We arrived at our tour at 11am to get checked in. There are
16 people per tour and we had a guide from the local university. Our guide
welcomed us and told us that the tour would focus on the history of the prison
and not on any specific criminal (to protect privacy of the victims). Our tour guide told us about the history and
general facts while leading us through the prison. When we arrived and each
location, there was a former guard, warden, keeper, or employee, who would then
tell us personal stories from their experience in the prison. The furniture has
been taken out so it felt very empty. There were several large photographs in
each location to show how the room looked at different times in the prison’s
history to help us get an idea of how it looked when there were prisoners
present. The prison was modeled after Auburn, New York’s local prison, which
looked like a wagon wheel (a main hub (or dome) in the middle, and then spokes
leading out to cells, outdoor space, workshops, and cafeteria.
Our tour began in one of the three visiting areas for
prisoners and their families. We were in the minimum security room, where
twelve tables would sit and people could sit and chat. There was a sign on the
wall that read, “Please to not speak to other inmate’s children unless you have
permission from both parents.” There was also a room that had glass between the
visitors (like in TV and movies), and also a conjugal housing project (4 houses
where inmates could live with their families for short periods of time). These
prisoners were allowed kiddie pools and BBQ’s.
The first man we met was a guard from 1970-2002. When he
started, the prison was just starting to phase out the “silent treatment”. This
meant that prisoners were expected to be silent at all time (unless answering a
guard) so that they could reflect on their crimes. There was a religious
element to this method, and by the 1970’s it wasn’t used anymore.
Our second guest was a woman who worked the main gate at the
prison. She spoke about how the prisoners would wake at 7am, and have one hour
for breakfast (which they got from the cafeteria but ate in the cells) and to
dress for work. They would work 8am-4pm, have outdoor/free time, then dinner,
then back in their cells at 8pm. The prisoners didn’t spend as much time in
their 19 in cells as people thought. The jail originally held over 800
prisoners, but with humane laws, the cells were doubled in size and the prison
could then only hold 400 prisoners.
The prisoners originally worked mainly outside of the jail.
They worked on farms, in the local quarry, or on local buildings. A local
church, called the “Church of the Good Thief” was built by inmates. The bell in
the main gate would ring at 8am and 4pm each work day to notify the people of
Kingston that the prisoners were on the move. This could allow women and
children to go inside while the inmates passed by.
The prison originally had a building for men, and another
for women and children. The youngest inmate was an 8 year old boy who stole a
loaf of bread (and then continued to disrupt the prison while incarcerated). The
prison was also used as a military prison since Fort Henry was close by.
Fort Henry (British soldiers at the ready if the prisoners
decided to riot) , the limestone quarry (cheap building materials), and
government money were the main reasons that the Upper Canada prison was put in
Kingston, over competing city, Hamilton.
This building is B6, known as the Keeper’s House. The Keeper
was directly below the Warden and was in charge of prison operations. There was
also an inmate radio show produced in the basement.
A main point of the tour was the riot of 1971. The riot,
which saw 3 inmates lose their lives, 4 guards taken hostage, the military
called in, and millions of dollars in damage, arose when prisoners began
protesting being sent to the Milhaven prison. A guard who was present during
the riots, spoke to its lasting effects. The four guards taken hostage didn’t receive
life threatening injuries (as they were protected and primarily used as bargaining
chips), but they were traumatized. Two never came back to work, two came back
but didn’t last a week before they retired.
Our next stop was the “Disassociation Unit”, also known as segregation.
Prisoners were brought here when they couldn’t get along in the general
population. If there was an incident, a court session was held. The Warden
presided over the case, and the inmate could bring in his lawyer. The inmate
could receive a long sentence to be served 30 days at a time (with a 24 hour
break between long stretches). In segregation, the inmate received two pieces
of bread for breakfast, a standard lunch (with no gravy or dessert) and two
pieces of bread for dinner. They were also given 3 showers a week, and the
option of 1 hour of outdoor time per day. The guard who was leading this part
of the tour said that when he started in 1966, there was a man in seg. For 19
years because he refused to have a “change of attitude.” Today that would never
happen, and after 30 days, the inmate would be reviewed, and after 5 of these
reviews, if they couldn’t be put back into the general population, they would be
transferred to a different prison.
We also saw the dry cell (where prisoners were left to expel
drugs that they had ingested). The guard told us that guards were paid double
overtime for this job. The guards called it the “poop room.” We also saw the
mailboxes for the different shops, cafeteria, and canteen, where prisoners
could put in requests and grievances.
After the riot in 1954 when prisoners tried to burn the
limestone buildings to the ground (these building now have stucco to cover the
scorch marks), the prison was updated with increased security, but the 1970
riot was planned and executed well. The first thing to be destroyed was the
bell that sat exposed in the main courtyard. The bell would ring for breakfast,
work, lunch, dinner, change of activity, etc. The bell would ring 32 times per
activity change. The inmates hated the bell. When I spoke to the former warden
he said that within 10 minutes of the riot the bell was destroyed (it now sits
in the museum). He said that the prisoners targeted things in the riot that
marked control over them. They took guards, destroyed the bell, and destroyed
the church.
There were several native inmates and they were given a
piece of land in the prison to have a prayer teepee, and grow sacred herbs.
Our next stop was the main shop dome. This is where the wood
and metal shops were housed. This is where inmates learned skills, and worked
for $1-$6/day. There was also a school. At this stop, we heard from a former
high school teacher, who left the school board to come work at the prison. She
had a teacher’s heart and spoke of how she wanted to make sure every inmate
left with a GED. There were 25-30 inmates per teacher, and the classroom doors
were locked during the school hours. She spoke about how defeated she felt
trying to get a prisoner to complete his final credit before he was released,
when he said, “I’ll do it when I come back.” She talked about the prisoners
very gently and she seemed to not want to call them inmates or prisoners, she
referred to them only as “the men”. She spoke about a time when an escape
attempt forced her to wait an hour before she could leave the building and how
she felt “so alone and trapped, she couldn’t imagine the pain that the
prisoners felt.” She seemed a little too sympathetic.
Our final stop was the hospital, where inmates were treated,
and if necessary sent to the local hospital. If inmates died without family,
they were either donated to Queen’s University Medical School, or placed in an
unmarked grave.
No comments:
Post a Comment