The Lost City Prison "The Tombs" 101 Centre Street

 

from the collection of the Library of Congress

In 1838 the gray granite Halls of Justice and House of Detention was completed.  Designed by John Lloyd Stephens, the massive Egyptian Revival prison and courts complex was modeled after a monumental Egyptian tomb.  Facing Centre Street, the building engulfed the block back to Elm Street (Lafayette Street today), and from Franklin to Leonard Streets.  The ancient, brooding appearance of the structure gave it the nickname, The Tombs.

The New York Times deemed The Tombs "the finest specimen of purely Egyptian architecture to be found in the United States."  from the collection of the New York Public Library

On March 7, 1897 The New York Times reported, "Arrangements for the erection of a new City Prison to take the place of the Tombs are fast nearing completion.  Plans and specifications have already been drawn, and are merely waiting to be approved before the contracts for the building are given out' and the historic structure so closely associated with New York Criminal annals will soon sink into oblivion."  

On one hand the journalist lamented the coming loss of an architectural treasure, but on the other accepted the pragmatism of the decision.  The Tombs, said the article, "is inadequate to meet the demands of the criminals of the city.  It was built for a prison and not for architectural interest, and in consequence it must be torn down."

Withers & Dickson's design drew from French 16th century architecture, melded with Gothic and Renaissance elements.  from the collection of the New York Public Library

Construction on the replacement structure would take five years.  The city had approved the Chateauesque style plans of the architectural firm of Withers & Dickson in 1896.  But, said the New-York Tribune on July 15, 1900, "when Tammany last came into power it desired to have the spending of the appropriation in its own hands, and so appointed Mr. [Richard] Croker's favorite grandstand builders, Horgan & Slattery, to supersede Withers & Dickson."

The writer explained, "so the consequence is that the building is like a ship with two captains, each with different ideas of what should be done, each giving orders that contradict the other's, the usurping architects pulling down and altering the work of the original architects, and thus prolonging the job and vastly increasing the expense."

Withers & Dickson's plans projected costs at $460,000.  The New-York Tribune averred that after Horgan & Slattery became involved, "it was seen that about $500,000 more would be needed, and this was appropriated in 1898."  Now, in 1900, "a third appropriation of $350,000 has been demanded."

The new City Prison rises on Centre Street while on Elm Street (i.e., Lafayette Street) the remnants of the old Tombs still stand.  original source unknown.

In September 1902 architect Frederick Clarke Withers described the nearly-completed structure saying, "The building is a prison, and there has been no attempt to conceal the fact by giving it the appearance of something else.  No one who sees it will have any doubt as to the character of the structure.  But it is a modern prison, and the men who go to it from the place where they are now confined will appreciate its superiority."

The prison held 320 cells arranged in two four-tier corridors.  The New-York Tribune reported on the improved conditions.  "The cells are large, and the walls are light in color.  The prisoner can walk erect through the massive doorway of a new cell, and need not stoop, as he must now to enter a City Prison cell."  Each cell had a cot, a hinged, table, a wash basin and toilet, and a single light bulb.  Prisoners were required to take two baths per week either in the shower at the end of the corridors, or in the "plunge bath."  Criminals just arriving were often filthy or ridden with fleas or lice.  The article said "the newcomers are compelled to undergo the process of scrubbing" in the plunge bath.

A typical cell.  New-York Tribune, September 28, 1902 (copyright expired)

The administrative section of the building held counsels' offices, hospital cells, a "search room," and "roomy and well arranged offices."  There were also a library on the third floor, a Protestant chapel on the fourth, and a Catholic chapel on the fifth.  On the roof was an exercise space.  But despite the modern amenities, the new building inherited the old nickname, The Tombs.

Thomas W. Hynes, the Commissioner of Correction, had modern ideas about incarceration, especially concerning young prisoners.  He initiated programs aimed at rehabilitation rather than mere imprisonment.  On January 28, 1903, soon after the new facility opened, the New-York Tribune reported that he "expected within a week or two to open a school for the boys temporarily confined in the City Prison."

Because the Board of Education could not spare a teacher for the prison, Hynes had requested an appropriation for the hiring of one.  He explained that among the 40 young prisoners between the ages of 26 and 21, "Some of them are appallingly ignorant."  But, he stressed, "Many of these boys are naturally bright, but they are absolutely unlettered."  He felt that a "faithful teacher" would be able to "drive the rudiments of learning into some of their minds during their temporary detention."

By the end of the year David Willard had the title of "principal of the school in the Tombs."  A journalist who visited the schoolroom "where the prisoners sat on wooden benches" in December that year wrote:

One would hardly realize that every member of the class was charged with crime.  The majority looked more dirty than wicked.  Many seemed to have just tumbled out of bed and had not bothered even to wash their faces nor brush their hair.  And yet on either side of one frowsy looking lad sat two prisoners who had been bank clerks.  Their clothes fitted well.  their linen was clean, and one wore a stickpin, which the frowsy headed lad squinted at with a grin.

