A prison in decline?

I just Googled 'Knaphill Prison' and came across this interesting record which suggests that the prison was almost entirely unoccupied by 1888. Huh, I wonder why? I also like how they use the term Convalescent Prison. I'm not quite sure the prisoners would have agreed scrubbing frozen bricks in the bleak mid winter.

PRISONS (ENGLAND AND WALES)—KNAPHILL PRISON.
HC Deb [sic] 16 November 1888 vol 330 c1384 1384

MR. HANKEY (Surrey, Chertsey) asked the Secretary of State for War, Whether his attention has been directed to the present condition of the prison at Knaphill, Woking, which is now almost entirely unoccupied; and, whether, in view of the great want of suitable barrack accommodation at present existing throughout the country, he will at once take such steps as will enable him to convert the prison into barracks, or utilize it for the military service of the country?

THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Mr. E. STANHOPE) (Lincolnshire, Horncastle) Communications have been entered into with the Home Office with a view of obtaining for military purposes the buildings and lands of the Woking Convalescent Convict Prison; but no decision has yet been arrived at. The position of these buildings, within easy reach of Aldershot, makes it most desirable to obtain them.

Swindling the old lady of Threadneedle Street.

I just stumbled across another interesting crime story involving some Americans incarcerated at Woking Convict Invalid Prison. In 1873, the Bidwell brothers robbed the Bank of England of a whopping £500,000.

So how did they pull off such an audatious heist?

In short, they discovered that the Bank of England allowed people to draw against bills of acceptance (cheques??) from large institutions without checking to see if they were genuine. They set up an account for 'Horton and Co', impressed the bank manager 'most favourably', then waved some genuine bills under his nose (to establish their credit) before commencing the forgeries which netted them half a million pounds cash!

Easy peazy lemon squeezy.

The following article was published in the New York Times in 1892. It tells the story of how the Bidwell brothers' sister fought tirelessly for their release and gives some interesting insight into the Victorian prison system. Read the Bidwell brothers article here

Ghosties and ghoulies

Okay, so my boyfriend will kill me for this, but what the heck. He was in the garden the other day when he glanced up at the spare room window (this is the bedroom in which I had my hello ghost experience) and saw a person moving away from the window.

Later in the day he started backtracking and saying things like: It could have been the shadow of a bird flying past or one of the cats sitting on the window sill ...

Yea right ;-)

Prison to Barracks transformation - 1893

Click images to enlarge

On September 12th 1893, a series of works took place to convert the prison into barracks. On our latest visit to The National Archives, we found some Record Plans and Drawings which show some of the renovations that took place.

The first plan (above) includes the following details:

Woking Inkerman Barracks Recreation Establishment Record Plan
Formally the RC Chapel - Male Convict Prison. Reconstructed and added to under the Barracks Act 1890.
Work commenced 12th September 1893
Work 19th October 1894
Actual cost £8,677.0.0.
Constructor Mr A A Gale of Woking
Accommodation for 1 Battalion (720 R&F)

Other plans show that the Barracks included:

• Canteen
• Skittle Alley
• Library
• Coffee Shop
• Stables
• Wagon Sheds
• Coal Yard (to hold 100 tonnes)
• Latrines
• Grocery Store
• Reading Room
• Fives Courts

Newspaper Detectives

According to the NEWSPAPER DETECTIVES, a newspaper archaeological site for local research purposes, an article appeared in a local newspaper on 24th March 1866 regarding the sudden death of a convict presumably on his way to Woking Invalid Convict Prison. The convict died at Woking Railway Station and Dr John Campbell, Medical Officer, was somehow involved, possibly with the inquest??

A few days earlier on the 17th March, the same newspaper records a Fatal Accident To A Convict. Was it the same convict? Did he fall under a train I wonder?

Charles J Kickham - Famous Prisoner, Author and Fenian Leader

Author and Fenian leader. Charles J. Kickham was born on 9 May 1828, at Mullinahone in Co. Tipperary.

Kickham joined the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) or the Fenians, in 1860. He was a committed separatist. During his career as an activist, he contributed controversial political articles to a nationalist paper, the Irish People.

On 15 September 1865 the Dublin Police took possession of the Irish People headquarters at 12 Parliament Street and seized the entire contents of the office. The few members of the staff still on the premises were arrested and others were picked up on the street or in their homes.

Irish People documents revealed Kickham’s role in the Fenian conspiracy. On 11 November 1865 he was arrested. Nearly blind and almost completely deaf, Kickham was charged for writing ‘treasonous’ articles and for committing high treason. He was tried before Judge William Keogh and sentenced to fourteen years penal servitude.

He was sent to Mountjoy prison. On 10 February 1865 he was transferred to Pentonville Prison near London. During this time his health deteriorated because of poor prison diet. On 14 May 1866 he was transferred to Portland Prison and later to the invalid prison at Woking in Surrey, where he spent the remainder of his term. He was released in 1869 with his health severely impaired and returned to Mullinahone, Co. Tipperary.

More on Charles J Kickham

Does My Bum Look Big In This?

In the New York Times on September 9th 1894, the following article appeared. It focused on the vanity of female prisoners, including those at Woking Convict Invalid Prison.

