PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
PRISONERS THEIR OWN
WARDERS
A RECORD OF THE CONVICT PRISON AT SINGAPORE IN THE
STRAITS SETTLEMENTS ESTABLISHED 1825, DISCON-
TINUED 1873, TOGETHER WITH A CURSORY
HISTORY OF THE CONVICT ESTABLISH-
MENTS AT BENCOOLEN, PENANG
AND MALACCA FROM THE
YEAR 1797
BY MAJOR J. R A. McNAIR
Late Royal Artillery, C.M.G., A.M.I.C.E., F.L.S., and F.R.G.S
Late Colonial Engineer and Surveyor General and Comptroller of Indian Convicts
Straits Settlements from 1857 to 1877 Author of " Perak
and the Malays " (Sarong and Kris)
ASSISTED BY W. D. BAYLISS
Mem. Sac. Engineers Lond., Late Superintendent of Works and
Surveys and Superintendent of Convicts, Singapore
WITH MAPS AND ILLUSTRATIONS
"A willing bondman."
H
(Julius Ccesar, Act I., Sc. 3)
WESTMINSTER
ARCHIBALD CONSTABLE AND CO
2 WHITEHALL GARDENS
1899
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
BUTLER & TANNER,
THE SELWOOD PRINTING WORKS,
FROME, AND LONDON.
260802
[McXait
DUFFADAR ARJOON, SENIOR PETTY OFFICER
OF ARTIFICERS.
Preface
SOME explanation appears to be due from us
for writing this account of the Singapore
Convict Jail so long after the date of its final
abolition.
The truth is, that for several years it has been
our opinion that it ought to be written by some
one, and the same suggestion had often been
made to one of us by the late Doctor Mouat,
Inspector General of Jails, Bengal, and others
who were well acquainted with its administration.
An opportunity lately occurred to bring us into
communication on the subject, and when we came
to compare the voluminous notes that each of us
had collected during the time that the jail was in
full vigour, we arrived at the conclusion that there
was abundant material for a work upon it. It
also appeared to us that there were some excep-
tional features in the training and discipline of
these native convicts, that might even at this day
prove of service to other Superintendents of native
jails in different parts of India and the Colonies ;
while, at the same time, such a work would not
be devoid of some interest to those who make -a
PREFACE
study of the punishment and reformation of the
criminal class of all countries, a subject in regard to
which, in spite of the great progress we have made,
the last word has certainly not yet been said.
This, then, is our apology for the attempt we
have made, and we trust that our joint labours
may be received with indulgence.
When this old Singapore jail was put an end
to in 1873, some six years after the transfer of
the Straits Settlements to the Crown, the convicts
then under confinement were removed to the
Andaman Islands, at that time not long estab-
lished as a penal settlement for India; while those
on a ticket-of-leave were permitted to merge into
the population, continuing to earn their livelihood
as artizans, cow keepers, cart drivers, and the like.
Those who were old and infirm were retained at
Singapore at the expense of the Indian Government,
and a certain number of convicts from Hongkong
were returned to that colony to complete their sen-
tences. There remained, therefore, only the local
prisoners to be dealt with, and for these, under
the subsequent orders of the Colonial Government,
was planned and constructed by our Department,
and under our supervision, a spacious prison on
the cellular system, and situated on a more healthy
site than the old convict jail, which had become
surrounded by the buildings of the town.
We should much like to have given a consecu-
tive history of this old jail from the date of its
vi
PREFACE
first construction until it was finally abolished, but
unfortunately the jail registers have not been care-
fully kept from the beginning, or are not forth-
coming ; but we have had access to some old
scattered letters and papers, and to statistics from
the year 1844, since which time the records have
been regularly kept from year to year.
A good deal of useful information has also come
within our reach from works written upon Singa-
pore and the Straits Settlements, and especially
are we indebted to an Anecdotal History of Sin-
gapore, published by the Free Press, and extend-
ing from the year 1822 to 1856, which gives an
interesting account of our early occupation of that
island, and of the use to which the labour of these
convicts was turned.
From the Memoirs of Sir Stamford Raffles,
written by his widow in 1830, and from his Life
by Demetrius Charles Boulger, in 1897, we have
been able to trace that, so far back as the year
1823, there were between 800 and 900 of these
Indian convicts at our settlement of Bencoolen, on
the south-west coast of Sumatra; and that, when this
place was conceded to the Dutch by the London
treaty of 1825, these convicts were removed to
Penang, and were subsequently distributed amongst
the three settlements of Penang, Malacca, and
Singapore. This distribution would in all proba-
bility have taken place about the year 1825, when
Singapore was incorporated with Penang and
vii
PREFACE
Malacca, under the Governor and Council of the
Incorporated Settlements.
We think the account which we are about to give
of the various employments of these Indian con-
victs at Singapore, will abundantly show how con-
siderably this important settlement has benefited by
their early introduction. They made most of the
roads in the settlement, including timber bridges,
viaducts and tunnels, and executed for the Govern-
ment many important public buildings. Moreover,
when released from imprisonment upon a ticket-
of-leave, they were absorbed innoxiously into the
native community, and again contributed to the
advantage of the place in the various occupations
they had recourse to, in order to obtain an honest
livelihood. By a judicious system of rewards, and
a graduated scale of promotion, a very remarkable
spirit of industry was infused into the bulk of
these convicts during their incarceration, and it
may be honestly said that this was effected without
the sacrifice of that wholesome discipline always
essential in the control especially of the criminal
class.
We could not, of course, interfere with their
religion, but by a well-judged scale of punishments
and rewards, and by instruction given to them in
their own vernacular, we endeavoured to raise
their character by helping them to good conduct,
and to a better way of living. To encourage and
foster that industry to which we have referred, we
viii
PREFACE
taught them the trades to which each of them
appeared to be best adapted, and held out to
them the hope that they might again become good
citizens, and earn for themselves a creditable sub-
sistence ; and, as it was our practice to deal with
each of them " individually," we were often made
aware that there was many an honest heart
immured within those prison walls.
In the narrative we have given of the Settle-
ments, it may seem that we have dwelt at too
great length upon their early history, but we
thought it would add to the interest of the work,
if we gave what is really only a limited sketch of
the various places to which those Indian convicts
were first banished beyond the seas.
In the initiation of the system of industrial
training among these convicts, special credit is due
to the late General (then Captain) Man, who in
his early years had been trained at Chatham as a
sapper. The late Colonel Macpherson, who suc-
ceeded him, carried on and improved the system,
and both these officers were well seconded in their
efforts by the late Mr. J. Bennett, C.E., who prac-
tically was their clerk of the works. Mr. Bennett
subsequently rose to a high position in the Depart-
ment.
It would be impossible to mention the names of
all the subordinate staff, but Burnett, Stuart, and
Lamb are prominent in our recollection as having
done good service as warders and instructors.
ix
PREFACE
In 1864, the Resident of Rhio, Java, Mr. E. Net-
scher, was appointed by the Dutch Government to
study and report upon the convict system in force in
Singapore, and both the Siam and Japan Govern-
ments sent special missions for the like purpose,
the mission from Japan being accompanied by Mr.
Hall, of the British Consulate. Many others, also,
recorded their opinions in its favour, and some
among them were authorities upon prison systems
pursued in some parts of both Europe and America.
The local government, we should add, in their
direction of this convict establishment, fully recog-
nised that the distinctive feature in the native mind
was to look to one rather than to many masters, to
one European executive officer rather than to a
collective body of magistrates, and, therefore, beyond
that general supervision which the Government must
ever assume over its Departments, it committed the
whole of the management, discipline, and control
of this large body of convicts entirely to their
Superintendent, under the approved rules and
regulations for his guidance, and for the administra-
tion of the whole establishment.
J. F. A. McNAIR, R.A., C.M.G.
W. D. BAYLISS.
SCOTIA, PRESTON PARK,
BRIGHTON, SUSSEX.
Contents
Chapter I
EARLY RECORDS OF BENCOOLEN, AND OBSER-
VATIONS ABOUT CONVICTS i
Chapter 1 1
A SLIGHT SKETCH OF PENANG AND THE
TREATMENT OF THE CONVICTS THERE . . 14
Chapter III
OLD MALACCA, AND THE FIRST INTRODUCTION
OF CONVICTS THERE 25
Chapter IV
A RUNNING HISTORY OF SINGAPORE: ITS JAIL
SYSTEM AND ADMINISTRATION .... 31
xi
List of Illustrations and Plates
GENERAL MONTHLY MUSTER OF THE CON-
VICTS, SINGAPORE JAIL .... Frontispiece
TO FACE PAGE
DUFFADAR ARJOON v
Plate I
OLD MAP SHOWING PENAL SETTLEMENTS . . i
Plate II
FORT CORNWALLIS, PENANG 14
Plate III
BOUNDARIES OF MALACCA, PORTUGUESE
PERIOD 25
Plate IV
OLD MALACCA 26
Plate V
ALBUQUERQUE . 26
Plate VI
MALACCA RIVER . . 28
xiv
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS AND PLATES
Plate VII
TO FACE PAGE
ST. FRANCIS XAVIER 28
Plate VIII
TOWN AND ENVIRONS OF SINGAPORE ... 31
Plate IX
ORIGINAL HUTS FOR CONVICTS, SINGAPORE . 39
Plate X
DISTRIBUTION OF JAIL BUILDINGS, SINGAPORE 77
Plate XI
MAIN GATE OF SINGAPORE JAIL .... 78
Plate XII
DUFFADAR RAM SINGH 84
Plate XIII
HEAD TINDAL MAISTRI 86
Plate XIV
CONVICT OF SECOND CLASS AND MUNSHI . . 88
Plate XV
CONVICTS OF FIFTH CLASS, AND FIFTH CLASS
SECTION A 90
Plate XV A
CHETOO CONVICT OF FIFTH CLASS ... 92
XV
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS AND PLATES
Plate XVI
TO FACE PAGE
CATHEDRAL, SINGAPORE 97
Plate XVII
GOVERNMENT HOUSE, GARDEN, AND MORTAR
MILL ioi
Plate XVIII
GOVERNMENT HOUSE, SINGAPORE, APPROACH-
ING COMPLETION 102
Plate XIX
GOVERNMENT HOUSE, SINGAPORE, COMPLETED 104
Plate XX
CONVICTS STONE-QUARRYING in
xvi
A' I) I A A
Plate L
Chapter I
EARLY RECORDS OF BENCOOLEN AND
OBSERVATIONS ABOUT CONVICTS
IN opening this account of the old convict jail
at Singapore, it will be necessary to refer, as
we have said, in some little detail to the history of
the settlements of Bencoolen, Penang, and Malacca,
to which convicts from India were first sent, prior
to their reception into the Singapore prison.
The first penal settlement was Bencoolen, the
Banka-Ulu 1 of the Malays, to which they were
transported from India about the year 1787, much
about the same time that transportation to Australia
for English convicts was sanctioned by our laws.
Bencoolen was singularly adapted as a receptacle
for convict labour ; it was not a populous place
when we took it in 1685, nor, as far as we
can gather, had the population much increased
up to the year 1787, and the few Sumatrans
and Malays that were its inhabitants were an
indolent race, and preferred a life of ease to any
1 Literally^ swollen at the source.
I B
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
kind of labour. They were content to get their
livelihood from fishing, and they had no artificial
wants. They would occasionally work upon pepper
plantations, and would bring the berries to Ben-
coolen for sale to British merchants. Labour was
therefore wanted here, and the East India Company
thought that by its introduction they would make of
Bencoolen a thriving settlement ; but as it turned
out they were greatly disappointed, for both pepper
and camphor, which were the only commodities
there for trade, greatly declined ; and commerce,
which was all-important to the East India Company,
almost entirely disappeared after its establishment
for some few years. It was a miserable place from
all accounts, and was described by Captain James
Lowe, in 1836, " as an expensive port, and of no
use to any nation that might possess it," and he
only echoed what was previously said of it by
William Dampier, who had once been there in the
humble position of a gunner, that it was " a sorry
place, sorrily governed, and very unhealthy." So
unhealthy was it, that it became necessary as early
as 1714 to remove the Residency and offices to a
point of land about two miles further off the coast,
which was called Fort Marlborough ; but even this
locality was found not to be beyond the reach of
malaria, and the place continued, as Crawfurd says,
to be more or less unhealthy down to the cession of
the settlement in 1825. But it had, however, done
its work in providing for us a firm footing in those
2
EARLY RECORDS OF BENCOOLEN
seas, and was a help to the next step in our pro-
gress towards a wider empire.
It is important to relate here that its last Lieut. -
Governor was the founder of our now important
settlement of Singapore. He took up the appoint-
ment at Bencoolen on the 2Oth March, 1818, founded
Singapore in 1819, returned to Bencoolen in 1820,
and finally left for England in 1824.
It is not our present purpose to dwell upon the
intellectual and moral greatness of this remarkable
man, for full justice has been done to his memory
in the recent account of his life by Demetrius
Boulger, and by an impressive tribute to his worth
by General Sir Andrew Clarke, R.E., G.C.M.G.,
in a paper read by him in May last at the Royal
Institution.
It is of course impossible at this late date to
trace what was done in connection with the convicts
on their first arrival at this settlement, though we
gather from old letters that they were employed
principally upon road- making, and on clearing
estates which, "owing to their owners having died
intestate, had reverted to the State." They were
also let out to planters on a guarantee as to their
not quitting the settlement.
The first authentic information we have in regard
to the management and treatment of these convicts
is from a letter to the Government by Sir Stamford
Raffles, written from Bencoolen in 1818; which we
give bodily from "his Life, written by his widow in
3
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
1830. It is a paper which gives evidence of the
soundness of his views upon this subject, and
indeed it may be truly said, that with every ques-
tion with which he had to deal he always displayed
the greatest judgment and keenness of insight.
It is as follows :
" But there is another class of people that call for
immediate consideration. Since 1787 a number of
persons have been transported to this place from
Bengal for various crimes of which they have been
found guilty.
The object of the punishment as far as it affects
the parties must be the reclaiming them from their
bad habits, but I much question whether the prac-
tice hitherto pursued has been productive of that
effect. This I apprehend to be, in a great measure,
in consequence of sufficient discrimination and en-
couragement not having been shown in favour of
those most inclined to amendment, and perhaps
to the want of a discretionary power in the chief
authority to remit a portion of the punishment and
disgrace which is at present the common lot of all.
It frequently happens that men of notoriously bad
conduct are liberated at the expiration of a limited
period of transportation, whilst others, whose
general conduct is perhaps unexceptional, are
doomed to servitude till the end of their lives.
As coercive measures are not likely to be at-
tended with success, I conceive that some advan-
4
EARLY RECORDS OF BENCOOLEN
tage would arise from affording inducements to
good conduct by holding out the prospect of again
becoming useful members of society, and freeing
themselves from the disabilities under which they
labour. There are at present about 500 of these
unfortunate people. However just the original
sentence may have been, the crimes and characters
of so numerous a body must necessarily be very
unequal, and it is desirable that some discrimination
should be exerted in favour of those who show the
disposition to redeem their character. I would
suggest the propriety of the chief authority being
vested with a discretionary power of freeing such
men as conduct themselves well from the obligation
of service, and permitting them to settle in the
place and resume the privileges of citizenship. The
prospect of recovering their characters, of freeing
themselves from their present disabilities, and the
privileges of employing their industry for their own
advantage would become an object of ambition, and
supply a stimulus to exertion and good conduct
which is at present wanting.
It rarely happens that any of those transported
have any desire to leave the country ; they form
connections in the place, and find so many induce-
ments to remain, that to be sent away is considered
by most a severe punishment.
While a convict remains unmarried and kept to
daily labour very little confidence can be placed in
him, and his services are rendered with so much
5
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
tardiness and dissatisfaction that they are of little or
no value ; but he no sooner marries and forms a
small settlement than he becomes a kind of colonist,
and if allowed to follow his inclinations he seldom
feels inclined to return to his native country.
I propose to divide them into three classes.
The first class to be allowed to give evidence in
court, and permitted to settle on land secured to
them and their children ; but no one to be admitted
to this class until he has been resident in Bencoolen
three years. The second class to be employed in
ordinary labour. The third class, or men of aban-
doned and profligate character, to be kept to the
harder kinds of labour, and confined at night.
In cases of particular good conduct a prospect
may be held out of emancipating deserving convicts
from further obligation of services on condition of
their supporting themselves and not quitting the
settlement.
Upon the abstract question of the advantage of
this arrangement I believe there will be little
difference of opinion. The advantage of holding
out an adequate motive of exertion is sufficiently
obvious, and here it would have the double ten-
dency of diminishing the bad characters and of
increasing that of useful and industrious settlers,
thereby facilitating the general police of the country
and diminishing the expenses of the Company."
These intentions were acted upon afterwards,
6
EARLY RECORDS OF BENCOOLEN
and the good effects of the regulations were soon
apparent ; a large body of people who had been
living in the lowest state of degradation soon
became useful labourers and happy members of
society. So grateful were they for the change, that
when they were sent round to Penang on the trans-
fer of Bencoolen to the Dutch in 1825, as we have
stated, they entreated to be placed on the same
footing as they had been placed at Fort Marl-
borough, and not reduced to the state of the con-
victs in Prince of Wales Island, who were kept as a
Government gang to be employed wherever their
services might be thought most desirable.
Upon December 2Oth, 1823, Sir Stamford
Raffles wrote a further letter to Government in
regard to these convicts, of which we can only
give an extract, which runs thus
" As the management of convicts ought to be a
subject of consideration, I send you a copy of the
regulations established for those of this place. The
convicts now at Bencoolen amount to 800 or 900,
and the number is gradually increasing. They are
natives of Bengal and Madras ; that is to say, of
those presidencies. The arrangement has been
brought about gradually, but the system now
appears complete, and, as far as we have yet gone,
has been attended with the best effects. I have
entrusted Mr. John Hull with the superintending
of the department, and he feels great pleasure and
7
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
satisfaction in the general improvement of this class
of people."
It is greatly to be regretted that we have been
unable to obtain a copy of the regulations to which
Sir Stamford Raffles refers, but we have no doubt
they formed the basis of what were hereafter called
the " Penang rules."
It was, as we have said, in the year 1825 that the
whole of the Bencoolen convicts were transferred
to Penang, and thence, as opportunities offered later
on, to Malacca and Singapore. One point we trace
in regard to those convicts is that, greatly to their
disappointment, they missed the freedom they had
possessed at Bencoolen, for they were sent to work
in gangs upon the roads, and in levelling ground
near the town of Penang. At first they were tried
at jungle cutting and burning, but had no aptitude
for it. This work was therefore entrusted to
Malays, who we all know have a natural bent for
cutting down trees and underwood, and are pos-
sessed of implements wonderfully suited for the
purpose.
We may remark here that transportation in those
early times had its terrors both to the European
from our shores to Australia, and to the native of
India to these settlements, and more especially to
the latter.
Though, by a system of " assignment" or "com-
pulsory" servitude to masters, or by a ticket of
8
EARLY RECORDS OF BENCOOLEN
leave which made it open to the European criminal
to work for whom and where he pleased, expatria-
tion became in time to be less severely felt ; still,
for a long period it continued to act as a deterrent
to others, though to the convict himself it was
" greater in idea perhaps than in reality." To the
native of India it meant even a severer punishment
than to the European, for to be sent across the
"kala pani," or "black water," in a convict ship or
"jeta junaza," or "living tomb" as they called it,
meant, especially to a man of high caste, whether of
the right or left hand section, the total loss to him
of all that was worth living for. He could never be
received in intercourse again with his own people,
and so strong are the caste ideas of ceremonial
uncleanness that it would be defilement to his
friends and relations even to offer to him sustenance
of any kind, and he was in point of fact excommuni-
cated and avoided. Happily this dread of caste
defilement has now, by railway communication over
the country and equalization of classes under our
rule, greatly diminished, but it is still, as Balfour
says, "a prominent feature in every-day Hindu life."
Sir Stamford Raffles' views as to the treatment of
those transported convicts have in the main been
recognised by all authorities in the Straits Settle-
ments since his time; and his suggestion as to the
privileges to be granted to men of the first class,
though not defined by him as a "ticket of leave,"
has been all along kept in view, and was in regular
9
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
force in the jail of which we treat. He divided his
convicts into three classes only, but as time went
on they were separated into six classes, and later
on in the narrative will be given the reasons for
this enlargement of the number. Dr. Mouat,
Inspector General of Jails, Bengal, in a paper read
before the Statistical Society some few years ago,
spoke of this jail and the ticket-of-leave system as
follows :
"I visited the Straits Settlements in 1861
when under the rule of my friend, Sir Orfeur
Cavenagh, and found in existence a system of
industrial training of convicts superior to anything
we had at that time on the continent of India. It
was said to have been inaugurated by the cele-
brated Sir Stamford Raffles in 1825, when Singa-
pore was first selected for the transportation of
convicts from India, and to have been subsequently
organised and successfully worked by General H.
Man, Colonel MacPherson, and Major McNair.
The ticket-of-leave system was in full and effective
operation, and very important public works have
been constructed by means of convict labour, chief
amongst them St. Andrew's Cathedral, a palace for
the Governor, and most of the roads. The ticket-
of-leave convicts were said to be a well-conducted,
industrious lot of men, who very rarely committed
fresh crimes, who all earned an honest livelihood,
and were regarded as respectable members of the
10
EARLY RECORDS OF BEXCOOLEX
community amongst whom they dwelt. The public
works were creditable examples of prison industry
and skill St. Andrew's Cathedral, built under
Major McNair from plans prepared by Colonel
MacPherson entirely by convict labour, struck me
as one of the finest specimens of ecclesiastical
architecture which I had seen in the East, and I
believe there exists in no other country a more
remarkable example of the successful industrial
training of convicts."
We are not of course greatly concerned in this
treatise with the original crimes committed by
those Indian convicts, and for which they had
received a sentence of transportation. Suffice it
to say that their warrants showed generally that, in
the case of convicts for life, the crimes were for the
most part those of Murder, Thuggee, and Dacoity ;
while those sentenced to a term of years had been
tried and convicted of frauds and forgeries, rob-
bery with violence, and such like misdemeanours.
" Thuggee," we all know, though it will bear repeti-
tion here, was in full operation all over India from
very early times, but at the beginning of this
century it engaged the serious attention of the
Indian Government ; and it was found to be an
hereditary pursuit of certain families who worked
in gangs the Hindus to satisfy their goddess
Bhawani, and other sects the goddess Devi and
they committed a countless number of murders
ii
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
all over the country. Thugs were a bold, resolute
set of men, and as a rule divided themselves
into groups consisting of a leader, a persuader, a
strangler, a scout, and a gravedigger, but all the
gangs, happily for India, were finally broken up
under Colonel Sleeman about 1860. Some of the
men were hanged, and many transported to our
penal settlements in the Straits of Malacca.
Dacoity was in some parts of India akin to
Thuggee, for the leaders carried with them in the
same way a sacred implement, which was devoted
to Bhawani. In the case of the Thugs this was a
pickaxe, but with the Dacoits it was an axe with a
highly-tempered edge.
In the early days we talk of, it was the common
practice of the authorities to brand these life con-
victs with a hot iron to indicate the character of
their crime, and this was in some cases done upon
the forehead both in the English language and in
the vernacular of the district where the crime was
committed. This was very properly put a stop to
shortly after the custom became known. We have
seen some of those in our jail who, by good conduct,
have risen to a ticket of leave, using their utmost
endeavours to get rid of the marks, but without
effect ; and finally as a last resource they were
obliged to be content to hide the " stigma" by
wearing their turbans, or head-dresses, inconveni-
ently low down over their brows.
It is worthy of remark here, in reference to those
12
EARLY RECORDS OF BENCOOLEN
native criminals who are in the habit of working
in gangs, more especially among the Thugs, how
signally they often fail when they attempt to act
alone. Amongst our Thugs we had one (a
strangler) who, coveting a pair of gold bangles on
the wrist of a fellow-convict employed at the
General Hospital, one night tried the handkerchief
upon him, but missed his mark, and got away
without being detected. Later on, the convict
authorities examined the warrants of all the men
at the hospital, and this gave them a clue, which
they followed up successfully and caught the
" Thug." He was punished, and then confessed,
saying, " Bhawani was unkind, and I could not do
it by myself; I missed my companions," or "saubut-
wale " as he called them, literally meaning those " I
kept company with."
It will not be inappropriate to mention here the
callous and brutalized nature of those gang-robbers,
of whom it is recorded that, when one of their gang
was suddenly arrested, they at once decapitated
him, and carried off the head, lest the whole gang
should be betrayed.
Chapter II
A SLIGHT SKETCH OF PENANG AND THE
TREATMENT OF THE CONVICTS THERE
PENANG, also named "Prince of Wales"
Island as a compliment to the then Prince
of Wales, afterwards George IV. This name for
the island has become almost obsolete, and the
Malay name Pi'nang, for the " Areka Palm," which
flourishes there, is that by which it is now always
known. It is situated at the northern extremity
of the Malacca Straits, and was ceded to us by the
Rajah of Kedah in 1785, when we gave up, but
only for a time, our British settlement on the North
Andaman, which we had acquired in 1789 and
abandoned in 1796. Province Wellesley, opposite
to Penang, upon the Malay Peninsula, was thirteen
years later taken by us for the purpose of sup-
pressing piracy, and forms part of this British
settlement. The island has an area of 107 square
miles, and the province of 270 square miles.
Another dependency of the settlement since 1889
is the Bindings with the Island of Pangkor, where
the treaty of 1874 was made by Sir Andrew
A SLIGHT SKETCH OF PENANG
Clarke, and which eventually led to our protectorate
of several of the native states of the Malay
Peninsula, and their complete federation in 1896.
When Penang was first occupied it was almost
uninhabited, and the whole island was covered with
the densest jungle, but it was not long before
Captain Light, who was appointed the first Super-
intendent of Trade, made a road to the highest point
of the island, then called " Bel retire " but now
Penang Hill. 1 A great part of the island was soon
cleared and roads made, so that in 1792, seven years
after it came into our hands, Captain Light was able
to report that the population had increased to
10,000 souls ; this increase of population has been
steadily going on from year to year, until, with its
dependencies, Penang, after a little more than a
century, now numbers no less than 240,000.
Since 1825, when the Indian convicts from
Bencoolen were added to those already on the
island, their labour was almost wholly turned to
account in the construction of roads both on the
island and in the province; but about 1850 some
1 There is an old legend in the island that Captain Light, in
order to encourage the Malays in the work of cutting down the
jungle, pointed a cannon in the direction in which he required it
to be cleared, then he loaded it with powder, and instead of a shot
he put in several dollars, and firing it off he called out to the
Malays, " Now you may have all you can find."
It is said that the eager contest which ensued, of one en-
deavouring to get the money before another, led to a regular
scramble, which considerably helped forward the work.
15
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
intramural work was also undertaken. The gangs
in the province were at last taught to cut and burn
the jungle as well as to construct the roads, and the
records say at some risk from tigers which infested
the province in those days, and occasionally carried
off a straggler from the gangs at work. They were
also bitten in large numbers by the venomous
hamadryads which used to abound there, and from
the poison of which some died.
About the time our treatise commences, Penang
had acquired the monopoly of the trade of the
Malayan Peninsula and Sumatra. It also had a large
traffic with China, Siam, Borneo, the Celebes, and
other places in the Eastern Archipelago ; but after
the establishment later on of Singapore it had
begun to decline, and the settlement then became
second only in commercial importance. But within
the last quarter of a century the trade has con-
siderably revived, owing largely to the planting of
tobacco in Sumatra by European planters, and the
annexation of the native states of the Malayan
Peninsula, both of which have constituted Penang
the chief shipping centre for their produce.