The boys had good reason to behave and learn.  David Willard's assessment of the prisoners--good or bad--was taken into account when the possibility of their release neared.

Prisoners were taken from The Tombs to the Criminal Courts Building (right) across Franklin Street on the elevated "The Bridge of Sighs."

Less than a decade after the model prison had opened, there were troubles.  On November 17, 1911 The Evening World began an article saying, "Some relief is promised from the scandalous overcrowding of the Tombs."  The current Commissioner of Corrections, Patrick H. Whitney, assured "I'm doing my best to remedy the overcrowding," while admitting, "There are two prisoners in each cell in the Tombs...but every prisoner should be alone as the law requires."

Two years later nothing had been done.  In 1913 a well-spoken prisoner, Julian Hawthorne, wrote a detailed description of his time here.  He said in part:

It is a unique place, a devil's ante-chamber, where almost anything except what is decent and orderly may happen.  It is not so much a prison or penitentiary as a human pound, where every variety of waif and stray turns up and sojourns for a while; murderers, pickpockets, political scapegoats, confidence men, old professionals, first time offenders, even suspects afterward to be proved innocent.

Despite the challenges, the Department of Corrections continued to focus on rehabilitating youthful offenders.  On February 26, 1928 The New York Times reported on the work of the Committee on Boys in the City Prison of the Public Education Association.  It said that of the 2,290 boys incarcerated in The Tombs in 1927, 916 had been "advised and aided" by the group.  "Many of these boys, who had reached only the border land of crime, are now leading useful lives," said the article.  The Committee on Boys investigated the prisoners' background and focused on "cases where abnormal home conditions or unemployment, rather than inherent viciousness, seem to be responsible for the boy's plight."

In the meantime, proposals to correct the overcrowding continued.  In 1930 the State Commission of Corrections "condemned the practice of confining more than one prisoner in a cell in the Tombs and declared that New York City should lose no time in correcting conditions there," according to The New York Times on February 22.  There were 419 cells and 669 prisoners at the time.  The Commission urged the construction of a supplementary uptown jail.

Still nothing had happened four years later when, on June 17, 1934, The New York Times reported, "If Mayor LaGuardia has his way, the gray, dingy Tombs, or City Prison, and its dull-red neighbor, the Criminal Courts Building, will be torn down to make room for a skyscraper combining the functions of both."  The article mentioned, "The Tombs prison...is connected with the Criminal Courts Building by the Bridge of Sighs over Franklin Street."

While the debate went on, the fact that the prisoners in the overcrowded facility were, in fact, not mere statistics but human beings was illustrated by a heart-rending incident on August 7, 1934.  A patrol wagon containing five prisoners pulled up to the Lafayette Street entrance that afternoon.  The driver had been, most likely, unaware that a dog had been trotting alongside the vehicle.  The New York Times reported, "The prisoners filed into the entrance, under the watchful supervision of two policemen."  The dog, described by the newspaper as "mostly black, two-thirds chow, one third spaniel," scurried up, looking for his owner.

"The dog tried to follow the last prisoner, but the policemen, who could think of no reason why such a bright-eyed, scrappy little dog should be jailed, interfered."  Locked out of the jail, the dog refused to budge, instead it sat by the doors and continuing "its mournful plaint."

An attorney took charge of the dog, taking her to the New York Women's League for Animals.  The group agreed to hold her until her owner's release.  "Pending the claim, the league said, the dog would be called Nancy, after the lady in 'Oliver Twist,'" said The New York Times.

Finally, after more than 25 years of debate, in January 1937 Mayor Fiorello La Guardia sent a bill to Albany requesting $15 million to erect and equip a replacement for the City Prison and the Criminal Courts Building.  Construction of the massive Criminal Courts Building and Men's House of Detention, designed by Wiley Corbett and Charles B. Meyers, at 100 Centre Street, directly across the street from The Tombs, began in 1938.

The new Criminal Courts complex looms behind the still standing old Criminal Courts Building (left) and The Tombs in 1941.  The New York Times, June 29, 1941

Today an urban oasis, the Collect Pond Park, occupies the site of The Tombs.

photo via nycgovparks.org

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Blackwell Island's Chapel of the Good Shepherd

By the second half of the 19th Century, Blackwell’s Island housed many of the city’s charitable institutions; among them the Smallpox Hospital, the Lunatic Asylum and the poorhouse – diplomatically referred to as the Almshouse.

The Almshouse originally consisted of two buildings, but by the 1880s there were at least a dozen structures making up the complex. Most of the institutions had their own chapels built into the structures as part of the architectural plan. But in 1872 when the Episcopal Church appointed William French as chaplain of Blackwell’s Island, the inmates of the Almshouse had no place to worship, being refused the use of other chapels.

George M. Bliss intended to correct the situation.

A banker, Bliss had amassed a fortune during the Civil War. A partner with Levi Morton, later to become Vice President of the United State, in the firm Morton, Bliss & Company, he was also the Treasurer of the Protestant Episcopal Mission Society.

