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AFTER vigorously protesting against my illegal arrest, trial by a Military Court, and being placed in a combatant regiment, whilst in possession of a non-combatant certificate - not, as I pointed out, that the latter mattered anything, for I had determined not to aid the war directly or indirectly, roundabout or square, at home or abroad - I was sentenced by a Military Court to six month's imprisonment.
I have never before so much as seen a prison, and looked forward to my new experience with great expectations. As a boy, I had read in my history books of the imprisonment of many reformers in the religious and political world. My father used to send my blood coursing warmly through my veins by stories of relatives, some of whom were either imprisoned or transported for taking part in the Chartist rising. These all contributed to sending me off on my new errand with buoyant spirits.
Any buoyance or enthusiasm I possessed was doomed to meet an early death, and something more solid and lasting was needed
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in its place. Prison was not what I expected it to be!
On my arrival at Wormwood Scrubbs, I was surprised to find there were no quarries there. This surprise was expressed to me by others also. Having entered, my first feeling was that of curiosity - a hasty glance round and a first impression. Then - of a sense of seclusion from the world without - for six long months!
I was soon introduced to my first cell. As I was marched by a warder along a corridor, there fell on my ears the rather uncanny sound of the warder's jingling keys and the tread of his heavy boots. Having passed into my cell, I was pierced through by the banging of the door and the turning of the key in the lock behind me. Thus began the two long years of my incarceration!
There was now no buoyancy left. The outlook was changed. One can wax warm when addressing his tens or his hundreds. But under these circumstances one grows cold. No encouraging eye can be seen, no approving nod, no ringing cheers to stimulate, no criticism to call forth all one's energies in reply. No! all is the reverse! You are driven within yourself. You ask yourself: "Is it worth the candle? Whatever has made me take this step? To where will your sufferings lead?" So I stood still; looked round, ruminated a little; realised my isolation and well-nigh choked with emotion, for I thought of home. I knew that somewhere in that same building was my only brother. I longed to speak to him; to signal that I was there, if only I could convey the word by telepathy! But I hadn't faith in that. Could he be in
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the next cell? I tapped at the wall. There was no response. I tapped again. The only answer was the echo from the empty halls. How near was the next man? How far? Just then the corridors echoed with the tread of some unknown person. Who could it be? My cell door opened and the warder handed in my first prison meal, a pint of porridge and an eight ounce loaf of brown bread, but sans butter, sans sugar, sans tasty bits - and sans appetite also.
I then began to collect myself, and I realised that this was solitary confinement. In other words, I was deprived of my elementary rights, vouchsafed to all creation, of associating with my kind. I know no worse or more brutal form of punishment. I have seen men driven stark mad by it. On men with a highly strung nervous temperament it is disastrous. If a man has a moral weakness it drives his weakness within him and weakens what strong points he made have. It is no cure for criminality! It aggravates it. My varied experience of prison life amply bears out these statements.
The rigours of prison life are not confined to your cell, but extend over a much wider field. A most barbarous rule is the silence rule! Imagine yourself having to suffer the indignity of having your letters, which are already regulated in number and matter, postponed for a week, and your yourself placed on bread and water for a week, plus being kept in your cell for the same length of time - all because you were caught talking to a fellow prisoner. Or a similar punishment because you are caught looking through your cell window. Nothing dare be in your cell but by the warder's permission, and such things
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as are there are to be placed according to the idiosyncrasies of the Governor. This exactness re details serves only to make the prisoner concentrate his mind on obscure matters, which is the tendency of cell life itself, and harms him in concentrating on anything of moment. I have often found myself counting the number of bricks there were in the walls of my cell, or the number of knots in the floor, or else engaging in the most fantastic dreams. These things drive out clear thinking, and make sound judgment more difficult; whilst the strictness of the warders makes men cunning and crafty, aiming at all kinds of devices and petty deceptions.
I had, however, much chance for study, and read extensively. I read secular and sacred history, studied Latin, Greek, Euclid and Algebra, and when later we secured greater liberty, I taught logic to some fellow prisoners, whilst they tried to teach me Esperanto, etc., but without much success. I conversed much with Quakers, and read a number of their books, but ever failed to appreciate their standpoint. Whilst in Wandsworth prison, I addressed their meetings four times, with varied effects upon their members. They do not appreciate a New Testament stand.