Before we pass on to treat of the Singapore jail,
it will be well briefly to describe the method
pursued in dealing with the Indian convicts on their
first arrival in Penang, as far back as we can trace
any definite notice in regard to them. They were
confined at the outset in the then existing prison
known as "Chowrusta Lines," situated on the
16
A SLIGHT SKETCH OF PENANG
Penang road ; but this proving to be too small to
accommodate all the convicts from India, a larger
and more commodious prison was built on the
opposite side of the road. It consisted of an en-
closure, surrounded by a high brick wall, subdivided
into yards, in each of which were erected the wards
or dormitories. These were simply long rooms open
to the high roof, having windows on either side
secured by iron bars. Iron gates closed the door-
ways to each ward, which were locked at night. A
gangway seven to eight feet wide ran the whole
length of the ward, and sleeping platforms about
seven feet wide extended to the full length of the
ward on either side of this gangway. The hospital
ward was similar to the others, except that it was a
two-storied building, and cots were provided instead
of the continuous sleeping platforms. The hospital
and women's ward were all within the enclosure
in a separate yard. Warders' and apothecary's
quarters were provided at the main entrance to the
prison. Cooking places for the different castes and
latrines were constructed in each yard ; a military
guard room, food and clothing stores were also
supplied. Little can be said in favour of this
prison, as the wards were ill-ventilated, and the
sanitary arrangements were very imperfect. All
the prisoners were in a somewhat lax system of
association, except those undergoing punishment in
cells. Prior to the receipt of the convicts from
Bencoolen, Penang itself, as a penal settlement,
17 c
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
had already been supplied from India with a
number of transported criminals of all tribes and
castes, who were working in gangs under free
warders ; but from vacancies and dismissals, and the
consequent inability to supply the place of these
warders, where free labour of the kind required was
not obtainable, an attempt was then made to enlist
the services of well-behaved convicts to oversee
their fellow-prisoners. But it does not appear to
have at all succeeded at that time, and we have it on
record that the Governor in Council at Penang, in
the year 1827, deemed it necessary to revise the
regulations under which these Indian convicts were
controlled; and accordingly we learn that a com-
mittee was appointed to assemble at Penang in
November, 1827, when a code of revised rules was
drawn up, and the following comment was made by
the committee as to the employment of convicts as
warders : " With regard to the present system of
employing convicts as tindals and sirdars, the com-
mittee think it very objectionable, as it is impossible
that men so intimately connected with those over
whom they are placed can exercise that authority
and control which is so essential in the management
of such a body of men as the convicts. The duties
at present performed by these servants are provided
for in the proposed increase to the establishment."
These rules, subsequently known as the " Penang
Rules," received the sanction of the Governor in
Council, and were sent for guidance to the Resident
18
A SLIGHT SKETCH OF PENANG
Councillor at Singapore, to which settlement some
few convicts had already been sent. This remark
of the Penang committee, which in all fairness we
have quoted, was doubtless quite true at the time
when it was penned, and when the system of em-
ploying prisoners as warders was in its infancy, and,
moreover, when the whole prison discipline was
acknowledged to be in more or less an indifferent
state ; but, as will hereafter be shown, it did not hold
good when the system was well established, and the
choice of warders was made from those classes best
suited for the control of their fellow-prisoners,
especially in the outstations, or " commands " as
they were called, where gangs of convicts were
placed under their control in the construction and
repairs of roads or in stone-quarrying.
In these early days, no organised system of
industrial employment appears to have been carried
on in this Penang jail, and no intramural work-
shops of any kind were provided, the convicts being
employed almost exclusively on extramural works,
such as opening up roads on the Penang Hill and
throughout the island, and in Province Wellesley ;
also in brick-making, felling timber, burning lime,
and reclaiming mangrove swamps. The ground on
which some portion of the present town is built was
filled up by convict labour. Much later on, however,
in the Fifties, rattan work was introduced into the
prison, and easy chairs, lounging chairs, baskets, and
other articles of a very substantial quality were
19
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
manufactured and sold to the public at a higher
price than that for which the same articles could be
purchased in the town, but they were far superior
both in the quality of rattan and in their make.
About the year 1860, blacksmiths' and carpenters'
shops were established in the prison, and on the
different "commands" in the country districts.
The ordinary discipline of the jail was carried out
in accordance with the " Penang Rules " referred to,
and any breach of these rules was punished according
to the nature of the offence, at the discretion of the
Superintendent. There was then no formal investi-
gation or inquiry into convict complaints or mis-
demeanours, and no records of them were kept with
any show of regularity. It was only after the
appointment of the late General Man as Resident
Councillor of Penang, Captain Milliard being
Superintendent, that a manifest improvement in the
management and control of the convicts took place,
and especially in their industrial training. He
brought with him the system in force in Singapore,
and the new rules and regulations formed with the
sanction of the Governor, then Colonel Butter-
worth, and which were an improvement on the
old Penang rules, but were only at this time being
tentatively carried out in Penang. By these
rules the entire abolition of free warders was ap-
proved, and petty officers raised from amongst the
convicts themselves fully established, though as the
Governor himself said in his letter to the Resident
20
A SLIGHT SKETCH OF PENANG
Councillor of Singapore in August, 1854, " I had
drawn up these rules as long ago as 1845 m tne
face of much opposition."
The late General Man held the appointment at
Penang from 1860 until 1867, when the Straits
Settlements were transferred to the Crown, and
from Penang he went to the Andaman Islands to
introduce there the system of convict management
in force in the Straits Settlements ; x and with the
view to uniformity of practice, the Government of
India had previously deputed Major, now General,
Forlong to prepare a code of rules based on those
in force in the Singapore jail.
When the transfer was fully effected, the new
office of Comptroller of Indian Convicts was cre-
ated, and the whole of those Indian convicts in the
three settlements were placed under his charge.
The " Butterworth Rules" remained in force, with
certain alterations and improvements, until the dis-
establishment of the whole department in 1873.
As many of the convicts were continued to be
employed at Penang and Province Wellesley on
roads and works at a distance from the main jail, it
was necessary to provide accommodation for them
in convict lines, or " commands," as we have said,
pronounced "kumman" by the convicts. 2 It will be
1 Now under the able management of Col. R. C. Temple,
CI.E.
2 Simpson, in his Side Lights on Siberia^ uses " command " as
denoting a jail outside of the prison walls.
21
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
interesting to give some particulars about them : They
consisted of a stockaded fence, constructed of rough
poles of wood from four to six inches in diameter, and
from ten to twelve feet long, set perpendicularly in a
trench about two feet deep, and placed close together,
being secured longitudinally by adze-dressed poles
nailed securely on the outside and along the top of
them. The stockade enclosed an area sufficient for
the erection of the dormitory, cooking place, and
sheds for the bullocks employed in carts to convey
road material, and for protection also against the
possible attacks of wild animals. The walls of the
dormitory were constructed in what is well known
as " wattle and daub." They were made with stout
stakes driven firmly into the ground at about one
foot apart, twigs of trees were then interwoven, and
the whole then thickly plastered with a mixture of
clay and cowdung, and when this had become
thoroughly dry it was coated with whitewash. This
formed both a substantial, and at the same time a
sanitary walling, which was frequently treated with
a further coating of limewash made thin. The
dormitories were ten feet high, with a continuous
open grating of wooden bars at the top, under the
eaves of the roof, for the purpose of complete ven-
tilation. The sleeping platforms were raised three
feet off the ground floor, which was covered with
the same composition as that of the walls, and the
building was roofed with thatch. In the centre of
the dormitory an earthenware brazier of burning
22
A SLIGHT SKETCH OF PENANG
charcoal was always maintained day and night, and
occasionally crude fragrant gum Benjamin was
thrown upon it. The natives believe that an aro-
matic perfume exhaled by fire keeps off all noxious
effluvia ; and we certainly found that they were in
better health from the use of this incense, and from
the fresh plastering of the floor every morning with
cowdung diluted with water, which is a common
practice in most of the native huts in India. This
was regularly kept up by two convicts of the invalid
class, who also acted as caretakers. The entrance
to the enclosure was secured by a stout gate, which,
after the roll was called, was locked every night at
nine o'clock. The number of convicts stationed on
one " command " averaged about thirty, and they
were under the charge of a responsible convict war-
der of the grade of a tindal, with a peon and two
orderlies and a native " moonshi," or timekeeper, to
keep account of work done, and to forward reports
to the main jail. By a system of surprise visits
both day and night occasionally, we rarely found
that any irregularities occurred.
It has not been already mentioned that the local
jails, or houses of correction, though according to
law they were kept distinct from the convict jails at
the several settlements, nevertheless were in their
superintendence placed under the Superintendent of
Convicts and convict petty officers. A good pro-
portion of these local prisoners were employed upon
extramural works, under the guard of these convict
23
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
petty officers, who, being natives of India, had
nothing in common with the Chinese and Malays
who formed the bulk of these prisoners, and they
kept them well under control, and allowed but few
escapes, and, moreover, they were never found open
to the taking of bribes from the prisoners' relations
and friends, who now and again would attempt to
offer them forbidden articles.
At Penang there were a considerable number of
these Indian convicts upon ticket of leave, who
gained their livelihood in a variety of ways. Some
of them were the first to discover the palm known
by the Malays as " Plas tikoos," and by botanists
as the " Licuala acutifida," a small palm, ordinarily
not higher than from five to six feet. From this
palm, which grew mostly upon the Penang Hill,
were constructed walking - sticks called " Penang
lawyers," and the process of preparing them was
very simple : the epidermis, or exterior coating, was
scraped off with glass, and then the stick was
straightened with fire, as is done by the Malays in
preparing the Malacca canes. Several of these
Penang lawyers were sold by the convicts on the
spot, and many more were exported to Europe and
America.
OlViCri^/
41 f iw"*-
Chapter III
OLD MALACCA AND THE FIRST INTRODUC-
TION OF CONVICTS THERE
A UTHORITIES differ very considerably as to
JL~JL the origin of the name of this place. Some
attribute it to the Malay name for a shrub which
largely abounded near the shore, a sort of " Phyl-
lanthus emblica " of the spurge order ; others, again,
ascribe it to a plant called the " Jumbosa Malac-
censis," or " Malay apple tree" of the myrtle bloom
order ; others, again, say that the Javanese were the
first to colonize the place about the year 1 1 60 of our
time, and that they gave it the name " Malaka,"
which in that language means "an exile," in
memory of one " Paramisura/' who came there as a
fugitive from the kingdom of Palembang.
In the original manuscript of Godinho de Eredia,
of date 1613, reproduced by Janssen in 1882, he
says that " Paramisura," the first king of the Ma-
lays, settled on the coast near to the Bukit China
River, which is close to the present town, and called
it " Malaka," after the fruit of a tree which grew
there. (See sketch from that old work, Plate IV.)
25
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
Anyway, like all Malay history, it is full of ob-
scurity, and it really does not concern us very much
just now as to what it is really derived from, though
it would be no doubt interesting to Malay scholars
to pursue the inquiry.
We know, however, on the best authority, that it
was the first settlement formed by a European
power in those seas. The Portuguese, in their
palmy days under Albuquerque, took it from a
Malay Sultan, named Mahomed Shah, in 1511.
They kept quiet possession of it for 134 years,
when it fell into the hands of the Dutch, who held
it for seventy- four years ; then the British took pos-
session in 1795, restored it to the Dutch in 1818,
who gave it back in 1824, and we have held it ever
since. In size it is forty -two miles long and from
eight to twenty-five miles broad, and contains 659
square miles.
In the old Portuguese days it was a very im-
portant place of trade, so much so that De Barros,
their famous historian, wrote of it that, " the native
town was a good league in length along the shore,
and that there were many merchant vessels there
from Calicut, Aden, Mecca, Java, and Pegu, and
other places." This splendid trade, however, began
to decline in the time of the Dutch, and shortly
after we had opened Penang in 1785 it had almost
entirely vanished.
The Portuguese must have attached great value
to this their first settlement in what was then known
26
,^^^ '*'
'. '. :>,' > '>.' *, ;>'
>>>
MALACA^NTi
Plate IV.
OLD MALACCA
(From Godinho de Eredia's Work).
OLD MALACCA
as the "Golden Chersonese," for they spent vast
sums of money in fortifying it, and enclosed a con-
siderable enceinte by a wall of great height and
thickness, and crowned the small hill of St. Paul's
within by the erection of a fine cathedral dedicated
to our Lady Del- Monte, with a monastery annexed
to it. These fortifications were afterwards razed to
the ground, and some of the old foundations may still
be seen ; but we left the buildings standing and the
greater part of the cathedral to go to ruins. Some
of the tombstones in the old nave bear the date
1515, and there is a tomb to the two Bishops of
Japan, but there is nothing to indicate that the
saintly St. Francis Xavier laboured here beyond a
small tablet ; but the memory of his deeds is yet
fresh amongst the traditions of the Portuguese
descendants still resident there.
Seen from the sea in these days, Malacca looks
an antiquated old place, with all the signs of de-
sertion about it. The old ruins on the hill form the
most prominent feature in the landscape, and the once
busy river (see Plate VI.) is now almost closed even
to boat traffic by the silt which has been brought
down from the interior. It is difficult indeed to realize
that this strange, dim old place was once the centre
of a thriving trade from so many distant countries,
though it still carries on its cultivation of rice and
other grain, and this is yearly being more developed.
As far as we can gather, the first batch of con-
victs were sent to this place from Penang shortly
27
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
after we took possession, and that they were em-
ployed in filling up the moat to suit it and the
glacis for a parade ground. These convicts were
confined first of all in the town jail, which was
situated on the steep or eastern side of St. Paul's
Hill, and was in point of fact the old Portuguese
soldiers' barrack, and was constructed on a terrace
excavated from the hillside; and, together with a
hospital, warders' quarters, store rooms and other
necessary buildings, was surrounded by a high wall
built from the stone from the old fort ramparts.
The few local prisoners were put into the old
Dutch prison, and both these prisoners and the
convicts were placed under the charge of half-blood
Portuguese warders. For some years few convicts
were sent into the interior, their labour being re-
quired for the public works in and near the town ;
but about the year 1840, as fresh arrivals came from
Penang, which is about 250 miles north of it, gangs
were made up to keep in repair about 100 miles of
the public roads that were left to us, and to open up
new communications near the frontier ; so that we
now have nearly 300 miles to keep in order. They
were located in temporary huts surrounded by a
palisading, and warders were raised from amongst
the best behaved to be responsible for their work
and general supervision. This practice was con-
tinued with satisfactory results, and gradually was
introduced into the town jail, and the half-bred
Portuguese warders were dismissed.
28
ST. FRANCIS XAVIER
(From Godinho de Eredia's Work).
Plate VIL
OLD MALACCA
Prior to the appointment to Malacca of Captain
Man as Resident Councillor, but little had been
done in the way of training the convicts in indus-
trial occupation, but he established a few workshops
and started them in various trades. It was not,
however, until 1860 that anything approaching to
really skilled labour could be got out of them.
They were then supplied with good tools and an
instructor, also a convict, was sent down from
Singapore. After this, carts for the roads, iron and
wood work for bridges, roofing timbers for public
works, and other necessary requirements for the
erection of minor works were satisfactorily accom-
plished. For some classes of work the convicts
were superior to the Chinese workmen in the town,
especially in metal turning and fitting. One Cinga-
lese convict became so expert at this trade that
upon his release from confinement he established
himself in Ceylon, and has been doing a very profit-
able business, and occupies now a respectable posi-
tion in life.
As far as can be gathered from the records, the
convicts were, as a rule, well behaved, though in the
early Sixties, owing to their maltreatment by an
overseer who had the supervision of a gang for
clearing the jungle and making roads upon Cape
Rachado for the erection of a lighthouse, an emeute
took place, and some life was lost, and many es-
caped inland, but were subsequently returned by
the native Malay chiefs.
29
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
Some of the Indian convicts here on ticket of
leave were expert shikarries, and frequently with
their trained dogs would hunt the deer and wild
boar, and dispose of the flesh to Chinese in the
town at some profit to themselves.
In 1873, when the convict establishments in the
Straits Settlements were finally broken up, those
convicts still wanting time to complete their sen-
tences were transferred to Singapore for transmission
to the Andamans, those upon ticket of leave being
permitted to merge into the population.
Chapter IV
A RUNNING HISTORY OF SINGAPORE: ITS
JAIL SYSTEM AND ADMINISTRATION
THE origin of the name of this island it is
difficult to trace, but the generally accepted
derivation is from the Sanscrit words, " Singh," a
lion, and " Pura," a city or town ; and if so, it would
not have been given by the Malays, but more
probably by the Indians, who, according to native
history, came over with one, Rajah Suran, and con-
quered Johore and this island in about the year A.D.
1 1 60. " Singh" is a title adopted by the Hindus,
and by several military castes of Northern India,
and the word " Singhpur " is often used by them to
mean the grand entrance gate to a palace.
If, on the other hand, we assume that the Malays
conferred the name to the island, they would in all
probability have given it from their word " Sing-
gah," which means "a place to stop at," or " to
bait by the way," and as the embouchure of the
Singapore river formed a commodious and sheltered
retreat for their rowing and sailing prahus, this view
is not inappropriate, the more especially as the
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
affix "pura," meaning a city, had been known to
them from the earliest times, and of which we have
one instance at least from their original home of
Sumatra, in the naming of their kingdom of Indra-
pura, which was, as Marsden says, "for a long time,
from 1400 A.D., the seat of a monarchy of some
consideration and extent."
The island is about twenty-seven miles long by
fourteen broad, and contains an area of 206 square
miles, and therefore is somewhat larger than the
Isle of Wight. It is separated from the mainland of
Johore by what is known as "The Old Straits,"
from its having been the only channel used in
the early days by vessels bound eastward. The
island was first settled upon, according to Balfour,
"in A.D. 1 1 60, by one Sri Sura Bawana," and from
an inscription on a sandstone rock at the mouth of
the Singapore River, now unfortunately destroyed,
it would appear that Rajah Suran, of Amdan Na-
gara, after conquering the state of Johore with
certain natives of India (Klings), proceeded in 1201
to a country then called "Tamask," and afterwards
returned to " Kling," leaving the stone inscription
in memory of his visit and victory. To have con-
quered Johore, the Rajah's vessels must have sailed
by the Old Straits ; but we have no record as to
where " Tamask " was situated, and it is not given
in the oldest Atlases we have been able to consult,
viz. by D'Anville and others, though it may be in
the charts of the 1 4th and i5th centuries. It seems
32
A RUNNING HISTORY OF SINGAPORE
more probable that the expedition set out from Java
or Sumatra, to which places Hindus had, as we
know, in very remote times proceeded from India,
as the old ruins they have left there of their temples,
supposed to be of the yth century, plainly prove.
Sir Stamford Raffles, as we have already stated
when treating of Bencoolen, took up the appoint-
ment of Lieutenant-Governor of that settlement on
the 22nd March, 1818, and he had not been there
long before he recognized the fact that British
interests needed a trading centre somewhere in the
Straits of Malacca. It was, he said, " not that
any extension of territory was necessary, but the
aim of Government should be to acquire somewhere
in the Straits a commercial station with a military
guard, and that, when once formed, it was his belief
that it would soon maintain a successful rivalry with
a neighbouring Power, who would be obliged either
to adopt a liberal system of free trade, or see the
trade of these seas collected under the British flag."
It is well known how the port of Rhio, on the
west coast of the island of Bintang, which is sepa-
rated from the island of Battam by the Rhio Strait,
was first thought of; but we were too late in occupy-
ing it. Then the Carrimon Islands were suggested
by the Resident Councillor of Malacca, at that time
Major Farquhar ; but the harbour was too exposed
to the prevailing monsoon. Subsequently Tanjong
Jatti, on the island of Bengkalis, was deemed to
be a suitable site, but this had its objection as to
33 D
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
situation ; and after coasting about these seas for
some little time, Sir Stamford Raffles finally fixed
upon the island of Singapore for an entrepot for
trade, and the wisdom and sagacity displayed by
him in this selection has been abundantly proved.
Sir Stamford Raffles concluded the treaty with
the native chiefs for the cession of the island to
Great Britain, and the British flag was planted on
the island on the same day that the treaty was
signed, viz., the igth February, 1819, but it has
since been found to have been actually signed on
the 6th of that month.
Our new possession, some 600 miles from Ba-
tavia, then contained in round numbers about 120
Malays and 30 Chinese. Some of these lived
wholly in their boats at the mouth of the river, and
the remainder in huts at Teloh Blangah, on the
south side of the island. In the course of a year
the population had risen to 5,000, and in little more
than five years to 19,000 or 20,000 of all nations
actively engaged in commerce, " offering to each
and all a handsome livelihood and abundant profit."
When the census was taken in 1881 the population
had risen to 139,208, and in 1891 there was an
increase of 45,346, making a total of 184,554, repre-
senting nearly every nationality and tribe in the
Indian Archipelago, China, and India, and about
1,500 Europeans.
In the year 1822, the first settlers to dwell on the
island were traders in the Archipelago, and they
34
A RUNNING HISTORY OF SINGAPORE
lived in raft houses, so called, or more probably in
huts, erected on poles in the Malay style, and these
were located on the site of the present "Commercial
Square," which was then little more than a mud flat
covered by the sea at high water. One of the first
steps taken by the Government was to fill up this
low-lying sea marsh, which was executed by free
labour, but was subsequently largely assisted by
some local prisoners who were confined in a tem-
porary jail near by, on the site where the present
Court-house now stands. The first magistrates to
be appointed in the settlement, and who tried and
sentenced these prisoners, were men whose names
will ever be preserved unforgotten by the colony,
and we make no excuse in giving them in full as
obtained from The Anecdotal History, viz., Messrs.
A. L. Johnstone, D. A. Maxwell, D. F. Napier,
A. F. Morgan, John Purvis, Alexander Guthrie, E.
Mackenzie, W. Montgomery, Charles Scott, John
Morgan, C. R. Read, and Andrew Hay. Two
magistrates sat in court with the Resident Coun-
cillor, to decide cases both civil and criminal, and
juries were formed of five Europeans, or four Euro-
peans and three leading natives. This court sat
once a week, but a court of two magistrates sat
twice a week to try cases, their office being open
daily to hear complaints.
The insecurity of the temporary prison mentioned
above, and the defects in its control, led to changes
in its structure and general management. The
35
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
Resident, then Mr. J. Crawford, expended $900
towards the construction of a more substantial build-
ing for the local prisoners, the transmarine convicts
from Bencoolen and India having not yet arrived
in the settlement. In April, 1823, as there was a
great difficulty in obtaining free labour, the local
prisoners were ordered to work upon the public
roads.
When finally leaving the settlement, Sir Stam-
ford Raffles entered into a new agreement with the
Sultan and Tummongong of Johore, by which the
whole of the island of Singapore and the adjacent
islands were to be considered as entirely British
territory. He considered this fresh agreement
necessary on account of some peculiar ideas that
were held at the time by certain dissentients.
On his final departure from Singapore, Sir Stam-
ford Raffles received an address from the European
and native merchants of Singapore, from which we
quote the following significant extract :
"To your unwearied zeal, your vigilance, and
your comprehensive views, we owe at once the
foundation and maintenance of a settlement, un-
paralleled for the liberality of the principles on
which it has been established principles, the
operation of which has converted in a period short
beyond all example a haunt of pirates into the
abode of enterprise, security, and opulence."
Sir Stamford replied with his characteristic
modesty in a letter dated Singapore, June 9th, 1823.
36
A RUNNING HISTORY OF SINGAPORE
The letter is too long to quote in extenso> but we
give the following extracts from it After acknow-
ledging the receipt of their address, and remarking
upon the impossibility of his being indifferent to any
of the interests, especially the commercial interests,
of Singapore, under the peculiar circumstances of*
his connection with the establishment of the settle-
ment, he says, " It has happily been consistent with
the policy of Great Britain, and accordant with the
principles of the East India Company, that Singa-
pore should be established as a * free port,' and
that Singapore will long, and always remain a
free port, and that no taxes on trade or industry
will be established to check its future rise and pros-
perity, I can have no doubt." " I am justified in
saying thus much on the authority of the Supreme
Government of India, and on the authority of those
who are most likely to have weight in the councils
of our nation at home."
Referring to difficulties which had to be encoun-
tered on the establishment of the freedom of the
port, he says, "In the commanding station in which
my public duty has placed me, I have had an oppor-
tunity of, in a great measure, investigating and
determining the merits of the case, and the result
renders it a duty on my part, and which I perform
with much satisfaction, to express my most un-
qualified approbation of the honourable principles
which actuated the merchants of Singapore on that
occasion."
37
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
We give the above extracts to show the rapid
advance that had been made in the first five years
of the settlement's existence, owing mainly to the
sagacity, forethought, and wisdom of its eminent
founder, and we have added the population up to
this period to show its steady rise and progress.
It was, however, in January, 1824, that the first
regular census was taken. The population then
consisted of 74 Europeans, 1 6 Armenians, 15 Arabs,
4,580 Malays, 3,317 Chinese, 756 natives of India,
and 1,925 Bugis, making a total of 10,683. It was
in this year that Singapore was first mentioned
in the House of Commons, in a remark made by
Mr. Canning, who had been nominated Governor-
General of India in 1822, but did not go out to that
country, that " Singapore in six years would produce
spices sufficient for the consumption of Great Britain
and her colonies " a prophecy not yet fulfilled.
In May of the same year the Resident made a
voyage round the island in the ship Malabar, 380
tons burden, to view the boundary of the island and
to take formal possession ; and it was while on this
voyage that the British flag was planted on the
island of " Pulo Obin," an island which has since
largely supplied the town of Singapore with granite
for making roads and also for building purposes.
The Government quarries situated upon it were
subsequently worked almost entirely by transmarine
convicts, of which more will be said hereafter.
On the 1 8th of April, 1825, the first batch of
38
A RUNNING HISTORY OF SINGAPORE
convicts transported from India to Bencoolen were
transferred from there to Singapore. They arrived
in the brig Horatio, and consisted of 80 convicts
transported from Madras, of whom 73 males and
i female were for life, and 6 male convicts on short
sentences. On the 25th of the same month another
batch was received, also convicts from Bencoolen.
These consisted of 122 convicts transported from
Bengal, of whom 88 males and i female were for
life, and 33 for short terms. When these Indian
convicts were landed at Singapore they were placed
at first in an open shed, or godown (from the Malay
word " godong," a shed), which stood on the site
where the present public offices stand, with only
four free petty officers, or "peons," natives of Chit-
tagong in the Bengal presidency, in charge of them.
Subsequently temporary buildings, to contain 1,200
to 2,000 convicts, were erected near the Hindu
temple, then situated near the Brass Basa Canal,
and at a considerable cost it is given as ,13,199
(see Plate IX.). They were all located in these
sheds, and there was little or no prison control over
them ; only, occasionally, an officer of the police
came and called the roll in order to report to
Government that all were present. These convicts
were afterwards detailed to the work of filling up
the mud flat before referred to as the site of the
present " Commercial Square." For this purpose
they carried the soil from near the Hindu temple
and from Pearls Hill. Mr. Bonham, the Resident,
39
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
finding that the convicts worked willingly, and were
well behaved, discharged the free " peons," or war-
ders, and selected five Madrasees and five Bengalees
from their number to supervise their fellow-convicts.
