A BRIEF history OF KILMAINHAM JAIL

BY

ELLEN EGAN 4C

Kilmainham Jail is mostly rememberd for its role until 1916 rising and in the 1798 united irish men rebellion . This history of the prison ended in 1924, two years after the founding of the Free State. Another part of Kilmainham Jail is not about politics but of common punishment in Ireland for normal crimes. In this story, the new building that opened in 1796 is just one moment in the history of the prison and is most interesting when put beside the opening of the new cast wing in 1863. Apart from Mount Joy model prison(1850), the east wing of Kilmainham Gaol is the one of the earliest and the best preserved examples of the surveillance-based jail design invented by Jeremy bent ham. This new design changed part of the prison from a dungeon-style jail into a modern jail. The origin of the prison is most probably linked to the presence of the Courthouse. In the eighteenth century, law courts travelled throughout the country and cases might be heard only every six months, People were often held in mini-jails called Bride wells attached to the courthouse. These Bride wells as in the case of Kilmainham, often developed into county jails within cities. They were often called Marshal Sea prisons.

Before the late eighteenth century, prisons were not meant to be places of punishment. The circuit courts empited rather than filled them. Punishment consisted of fines, public humiliation, torture death or transportation.

Throughout the eighteenth century,

However, as the economy grew a new class of prisoners, known as debtors, was kept in prison. These were people who were unable to pay their debts and were punished by fines and confinement, Because they were required to pay fees for their keep to the turnkeys, sheriff and anyone else who incurred costs in their detainment, many languished in prisons for years. John Howard, the famous prison reformer, visited kilmainham

Gaol in the 1770s and the 80s.

it described a scene common to prisons throughout Europe at the time; overcrowding hunger, filth and a

General cruelty towards the prisoners. Women, men, and children were confined together brutality and drunkenness were the norm. Prisoners who had money could pay for the things they needed and even luxuries of life. An impoverished one might endure the nightmare of the dungeon and, after a flogging for the crime, be detained indefinitely for non – payment of fees.

There was a general expansion of county and city jails in late eighteenth- century Ireland. Like the new negate prison opened in 1780, the kilmainham bride well was replaced in 1796 by a major prison, negate, serving all co. Dublin. The designs of kilmainham and negate were very similar and represent a prison architecture already out of date in the designs of the new disciplinary. Howard was highly critical of the new prison at negate in this respect, and no doubt would have had the same criticism of kilmainham . Both prisons were merely bigger and more elaborate dungeon houses. The new kilmainham gaol and the courthouse to which it was attached, immediately served the detention, prosecution, and punishment of those who rebelled by force of arms against Irelands political subordination to England. Henry joy McCracken was amongst kilmainham s first political prisoners in 1796, to be followed by Thomas Addis emit in 1798. Robert emit was detained and tried at kilmainham in 1803 and was put to death for high treason, beginning a long historical connection between Irish nationalist rebellion and the police , court and prison complex of kilmainham . In the nineteenth century Jeremiah o Donovan rose, Charles Stewart Parnell, and Michael davit were among the famous rebels detained there. In the twentieth century, the leaders of the 1916 rising, including Patrick parse, Thomas Clarke john McBride and jams Connolly, were executed at the prison. The last prisoners to die there, including arsine Childers, were put to death by the Free State government in 1922 because of their opposition to the treaty with Britain.

With regard to common punishment, however the east wing opened in 1863 is of the most interest. Chosen by completion, john mc curds design embodied the separate system of corrective discipline, each of the 101 cells intended to hold just one prisoner. The entire wing, on three levels could be viewed from a single position on the west side. As the purpose of the design was to correct deviant behavior, prisoners charged with capital crimes were not usually detained there. While it is the most interesting Irish monument to nineteenth – century therapeutic punishment the east wing has the least connection of any part of the jail with the history of political prisoners.