Penal school

The penal school was a separate school in Hamburg , to which children were admitted who could not be disciplined with normal school sentences. It existed from 1833 to 1906.

history

Before the penal school was set up in Hamburg, grossly disobedient pupils and truants , for whom the usual school sentences did not work, were handed over to the public prosecution authorities. From 1828 the penal class of the work house and poor house existed ; in contrast to the penal school that followed later, it was organizationally assigned to the penal institutions . It was also spatially connected to the penitentiary and the workhouse .

At the suggestion of Senator Martin Hieronymus Hudtwalcker , the penal school was set up as a new type of institution in 1833. Instruction in the penal school should be somewhere between school and police punishments and was intended for “children for whom the usual disciplinary punishments of the school are no longer fruitful and who have not yet committed such a serious offense [...] that their transfer to the punitive power of the state would be necessary ” . In Hudtwalcker's opinion, a police punishment was unsuitable for such children and morally endangering, as it would dull them, give them the opportunity to make bad acquaintances and come into contact with criminals. The penal school was attached to the Hamburg school for the poor .

Initially, the penal school was located in Steinstrasse, and from 1836 in the churchyard of St. Petri Church . In 1842 it was destroyed in the great fire in Hamburg and was to be found in different places until the move to a new building in today's Bülaustraße in 1859. In 1857 it became a detention school where the children had to stay overnight. From then on, at the latest, the penal school was more like a prison than a school.

After the establishment of the general primary school in Hamburg, the penal school was also incorporated into the public school system. However, fewer and fewer children were sent to penal school; In 1891 the number of students was 333, in 1905 there was only one student in the penal school. After years of protests from the teaching staff, especially from educators who were inclined to the emerging reform pedagogy , the institution, unique in the Reich , was finally abolished in 1906 and the penal school closed.

Transfer to the penal school

The transfer to the penal school happened on the basis of a resolution of the school convention; decisions were made at regular intervals. In contrast to the penal class of the work house and poor house, which was supposed to pursue longer-term sentences, the children were initially admitted for about six weeks, longer if repeated. Poor parents of admitted children have been able to cut support while their children are being referred. They later had the right to appeal against the placement. In the case of repeated unexcused absenteeism, the children were handed over to the police authorities for instruction in the penal class of the work and poor house.

The penal school was intended as an alleviation for less severe cases; Nevertheless, even after their establishment, a large number of the students to be punished were assigned to the stricter class of the work house and poor house because they simply skipped school.

Breeding measures, food and lessons

In the early days of the penal school, arrest was limited to between eight in the morning and eight in the evening during the day; Sundays and public holidays between eleven o'clock in the morning and three in the afternoon - in contrast to the penalty class with continuous accommodation. Children who were absent from the penal school without an apology could be locked up overnight. From 1857 the penal school became a prison from which the children were not released overnight.

The interned children had to wear and work special institutional clothing, which usually involved working with wool or cordage. During the stay in the penal school there was a strict law of silence; corporal punishment was to be expected if this commandment was broken.

For lunch there was Rumford soup , otherwise the provisions consisted of bread and water.

Classes at the penal school were given in the morning and afternoon; about two to three lessons were given both times. However, the heterogeneity of the inmates' age and the duration of the placement of a few weeks made targeted teaching impossible.

literature

• Theodor Blinckmann : About penal schools . Lecture given at the Hamb association. Elementary school teacher . In: Pedagogical Reform , Vol. 16, 1892, No. 21, pp. 124–125 and No. 22, pp. 130–132. Digitized .
• Theodor Blinckmann: The penal school . In: Pedagogical Reform. At the same time organ of the "Hamburg Teaching Aids Exhibition". Vol. 28, 1904, No. 14, pp. 127-128; also in: Hamburgische Schulzeitung A weekly for pedagogical theory, art and experience , Vol. 12, 1904, No. 15, pp. 116–117. Digitized .
• Joachim Döbler: Tamed Youth. Regulatory processes in the penal class of the Hamburg work and poor house (1828–1842). Lit, Hamburg 1992, ISBN 3-89473-270-9 .
• Hartwig Fiege: History of the Hamburg elementary school. Julius Klinckhardt, Bad Heilbrunn, 1970, ISBN 3-7815-0007-1 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Senator Martin Hieronymus Hudtwalcker on the occasion of a meeting of the poor college in December 1832, quoted from Joachim Döbler: Tame youth. Regulatory processes in the penal class of the Hamburg work and poor house (1828–1842). Lit, Hamburg 1992, ISBN 3-89473-270-9 , p. 184.
2. ↑ Johannes Jung: Art-class reform ideas in school reality. A contribution to the history of elementary schools in Hamburg and Bavaria Klinkhardt, Bad Heilbrunn 2001, ISBN 3-7815-1164-2 , p. 65 note 172
3. ↑ Johannes Richter: "Good children of bad parents". Family life, child care and deprivation of custody in Hamburg, 1884–1914. Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden 2011, ISBN 978-3-531-17625-3 , p. 139, footnote 3. Text in the network