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FROM A PRISONER IN THE PRATT MINES STOCKADE, ALABAMA

To the Chronicle:

Supposing a line or two from our prison, its surroundings, happenings, etc., would be acceptable, prompts me to drop you this.

The monotony of prison life is such that hardly anything transpires, that would command the notice of a news reporter, or draw an article from a newspaper correspondent. But, Mr. Editor, we had something to take place here last night that beats anything we ever saw or heard of.

About the time all the convicts had finished eating the evening meal, Captain P. J. Rogers announced that all should remain seated awhile, to hear preaching. Now to hear preaching is no uncommon occurrence here, Brother Rush preaches regularly for us, and occasionally other ministers deliver discourses upon the importance of living the life of a Christian, so when Capt. R. announced that we were about to have preaching, no one experienced much motion of spirit. The minds of those who gave the matter any thought were picturing in expectation, a man, perhaps baldheaded, clad in a long priestly robe with Bible and Hymn-book in hand, and of a solemn, or sanctimonious countenance, others, perhaps, drew a different man in appearance, but none had drawn the picture correctly.

Imagine our surprise when instead of a man, a woman of mature age, clad in the usual mourning apparel worn by the ladies, armed with Bible and Hymn-book, mounted the rostrum, and announced that she was going to preach to us. This announcement at once produced the most profound and reverential silence imaginable—every eye was at once riveted upon the face of the fair preacher, whose countenance wore a pleasant smile and indicated an affectionate and amiable disposition, and complete surprise or amazement was vivid upon the countenance of her entire audience. The discourse was one worthy of the attention of all who heard it—the sufferings of Jesus in and around Jerusalem—His temptation and trial of toil and misery—His holy life—His triumphant death and resurrection—His grand ascension to the realms of the blessed, were eloquently delineated. The certainty of death—the shortness of life—the never ending of the life beyond the grave were theories eagerly pressed for reception upon the minds of her hearers. Taking all in all, the discourse was well delivered and spiced with enough enthusiasm to produce good effect. But, Mr. Editor, the idea of a woman canvassing the world in behalf of the church is simply an incident so unusual that quite a number of us here eagerly inquire, what has become of the men? * * * *

Elizabeth R. Wheaton, for such is the name of our distinguished visitor, related among other things, that she was called and led by the God of Glory to go all over the world and preach the gospel to the lost children of men, that the prisons, saloons, dens of sin and pollution were the places of her special care. The huts of the poor and outcast were by her to be visited and that she did not ask for money, that her Master had promised to provide all things for her and did so daily.

Saw Mother Wheaton

THE NOTED PRISON EVANGELIST VISITED THE COUNTY JAIL PRISONERS TODAY

A kindly faced, white-haired old lady walked into the county jail this morning and asked permission to address the prisoners. She was "Mother" Elizabeth Rider Wheaton, the prison evangelist, who is known from coast to coast. As soon as her identity was made known Turnkey Reynolds and his corps of assistants did their utmost to assist the generous old lady. She was shown through the building, and then allowed to enter each ward.

From 11 o'clock until long after the noon hour she remained with the unfortunates, visiting them separately and then preaching to all. Tears were in the eyes of many of these hardened criminals before she had finished.

"Mother" Wheaton was met at the jail entrance and asked to explain her system of working. "It is all done by faith," she said. "I have faith in God, and that is sufficient. He will provide me with all that is necessary to carry on this work."

"Under whose guidance do you work?" was asked.

"The Lord's, and His only," was the reply.

"But are you not employed by some religious sect?"

"No. I do this on my own responsibility, and for the glory of God. For the past fifteen years this has been my life's work. I go where I please and do as I please."

"How far have you traveled?"

"Thousands and thousands of miles. Last year I was in Europe and have been all over America."

For the past forty years "Mother" Wheaton has been a professed believer in Christianity. Fifteen years ago she started in the work of visiting prisons, and has been in every place of detention in any city of note. She is received with the utmost courtesy both by the officials and the prisoners. Many of the latter have met her at different places, and most all the officials are acquainted with her and her work.—A Detroit paper.

The Prison Evangelist

MRS. E. R. WHEATON DELIVERS AN ADDRESS AT THE PENITENTIARY CHAPEL SUNDAY MORNING

The service at the penitentiary chapel Sunday was made memorable by the presence and discourse of Mrs. E. R. Wheaton, the world-known prison evangelist. Chaplain Winget conducted the services and offered the invocation and in a few explanatory remarks introduced Mrs. Wheaton. Mrs. Wheaton's hair is white as silver, but she still retains her ever-youthful appearance and sprightly step. She sang in an indescribably sweet, but powerful, voice "Some Mother's Child." At the conclusion of the singing Mrs. Wheaton preached a wonderful discourse. "I was on my way to Jerusalem," said she, "and had gotten as far as London, England, when the Lord turned me back to my own country and to my suffering boys in prison; and I said God bless my children, my boys, for I am their mother.

