Halls of Justice

Charles Dickens, visiting the United States in 1842, made a tour of the Tombs during his time in New York.  Dickens spoke to the guards and looked into the cells and judged prison conditions in New York to be worse than those in Britain.  "A long, narrow, lofty building, stove-heated as usual, with four galleries, one above the other . . . On each tier, are two opposite rows of small iron doors.  They look like furnace-doors, but are cold and black, as though the fires within had all gone out."  Dickens ended his visit in the execution yard at the rear of the prison.  "The prison-yard . . . has been the scene of terrible performances.  Into this narrow, grave-like place, men are brought out to die.  The wretched creature stands beneath the gibbet on the ground; the rope about his neck; and when the sign is given, a weight at its other end comes running down, and swings him up into the air -- a corpse."