unfitted to mix with their equals in rank, the blight of gaol life
had passed upon them ; and cases are not infrequent of such as had
actually got their discharge refusing to avail themselves of it, and
continuing to occupy their old quarters.**
The Warden's freehold consisted of the prison strictly so called,
and comprehended, besides, an inclosure precisely similar to that
which surrounds many of our cathedrals.^' In this close several
'* messuages " had been built from time to time by successive
Wardens at their own cost. The " messuages " appear to have been
blocks of buildings like those in the Temple or Lincoln's Inn, and
were like them divided into chambers and let out to such as
could pay for them, almost precisely as in the Inns of Court. It
appears that there was even some competition for these chambers,
and that as long as the occupant paid his rent he could not — or
believed he could not — be ejected from them. When he went out
he locked his door, and for the Warden to force an entrance was
regarded as a trespass — outrageous and illegal.'^ Sir Francis Engle-
field had three " chambers," in which, says Harris, he received as
many as sixty visitors in a day. Mr. Chamberlayne seems to have
kept up quite an establishment."^ Ashburnham Peck had his sons
to livQ with him. Others had their wives and families. Francis
Tregian had collected a large library during his long incarceration,
and when he died in the Fleet there were " many hundred volumes "
in his chamber which he had accumulated.®
« Pp. 9, 27, 65, 66. ^ MS. A. « P. 73, 1. 18; p. 102, 1. 10.
d P. 62, 1. 15. « Pp. 84, 93, 59, 72, 141.
XIV INTRODUCTION.
A great inducement to the erection of these blocks of chambers
seems to have been given by the legislation of Queen Elizabeth
against the Catholics, and the consequent imprisonment of a new-
class of prisoners," viz. : the Recusant Gentry, whose obstinate non-
conformity subjected them to heavy fines, and the Priests who were
hunted down by the Pursuivants. This class were prepared
to pay for any indulgence, and the profits derived from such
prisoners were so large that it became well worth the Warden's
while to enter into an extensive building speculation whereby the
*' chambers" were increased in number fivefold.'' For this privi-
leged class too there were " gardens and places of recreation" —
such as they were — and for others who could hardly afford such
luxuries as these there was yet the privilege, not to be enjoyed
without the inevitable fee, of taking exercise " on the leads."
But the occupants of the chambers were the aristocracy of the
Fleet, who held themselves aloof from the motley rabble, who
bawled and swore, and robbed and drank, and fought and gambled
in the prison strictly so called. This in Harris's time seems to have
been substantially the same as it had been for centuries.'' It con-
sisted of " six great rooms and a court-yard, with the Tower Chambers
and Bolton's Wards." The Tower Chambers appear to have
been only recently set apart by the Warden as second-class chambers,
the occupants of which were charged less than in the " Parlour
Chambers," but more than the tenants considered the Warden had
any legal right to claim. They could have been but small rooms,
and were three in number.*^ And Harris says they could without
crowding hold eight beds. In other words the Tower Chambers
were chambers where two or three men at least had one room
»P.86. "p.iY^i. 10. «P.86. -'P. 89.
INTRODUCTION. XV
amongst them. Of the other wards one was appropriated to women-,
one was called the Twopenny Ward, because the prisoners there paid
2d. a night; and one was the Beggars' Ward, where the prisoners
paid nothing and received nothing. Though tlic Warden men-
tions Bolton's Wards frequently, it is difficult to make out anything
about them, or that they differed in any respect from the ordinary
wards where the rank and file of the prisoners were confined.
There was a depth lower than the wards, viz., the Dungeon," for
refractory prisoners. Harris tries to make the best of it, but even
so his account exhibits to us a very ugly picture : that a culprit once
shut up there could be kept in irons and fastened in the stocks was
no more than was to be expected; but that the dungeon could on
occasion be converted into a place of torture and persecution of a
very dreadful kind we learn from more sources than one in the
course of its black history.^
It did not suit Harris's purpose to reveal to us much about the
Dungeon, nor do the complainants in the case seem to have troubled
themselves much with that. Nobody would get into the Dungeon
if he could help it; but if he did get there— well, naturally, all the
worse for him ! Nor do the petitioners concern themselves with the
Beggars' Ward ; that was beneath their notice ; and Harris accord-
ingly scarcely does more than allude to it. When poor creatures
got there, they were past caring for. We have to trust to an inmate
of the Beggars' Ward, more than a century after Harris's time, to
get some insight into the horrors of tlie place ; and, revolting as the
details are, they apply with certainly not less fidelity to the Prison
as it existed in Harris's time.'=
" ^- 88, 89. b MS. (B) and Bainbridge.
