ISLAND PRISONS

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 21 August 1926, Page 11

ISLAND PRISONS

A DISCOUNT IN LASHES.

s< Xj A WARINIERE,” said to be the last of the French convict ships, sailed out of La Rochelle the other day with 340 convicts, destined for incarceration on Devil’s Island, French Guiana. Recently Mexico despatched a noted criminal to its lonely convict island, .Maria JVladre. has started an air service between Ivem and Solovetski Island, in the White -Sea, for the .transportation, ot prisoners. The famous monastery on the island has been converted into a prison. These three incidents show that the practice of maintaining; convict colonies in the world’s loneliest places has not entirely been given up,” says a bulletin of the National Geographic Society from its headquarters at Washington. Devil ’s_ Island, Maria Madre, and Solovetski Island are in very mixed < nmpany historically. Virginia, St. Helena, Funchai, Monte Cristo,- Siberia, the Seychelles, Australia, New Caledonia, Andaman Islands, Tasmania, and Sakhalin, have all been' penal colonies for more or less distinguished prisoners. St. Helena, Funchal, and the Seychelles are royal prison islands. The others in their time served for common criminals or unlucky politicians. When Elba.failed to hold Napoleon, he was placed on St. Helena, well toward the middle of the South Atlantic, out of harm, and out of the shipping lanes. That was in 1815. He died in 1821.

THE ART OF KNOUTING

Chateau d ’lf, the castle in which the hero of ‘‘The Count of Monte Cristo was confined for fourteen years, now received tourists from Marseilles. Curiously, Monte Cristo was also a penal colony island for many years. Monte Cristo is owned by Italy. It lies off the coast from Leghorn, and about 25 miles north of Elba. Czarist Russia, for a time, sent 18,000 prisoners to .Siberia annually. ,Mpcdi_.p.f the famous Trans-Siberian railway was built with prison labour. The chief horror; of Siberian exile- was the knout. By it, or by terror of it, guards kept prisoners docile. The handle of the knout is a heavy wood stick, IS inches long. Fastened to it is a thong of rawhide. About eight feet from the handle the thong is split in three parts. I'll esc streamers are three feet long. The ends are tied into hard knots, although lead or iron hooks sometimes were used. Preparatory to administering the knout, the victim was tied face downward on a rough table. Close to the knout-wield or stood a clerk with a book, in which he checked the number of strokes as that worthy swung them and called them. For the first 25 strokes the skin was marked white by the lash, as if a chalk mark was drawn on the flesh. After that the thongs began to cut through. When a knout sentence called for 100 strokes the last one was usually omitted as a ‘‘token of Imperial magnanimity.”