This was, as far as we gather, the first trial of the
system of convict warders at Singapore, possibly
the first venture of the kind made in any penal
establishment. As convicts continued to arrive
from India, many of those from Bencoolen were
constituted warders over their fellows, in the pro-
portion of one warder to every twenty convicts.
Each warder was granted a monthly wage of $3.00
in addition to his rations and clothing, with the
usual blanket given to each convict once a year.
In addition to his ordinary rations, clothing, and
annual blanket, each convict received a monthly
allowance of 50 cents (say 2s.) a month, to purchase
condiments and salt. A European overseer was
placed in immediate charge of the convicts, and
a Superintendent over the whole convict establish-
ment, this responsible duty first falling upon Lieu-
tenant Chester, of the Bengal Native Infantry.
The convicts from Bencoolen were not sent over
to the Straits of Malacca in chains, but those re-
ceived from India in the earliest times were mana-
cled with light leg fetters, in which they had to
work for a probationary period of three months.
As, however, they were granted, equally with the
others, the privilege of going about the town to
make their purchases, it is said they ceased to con-
40
A RUNNING HISTORY OF SINGAPORE
sider their fetters a mark of degradation, being so
completely overwhelmed with the thought of ban-
ishment from their country and kindred ; and to
many men of caste it must be remembered that
transportation alone was a severe punishment.
In the year 1826 there was a change of govern-
ment in the settlements. Hitherto the settlements
of Penang, Malacca, and Singapore had not been
incorporated under one government. In this year
it was decided by the Supreme Government to do
so, and the seat of government was fixed at
Penang, that being our oldest settlement in these
seas. On this change taking place, many more of
the Indian convicts from Penang were sent down
to Singapore, the ship Esperanza bringing down a
further batch of 23 Bengal life convicts (males), and
26 Madras convicts (males), and i female ; 31
Bombay (males), and 2 female convicts.
From the accounts given in the newspapers of
that day, the convicts were at this time treated
with great indulgence if of proved good behaviour,
being permitted, after their work was over, to
engage themselves as servants to the residents,
who, in the scarcity of labour at that time, and the
fitness of the convicts for such service, were content
to give them a very liberal wage. In the early days
of penal colonies this has not infrequently occurred,
and some of these old convicts have been known
to amass considerable sums of money, and, indeed,
to become possessed of landed property in the
4*
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
town. The Government, however, under Major
Campbell, who succeeded Lieutenant Chester, took
care to exact from them a large amount of useful
work in the filling up of swampy ground near the
town, and laying out plots of land for building
purposes. They also blasted the rocks at the
mouth of the Singapore river, on the site of which
was afterwards constructed a fort, named after the
first Resident, Mr. Fullerton, and much of the rock
was also used in the construction of the sea and
river walls adjoining. Their services were also
turned to account on any occasion when the pres-
ence of a body of men under discipline was re-
quired, such as the suppression of fires. An instance
is given in the journal already quoted of a serious
outbreak of fire in Market Street, in the year 1830,
which threatened to consume the houses in several
streets adjoining. There were no fire engines in
those days, and the only supply of water was carried
in buckets by the convicts, which materially helped
to subdue it. The houses in the square at the
back of Market Street were not burnt ; they, and
also the houses on the side of Market Street next
the square, were partly built of brick, but those on
the opposite side were wholly of wood, and were
quickly destroyed. The middle of the square was
covered with goods carried from the burning
houses.
Occasionally, even in those days, convicts were
employed as orderlies and servants to public officers,
42
A RUNNING HISTORY OF SINGAPORE
and when Dr. Oxley's house was attacked by burg-
lars in 1821, his Indian convict servant, though
wounded by a " kris," succeeded in capturing the
burglar, who turned out to be a Malay pirate from
Bencoolen. Robbery on land was not common
amongst Malays in those days, but piracy was one
of their pastimes, and their romances always glorify
their ancestors in this pursuit.
The rules at that time in force amongst the con-
victs were what were known as the " Penang Rules,"
already mentioned, and published in 1827 ; but
there were also a few scattered rules known as the
" Bencoolen Rules," probably some of those drawn
up by Sir Stamford Raffles, and referred to in his
letter of the 2oth September, 1823, and incorporated
with the former.
In 1832 an alteration in the seat of govern-
ment took place. Penang had hitherto been the
seat of government, but in this year it was trans-
ferred to Singapore, which had by this time
become the most important of the three Settle-
ments.
When later on, in the year 1833, Mr. G. D. Cole-
man was placed in charge of the convicts as " Sur-
veyor and Executive Officer of Government," a
great improvement was set on foot in the regular
and systematic employment of these convicts. He,
by their means, reclaimed large plots of land as
intakes from the sea and river marshes, and largely
extended the town lots, so that Captain Begbie,
43
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
who in that year wrote a book upon the Straits
Settlements, stated that " 200 of these convicts, in
eight months, at a small money outlay of $500 for
covered drains, had reclaimed 28 acres of marsh,
and intersected it with roads. This land was shortly
afterwards sold at a handsome price, and was very
quickly covered with good, substantial upper-story
houses, which were readily let."
Under Mr. Coleman the public roads on the sea
front were marked out and constructed, and also the
main road from the town to Campong Glam, now
known as North and South Bridge Roads. He
surveyed and marked out the first country road
towards Bukit Timah, and he afterwards laid out
the Serangoon, the New Harbour, Budoo, and
Thompson's Roads, and employed Indian convicts
principally in their construction. When the con-
victs could not be marched out to and from their
daily work to the prison, owing to the long distance
they had to traverse, Mr. Coleman constructed for
them temporary buildings, surrounded by a fence,
similar to those already described when treating of
Province Wellesley and Malacca. In these "com-
mands " they were located until the work on which
they were employed was completed ; and in many
cases these " commands," as they were always
called, became permanent stations for the convicts
employed in maintaining the roads. At first their
rations were sent out to them from town once a
month, but subsequently it was found desirable for
44
A RUNNING HISTORY OF SINGAPORE
them to attend the general muster at the main
prison on the first of every month, and to receive
their rations then, and to be inspected at the same
time by the Superintendent.
The records of the jail at this time, and until the
year 1844, have not been kept, as we have said,
with any precision, and, indeed, most of them are
missing ; but the excellent work performed by Mr.
Coleman (in the execution of which he, as far as
possible, employed convict labour) is, fortunately,
to be seen in the map of the town and its environs
surveyed by him in 1836, and lithographed in Cal-
cutta the same year, a copy of which is given in
Moor's Notices of the Indian Archipelago.
Mr. Coleman was no mean architect. It was he
who designed the first church for Singapore. It
was erected on the site where the present cathedral
stands. It was completed in 1837, and consecrated
in September, 1838, but was opened for service
on the 1 8th June, 1837, by the first chaplain
appointed from Bengal, the Rev. Edmund White.
Indian convicts were employed in the erection of
this church, chiefly as labourers, as they were also
at the public buildings which were erected about
this time, notably the first extension of the Raffles
Institution and its museum.
To Mr. Coleman, however, the colony is chiefly
indebted for the many excellent roads on the island,
and the carrying out of the disposition of town
allotments, projected in the first instance by Sir
45
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
Stamford Raffles himself, in his instructions to the
Committee appointed for the purpose shortly after
the settlement was founded.
Mr. G. D. Coleman died on the 2;th March, 1885,
and the newspapers of the day, in regretting his
death, brought about by hard work and exposure
in the public service, spoke in the highest terms of
his ability as an architect and surveyor, and Super-
intendent of Convicts.
46
Chapter V
SINGAPORE (Continued)
THERE were then about 1,100 or 1,200 Indian
convicts in Singapore, divided into six
classes, and employed in various ways as already
narrated, but the following extract from The Anec-
dotal History is worth quoting verbatim :
" Singapore, Malacca, Penang, and Maulmein were
the Sydneys of India. There are upon an average
about 1,100 to 1,200 native convicts from India
constantly at Singapore. These are employed making
roads and digging canals ; and, undoubtedly, without
them the town, as far as locomotion is concerned,
would have been now but a sorry residence. They
are secured within high walls, and although a few
now and then escape, they meet with such rough
treatment from the Malays on the Peninsula, that
they find it commonly the most prudent course to
return, or allow themselves to be brought back.
The native of India accommodates himself more
easily to banishment than a European does, because
his ideas lead to predestination, and his habits are
47
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
simple. In former days, when convict discipline
was not so well understood as it is now, the convicts
transported from India used to traffic and amass
money ; banishment was in some cases, perhaps,
sought for, and crimes were, it is feared, sometimes
committed by natives to obtain it ; but the felon
must now expect to be kept in his place and hard
at work. Still, the convict whose period is short,
contrives to save something out of his allowance,
and on the expiration of his term he generally sets
up as a keeper of cattle, or a letter-out of carriages
and horses ; and undoubtedly some of these men are
as well, if not better behaved than many of their
native neighbours of higher pretensions. There
are regulations by which the convict is encouraged
by certain rewards, or remission short of emancipa-
tion, to orderly conduct."
When Mr. Coleman resigned, the duties of
Superintendent were taken up by Captain Steven-
son of the 1 2th Madras Native Infantry, who carried
out the system then in force, and somewhat added
to the strength of the convict warders ; for we
find in his annual report for 1845 the following re-
marks : " Convict peons are selected from the
second class for general good conduct and intelli-
gence, and they continue to receive $3 each per
mensem, in addition to provisions and clothing.
Free peons were, I hear, formerly tried, but found
not to be so well suited for the peculiar duties
48
SINGAPORE
required of them ; besides, the prospect of gaining a
belt a mark of authority is a strong inducement
to good conduct on the part of the convict, and
conduces much towards lightening, in the well dis-
posed, the feeling of hopelessness that ever accom-
panies a sense of imprisonment and slavery for
life."
At this time (1840 to 1845), Singapore was
more than ever before infested with tigers it is
supposed that they swam across the narrow part
of the Old Straits, from Johore to Kranji. The
number of natives, principally Chinese, employed on
gambier and pepper farms, that were carried off or
destroyed by them annually was considerable, and
it was said at the time that not a day passed with-
out one man being killed by wild animals. Whether
it was actually so or not, there are no police statistics
to prove, but as many as five in eight days were
reported at that time, and in later years, about 1860,
as many as 200 deaths were notified to the police
in one year, and probably a great number never
were brought to notice, because the difficulty of
obtaining coolies to work in the thick jungle, as it
then was, was a great inducement to the " Tow-
kays," or Head Chinese, to keep the number of
deaths as much as possible from being known. In
those days a reward of one hundred dollars was
offered by Government for every tiger brought to
the police station, whether alive or dead ; and this
sum, owing to their continued ravages, was sub-
49 E
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
sequently increased to one hundred and fifty
dollars.
One seizure of a man-eater is worth recording
here ; it is taken from The Singapore Free Press of
the year 1840, and runs as follows :
" The news of the capture and death of a tiger last
Saturday night on a Chinaman's plantation, close to
that of Mr. Balustier, the American Consul, gave
general satisfaction, being the first of these destruc-
tive animals which the Chinese had succeeded in
catching alive. A pit was dug where his track had
been observed, the mouth of which was covered
lightly over, and two or three dogs tied as bait.
The ruse luckily took effect, and, when advancing to
his imagined prey, he was himself precipitated into
the pit head foremost, where he was very soon de-
spatched by the natives, who pounded him to death
with stones. He was a large animal for the Malay
type, measuring 9 ft. 3 in. from the nose to the tip
of the tail, which was 35 inches long, the circum-
ference round the forearm being 21 inches. The
captors have claimed and obtained from the local
authorities the promised reward of one hundred
dollars, besides having sold the flesh of the animal
itself to the Chinese, Klings, and others for six
fanams a catty (a fanam is about three halfpence),
by which they realized about seventy dollars more."
It is singular how all natives believe that by eat-
ing the flesh of the tiger they absorb the essence
50
SINGAPORE
or distinctive features of the animal. Balfour says
that "the clavicle or collar-bone of the tiger is
considered of great virtue by many natives of India.
The whiskers are supposed by some to endow their
possessor with unlimited power over the opposite
sex." Tiger bones are often sold in China to form
an ingredient in certain invigorating jellies, made of
hartshorn, and the plastron of the terrapin or
tortoise. Burmese and Malays eat the flesh of the
tiger, because they believe that by eating it they
acquire the courage and sagacity of the animal.
Tigers' claws are used as charms, and the most
solemn oath of one of the aboriginal tribes of
India, the " Santals," is sworn when touching a
tiger's skin ; handsome brooches and earrings
are also made from tigers' claws mounted in gold.
In 1854 no less than six persons were killed
within the space of a few days not far from the
town, and in April of that year the Government,
alarmed for the safety of the people, sanctioned a
considerable expenditure for the construction of
tiger pits over many parts of the island. In August
of the same year the following article appeared in
The Singapore Free Press :
"The attention of His Honour the Governor
having been directed to the continued deplorable
ravages committed by tigers on the island, he has
expressed himself ready to adopt any measures
which may tend to remove the evil. It has been
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
suggested that persons are to be found in the
vicinity of Calcutta trained for the purpose of de-
stroying tigers ; and His Honour has written to the
Bengal Government requesting that half a dozen
of these ' shikarries ' should be sent to the Straits
for a limited period, to be employed in the destruc-
tion of these animals. The Governor has also
directed that in the meantime, should it be deemed
expedient, a certain number of volunteers from
convicts of the third class should be permitted to
beat the jungle once every month with tom-toms
(native drums), horns, etc., which, if they do not
lead to the destruction of the tigers, may frighten
them away from the island, to which they come
from the neighbouring state of Johore."
Later, in 1859, finding that the number of tigers
on the island, and the number of people killed by
them, were still increasing, the Governor, General Sir
Orfeur Cavenagh, discussed the matter with the then
Superintendent of Convicts (Major McNair), who
informed him that he had good shikarries amongst
the Indian convicts, and it was arranged to organize
parties of convicts for their destruction. Three
parties, of three men in each party, were selected,
and armed with the old muzzle-loading muskets and
ball ammunition. One party was sent to the Bukit
Timah or Central district, another to the Serangoon
and Changi or Eastern district, and the third to
the Choo Choo Kang or Western district. These
52
SINGAPORE
parties were generally successful in killing half a
dozen or so in the course of the year, chiefly in the
Central or garden district. Recourse was also had
to trapping them in cleverly-constructed deep pits,
built cone-wise, and by heavy beams of timber sus-
pended from tree to tree over their tracks, connected
on the ground with springes ; but only upon rare
occasions were they successful in this way. We
had in our possession several skins and skulls from
those destroyed by convicts. Some castes amongst
these convicts from India, when employed on this
duty, were also very expert in catching such venom-
ous snakes as cobras and craits. They appeared
not to possess the slightest dread of them, and
would stealthily follow them to their burrows, then
grasp the tail, and by a rapid movement of the
other hand along the body to just below the head,
grip the snake firmly at the neck and allow it to
coil round their arm. During the construction of
Fort Canning, later on, many were so caught and
brought down to the jail for the reward. They
were then destroyed, the convicts at the time always
asking pardon of the snake for so betraying it to
their masters. It is worth mentioning here that in
the jail there were so many different races of India,
and men of so many occupations and artifices, that
what a man of one caste did not know, another
would be sure to volunteer to perform. This col-
lection of such a variety of races in a jail under the
association system had another and more important
53
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
advantage, for it was at once a safeguard and pro-
tection against any possible combined revolt against
the authorities, for one caste would invariably
"split" against another.
It was in the year 1841 that it was decided to
erect a jail for the Indian convicts on a site near
the Brass Basa Canal on the east of the town, and
immediately below Government Hill, now known as
Fort Canning. The boundary wall was first built,
and then a brick building within, which was subse-
quently used as a convict hospital. This is shown
in the plan of the whole prison made in 1872, a
copy of which is given later. In this brick build-
ing the defaulters and those in irons were placed
on one side, and the local prisoners on the other.
The remainder of the convicts were lodged in tem-
porary structures inside the enclosure wall ; and
those employed in positions of trust were allowed
to erect small huts for themselves in the style of a
native village just outside the wall, in which they
were allowed to have their wives and families.
There was but one entrance to this enclosure,
where convict warders were at all times stationed
as agate guard. It will be readily understood that
discipline could not well be maintained under such
circumstances, while no records appear to have been
kept of any kind, relating to their daily employment
or occupation, so there is nothing to show whether
the convicts were employed in the erection of this
boundary wall ; but it is more probable that they
54
SINGAPORE
were only used as labourers, and not as artisans, for
it was not until a later date that they were organ-
ized and trained as skilled workmen.
It may be well for us to indicate here the progress
made in the Singapore town up to 1842, as given by
The Free Press newspaper in that year. It runs
thus :
" A stranger visiting Singapore cannot fail to be
struck by the signs everywhere exhibited of the
settlement being in a high state of prosperity and
progressive improvement. If he lands on the side
next the town he beholds the pathway in front of
the merchants' ' godowns ' or warehouses cumbered
with packages, and if he glances inside one of the
' godowns ' he will see it filled with packages and
bales of goods from all parts of the world. If he
goes among the native shops he finds them filled
with clamorous Klings (natives of the Coromandel
Coast of India) and Chinese, all busily engaged in
driving bargains. Passing on, he comes to where,
near the jail, the swamp is being filled up and
covered with shops, which are seen in every stage
of progress, some with the foundations newly laid,
and others nearly completed. If he wishes to leave
the town he crosses the Singapore River by a new
bridge, which was built two years ago. The scene
now undergoes a change : in place of the narrow
and crooked streets the stranger finds himself
amongst rows of neat villas, each standing in its
55
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
own enclosure. The Governor's residence is to
the left upon a small hill commanding a fine view
of the town and harbour. The flag-staff is also
placed there, and at all hours of the day may be
seen covered with flags, announcing the approach
of ships from every quarter of the globe. If he
should go into the country, the many thriving plan-
tations of spices and other tropical productions
(amongst which are to be noted one or two sugar
estates) present an equally pleasing sight, and give
promise of a long continuance to the well-being of
the settlement."
In this year, 1842, or it may perhaps have been
in the previous year, Mr. J. T. Thompson came to
Singapore in the capacity of Government Surveyor ;
whereupon the Government called upon all holders
and occupiers of land to point out to him their
boundaries, preparatory to the issue of proper leases.
Under his direction there was a systematic survey
made of all allotments upon the island ; and intelli-
gent Indian convicts were provided him to act as
his survey party, being preferred for that duty over
freemen to be obtained in the town. These con-
victs formed the nucleus of a regular native staff
for this department of the Government ; and, indeed,
up to the time of the abolition of the jail they
continued to be employed as chainmen and survey
assistants.
When Mr. Thompson visited Malacca, to inquire
56
SINGAPORE
into the system pursued there, he found it to be of
the most primitive type. For the linear measurements
the surveyor had for a chain, rattans jointed to-
gether, and this, with a ten-foot rod and a common
compass, formed their whole equipment. When
he tested however the measurements of the fields
and the town lots, he was surprised to find to what
approach to accuracy they had arrived with their
rude implements. Indian convicts were also there
employed as land measurers and assistants.
Upon his return to Singapore, Mr. Thompson
designed a European hospital, and adjoining it a
pauper hospital, erected mostly at the cost of a
benevolent Chinese gentleman of the name of
Tan-Tock-Seng. They were built on a plateau of
Pearls Hill facing the town. Some years later
these buildings were required for military purposes,
and were adapted for the purposes of a Commissariat
and Ordnance Department respectively. A new
building, in which was incorporated a general
hospital, was subsequently erected facing the Bukit
Timah Road, and the Tan-Tock-Seng hospital
for paupers was built further outside the town on
the Serangoon Road. In the erection of these
buildings convict labour was very largely utilised,
and in the front elevation of Tan-Tock-Seng's
hospital they had some rather difficult mouldings
to execute.
In the year 1844, owing to the amount of building
that was then going on in the town, there was a
57
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
great dearth of bricks ; so much so, that the
Chinese brick-kilns could not supply the immense
demand, and the price per laksa of 10,000 rose
more than fifty per cent. This led to the deter-
mination on the part of the Government to make
their own bricks, and an order was issued to the
Public Works Department to arrange for their
manufacture by the convicts. This was subse-
quently done ; and a suitable site having been
found upon the Serangoon Road, a large establish-
ment was started, an account of which will be
given in detail when we come to deal with the
industrial occupations of the Indian convicts. The
first Government brick-field, however, was started
at Rochore, under Captain Faber, but was given
up after only a short trial. He employed free
labour.
Chapter VI
SINGAPORE (Continued)
DURING the year 1845 the Bukit Timah Road
was opened up by convict labour between
Bukit Timah and Kranji, so that the produce
hitherto carried by water to Singapore from the
neighbouring country of Johore could now be
brought into town by road, while at the same time
land was thus opened up for cultivation. The
convicts were also employed in this year in con-
structing a road to the summit of Telok Blangah
Hill, now called Mount Faber, for the purpose ot
building there a signal station, that upon the island
of Blakan Mati having proved unhealthy, due, as
it was said at the time, to malaria from the enclosed
marsh at the back of the island, and to the tainted
air from decaying pine-apple leaves, which were
left by the Malays, who cultivated the fruit upon
all the available soil. Pine-apple growing has been
largely extended in this island, as is now generally
known at home ; and as it is a source of some
wealth to the colony, it may be incidentally men-
tioned in this running history of the place, and
59
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
more particularly in reference to the fact that the
Indian convicts upon ticket of leave have been
often employed in its culture in order to earn a
daily wage. The plant that produces the pine-
apple known as the "ananas," or by the Malays
as " nanas," grows literally wild upon the hills on
Blakan Mati Island, and other islands round about
Singapore. It delights in a moist climate, and
here it has it to perfection, with just enough heat to
help its growth. There is little or no trouble in its
propagation, for after the apple is sufficiently ripe
and cut, the crown that surmounts the fruit is
planted, and a new plantation soon springs up.
There is, however, some difference in the sweetness
and flavour of the fruit, according to the exposure
to which it is subjected, those having the benefit
of the sun being preferred.
The first to export the tinned fruit to Europe
was a Frenchman named Bastiani, 1 who succeeded
far beyond his expectations, and the industry has
since been taken up largely by the Chinese in
Singapore and Johore.
Yet another of the important public works of the
colony, upon which the labour of Indian convicts
was employed some five years earlier, was at the
construction of the lighthouse on " Pedro Branca,"
called the " Horsburgh," after the celebrated
hydrographer of that name. The design was by
1 He was known to both of us when he commenced the
undertaking.
60
SINGAPORE
Thompson, and the selection of the site by Sir
Edward Belcher, R.N., and most of the detail work
was under the direct supervision of Mr. J. Bennett,
a civil and mechanical engineer, who afterwards,
as we have said, played a prominent part in the
direction and control of the labour and industrial
training of the Indian convicts in the Singapore jail.
He had, as an assistant, Mr. Magaelhaens of the
Convict Department, and both the officers and the
convicts lived on board of a " Tonkong," or a large
boat, which was anchored close to the rock. The
convicts were chiefly employed in the capacity of
blasters and dressers of stone. The foundation
stone was laid with masonic honours by the Wor-
shipful Master Brother M. F. Davidson, on the
24th May, 1850, in the presence of the Governor,
Colonel Butterworth, and a large party from Singa-
pore ; and the work was completed and the lamps
lighted on the 27th September, 1851.
The Free Press spoke of it as an edifice of which
Singapore might well be proud. " The granite blocks
which form the walls were quarried and shaped at
Pulo Ubin, the timber used in the building was the
growth of our island, the brass rails of the staircases
were moulded and turned in this settlement, and
last, not least, the architect and engineer acquired
the skill and experience which enabled him to erect
so rapidly the chaste and stately building during
a long and useful career as Government Surveyor
at Singapore." Both the quarrying of the stone at
61
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
Pulo Ubin, and the felling of the timber required
in the erection of this lighthouse, were by the work
of Indian convicts.
In 1845 the foundation stone of a second light-
house was laid on a reef near a small island at the
eastern entrance to the Straits of Malacca called
" The Coney." It was also laid with masonic
honours by the Worshipful Master and Brethren of
the Lodge Zetland in the East, No. 748, in the
presence of the Governor, Colonel Butterworth, and
many of the British and foreign residents at Singa-
pore. This lighthouse was named after the eminent
founder of the settlement, Sir T. Stamford Raffles,
and was completed in 1856. It was built by free
labour, but many convicts were employed, as at
the " Horsburgh," as stone cutters, blasters, and
as labourers, under the charge of an officer of the
Convict Department.
We have referred elsewhere to the rules that had
from time to time been framed for the control of
these Indian convicts, but now we are able to state
that in 1845-46 what may be called the most
complete code of rules was permanently established.
Colonel Butterworth, who was then Governor of
the Straits Settlements, in consultation with the
Superintendent of the Convicts, collected all that
had been previously issued, together with those
that subsequent experience had shown to be neces-
sary, and working on the principles laid down by Sir
Stamford Raffles, the new set of " Rules and Regu-
62
SINGAPORE
lations for the Management of the Indian Convicts"
was formally sanctioned, and put in force under
the title of the " Butterworth Rules."
These rules practically recognised the total
abolition of free warders in the control of the
convicts, and the substitution entirely of petty
officers, raised from amongst the convicts them-
selves, together with the division of the convicts
into six distinct classes, according to their date of
arrival in the prison, and their general subsequent
behaviour ; holding out to one and to all by ex-
emplary conduct during their probationary period
a certain progressive reward and promotion.
Added to these " Butterworth Rules " were several
others of importance, introduced by Major McNair
in 1858-59, and sanctioned by the Government from
time to time as additions to this code. Later, Cap-
tain, now General, J. G. Forlong came to Singapore,
as we have stated, to study the convict system in
force ; and from the rules in use and the numerous
" standing orders " that had been issued at various
times, he prepared a valuable digest of the whole,
which he duly submitted to the Government of
India, in which he said, " I have but lately visited
most of the convict prisons of England, living for
some time with the Governor of the Dartmoor
jail, and I have seen many Indian prisons, and
can state for the Singapore system and establish-
ment, that it is not inferior to those of England,
and quite unequalled by any I have seen in India."
63
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
It is to Captain, the late General, Man that the
initiation of several handicrafts is due, and he com-
menced by starting all kinds of carpenter work.
The old Guthrie's timber bridge across the Singa-
pore River, for instance, was entirely their work.
They were also then taught brick-laying and black-
smith work ; and so valuable was this trained
labour to the State, even at that time, that the
Superintending Engineer of the station wrote to
Government in 1849 as follows :
" I can most confidently, and without fear of
refutation, assert it to be simply impracticable to
induce and obtain from Chinese carpenters that
accurate, close, substantial, and lasting workmanship
which not only can be, but is derived from the
convict artificers under the absolute control of the
present able and zealous Superintendent, Captain
Man."
We must here not forget to refer to another
public building, in the erection of which the Indian
convicts took their part, viz. the New Civil Jail
at Pearls Hill, the foundation stone of which was
laid by Captain Faber, the Superintending Engineer
of the Straits Settlements. Below the stone a
brass plate was deposited with the following in-
scription, which we give in full as of some peculiar
interest, and evidence of the progress of the settle-
ment up to 1847.
64
SINGAPORE
This Foundation Stone
of
H. M. Gaol, at Singapore,
was laid by Captain Faber, Madras Engineers,
Superintending Engineer, Straits Settlements,
on the 6th February, 1847,
the 2yth Anniversary of the Foundation
of a British Settlement
on this Island.
