London's Prisons in 1900: Mansion House Cells

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Arthur H. Beavan concluded his survey of London's Prisons in Imperial London, published in 1901, with a look at Mansion House Cells:

At the Mansion House, the arrangement of the cells differs from that at Bow Street Station, which adjoins the court itself; the prisoners at the former being brought each day and remaining only a few hours - while their case is heard by the Lord Mayor or Aldermen - returning to the police station or House of Detention, in the very select closed-carriages which conveyed them thither.

Entering by the side-door in Mansion House Place, one arrives on the ground floor, immediately below the justice Room, in a rather spacious apartment, quite unlike one's idea of a salle d'attente of a gaol; in fact almost cosy-looking in winter, when a big fire is blazing on the hearth.

Off this room, always artificially illumined, in various directions are the cells, whose occupants can be plainly discerned through the iron-barred doors, looking for all the world like an assortment of strange animals at Jamrach's or London Zoo.

From the cells, each prisoner, when his case is called, passes up an iron spiral staircase, whence, the wooden flaps at the top being thrown open, he emerges, like a Jack-in-the-box, in the dock.

Then, if convicted, or remanded, he is unceremoniously hustled down again.

In 1900, in order to get to see this part of the Mansion House - by no means easy - it was best to make a direct application to the chief City magistrate or one of the sheriffs.

Many years ago, the author, to oblige an inquisitive American, contrived to take him over the place, and even to exchange a few words with some of the detenus; but just as the visit had reached its most interesting stage, there appeared on the scene one of the sheriffs, who, although he did not address himself to the intruders, administered such a stern rebuke to the head-gaoler, as to convince them that indirect methods of seeing that which is usually interdicted, are hardly justifiable.

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