My conclusion, after calmly studying my two years' experience, is that I fail to find anything that can be said in favour of our present prison system. It is no cure for crime, for it brings offenders together where they clandestinely compare notes. Rather than inducing them to look at their act with shame, it causes them to dwell unduly on the same. "Familiarity breeds contempt" is a maxim which applies here also, and they become crime hardened. They realise they have lost their
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name, and they go on from crime to crime. I view with pity the juvenile offender, who is seldom cured by the system, but rather marked out by it to become a frequenter of these quarters.
The system requires to be uprooted and supplanted by another which shall rest not on force and punishment, but which shall give greater facilities for moral education and a persuasiveness to amend. At present, this side lacks fearfully. The predominant religious element is the Church of England, whose ministers have free access to every cell. They run three and four meetings a week, but the spirituality of these meetings and visits is, I regret to have to say, at a very low ebb. Nonconformity should rise to the occasion and demand an equal standing with the State Church, a free access to all cells, the same as these religious state hirelings. A system is required which will not drive a man within himself, but which will raise him up higher. There is a germ of good in the heart of every man if only we can find it, and it is so valuable it is worth the effort. A soul is at stake!
Brute force is the underlying principle of our prison system, whether civil or military. In the latter, you find it carried out to its utmost logical conclusion. My knowledge of this is based on a month's stay in France, the first fourteen days at Etaples, the remainder at Les Attaque No. 5 Military Prison. It was here I witnessed, and experienced, the most barbarous treatment. I will content myself by giving an extract from a letter written by me on my return to Wandsworth Prison:- "On the 'compound' at Etaples, we were horse-whipped, half-choked by sandbags slung
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round our necks, and thrown into dark cells. Later, for an hour and a half, ten or twelve of the army's biggest bullies set about five of us, for refusing to obey the order to "double" - and we were whipped, struck and kicked, with fists and boots, thrown down, kicked whilst down, thrown against the railings, shaken as a dog would shake a rat, pushed and dragged about until totally exhausted, and we were all on the point of collapse.
"We were then transported to No. 5 Prison, Les Attaque. There, for refusing to unload a boat we were sentenced by another military tyrant to 'fourteen days confinement to cell, fourteen days No. 1 Field Punishment, fourteen days No. 1 Diet.' The field punishment consisted in being handcuffed twenty-four hours per day. During the daytime our hands were behind us, during the night they were fastened in front."
I am told harrowing tales of men being doomed to death for small offences. But, not to rely on hearsay, I have seen men, or rather youths in their teens, beaten mercilessly with the buckle end of officers' belts, on head and face. At Les Attaque, I saw a youth chained hands and feet, stripped naked, doubled over an officer's knees, and then thrashed by two or three others with their metal mounted belts. The shrieks of agony, which lasted long after the incident was over, I shall never forget. Again, I heard the cries of a man who was shot whilst trying to escape. He was brought back, thrust into a cold cell, whipped with officers' belts, and allowed to bleed all night, if needs be to death.
J'ACCUSE.
There is no torture too severe, no punishment too harsh, if done to maintain the moral
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of the army. And these things were done with the full knowledge and consent of the authorities. I indict the Government of the day with knowing these things - for reports were made to them on the return to England of many who thus suffered - and permitting them to continue. And similar things are done in the military prisons in this country. I indict the Government with knowing these things and hypocritically howling down others for doing the self-same things. The independent mind which asserted itself in the army was thrust into prison, there to be bullied, starved and tortured till all love of independence was gone, and nought was left but a fearful slavish obedience, be he volunteer, conscript or conscientious objector - a man robbed of manhood. I indict them with soliciting my services to end such and yet applying it to me. I indict them with making such the foundation of the army. I indict the Church with defending a system which must have this as one of its integral parts. He must be more than a bold Christian who will justify this business.
I challenge contradiction of my statements and am prepared to prove them up to the hilt. These things happened in the sixth month of the year 1917, on the compound at Etaples and in No. 5 Prison, Les Attaque, Calais.
The following extract from a letter written at the time sets forth the spirit in which we were enabled to endure and become more than conquerors through Him that loved us:-
"I shall no doubt come out of this crisis, by God's help, a vessel shaped more like
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the Divine image, made perfect through suffering."
And the words of Robert Browning, as follows, will fittingly express what we desired and aimed to be in all our witness for Christ:
One who never turned his back, but marched breast forward,
Never doubted clouds would break;
Never dreamed though right were worsted, wrong would triumph;
Held we fail to rise, are baffled to fight better, sleep to wake.'