The Hon'ble Colonel W. J. Butterworth, C.B.,
being Governor of Prince of Wales Island,
Singapore, and Malacca,
and
the Hon'ble T. Church,
Resident Councillor at Singapore.
VICTORIA,
Queen of Great Britain and Ireland,
the Right Hon'ble Lord Hardinge, G.C.B.,
Governor-General of British India.
God save the Queen.
In a bottle, likewise placed below the stone, the
following statistical information relative to the
Straits Settlements, written on parchment, was
enclosed.
The trade for the year 1845-46 of Prince of
Wales Island, Singapore, and Malacca aggregated
the sum of Company's Rs. 52,190,685 in mer-
chandise, and Company's Rs. 9,606,061 in bullion
and treasure, making a grand total of Rs. 61,796,746
(exclusive of the trade between the three settle-
ments) as follows :
65
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
Imports. Exports. Total.
P.W. Island Rs. 6,614,794 6,528,452 = 13,143,246
Singapore 26,616,448 21,162,987 = 47,779,435
Malacca 509,872 3 6 4,*93 = 874,065
Grand total, Company's Rs. 61,796,746
W. J. BUTTERWORTH, Governor.
SINGAPORE, 6th February, 1847.
The revenue and charges for the year 1845-46
of Prince of Wales Island, Singapore, and Malacca,
including Civil, Military, Marine, Judicial, Convicts,
etc., were as follows :
Charges.
P.W. Island . Co. 's Rs. 402,783 15 n
Singapore . 497,i86 14 5
Malacca . 231,158 12 5
R S . 1,131,129 10 5
Revenue.
P.W. Island . Co.'s Rs. 185,443 2 9
Singapore . 530,040 15 7
Malacca . 64,408 9 n
Rs. 779,893 12 3
Total deficit at three settlements . . Rs. 351,236 14 6
W. J. BUTTERWORTH, Governor.
SINGAPORE, 6th February, 1847.
In the year 1848 we find that the Indian convicts
were employed in blasting some considerable part
of a mass of rock known to the Malays as Batu
Delayer, or " Stone to sail to," and by Europeans
as " Lot's wife." It was a dangerous obstruction
to navigation, being situated on the Singapore side
66
SINGAPORE
of the western entrance to the New Harbour. 1 It
is reported as known to the old navigators of those
seas, and was shown on old charts over two
hundred years ago.
In following The Anecdotal History it may
be well to mention here, as showing the steady
progress of Singapore, that a census was again
taken in 1849, which gave the total population at
59,043 Europeans being given at 198, Eurasians
at 304, Chinese at 24,790 ; and the remainder was
made up of Malays and other nationalities of the
Indian Archipelago, and from the Coromandel
Coast. This was recorded as only a trifling increase
on 1848 amongst the Chinese, and was attributed
to the decrease in the Chinese coolies working in
the interior of the island, owing to the exhaustion
of much soil, and the low price of produce, which
had caused many of the planters to open new
plantations in J chore.
As an evidence of the variety of the employ-
ments to which these Indian convicts were turned
by the Government, it should be remarked that
during the Chinese riots in 1851, when the Chinese
Hwuys began to distrust their countrymen who
had become converted to Christianity by a Roman
Catholic mission in the interior of the island, these
1 This entrance to Singapore was called New Harbour after
the construction there of Cloughton's Dock, now the much im-
proved New Harbour Dock. Singapore can now boast of another
fine dock at Tanjong Pagar, constructed some forty years ago, and
an additional dock is reported to be in contemplation.
6?
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
convicts were sent out in gangs to follow the
rioters into the jungles and disperse them. These
riots lasted for over a week, and it required the
presence at last of the military to quell them. As
it was, over 500 Chinese were killed, and among
them many of the well-to-do Christian converts
who had become planters.
Utilized as the services of these convicts from
India were by the Government of that day, and
their being wholly different in their habits, customs,
and language from the Chinese who formed the
bulk of the town population, it is not to be won-
dered at that the Chinese felt themselves estranged
from them, and kept themselves ever aloof. There
were, however, some Chinese of the lowest class
who sought to embroil themselves with them, so
as to bring the convicts into trouble, but the con-
victs always avoided a quarrel. They therefore
sought other means, and in 1852 they gave out
and placarded over the town that the Governor
and all the Europeans had left worshipping in St.
Andrew's Church, owing to the number of evil
spirits there, and had gone to worship in the Court
House, and that in order to appease the spirits
the Governor required thirty heads, and had ordered
the convicts to waylay people at night and kill them.
These placards created quite a panic in the place,
so that people were for some days afraid to leave
their houses after dark. In order to allay the
fears of the people the Governor issued a procla-
68
SINGAPORE
mation saying that St. Andrew's Church had been
struck by lightning and was unsafe (which was the
fact), and he called upon the people not to believe
the reports of evil men. Moreover, he offered a
reward of $500 for the discovery of any person
propagating such reports. This had no effect
however, so the leading Chinese merchants were
called upon to address their countrymen, which
they did in a long appeal, assuring them of the
benevolence of the Christian Government, and
urging them to have no fear and not believe in
foolish reports. In two days the fears of the
Chinese population were thus dispelled. In 1875
a similar "head scare" occurred during the con-
struction of the "puddle trench" for the new im-
pounding reservoir. This was a work of con-
siderable difficulty, and some superstitious natives
circulated a report that it could not be done without
" human sacrifice," and that the Government were
looking for " heads " to put into the trench, and
the alarm for days was so great that people would
not pass along Thompson's Road adjoining the
reservoir after dark; and even the " dhobies," or
washer-men, in the stream adjoining the puddle
trench, hastened into town before dusk. Similar
so called " head scares " have occurred in Singa-
pore up to even the present time. It is not easy
to define what has led to this superstition in the
native mind, and it is made more complicated from
the fact that it is shared alike by Chinese and
69
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
natives of India. In many of the Polynesian
Islands the practice of human sacrifices we know
exists even in our own days, and that chiefs, when
they build a house or a war-canoe, offer up a human
being ; and the Polynesians and Indonesians re-
semble one another very closely. But such a super-
stition has not come to us through the Malay race,
and we must rather seek for its origin from the
Aryan Hindus of India; and as the Chinese took
most of their tradition and folk-lore from the cradle
of the Aryan races, the belief might thus be
common to both peoples. 1 The Rev. Mr. Ward,
writing early in this century, refers to the human
sacrifices at Bardwan, in Bengal, and says of them :
"The discovery of murders in the name of religion
was made by finding bodies with the heads cut
off, and placed near the images of ' Durga ' and
1 Kali.'" Also at Serampur, before the temple of the
goddess " Jara," a human body was found without
a head. Whatever the origin of the superstition
may be traced to, the municipality at Singapore
were wisely advised, and we think very properly
declined to take any notice of the recent " head
scare " of this year, and we can only hope that
these apprehensions will gradually cease to stir the
minds of the people as they become more instructed
and advanced in civilization.
1 The old mystic symbol of the Swastika of India, . .
for instance, is common amongst the Mongolian races, * I
and other signs of an early union between these races -J
might be given.
70
SINGAPORE
Among the many works of utility carried on by
convict labour during the tenure of the office of
Superintendent of Convicts by Captain Man was
the widening and improving of the Bukit Timah
Canal, in order to drain the adjacent low lands,
and render them capable for cultivation by market
gardeners. In the cutting of these artificial
channels the convicts from India had great aptitude,
and some of them had been employed on similar
work in their own country. The largest work,
however, commenced in Captain Man's time, was
the erection of the whole of the permanent build-
ings required for the location of the then large
number of Indian convicts. They were built with-
in the surrounding wall of the jail, near the " Brass
Basa " or "Wet Rice" Canal, and entirely by the
labour of the convicts themselves. The estimate
for the work made by the Superintending Engineer
for their execution by free labour was 100,000
rupees, but the money cost to the Government
was only 12,000 rupees, when executed by convict
labour and with convict-made materials. To effect
this, the convicts were trained to make the bricks,
to dig and burn coral for lime, to quarry stone for
foundations, and to fell the timber in Government
forests in the island, and to dress it for roof timbers,
door and window frames, and so forth.
When Captain Man went to Malacca as Resident
Councillor, Captain Ronald Macpherson, of the
Madras Artillery, succeeded him as Superintendent
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
of Convicts, Singapore, and carried on the works
in progress at the time. This was in the year
J ^55- The most prominent work commenced by
the convicts in his time, and subsequently carried
to completion, was the erection of the new church,
now the cathedral of the diocese. It must be
acknowledged that it was a courageous act on the
part of Captain Macpherson to have designed a
church in the early English style of architecture,
and to have pledged himself to the Government
that he would undertake to construct it wholly by
convict labour. We think it showed both con-
fidence in himself and in his convict workpeople,
and nothing could more clearly have proved to
what perfection their skilled labour had advanced
than that he felt himself able to embark on so
elaborate a work.
It was in May of this year, 1855, that the Bengal
Government approved of the project, and sanc-
tioned the expenditure in cash of 47,000 rupees
upon its construction. The Bishop of Calcutta
laid the foundation stone during next year before
a large concourse of the merchants and residents
of the place, and the inscription below the stone
ran as follows :
The first English church of Singapore, commenced A.D. 1834,
and consecrated A.D. 1838, having become dilapidated, this
stone of a new and more commodious edifice, dedicated to
the worship of Almighty God according to the rites and dis-
cipline of the Church of England, under the name of St.
72
SINGAPORE
Andrew, was laid by the Right Reverend Daniel Wilson, D.D.,
Lord Bishop of Calcutta and Metropolitan, on the 4th March,
1856, in the twenty-fourth year of his episcopate.
The Hon'ble Edmund Augustus Blundell being the Governor
of the Straits Settlements.
The Hon'ble Thomas Church being Resident Councillor of
Singapore.
Lieut-Col. Charles Pooley, of the Madras Army, Commanding
the Troops.
The Rev. William Topley Humphrey being Chaplain.
And Captain Ronald McPherson of the Madras Artillery being
the Architect.
The Building to be erected at the charge of the Hon'ble East
India Company.
Full Estimate of cost: Co.'s Rupees 120,932, or with Convict
Labour Rupees 47,916.
In May, 1857, Captain Man proceeded from
Malacca to Penang as Resident Councillor of that
settlement, and Captain Macpherson took his place
at Malacca. Captain Purvis, also of the Madras
Artillery, was appointed to succeed Captain Mac-
pherson in the combined duties of engineer and
Superintendent of Convicts ; but, to the regret of
the Government, he relinquished the appointment
at the close of the year, and Lieutenant McNair,
another Madras Artillery officer, succeeded him.
Lieutenant (now Major) McNair was a passed in-
terpreter in the Hindustani language, which was
spoken by the bulk of the convicts in the jail, and
he subsequently qualified as a civil engineer. He
remained in charge of the convicts until the jail
was abolished in 1873.
73
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
Upon his assuming charge, the foundations of
the new church had been laid and the masonry
built up to nearly three feet above ground. The
work was steadily carried on in accordance with
the plans of Captain Macpherson, with the single
exception that it was found necessary, owing to the
weakness of the foundations, to abandon the heavy
tower, and to place a light steeple instead. In the
building of this church, Mr. John Bennett afforded
most material assistance as Assistant Superinten-
dent of Convicts. To his oversight and careful
attention to the variety of details incident to such a
work may be ascribed its satisfactory completion in
January, 1862, when the edifice was consecrated by
the then Bishop of Calcutta, Dr. George Cotton,
who so unfortunately met his death in 1 866 by
being drowned in the Ganges. Further details in
connection with this work will also be given under
the heading of " Convict Industries and Public
Works."
74
Chapter VII
SINGAPORE (Continued)
TO continue the narrative according to date, we
trace that in the year 1858, after the mutiny,
the Indian Government came to the conclusion that
at all principal centres " field redoubts " should be
constructed, to be available as places of refuge for
Europeans in the event of a native rising ; and
accordingly orders were given for the fortification
of Singapore. Colonel Collyer, of the Madras
Engineers, was therefore sent over from Madras to
design and carry out the necessary military works,
and he was given the appointment of Chief Engineer
of the Straits Settlements.
He selected Government Hill for the main work,
and improved and enlarged the batteries on Mounts
Palmer and Faber, being of opinion that, beyond
the idea of a place of refuge, the island should be
fortified to resist aggression from without. All his
plans were approved, and, as Lord Canning had
then become the first " Viceroy" of India, the main
work was named after him, which name it bears to
this day. In the execution of most of the earthwork,
75
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
Chinese labour was employed, but the convicts were
utilized in building the sally ports, constructing the
drawbridge, sinking the deep wells ; and the whole
of the bricks, and much of the lime and cement
required, were manufactured by the convicts at the
Government kilns on the Serangoon Road. Colonel
Collyer also designed other important works in the
place, notably the Collyer Quay. Major Mayne, of
the same corps, succeeded him, and in his time the
waterworks scheme for the town was initiated, but
not carried fully to completion, and fresh designs
became necessary under his successor, in consulta-
tion with the late Sir Robert Rawlinson, K.C.B.
During this year also the convicts were em-
ployed in the erection of a new court house (now
the public offices), the general hospital, lunatic
asylum, pauper hospital, and some other minor
public works. They also built the walls of the
reclamation works along the sea front, now known
as Collyer Quay, and above referred to, and the
river wall at Campong Malacca. Both these sea
and river works had been attempted by free labour,
but the work of the convicts for this class of rubble
walling was found more suitable, and therefore it
was carried on by them, and with satisfactory results
in every way.
Shortly after the transfer of the Straits Settle-
ments to the Crown, which occurred on the ist
April, 1867, the Governor, then Sir Harry St.
George Ord, called upon Major McNair, who had
76
/ X
^* /?/ A \. Cw,,;.-/
^ / ^^M **
l_o*
. nl-
ssr o
I
SINGAPORE
been appointed Colonial Engineer and Comptroller
of the Indian Convicts, to prepare plans for a
Government House to be erected near Mount
Sophia, somewhat under two miles from the town.
The plans were approved by the Governor, and
passed by the Legislative Council early in 1868.
The land on which it stands cost $43,800, and the
building, furniture, and laying out of the grounds,
$115,000, and the work, with convict labour, was
finished for the reception of H.R.H. the Duke of
Edinburgh 1 in December, 1869.
DESCRIPTION OF THE SINGAPORE CONVICT JAIL.
We have already incidentally referred to the
plans of Captain Man for the erection of a perma-
nent jail for the Indian convicts, which he had
agreed to construct wholly by convict labour. The
enclosure wall already existed, within which the
original temporary buildings and thatched huts had
been run up for their shelter. Only one solid
building was within it, part of which was used as a
hospital and the remainder for the confinement of
convicts in irons. The next permanent building to
be erected was quarters for the chief warder, and
then came the solid gateways and guard-rooms.
After these were built the wards for the fourth and
fifth classes, or convicts in irons, then Nos. i and 2
wards, all shown on the plan (Plate X.) attached.
Then a work-yard was enclosed by a solid wall,
1 Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.
77
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
and offices built near the outer entrance to it, for
the offices of the engineer and Superintendent of
Convicts. While this wall was under construction
by one gang, other gangs were employed in erecting
within the main enclosure a refractory ward and
punishment cells, and other minor buildings re-
quired in the way of store rooms, filter rooms, 1 chain
room, and a receiving room for fresh arrivals ; and
the effectual drainage of the whole prison.
It was only when all these buildings were actually
completed, in the year 1860, that the establish-
ment assumed the character of a prison ; and the
convicts themselves were not slow to realize the
fact, for it became a proverb amongst them that
" an open campong, or village, had become a closed
cage."
In 1857 there were altogether under the control
of the convict authorities no fewer than 2,139
transported felons from India and about fifty from
Hongkong. About one half of this number were
localised in the main prison, the other half being
employed upon the country roads, the quarries, and
brickfields. These were of the third class ; the
second class men were detailed for duties as Govern-
ment messengers, punkah pullers at the hospitals
1 These filters were of the simplest construction. They con-
sisted of three very porous earthenware pots or " chatties "
placed on a tripod. In the first was the water to be filtered,
a foot off was the pot full of charcoal and white sand, and the
filtered water was drawn off from the third. The charcoal and
sand were renewed twice a week.
78
SINGAPORE
and Government offices, and others of this class
also as "lookout men" at the flag-staff stations,
helpers to light keepers, crews for the Government
boats conveying firewood to the jail and brick kilns,
and others digging and conveying coral for lime
burning.
In the main prison the wards were built of a
uniform length of 230 feet, breadth 60 feet, and
height of walls 20 feet. The wards were not
ceiled, but open to the tiles, with a ridge ventilator
along the whole roof. Beneath the side windows,
which were barred, ground ventilation was pro-
vided, in order to ensure a current of air through-
out the whole building. The floors were laid in
concrete, and cemented over with " soorkee," or
brick dust and cement mixed, and graded to the
sides. Each ward was arranged to contain four
hundred convicts. All the convicts were in associa-
tion, separate confinement being restricted to the
punishment cells. In each ward were platform
sleeping benches. They were raised three feet at
the head, and two feet nine inches at the foot,
above the floor, and were coated with coal tar
except on the actual sleeping place.
Lime-wash was used for the inner roofing timbers
and tiles, and generally for the walls, except for the
three feet of dado, which was coated with coal tar.
Parts of this dado were daily re-coated with hot
fresh tar, as we found coal tar to be a valuable deo-
dorizer. To each ward there were four night urinals,
79
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
detached from the main building and provided with
double spring doors. In each urinal there were
utensils coated with coal tar, and at every corner
iron crates filled with wood-charcoal to absorb
noxious vapours. Down the centre of each ward
spit-boxes were provided for second and third class
convicts accustomed to betel chewing. There was
always a night watch of one petty convict officer in
each ward, and surprise visits were often paid at
night by the Superintendent, his assistant, and the
chief warder. Going down a ward at night, one
might see four hundred or more of these convicts,
each enveloped from head to foot in a " chadar," or
native sheet, literally over head and ears in sleep.
They were all properly worked, properly fed, and
properly punished when they deserved it ; so, with
the benefit of the two first, and a wholesome dread
of the third, no wonder they were soon lulled to
sleep when the prison doors were closed upon them.
Now, at the risk of being a little tedious, we
propose to describe in some detail the "day"
latrines in use in this old jail. The information
may, we think, be of service to those who have
native prisoners under their charge either in jails or
police stations in the East. At this period of time,
when conservancy has rightly taken a first place in
all such establishments, it may be thought by some
to be superfluous, but the system pursued by us
worked so very well that we do not hesitate to give
an account of it.
80
SINGAPORE
There were many such latrines in the prison, so
we will confine our remarks to one only. The
building in use for this purpose was about seventy
feet in length and twenty feet wide, and the tiled
roof was supported upon brick pillars raised twelve
feet from the ground. In its construction care was
taken, above all things, to ensure a solid floor
"impervious" to "moisture." This was made by
first laying down six inches of well-prepared con-
crete, consisting of pounded granite, brick-dust, and
gravel cemented together by hydraulic mortar, then
overlaid with pure cement, and after this coated
with an inch thick of asphalt. Around the whole
building was an open drain, about two feet inside of
the pillars, and built like the floor, and carefully
graded to the outfall. The walls, pillars, and
drains were coated with coal tar, and here and
there daily renewed to ensure deodorization. Close
to the drain, and at eighteen inches apart, were
placed troughs of hard wood two feet in length,
one foot nine inches wide, and nine inches deep,
with stout handles at either end. These troughs
were smeared over with pitch. Between every
second trough was placed a box containing about
a bushel of powdered red earth, perfectly dry, and
in each box was a ladle made of half a cocoanut
shell attached to a handle. Two convicts of the
sixth, or feeble class, were placed in charge of this
latrine, whose duty it was to see that the red earth
was sprinkled by those using the troughs. When
81 G
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
the troughs were full they were emptied into a
conservancy cart with a hermetically closed screw
top, and when this was full it was conveyed by
bullocks to plantations in the country.
We think we are quite warranted in saying that
this was the first jail, if not the first establishment
anywhere, in which this dry earth system of conser-
vancy was used. For centuries, no doubt, in India
the well-known habit of the cat had been followed
by many of the native castes, but it was not until
vast numbers of these convicts from India were
aggregated in association that the application of the
system to their dwellings was initiated, and we
think that the clever invention of the "earth closet"
for certain localities may have suggested itself to
its inventor when a resident at Singapore.
It may be as well to give here the testimony of
Dr. Mouat, the Inspector-General of Jails, Bengal,
on the efficiency of the conservancy of this old jail,
and in no spirit of self-satisfaction we quote his
own words " verbatim," which are as follows :
"Singapore, ist June, 1865. I have sincere
pleasure in recording the unmixed satisfaction
which I have experienced from a careful examina-
tion of the jail, and system of prison management
in use at Singapore.
The scrupulous cleanliness, perfect plan of con-
servancy, excellent order, well-regulated system of
labour and punishments, and the high standard of
82
SINGAPORE
health attained are not surpassed in any other well-
regulated institution of the same kind that I am
acquainted with in Europe or in Asia. My personal
knowledge of prisons and of all details of prison
management is sufficiently extended to entitle me to
speak with authority on this subject.
In many important points of internal economy
and discipline, Singapore can fairly lay claim to
being Primus in Indis in the adoption and
practical working of principles that are now gener-
ally accepted as sound and correct. My own feeling
on the subject is that Colonels Man and Macpherson
and Captain McNair, to whom the chief credit
appears to be due, are entitled to rank in the first
class of prison officers and reformers in India."
Perhaps the last addition to the jail buildings was
the erection by the convict bricklayers and plas-
terers of a stand to hold the prison bell, and from
whence to call the roll at general musters. It was
built in the form of a " monopteron," a sort of
structure without walls, and composed of columns
arranged in a circle, and supporting a covered
cupola.
Chapter VIII
DIVISION INTO CLASSES, TRADES, FOOD, AND
CLOTHING
WE now come to deal with perhaps not a
very inviting part of our subject, viz. the
division of the convicts into classes, their super-
vision, artificer trades, hours of work, food, and
clothing, but it must be told in brief in order to
make the narrative of this jail complete.
They were divided into six classes, but since the
year 1857, when Major McNair took charge, sec.
A of the third class, and sec. A of the fifth
class were added to the classification.
The First Class consisted of trustworthy con-
victs allowed out on ticket of leave.
Second Class consisted of convict petty officers,
male and female, and those employed in
hospitals and public offices.
Third Class were convicts employed on roads
and public works, having passed through
their probationary course.
Fourth Class were convicts newly arrived, and
those degraded from other classes or pro-
84
[AfcNair.
DUFFADAR RAM SINGH, SENIOR PETTY OFFICER
OF THE JAIL.
Plate XII.
DIVISION INTO CLASSES, TRADES, ETC
moted from the fifth class. They worked
in light irons.
Fifth Class were convicts degraded from the
higher classes, and such as required more
than ordinary vigilance to prevent escape,
or regarding whom special instructions
had been received from India. They
worked in heavy irons.
Sixth Class were invalids and superannuated
convicts.
Youths were transferred to a special gang for
"boys."
Convicts, if for life, were admitted to the first class
after having been sixteen years in transportation ;
if for seventeen years, after twelve years ; and if for
seven years, after having been six years in trans-
portation. Females, for whatever period, from
three to five years. Before a ticket of leave could
be granted, the convict had to provide personal
security for his good behaviour and continued pres-
ence in the settlement ; and any misdemeanour on
his part involved a revoking of his ticket of leave,
and his return to confinement in the prison and
reduction to a lower class. All First Class convicts,
whether male or female, had to attend muster on
the first of every month, and had to keep the
Superintendent informed of their place of residence,
and were bound to sleep in it every night.
Second Class convicts were employed as stated.
85
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
They were allowed to go out of the jail after
working hours, but had to appear at 8 p.m. roll call
daily (except those employed at hospitals and in
special duties), and were required to sleep in prison
at night. Convicts were admitted to this class, on
good behaviour, at the Superintendent's discretion,
as follows :
If transported for 7 years, after 5 years.
14 ,, 7
life, 8
All jail petty officers, from duffadars to orderlies,
were included in this class, and no convict was
eligible for an orderly until he had been eight years
in transportation ; promotion went either by senior-
ity or qualification, but he should have been an or-
derly for two years before being promoted to a peon.
Third Class convicts. Convicts were admitted
to this class at the Superintendent's discretion
If transported for 12 years, after 12 months.
14 2 years,
life, 3
This was not a chain class, and one rupee a
month was allowed to each man for the purchase of
condiments, called "subsistence money." If not
belonging to the country gangs, and of approved
good conduct, this class was allowed, after working
hours, to be outside the prison until 6 p.m., if they
had already completed four years in transportation ;
86
HEAD TINDAL MAISTRI OF CART MAKERS
AND WHEELWRIGHTS.
Plate XIII.
DIVISION INTO CLASSES, TRADES, ETC
until that period had been discharged they were
confined after work was over. This class was
allowed to use their sectarian marks as a privilege.
Degraded prisoners of this class were called " Sec.
A, 3rd Class," and wore a ring on each ankle ; they
were strictly confined to the jail precincts.
Fourth Class. All newly arrived convicts, except
those regarding whom special instructions had been
received from India, were placed in this class, and
served their probation in it. They were worked in
double light irons, and were not allowed to leave the
prison except for work ; they were not granted any
money allowance, but fish, vegetables and condi-
ments were supplied to them with their rations.
They were, however, allowed the privilege to cook
their own food.
Fifth Class. This was a " punishment class " for
troublesome characters from the upper classes, and
every man degraded to it had to serve two years
before being again promoted to the fourth class, and
an additional six months before he could be pro-
moted to the third class, unless the Superintendent
saw sufficiently good cause for leniency. This class
received clothing and rations like the fourth class,
with vegetables, fish, and condiments ; but all were
cooked for them in mess under a convict cook.
They received no money allowance, and were not
allowed to leave the prison except for work. Refrac-
tory prisoners of this class were called " Sec. A, 5th
Class " ; they were put in the heaviest irons, with
87
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
wrist irons if necessary, and were confined in the
refractory ward on severe task work, as making coir
from the rough husk of the cocoa-nuts, pounding
and cleaning rice, and such like hard labour.
"Flogging" : If upon rare occasions this pun-
ishment had to be resorted to, the culprit was
first inspected by the medical officer to see if he
were capable to undergo the sentence : usually the
number of lashes was from one dozen up to six
dozen with the cat-o'-nine- tails. If passed by the
medical officer, the punishment was inflicted in the
presence of the convicts, and by selected convict
warders, the medical officer or his apothecary being
invariably present during the infliction. The tri-
angles were of the usual pattern, and the flogging
was on the buttock.
No person was allowed to punish a convict but
the Superintendent or the Assistant Superintendent
acting for him. The defaulter was brought to the
inquiry room, the case inquired into fully, and the
default and sentence duly recorded in a book kept
for the purpose.
Sixth Class. This class embraced all invalid and
incapable men who were able to perform light work,
as sweepers, watchmen in country commands, and
in charge of latrines ; also caretakers at Govern-
ment bungalows, and those superannuated men who
were exempt from all work. No convicts were
admitted to this class until declared unfit for hard
work by the medical officer and the Annual Medical
88
CONVICT OF THE SECOND CLASS AND
MUNSHI.
Plate XIV.
