Lights and Shadows of New York Life

J >> James D. McCabe >> Lights and Shadows of New York Life

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In the central building are located the kitchens, and storerooms, the
private quarters of the Superintendent and the other officials, and a
large and handsome chapel. The wings contain each a broad hall, on each
side of which are three tiers of cells, one above the other. Iron
galleries, with stairways, extend along the fronts of these cells, and
afford access to them. There are 150 cells in each wing. Each cell is
provided with an iron grated door, and contains four single berths. The
cells are separated from each other by brick walls. In the workshops,
the carpenter's, blacksmith's, wheelwright's, tinner's, tailor's, and
other trades are carried on. The men are also kept at work grading the
island, building the seawall, and cultivating the gardens. Gangs of
laborers are sent daily to engage in the works on Ward's and Randall's
islands. The women are made to do the housework and cleaning of the
various institutions on the island, and are employed in washing, mending,
sewing, knitting, etc. All the inmates are obliged to labor.

The number of persons annually sent to the Workhouse is from 15,000 to
20,000. The vagrant, dissipated, and disorderly classes are sent here by
the city police courts, ten days being the average term of commitment.
Drunkenness is the principal cause of their detention here. Very few are
Americans. Of the foreigners, the Irish are the most numerous, the
Germans next.

Back of the Workhouse, and occupying the extreme upper portion of the
island, is the New York City Lunatic Asylum. It is a large and
commodious building, with several out-buildings, with accommodations for
576 patients. A new Lunatic Asylum is now in course of erection on
Ward's Island. It is to accommodate 500 patients. It is one of the most
complete establishments in the country, and is built of brick and Ohio
freestone. It is a very handsome building, with an imposing front of 475
feet. The two asylums will accommodate 1076 patients, but they are not
adequate to the accommodation of all the afflicted for whom the city is
required to provide. Still further accommodations are needed. In 1870,
the number of patients committed to the care of the Commissioners was
over 1300.

II. WARD'S ISLAND.

Ward's Island takes its name from Jasper and Bartholomew Ward, who
formerly owned it. It comprises an area of about two hundred acres, and
is owned in about equal portions by the Commissioners of Emigration and
the Department of Charities and Corrections. It is separated from New
York by the Harlem River, from Blackwell's and Long islands by that
portion of the East River known as Hell Gate, and from Randall's Island
by a narrow strait called Little Hell Gate. It lies a little to the
northeast of Blackwell's Island, about half a mile from it, and is the
widest of the three islands in the East River.

The Emigrant Hospital is described in another chapter.

The new Lunatic Asylum is located on the extreme eastern portion of the
island.

Between the Emigrant Hospital and the Lunatic Asylum is the New York
Inebriate Asylum, a handsome brick edifice, three stories in height, with
a frontage of 474 feet, and a depth of 50 feet. It is provided with
every convenience, is supplied with the Croton water, and has
accommodations for 400 patients. The patients consist of those who
either seek the Asylum voluntarily or are placed there by their friends,
and who pay for their accommodations, and those who are sent to the
institution by the police authorities for reformation. The treatment is
moral as well as physical. The physician's efforts to repair the ravages
of dissipation in the physical system are supplemented by the labors of
the chaplain and the other officers of the institution, who seek to
revive in the patient a sound, healthy morality, which they strive to
make the basis of his reformation.

III. RANDALL'S ISLAND.

Randall's Island is so called from Jonathan Randall, a former owner. It
lies about one hundred yards to the north of Ward's Island, from which it
is separated by Little Hell Gate. The Harlem Kills separate it from
Westchester county, and the Harlem River from New York. About thirty
acres of the southern portion are owned by the "Society for the
Reformation of Juvenile Delinquents." The remainder is the property of
the "Commissioners of Charities and Corrections."

[Picture: HOUSE OF REFUGE: RANDALL'S ISLAND.]

