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Tag Archives: Imprisonment

Early American Criminals: John Quelch’s Piratic Joy Ride

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

In the fall of 1703, the owners of the 80-ton brigantine, the Charles, desperately wrote to various West Indies ports in an attempt to discover any information on the whereabouts of their new ship, but without success. This leading group of Boston merchants—Charles Hobby, Col. Nicholas Paige, William Clarke, Benjamin Gallop, and John Colman—built the […]

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Early American Criminals: The Curse on Joseph Lightly

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Joseph Lightly relates in his Last Words and Dying Speech that when his mother learned he had enlisted in the British army, “she told me she hoped she should hear of my being hanged, for my Cruelty of going to leave her against her Will.” Lightly’s mother may simply have been reacting to the moment, […]

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Crime and Prison Songs: “John Henry”

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

[display_podcast] “Take My Hammer” is a work song that possibly has roots going back to the time of slavery and was sung by convicts who were leased to dig tunnels through the Appalachian Mountains: Take my hammer, Carry it to the captain, Tell him I’m gone, Tell him I’m gone. If he ask you was […]

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Crime and Prison Songs: “Prettiest Train”

Wednesday, March 30, 2011

[display_podcast] From the 1870’s to the 1920’s, some Southern states contracted their convicts out to private landowners and companies to perform heavy labor, such as timbering, mining, railroad work, and farming. Little to no concern was given to the prisoners’ safety or health, and they received inadequate food, shelter, and clothing. Because the convicts belonged […]

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Crime and Prison Songs: “Jumpin’ Judy”

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

[display_podcast] In 1933, John and Alan Lomax visited prison farms in the South in the hope of recording African-American songs that dated back to the time of slavery. Their visits were based on the theory that the best places to find songs of slavery preserved in their purest form were in prison camps, with their […]

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