DIVISION INTO CLASSES, TRADES, ETC
Committee. Men of approved conduct got the
indulgences of their former class. Female convicts
belonged to this class, of which there were always a
few under transportation. They were confined in a
separate ward under a convict matron, and no
prison male warder was allowed therein on pain
of degradation.
The supervising staff consisted of a Superinten-
dent who was also the Executive Engineer of the
station and his assistant, a chief warder and two
assistants, an overseer of artificers and of roads.
The native staff, being all petty officers raised from
amongst the convicts, consisted of three duffadars,
eight first tindals, twenty-two second tindals,
ninety- four peons, and sixty-five orderlies, for the
number of convicts then under confinement.
In the year 1857 there were 2,139 convicts from
different parts of India, Burmah, and Ceylon in this
jail ; but upon an average, until the prison was
broken up, there were 1,900 always under control.
The men from India were Seikhs, Dogras, Pallis, or
a shepherd race ; Thugs and Dacoits from different
parts of the Bengal presidency, and mostly from
round about Delhi and Agra ; felons from all
parts of the Madras and Bombay presidencies, and
a few from Assam and Burmah, chiefly Dacoits, and
a sprinkling of Cingalese.
Upon arrival from India, each convict was
checked with the warrants that accompanied the
several gangs, then photographed, bathed, and
89
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
supplied with the prison clothing, and each received
a number by which, until he entered the third class,
he was always known. Each convict was then duly
inspected by the medical officer before admission to
the wards. Any property with them was scheduled
and put away until they were entitled to receive it,
and the clothing in which they arrived was duly
fumigated.
The artificer body was drawn from the third and
fourth classes only, and they were subject to the
same discipline as their classes in the general prison.
They were divided into four grades, according to
the degree of skill they evinced, and received a
monthly allowance commencing at one half a rupee,
or is. a month, up to the highest sum given to the
best workmen of los. a month, who were called
" tindal maistris," and who were entrusted with
the duty of teaching beginners. These tindal
maistris were exempted from keeping watch in
the wards at night.
The several trades taught in the prison were as
follows, and none of them were dangerous to health
except the cement-sifting by females on treadles,
which had to be discontinued :
Bricklayers and plasterers. Coopers.
Brick and tile makers and Carpenters, cement and
potters. lime burners.
Blacksmiths. Gardeners.
Basket makers. Painters.
90
DIVISION INTO CLASSES, TRADES, ETC
Lime and charcoal bur- Shoe and sandal makers.
ners. Tailors.
Plumbers. Turners and weavers.
Quarrymen. Wheelwrights.
Sawyers, stone cutters, Woodcutters.
and blasters. Boatmen.
Slaters. Stone masons.
Those few of the convicts who had acquired a
trade in their native country were not admitted to
the artificer gang until they had gone through their
probationary period in irons on the public roads.
The bulk of the convicts were trained in the prison
itself; and after the year 1857 native methods of
working were abandoned, and the use of our car-
penter's bench introduced, and English tools em-
ployed in all trades.
They felled and stacked timber upon the island,
which, after conveyance to the yard, was sawn and
wrought into all that was required for roofing
timbers, doors and window frames. They made
the bricks, lime, and cement, and all tiles necessary
for roofing or for paving. They quarried the stone
at Pulo Obin for foundations, and for sea and river
walls. The blacksmiths cast and forged from the
raw state all the iron work for which there was a
necessity. As a matter of fact all material and all
labour for the execution of any public work required
by the Government were executed by these convicts,
from a small timber bridge upon a country road,
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
even to the erection of a " cathedral" and " Govern-
ment House," of which it is purposed further to give
a detailed account.
This is the proper place in which we may men-
tion that in the years 1859-60 the estimated
value of this convict labour was 162,230 rupees,
while the expenses of the whole convict depart-
ment amounted to 117,578 rupees. In 1860-61
the manufacture account showed a balance of 25,028
rupees in favour of the State, though profit was
always deemed of secondary importance. Material
was valued at one half the market rate, and the labour
at two- thirds the value of the same labour prevail-
ing in the place.
The hours of work were limited to nine, includ-
ing the time taken in marching to and fro from the
works ; but to add to discipline we would occasion-
ally give them some extra hours of work, answering
somewhat to our " pipebrooms " in the Navy, or the
" pipe- claying of belts " in our Army on the line of
march on active service.
The jail bell was rung at 5 a.m. (except Sunday),
when every convict rose, rolled up his blanket with
the number visible, and placed his " chadar " or
sheet in his box, which was also numbered to
correspond. He was marched out to the prison
yard with the men of his ward, and the roll was
called by the responsible officer. Time for light
food was allowed, and the convicts were then de-
tailed to the work gangs as arranged overnight.
92
CHETOO, AN INCORRIGIBLE CONVICT OF THE
FIFTH CLASS.
Plate
DIVISION INTO CLASSES, TRADES, ETC
The work gangs left the prison punctually at 6 a.m.,
and returned at 1 1 a.m. ; were marched out again at
i p.m., returning at 5 p.m. At 6 p.m. a roll was
again called for the 3rd, 4th, and 5th classes, who
were then locked up for the night. At 8 p.m. there
was another roll call for those who had the privilege,
and then all were seen to their wards, and all wards
and gates were locked by 9 p.m., when strict silence
reigned throughout the prison; the European warder
going rounds up to 10 p.m., and occasionally, with
the Superintendent and his assistant, paying surprise
night rounds. Convicts on the march out of prison
were moved five abreast, or as they called it "panch-
panch," literally, by " fives."
On the first of every month there was a general
muster of the whole of the convicts, including the first
class, when the roll was called, and each answered to
his name or number. This muster was always in
the presence of the Superintendent, who inspected
each convict, and if any one had a grievance his
name was taken down, and his complaint afterwards
inquired into at the " Inquiry Room," This op-
portunity was taken by the Superintendent to inspect
the whole prison, wards, latrines, drains, and bath-
ing places.
The rations required for the jail were either
obtained upon indent upon the Government Com-
missariat Department, or by tender called for in
the town. Each convict's daily allowance was as
follows :
93
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
To 2nd, 3rd, and
6th classes with-
out condiments.
Rice.
Dholl
or
Peas.
Salt.
Ghee,
clari-
fied
Butter.
Vege-
tables.
Fish.
Mussalah
or Curry
Stuff.
oz.
oz.
drs.
drs.
oz.
oz.
drs.
Effective men
32
5
8
8
7i
Invalids and
Women
24
2
8
8
7i
To the fourth and fifth classes, being effective, with
condiments, fish and vegetables alternating thus
Mussalah
Rice.
Dholl.
Salt.
Ghee.
Vegetables.
Fish.
or Curry
Stuff.
oz.
oz.
drs.
drs.
oz.
oz.
drs.
Monday
Tuesday
28
28
5
I
10
10
5
5
',1
We found that this dietary scale was sufficient to
a native under labour to repair waste tissue without
giving fat. The "ghee," or clarified butter, made
the rice more nutritious, and the " dholl," or peas,
contained both albumen and starch, which would of
themselves alone support life. For the penal class
there was the usual congee diet.
All convicts not being in the first class, nor em-
ployed as messengers in hospitals or at public
offices (when they received a compensation), were
clothed in the jail.
The 2nd, 3rd, and 6th'
classes
4th and 5th classes .
INine yards of stout grey
shirting.
One jail suit.
Two working suits and
a stout cap.
94
DIVISION INTO CLASSES, TRADES, ETC
To all annually was given one blanket of coarse
wool called a " kumblie," and made by the convicts
themselves from wool purchased in the place and
prepared by them for the purpose.
Belts and brass plates for them were supplied
only to duffadars, tindals, peons, and orderlies.
The European warders were dressed in a light
blue serge loose coat with lace round the cap, and
distinctive badge to indicate the grade, and in the
case of an overseer of artificers a hammer and chisel
crossed. After the reception in 1858-59 of a
large number of mutineers they were supplied with
a belt and revolver.
95
Chapter IX
PUBLIC WORKS AND INDUSTRIES
IN referring to the variety of public works under-
taken by these Indian convicts, we have hitherto
refrained from going into much detail in regard to
them ; but we think it will not be without interest
to dwell somewhat more at length, as we have
proposed, upon the construction of the cathedral
and the Government House, which still remain as
records of their labour, and spring into the greatest
prominence. Of the jail itself, which, as we have
said, was planned and partially carried out by the
late General Man, nothing further need, we think,
be added for it is now dismantled except that
it was in truth the training ground for the artificer
gang under that able officer, who saw the absolute
necessity of having some large public work in hand
in order to the convicts acquiring a knowledge of the
various trades. This principle in the management
of convicts was advocated by Sir Edmund Du Cane
in one of his pamphlets, in which he judiciously
says that " the best system devised for the employ-
96
CATHEDRAL, SINGAPORE.
[Koch.
Plate XVI.
PUBLIC WORKS AND INDUSTRIES
ment of convicts is that of executing large public
works by means of their labour."
As the late General Man had for this purpose the
erection of the permanent jail, so the late Colonel
Macpherson planned and laid the foundations for
execution by their labour of St. Andrew's Church,
now the cathedral of the diocese ; while to Major
McNair fell the duty of designing and constructing
almost wholly by these convicts the house for the
Governor of the colony.
CATHEDRAL 1 (see Plate XVI.).
In preparing the designs of this ecclesiastical edi-
fice, Colonel Macpherson had to select as simple
and easy a form of architecture as he could, and
with as little ornament as possible, and therefore
within the capacity of his workpeople ; so he chose
the Gothic, or rather, we should say, the Early
English style of about the I2th century, and in
so doing he said he had somewhat reproduced the
character of old Netley Abbey. 2 He laid the
1 Archdeacon and Chaplain, Ven. John Perham j\
Choirmaster, Mr. C. B. Buckley; Organist, V 1899.
Mr. E. Salzmann. J
2 Colonel Macpherson had seen as a young man the ruins of
the old church and abbey of Netley, or " Letley," as it was
originally called, from the Latin word "laetus," pleasant, and the
Saxon word " ley," a field, and had been so impressed with the
simple character and proportions of the Early English style of
church architecture, of which this was an excellent example, that
when called upon to plan a new church for Singapore, he, as we
say, chose this as his model.
We have a very good account of Netley Abbey given in 1848
by George Guillaume, architect, and from his description it was
97 H
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
foundations, and saw it built up to about three feet
above the ground, and then left for Malacca to take
up the appointment of Chief Civil Officer there, and
was therefore not able further to see the progress of
the work that he had inspired. His plans, however,
were carefully followed by his successor, with the
exception, as has already been said, of substituting a
spire for a tower, owing to undue settlement at the
tower end. This building is 250 feet long inter-
founded in 1239, and was occupied by monks of the Cistercian
order, who were brought over from a neighbouring monastery at
Beaulieu in the New Forest, where there was already an abbey
dedicated to the Virgin Mary. Netley Church was built on a
cruciform plan, and was proportioned according to the ancient
mysterious figure called the " Visica Pisces," as will be seen in
the sketch below from his work.
{/ NJ
/( \
\\
\
9
*^ v
&!
\ * r -i
\\ I / .
i ?'
t\\ '/i
t \* 9 T
I V I-
.
\
Singapore Church, now, as we have said, the cathedral of the
diocese, has been much admired for its true symmetry and exact
proportion, as well as for the delicate simplicity of its details.
98
PUBLIC WORKS AND INDUSTRIES
nally, by 65 feet in width, with nave and side aisles;
or, with the north and south transepts, 95 feet, the
transepts being used as porticoes. The simple
columns, with plain mouldings only, carried arches,
on which rested the side walls of the nave, which
were run up of sufficient height to clear the roofs
of the aisles, and were perforated by a range of
windows to admit light to the whole building. At
the north-east end of the nave was a great arch
leading into a chancel, and an apse with three
lancet windows in stained glass. The building
was roofed with ,teak timber, with a sarking of
lighter wood as a lining to form a contrast, and
then covered with slates imported from England.
Over the main entrance is a vaulted dome, with a
neat piece of groining in granite, also made by the
convicts. Leading to the organ loft is a circular
well staircase, made from quarter-inch plate iron,
the treads and risers punched with holes by the
punching machine in the work yard to render them
lighter. They were bracketed together, and secured
by screw bolts and nuts. The risers were bent
round a two-inch bar of round iron, which passed
down through all of them at the centre from top to
bottom of the staircase. The whole was made and
fixed in its place by the convicts.
As a pattern for the convicts to follow, we built
two arches on the ground, the exact counterpart of
those in the building ; and, indeed, at any time
when they wanted a guide, we had a model made;
99
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
and the natives of India are such wonderful imita-
tors, as we all know, that they soon were able to
follow the copy we had given them. So the work
progressed from day to day, until it was ultimately
finished in 1862. We found that the skill of the
convicts never failed them, and their capacity as
builders and carpenters never seemed to slacken.
In dealing with the interior walls and columns, we
used what is well known, though little employed
with us in England, " Madras chunam," made
from shell lime without sand ; but with this lime
we had whites of eggs and coarse sugar, or "jag-
gery," beaten together to form a sort of paste, and
mixed with water in which the husks of cocoanuts
had been steeped. The walls and columns were
plastered with this composition, and, after a certain
period for drying, were rubbed with rock crystal or
rounded stone until they took a beautiful polish, being
occasionally dusted with fine soapstone powder, and
so leaving a remarkably smooth and glossy surface.
We have given the dimensions of this building,
but we may remark that, owing to the simplicity of
its tracery and mouldings, it really appears much
larger than it actually is, and being built on an open
space, its proportions at once strike the eye of every
visitor to the colony.
A peal of bells was added to the cathedral in
1889 by the munificence of Mr. W. H. Read,
C.M.G., who, with the late Mr. John Crawfurd,
Mr. James Guthrie, and others, was instrumental
100
MORTAR MILL, GOVERNMENT HOUSE, SINGAPORE.
GOVERNMENT HOUSE GARDEN BEING LAID OUT BY CONVICTS.
Plate XVII.
PUBLIC WORKS AND INDUSTRIES ;
in bringing about the transfer of these settlements
to the Crown, and some of their portraits are now in
the Town Hall, including that of Mr. Thomas Scott,
then M.L.C.
GOVERNMENT HOUSE (see Plate XIX.).
We have already mentioned that the transfer of
the Straits Settlements from the direct control of
India to the Crown was effected on the ist April,
1867. The first Governor under the new regime
was Colonel Sir Harry St. George Ord, R.E., who,
upon his arrival in Singapore, had to take up his
abode in a hired house. He therefore lost no time in
issuing orders to purchase land, and to erect a suit-
able residence for himself and for the future Gover-
nors of the colony. Plans were accordingly called
for from the colonial engineer (Major McNair), and
they soon took shape and were submitted by the
Governor to the Legislative Council without delay ;
and money was voted for the erection of the build-
ing, the purchase of land, and the ordering of
furniture from England. The work was actually
commenced within three months of the Governor's
arrival, the foundation-stone was laid by Lady Ord
a month later, and the building was made ready for
the reception of H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh in
October, 1869.
The whole of the brick work, exterior plastering,
and most of the flooring and interior work were
effected by convict labour ; but it became necessary,
101
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
towards the last, to employ free labour, to assist in
the flooring, which was executed with battens from
the steam sawmills at Johore, and also in the coffer-
ing of the ceilings in the drawing-room and some
plastering in the rear block. The whole of the
bricks used were made by the convicts, and much
of the lime and cement was of their manufacture.
The edifice stands upon a hill in the eastern
suburb of the town, about a mile and a quarter
from the cathedral, and is surrounded by nearly
100 acres of ground, which has been tastefully laid
out, and planted with rare plants under successive
Superintendents of the Government Botanical Gar-
dens. The building commands an extensive view
of the harbour and surrounding country, and from
the tower the distant islands and mainland of
Johore are distinctly visible. It is supplied with
water from the town water supply, 1 by the use of
a hydraulic ram. It was first lighted with gas, but
now by the electric light throughout the whole
building.
The house is built somewhat in the shape of a
cross. Ascending a flight of broad steps from the
wide portico, you enter a spacious entrance hall
floored with beautiful white marble from Java,
having in your direct front a handsome stone
staircase leading up through an arcade to a half-
pace, from which it returns right and left to the
1 Also a work which we initiated and brought to completion
on designs approved by the late Sir Robert Rawlinson, K.C.B.
102
PUBLIC WORKS AND INDUSTRIES
lobby above, which is of the same dimensions as
the entrance hall. Off this lobby, on the eastern
wing, is the library, and beyond, the principal bed
and dressing-rooms, and an open verandah over the
portico (since regrettably built in). In the western
wing is a double drawing-room, with disengaged
pillars between ; and below, off the entrance hall, on
the east side, is the ball-room, and on the west the
dining hall and billiard-rooms. Store-rooms, pan-
tries, and all necessary accommodation were sup-
plied as in any of our home mansions.
The ground floor of the building is raised four
feet from the plateau, and ample ventilation is pro-
vided underneath. The building is 230 ft. in front-
age, and 1 80 ft. in depth, and the height to the
tower is 80 ft. The style is Ionic upon Doric, with
Corinthian pillars and pilasters to the tower. It is
roofed with slates, and the lower floors and veran-
dahs are paved with marble.
As at the cathedral training for the convicts, so
here models of the pillars and capitals were made
on the ground for them to copy, and the special
bricks for mouldings, copings, architraves, and
capitals were made at the convict brick kilns. 1
The plaster work for the exterior walls was a
subject of much consideration with us ; and, after
various experiments, we arrived at the following
composition, and it has thoroughly withstood the
1 All taught by ourselves to the convicts, with the assistance of
Overseer Callcott, now risen to be Deputy Colonial Engineer.
103
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
weather, which, under the trying circumstances of
a rapid succession of damp and heat, was excep-
tional in that climate :
Portland cement ... 2 parts.
White selected sand ... i part.
Granite powdered to dust in^j
small handmills, or querns/ 2 P artSm ^
Carefully and
slowly mixed
by the con-
victs.
A gift by the Chinese community of a statue of
H.M. the Queen was unveiled with some ceremony
at this Government House in the year 1889.
INDUSTRIES (INTRA-MURAL).
We have already enumerated the various trades
that were taught to these Indian convicts, and shall
therefore confine our remarks here to a brief de-
scription of some of those productive occupations
upon which we employed their labour both within
and without the main jail.
We must, however, make known beforehand, in
connection with intra-mural works, that, attached to
the main jail, yet distinctly separated from it by
high walls and a guarded gateway, was a " work-
yard," in which were built shops for carpenters,
blacksmiths, coopers, wheelwrights, sawyers, stone-
cutters, and turners in wood and iron.
In one part of this yard was also a machine shop,
in which were fitted lathes, punching and shearing
machines, and a bolt and nut machine, also a band
104
PUBLIC WORKS AND INDUSTRIES
saw and a circular saw table. To drive this
machinery a 12 h.p. engine was used, and this
was placed under the charge of a convict who had
been employed in the engine-room of a P. and O.
steamer, and had gone through his probationary
period in the jail. Added to these machines was
one of Blake's stone-crushers to break stone of
various gauges for metalling the roads of the
town.
This was the first Indian jail, and we might even
go so far as to say it was amongst the first of any
jails, where convicts were employed in connection
with steam power. We had, it is true, an engine
to be worked by manual power, for six or eight men
abreast, to drive the circular saw, but it did not
answer. It was intended as "crank" labour for
the convicts.
When Dr. Mouat, the Inspector-General of Jails,
Bengal, wrote his annual report of 1864-65, he
said : " I have suggested the introduction of steam
machinery for the spinning of jute yarn, in order
that all prisoners sentenced to rigorous imprison-
ment may never be without the hard labour which
the jail is bound to provide for them. In this, as in
most matters connected with the organization of
prison industry, I have been anticipated by the
authorities at Singapore, there being a steam saw-
mill in use at the Singapore jail, and a pug-mill
employed in the preparation of the clay used in the
brick and tile manufactory."
105
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
The carpenters made every necessary article re-
quired for the public buildings in progress ; even the
pulpit, reading-desk, and interior fittings for the
cathedral were the work of their hands. The
blacksmiths had four smithies, and forged, cast,
and prepared all kinds of ordinary iron work found
necessary. The coopers made buckets, tubs, and
all the casks for storing cement, and for other jail
purposes. The wheelwrights made all the carts,
barrows (hand and wheel), and the hack-barrows
wanted at the brick kilns. The stone-cutters
turned out the mouldings, mullions, capitals, cills,
steps, and all that was essential in our building
operations.
Within the jail proper there were shops for
tailors, weavers, rattan workers, coir and rope
makers, flag makers, a printing press, and a photo-
graphic studio, and a few draughtsmen for execut-
ing plans and working drawings. The tailors cut
out, made, and repaired the clothing for the fourth
and fifth classes, and any other such occupation re-
quired in the prison. The weavers, who worked
with an ordinary Indian hand-loom, made the coarse
cloth required for those classes in irons, and washed,
dressed, combed, carded, and spun the raw wool
purchased from the butchers in the town, from
which the " kumblies " or coarse blankets supplied
to all the convicts were made. The coir or yarn
manufactured from the husks of cocoanuts was
prepared by those employed at "hard labour" in
1 06
PUBLIC WORKS AND INDUSTRIES
the refractory ward. From this yarn we made cord-
age for the convict boats, mattresses for the hos-
pitals, and matting of various kinds. The flag
makers made up and repaired the flags and colours
for the signal stations, and for the department of the
master attendant. Upon this work female convicts,
and feeble men of the sixth class, were usually
employed.
The printing press was established in 1860, and
to start it the services of a Portuguese foreman
printer were engaged for a short time to teach
the convicts ; and bookbinding was added later
on. Photography was taught by one of us * to
two intelligent convicts of the Calcutta Baboo
class who wrote English. All convicts had their
likeness taken, and were registered for identification
in case of escape ; also local prisoners and men
under custody by the police. We had not, of
course, the knowledge then of Mr. Henry's method
of identity by means of " finger-prints," for it was
only approved last year by the Government of
India. The draughtsmen, numbering three, exe-
cuted all the plans and working drawings for the
public works. Those for the cathedral and
Government House, and many other buildings,
were drawn by these men, the principal draughts-
man being a convict transported from Bombay of
the name of Babajee. The rattan workers wrought
1 Major McNair, who himself supplied both apparatus and
chemicals.
107
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
chairs and baskets of all kinds, fenders for the
Government steamers, and signal baskets for the
flagstaff's.
There were other minor industries carried on
within the prison walls, so that it was a busy scene
of task work from one end to the other, for every
one was engaged upon something, and there was no
chance for an idler to do nothing. Nursing a job
was quite out of the question.
But we must pass on to deal with the industries
beyond the walls, and we shall limit our description
to the making of bricks, lime, and cement, and the
quarrying of stone, and well digging.
INDUSTRIES (EXTRA-MURAL).
It will be quite superfluous to give an account in
detail of the method pursued in brick and tile
making, for the process is known to every one.
Suffice it to say that Colonel Faber, R.E., as
previously noted, was the first to introduce
the manufacture on Government account ; he
opened a place at Rochore, near the present gas-
works, and employed free labour. The system was
what is known as the "dry" and sand-moulding
system, and the bricks were burned in clamps. All
that could be said of these bricks was that they
were better than those made by the Chinese at that
time, but they were not a success, and the manufac-
ture was after two or three years given up.
In 1858 we started, on a systematic principle,
1 08
PUBLIC WORKS AND INDUSTRIES
under a trained European brick maker, an extensive
brick field on the Serangoon Road, about three
miles from the town, where there was a considerable
bed of excellent clay for the purpose. The site,
too, was well situated near the banks of an inlet
from the sea, and affording great facility for water
carriage, and with a palm grove close at hand, under
the shade of which the convicts were allowed to
roam without restraint when their work was over.
Sheds, kilns, pug-mills, moulding tables, and all the
necessary appliances for hand-made bricks were
soon set on foot, and a large dormitory, surrounded
by a stout precinct fence, was built for the number
of convicts required for the manufacture, approxi-
mating to about 1 20 of all classes, except those in
irons.
Our process was commonly known as "slop-
moulding," each moulder turning out from 2,500 to
3,000 bricks in the course of the day. After the
second year, when the convicts had become accus-
tomed to the work, and to adapt themselves to each
other, we were able to supply all that were needed
for the public works, and even to export them for
works at Malacca. In tabulating the account of the
value of their labour and the outlay for fuel, and
comparing it with the recognised value of the
bricks, there was found to be a credit to the State
in most years. (See Appendix No. 4.)
When, in 1867, there was an Agricultural Exhi-
bition at Agra, in the N.W. Provinces of India,
109
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
we sent up specimens of bricks, tiles, drain pipes
of all sizes, and stable flooring bricks, manufactured
by these convicts, for which the Superintendent
gained the silver medal ; and if any further proof
is needed of the excellent work turned out by
these convicts, we may quote the report of the late
Colonel Fraser, of the Bengal Engineers, which
ran as follows :
" As an Engineer Officer of the D.P.W., I have
had a good deal of experience as regards the man-
agement of jails in India and Burmah, and have, of
course, employed much convict labour, but I have
never been in any jail where the arrangements are
so perfect as in that of Singapore. While the
discipline under which the convicts are held is
obviously most efficient, the skill with which their
labour is directed will be equally obvious to all who
will take the trouble, as I have done, to go into the
detail of their operations, and look at the results in
the many large works which have been executed at
Singapore.
I went over the brick field with Captain McNair,
and while I found that the greatest reasonable
amount of work was got out of each man, I also
found that the work turned out was the best I have
seen in India. Where there are good bricks, other
work is seen to be equally good, and when a proper
amount of work is required per convict, then the
discipline must be also good ; I measured myself
no
PUBLIC WORKS AND INDUSTRIES
what the men were expected to do, and found it to
be three cubic yards in eight hours. This is the
full task of a European sapper in the same time."
Our lime and cement were made from coral, of
which there were extensive reefs round the Island
of Singapore, and some few "atolls" (a Cingalese
word), or special coral islands. Coral is almost a
pure carbonate of lime, and therefore very well
suited for the purpose. It was broken up and
heated in kilns constructed for the purpose. The
cement was made from this lime, and from selected
clay, in the proportions we had by careful experi-
ments established, until we obtained a good and
quick-setting article. It was made into small balls
and then dried, and burnt in a special kiln, and
afterwards well and finely ground and sifted by
female convicts ; its tensile strength was excellent.
STONE QUARRYING (see Plate XX.).
The stone we used for all our building operations
was procured from an island between Singapore
East and the mainland of Johore, and was named
Pulo Obin. It is about three miles long and three-
quarters of a mile broad. The stone was the best
possible form of crystallised granite, fine grained,
very compact and durable, grey in colour, with here
and there black patches or nodules of hornblende.
It occurs in large fluted boulders, and was wrought
by the convicts by fire, or by blasting with gun-
iii
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
powder, or split by pointed chisels and large
hammers. Its weight was 168 Ibs. per cubic foot.
The excellent quality of this granite led the
Government of India to approve of the construction
by the late Colonel Eraser, C.B., of several courses
for the Alguada Reef lighthouse, which was built
upon a dangerous reef off the coast of Burmah.
Our department looked after the preparation of
some of these courses, and forwarded them by
ship to Burmah.
WELL DIGGING.
It is known to everyone how capable the Indians
are in the sinking of wells, and that with many
Orientals it is a work of great merit to build one.
As two were required for Fort Canning, we were
soon able to select men fitted for this special work
amongst the third class convicts, who, many of
them, begged to be allowed to take part in their
construction. After a careful set of borings, we
came upon water at a depth of 180 and 120 feet
respectively. They were eventually dug out to these
depths, and steined to six feet in diameter by the use
of sound and hard bricks from the convict kilns.
