History - Prisoner Custody in the 1880's:
U. S. Marshals, similar to today, relied upon local sheriffs for jail
space in the early to mid-1880's. The marshals also rented the
places in which court was held and prisoners were housed. Generally
during this period, the federal government did not build or maintain its
own courthouses, preferring to lease county courtrooms or other
facilities annually. The government refused to rent office space for the
marshals and U.S. attorneys, though it did agree to pay for space for
clerks to keep court records.
A prisoner wagon used by Marshals
and local sheriffs in Boston in the 1890's.
Each marshal and attorney was expected to arrange and pay for his own
office. In addition, the marshals and attorneys cleaned their own rooms;
payments to janitors were not allowed. Jail space was rented by
the week from the local sheriff. Occasionally the local jails caused the
marshals problems. In October 1821, Marshal Morton Waring of South
Carolina reported the escape of two federal prisoners from the county
"The Marshal," he complained to the secretary of state, "has no
the Officers of the Gaol, and altho' he may notice the most glaring
improprieties, and remonstrate against them, he can do no act which will
remedy the evil. " The county jail used by the marshals in New York
City, according to Marshals Abraham T. Hillyer in 1853, was "utterly
insecure." He suggested using the prison in Brooklyn to house his
prisoners, despite the expense of transporting them back and forth to
By the early 1850s, Attorney General Caleb Cushing considered the
lack of adequate courthouses and prisons "a serious evil demanding the
attention of the Government." He pointed out to President Franklin
Pierce that "in most cases. the courts of the United States are held in
buildings belonging to individuals or to the counties, cities or
parishes of the respective states upon whom the United States are thus
made to depend for their necessary accommodation. This dependence, in
the matter of prisoners, is particularly
inconvenient. " On several occasions, when northern marshals tried to
house fugitive slaves in local jails before extraditing them to the
South, the states had refused to allow the marshals to use their
prisons. Cushing believed that the time had come for the United States
to build its own courthouses and prisons.
"Such an application of some part of the public treasure will be
perfectly constitutional and proper and the object is one of
unquestionable public exigency and utility."
However, construction of the facilities did not begin in earnest
until after the
Civil War. Fortunately, the marshals during this period were not
overwhelmed with prisoners.
On February 23, 1846. Secretary of the Treasury R.J. Walker polled
marshals on the number of federal prisoners housed in state prisons in
their districts, the cost per day, and the names and crimes of the
felons. Sixteen marshals responded to the survey, four of whom reported
that they had no prisoners.
Marshal Thomas Fletcher of Mississippi informed the Treasury that in
years his court had never had an indictment or a conviction. The court
western Tennessee, according to Marshal Robert I. Chester, had never
sentenced a defendant to prison. In Virginia no prisoner had been
sentenced for a dozen years, since the spring 1834 court term.
Marshal Samuel Hays of western Pennsylvania had had no prisoners during
first year as marshal. Four districts reported only one prisoner;
three districts reported two prisoners. Five of the prisoners were
two were counterfeiters, two had been convicted of manslaughter on the
high seas, and one had engaged in the African slave trade. The remaining
five districts reported slightly higher numbers of prisoners-four, five,
six, eight, and eleven felons. Northern New York had the most prisoners,
followed by its neighbor southern New York. The crimes were mail robbery
or embezzlement; murder, assault, or piracy on the high seas; engaging
in the African slave trade; counterfeiting and forgery; perjury;
property; and attempting to create a revolt.