The southern portion is occupied by the "House of Refuge," which is under
the control of the "Society for the Reformation of Juvenile Delinquents."
The buildings are of brick, and are constructed in the Italian style.
They have a frontage of nearly 1000 feet, and were constructed at a cost
of about $500,000. They constitute one of the handsomest public
institutions in the city. The main buildings contain 886 dormitories,
several spacious and fully furnished school rooms, a handsome chapel,
which will seat 1000 persons, the kitchens, hospital, and officers'
quarters. The average number of inmates is about 700 boys and 150 girls.
Every child is compelled to labor from six to eight hours every day in
the week, and to attend school from four to five hours. The inmates
consist of such juvenile offenders against the law as the courts commit
to the Refuge in preference to sending them to prison. Some of them are
young people, whose parents, unable to manage them, and wishing to save
them from lives of sin and crime, have placed them in the hands of the
Society for reformation. The discipline is mainly reformatory, though
the inmates are subjected to the restraints, but not the degradation of a
prison.

"The boys' building is divided into two compartments; the first division,
in the one, is thus entirely separated from the second division in the
other compartment. The second division is composed of those whose
characters are decidedly bad, or whose offence was great. A boy may, by
good conduct, however, get promoted from the second into the first
division. As a rule, the second division is much older than the first.
Each division is divided into four grades. Every boy on entering the
Reformatory is placed in the third grade; if he behaves well, he is
placed in the second in a week, and a month after in the first grade; if
he continues in a satisfactory course for three months, he is placed in
the grade of honor, and wears a badge on his breast. Every boy in the
first division must remain six months, in the second division twelve
months in the first grade, before he can be indentured to any trade.
These two divisions are under the charge of twenty-five teachers and
twenty-five guards. At half-past six o'clock the cells are all unlocked,
every one reports himself to the overseer, and then goes to the
lavatories; at seven, after parading, they are marched to the school
rooms to join in the religious exercises for half an hour; at half-past
seven, they have breakfast, and at eight are told off to the workshops,
where they remain till twelve, when they again parade, previous to going
to dinner. For dinner they have a large plate of soup, a small portion
of meat, a small loaf of bread, and a mug of water. At one o'clock, they
return to their work. When they have completed their allotted task, they
are allowed to play till four, when they have supper. At half-past four
they go to school, where they remain till eight o'clock, the time for
going to bed. Each boy has a separate cell, which is locked and barred
at night. The cells are in long, lofty, well ventilated corridors, each
corridor containing one hundred cells. The doors of the cells are all
grated, in order that the boys may have light and air, and also be under
the direct supervision of the officers, who, though very strict,
apparently know well how to temper strictness with kindness. Before
going to bed, half an hour is again devoted to religious exercises,
singing hymns, reading the Bible, etc.

"One of the most interesting, and at the same time, one of the most
important features of the Refuge, is the workshop. On entering the shop,
the visitor is amused by finding a lot of little urchins occupied in
making ladies' hoopskirts of the latest fashionable design; nearly 100
are engaged in the crinoline department. In the same long room, about
fifty are weaving wire for sifting cotton, making wire sieves, rat-traps,
gridirons, flower baskets, cattle noses, etc. The principal work,
however, is carried on in the boot and shoe department. The labor of the
boys is let out to contractors, who supply their own foremen to teach the
boys and superintend the work, but the society have their own men to keep
order and correct the boys when necessary, the contractors' men not being
allowed to interfere with them in any way whatever. There are 590 boys
in this department. They manage on an average to turn out about 2500
pairs of boots and shoes daily, which are mostly shipped to the Southern
States. Each one has a certain amount of work allotted to him in the
morning, which he is bound to complete before four o'clock in the
afternoon. Some are quicker and more industrious than others, and will
get their work done by two o'clock; this gives two hours' play to those
in the first division, the second division have to go to school when they
have finished, till three o'clock, they only being allowed one hour for
recreation. The authorities are very anxious to make arrangements to
have a Government vessel stationed off the island, to be used as a
training-ship for the most adventurous spirits. If this design is
carried out it will be a very valuable adjunct to the working of the
institution, and will enable the Directors to take in many more boys,
without incurring the expense of extending the present buildings. The
girls are also employed in making hoopskirts, in making clothes for
themselves and the boys, in all sorts of repairing, in washing linen, and
in general housework. The girls are generally less tractable than the
boys; perhaps this is accounted for by their being older, some of them
being as much as five or six and twenty. The boys average about thirteen
or fourteen, the girls seventeen or eighteen years of age. Nearly
two-thirds of the boys have been bootblacks, the remainder mostly 'wharf
rats.'

