In our first article on the Cascades we gave a description of the House of Correction for females and we will now proceed to give an account of the other establishments at the same place. Upon leaving the wash-yard of the female House of Correction, our reporter was first shown into the female pauper establishment. The first apartment here is a large dining hall, where most of the inmates take their meals, and then there is a room in which the bedridden women are kept. There were a good many of these poor creatures there at the time of our visit, and many of them were very old. One was nearly ninety years of age, and another eighty-six. There is a large yard for the female paupers somewhat similar to that in the female gaol, with a separate entrance from the front. At the side of the yard are buildings used for different purposes. Upstairs are the dormitories with the beds arranged down the sides, with the heads against the wall. The beds are comfortable and the clothing ample, while the size of the room allows each occupant 600 cubic feet of air. The ventilation is also good, and the temperature can be easily regulated by the letting on or cutting off of a supply of air from outside, by means of a very good apparatus. In another dormitory about the same size as the first one visited, there are 40 beds arranged in the same manner. There are stoves in each of the sleeping apartments for use in the winter months. There is another large room for use if wanted, and the officers quarters complete the list of apartments in connection with the female pauper establishment. The cooking and washing for the female paupers is all done by the prisoners in the House of Correction, as few of the inmates are able to do anything for themselves. In connection with this establishment there are altogether eleven nurses employed, to attend to the 114 women who were inmates a few weeks ago. The dietary scale for the old women per day is as follows :-1 lb. of 20 per cent, bread, ½lb. meat, ½lb. vegetables, 1 oz. butter, ¼oz. of tea, 1½ oz. sugar, 1/8 oz. salt, and 1 oz. of barley for soup. From this it will be seen that the inmates get pretty substantial fare. Some of them are very helpless, and can scarcely move about, while it is still more painful to see some of the poor bedridden creatures, barely able to move, their faces covered with gauze to prevent the flies from annoying them. There is a receiving room for the female paupers, where they are cleansed before they enter the other portions of the establishment.
The establishment for male paupers is in another part of the premises. The men when admitted first of all go into the reception room, and are then conducted across the yard to the lavatory, where there are a number of troughs used as baths. They have a good sized yard to themselves, and from it are entered all the different buildings connected with this part of the establishment. There is a large kitchen in which cooking for the men is done by some of the inmates themselves, and further on is the dining room, a structure with glass sides. There is also what is called a day room for the old men, in which they are allowed to sit and smoke when they have nothing else to do. Passing on to the sleeping wards, which are much the same as those in the other establishments at the Cascades, we notice that the paupers are much better off than are the prisoners in the matter of bedclothes. The prisoners supply consists of two blankets and a rug in summer, and one additional blanket in winter. The paupers get three blankets and a rug in the summer, and four blankets and a rug in the winter. There is a sleeping ward for the men who are very weak, and another in which the paupers are placed to sleep for two or three days after their arrival. The dormitories we have already alluded to are on the ground floor. Upstairs there is one that has forty beds in it, and another containing the same number. There are also some other small sleeping wards for the accommodation of the male paupers. One small room is kept as a dining room for a few men who are brought from the gaol to do different descriptions of work at the Cascades, and at the time of our inspection there were a dozen of them there. Passing by two rows of old cells, which could be used if required, we come to the four hospital wards, and then to the oakum store, in which all the oakum picked by the women in the gaol and the male paupers is placed.
This is about the only work the old men are able to do. A good many of the inmates are blind, and consequently they require a good deal of attention. The poor old fellows have very little to amuse them, or to take away from the monotony of an existence in an establishment like the one we have described, and the receipt of a few newspapers, or old periodicals, is a rare treat for them. Contributions of this kind would be gladly received by the superintendent, Mr Atkins. If the donors cared about any reward, we would advise them just to go and see the old men reading the papers. Very often one old fellow, surrounded by a crowd of two or three dozen, will commence to read a newspaper, not in the way we of the outside world skim it over at breakfast time, but commencing at the first column of advertisements, and reading steadily through the advertising and news columns to the end. Let the man who complains of a scarcity of exciting news in his daily paper see the intense interest with which those less favoured ones will read or listen to the advertisement containing the particulars of a Government land sale, or an account of something that took place six months ago. As we have seen how the female prisoners and paupers are fed by the Government, we will now give the daily dietary scale of the old men. It consists of I lb. of 20 per cent, bread, ¾ lb. of meat, 1 lb. of vegetables, 2 oz. of oatmeal, 3 drams of tea, 1 oz. of sugar, ½ oz. of treacle, ½ oz. of salt, and ¼ oz. of tobacco. A good deal has been said for and against "the soothing weed," but we question very much if there could be found two of the smokers among the male paupers at the Cascades, who would not rather give up their three quarters of a pound of meat per day than their quarter of an ounce of tobacco. The scale that we have given above shows that the old men get a plentiful supply of good food, and whether their presence in such an institution is due to their misfortunes or their faults, it must not be forgotten that most of them are men who will ere long depart for 'that bourne from which no traveller returns;" and this being the case, there is some satisfaction in knowing that many poor old fellows, whose lives may have been misspent, have found an asylum at last, and that when their end approaches they will be better cared for than they have been for long years past.