The water rose to a height of 80 feet from the
surface of the ground, and they were provided with
lift and force pumps for the convenience of the
troops in garrison. It was a heavy job for the
convicts, but they performed it with eagerness and
alacrity.
112
Chapter X
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS AND
EUROPEAN LOCAL PRISONERS
No. i
MOST of the convicts sentenced to the Straits
Settlements for short periods of transporta-
tion were, as we have said, usually retained in the
convict jail at Malacca. Amongst these, in the
sixties, was a very remarkable man, and known to
both of us, of the name of " Tickery Banda," who
was a native of Ceylon, and had received a sentence
of seven years in transportation for a crime commit-
ted in that island, though of which he declared, like
many of his congeners, he was perfectly innocent.
A story in connection with this man is given in
Cameron's Tropical Possessions in Malayan India,
which is quite worthy of repetition here.
When the English took possession of Kandy,
Tickery Banda and two or three brothers, children
of the first minister of the King of the Kandians,
were taken and educated in English by the then
Governor of the island. Tickery afterwards be-
came manager of some coffee plantations, and was
so employed on the arrival of a Siamese mission of
113 I
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
priests in 1845, wno came to see Buddha's tooth.
It seems that he met the mission returning dis-
consolate, having spent some 5,000 rupees in
presents and bribes in a vain endeavour to obtain
a sight of the relic. Tickery learned their whole
story, and at once ordered them to unload their
carts and wait for three days longer, and that he
would in due time obtain for them the desired view
of the holy tooth. He had a cheque on a bank for
^200 in his hands at the time, and this he offered
to leave with the priests as a guarantee that he
would fulfil his promise. He did not say whether
the cheque was his own or his master's, or whether
it was handed over or not ; perhaps it was this
cheque for the misappropriation of which he found
his way to the convict lines of Malacca. The
Siamese priests accepted his undertaking and un-
loaded their baggage, agreeing to wait for the three
days. Tickery immediately placed himself in com-
munication with the then Governor, and represented,
as he says, forcibly, the impositions that must have
been practised upon the King of Siam's holy
mission, when they had expended all their gifts and
had not yet obtained the desired view of the tooth.
The Governor, who, Tickery says, was a great friend
of his, appreciated the hardships of the priests, and
agreed that the relic should be shown to them with
as little delay as possible. It happened, however,
that the keys of the temple where the relic was
preserved were in the keeping of the then Resident
114
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
Councillor, who was away some eight miles elephant
shooting. But this difficulty was not long allowed
to remain in the way, for Tickery immediately
suggested that it was very improbable that the
Resident Councillor would have included these keys
in his hunting kit, and insisted that they must be in
the Councillor's house. He therefore asked the
Governor's leave to call upon Mrs. , the
Resident Councillor's wife, and, presenting the
Governor's compliments, to request that a search be
made for the keys. Tickery was deputed accord-
ingly, and by dint of his characteristic tact and force
of language, carried the keys triumphantly to the
Governor.
The Kandy priests were immediately notified
that their presence was desired, as it was intended to
exhibit the great relic, and that their guardian officer
would be necessary. Accordingly, on the third day,
the temple was opened, and in the building the
Siamese priests and worshippers were assembled,
with Tickery on the one side, and the Kandy or
guardian priests on the other side, with the Gover-
nor and the Recorder in the centre.
After making all due offerings to the tooth of the
great Buddha, the Siamese head priest, who had
brought a golden jar filled with otto of roses,
desired to have a small piece of cotton with
some of the otto rubbed on the tooth, and then
passed into the golden jar, thereby to consecrate the
whole of the contents. To this process the Kandy
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
priests objected, as being a liberty too great to be
extended to foreigners. The Siamese priests, how-
ever, persisted in their request ; and the Governor and
Recorder, not knowing the cause of the altercation,
asked Tickery to explain. Tickery, who had fairly
espoused the cause of the Siamese, though knowing
that in their request they had exceeded all prece-
dent, resolved quietly to gratify their wish ; so, in
answer to the Governor's interrogatory, he took
from the hands of the Siamese head priest a small
piece of cotton and the golden jar of the volatile
oil. " This is what they want, your Honour : they
want to take this small piece of cotton, so ; and
having dipped it in this oil, so , they wish to rub
it on the sacred tooth, so ; and having done this,
to return it to the golden jar, so ; thereby, your
Honour, to consecrate the whole of the contents of
the golden jar."
All the words of Tickery were accompanied by
the corresponding action, and of course the de-
sired ceremony had been performed in affording
explanation. The whole thing was the work of a
moment, and the Governor and Recorder did not
know how to interfere in time, though they knew
also that such a proceeding was against all prece-
dent. The Kandy priests were quite taken aback,
while the Siamese priests, having obtained their
desired object, took from Tickery Banda's hands
the now consecrated golden jar with every demon-
stration of fervent gratitude. The Kandy priests
116
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
were, however, loud in their indignation, and subse-
quently the Governor, patting Tickery on the back,
said, " You have indeed settled the question, and it
is a pity you were not born in the precincts of
St. James', for you would have made a splendid
political agent."
The next morning Tickery received a douceur of
1,000 rupees from the Siamese priests, and has ever
since been held in the highest esteem and respect
by the King of Siam and his Buddhist priests, being
considered quite a holy man, while periodically the
King of Siam sends him substantial tokens of the
Royal favour.
# # # * #
No. 2
It was remarkable what a wide difference there
was between the accounts given by the convicts
themselves, of the circumstances which were the
cause of their transportation, and the summary of
them given in the warrants sent with them.
Although many of them did not deny having com-
mitted what the law looked upon as a crime, they,
under the circumstances, either considered that the
act was justifiable, or perhaps that it was the result
of accident. Here is the case of a convict who was
sentenced to transportation for life for murder,
given as related by himself.
" In my Madras native village, I ( Rudrapah ' was
117
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
a planter (ryot). I was possessed of several large
paddy fields ; some were near my house and others
were far off. At a little distance from my house a
friend of mine lived, * Allagappen ' by name. He
also was a ryot, and possessed of paddy fields. He
often came to eat rice with me, and I often went to
his house ; we were like brothers. At a village
about six miles away, there lived a man who was a
breeder of cattle. He and his wife were very partial
to me, and it was arranged between us that I should
marry their daughter when she was old enough
she was then eleven years of age. All went well
for two years, and then I was married to the girl
and took her to my house. My friend, ' Allagappen,'
used to come and visit us and eat rice as before.
Things went on very well for five or six years : my
wife and I were very happy together, and never
quarrelled ; we had only one child. Having saved
some money, I bought a bandy (a country vehicle)
and a pair of bulls, and used to hire them to any
one travelling. Sometimes my bandy would be en-
gaged for a long journey, and I would be away from
my house for two or three days together, leaving my
wife and child alone. But now my trouble began.
About six months after I bought my bulls, one of
them got sick and died. I had not then enough
money to buy another, and was on the point of
selling the bandy and remaining bull, when my wife
proposed that we should ask her father to help us, as
he had plenty of bulls. I had not thought of this,
118
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
and I said, ' Very good.' We went and saw my
father-in-law, and he agreed to let me have a bull and
pay for it as I earned money. Soon after that I hired
my bandy to a man to go to a town thirty miles
away, expecting to be away some days. I left my
wife and child under the charge of a neighbour and
his wife, who promised to look after them. I and
the man who hired my bandy set out early in the
morning, and reached the town about mid-day next
day. In the evening the man told me he was going
to stay many days in the town, and I could return to
my house. He paid me, and I bought some things
I wanted. Early next morning, at daybreak, I set
out on my journey back to my village, and arrived
there about 3 o'clock the next morning ; and after
seeing to my bulls I went to my house and to my
surprise found the door unfastened. I entered with-
out making any noise, not knowing what could be
the reason the door was not fastened. I went quickly
into my sleeping place, and there I saw my wife
laying asleep, and beside her was a man also asleep.
On going close up to him that I might see who it
was, to my great sorrow I found that it was my friend,
' Allagappen.' It was my great misfortune that I
had in my hands a granite stone, or sort of muller,
for grinding massalah (curry stuff) which I had
bought, and being so angered with my friend, and
so overcome with grief at finding my wife to be
false, it made me tremble so much that I let the
stone fall from my hands, and quite unintentionally
119
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
i
it dropped on ' Allagappen's ' head, and the stone
being heavy it broke his skull and killed him on
the spot. My wife woke up, and seeing me, she
screamed and ran away from the house. She went
to the neighbours' house in whose charge I had left
her. I followed her, and told them what I had
done : that morning I was taken by the police and
locked up, and after that I saw my house no more.
I was tried by an English judge, and was sentenced
to be sent away from my country for as long as I
lived : such was my misfortune."
Here the tears came into the old criminal's
eyes, and it was very evident that there was still a
soft place in his heart, showing a sign of reclamation
in spite of his convict life. This convict was par-
doned after serving twenty-five years.
No. 3
As late as the year 1863 piracy had not been
wholly suppressed in the Straits of Malacca, and
cases were by no means rare of native trading craft
being attacked by them. During this year a num-
ber of piratical boats infested the mouths of the
rivers Prye, Juroo, and Junjong on the Malay
Peninsula, and the South Channel between Penang
Island and the mainland of Province Wellesley ;
and many a tongkong belonging to Chinese traders
between Penang and Laroot was attacked by them
120
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
and plundered, and sometimes the crews were
murdered.
Some of these pirates were in the habit of going
about in Penang and quietly ascertaining what
tongkongs were about to sail, and all particulars in
regard to their cargo, crew, and so forth. Two of
them having discovered that a tongkong owned and
manned by Chinese was about to leave Penang for
Laroot with some valuable cargo and $2,000 of
specie on board, disguised themselves as "had-
jis," or Mohammedan pilgrims, and engaged a
passage in her. They arranged with some of their
confederates to have a prahu, or fast sailing boat, at
a certain place off the Juroo River, and when the
tongkong in which they were passengers reached
this spot a signal was to be given, and the prahu
was to run alongside the tongkong ; and after
plundering her and gagging the crew, the pirates
intended sinking the tongkong and making off in
the prahu. They carried their villainous scheme
into execution, but meeting with stouter resistance
from the crew of the tongkong than they had
anticipated, they killed, as they thought, every man
on board, and were preparing to scuttle the tong-
kong, when a boat containing Indian convicts, and
employed in carrying coral for the Government
lime kilns, and which, unperceived by the pirates,
had been rapidly approaching, came alongside the
tongkong, having been attracted by the yells and
cries of the victims. The pirates, recognizing that
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PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
they were convicts, immediately got into their prahu,
and made sail as fast as they could ; and she, being
a very fast sailer, was soon out of sight. The con-
vict tindal in charge of the boat, with one or two
convict boatmen, went on board the tongkong and
found all the crew and passengers dead ; but fancy-
ing they heard groans they searched round the
tongkong, and at last found one of the Chinese
boatmen clinging to the rudder. They lifted him
on board, and found that he was severely cut about,
and covered with wounds. The convict tindal in
charge of the Government boat then shaped his
course, with the tongkong in tow, for Butterworth,
in Province Wellesley, which they reached early in
the morning. The wounded Chinaman was taken to
the hospital, a report was made to the police of the
pirates' attack, and the tongkong was handed over
to their charge. From the description of the
prahu given by the convict tindal, and the informa-
tion gathered from the Chinaman when he was able
to talk, the police were enabled to trace the prahu
to Sunghie Rambay, where the pirates were ar-
rested. The case was tried at the Supreme Court,
Penang ; some of the pirates were hanged, and the
rest sentenced to penal servitude. The tindal of
the Government boat and the convict boatmen were
highly commended by the judge for their conduct,
and were otherwise rewarded by the authorities.
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STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
No. 4
We have referred elsewhere to the numerous
races of India which went to form the convict body
in the old Singapore jail. We found this admixture
of castes and tribes a very valuable corrective
against a possible chance of insurrection, and for the
discovery of plots of escape ; and, indeed, sometimes
as a means of finding out any serious mischief that
might be brewing in the jail.
It seems to delight many a native of India to be
a spy upon another ; and though intrigues were
never encouraged, nor as a rule listened to, yet now
and again an informer would appear when the
matter was of sufficient importance to be reported
to the authorities.
As an instance of this it may be recorded that on
one occasion there was a dispute between two
Sikhs, one of the " Ramdasee " and the other of the
" Mazahbee " sect ; and as they went from high
words to blows they were placed in confinement and
brought before the Superintendent 1 in the Inquiry
room. After full investigation into the matter, the
" Mazahbee " Sikh was proved to have been the in-
stigator of the quarrel, and he was punished. The
whole of his sect appear to have resented this judg-
ment, and determined amongst themselves to be
avenged, and to inflict some pain or injury upon the
Superintendent. They began to plot and to scheme
as to the best way to carry out their design ; and
1 Major McNair.
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PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
this plotting was not lost on the observation of a
clever Parsee convict, who, having traded in
Northern India, knew their language. He watched
them closely, and had decided when their plans
were matured to inform the authorities.
The scheme was only ripe for execution, however,
on the very morning of the muster, so that there
was no time for the Parsee convict to acquaint the
chief warder ; and as a last resource, therefore, he
made up his mind to inform the Superintendent at
the muster as to what was in store for him. Creep-
ing stealthily along the rear of the standing men, he
timed the arrival of the Superintendent going down
the front on his inspection ; and, stooping down, he
thrust his head between the legs of the front rank
men, and level with the ground, calling out only loud
enough for the Superintendent to hear, " Khabar-
dar sahib Sikh kepas tamancha hai " " Look out,
sir ; a Sikh has a pistol." The Superintendent took
no notice of the warning until he had passed to about
the middle of that line, then he ordered the chief
warder to take a dozen of the Sikhs who were
standing at the end of the line, and move them off
into their ward that he might inspect their boxes,
and he added, " Search them thoroughly."
As the Superintendent passed the end of the line,
and was about to inspect another line at right angles
to it, no shot had been fired ; so he concluded that it
was either a false alarm, or that the miscreant was
amongst the dozen men in the ward. And so it
124
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
proved ; for shortly afterwards, the chief warder
came to report that he had found a loaded pistol on
the person of one of the Sikh convicts, and had
placed him in a cell to await investigation.
After the muster an inquiry accordingly took
place, and it turned out that a fellow-tribesman
had managed to pass the main gate with a pistol
secreted about his person, and had handed it to
the man to whom the lot had fallen to do the
deed.
The would-be assassin was sentenced to heavy
irons, and placed in the refractory ward. The
gang was eventually broken up, the ringleaders
being transferred to Penang, and the remainder
kept in Singapore under close observation. The
Parsee convict, who checkmated the conspirators,
was advanced from the third to the second class,
and otherwise rewarded.
The design on the life of the late Colonel Mac-
pherson, the immediate predecessor of the above,
was also similarly frustrated by another Parsee,
who, on the evening before muster, observed a
man burying a knife in the sandy ground near
which he had to stand for inspection. Waiting
his opportunity, he proceeded to the spot and
withdrew the blade from the knife, and replaced
the handle just above the ground as he had found
it. When Colonel Macpherson passed the man
on the morrow he quickly seized the handle from
the ground to make his stab, but only to find that
125
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
he was unexpectedly baulked in his villainous
attempt to kill his Superintendent
No. 5
" FUNNY JOE "
His surname need not be mentioned, but he
went by the name of " Funny Joe." He was the
son of a clergyman of the Church of England,
sharp witted, and well educated ; but his moral
character, from some cause or another, became
quite disorganised, and to the grief of his parents
he left his home and took to the sea. His educa-
tion there stood him in good stead, and under
new surroundings he improved for the time, and
eventually rose to be chief mate of a ship. Had
he persevered in this good course, he would in
all probability have succeeded well in the mercantile
service ; but events proved otherwise, and on his
second voyage as mate he was, he said, wrong-
fully charged as being both insolent and insub-
ordinate to his commander, and on the arrival of
the vessel at the Cape of Good Hope he was
discharged. Left with but small means, and, to
him, almost on foreign soil, he bethought himself
of some expedient for making money ; so, getting
hold of a sailor loafing at the port, he talked
matters over with him, and they decided upon
clubbing their resources, hiring a hall, and cir-
culating posters that on a certain night at "so
126
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
much," and "so much" for entrance, a man might
be seen " walking on the ceiling like a fly." On
the night advertised the hall was crowded. " Funny
Joe " then went to his companion, who was col-
lecting the money, and took from him the amount
he had received, and told him he might have all
the rest that he could collect. He (Funny Joe)
then decamped, and was never heard of more in
Cape Town. He was next at Rangoon, where
he got into the same plight for want of funds ;
but his mother wit came to his aid again, and this
time he posed before the public as a naturalist
who had discovered off the coast what he pro-
nounced could be nothing else than a " mermaid,"
and for the exhibition of this marine creature,
which he had cleverly constructed from the head
and breast of an ape and half the body of a fish,
he obtained a good round sum. We hear of him
next at Singapore, where he also advertised his
"mermaid" as being on exhibition at a certain
boarding establishment. There, however, the
"mermaid" did not succeed, and his funds being
exhausted he possessed himself of a watch and
some cash, the property of the people of the
house with whom he lodged, and for which he was
sent to jail. Here he came under some strict
discipline and good wholesome advice, and it was
in the Singapore jail that he told the story of his
life as given above.
When the term of his sentence had expired, and
127
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
he was about to be discharged, he warmly thanked
the Superintendent for his counsel, and declared
very positively that he intended to turn over a
new leaf.
We believe that he did so; at all events, the last
heard of him was that he had signed articles as
mate of a ship ; and he scrupulously returned to
the Superintendent (Major McNair) the money he
had advanced to him from his private purse to
make a new start in life.
* * * # #
No. 6
CONVICTS WITH A COBRA AND A CROCODILE
It is well known that the Cobra di Capello is
one of the most deadly of the snakes of India
and the East. The palish yellow cobra of India
is perhaps more dangerous and surely fatal in its
bite than the black "cobra" or " kala samp," which
is more frequently found in the Straits Settlements,
but neither of them is very pleasant to be in
close proximity to.
The Cobra. As we have noticed elsewhere,
some of the convicts were very expert in catching
these reptiles and extracting their fangs. The
following personal incident is given by a public
works officer :
" When the new cantonments were in progress
at Tanglin I was placed in charge of the works
by Col. G. C. Collyer, R.E., the then Chief
128
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
Engineer of the Straits Settlements, and was
permitted to occupy a part of a large house on
the estate. The bath rooms were on the ground
floor, and stairs from the bedrooms above led down
to them. One morning, just as I was sitting down
to breakfast, my convict orderly came running to
me and said that a large ' cobra' had crawled up
the drain leading from the main drain at the back
of the house to the bath room. We went im-
mediately to the bath room, and, finding that the
snake had not made his appearance inside, I
stopped up the opening into the drain with a towel,
and the convict orderly, who had gone round to
the outer end of the drain, began pushing a long
bamboo up it. This drove the snake to the upper
end. The convict, then, with a pickaxe, loosened a
brick from the covering of the drain close to the
wall of the house, while I stirred up the bamboo
rod. The convict then gently and by degrees re-
moved the brick, and in an instant the snake
emerged fully from the drain, raising its hood
and hissing at us. It then retreated back to the
drain, when the convict dexterously seized it by
the tail, and, drawing it out, held it tight by the
neck. The convict then teased the snake with
his coarse flannel * kumblie,' or blanket, and it
struck at it several times with its fangs ; when,
with a sudden jerk, the convict drew out the fangs
in the blanket, and the snake became perfectly
harmless.
129 K
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
" The snake was afterwards sent on board H.M.
surveying schooner Saracen, and getting loose on
board was summarily destroyed, for none on board
had been told that its fangs had been removed."
The Crocodile. Govindhoo, a convict em-
ployed at the Pulo Obin stone quarries, was
admitted into hospital with a lacerated leg, the foot
being almost severed from the body. He was
visited by one of us, and told his story as
follows :
" I was walking along the sea beach close
to the water, when I was suddenly seized from
behind, and I at once saw that I was in the
jaws of a crocodile. I had nothing in my hand
but my 'roomal,' or handkerchief, with my keys
tied in one corner. I hit at his head with this,
but it was of no use, and finding myself being
dragged into deeper water, I suddenly thought I
could dig out both his eyes, 1 and I did it, and very
shortly afterwards he let me go, and I half swam,
half paddled back to the shore."
The convict's leg had to be amputated.
The Malays say that there are three descriptions of crocodiles,
or, as they call them, "buaya." The first is the "katak :> or frog
crocodile, the second the " labu " or gourd crocodile, and
the third is the "tumbaga" or copper crocodile. The frog
crocodile is the most active, and we have often been told by
Malay boatmen, when going up a river, to keep our hands and
shoulders well within the boat, for fear of their sudden attack.
1 Literally gouged the animal.
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STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
There are, however, known to our naturalists a dozen or more
different forms of the crocodile proper, and it is said that they
have been found up to thirty feet in length ; but from eighteen
feet to twenty feet is the longest found in the Straits of Malacca.
They may often be seen in the Malay rivers, and on the coast,
floating in the water, with the snout well above the surface, on the
look out for prey.
No. 7
The Chinese have one superstition amongst
many in regard to tigers. They believe that when
a person is killed by a tiger his " hantu," or ghost,
becomes the slave of the beast and attends upon
it ; that the spirit acts the part of a jackal, as it
were, and leads the tiger to his prey ; and so
thoroughly subservient does the ghost become to
his tigerish master, that he not infrequently brings
the tiger to the presence of his wife and family,
and calmly sees them devoured before his ghostly
face.
A very ingenious tiger trap was invented by Mr.
Frank Shaw, of Caledonia sugar estate, in Province
Wellesley, which is worth describing. It was con-
structed at the foot of a small hill, about a mile
away from the estate, where there was a consider-
able area of secondary jungle and gigantic bracken
fern, a favourite resort of tigers. A trench, about
four or five feet wide, was opened in the sloping
ground for a distance of ten or twelve feet ; stout
stakes were driven in the trench close to the sides,
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
projecting some three or four feet above the ground,
for about two-thirds the length of the trench ; the
remaining one-third at the upper end was converted
into a strong cage, or pen. This pen communicated
with the other part of the trench by an opening
in which a gate in two flaps was fitted ; a heavy
cover, weighing ten or twelve cwt, of round logs
was made to fit the open part of the trench, and
so arranged in an inclined position, and connected
by triggers with the two flaps, that any attempt to
open the latter released the upper end of the
heavy cover and allowed it to fall down in the
trench. A couple of goats were tied at the far
end of the pen as a bait, and were kept there
constantly, food being taken to them by a convict
coolie. After the trap had been set for some time,
the coolie who fed the goats came running to the
house one day with the news that a tiger was
caught in the trap. Of course every one set out
immediately to secure the animal. The tiger had
evidently tried to push in between the two flaps
to get at the goats : this released the triggers, and
the jerk and movement of the cover had evidently
alarmed the animal, who tried to back out ; but the
weight and force of the falling cover on its back
had pressed the beast down flat on the ground and
rendered him powerless. The difficulty now was
to dispatch the tiger. Only its hind quarters could
be seen ; and a revolver shot was fired into the
body. After a while the cover was raised a little,
132
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
and a bullet in the brain finished the work. The
cover was then entirely removed, and the carcase
taken out of the trap ; the fore and hind feet were
tied together, and it was slung on a pole in the
usual way, eight Kling convict coolies lifted the
load and started for the sugar mills. They, how-
ever, soon got tired. Half a dozen more convicts,
who were at work on the road, were then called
in to assist, and at last they reached their journey's
end.
On arrival at the sugar mills it was skinned, the
skin becoming the property of the manager, and the
natives disposed of the flesh. The animal proved to
be a tigress, and evidently had young cubs, as she
had a quantity of milk. This the Chinese coolies
were very eager to secure, as it is by them con-
sidered to be a valuable medicine. We never
heard whether any more tigers were caught in
this trap.
The ordinary method, however, adopted for
catching tigers is by means of pits, which are dug
from twelve to fifteen feet in depth, and somewhat
pyramidal in form. Sometimes pointed stakes are
fixed in the bottom of the pit. The mouth is
covered over with light brushwood, and when con-
venient, a tree is felled and laid a few feet from it
across the tiger's track, so that the animal in leap-
ing off the tree adds impetus to his own weight in
falling into the trap.
The trouble of digging these pits is not so slight
133
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
as might be supposed, as the construction of a pit in
the proper manner fully occupies a couple of convicts
a fortnight, besides the risk of being interrupted in
their labour by the tiger happening to encounter
them, and, naturally enough, on finding the work
they were engaged upon, testifying his displeasure
at the treachery they were meditating against him
by making a meal of them.
An Indian sportsman wrote to the Singapore
Free Press, at the time when so many Chinese
were being destroyed at Singapore, saying :
" I have been accustomed to tiger hunting in
India, but the same mode could not be adopted
here, the jungle being of a different character. In-
deed, the only plan which is likely to be attended
with success is by setting traps ; and it is to be
regretted that the local Government did not long
since take some pains to prove this to the culti-
vators. Had this been done, many lives might
have been spared." The Chinese were evidently
delighted at the interest shown by the European
gentlemen on the last occasion, and it is to be
hoped that they will exert themselves to rid the
island of tigers by this means.
While the ravages of tigers were destructive of
human life on land, crocodiles were almost equally
as mischievous on the coast and in the rivers, and
many Chinese and other natives fell a prey to their
134
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
voracity. Sometimes bathers were attacked ; at other
times fishermen, shrimp catchers, and oyster divers
were carried off or attacked by them. Some croco-
diles, like some tigers, have a peculiar partiality to
human flesh, and often display remarkable in-
genuity in gratifying their appetites. Regular man-
eater crocodiles existed in some of the rivers in the
Straits Settlements, notably in the rivers in Pro-
vince Wellesley ; but many were found also in the
rivers in Singapore and Malacca, as well as on the
sea coast. Some of these man-eaters were very
bold, and would attack natives in their canoes,
sometimes getting under the canoe and upsetting it
in order to devour the occupants. Cases have been
known of persons being snatched out of boats. A
case of this kind happened in the Prye River, in
Province Wellesley. The supervisor in charge of
the public works was proceeding in a ferry boat
with some convicts to repair the boundary pillar,
situated some distance up the river, when suddenly
a splash was heard, and his convict orderly, who
was squatting in the bow of the sampan, or boat,
uttering a cry, stood up, at the same time pointing to
the stern of the boat. Upon looking round, a
Chinaman, who had been seated in the stern of the
boat, was found to be missing. A crocodile had, as
it were, shot up out of the water, and, seizing the
Chinaman by the waist, had drawn him down into
the river, and nothing more was seen of them at the
time. Shortly afterwards, a canoe with a Malay
135
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
man and his wife in it was upset near the same spot
by a crocodile, and both of them disappeared. A
little later a Kling, who had been in the habit of
diving for mud oysters near Qualla Prye Ferry for
many years, and had repeatedly been cautioned
about his danger in doing so, was missed, and it
was ascertained that he had been seen diving for
oysters as usual, and had suddenly disappeared, and
had not been seen to come up again.
