Elizabeth Fry and Her Prison Reforms

Elizabeth Fry had to do something about the state of Newgate Women's Prison (read this post about the conditions there):

She went down to Newgate prison that cold January day in 1817, four years after her first visit, not because she had decided to take up prison reform, but because she had thought, at last, of something practical which she could do to help. She went to make human contact with the prisoners; to take a hands-on approach.

Elizabeth knew she was in danger, particularly if she showed fear or said or did the wrong thing. But she had never been less afraid in her life. She picked up a scruffy little child who immediately started to finger her watch chain. She lifted her hand for attention and there was silence. 

Friends, many of you are mothers. I too am a mother. I am distressed for your children. Is there not something we can do for these innocent little ones? Do you want them to grow up to become prisoners themselves? Are they to learn to be thieves and worse?

She had gained their attention. Save their children? Sobs and tears answered her appeal. They gave her a chair, and brought their children to show her. What tales they told in their simple way of wickedness, remorse, injustice and despair. Elizabeth remained with them for hours. She tried to cheer them as best she could. When at last she was ready to leave and the barred gate was opened for her, she left behind a strange new inhabitant at Newgate, one usually abandoned at its doors; that reviver of human spirit, hope.

What was behind Elizabeth Fry’s determined visit to Newgate that winter’s day? It was very simple. Hardly anyone could possibly have disagreed with it. It required no Act of Parliament, nor any great outlay of money. She wanted simply to start a school in Newgate for the children of prisoners and for juvenile criminals. 

A visitor to the prison vividly describes the changes which had taken place:

I obtained permission to see Mrs Fry, and was taken to the entrance of the women’s wards. On my approach, no loud or angry voices indicated that I was about to enter a place which had long been known as “Hell above ground”. The courtyard into which I was admitted, instead of being peopled with beings scarcely human… presented a scene where stillness and propriety reigned. I was conducted by a decently dressed person, the newly appointed yards-woman, to the door of a ward, where, at the head of a long table, sat a lady belonging to the Society of Friends. She was reading aloud to about sixteen women prisoners, who were engaged in needlework around it. Each wore a clean-looking blue apron and bib, with a ticket having a number on it suspended from her neck by a red tape… Instead of a scowl or ill-suppressed laugh, their countenances wore an air of self-respect and gravity, a sort of consciousness of their improved character and the altered position in which they were placed. I afterwards visited the other wards, which were counterparts of the first.