“A scene of shameful disorder and dissipation”: alcohol, music, animals, and vegetables in early nineteenth-century Irish prisons (Pre published)

Abstract

James Palmer and Benjamin Woodward, the state’s prison inspectors in early nineteenth-century Ireland, faced a monumental challenge: all around the country in big county gaols and in small bridewells, prison governors and wardens were a law onto their own. Affairs were managed on a county-by-county basis, the running of a prison often passed from father to son, and new laws and ideas about prison reform coming from Dublin and London were, in general, quietly ignored. The annual reports of the Irish prison inspectors make for a sorry indictment of cans kicked down the road, suggestions not taken on board, and appeals to the local landlords on county grand juries to take the running of their prisons a little more seriously.