See full article here.

Prison Houses

There are three rows of houses (as marked on the 1871 Ordnance Survey map above) that used to cater for the prison staff. I believe they were built at different stages of Woking Invalid Convict Prison's development.

The first stretch (marked in red) is our little stretch of Raglan Road.



The second row of houses (marked in blue) is also Raglan Road. These houses look similar to ours but they are larger and have entrances front and back. There used to be a row of these houses on both sides of the road. Now only the one side remains. The black and white image clearly shows houses on both sides of the road. It looks like such a grand road.





The third row of houses (marked in green) is furthest away from the prison and can be found on Victoria Road. These are really pretty little cottages, but look different from those on Raglan Road. If I'm honest, I don't know if these are original or if they've been rebuilt, but they certainly appear on the old map.

Newspaper clippings

24 Apr 1886 - CONVICT ESTABLISHMENT ... Last week nearly a hundred convicts arrived at this prison [Parkhurst], and more are coming nearly every day. It is stated that over a dozen of the officials at Pentonville have been ordered to join here, where duty is now very heavy. It is said that the large prison at Woking is to be devoted to the reception of lunatic criminals after the manner of Broadmoor, hence the influx of prisoners to Parkhurst. (IW County Press) - source: http://members.lycos.co.uk/s0uthbury/parkhurstsnippets.htm

It sounds as though prisoners were being shifted between prisons left right and centre during the late 1800s.

6 Feb 1915 - DEATH ... has occured of Mrs Mary Ann PRICE, aged 84, who had to her credit over 34 years efficient service in H.M. Female prisons. She joined the prison at Millbank as Assistant Matron in 1862 and was subsequently transferred to Parkhurst when the establishment was used for women. She afterwards went to Woking when the women prisoners were transferred from Parkhurst to that place. Before her retirement in 1896 she had attained the position of Chief Matron ... (IW County Press) - source: http://members.lycos.co.uk/s0uthbury/parkhurstsnippets.htm

Naughty naughty!

Every now and again I stumble across interesting tidbits of info about the sorts of people incarcerated at Woking Invalid Convict Prison. This chap, it would appear, had a problem staying out of trouble...

John Solloway
1860
Described as 'rather delicate health' he was given three months hard labour (despite only having one arm) for 'willfully exposing himself to insult certain females'. In other words: a flasher! Also described as a rogue and a vagabond.

Was this the same John Solloway imprisoned in Lewes Prison the previous year for stealing 56lbs of lead from a roof in Derby Arboretum (the UK's first public park)?

I guess some things never change.

Original Victorian Floor Plan

When Rob and I visited National Archives in Kew a couple of weekends ago, we didn't really have a clear idea of what we wanted to look at, not to mention where or how we would find it. There must be millions of documents there! By some miracle, the very first document we looked at was this: the original Victorian floor plan of our house. What are the chances of that??? And what an incredible looking document it is too; A3 in size with crumbly edges, like all important old documents should look!

On the close up below, you can see that what is now our dining room was once the kitchen (with a circular copper in the corner next to the fireplace). And what is now the kitchen was once the outside pantry and coal cellar. It appears the house had its own outside toilet, although it's difficult to ascertain whether this was an original feature or whether it was added later by Inkerman Barracks.

A copper, by the way, was a sort of water tank heated up by the coal fire or range. It would have been used to fill a tin bath, for example.

Victorian prison warders' uniforms

I began to wonder what Victorian prison warders would have looked like and discovered these fab images on the Internet. Althought they don't portray prison warders from Woking Invalid Convict Prison, they do portray prison warders of the same era.

The first image depicts Mr Lewis Cooke, his wife Mary and their three children. Lewis Cooke was a warder at Stafford Gaol between 1881 and 1891. The second image depicts a female warder at the same prison.

Image source: http://www.search.staffspasttrack.org.uk/engine/resource/default.asp?theme=33&originator=%2Fengine%2Ftheme%2Fdefault%2Easp&page=&records=&direction=&pointer=8515&text=0&resource=2651

An early discovery

One of the first snippets of information I unearthed relating to our house was this, taken from John and Anne's Family Pages: http://www.kernick.me.uk/index.html

"William James Kernick: born 21st August, 1873, at 3 Prison Cottages, Woking, where his father, John Oliver, was an Assistant Warder at the Invalid Convict Prison. He died in Bodmin in June, 1878, aged 5.

Francis George Kernick: born 30th November, 1875, at 2 Prison Cottages, Woking, but unfortunately died the following year on 8th November, of whooping cough."

A little bit more about John Oliver Kernick can be found here on the same website: http://www.kernick.me.uk/page5.html It would appear that John entered the Prison Service and was stationed firstly at Bodmin Prison, later being transferred to Woking. At the end of five years in Woking he was moved back to Bodmin in Cornwall. Sadly he died just a year after Francis' death on the 21st of November 1877 aged 42. (According the the Kernick Family Website, it was a sudden and unexpected death. A coroner's inquest held on the same day recorded a death from 'natural causes'.)

Did little Francis die at 2 Prison Cottages? And was this the reason the family returned to Bodmin? Who knows. It's weird to think that these strangers from the past have such an intimate and potentially heartbreaking link with our home.