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The Beginning Step
John Howard cared about his country and his community. At the age of 30, he had heard of a devastating earthquake striking the city of Lisbon, Portugal. He made the choice, a pivtol one, to sail to the site to offer help to those in need. It was this step that began his long and dramatic path work in the area of criminal justice reforms, elementary level education for children, sanitation systems as well as other areas of societal values that we still see the effects from today.
It’s said John had a manner and air about him that allowed him to develop a rapport and trust with others readily. His approach brought down barriers to change, and enouraged important new ways of thinking about persons in conflict with the law, which is why today there are many agencies across Canada, the UK and elsewhere who adopt his name for their work in the community.
John’s Journey on the Hanover
In 1755, John Howard was readying himself for another tour of the European Countries. He had heard there was a great earthquake in Lisbon, Portugal which left thousands of people homeless. When he heard of the tragic news, John Howard decided he would first set out for Lisbon to see what help he could offer to his fellow men and women.
On his journey to Lisbon, the French captured his ship and he was placed in a dungeon with other prisoners of war. It was here that many believe John Howard’s interest in prisoner reform began. He describes the prison as a filthy, dark and damp place where he and the other prisoners spent many hours starving. Here, the prisoners spent a whole week sleeping on nothing but a bed of straw. Eventually, John Howard was able to arrange an exchange for himself and his fellow prisoners.
John’s Return to Cardington
Having returned from his incarceration experience in the dungeons of France, John settled again at Cardington, Bedfordshire to live on a 200-acre estate. It was formerly two farms, the larger of which he had inherited from his grandparents. His grandmother, Martha Howard, was a relation of the Whitbread family, and he became a neighbour and close friend of his cousin, Samuel Whitbread.
John spent the next two years building properties and trying to improve the lives of the tenants living on his land. Later, a survey of Cardington in 1782 found that he was paying for the teaching of 23 children. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in May 1756.
John’s Intervention at Savoy
The military prison of Savoy in London saw 200 prisons erupt in a violent riot. The building was completely under the rioters control, two guards had been killed, and none of the local authorities could make any headway at bringing calm to the situation.
Upon hearing of the incident, John Howard immediately travelled to the facility to address the inmates. Unarmed and dismissing the warnings of the authorities on the danger of the situation, John entered the prison by himself. He not only quelled the angry mass, but even got the prisoners to return to their cells quietly. John promised to take their grievances forward, to be their voice of reason, and to bring about change for a just and humane facility.
John Howard is often referred to as the father of modern prison reform as his principals and research lead to many of the core methods encouraged and practiced today.
John Howard as High Sheriff
John Howard was appointed the High Sheriff of Bedfordshire in 1773. He had no knowledge of prison science per say, and so it remained for him to invent it, but he had a thoroughness and devotion to the duty, attending to every peice of official business personally, rather than to assign those tasks to Deputy Sheriff’s, as had been the custom prior to him. John sat in the courts during trials, visited every cell in the gaols of his county, and scrutinized every individual prisoner’s case.
Prisons in Howard’s Time
Howard said that the first circumstance that excited his activity on behalf of prisoners was that men found not guilty at their trial were sent back to gaols and locked up until they had paid the fees due to the gaoler or the Clerk of the Assizes.
Debtors were treated as criminals. The death penalty was applied for 200 different offences, from stealing a pair of shoes or a skein of thread to arson and murder.
Feeding the prisoners was farmed out to the lowest bidder and water was often supplied from outside the prison walls but filth was allowed to accumulate in reeking masses all over the grounds and in the water stores.
Spirituous liquors and beer were sold within the gaol, encouraging drunkness. Men and women were placed in close proximity, and vice was rampant. Straw was seldom provided for bedding and prisoners had to lie on muddy floors with dampness oozing into their cells. Gaol Fever was almost an exclusively British disease, costing many lives.
Current prisoners had the right of demanding an entry fee of new prisoners called a “garnish” before the “privileges” of the prison were allowed to him. This meant for much personal cruelty and inside persecution. Debtors and felons alike were in constant jeopardy of life from the foul air, filthy cells, and unventilated holes into which they were crowded almost to suffocation. Prisoner’s mental health received no attention.
John Howard’s Impact
Distances, labour and even personal expense were no barrier to John. He travelled hundreds of kilometers at a time by post and horseback, night and day through England, Wales, Ireland, Scotland, and the Isle of Wight. A gaol with even one single prisoner was important enough to draw him for inspection. He recorded his findings in narrative style. He did not seek to create any association or group, but to conduct work for reform by his own hand.
When called to the House of Commons, he was asked to be witness as an expert on prison conditions. His bearing, modesty, precision and exactness of answers filled the House with surprise such that he was called back a second time to be publicly thanked by the Speaker for his humanity and zeal.
John wrote “The State of the Prisons”, printed in 1777, as his own expense, addressed in a format that the general public absrobed readily with clear understanding as to what he had discovered. It created a new interest at a near-universal level in the way prisons and justice were managed at that time.
From this work the theory of criminal law became the true practise of criminal law, and methods began to be reformed to address the filthy conditions, the means of paying the gaolers separately from the prisoner’s being extorted, separation of prisoners into single cells, removal of spirits and more.
John Howard is often referred to as the father of modern prison reform as his principals and research lead to many of the core methods encouraged and practiced today.
Funders
- Delta Bingo (Pickering)
- Durham Children’s Aid Society
Government of Canada— Homelessness Partnership Strategy
Government of Canada—Youth Employment Strategy
KPR District School Board
Ministry of the Attorney General
Ministry of Children, Community & Social Services
Ministry of Education
Ministry of Health—Long Term Care
Ministry of Training, Colleges & Universities
Municipality of Clarington
Region Of Durham
United Way of Durham Region
Youth Employment Strategy—Service Canada