BEHIND PRISON WALLS.

Putaruru Press, Volume VII, Issue 310, 17 October 1929, Page 1

BEHIND PRISON WALLS.

53-YEAR “ SLEEP.” Modern Rip Van Winkle. , ■ Fifty-three years ago a boy of 17 who had murdered children even younger than himself entered the j Charleston State Prison to expiate his crimes by a life in solitary confinement (says the Springfield Daily Republican). Last month Jesse H. Pomeroy, now a grizzled old man of 71, was taken from behind the grim walls that for more than half a century had been his home, to a State farm, a vast expanse of fertile land on which the several hundred inmates raise garden crops. Pomeroy arrived in an automobile, the first ride he had ever taken in a motor vehicle, and during the trip his eyes were held wide by wonder and his tongue almost speechless as he realised with what speed a world hidden from him by prison walls had moved in 53 years. Misses the Horses.

! Massachusetts’ historic “lifer” was surprised and disappointed by the virtual absence of horses from the highways. He saw but one from the time he left Boston until he arrived at the outskirts of Bridgewater, and at the State farm he faced one of his greatest surprises. There tractors have all but displaced horses in agricultural work, and a lengthy explanation was necessary before he was able to understand the use of those machines.

Near Brockton the two motor cars bearing Pomeroy and five other longterm prisoners like him, suffering from ill health, paused long enough at an airport for Pomeroy to witness for the first time the take off of an aeroplane. He was so amazed that he was unable to question his guards. At another point a string of freight cars held his attention, and an explanation was necessary before he could comprehend their use. The gates lowered at a railroad crossing, which halted the machines in one town through which they passed, impressed Pomeroy as one of the greatest improvements he had seen. A string of high-tension power lines on the skeleton poles completely baffled the aged prisoner. Pomeroy appeared in good humour, and his ; guards, to permit him better to_ view the countryside, had the motbr- car driven slowly. At Randolph a halt was called while a guard entered a drug store and bought Pomeroy an ice cream cone and a bottle of soda. He readily posed with these delicacies for cameramen.

Small crowds of curious people delayed the party in nearly every town. Prisoners at the State farm, who had just finished their noonday meal, were hardly less curious, and flocked about Pomeroy’s machine. Pomeroy’s removal to the State farm was directed because of his physical condition. Dr. A. W. Stearns, commissioner of correction, had ruled that Pomeroy could be better cared for at the farm than at the prison. He was assigned to a room exclusive to himself at the farm infirmary. Pomeroy was sentenced to be hung for the murder of Horace Milan, his third victim, but because of his youth the sentence was commuted to solitary confinement for life. After 41 years of “ solitary ” he was permitted to take his place with other prisoners. Prisoners at the State farm are allowed a considerable degree of liberty. Numerous Appeals Refused.

If one were to seek for the most friendless man in the world, Jesse Pomeroy perhaps would be the man finally designated. It has never been possible to arouse public sympathy enough for him to make the least impression on the Governor and Council. They have rightly refused his numerous appeals for a pardon. The release of such a prisoner, with his record of homicidal mania, would have been dangerous to society. Yet, in the retrospect, the many years of solitary confinement which be had to endure now appear to have been cruel. It was as late as the administration of Governor Foss that this aspect of the prisoner’s punishment

was seriously challenged and ended by the Governor’s order. Few people now living can remember the murder that Pomeroy committed in a church steeple in a fit of adolescent blood lust. Penological science since then has made developments that make the decade of the 1870’s seem like antiquity. Pomeroy’s crime and his long incarceration furnish good case material for the criminologist and the sociologist, but certainly nothing in the course pursued by the authorities justifies the belief that, in lieu of capital punishment, a sentence to life imprisonment means the eventual release of the murderer. Pomeroy will pay the penalty imposed to the very end.