"The Directors of the House of Refuge, while having a due regard for the
well-being of its inmates, very properly take care that they are not so
comfortable or so well-fed as to lead them to remain longer in the
reformatory than necessary. As soon as the boys appear to be really
reformed, they are indentured out to farmers and different trades. In
the year 1867, no less than 633 boys and 146 girls were started in life
in this way. Any person wishing to have a child indentured to him, has
to make a formal application to the Committee to that effect, at the same
time giving references as to character, etc. Inquiries are made, and if
satisfactorily answered, the child is handed over to his custody, the
applicant engaging to feed, clothe, and educate his young apprentice.
The boy's new master has to forward a written report to the officer, as
to his health and general behaviour from time to time. If the boy does
not do well, he is sent back to the Refuge, and remains there till he is
twenty-one years of age. Most of the children, however, get on, and many
of them have made for themselves respectable positions in society. The
annals of the Society in this respect are very gratifying and
interesting. Many young men never lose sight of a Refuge which rescued
them in time from a criminal life, and to which they owe almost their
very existence. Instead of alternating between the purlieus of Water
street and Sing Sing, they are many of them in a fair way to make a
fortune. One young man who was brought up there, and is now thriving,
lately called at the office to make arrangements for placing his two
younger brothers in the House, they having got into bad company since
their father's death. A very remarkable occurrence took place at the
institution not long ago. A gentleman and his wife, apparently occupying
a good position in society, called at the Refuge and asked to be allowed
to go over it. Having inspected the various departments, just before
leaving, the gentleman said to his wife, 'Now I will tell you a great
secret. I was brought up in this place.' The lady seemed much
surprised, and astounded all by quietly observing, 'And so was I.' So
strange are the coincidences of human life."

The institutions on this island controlled by the Department of Public
Charities and Corrections, are the "Nurseries," the "Infant Hospital,"
and the "Idiot Asylum."

The Nurseries consist of six large Brick buildings, each three stories in
height, arranged without reference to any special plan, and separated
from each other by a distance of several hundred feet. Each is in charge
of an assistant matron, the whole being under the supervision of a Warden
and matron. These nurseries are devoted to the care of children over
four years old, abandoned by their parents, and found in the streets by
the police, and children whose parents are unable to care for them.
Wherever the parent is known the Commissioners afford only temporary
shelter to the children, requiring the parents to resume their care of
them at the earliest possible moment. Three months is the limit for
gratuitous shelter in such cases. Where the parent is unknown, the child
is cared for until it is of an age to be apprenticed, or until some
respectable persons take it for adoption. Only healthy children are
received into the nurseries, and none may remain in them after reaching
the age of sixteen years. The average number of inmates is about 2400
per annum.

The Infant Hospital is for the reception of children under the age of
four years, for foundlings, for children whose parents are too poor to
take care of them, and for the sick of the Nurseries proper. The
children are divided into three classes: I. The "Wet nursed:" II. The
"Bottle fed:" III. The "Walking Children." They are retained here
unless claimed by their parents until they attain the age of three or
four years, when they are transferred to the Nurseries mentioned above.
The Hospital is a large and handsome brick building, and will accommodate
several hundred children and their nurses.

The Idiot Asylum is a large brick building, with accommodations for
several hundred patients. It contains at present about 150 of these,
whose ages vary from six to thirty years. They represent nearly all the
different phases of idiocy, and are well cared for. Some of them have
been greatly improved in mind by the treatment and discipline pursued.

LII. BENEVOLENT AND CHARITABLE INSTITUTIONS.

It would be simply impossible to present within the limits of a single
chapter, or indeed in half a dozen chapters of the size of this, a
description of the Benevolent and Charitable Institutions of New York.
We can do no more than glance at them. Besides the institutions already
mentioned, there are twenty-one hospitals, twenty-three asylums,
seventeen homes, five missions, industrial schools, and miscellaneous
societies, making a total of sixty-six institutions, or with those
already noticed, a total of nearly one hundred benevolent, charitable,
penal, and reformatory institutions supported by the city and people of
New York.

Among the hospitals the largest and oldest is the New York Hospital,
formerly located on Broadway opposite Pearl street. The Hospital is in
charge of the medical faculty of the University of New York. At present
the operations of this institution are entirely suspended, and will not
be resumed until the completion of new buildings, the old ones having
been sold and pulled down.

