HM Prison Perth

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View over the HM Prison Perth

The HM Prison Perth is a prison in the Scottish city of Perth in the Council Area Perth and Kinross . It is located south of the city center near the right bank of the Tay . Various buildings of the facility are listed. The main block with blocks A and B, the Aultbea House and the former caretaker's house are classified in the Scottish monument lists as monuments of the highest monument category A. The former guard house, on the other hand, is a Category B monument.

HM Prison Perth is the oldest continuously operated prison in Scotland. Today it has a capacity to house 630 male prisoners. These were mainly convicted in Perth and Kinross, Dundee , Angus or Fife . The prison accepts both long and short prison sentences.

history

The prison was built between 1810 and 1812 to hold prisoners of war from the Napoleonic Wars . The required property was previously acquired by the Moncrieff family. The Scottish architect Robert Reid was responsible for the design of the building . Around 7,000 French prisoners of war were housed there during wartime. Inmates were allowed to make simple products that were sold to the population on a weekly basis. Officers were not detained at HM Prison Perth, but were placed with families within the city against assurances that they would not attempt to escape. After the end of the war in 1815, all prisoners were returned home.

Between 1815 and 1839 the buildings were used as an armory . This year the expansion of the facility began. When Block C was completed the following year, it was reopened as a prison. From 1922, the HM Prison Perth served mainly as an admission and transit station for the Dundee prison, which is why parts were temporarily closed. It was not until Dundee Prison was closed in 1927 that HM Prison Perth was fully used again. At the location of today's kitchen there was once part of Block B, which was demolished in 1948 after a fire. The central watchtower was demolished in 1965. A new execution building was also completed that year, but became obsolete with the abolition of the death penalty in the UK that same year. After serving as a training building for a few decades, it was finally demolished in 2006.

Two years later, following the ban on public executions in the UK in 1868, the first non-public execution in the UK took place at HM Prison Perth. George Chalmers was executed . 1914 was the HM Prison Perth the only prison in the country in which the hunger strike located suffragettes force-fed were.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Listed Building - Entry . In: Historic Scotland .
  2. ↑ Listed Building - Entry . In: Historic Scotland .
  3. ↑ Listed Building - Entry . In: Historic Scotland .
  4. ↑ Listed Building - Entry . In: Historic Scotland .
  5. ↑ a b c d Information from the Scottish Prison Service

Web links

Coordinates: 56 ° 23 ′ 6.1 "  N , 3 ° 25 ′ 47.6"  W.