" " Gry of the Oppressed," p. 89; copy, pp. 130-35.
CAMD. SOC. d
XVI INTRODUCTION.
Tn the Beggars' Ward an insolvent debtor — who may have been
arrested for a few shillings — was left to his fate. For fire, food,
clothing, bedding, he had to trust to the commiseration of the out-
side world, who had never perhaps heard of his name, and only
darkly suspected that there was a ghastly sweltering mass of misery
inside the prison walls which it was well to alleviate if it could do
so. But in the course of those long centuries hundreds must have
fallen victims to cold and want and squalor, dying literally like dogs
in their corner, mouldy straw beneath them, and foul rags scantily
spread over their shivering and emaciated forms. The condition of
the prisoners in the Common Wards was only a shade better than that
of the occupants of the Beggars' Ward, and for this no thanks were
due to the Warden, but to the friends of the prisoner, who still con-
tributed some pittance to his support, and who took care that the
rio-our of his imprisonment should be lessened as far as might be.
These poor creatures had to find their own bed and bedding — as every
one else had — but they paid fees for the privilege of lying upon
it without some one or more of their fellow prisoners being told off
to share it with them.'' How frightfully crowded the wards some-
times were may be inferred from the incidental allusion of Harris
to one occasion when the Tower Chambers, in which it was consi-
dered hard that eight beds should be placed, had contained '' " above
20 beds of the Wardens, and prisoners lodged there to the number of
56 ! " The filth and vermin are mentioned and alluded to ivithout
complaint — it was taken for granted, and looked upon as inevitable.
Harris even mentions it as an instance of his own extraordinary
humanity and regard for the prisoners' welfare (! ) that ^'' at the
a Two in a bed was the best accommodation that a prisoner could expect, p. 82,
1. 7. p. 84, 1. 10. " r. 90, 1. 14.
INTRODUCTION. XVll
beginning " of his entering upon his office some of the prisoners
" were permitted to come out and fetch water to cleanse the
wards." Xay ! " sometimes " the beds were actually aired ! '•'
The moral degradation corresponded to the physical. " You must
have been most miserable to be so cruel," was Aurora Leigh's retort
to the has who was hurlino; curses at her. And those Fleet prisoners
who were " most miserable " in their abject wretchedness were con-
sistently merciless and cruel. In mere wanton mischief men howled
like maniacs through the night, and blew horns while the sick were
gasping out their last breath.'' Women of the town came in and out
freely; pickpockets took refuge within the " liberties"; the blackleg
and the sharper were safe there; ingress and egress for any one not
actually under arrest was almost incredibly lax; and much more de-
pendence was placed upon such bonds and securities as the lawyers
drew up than upon any bolts and bars which the smith or carpenter
could contrive. We hear of prisoners being robbed of every far-
thing upon their persons by their fellow-prisoners, of brawls and fights
as too frequent to deserve notice, of its being the ordinary thing for
the prisoners to be ready with their sword or dagger. If now and
then the Warden's servant got stabbed, or a riotous ruffian got his
head broken with a candlestick, or some one else got " slain by
misadventure," the occurrence called for very little comment, and
by-and-by things went on as before.
INIeanwhile the rations furnished to such as were able to pay their
way to one of the " Hall Commons " appear to have been no better
than we should have expected. The . Warden must live, and his
income was derived not only from the rents of the chambers but
from the profits that accrued from the supply of food, drink, and
« p. 88. ^ Pp- 73, 74, 151, 1. 36.
XVIU INTRODUCTION.
fuel. The prisoners said the quality was abominable and the
charges extortionate. Some rough attempts were made to remedy
the evils complained of, but practically there was no redress. Sir
Francis Englcfield set up a sort of ordinary in his chambers ^ at
which certain prisoners dined; others followed his example. The
Warden began to be afraid that his own gains would be diminished.
He objected, and took measures to put a stop to this poaching upon
his prerogative. The mutiny which broke out at last, and of
which we hear so much in the following pages, seems to have been
caused by Harris's attempt to force all prisoners to content them-
selves with such purveyance as he was ready to afford. But it is
evident that he abused his monopoly. Even by his own admission
some prisoners actually paid for their rations and paid an additional
fee for liberty to find themselves^ Even so the Warden had not
done with them ; for after they had obtained their provisions from
outside they were again charged a fee for licence to cook at the
Warden's kitchen.'^ Surely, pleads the Warden, this could be no
hardship ! Twenty years before, one man " paid 20/. per annum for
licence to fetch his diet from abroad." ^ That any temperament or
any constitution could support long years of imprisonment like this
— aggravated as it was by all that goes to make life weary, hateful,
and hopeless — is to us, in our luxurious days, almost unintelligible.