The Bloomingdale Asylum for the Insane, is a branch of the New York
Hospital. It is situated on One-hundred-and-seventeenth street, between
Tenth and Eleventh avenues. It is one of the most complete
establishments in the world, and is admirably conducted.

Bellevue Hospital, on the East River, at the foot of Twenty-sixth street,
is one of the largest in the city. It will accommodate 1200 patients,
and is conducted by the Commissioners of Charities and Corrections.
There is no charge for treatment and attendance, everything being free.
The hospital is in charge of the most distinguished physicians of the
city, and as a school of clinical instruction ranks among the first in
the world. The course is open to the students of all the medical schools
in the city.

[Picture: BLOOMINGDALE ASYLUM FOR THE INSANE.]

St. Luke's Hospital, on Fifty-fourth street and Fifth avenue, is a noble
institution, and one of the prettiest places on the great thoroughfare of
fashion. Its erection is due to the labors of the Rev. Dr. W. A.
Muhlenberg. It is the property of the Episcopal Church, by which body it
is conducted. The sick are nursed here by the "Sisters of the Holy
Communion," a voluntary association of unmarried Protestant ladies. The
hospital has accommodations for over one hundred patients, and is said to
be the best conducted of any denominational charity in the city.
Patients who are able to pay are required to do so, but the poor are
received without charge.

The Roosevelt Hospital, a magnificent structure, is situated on West
Fifty-ninth street, between Ninth and Tenth avenues, and is to furnish,
when completed, accommodations for 600 patients. It is the gift of the
late Jas. H. Roosevelt of New York to the suffering.

[Picture: ST. LUKE'S HOSPITAL.]

The Presbyterian Hospital, on Seventy-first street, between Fourth and
Madison avenues, is not yet completed. It is a beautiful structure, and
is to have accommodations for several hundred patients. It is the
property of the Presbyterian Church of New York. The site, valued at
$250,000, and a further sum of $250,000 in cash, were the gift of Mr.
James Lenox.

The Roman Catholic Church conducts the Hospitals of St. Francis and St.
Vincent, the former on East Fifth street, and the latter on the corner of
Eleventh street and Seventh avenue. These two institutions contain about
250 beds.

The German Hospital, Seventy-seventh street and Fourth avenue, is, as
yet, incomplete. It was erected by the German citizens of New York, but
receives patients of every nationality and color. The poor are received
without charge under certain restrictions. There are accommodations for
about seventy-five patients in the present buildings. Connected with the
hospital is a dispensary from which medical advice and medicines are
given to the poor.

The Jews of New York have just completed a magnificent edifice, known as
the Mount Sinai Hospital, on Lexington avenue, between Sixty-sixth and
Sixty-seventh streets. It will contain 200 beds. The present Hebrew
Hospital, in Twenty-eighth street, near Eighth avenue, contains about
sixty-five beds. The Jews also have a burial ground, in which those of
their faith who die in the Hospital are buried without expense to their
friends.

The Child's Hospital, Lexington avenue and Fiftieth street, embraces four
distinct charities: A Foundling Asylum, a Nursery for the children of
laboring women, a Child's Hospital, and a Lying-in Asylum. The buildings
are very extensive. The annual Charity Ball is given in behalf of this
institution.

The Woman's Hospital of the State of New York, Fourth avenue and Fiftieth
street, is a handsome building, and the only institution of its kind in
the country. It owes its existence to the exertions of Dr. J. Marion
Sims, who is, together with Dr. Emmett, still in charge of it. It is
devoted exclusively to the treatment of female diseases. It is attended
by physicians from all parts of the country, who come to receive clinical
instruction in this branch of their profession.

The other prominent hospitals are, Dr. Knight's Institution for the
Relief of the Ruptured and Crippled; the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary;
the House of Rest for Consumptives; the New York Infirmary for Women and
Children; the New York Medical College and Hospital for Women; the
Hahneman Hospital; the Stranger's Hospital (a private charity); the New
York Ophthalmic Hospital; the New York Aural Institute; and the Manhattan
Eye and Ear Hospital.

[Picture: INSTITUTION FOR THE BLIND.]

