Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1917-07-21

third-year trees. another "pulr' fourth
barrels of spirits. The stills run two
charges a day ordinarily and produce
Icm 100 to 10 gallons of turpentine in
one charge.
July and August, the rainy season in
Florida, are the worst months of the year
for ague, chills, fever, pneumonia and tha
like Then 1t rains almost every day and
the water foods the country.
Oats de time when 1t gifts you." said
n convict in a whisper. Nah Gawd
nan, hits sho' awful. standin in watah
an runnin' all day long in the wet grass
ND to yo' waist. Why, man, abs got a
lump in nah chist right now as big as yo
fist. Every man in this heah camp has
got sumpin' the matter of him.
In 1910, Gov Gilchrist considered TWEEN.
ty deaths among 1881 prisoners a low
rate. because $50 many are diseased be-
fore entering the camps"
Reward for Industry.
All prisoners are worked on the task
system, and If they finish their work on
Friday evening or early Saturday morn
ing. they have the balance of the week in
which to rest. This system. inspectors
say, has been the means of getting good
work out of the men without punishment
But there are many camps where there is
entirely too much punishment, where the
wardens and guards are not at all suited
to their positions.
When you cut or burn your finger and
run to the medicine cabinet for bottle
OF spirits of turpentine, you seldom stop
to think of the way in which this medi-
cine is gathered; how much more Of pain
it involves than the pain you seek to al
lay by it's use. what bodily and mental
travail what cost in human life.
Al the time of my visit 20 this Florida
camp, 1909 or more convicts were leased
by the state to one company-the Florida
Pine Company-for the sum of $323.84 per
convict annually. and in turn subleased
to individual turpentine distillers operat-
ing the thrty-one convict camps of the
state, for the sum of $500 a year apiece.
Thus the Florida Pine Company was col.
lecting the tidy little sum of about $76
per annum upon the labor of between
1900 and 1900 ccnvicts-a total of perhaps
S12t 900 a year. This company paid to
tho state one year for the use of convicts
$o07 116.48 The arrangement was 80
satisfactory and profitable to both parties
that the lease was renewed in 1909 for a
period of four more years; and on Janu-
airy l, 1914. number of leases were re-
newed for two years.
All the convict got out of this sum was
a whitewashed stockade, work the year
round in all kinds of fever and weather,
punishment with a leather strap for in
fraction of rules or tagging at work. no
erergy left for overtime work, even IL he
were paid for IL, and no money for thoss
who might be dependent upon him.
And then. as If the system were in
compatible with nature herself, the mil
liens of pine trees began each year to
lose their productiveness so IT was no
longer profitable to operate the camps, =
number of which went out of existence
when the four-year lease expired in 1914,
ana others followed so that the state.
both from necessity and policy, provided
by statute for the care of its convicts on
a state prison farm in Bradford County.
The bill provided that after January 1.
1914, all new prisoners should be placed
on the state farm. except that able
bodied ones could be delivered to private
lessees or to counties. to replace those
whose sentences might have expired or
who might have become hospital suS-
jects. AS time goes on. the solution, II It
car be called that. of the state convict
from the turpentIne camp to the prison
farm becomes a gradual and much-de-
sired process