And yet the denizens of the Fleet lived on. " IMany of them,"
says Harris, "have been prisoners for 30 years, some 25, and down-
wards." ^ They did die, however, and they died frequently. And
what ghastly death-beds they must have been ! Even when a poor
wretch had got his last discharge and the broken heart had made an
end of beating, even then the dead body of the debtor was the
» Pp. 93-95. ^ P. 119. '' P. 93. ^ P. 92. <^ Pp. 43, 65, 72, 94.
INTRODUCTION. XIX
Warden's property, and could not be recovered by the relations
without the payment of the fees due or demanded." The cases
mentioned by Moses Pitt as occurring in his own experience can
hardly have been fabrications, and, if they were not, they can hardly
have been without precedent or even unusual.
Amid all this turmoil of violence, lawlessness, and vice, it will
perhaps surprise the modern reader most of all to find that not only
were the forms of religious worship kept up,^' but that inside tliis
chamber of horrors the religious dissension and feuds of the outside
world were repeating themselves in grim parody. In Marston's
" Eastward Hoe " <= Wolfe the Jailor says, " I have had of all sorts
of men i' the kingdom under my keys, and almost all religions i'
the land, as Papist, Protestant, Puritan, Brownist, Anabaptist,
Millenary, Family o' Love, Jew, Turk, Infidell, Atheist, Good
Fellow, &c." He might have been speaking of the Fleet instead of
the Counter, for in the Fleet the clamour of conflicting zealots was
confusing enough. Popish Recusants, themselves suiFering for their
religious opinions, stubbornly refuse to attend the Protestant service
and treat it with mockery and derision, " drumming " at the doors
» A long list of complaints against the Wardens of the Fleet for extortion, jier-
secntion, and actual torture, might be made out from the Records in the State
Paper Office if it were worth while to pi;rsue so painful a subject. In the
Appendix will be found the case of Joachim Newton, Warden (or Deputy Warden?),
in 1597; and the barbarities of Richard Manlove, Warden in 1690, became the
subject of judicial inquiry (Ciy of the Oppressed, p. 84). The case of Thomas
Bainbridge, dismissed from the Wardenship in 1729, may be read in the Statutes at
Large, 2° Geo. 11. c. 32, and in the State Trials. It is certain that if matters did
not much improve between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries they could not
have got worse. Harris's summary of the past history of the Fleet, at p. 9, 1. 24, &c.
speaks for itself.
'' Down to Howard's days, and long after, the fees for the chaplain charged to the
prisoners are conspicuous. ' The play was acted in 1605.
XX INTRODUCTION.
while it is going on.'"^ Another set of fanatics elect a preacher of
their own, make a contribution for him at the end of his sermon, and
are marvellously edified by his discourse.'^ A crazy enthusiast who
had rendered himself notorious by his extravagant notions and the
energy which he had displayed in trying to propagate them, though
thrown into the Fleet to cure him of his delusions, does his best
to proselytise there, and appears to have had some success. But it
was inside the walls just as it was outside: Men were fighting for
religion without it; and for any influence that their professions
exercised upon their daily conduct, or for any wholesome effect
which these produced upon their lives, they might almost more
profitably have been playing at bowls or working problems in
algebra than belabouring one another with the bludgeons of contro-
versial theology.
The two most notable incidents with which Harris's Apology has
to do are the mutinous outbreak among the prisoners, which
ocurred in July 1619/ and the stabbing of Sir John Whitbrooke
by Broughton in the following October.
We should probably have heard little or nothing of either
occurrence if it had not chanced that, two years later, some of the
prisoners contrived to get a formal complaint lodged against the
Warden. As to the stabbing of Sir John Whitbrooke it attracted
very little attention at the time; the event is just mentioned in the
news-letters, and it seems as if the rumours that were circulated
about it by the quidnuncs provoked a faint sentiment of displeasure
in certain quarters, but it was a nine-days' wonder, and was soon
forgotten. As for the mutiny, I have not once met with any notice
of or allusion to it in any of the many diaries or letters which have
» P. 136. '' Pp. 48, 50, 1. 32. «= P. 43.