This sort of thing went on for some time, and the
crocodiles could not be caught. At last the convicts
stationed at Prye town convict lines succeeded in cap-
turing a large crocodile, and this is how they managed
it. They prepared a bait by tying a strong hook
underneath the body of a pariah dog. One end of
a piece of light iron chain 1 was fastened to this hook ;
the other end was fastened to a log of very light
wood as a buoy. They then went in a boat to
that part of the river where the greater number of
casualties had occurred. Here they drifted about,
at the same time pinching the dog's ears and other-
wise tormenting him to make him yelp. After
watching the surface of the water for some time,
they descried the V mark on the water indicating
the approach of a crocodile ; then, throwing the dog
and buoy overboard, they pulled away for some
distance to watch the result.. They saw the croco-
dile rapidly approaching the dog, who was swim-
ming for his life. Suddenly there was a howl, and
1 Shreds of tough rope are better.
136
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
the dog disappeared. Then they watched the buoy,
which would sometimes disappear under the water
and then rise again to the surface ; and in this
manner they traced the crocodile, and followed him
into a small creek, where he crawled on shore ; and
there they dispatched him with musket balls. This
crocodile measured fourteen feet from the tip of his
nose to the end of his tail, and was said to be the
largest specimen captured at that time, but they
have been known to reach from eighteen to twenty
feet in length. Upon opening him a human leg and
a pair of Chinaman's trousers were discovered, and
it was concluded that this was one of the man-eaters.
As an illustration of the effect of shock upon the
human system at the sight of wild beasts, we may
mention a case of a Malay fisherman who was
shrimping on the bar at the mouth of the Krian River
(Province Wellesley), when a crocodile approached
him from behind and seized him by the thigh. The
Malay drew his parang and hacked away at the
creature's nose until he let go. Some convicts
stationed at Nebong Tubal and a Malay police peon
saw what was happening and put off in a boat to his
assistance. They rescued the poor fellow, and the
police conveyed him at once by boat to the hospital
at Butterworth, where his wounds, which were not
very serious, were attended to ; but the shock to the
nervous system was so great that the man lost his
reason, and would constantly leave his cot and walk
down the hospital ward, moving his hands up and
137
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
down, as if in the act of shrimping. He died shortly
after. A similar case of shock, and a well-known
story in the Straits Settlements, occurred in Province
Wellesley, but this was from a tiger. A Roman
Catholic priest was returning to his house after
breakfasting with a planter at Alma, and when
passing through some tall "lalang" grass a tiger
suddenly sprang out into the path a few yards in
front of him. The priest, with great presence of
mind, suddenly opened his Chinese umbrella in the
face of the tiger ; the animal gave a leap round
to one side, and the priest repeated the umbrella
movement. The tiger then gave another leap
round to the other side, and the umbrella action was
again performed. This was renewed till the tiger,
who evidently was not hungry, and had taken alarm,
made a disappointed growl and bounded away into
the high lalang grass, and the priest hastened on
his way home. On reaching his house he took a
cold bath, to brace up his nerves as he said ; but the
next day he was confined to his bed, and died a
fortnight after the event, due entirely, it was said, to
the shock that he had sustained.
No. 8
As we have already intimated, the house of cor-
rection at Singapore was under the management
and control of the Convict Department ; and there
138
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
were frequently from thirty to forty Europeans
confined in this prison, chiefly seamen on short
sentences for neglect of duty on board ship.
When Sir Robert McClure was commanding a
vessel of war 1 in Chinese waters about 1859, his ship
was on the Singapore station for some little time ;
and upon his arrival he sent in to the house of
correction a very incorrigible man-of-war's man
named John (we will not give his surname, for
he may be yet alive). This man had been several
times punished while the ship was in China, and
had been twice sentenced to be flogged. We heard
all about him from the officer of the ship who had
brought him ashore.
His sentence was three weeks' imprisonment : the
first week in solitary confinement on bread and
water, and congee or rice gruel diet. Upon his
receipt into the prison, after the usual routine, he
was placed in one of the penal cells, and bread and
water set before him. Before the cell door was
closed, he looked hard at the chief warder, saying,
"Take away that filth ; I won't eat it." The chief
warder reported to the Superintendent that the man
in the cells was a dangerous-looking character, and
he was afraid we should have trouble with him, for
he had never seen a man with such a hang-dog
look. The morning of the second day he had
touched neither bread nor water, though fresh had
been given him, and in a churlish manner he said to
1 H.M.S. Esk.
139
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
the chief warder, who had remonstrated with him,
"I'll eat the tail of my shirt first, before I eat what
you bring me." The doctor visited him, and
made his report to the Superintendent that he
was a strong man, and in excellent health, and
that he might be safely left until hunger obliged
him to eat, but that he would see him twice a
day.
Upon the afternoon of the second day the Super-
intendent himself, upon his inspecting the prisoners
in the penal cells, entered this prisoner's cell, and
the following dialogue ensued: "What is your
name ? " " What is that to you ? " " But I am the
Superintendent of this jail, and I ask you a simple
question, and I want a simple answer." Then look-
ing at the Superintendent with a disrespectful air
the prisoner said, " Look at my warrant if you want
to know it." " But I want to hear it from your-
self." " Well, if it is any satisfaction to you, my
name is John " The Superintendent then
said, " Now I want to know what part of England
you come from." " Well, what do you want to
know that for ? but I say again, if it is any satisfac-
tion to you, I come from Saltash." " So you are a
Cornishman, are you ? " replied the Superintendent.
" I know Saltash very well. It is a fine old place.
And I know the Viaduct, and the cottages over
against it. I wonder if you were born there in one
of those cottages ? Perhaps you were, and have a
mother now living there ; and if you have, and she
140
STORIES ABOUT INDIAN CONVICTS
knew that her son was now in an Indian jail, you
would break that old woman's heart, that you
would." This ended the conversation, and the cell
door was shut.
Late in the evening the chief warder sent a
special messenger to the Superintendent's quarters,
asking him to visit the prison before nightfall, for
the prisoner in the cells from the man-of-war in the
harbour had something to communicate. So be-
fore it was yet very dark the Superintendent
went down, and the cell door being opened, and
the bull's-eye lantern turned upon the man, the
Superintendent at once noticed a change in the
countenance of his prisoner, for the reckless,
devil-may-care expression had shifted, and as if by
some good influence within. "Well, you sent for
me, and I have come ; what do you want ? " said
the Superintendent. Then in a faltering voice, and
with tears in his eyes, the prisoner said, " I only
want to say, sir, before I go to sleep, that you are
the first man that has ever overcome me, for you
spoke to me of my ' mother ' ; and now, sir, you can
do anything you like with me, and I'll carry out my
sentence properly, and go back aboard my ship and
do my duty as a British sailor ought to do."
And he did ; and after his release went in the
ship on to Bombay, from whence the Superinten-
dent heard from Sir Robert McClure that John
was as well behaved a man as he had on
board, and that the treatment he had received in
141
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
the Singapore jail had quite altered his nature, and
he would like to know the prescription for it.
Very often, when a long course of positive pun-
ishment has ceased to have its effect, a contrary
treatment may lead to quite a change in the char-
acter, and if anything will touch the heart of a
vicious Briton, it is to bring him to think upon
the early counsels of a godly mother.
142
Chapter XI
ABOLITION OF THE CONVICT DEPARTMENT
AND DISPOSAL OF THE CONVICTS
ON the separation of the Straits Settlements
from British India in 1867, it was arranged
that the Indian life convicts at Singapore should be
transferred to Port Blair in the Andaman Islands.
In the course of correspondence which took place
on the subject, His Excellency the Governor of the
Straits Settlements proposed, in respect of those
convicts who were to continue in the Straits, that a
liberal use of the power of pardon should be made
in the case of such convicts, the nature of whose
crimes and whose subsequent character warranted
it.
The Government of India agreed to this pro-
posal, with the proviso that pardon should be con-
ditional on convicts not returning to India, or in the
case of Burmese to Burmah, without the special
sanction in each case of the Government of India ;
and that this sanction would not be given in any
cases in which the crime was " Thuggee " or
11 Dacoity," or robbery by administering poisonous
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
drugs, or other form of organized crime, or in the
case of mutiny or rebellion accompanied with
murder.
Accordingly, the Straits Government authorities
submitted lists of convicts whom they recommended
for pardon. After consulting the local governments
concerned, the Government of India issued orders
in each case, authorizing the release and return to
India of some of the convicts, granting conditional
pardon to others, and refusing release on any
account to the remainder.
This decision did not commend itself to the
Straits Government, and His Excellency the
Governor suggested the deputation of a special
officer from India to inquire into the matter.
Mr. Brodhurst, of the Bengal Civil Service, was
accordingly deputed. This officer extended his in-
quiries to the cases of other convicts brought
specially to his notice by the Straits Government ;
and on receipt of his report, the Government of
India granted unconditional releases in certain
cases, while in others the convicts were pardoned
conditionally on their not leaving the Straits.
On this representation by the Straits Govern-
ment, His Excellency the Governor-General in
Council, having reconsidered the subject, decided
that any Indian or Burmese, who had completed
twenty-five years' imprisonment and bore a good
character, should be released, with permission to
return to India or Burmah, provided he, or she, as
144
ABOLITION OF THE CONVICT JAIL
the case might be, was not convicted of one of the
offences enumerated below, viz. :
1. Thuggee. 5. Belonging to a gang
2. Dacoity. of Thugs.
3. Professional poisoning. 6. Mutiny or rebellion
4. Belonging to a gang with murder.
of Dacoits.
Of those who did not come under this category,
some were pardoned unconditionally ; others were
released after they had completed twenty-five years'
imprisonment, on condition that their conduct con-
tinued satisfactory. Of those who were pardoned
unconditionally many returned to their own country ;
but when they arrived there they found things so
uncongenial that they returned to the Straits and
settled down as shopkeepers, cowkeepers, cartmen,
etc., and most of them sought and obtained employ-
ment either with private individuals or in the Public
Works Department. Several of the skilled artifi-
cers, who had been petty officers, were employed
as sub-assistant overseers and gangers on public
works, where their services proved to be of great
utility, their prison training having rendered them
much more to be relied upon than free men, and, as
far as we have been able to ascertain, none of them
have been reconvicted.
Of the total number of convicts in the Straits
at the time when the convict establishment was
broken up in 1873
145 L
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
256 had been transported for Thuggee.
581 Dacoity.
21 ,, Professional poisoning.
269 Robbery with murder, including
highway robbery and gang
robbery.
1,127
The remainder were nearly all for murder, for
being accomplices in murder, or for robbery with
violence, and for felony.
146
Chapter XII
DISEASES AND MALINGERING
DISEASES
PERHAPS a few observations on the principal
diseases to which these Indian convicts were
liable may be found useful ; and we take for the
purpose the statistics of the year 1863-64 as given
in Appendix No. 2, when nostalgia did not occur.
In alluding to these diseases, we shall at the same
time notice the locality of the Singapore jail, and
the composition of the soil on which it was built.
It is now universally recognised that the soil on
which communities reside continuously does in a
measure influence their health.
So many works on hygiene have, however, been
written, and so much has been said by medical
experts on this subject, that we may almost say
that it has been exhaustively treated. What we
wish to show is simply that soil and locality do not
influence all communities alike.
The site of the Singapore jail in Brass Basa
Road was originally a piece of low ground saturated
with brackish water; and the convicts themselves
147
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
were, as we have elsewhere stated, employed in
conveying red earth from the side of Government
Hill to reclaim most of this marsh, in order to erect
thereon the necessary buildings for their occupation.
The site had to be raised from two to four feet,
and the red earth was what might be called dis-
integrated laterite or clay ironstone. When the
finished level was completed, it was about two feet
above high water mark S.T. The surface of the
enclosure had been so thoroughly trodden down,
rolled, and graded to the drains and into the ad-
joining canal, that, with the periodical coatings of
pure white sand from the Serangoon sand pits that
had been laid over it, it had become almost imper-
vious to water ; and this we would notice particularly,
for it had much to do with the sanitary condition
of the jail and its inmates.
The dormitories were further raised slightly over
two feet above the general surface, and their floors
were carefully laid, so as literally to be as dry as a
bone.
From Appendix No. 2 it will be seen that the
principal disease from which these Indian convicts
suffered was " fever," but not of a dangerous type ;
for, upon comparing the admissions to hospital with
the deaths from this disease in all three settlements
during the year referred to, we find that in Singa-
pore and Penang they were nil, and but seven in
Malacca. The next ailment which presented nu-
merous cases were abscesses and ulcers, and the
DISEASES AND MALINGERING
deaths from this cause amounted only to one in
Singapore. Many of these ulcers were on the legs,
and were caused by grit getting between the skin
and the leather band worn under the fetter rings of
convicts in the fourth and fifth classes. Stomach
and bowel complaints rank next on the list, but we
find that the deaths here only amounted to units.
Rheumatic affections were numerous, caused per-
haps in that damp climate from working on extra-
mural duties and returning to jail in wet clothes
with the wind blowing on them. A few cases of
dropsy appear on the list, the largest number occur-
ring in Penang, three only at Singapore. There
were ordinary cases of oedema.
The death-rate to strength per cent, from ordinary
diseases for the year given was 2*20 for Singapore,
3*82 for Penang, and 3*17 for Malacca. Perhaps
the special attention to sanitation in Singapore may
account for the death-rate being lower here than at
the sister settlements.
After the convict jail had been broken up, and
the convicts had all left it, the jail was handed over
to the prison authorities to be converted into a
criminal prison for the whole settlements. Not
long after this change had taken place a very
peculiar disease broke out amongst the inmates.
It was known as Beri-beri, or, as some call it, the
" Bad sickness of Ceylon." It is a very serious
disease, and some think it arises from extreme
exertion without sufficient sustenance to the body.
149
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
In 1878 the ratio of mortality in the prison had
risen to 16*20 per cent. ; in 1879 it was further
augmented to 20*63 per cent. The Local Govern-
ment deemed it necessary without delay to appoint
a Committee of Inquiry into the possible causes
which had given rise to the spread of this disease.
The conclusion at which they arrived was that it
was due to the want of proper drainage of the site,
so that the soil had got water-logged, and had
generated malaria ; also, that the prisoners needed a
more nitrogenous diet. They advised the erection
of an entirely new prison on a better and more
elevated locality. These suggestions were all
adopted, and the Committee in their judgment
were greatly aided by Dr. Irvine Rowell, C.M.G.,
the Principal Civil Medical Officer, who formed
one of the Committee.
There was no time lost by the Government with
the Colonial Engineer (Major McNair) in preparing
plans and erecting on the west side of Pearl's Hill,
near the old civil jail, a prison on the cellular system,
and after the most approved English model ; but the
change of site did not effectually remove the disease,
for as late as the year 1884 "there were 262 cases
under treatment. In the first nine months of that
year the deaths were comparatively small, but during
the latter three months they increased, constituting
nearly one half of the total deaths during that period."
Dr. Kerr attributed this increase to exacerbation
in the type, and epidemicity of the disease.
150
DISEASES AND MALINGERING
It is not necessary, nor is it within our province,
to attempt a description in detail of this disease ;
and happily it is mostly confined to Ceylon and the
Malay Archipelago, though it occurs occasionally in
China and Japan, where in the former country it is
known as " Tseng," and in the latter as " Kak-ki."
It is referred to in a book we have quoted in the
body of this work, viz., that written by " Godinho
de Eredia" in 1613, reproduced by M. Leon
Janssen in 1882. It is called there bere-bere,
which in the Malay language signifies a " sheep,"
or a "bird which buries its eggs in the sand," and
is not now known by the Malays under that name,
as far as we can gather, as a "disease." Godinho
de Eredia says that the Malays cured it by the use
of a wine made from the nipa palm, from whence
we know a saccharine fermentable juice exudes from
the cut spadices of this and other species. They
call this juice "tuaca." Marco Polo alludes to the
same wine in his second book, chapter xxv.
Some authorities say it arises from malarious ex-
halations, favoured by damp, or over-crowding in
buildings improperly ventilated. To this latter
cause we are inclined to attribute the outbreak in
the Singapore prison ; for when the prison was oc-
cupied by the Indian convicts, the area of open
space round the different wards and buildings was
well exposed to the action of sun and wind, but
after its conversion into a criminal prison, this open
space was divided off by high division walls, and
151
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
for the purpose of shot drill and work sheds the
enclosure was still further crowded. Perhaps the
disturbance also of the soil may have had something
to do with it, for we have known instances in the
town where the excavation of subsoils had liberated
noxious gases.
It was, however, very remarkable that during the
period of over twenty-five years when this jail was
occupied by the Indian convicts, not a single case of
beri-beri was known to have occurred. The
medical officers were quite unable to account for
this, and of its non-occurrence in other parts of the
town.
The Rev. Wallace Taylor, M.D., of Osaka in
Japan, attributed the disease to a microscopic spore
found largely developed in rice, and which he had
also detected in the earth of certain alluvial and
damp localities,
FEIGNED DISEASES
The question of feigned diseases should find a
place in a work treating upon convicts, for amongst
a number of natives in confinement and indeed also
amongst European prisoners where regular work
is insisted upon, and idleness in any is severely
punished, it is but natural that some should be found
to resort to expedients to escape work, or, in other
words, to malinger.
Perhaps the most frequent cases of convicts in
152
DISEASES AND MALINGERING
irons was the encouraging of sores round the ankles,
where the iron rings of their fetters were placed ;
and this was done, notwithstanding the precaution
always taken to guard the ankles with leathern
bands for the rings to rest upon. When suspicion
was attached to a convict in irons that he was
tampering with his leg sores, he was at once detailed
to work with the gang beating out coir from cocoa-
nut husks : it involved no use of the legs, but it was
the hardest of labours. The result was that the
convict soon gave up the trick, and begged to return
to outdoor work with his own gang. Of course
there were cases where convicts working on roads
or at sand pits may get grit below their leathers,
which, without knowing it at the time, would cause
a sore ; but such cases were readily distinguished
from those sores wilfully caused and designedly
kept open.
We had no cases of feigned insanity or any species
of mania, but cases of imitated " moon blindness,"
or dim-sightedness, did occur now and again for the
purpose of shirking night watch.
Upon one occasion we had a remarkable instance
of shamming blind, which is worth giving in detail.
The case was that of a life convict transported from
Madras, who complained that lime had suddenly got
into both of his eyes while employed at the lime
kilns. It was deemed by the medical authorities
as not unnatural that he should become blind from
caustic quick-lime, and he was admitted into the
153
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
convalescent gang, where he had only the simple and
easy task of picking oakum. The deceit was as
cleverly kept up for years as it was cleverly com-
menced at the outset, and was only detected by Dr.
Cowpar, a hard-headed Scotchman and skilful
surgeon, who, during the absence of the permanent
incumbent, had been appointed by the Government
to officiate as medical officer of the jail. After
his inspection of the invalids in the convalescent
gang, he looked at the eyes of the "blind man" ; and,
having some suspicion in his mind, he decided that
he should be put aside for closer examination.
When the inspection was over, the " blind man" was
taken, and carefully led by the peon in charge of
the gang to one of the long wards, when he was told
to walk up and down in the presence of the doctor.
After he had made two or three trips, the doctor
directed two men to hold a long pole about a foot off
the ground on the track he had to pass. When he
came to the pole he fell over it flat on his face, and
to the bystanders it seemed rather an inhuman
proceeding on the part of the doctor, but he had
observed an ominous pause before the convict had
struck the pole with his legs.
He sent for his case of instruments, and, with-
drawing a probe, he with little difficulty removed the
film off both of the man's eyes, which proved to be
nothing more nor less than the thin membrane
found inside an egg, which the convict had artfully
introduced, and renewed from time to time. Of
154
DISEASES AND MALINGERING
course he was reduced to the fifth class, and to the
hardest labour.
We have often thought it strange that none of his
fellow-convicts appeared to suspect him, or if they
did, they kept it back from the jail authorities ; and
certainly to any casual observer the deception was
complete, and it was the best case of feigned blind-
ness we have ever known or heard of.
Upon the whole, however, cases of malingering
were few and far between, as most of the convicts
became after a time interested in the works upon
which they were engaged, and those in irons were
ever on the look-out for promotion to a higher class.
Sometimes there was a case of feigned rheumatism
or paralysis, but the application of the galvanic
battery invariably cured them of that after a few
powerful shocks.
155
Chapter XIII
CONCLUSION
WE have now given a full, and, as far as we could,
a succinct account of the system pursued in
the old Singapore jail. We have traced the history
of the convict establishments in all the penal
settlements in those seas, and have shown the
progressive improvements in the convict prisons up
to the time when, as was acknowledged by many
competent authorities, a system of organization
and discipline had been satisfactorily attained to,
especially at the headquarter jail at Singapore.
We have also shown the number and variety of
industries that were from time to time introduced,
and the utilization of trained artificers in the con-
struction of important public works in the Straits
Settlements.
Perhaps we may say that the conduct of these
prisons from the year 1825, down to 1845, was in a
measure experimental ; but at any time we do not
assert that the system was free from defects. But on
the whole, in the treatment of these trans-marine
convicts, it worked with remarkable success, and was
well adapted to their condition and circumstances ;
156
CONCLUSION
for it must not be forgotten that we had to deal
with convicts who in great part had expiated their
crimes by a sentence of banishment to a foreign
country, which we have already explained was more
severely felt by a native of India than could possibly
be by any European. As a matter of fact, owing
to caste prejudices, transportation across the seas
was to many of the Indian convicts worse than
death itself, for it carried with it not only expulsion
from caste, but, owing to their wrong conception of
fate, or "nusseeb" as they call it, a dread of pain
and anguish in another existence.
In the later management of this jail, to all fresh
arrivals for life there was a period of probation of
three years, during which time they were fettered and
worked in gangs upon the public roads. This was
thoroughly punitive, and with no liberty whatever.
They were, in point of fact, full of fears and practically
without hope. After a time, they began to find that
the only chance of any amelioration from this hard
labour was by a course of good conduct ; and they
saw before them their own countrymen, who had
once been similarly circumstanced, occupying better
positions and employed on less distasteful work.
They also heard from their fellows that several had
attained to a ticket of leave, and were earning for
themselves an honest livelihood in the place of their
banishment. This, then, was their encouragement ;
but not a few at first, however, though carefully
treated in hospital, died from " nostalgia," or " love
157
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
of country," before they could complete their term
of probation.
The late General, then Captain Man, who, as we
have already said, did a great deal in the consolida-
tion of the convict system of Singapore, went from
the Straits Settlements to the Andamans, and in-
augurated there the same system ; but we learn that
since his time convicts upon first arrival from India
are placed for a certain period in separate cells, and
no doubt the authorities had good and weighty
reasons for the change. We have no report as to
the advantage or otherwise of this probationary
alteration, but from what we have said, it will be
seen that we incline to the belief that for this class
of native convicts work in irons upon the public
roads is a better " first trial" than to place them
under what is known to us as the " cellular sys-
tem."
For local prisoners, who after their sentences have
expired are returned to the town, we do advocate the
" cellular system," and have ourselves designed and
built for term convicts several wards upon this
system. The advantage gained is complete isolation
from one another for a fixed period, and the indis-
criminate admixture of classes thus avoided, and so
possibly by this means a recrudescence of crime in
the place prevented ; but with convicts under banish-
ment, and mostly for a life term, we think the
conditions are very different, and we prefer the plan
adopted in the old Singapore convict jail.
158
CONCLUSION
The punishments in force by our laws are of
course designed to deal out retributive justice to the
prisoner for his offence against society, and so to
prevent, if possible, a repetition of the offence by
others, and by this means to protect society against
evil-doers. There is no wish to punish with any
vindictive feeling, but rather, if it can be done, to
bring about the reform of the prisoner, and to take
away from him the desire to offend again ; and as
" Beccaria," the Italian philanthropist, well said,
" those penalties are least likely to be productive of
good effect which are more severe than is necessary
to deter others."
In the later days of our Singapore convict jail,
of which time only are we in a position to express
an opinion, the treatment of the convicts was one
of discipline from beginning to end. There was
first the probationary period under fetters, in gangs
upon the public roads, or upon the severest hard
labour ; next the period of freedom from this re-
straint and a time of test, and if they stood this test
well, then advancement to a position of trust, either
on the lower rung of the prison warder-staff, with a
belt of authority across the shoulder, or, if an apti-
tude for any trade was evinced, to the position of a
novice in the workyard, at whatever branch of
industry the convict was thought to be best suited.
There was then open to the prison warder a rise in
grade to that of peon, with a distinctive badge, and
eventually to the highest grade of a tindal or
159
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
duffadar, if duly qualified. In the case of the
industrial class there was also open a promotion to a
higher grade, and eventually to that of a foreman
of artificers. All were fully occupied and employed,
and the jail was in point of fact a busy hive of
industry, the pervading idea of the convict author-
ities being to teach the convict to love labour, and
to take a personal interest in it.
We know that there are still some who think
that no prisoner, while undergoing his sentence,
should be allowed to feel any pleasure in the occu-
pation in which he may be engaged ; and hence
they advocate the crank, shot drill, and other aim-
less tasks, which serve but to irritate, and do not
the least good to the heart, from whence all our
actions spring. For a short term of probation, no
doubt, the task should be irksome ; but when this
is over and it should not be prolonged work
should be given which would tend to call out the
best feelings, restore self-respect, and act as a sort
of cordial to remove lowering and depression. To
explain by a homely instance what we mean, we
will mention an incident that occurred to one of us
when building the Woking prison in 1866. A con-
vict undergoing sentence there, of the labouring
class, was found to be of an exceptionally dogged
and dull nature. Nothing pleased him ; he was
disgusted with the world, and wished he was out
of it. After a time he was tried at plain brick-
laying in a foundation, and gradually began to
160
CONCLUSION
handle a brick rather well. He seemed to grow
step by step more reconciled to his lot, and was
advanced to work upon a chimney-piece. A day
or two later he was asked how he was getting on.
He then replied, with a bright smile upon his face,
" Oh, very well, sir, now ! I likes my chimbley-
piece, and dreams of her at nights in my lonely cell."
Hence we see how the implacable temper of this
convict gave way over a congenial bit of work, and
the first step was thus taken towards his reforma-
tion of character, and he continued to improve until
his release from prison.
Herbert Spencer says with truth, "that experi-
ence and experiments have shown all over the
world that the most successful criminal discipline
is a discipline of decreased restraints and increased
self dependence"; and to a degree of this "self
dependence " the convict we refer to had been
encouraged to aspire.
Of course, in all criminal prisons we must expect
a certain percentage of incorrigible characters, who
under the best training cannot be brought under
control ; but the bulk of those in the old Singapore
jail, and we had often as many as two thousand at
a time, were well behaved, and gave evidence of
the good influence of a course of discipline upon
them ; for when they were advanced to a ticket-of-
leave, and thrown again on their own resources,
they very rarely a second time came under the
cognisance of the police, but peaceably merged into
161 M
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
the population, and earned their livelihood by honest
means.
We have one word to say in reference to the
employment of these convicts as warders over their
fellow-prisoners ; a system, so far as we are aware,
then unattempted either in Europe or America,
even in a modified form. We do not, however,
see why, in the case of well-behaved and suitable
European convicts sentenced to long periods of
penal servitude, some might not be placed in cer-
tain such positions of trust under free warders ; and
as the new prison rules for our jails may possibly
involve a large increase in the warder staff, it has
occurred to us that the system might have a trial
to a limited extent ; but we are, of course, not in a
position to speak with any authority upon the sub-
ject as affecting our own prisons. In our case,
with the exception of two or three European war-
ders, the whole warder staff were convicts ; and at
first, certainly, there was the fear that so large a
number of convict warders might side with the con-
victs, when a rule they might have thought repug-
nant to all, was introduced by the governing body.
