The Belfast Prison/Crumlin Road Jail

As with the Crumlin Road Courthouse and many other Belfast buildings of note Crumlin Road Jail was built by Sir Charles Lanyon. The prison was built between 1843 and 1845 and cost £60,000. As a replacement for the county gaol on Antrim street in Carrickfergus Partly based on HMP Pentonville, it was one of the most advanced prisons of its day.

Built within a five-sided wall, the four wings are up to four storeys in height and fan off from the central area which was known as The Circle. The prison was originally built to hold between 500 and 550 prisoners in cells that measured 12 x 7 feet, these were without class and prisoners slept on straw. It was also the first prison in Ireland to be built according to "The Separate System", intended to separate prisoners from each other with no communication between them. Later, especially in the early 1970s, as many as three prisoners were placed in each cell.


It is connected by the passageway shown in the picture to crumlin road courthouse across the road.

The first 106 inmates, who were forced to walk from Carrickfergus Prison in chains, arrived in 1846. These inmates, who were men, women and children, completed the changeover of the two prisons. Children from impoverished working-class families were often imprisoned at the Jail in the early years for offences such as stealing food or clothing and routinely flogged with a cat o’nine tails as part of their sentence. Women inmates were kept in the prison block house until the early 1900s. Ten year old Patrick Magee, who had been sentenced to three months in prison hanged himself in his cell in 1858.

When originally designed by Lanyon, the prison did not contain a gallows and the executions were carried out in public view until 1901, when an execution chamber was constructed and used until the last of the hangings in 1961.

Seventeen prisoners were executed in the prison, the last being Robert McGladdery who was hanged in 1961 for the murder of Pearl Gamble.The condemned would live in a large cell (large enough for two guards to live in as well), unknowingly living next to the gallows, which were concealed by a bookcase. The bodies of the executed were buried inside the prison in unconsecrated ground and the graves were marked only with their initials and year of execution on the prison wall.

The execution of TomWilliams took place on 2 September 1942. Williams, nineteen years old, was hanged for the murder of an RUC officer.



The hangman in charge was hangman famous Thomas Pierrepoint (he was also the gaol's most regular hangman, he carried out six executionthe gaol between 1928 and 1942) the gaol between 1928 and 1942)
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Even with the heavy security in place, there were several escapes from the prison over the years. In 1943, three prisoners including the IRA's chief of staff, escaped from Crumlin Road Gaol and were not recaptured despite a £3,000 reward being offered. Several other escapes by IRA prisoners were carried out in 1971.

For the last thirty years of its working life until it closed on 31 March 1996, Crumlin Road prison served as a remand centre for suspected Terrorist prisoners awaiting trial.

Its recently been opened to tours for the public with 27,000 visiting in 2009 sadly at the time of writing it is under renovation so again I have had to use pics from the 28 days later forum.

A film “ghost machine” was recently filmed in the jail it has also benn used for film screenings and some theatre pieces.

Check out the trailer for “ghost machine here”

http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi2085552665/

(huge thanks to wikipedia for this post)

Theres a very extensive tour of the jail by two local men from the “Belfast History Project”

Crumlin Road Courthouse.

The Crumlin Road Courthouse was designed by the architect Sir Charles Lanyon and completed in 1850 at a cost of £16,500 and is situated facing Crumlin Road Gaol.

Sir Charles Lanyon was the architect behind a large number of well-known buildings in Belfast, including Queens University’s main building, Belfast Central Library, the Customs House, the Theological College in Botanic Avenue (which was used for Northern Ireland's first parliament before Stormont was built), the Palm House in Botanic Gardens (the first in the world and built 10 years before Kew Gardens famous palm house) and Belfast Castle. He later went on to become Belfast Lord Mayor and an MP.

Northern Ireland still has some beautiful working courthouses of this era, Downpatrick, Armagh (which resembles a smaller “Crum”) and Enniskillen are of particular note.

The Courthouse served as the main “Crown Court” for Belfast as such many of the most signifigant trials in Nothern Irish s history took place in this building and it remains a huge part of our Legal History. The last execution in N.Ireland was ordered from these very benches, its important to remember for the first 50 years of this Courthouses history these were public hanging’s. It’s dock has had some vistors of note such as NI Politicians Gerry Adams, Ian Paisley and the late David Ervine as well as the infamous Lenny Murphy the leader of the so called Shankill Butchers.

Whilst Prisoners today appear in Court via video link or are brought by bus from HMP Maghaberry in Lisburn. Crumlin Road Courthouse prisoners were quite literally “sent down” as the courthouse was linked to Crumlin Road jail by an underground passage that was used to bring prisoners to and from the jail.

The Courthouse closed in June 1998, much of the work of “The Crum” was transferred to the new Laganside Court buildings which face the Royal Courts of Justice on Chichester Street in the city centre. Which, while a leap forward in modernisation, “Laganside” lacks a great deal of the athmosphere and grandeur of this old building and to me has a bit of a Travelodge feel.

It was sold to local investor Barry Gilligan in September 2003 for £1. His plans for the courthouse include redeveloping it as a tourist attraction and a hotel. The courthouse had a series of fires in 2009 causing further massive damage to the structure.

Sadly the future of the building remains in question and with inaction, further damage seems inevitable. A very sad end to this once great and historic building.

To quote one of Belfast’s defence QC’s “bring back the crum”

The Photos for this post were taken from the 28 days later forum and more can be found there.

http://www.28dayslater.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=31705

There is an excellent video guide of the courthouse at present by I guidez, 6mins long and well worth checking out.

http://www.iguidez.com/Belfast/crumlin_road_courthouse/