A letter on the nature and effects of the tread-wheel, as an instrument of prison labour and punishment : addressed to the Right Hon. Robert Peel, M.P., His Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for the Home Department, &c. &c. / with an appendix of notes and cases ; by one of his constituents, and a magistrate of the county of Surrey.
- John Ivatt Briscoe
- Date:
- 1824
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A letter on the nature and effects of the tread-wheel, as an instrument of prison labour and punishment : addressed to the Right Hon. Robert Peel, M.P., His Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for the Home Department, &c. &c. / with an appendix of notes and cases ; by one of his constituents, and a magistrate of the county of Surrey. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![poize with respect to a species of discipline, where injury and accident may occur at any and every moment. Much doubt may likewise be entertained whe- ther the law of England designs by a sentence to HARD LABOUR, that the prisoner should be stationed on a circular body revolving upon an axis, and propelled by a part only of the feet; while the weight of the whole person, thus unnaturally applied, acts (as it has been accurately described) “ precisely as a stream upon the floating boards “ of a water-wheel,” and the use of the hands is totally superseded. Delinquents must and should be punished; but only in a manner which their best interests and those of society require. I have consulted the volumes of English Jurispru- dence and the pages bequeathed as a rich legacy to his country by the immortal Howard: but I perceive no allusion in either to any similar description of mechanical ])unishment; though I find in both that a provision is made, and recommended for purchasing materials and im- plements in order to “ the setting men to work;” evidently supposing the employment to be carried on in the ordinary method, and that habits of useful industry were designed to be inculcated Indeed, it is difficult for me to divest myself of an impression—that the Tread-wheel is, in reality.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22390662_0023.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