Among the asylums are the Institution for the Blind, on Ninth avenue and
Thirty-fourth street; the New York Institution for the Instruction of the
Deaf and Dumb, on Washington Heights, overlooking the Hudson; the
Institution for the Improved Instruction of Deaf Mutes, Broadway, near
Forty-fifth street; the New York Orphan Asylum, Seventy-third street,
west of Broadway; the Colored Orphan Asylum, One-hundred-and-tenth street
and Tenth avenue; the Orphan Home and Asylum of the Protestant Episcopal
Church, Forty-ninth street and Lexington avenue; the Sheltering Arms, an
Episcopal institution for the Protection and Care of Orphans and half
Orphans, especially those whose bodily infirmities would exclude them
from other institutions; three Roman Catholic Orphan Asylums, one at the
corner of Mott and Prince streets, one on Fifth avenue (for boys), on the
block above the new Cathedral, and one in Madison avenue (for girls),
immediately in the rear of that just mentioned; the New York Asylum for
Lying-in Women, 83 Marion street; the Society for the Relief of Half
Orphans and Destitute Children, 67 West Tenth street; the Leake and Watts
Orphan House, West One-hundred-and-tenth street, near the Central Park;
the New York Juvenile Asylum, One-hundred-and-seventy-sixth street,
devoted to the reformation of juvenile vagrants; the Hebrew Benevolent
and Orphan Asylum, Third avenue and Seventy-seventh street; St. Barnabas
House, 304 Mulberry street, an Episcopal "Home for Homeless Women and
Children;" the Institution of Mercy, 33 Houston street, a Roman Catholic
institution for the visitation of the sick and prisoners, the instruction
of poor children, and the protection of virtuous women in distress; the
Roman Catholic Orphan Asylum of St. Vincent de Paul, Thirty-ninth street,
near Seventh avenue; the Society for the Protection of Destitute Roman
Catholic Children, the Protectory of which is located at West Farms, in
Westchester County; the New York Foundling Asylum, in Washington Square;
the Shepherd's Fold, Eighty-sixth street and Second avenue, an
establishment similar to the "Sheltering Arms," and conducted by the
Episcopal Church; the Woman's Aid Society and Home for Training Young
Girls, Seventh avenue and Thirteenth street; and St. Joseph's Orphan
Asylum (Roman Catholic), Avenue A and Eighty-ninth street.

Among the Homes and Missions are, the Association for the Relief of
Respectable Aged Indigent Females, in East Twentieth street; the Ladies'
Union Aid Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church, Forty-second street,
near Eighth avenue; the American Female Guardian Society and Home for the
Friendless, 29 East Twenty-ninth, and 32 East Thirtieth streets; the Home
for Incurables, an Episcopal institution, with its buildings at West
Farms; the Samaritan Home for the Aged, Ninth avenue and Fourteenth
street; the Colored Home, First avenue and Sixty-fifth street; St. Luke's
(Episcopal) Home for Indigent Christian Females, Madison avenue and
Eighty-ninth street; the Presbyterian Home for Aged Women, Seventy-third
street, between Fourth and Madison avenues; the Union Home School, for
the Orphans of Soldiers and Sailors, on the Boulevard at
One-hundred-and-fifty-first street; the Female Christian Home for Women,
314 East Fifteenth street; the Home for Friendless Women, 86 West Fourth
street; the Women's Prison Association, 213 Tenth avenue; the Roman
Catholic Home for the Aged Poor, 447 West Thirty-second street; the
Chapin Home for the Aged and Infirm (Universalist), now in course of
erection; the Baptist Home for Aged and Infirm Persons, 41 Grove street;
the Home for Aged Hebrews, 215 West Seventeenth street; the Ladies
Christian Union or Young Women's Home, 27 and 28 Washington Square; the
Water street Home for Women, 273 Water street, devoted to the reformation
of fallen women, and occupying the building formerly used by John Allen,
"the wickedest man in New York," as a dance house; Wilson's Industrial
School for Girls, Avenue A and St. Mark's place; the New York House and
School of Industry, 120 West Sixteenth street; and the Society for the
Employment and Relief of Poor Women (Unitarian).

The city conducts five large and excellent dispensaries, at which the
poor may receive medical advice, treatment and medicines free of charge.
There are also a number of dispensaries devoted to the gratuitous
treatment of special diseases.

LIII. HENRY WARD BEECHER.

Although Mr. Beecher is a resident of Brooklyn, and although Plymouth
Church is located in that city, yet the great preacher is sufficiently
bound to New York by business and socialities to make him a part of the
great metropolis.