Most residents of the historic Gloucestershire market town of Berkeley still know the Victorian stone building in the corner of the Market Place as “the bank”, though it has been some years since it closed its doors. Berkeley’s modern inhabitants might be surprised that in this prominent position in the centre of the town once stood one of Gloucestershire’s very first prisons.
I’ve been researching the history of this building because it also provides a unique insight into the lives of the historic residents of Gloucestershire at their worst, or perhaps just their most desperate. Indeed the records of the justice system can provide one of the richest sources of information about the lives of our forebears. At their most detailed, committal records even describe the appearance of the prisoner whilst then, as now, the most interesting trials would also feature prominently in newspaper articles.
The Bridewell at Berkeley was certainly in existence by 1672 and, like other similarly named institutions established at this time, followed the model of the original Bridewell in London. As both a prison for petty criminals and a workhouse for the poor and destitute, bridewells were intended to bring about behavioural change through menial work. At Berkeley, prisoners were initially tasked with spinning woollen yarn or grinding malt. In order to ensure that their labour was not in vain, the authorities required that local brewers only purchased malt that had been ground in the Bridewell.
Who was imprisoned there? The Bridewell at Berkeley served a sizeable part of Gloucestershire, including the Vale of Berkeley, the Forest of Dean, Stroud, Dursley and even Chipping Sodbury. For the most part, I think that those confined there fall into two broad categories, the first of which I have termed ‘crimes of abandonment’. These include such crimes as running away from your family, which saw Sarah Banknett from Chipping Sodbury committed for one month after leaving her three children behind, and breaking an apprenticeship indenture by taking leave of your master, something that John Norton from Wotton-under-Edge is understood to have done in 1739. Perhaps of most concern to the authorities, and the cause of a significant proportion of committals, was the crime of having an illegitimate child. In 1739, Elizabeth Young of St Briavels was described as “being wayward and disorderly of person” after giving birth to an illegitimate son, John; however this kind of judgement of character is rare in these records. Illegitimate children were considered a burden on the parish; the punishment here was for leaving a child “chargeable”, rather than for the act of having a child outside of wedlock.
Alongside those imprisoned for ‘crimes of abandonment’, were those who had committed a variety of other criminal offences. At the more petty end of the scale, were cases such as Thomas Collins from Slimbridge, imprisoned in 1739 for a second offence of selling ale without a licence. Those convicted of more serious crimes included William Champion from Cam, committed in 1739 after breaking into the house of Daniel Cobb and taking several pieces of gold and silver, and Ann Coopey and Hester Low who were imprisoned in the Bridewell on 13 December 1735. Ann was alleged to have run a bawdy house in Dursley, whilst Hester had been “caught in bed with a man in the house of the above said Ann Coopey”. Needless to say, the man was neither named nor, it seems, punished for his role in this crime.
Sentences appear to have been short; in some cases a brief stay in the Bridewell was more than enough to bring about the desired reformation in behaviour. Timothy Thurston from Ham, for example, who was imprisoned in 1739 for “having begotten a child on the body of Sarah… and he refusing to marry her” and this was, it seems, enough to convince Timothy of the error of his ways. He and Sarah Smart were married in St Mary’s church, Berkeley on 27 November 1739. There were however a few instances of what seem like excessively long sentences. On 14 May 1735, Mary Humphries of Mitcheldean was committed for a whole year having given birth to an illegitimate child, a boy named Thomas. It’s pure speculation, as the records do not show the reasoning behind the length of an individual sentence, but perhaps it was believed that a longer stay might have been appropriate for Mary as Thomas was her second illegitimate child, her first daughter Mary having died in 1733 aged just 4.
The bridewells may have been a new model for justice, the start of a move away from corporal and capital punishment, however they were far from perfect. In his 1777 survey, The State of the Prisons in England and Wales prison reformer John Howard gave a damning verdict on the Bridewell at Berkeley, describing it as “quite out of repair”. I think this may be an understatement. Howard states that there was just one room for male and female prisoners, with no water, no straw for the floor and no chimney (and therefore no heating). The yard was not considered secure, so prisoners were not even allowed to go outside for fresh air and exercise. Even the task of grinding malt had eventually been taken away from them. Such horrific conditions must have had more than just an effect on the physical health of those confined there:
“The sensible old keeper lamented the effects of close confinement in idleness, upon the health of even young strong Prisoners. Many such, he said, he had known quite incapable of working for some weeks after their discharge.“
Howard’s survey was instrumental in bringing about much needed reformation of the prison system. In 1785, the Gloucestershire magistrate Sir George Onesiphorus Paul obtained an Act of Parliament to allow for the rebuilding of the county gaol in Gloucester and the Bridewell at Lawford’s Gate in Bristol, along with the construction of new houses of correction at Northleach, Horsley and Littledean. Once these had opened the Bridewell at Berkeley became redundant and fell into disrepair. It must have stayed this way for many years, the drawing that illustrates this post was probably not made until at least the early 1830s, a constant reminder to Berkeley’s residents of its harsh conditions and, perhaps, an incentive for them not to commit any of their own misdemeanours.
Sources
Gaol calendars from Gloucestershire Archives (Q/SG/1).
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