Policing and Punishment in Nineteenth Century Britain by Victor Bailey

Author:Victor Bailey [Bailey, Victor]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781317374886
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Published: 2015-08-20T00:00:00+00:00

III

The first penal servitude act (16 and 17 Vic. cap. 99) was passed in 1853, retaining the sentence of transportation, but introducing the sentence of penal servitude to stand side by side with it. Four years penal servitude was to be the equivalent of seven years transportation — the old minimum sentence; four to six years penal servitude would replace seven to ten years transportation; and six to eight years penal servitude was the alternative to ten to 14 years transportation. Those sentenced to 14 years or life transportation were still to be transported. The rest of the Act's provisions treated the two sentences identically: conditional pardons were to be equally applicable to both; the places of confinement were the same; the chances of being sent overseas were equal; and licences to be at large could be granted to convicts under either sentence. Evidently either hopes were high that some new penal colony would soon be found, or else the Home Office feared that society would be alarmed at the total abandonment of transportation. Besides, Western Australia was still willing to accept convicts, and continued to do so until 1867.

The passing of the 1853 Act, however, was the beginning rather than the end of the evolution of penal servitude, for no sooner was the system begun than problems were encountered. One principal issue to settle was the question of remission.

It had long been the practice to grant early release to convicts who were sentenced to transportation, but were retained on the hulks or in Millbank. A convict on the hulks serving seven years could, if well behaved, secure his release after four years;26 and a convict in Millbank would serve five years of a seven-year sentence; seven years for a sentence up to 14 years; and ten years for a life sentence.27 Jebb had assumed that remission would continue to be granted to all well-conducted convicts.28 Horatio Waddington, Permanent Under Secretary at the Home Office, was quite determined, however, that the new sentences would be carried out to the letter. He considered that sentences of penal servitude had been made shorter than those of transportation, so that in practice they would both be the same length, and therefore they must be carried out in full. He rigorously opposed Jebb in his efforts to secure remissions, taking his stance on upholding the letter of the law, which was necessary, he declared, for the protection of society and the deterrence of future crime; and on maintaining an appreciable difference between a sentence of penal servitude carried out in convict prisons, and a sentence of hard labour carried out in a local gaol.29 Waddington was supported by his Home Secretaries, who felt that any pardon — that is, any early release — should be regarded as a special boon granted by the Secretary of State only in exceptional cases, and not a right to be expected by all convicts, regardless of circumstances.30

Jebb, however, was influenced less by legal niceties than by practical issues.

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