There also appeared the danger that discipline
might be undermined by a system of favouritism,
especially amongst men of the same caste, or that
they would shut their eyes to breaches of the rules.
None of these apprehensions were, however,
experienced; but, on the contrary, these convict
warders were always the first to apprise the
162
CONCLUSION
authorities of any contemplated attempt at escape,
or of any ill-feeling that might be brewing amongst
any particular class, or breach of prison rules ; so
that, in a great measure, they acted in the double
capacity of both detectives and police. It was
only upon very rare occasions that a convict war-
der had to be disrated ; and the punishment
amongst them consisted for the most part in fines
for want of vigilance and attention to detail, and
such like petty offences. They all manifested the
highest appreciation of the trust reposed in them,
and lived in a perpetual fear that they might forfeit
their position, and have to begin anew the whole
course of jail punishment.
It need scarcely be said that great care was
exercised to single out men of the best character,
and to the highest posts those who could take upon
themselves responsibility as men of purpose and
discretion. Promotion in the different grades was
made only by the Superintendent, who in our case
was an officer who had served in India, knew
natives of most sects and races, and was acquainted
with their habits and customs, and spoke one or
two of their languages.
The prison system in all its branches worked in
perfect harmony, and all the parts of it seemed to
be adapted to each other. Discipline was main-
tained throughout, and the artificer gang, as we
have shown, developed a high skill in their various
trades ; so that important public works could be
163
PRISONERS THEIR OWN WARDERS
executed without difficulty or embarrassment.
Those also who had passed through its course, and
were admitted back to society upon a ticket of
leave, as a rule behaved themselves as good
citizens.
In the extraction of labour from the convicts,
there was no desire on the part of the Government
to work the establishment with a view to show any
pecuniary profit in the returns ; though, as it
proved, the actual cost to the State was often more
than reimbursed by their labour, estimated as it
was at two-thirds of that prevailing in the place,
and the material at half the market price. How-
ever, in regard to this part of the question we
might here quote "Jeremy Bentham," who once
wisely said of prison labour, "It is not the less
reforming for being profitable."
We would now take leave of our old Singapore
jail, as indeed, owing to the result of the earnest
entreaty of the community to the Government, it
finally took leave of us in 1873, though in our
judgment perhaps a little too prematurely in the
best interests of the colony.
We can only hope that in the record we have
now given, we have furnished some suggestions
for general application to those who, like ourselves,
are concerned not merely with the punishment of
the criminal, but also with his reformation, both as
a question of social science, and to the prisoner's
own ulterior benefit.
164
CONCLUSION
This reformation could, we think, be best brought
about by a course of severe probationary discipline
at the outset, to be followed up by continuous
employment upon productive occupations and
trades, so as to encourage within the criminal a
lively diligence and a persevering industry ; our-
selves meanwhile also encouraged in the task by
the words of Shakespeare, that
" There is some soul of goodness in things evil,
Would men observingly distil it out."
King Henry V., Act. iv., Scene i.
APPENDICES
APPENDIX I
Statement of the expenses of the convict jail in
Singapore for the years 1862-63 and 1863-64,
showing the average cost per prisoner :
Heads of Expenditure.
1,964 Prisoners in 1862-63.
1,995 Prisoners in 1863-64.
1862-63.
1863-64.
Rations ....
Money Allowance
Total
Cost per Prisoner
Fixed Establishment .
Cost per Prisoner
Extra Establishment .
Cost per Prisoner
Total
Cost per Prisoner
Hospital Charges
European Medicines j
Bazaar ditto \-
Sick Diet J
Total
Cost per Prisoner
Clothing, including Blankets
and Bedding .
Cost per Prisoner
Contingencies
Cost per Prisoner
Additions, Alterations, and
Repairs ....
Cost per Prisoner
Gross Cost of Maintenance .
Gross Cost per Prisoner
Rs.
67,803 9 10
20,938 13 8
Rs.
62,901- o 10
19,369 14 3
88,742 7 6
45 2 II
82,270 15 i
41 3 10
16,094 i o
8 3 i
nil.
t>
11,173 i 5
597
nil.
n
16,094 i o
8 3 i
n,i73 i 5
597
472 13 o
454 10 4
472 13 o
o 3 10
454 10 4
o 3 7i
8,699 14 6
4 6 ii
3,235 3 i
i 10 4
IOO 12 2
O O IO
8,250 14 4
422
4,407 5 3
2 3 4}
51 8 8
005
n7,345 3 3
59 ii ii
106,608 7 i
53 7
The above table gives a fair average of the
annual cost of maintenance of each prisoner as
taken from the records of the jail.
169
APPENDIX
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170
APPENDIX
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171
APPENDIX
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APPENDIX
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173
APPENDIX
APPENDIX IV
The following is a tabulated account of the cost of
the brick kilns to the State, and the value of these
convict-made bricks in the local market.
The output of bricks per month when four tables
were at work was 230,000, and their value at
$45-00 per 10,000 would be $1,035. The cost of
manufacture was as follows :
Overseer's Salary
Labour of 1 25 Convicts,
at 25cts. per diem for
artizans and Qcts. for
labourers
Cost of Fuel
Wear and Tear .
Food for Cattle .
Contingencies .
$
45-00
306-00
2OO'OO
I7-IO
24-30
16-20
Total
. $608-60
$
Value of 230,000 of
Bricks at $45 per
laksa, that being the
market price for
Government Bricks 1,035-00
Deduct cost of manu-
facture .
Difference to credit of
the State.
608-60
$426-40
Bricks were debited to Government Works at
$20 per laksa. The size of a Government brick mould
was io|- x 5j x 3 ins. The bricks when burnt
measured 9 x 4^ x 2 fins., and weighed about 7 Ibs.
when dry, and about 7 Ibs. 3 or 4 ozs. after soaking
174
APPENDIX
in fresh water. These were ordinary bricks, but
those manufactured for hydraulic work were im-
pervious to water.
NOTE. The size of a Chinese-made brick when burnt is
10 x 5 x ijins. It requires 22 Chinese-made bricks to build
one cubic foot of brickwork, but of convict-made Government
bricks a cubic foot of brickwork requires 13 only.
175
APPENDIX
APPENDIX V
Number and nature of defaults committed by
Indian convicts :
Nature of Defaults.
F<
1846.
>r the y<
1856.
jar
1866.
Stealing ....
II
II
12
Disobedience of Orders
. . .
4
I
10
Drunkenness
...
2
15
6
Assault ....
...
I
Neglect of Duty .
. .
4
22
12
Smuggling Articles into Jail .
.
4
4
Disturbing Women at Night.
.
i
Sleeping while on Duty
.
i
3
7
Cutting and Wounding
.
i
i
Breaking open a Convict's Box .
i
Allowing Local Prisoners to
speak to Out-\
i
side Men.
. ./
Receiving Money for Safe
Keeping and\
7
Denying the Same .
. . ./
>
Quarrelling and Abusing
.
5
9
Telling Falsehood
.
3
2
Allowing Local Prisoners to Abscond .
3
19
Idleness at Work .
.
i
3
Gambling ....
.
6
4
Absent from Roll Call .
.
4
17
Impertinence to Warder
.
i
Selling his own Cloths .
.
2
Confined by the Police
.
5
Striking a Fellow-Convict .
.
5
3
Refusing to Work
.
3
6
Unlawfully Detaining a Man's
Sampan .
i
Creating a Disturbance
.
2
2
I 7 6
APPENDIX
Nature of Defaults.
For the year
1846. 1856. 1866.
Bringing a False Charge
Writing a Threatening Petition .
Having Stolen Property in Possession .
Wilfully Destroying Tools .
Carelessness at Work ....
Leaving Work without Orders
Intending to Abscond ....
Bringing a Woman into the Hospital at Nigh
Selling Rations
Begging in the Streets ....
Committing a Nuisance
Mixed up in Street Rows
Counterfeiting Coin ....
Buying Rations from a Fellow-Convict .
Pawning ......
Suspected of Thieving . . .
Losing Cloths
Leaving his Watch ....
Committed by the Police
Attempting to Commit Suicide .
Marrying without Permission
Carrying Letters for Local Prisoners
Disrespect to Superiors
Obtaining Money under False Pretences
Receiving Bribes .....
Impertinence
Malingering
Suspected of being Concerned in a Murder
Assaulting a Free Man
i
2
I
I
7
4
ii
i
2
I
I
I
I
Total
132 172
This table gives the number and nature of the
defaults committed by the Indian convicts for the
years 1846, 1856 and 1866, but it is doubtful whether
the list for 1846 is complete, as the prison records
do not appear to have been fully kept up ; anyhow
they are not to be found, and at that time the
inquiry room had not been established. The num-
177 N
APPENDIX
her of convicts under discipline and on ticket of
leave during the twenty years was between 1,900
and 2,500, which shows a small percentage of
defaulters, and they are all, with few exceptions,
of a petty nature.
178
APPENDIX
APPENDIX VI
Extracts from letters from T. Church, Esq.,
Resident Councillor, Singapore, addressed to the
Honourable the Governor of the Straits.
1 5th September, 1849. Transmits copy of letter from
Captain Man, dated August, 1849, forwarding account of
value of labour of the convicts for the year ending 3Oth
April last.
In my last report I adverted to the efficient state
of this department, and the importance of the work
performed by convicts under the zealous and active
supervision of the Superintendent. The accompany-
ing papers will, I think, satisfy your Honour, and
distant authorities likewise, that the value of the
labour of the convicts, particularly the artificers, is
annually becoming developed ; and even now the
skill of the men is quite equal, if not superior, to the
free labourers generally employed by the Superin-
tending Engineer ; in fact, Major Faber has on more
than one occasion expressed his professional opinion
on the superiority of the masonry and other works
executed by the convict body. I trust the period is
not far distant when the Government will allow all
repairs and minor works to be done by the Super-
intendent of Convicts, a measure much to be desired,
and vastly more economical than the present system.
The annexed statement has no pretensions to
179
APPENDIX
accuracy, and I am rather disposed to place on
record Captain Man's estimate than my own ; but
whichever is adopted, the result is most satisfactory,
as showing that the labour of the convicts is equiva-
lent to all expenses incurred in their maintenance at
this station.
August, 1850. A cursory view of the papers sub-
mitted by Captain Man will show how much the community
are indebted to the convict body for the cleanliness of the
streets in town, and the extensive and admirable roads in
the country, which elicit the praise and even the astonish-
ment of sojourners from the continent of India, and the
Colonies.
loth August, 1852. Captain Man's report is exceed-
ingly gratifying, and demonstrates how admirably adapted
the existing rules and regulations are to preserve order
and discipline among a large body of probably the most
vicious and demoralized characters from the presidencies,
and at the same time render their labour of considerable
importance to the place of transportation.
Extracts from the letters of the Governor of the
Straits Settlements to the Resident Councillor,
Singapore :
29th August, 1850. The management of the convict
body at Singapore reflects great credit on Captain Man,
whose energy and zeal in the execution of his duties have
always been very conspicuous ; and I notice with extreme
satisfaction the eulogium passed on that officer in the
concluding paragraphs of your communication.
The observations of the Superintendent of Convicts and
Roads at this station, as well as at Penang, on the afore-
said rules and regulations, coupled with your notice of the
same, have afforded me unqualified gratification, seeing
180
APPENDIX
that they were drawn up by me so far back as 1845 in the
face of much opposition to the entire abolition of free men
as petty officers, in which, however, as in all matters con-
nected with the welfare of this station, I acknowledge your
cordial support and assistance.
i8r
APPENDIX
APPENDIX VII
The head of the Madras Medical Department
Dr. Edward Balfour, visited this jail in August,
1863, and thus recorded his opinion :
The point that most struck me in the management of
this jail were the diversified occupations and evident in-
dustry of its inmates, and their complete employment.
The mass v/ere actively working, and the few were super-
intending those engaged in labour. I have not before
seen the various labouring industries of artizans so largely
introduced in any jail, nor have I seen such diligence in
their labour. Blacksmiths' and tinsmiths' work, carpentry
and sawmills, carving and coopering, stonemasons, manu-
facture of coir and woollen yarn for blankets, weaving
door-mats, and printing too, all in active operation inside
the jail, with wood-cutting, brick and tile works, and
vegetable gardens without. Daily task work, and its
allotment and registration as to quantities performed in
the jail, may be operating to produce the application to
the work before them which the prisoners were everywhere
giving. The hospital and its arrangements were very per-
fect. The well-kept floor, the clean cots, and the very small
number of about twenty inmates out of a strength of 2,000,
may be taken as indicative of the care in all other sanitary
arrangements. Both the sickness and mortality seems very
small. I have been much gratified with what I have seen,
and have learned some points of interest and value.
182
APPENDIX
APPENDIX VIII
Extract from the Singapore Free Press, October,
1884:
To this day many of the released convicts are living in
Singapore, cart owners, milk sellers, road contractors, and
so on. Many of them are comfortably off, but are growing
fewer year by year, and their places will never be filled by
that class again. The name of Major McNair is a pass-
word to their good feelings, and all their disputes used to
go to him as a matter of course. When the v( Major wrote
the Sarong and Kris, Perak and the Malays, it was re-
marked by one of the reviewers that he hoped the Major
would some day give an account of the old jail to the
world. It was one of the most remarkable sights of the
place, and no one came from India on a visit in those days
without going over it before he returned. For all sorts of
things, from coir matting and rattan chairs down to waste
paper baskets, every one went to the jail ; and the rattan
chairs the Chinese now sell here so largely, were invented
in the jail, beginning with a cumbrous heavy chair, which
was the first pattern, down to the shape we see now.
No doubt the system had its defects, and there was
a wide difference between the jail as it is now, filled with
offenders sentenced in Singapore, and a jail which con-
tained criminals who came from distant places and did
not know the local language, and had no friends outside
APPENDIX
the walls to help them to escape from the island if they
succeeded in getting clear of the jail ; but, notwithstanding,
it was often a wonder to many to find so large an estab-
lishment of the worst characters of India kept in check by
what was, practically, almost personal influence alone.
184
APPENDIX
APPENDIX IX
From the Singapore Free Press, February 2nd,
1899. Given to show how very lately this "head
scare " superstition is entertained :
THE "HEAD-CUTTING" SCARE.
To the Editor of the Free Press Pao.
MOST POWERFUL SIR, Permit thy humble servant to
approach thee by the way of my friend Tan Tan Tiam,
who knoweth the Ang Moh's speech, and kindly con-
senteth to write to him who moveth the Government to
influence the Tye Jin to have compassion upon the exiled
sons of China.
Thy servant is a humble puller of the man-power-
carriage by night, and is suffering grievously because he
is unable to carry on his lawful occupation of plying by
hire, by reason of the dire fear that besetteth him. It hath
come to the ears of thy servant and of his fellows, that the
Ang Moh's engineers do seek a sacrifice to appease the
offended gods of earth and water, whom they have out-
raged by disturbing his habitation on the hill that standeth
behind the office of the Tye Jin, which they of India call
Ko-mis-a-yat. The said engineers, perchance from ignor-
ance, have neglected to consult the wise ones of earth-lore
as to the means to be taken to please the said spirits, who
have consequently so tormented the Ang Moh that they
seek a sacrifice. Not of the rich and family-blessed, who
185
APPENDIX
would make a complaint to the Government, if they were
sacrificed ; but of us poor and friendless man-power-
carriage coolies, who in the exercise of our nightly avoca-
tion are called to distant parts of the town, where the
knife that is invisible will speedily sever the head from the
body, and the cloth that is impenetrable will stifle the last
cry of him that hath none to avenge, and our heads go to
make the water run within the pipe, and make firm the
foundations of this new water hole.
Let the engineers make the necessary sacrifices, that we
may go without fear and trembling to those who call us,
with mighty voice and thick, to go to Si Poi Poh. Then
shall we receive the reward of the Ang Moh's gratitude,
far exceeding that of they who aforetime dwelt in the
land, or of our brothers of the Celestial Empire.
HAK-CHEW.
186
Index
Alquada Reef lighthouse, 112.
Andaman Islands, 21, 143-
Anecdotal History -, on Singapore,
etc., convicts, 47, 67.
Balfour, Dr. Edward : opinion of
Singapore jail, 182.
"Bastiani," exporter of pine-
apples to Europe, 60.
Begbie, Captain, 43.
Belcher, Sir Edward, R.N., 61.
Bencoolen, First penal settlement
at, 1-3.
Sir Stamford Raffles' letters on
treatment of convicts at, 4-8.
Transfer of convicts from, to
Penang, 8.
Transfer of convicts from, to
Singapore, 39.
" Bencoolen Rules " in force at
Singapore, 43.
Bennett, Mr. John, 61, 74.
Beri-beri disease, 149.
Blundell, Hon. Edmund Augus-
tus, 73.
Branding, 12.
Bricks, Dearth of, at Singapore
in 1844, 58.
Bricks made by convicts, 1 10, 174.
Brodhurst, Mr., 144.
Budoo road, 44.
Bukit Timah Canal, 71.
Butterworth, Colonel, 20, 6 1, 62.
"Butterworth Rules," 21, 62, 63.
Campbell, Major, 42.
Canning, Lord, 75.
Cape Rachado, 29.
Carrimon Islands, 33.
Cathedral, Singapore, 97-101.
Cavenagh, General Sir Orfeur, 52.
" Cellular system," 158.
Chains, Convicts in, 40, 87.
Chester, Lieutenant, 40.
Chinese rioters dispersed by In-
dian convicts, 67-68.
Church, Hon. Thomas, 73.
Extracts from letters on value of
convict labour, 179-181.
Clarke, Sir Andrew, 3, 14.
Clothing of convicts at Singapore
jail, 94.
Cobra, 128.
Coleman, G. D., Work performed
by, at Singapore, 43-46.
Colly er, Colonel, 75.
Collyer Quay, 76.
Convicts,Treatment of, at Penang,
16-20.
Ticket-of-leave, at Penang, 24.
at Malacca, 27-30.
Transfer of, from Bencoolen to
Singapore, 39.
First trial of, as warders at
Singapore, 40.
Lenient treatment of, 41.
187
INDEX
Convicts (continued),
used for suppressing fires at
Singapore, 42.
employed as orderlies and ser-
vants, 42.
at Singapore, Malacca, Penang,
and Maulmein, Extract from
Anecdotal History on, 47.
used for destroying tigers, 52.
used for surveying, 56.
employed for road- constructing,
19, 28, 59.
build lighthouses at Singapore,
60, 62.
Indian, disperse Chinese rioters,
68.
Bukit Timah Canal improved
by, 71.
A new St. Andrew's Church
constructed by, 72, 97.
assist in building fortifications
of Singapore, 76.
Government House built by, 77,
101.
Classification of, at Singapore
jail, 84-89.
Average number of, at Singa-
pore, 89.
Trades of, 90-92.
hours of work at Singapore, 92.
Clothing of, at Singapore jail,
94-
Industries of ( intramural )
104-108.
Industries of ( extramural )
108-112.
Stories about Indian, 113-142.
Indian, fondness for spying, 123.
Indian, Transfer of, to Port
Blair from Singapore, 143.
Pardoning, 143-145.
Analysis of crimes of, in 1873,
145-
Convicts (continued),
Diseases of, at Singapore,
147-152.
Death-rate of, at Singapore, 149.
Disciplinary treatment of, at
Singapore, 159.
Incorrigible, 161.
Materials made by, 172-175.
Bricks made by, 172-175.
Defaults committed by Indian,
176.
Cotton, Dr. George, 74.
Cowpar, Dr., 154.
Crawfurd, Mr. John, 36, 101.
Crocodiles, 130, 134-138.
" Dacoity," 12.
Davidson, M. F., 61, 62.
Death-rate of convicts at Singa-
pore, 149, 170.
De Barros on Malacca, 26.
Dindings, 14.
Diseases of convicts at Singapore,
147-152.
Feigned, 152-155.
Du Cane, Sir Edmund, 96.
Edinburgh, H.R.H. The Duke of,
77-
Faber, Captain, 58.
lays foundation stone of Pearl's
Hill jail, 64.
Farquhar, Major, 33.
Fires, Convicts used for suppress-
ing, 42.
Flogging, 88.
Forlong, General, 21, 63.
appreciation of Singapore con-
vict system, 63.
Fraser, Colonel, report on man-
agement of Singapore jail,
no.
"Funny Joe," 126.
T88
INDEX
Godinho de Eredia, 25, 151.
Government House at Singapore,
101-104.
Guillaume, architect, 97.
Guthrie, Mr. Alexander, 35.
Guthrie, Mr. James, 101.
Hamadryads, Convicts bitten by,
1 6.
Hay, Mr. Andrew, 35.
" Head Scare," 69-70.
Hilliard, Captain, 20.
Hospital erected at Singapore, 57.
Humphrey, Rev. William Topley,
73-
Industries, Convict, 104-112.
Jail erected near Brass Basa
Canal, 54.
New Civil, at Pearl's Hill, 64.
Singapore, Description of,
77-83.
Singapore, Classification of
convicts at, 84-89.
Singapore, Rations for, 93.
Industries at Singapore, 104-
112.
Convict Probation at Singa-
pore, 157.
Expenses of Singapore, 169.
Statistics of Hospital Depart-
ment, 170-171.
Janssen, M. Leon, 151.
Johnstone, Mr. A. L., 35.
Johore, Sultan of, 36.
Kerr, Dr., 150.
Labour, Value of convict, 92.
Statistics of convict, 172-175.
Latrines, 80-82.
" Licuala acutifida," 24.
Light, Captain, 15.
Lighthouses at Singapore, 60-62.
erected at eastern entrance to
Straits of Malacca, 62.
McClure, Sir Robert, 139.
MacKenzie, Mr. E., 35.
McNair, Lieut., 73.
McNair, Major, 52.
Rules introduced by, 1858-59,
63-
prepares plans for Government
House at Singapore, 77, 97,
101.
Macpherson, Captain Ronald,
7i, 73-
Macpherson, Colonel, 97.
Attempt to kill, 125.
Magaelhaens, Mr., 61.
Mahomed Shah, 26.
Malacca, Origin of name of, 25.
Size of, 26.
Trade of, 26.
The Portuguese at, 26.
Appearance of, 27.
First convicts at, 27
Industrial training of convicts
at, 29.
Transfer of convicts to Singa-
pore from, 30.
trade, 1845-46, 65.
Man, Captain, 158.
Man, General, 20, 21.
Man, General, Initiation of car-
penter's work at Singapore,
64.
Marco Polo, 151.
Maxwell, Mr. D. A., 35.
Mayne, Major, 76.
Montgomery, Mr. W., 35.
Moor's Notices of the Indian
Archipelago, 45.
Morgan, Mr. A. F., 35.
Morgan, Mr. John, 35.
189
INDEX
Mouat, Dr., Paper on ticket-of-
leave system at Singapore,
10.
Testimony as to conservancy of
Singapore jail, 82.
Report on Singapore jail, 1864-
65, 105.
Napier, Mr. D. F., 35.
Netley Abbey, 97.
New Harbour Dock, 67.
Ord, Lady, 101.
Ord, Sir Harry St. George, 76,
101.
Oxley, Dr., House of, attacked by
burglars, 43.
Pangkor, 14.
Penang, Convicts transferred to,
from Bencoolen, 8, 14.
Increase in population of, 15.
Trade of, 16, 65.
Treatment of convicts at, 16-20.
Ticket- of-leave at, 24.
Seat of government fixed at, 41.
" Penang lawyers," 24.
" Penang Rules," 8, 18.
in force at Singapore, 43.
Pine-apples at Singapore, 59.
Piracy in the Straits of Malacca,
120-122.
Pooley, Lieut.-Col. Charles, 73.
Port Blair, Transfer of Indian
life-convicts to, 143.
"Prince of Wales Island" (see
also Penang), 14.
Prisoners (see Convicts).
Province Wellesley, Acquisition
of, 14.
Pulo Ubin, British flag planted
at, 38.
Purvis, Captain, 73.
Purvis, Mr. John, 35.
Queen, H.M. The, Statue of, 104.
Raffles', Sir Stamford, letters to
Government on treatment of
convicts at Bencoolen, 4-8.
Views of, on necessity of trad-
ing centre in Straits of Ma-
lacca, 33.
Address from merchants at
Singapore to, 36.
reply to address from mer-
chants at Singapore, 37.
"The Coney "lighthouse named
after, 62.
Raffles Institution, 45.
Rations for Singapore jail, 93.
Rawlinson, Sir Robert, K.C.B.,76.
Read, Mr. C. R., 35.
Read, Mr. W. H., C.M.G., 100.
Rhio, 33.
Roads opened between Bukit
Timah and Krangi, 59.
to summit of Telok Blangah
Hill, 59.
Rock-blasting by Indian convicts,
66.
Rowell, Dr. Irvine, C.M.G., 150.
St. Andrew's Church, 68.
Construction of a new, 72.
consecrated by Dr. George
Cotton, Bishop of Calcutta, 74.
Scott, Mr. Charles, 35.
Scott, Mr. Thomas, 101.
Serangoon road, 44.
Shaw, Mr. Frank, 131.
Singapore, Foundation of settle-
ment, 34.
Origin of name of, 31.
Size of, 32.
ceded to Great Britain, 34.
Population of, 34.
First settlers at, 34, 35.
190
INDEX
Singapore (continued),
Early prison at, 35.
Address from merchants at, to
Sir Stamford Raffles, 36.
Extracts from reply to address
from merchants to Sir S.
Raffles, 37.
First census, 38.
Transfer of convicts from Ben-
coolen to, 39.
First church for, 45.
jail erected, 1841, 54.
Tigers at, 49-53.
Extract from The Free Press
on progress of town, 55.
hospital erected, 57.
bricks, 58.
pine-apples, 59.
trade, 1845-46, 65.
census, 1849, 67.
new church, 72.
Fortification of, 75.
waterworks, 76.
jail, Description of, 77-83.
cathedral, 97-101.
Government House, 101-104.
Expenses of, jail, 169.
Singapore Free Press: Extract
on capture of a tiger, 50.
Extract on ravages of tigers, 51.
Extract on progress of Singa_
pore town, 1842, 55.
Extract on Singapore light-
house, 61.
Extract on tiger-hunting, 134.
on released convicts, 183-184.
on " head-cutting " scare, 185-
186.
Sleeman, Colonel, 12.
Stevenson, Captain, 48.
Stone Quarrying at Singapore,
in.
Surveying, Convicts used for, 56.
Tanjong Tatti, 33.
Tan-Tock-Seng, 57.
Taylor, Rev. Wallace, M.D., 152.
Temple, Col. R.C., 21.
Thompson, J. T., 56.
designs hospital for Singapore,
57-
designs Singapore lighthouse
60.
"Thuggee," n.
"Tickery Banda," 113.
Ticket-of-leave system, 10, 24.
employed in pine culture, 60.
Tigers at Singapore, 49-53.
trap, 131.
Trade for year 1845-46 of Penang,
Singapore, and Malacca, 65.
Trades of Singapore convicts,
90-92.
Transportation, 8.
Effect of, on the native of
India, 9, 117, 157.
Tropical Possessions in Malayan
India, Story about "Tickery
Banda" in, 113.
Warders, Singapore convicts as,
40, 48, 162.
Well-digging at Singapore, 112.
White, Rev. Edmund, 45.
Wilson, Rt. Rev. Daniel, D.D., 73.
Xavier, St. Francis, 27.
Butler & Tanner, The Selwood Printing Works, Frome, and London.
191
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