UNIVFr-
INTRODUCTION.^^^'4 L ' r xxi
been preserved. Such things had been and such things would be
again. The silence is more suggestive than any comments could
have been ; nor is that silence less suggestive because, just about a
year after the prisoners in the Fleet barricaded the wards — smashing
the furniture, forcing the bolts, and assaulting their gaolers — a pre-
cisely similar emeute broke out in the King's Bench, and of so
violent a character as to need the interference of the High SheriflF
of the county Avith something approaching an armed force.^ There
is no reason to believe that there was any concerted action between
the inmates of the two prisons. Both cases appear to have been
sudden and spontaneous explosions of passion among a crowd of
desperate men, whose condition was past all bearing, and whose
misery and irritation had driven them at last to phrcnzy.
It would be out of place to continue the history of the Fleet for
the two centuries after Harris's time, during which it continued to
be used as a debtors' prison. The same abuses and abominations
went on unchecked and unreformed for 150 years. At last the
" iNIoral Genius" arose who denounced the iniquities that were
so scandalous, and, though it took another 70 years to get rid of
the vile system, it succumbed at last. Even towards the end of
the seventeenth century some feeble palliation to the barbaric laws
affecting imprisonment for debt were from time to time introduced
into the statutes; but the very frequency of these enactments shows
too plainly how partial such measures were in their operation, and
how much they were needed. The men who framed and draughted
the remarkable petition and Act which is printed in the Appendix V.
" See Appendix III.
XXll INTRODUCTION.
were men who were very much in advance of their age. Two
hundred years were to pass away before the legislature of this
country could entertain such views as those set forth, and before the
abolition of punishment for debt was finally determined on. It was
not till the 22nd December 1844, that the Fleet Prison and the
ground on which it stood was brought to the hammer.*
" In the Guildhall Library the printed plans and specifications, «Scc. of the sale
may still be seen. In the same collection is a " Plan and Section of the Interior,
and Perspective views of the Fleet Prison, by Rotaldc;" it has no date, but it must
represent the Fleet as it appeared after the fire in 1755.
The (Economy of the Fleete,
OR
An Apologeticall Answeare of Alexander Harris
[late Warden there] unto xix Articles sett forth
agaiiist him hy the Prisoners
CAMD. soc.
Thus say the Prisoners.
A breife Collection of some part of the Exactions, Extortions,
Oppressions, Tyrannies, and Excesses towardes the Lives, Bodies,
and Goods of Prisoners, done by Alexander Harris, Warden of the
5 Fleete, in his fowcr yearcs raisgoverneinent, ready to be proved by
Oath and other Testimonyes.
Answearc
After knowne quarrells and fightings ^ Page
betweene two prisoners, lodging them in \
10 one chamber, where quarrelling and fight- j
ing againe, and notice to him thereof given, \ 32
and of likelye further mischeife, this not-
withstanding continuance of them together
uniill the one murdered the other.
Removeing a prisoner out of his cham-
1. Murder.
15
ber, having 5\li. Is. hidd under his bedd,
whicli the prisoner required he might goe
to his chamber to dispose off, which was ^^
denyed, and he thrust up in another roome
20 close prisoner until the warden and some
of his servants rifled liis bedd of that
money.
WlL Qe-. taken out of the trunck and by 1
violence from the person of a close prisoner I
25 sick in his bedd, by the Warden and his f
servants. J
After engagement of faith soule and all
under hand and scale, contrary thereto,
detayneing a prisoner have[ing] libertye by
30 his ^Majesty's writt, to his great prejudice.
2. Felonie.
47. 3. Robberie.
52. 4. Infidelitie.
THE (ECONOMY OF THE FLEETE.
False imprisonment of men discharged
offering to pay all due fees for divers
moneths.
Close imprisonment of many without
order, warrant, or lawe, by moneths and
yeares.
Close and cruel imprisonment, chaineing,
manacling, and bolting of them with irons,
some of the degree of knighthood, with-
out cause or warrant.
Starving of men close imprisoned, guard-
ing them from meate, drinke, &c. and that
after command of authoritie to the con-
trary.
Breaking of prisoners chambers, haveing
first removed them, opening their truncks,
seizeing their goods, and still detayneing
them.
Where an order gives upon every dayes
goeing abroad by one that is not in execu-
tion 8d. to the wardes box, the orders ex-
emplified under the great scale hath a
dash over the word ivardes to make it
Wa7xlen''s bo.v,hy which practise and under
couUor thereof he continually robbeth the
poore of that 8c/. a day, which is yearely
a great matter.
