Page 28 - All About History - Issue 52-17

Prisons

Hall of Fame

Prison reformers

Meet the pioneers who helped transform prison systems around the

world and changed the lives of inmates serving their time

elizAbeth fry BRITISH, 1780-1845
Born into a Quaker family, Elizabeth Fry
believed strongly in the importance of charity
Elizabeth Fry work and did all she could to help those less
dedicated her fortunate than herself. When visiting Newgate
life to helping
people and Gaol in 1813, she was shocked by the filthy
made huge and overcrowded conditions, particularly those
improvements to suffered by female prisoners and their children,
prison conditions
and so began campaigning for reform. When
her brother-in-law, Thomas Fowell Buxton, was
elected as an MP, he helped to promote her Ancus Marcius set up the first state prison
In 1840, cause in the House of Commons and eventually in Ancient Rome, primarily as a place to
hold those awaiting execution
Elizabeth Fry the 1823 Gaols Act was introduced, resulting in Ancus mArcius
improvements such as women warders being
set up a school for put in charge of women prisoners. ROMAN, c.678 BcE-616 BcE
nurses in London, and The only state prison in ancient Rome was built
some of her students “Punishment is not for by the fourth king of Rome, Ancus Marcius, to
deal with the growing number of lawbreakers.
accompanied Florence revenge, but to lessen crime As incarceration was not a sentence under
Nightingale to the Roman law, Marcius’ Mamertine Prison was
Crimean War and reform the criminal” mainly used as a place to hold those awaiting
Elizabeth Fry execution. It consisted of an underground
chamber that could only be accessed via a hole
Beccaria’s essay was in the roof, through which the prisoners were
cesAre beccAriA on overhauling the lowered and often never returned from.
the first treatise
ITALIAN, 1738-94 criminal law system
Now considered one of the
greatest minds of the 18th theodore
century Age of Enlightenment,
Cesare Beccaria’s writings on WilliAm dWight
criminology were ahead of AMERICAN, 1822-92
their time. He wrote his most
As well as being the sole
famous and influential essay, On
professor at New York’s newly
Crimes And Punishments, when
established Columbia School of
he was just 26, but initially
Law from 1858 to 1873, before
published it anonymously for becoming dean until 1891,
fear of a government backlash Cesare Theodore William Dwight also
over his criticisms of the penal Beccaria’s had a particular interest in
system. He protested against essay, On Crimes prison reform. He collaborated
the use of torture to obtain on the 1867 Report on the Prisons
confessions, the inconsistency And Punishments,
and Reformatories in the United
and inequality of sentencing, was translated into States and Canada endorsing
and advocated the abolition of the reformatory approach to
capital punishment. His ideas several languages and legal punishment, and served
went on to heavily influence publicly endorsed by as president of the New York
Dwight was an active
reform in Western Europe and Catherine the Prison Association. He was also a member of the prison
even helped shape the US delegate to the 1878 International and legal system
Constitution and Bill of Rights. Great
Prison Congress in Stockholm.
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