There are at present 160 inmates of the male pauper establishment at the Cascades, and they are managed by an overseer, a head wardsman, six inmates acting as wardsmen at sixpence per day each, and a night watchman. One inmate also acts as barber at sixpence per day, and then there is also a hospital attendant and writer. In the estimates of the expenditure of the Colony, the male and female pauper establishments at the Cascades are placed under one head. In the female branch the salaries amount to £348 16s. 1d., and in the male branch to £310 5s. 5d. The contingencies for both establishments, consisting of expenditure for clothes, bedding, stores, provisions, fuel and light, stationery, medicine, and other items, amount to £2,760 10s., making a total expenditure of £3,410 10s 6d. per annum for the Cascades establishment for male and female paupers.
We now come to the Reformatory for Juveniles, which is situated next to the male paupers quarters. The boys have a moderately sized yard to themselves, but, as will appear presently, they are very seldom in it. They sleep in cells similar to those described in our account of the female House of Correction, and of those there are fifty-six arranged in two tiers, one above the other, down the yard. There is a watchman here at night, and if one of the youngsters misbehaves himself, all this officer has to do is to make a chalk mark on the door of the offender's cell, by which he is identified, and brought to task in the morning. The dining room is a good large apartment. The school room is used as a dining room by some of the men on the premises, when the boys are out at work. The boys in the reformatory get up at six o'clock in the morning and go to work, as many as are required remaining in to clean up the cells and put everything straight. At eight o'clock they come in again to breakfast, and start out to work again at a quarter to nine o'clock. At noon they return to dinner, and starting back to work at one o'clock in the afternoon, remain out until half-past three o'clock, when they come in to school, which lasts until five p.m. The schoolmaster is Mr Simpson, who acts as wardsman as well.
The authorities appear to hold peculiar views as to the value of education and the best time to impart it. We are of opinion that the boys should not be sent to school after doing a hard day's work, when they are thoroughly tired and require rest. The system pursued is unfair to the boys and discouraging to the schoolmaster, for the youngsters are not in a condition to go to their tasks with any degree of interest. We venture to say that if two hours in the morning, say from six to eight, were devoted to school, much more progress would be made than at present. The boys have a band, but the little fellows have to get music from such sorry instruments. A couple of toy drums and penny tin whistles are all the musical instruments they have, but still they march as if a first class brass band was in front of them. A few shillings would supply some decent drums and fifes, and be an encouragement to the youngsters.
Outside the walls of the premises are the stalls in which the cows are fattened for the butcher when they go dry. There are seven cows belonging to the establishment now. There is also a place where the bedding is aired, and the clothes are very often hung-out. The piggery consists of nine sties, all of them occupied, and last year between fifty and sixty pigs were disposed of. The cemetery is a pretty little green patch of three quarters of an acre, and we may remark for the information of the curious that it has no denominational sub-divisions. Prisoners, paupers, and juvenile offenders, of all creeds, find a last resting place in the same spot, and a few of the graves are marked with neat little crosses and head boards erected by the friends or relations of those buried there. The superintendent, Mr Atkins, is doing his best to make the cemetery a pretty place, and he is succeeding very well. The boys all have to work tolerably hard, and the forty of them in the reformatory really get through a good deal of work. Some of them have just finished clearing a portion of the creek bank, in order to prepare it for the growth of maize. The refuse from Degraves brewery used to run down this creek and pollute the water, but it is all now utilised. It is conducted from the brewery in pipes to two large tanks, from which it is conveyed in troughs to different parts of the ground as a fertiliser. A good deal of the wall on the bank of this creek was destroyed by the last flood, and this has all been repaired. All that can be done, is done to make the establishments at the Cascades as much self-supporting as possible. Out of the twelve men from the gaol there is one carpenter, one shoemaker, one blacksmith, and two quarrymen, the others being labourers. Some of the boys are learning to be shoemakers and blacksmiths, two of them are employed to look after the cows, and most of the others work upon the land connected with the establishment.
There are about 15 acres of land at present under cultivation, and this is cropped with oats, barley, potatoes, grass for hay, beans, turnips, parsnips, and carrots. This area is found to be about as much land as can be worked by the present inmates, as it is all dug by hand and not ploughed. Last year the Hospital and the Invalid Depot at the Brickfields were supplied with potatoes for two or three months from the Cascades. The following is the daily dietary scale for the boys under 14 years of age, ½ lb. of bread, ½lb. of meat, ½lb. of vegetables, ½oz .of salt, 3oz. of oatmeal made into two pints of gruel; and for boys of fifteen years of age and upwards, the only difference is that they get ¼ lb. of bread more per day. The cost of the Reformatory for Boys is according to the last estimate £475 per annum. The whole establishment seems to be well conducted with a view to economy, and to the welfare of the boys, except, as we have stated, in the matter of education, and its condition certainly reflects credit on Mr Atkins, the superintendent. As we believe in giving credit to all those to whom credit is due, we must not forget to mention that the Hon. J. M. Wilson has always taken a great interest in the boys reformatory, and that to his exertions a great many of the improvements in the system of conducting it, are due. In our account of the House of Correction we stated that all the boots and shoes required for the Queen's Asylum were made at the Cascades. We have since been informed that only the repairing is done. 1
- 1THE CASCADES - The Mercury (Hobart, Tas. : 1860 - 1954) 1 January 1873: page 3
A previous version of this