Where the same order gives I2d. a day
to the keeper that goeth abroad with such
prisoner he robbeth his servante of tliat
alsoe, forcing the prisoner besides to con-
tent his keeper.
Answeare.
I rage
55. 5. False im-
prisonment.
[ 58. 6. Close impri-
sonment.
58.
67.
71.
76.
77.
7. Cruel impri-
sonment.
8. Starveing
close prisoners.
10
15
9. Seizeing and
detaineing pri-
soners goods.
20
10. Eobbing the
poore men's box.
20
11. Kobbing his 30
poore servants
of their dues.
THE (ECONOMY OF THE FLEETE.
He hatli warrant doiinants under some
of the counsell's hands, not nameing any
particular person, by which continually in
^ all countryes he seizcth upon his Majesties
subjects forccth them to give bonds to be
his prisoners, exacteth intollerable fees and
compositions, &c, where thcis apprehen-
sions ouixht to be by the sherriffs of the
^^ shires without such vexation or charjre to
the subject.
Where by orders noc man ought to pay
for any chamber (the "Warden alloweing
bedd and beding) above is. 4d a weeke
^^ he exacteth 8s., 10s., 13s. 4t/., and of some
20s. a weeke without beding.
Where before his tyme nothing was
paid for lodging in conion wards, he ex-
acteth as if they lay in private chambers
20 uponhis bedding, yea, fbrthedungconalsoe.
He exacteth after those high rates cham-
ber rents of men haveing noe chambers,
but lyeing abroad by the King's writt or
otherwise.
25 He exacteth for dyett whole commons
of men that take none of his meate or
drinke, a thing never demaunded before
his tyme.
He layeth impositions upon meat and
30 fewell, and fbrceth prisoners to pay them,
as 2f/. a joynt, 3s. 4fZ. for a loade of billets,
&c. and forceth prisoners to pay \'2d.
a bushell for charcoale which are to be
bought for \'2d, a sack.
Aiiswearc.
80.
82.
86.
91
/J2.
>98,
12. Abusing the
councell's war-
rant dormant.
13. Excessive
rates of cham-
bers.
14. Exacting lor
lodging in com-
mon wardesand
dungeon.
15. Exaction for
chombers, not
having any.
16. Exactions of
dyett, takeing
none.
17. Impositions
upon Meate and
Fuell.
THE OECONOMY OF THE FLEETE.
Answeare.
Wliere men be whole vacations abroad -) Page
by habeas corpus he forceth them to pay
him 2Qd. a day for outgoeings, their cham-
ber rent and dyett, horrible exactions
never had or demaunded by former
Wardens.
Of men haveing the King's writts to ^
goe about their businesse, he exacteth of
them for his leave, of some 40s. 3/i. oU.
\Qli. or more in money or other bribes,
a day lie trade never done by any before,
and without yeilding theis fowle exactions
they are staied and loose their occasions.
18 Horrible ex-
actions upon
101. such as goe 5
abroad by the
King's "Writs.
19. Excessive ex-
actions for his 10
> 104. favour to goe
upon the
King's Writts.
^ Their fowle exactions, extortions, and base usages towards prisoners 15
by Robert Holmes the clarke, Henry Cooke the porter, Richard
Mansell, and other ]\P Warden's worthy instruments, servants,
and affidavit men, would aske a volume, and is reserved for a longer
discourse.
There be many other great greivances which for brevity are 20
omitted, all which will directly be proved and most of theis above
be in the particular accusations deliverd in Parliament with the
witnesses names annexed, ready to bo verified upon oath as they
have already been verbally attested before the honourable comittee
at fower severall meeteings in the Fleete. 25
Thus saietli the Warden :
The Xyneteene Articles sett forth against the AVarden are such, as
if he should not answeare, it weare a tacite confession of guilt;
and to answeare in this elaborate and tedious manner may be
irksome to read. But as he hath undergon the reproach of the 30
THE (ECONOMY OF THE FLEETE.
accusation, soc he hat]i presumed to hazard the rebuke of his un-
pollished writeing rather than to leave hisinnocency unremenibred
to the workl. And therefore A^on ad forum judicii sed ad infor-
mandian conscientiam.
The Warden hath also answeared unto divers particuler men's
complaints which were made against him. And for better cleareing
thereof hath mentioned theis fblloweing, viz.:
Answeare.
The orders and constitutions renewed
10 and made Anno 3" Elizabeth for goveme-
ment of the Fleete and the prisoners
there.
The explanations of those constitutions ^