not
'nly in the Antipodean colonies, but
as circumnavigated Great Britain and \,
reland twice, and been shown FIVE times
q Londops
Her visitors have numbered over 15,-
D0000 r,aorre and ded the Hfn~ H. ~