Corrections History and Timeline

Corrections History and Timeline

Introduction

The ancient law of corrections and capital punishment has a startling history. During the ancient era and by the early eighteenth century many persons were responsible for reforming the way punishments for crimes committed were meted. Cesare Beccaria was one person who helped bring some dignity to people accused and punished for crimes.

1597

Legislation providing for the transportation of offenders was first passed in 1597, though it was most probably never put into effect. In 1666 further legislation was passed by which moss troopers convicted in Cumberland or Northumberland as notorious thieves and spoil-takers could be transported for life to America.

1767

In 1767 Cesare Beccaria wrote an essay, On Crimes and Punishment. Cesare believed that there was no justification to take another human life as a punishment for a crime committed. He thought that the prevention of crimes was more important than the punishment of crimes and that punishment was not meant to provide a social revenge.

1829

The early police forces in nineteenth-century America were modeled in part on the Metropolitan Police of London, formed in 1829 by Robert Peel (hence the nicknames "peelers" and "bobbies"). But American police came to differ from the police of other Western nations in several important ways. First, they have always been a part of local government, unlike other countries where the local police are a part of a nationally administered force. Second, because of their local roots, police departments appeared at different times throughout the nation. In general, big eastern cities created police forces first, with smaller cities lagging well behind. Third, as a part of the executive office of the city, police departments have been administered separately from state and county systems of criminal justice. Historian Wilbur Miller has argued that this final difference accounts for some of the more obvious contrasts between American and English police: American police have seen themselves as administering justice on the street; the English, as representing law, or the unwritten English Constitution.

1850-1900

By the 1850s, the capital punishment was restricted to murder and treason, and public executions ended in 1866. The lesser physical penalties were also curtailed or abolished - branding in 1779, the pillory in 1837 and whipping of women in 1819.

During the transportation era, the term convict referred to the serious offender who received a sentence of either death or transportation. After the passing of the first Penal Servitude Act in 1853, a new long term prison sentence replaced that of transportation. For details of names of ships, numbers embarked, numbers landed, dates, ports from which the vessels set out and their destinations,

The removal of the male convicts to hulks in 1822 meant that conditions at the Cork depot improved considerably. During her tour of inspection of Irish prisons in 1826, the prison reformer, Elizabeth Fry, pronounced it to be defective as to its conformation, but '...cleanly, comfortable and well superintended'. She was not convinced, however, of the need for such depots, and seemed more in favour ...