He commissioned British-trained architect Frederick Clarke Withers to design a dignified chapel in keeping with the needs and circumstances of the poor held on the island. Bliss told the architect he wanted “the most beautiful church in the city for its most neglected class of humanity.”

On February 9, 1889, the steamboat ferry from Manhattan carried Vice-President elect Morton, former mayor Hewitt, Bishop Potter, George Bliss and other dignitaries to Blackwell’s Island for the dedication of The Chapel of the Good Shepherd.

Withers had produced an English country church of granite, “Croton front brick” and Belleville brownstone trim. The architect was long a proponent of Gothic Revival as the appropriate style for church architecture and his chapel charmingly reflected his stance. Completed at a cost of $75,000, the first formal church on the island was applauded by The New York Times. “Situated between the almshouse and the penitentiary…the new chapel adds greatly to the appearance of that part of the island.”

“The chapel has a seating capacity of 400,” reported The Times. “In the basement is a lecture room and study and a room for the use of the ladies working in connection with the mission. The chapel consists of a nave, 80 feet long by 37 feet wide, and a chancel, 27 feet in width and 24 feet deep, ending in a semicircular apse.”

The newspaper described the roof as “open-timbered, finished in panels, with molded ribs.”

Because Withers felt that single-toned church bells were “doleful and monotonous,” he stipulated a five-toned bell for the stone tower which the newspaper remarked produced “a remarkably sweet chime.”

As in his Jefferson Market Courthouse in Greenwich Village, Withers combined colors and textures for a pleasing effect. The red Flemish bond brick is dotted with occasional gray bricks. Brownstone trims contrast with the brick and the course gray gneiss, quarried on the island by inmates, of the lowest level.

Separation of male and female worshippers was provided by two distinctive porches that lead to staircases accessing separate seating areas in the nave.

By the end of the following year over 2000 visitors had taken the steam ferry from Manhattan to see the little chapel.






Photo New York Landmarks Conservancy


Every Spring when the Episcopal Bishop of New York visited The Chapel of the Good Shepherd to administer the rite of confirmation to the poor, the newspapers vividly covered the event, describing in detail the plight of the impoverished. In 1892 The Times reported on the visit, which was attended by the Earl and Countess of Meath, Ireland.

Fifteen candidates were called to the altar and “very unsteadily they arose and started for the chancel. Three of the men were blind, and the priests, seeing their misfortune, guided them by the hand. One of the five old ladies became faint at the moment and had to be assisted…Two of the men, young enough in the lines of their faces, but weak physically, fell down on the altar, utterly helpless. They were helped to their feet by the young altar assistants, but one of them fell again through the arms of the surpiced boy from sheer weakness.”

The Bishop’s annual confirmation visits continued until the middle of the 20th Century.

The New York Times did not always win favor with the administrators of the Chapel, however. In 1903 the chaplain read an editorial in which the editor, proposing a park on Blackwell’s Island, wrote “There is no more reason why the lunatics and the paupers and the criminals should be allowed to monopolize the most picturesque and attractive scenery than why the devil should have all the good tunes.”

The chaplain fired back. “I know no class of poor people in the world who need what comfort there may be had in picturesque surroundings more than the class you style ‘lunatics and paupers.’ There are 2,500 persons in the almshouse – 1,500 at least of these are men and women who command the sympathy and respect of all right-minded people.”

Eventually, the buildings and institutions on the island became obsolete. More modern facilities in Queens and elsewhere were built and the old stone structures were abandoned and neglected. The Chapel of the Good Shepherd celebrated its last religious service in 1952. The chapel was saved by the erection of two long-term care facilities, Goldwater Hospital and Coler Hospital. The Chapel of the Good Shepherd was used as a home for the chaplain of Coler Hospital.

By the 1970s the island, now named Roosevelt Island, had become a planned community of mixed income housing. The Chapel, now owned by the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation, was included in a survey of potentially historically important structures, spearheaded by the Landmarks Preservation Commission. Restoration architect Giorgio Cavaglieri oversaw the first restoration of the chapel, which was completed in October of 1975.

Twenty-two years later, based on a survey by architectural conservator William J. Stivale who identified several areas of disrepair, State Assembly Representative Pete Grannis began the allocation of a series of state grants for subsequent restoration. Headed by The New York Landmarks Conservancy with restoration contractors Schtiller & Plevy, work began in 2003. The masonry and brownstone trim of the bell tower and spire were cleaned, repaired and repointed.

At some point in the mid-20th Century a sealant had been applied to the brownstone which trapped moisture in the stone, causing the outer layer to eventually begin falling away, a process termed delamination. These areas were re-tooled and patched with composite. The topmost six feet of the spire was taken apart and rebuilt and the beautiful rose window was dismantled, releaded and replaced.

The chapel is once again a place of worship for both the Roman Catholic and Episcopal congregations of the island and doubles as the Roosevelt Island Community Center.

Appropriately, the picturesque country church that was built for the poor now has a homeless shelter in the lower level.