I have not forgotten the Marshalsea. The position of the Marshalsea Prison was changed from its first site south of King Street in the year 1810, when it was removed to the site which it occupied down to the end, overlooking St. George's Churchyard. The choice of that site is a good illustration of English conservatism. Why was the Marshalsea brought there? Because there had been a prison on the spot before. From time immemorial the Surrey Prison had stood there. They called the place the White Lyon. It still stood when the Marshalsea was brought there: it was still standing when the Marshalsea was pulled down.
I think it was in the year 1877 or 1878 or thereabouts that I walked over to see the Marshalsea before it was pulled down. I found a long narrow terrace of mean houses--they are still standing: there was a narrow courtyard in front for exercise and air: a high wall separated the prison from the Churchyard: the rooms in the terrace were filled with deep cupboards on either side of the fireplace: these cupboards contained the coals, the cooking utensils, the stores, and the clothes of the occupants. My guide, a working man employed on the demolition of another part of the Prison, pointed to certain marks on the floor as, he said, the place where they fastened the staples when they tied down the poor prisoners. Such was his historic information: he also pointed out Mr. Dorrit's room--so real was the novelist's creation. At the east end of the terrace there were certain rooms which I believe to have been the tap-room and the coffee-room. Then we came to the White Lyon, which at the time I did not know to have been the White Lyon. It was a very ancient building. It consisted of two rooms, one above the other: the staircase and the floors were of most solid work: the windows were barred: bars crossed the chimney a few feet up: large square nails were driven into the oaken pillars and into the doors. The lower room had evidently been kitchen, day room, sleeping room and all. Outside was a tiny yard for exercise: this was the old Surrey Prison. I have seen another prison exactly like it, and, if my memory does not play tricks, it was at the little country town of Ilminster. This was a Clink, and on this pattern, I believe, all the old Prisons were constructed. Beyond the Clink was the chapel, a modern structure. So far as I know, Mr. Dickens _père_, and Mr. Dorrit, were the only persons of eminence confined in this modern Marshalsea. In the older Marshalsea all kinds of distinguished people were kept captive, notably Bishop Bonner, who died there. They say that it was necessary to bury him at midnight for fear of the people, who would have rent his dead body in pieces if they could. Perhaps. But it was not at any time usual for a mob of Englishmen to pull a dead body, even of a martyr-making Marian Bishop, to pieces. Later on, in the last century, it was the rule to bury at night. The darkness, the flicker of the torches, increased the solemnity of the ceremony. So that after all Bishop Bonner may have been buried at night in the usual fashion. He lies buried somewhere in St. George's Churchyard. It is now a pretty garden, whose benches in fine weather are filled with people resting and sunning themselves: in spring the garden is full of pleasant greenery: the dead parishioners to whom headstones have been consecrated, if they ever visit the spot, may amuse themselves by picking out their own tombstones among the illegible ones which line the wall. But I hardly think, wherever they may now be quartered, they would care to revisit this place. The owners of the headstones were in their day accounted as the more fortunate sons of men: they were vestrymen and guardians and churchwardens: they owned shops: they kept the inns and ran the stage coaches and the waggons and the caravans: their tills were heavy with guineas: their faces were smug and smiling: their chins were double: they talked benevolent commonplace: they exchanged the most beautiful sentiments: and they crammed their debtors into these prisons.