"Oh! how sad and discouraged many of you are, but if you will believe in God and read your Bible you will be comforted. How can any man have the heart not to believe the Bible and rest his case upon the bosom of the good Lord who died for us? I thank God that the good old-time religion still lives. The devil, my children, causes you all your sufferings and sorrows. Exchange him for Jesus. He will keep you. Forgive your enemies and submit yourself to the officers of the prison. You must obey—it is the Lord's will. He has placed you here for his own purpose, maybe for your soul's good and salvation. Jesus says, 'Come to me all ye that are heavy laden and I will give you rest.' Have faith. I am so sorry when some of you do wrong for the innocent must suffer with the guilty and society becomes stern with you. God bless you all."—Columbus, Ohio, paper.

Mrs. Elizabeth Rider Wheaton Preaches to Unfortunates

VISITS THE BRIDEWELL AND HEARS THE COMPLAINT OF ONE OF THE CITY'S CHARGES

"What's the use? What have I to hope for? Who cares for me? Who'll help me? What can I do when my time expires? Everybody's hand will be against me! A hopeless drunkard is past redemption."

Tears came to the eyes of Mrs. Elizabeth Rider Wheaton yesterday afternoon as she heard these words fall from the lips of a dejected prisoner at the bridewell. The prison and train evangelist whose work for fifteen years among convicts had brought her many such questions, which she was unable to answer to the satisfaction of the prisoners, spoke to the wretched man in tender tones, and told him of the consolation offered by religion.

"But," she said, turning to a reporter, "what can I do in one conversation? It needs many. I'm going back to Chicago next week, and I intend to devote considerable time to every prison and house of refuge in the city. I haven't done any work in the city since the anarchist execution."

Mrs. Wheaton's methods of evangelizing are sometimes dramatic. For instance, Mrs. Wheaton arrived in Chicago from St. Louis on a Wabash train early yesterday morning. Night before last, while the train was speeding along in the darkness, the occupants of the reclining chair car were startled.

"Look out!" cried a voice in shrill tones. "We're coming to a high bridge. Before we reach it we pass over a curve. The rails may be all right, the bridge may be safe; but who knows?"

The passengers turned around in their seats. They looked frightened and appeared anxious to know whether there was really an impending danger. They saw only a woman whose face, softened by grief, bore lines of pain and care. She was Mrs. Wheaton.

"But the Christian is not afraid to die," she continued. "He welcomes death as a release from care and a blessing."

Then the evangelist preached a sermon, to which all listened with attention.

Although Mrs. Wheaton has visited every state in the Union many times during her fifteen years of missionary work, she has been in a sleeping car but once. Railroads give her passes. She has no property, and, of course, can collect no money from convicts, though occasionally she receives a contribution on trains.

"The trouble of it all," said she after her talk with the man in the bridewell, "is not in the prisons. It is after the convicts get out. For that, humanity is to blame. Prisoners have not much hope, and some of them accept religion in a tentative sort of way.

"When they are released they are hounded by the police, marked by all citizens as ostracized men, unable to get employment, and, in fact, the second termers tell me they are reduced almost to the necessity of choosing between starvation and stealing. Those whose conversion is real do neither, because no man need ever starve in this country, but the weak go under and are brought back to jail. What the world needs is more Christian charity. We should forgive, as our Saviour did, seventy times seven."

In addition to her charm as a speaker, Mrs. Wheaton is a singer of no mean ability. She is not a believer in men who accept religion for the sake of business and put on a sanctimonious air. The view that she takes of life meets with favor among the convicts, and she sings a song called "The Twin Ballots," which illustrates her opinion on the temperance question. The song is about two rum votes that sanctioned the license plan, "but one was cast by a cunning brewer and one by a Sunday-school man."

The evangelist left last night for Pittsburg, but will return next week. She said she wished to impress upon people the fact that converted prisoners are not hypocrites, although the guards often suspect insincerity and treat a converted man worse than any other, because they think he is seeking to curry favor.—A Chicago paper.

A Disgraceful Proceeding

Thursday afternoon, Mrs. Elizabeth R. Wheaton, the noted prison evangelist, accompanied by a sister, asked permission from a policeman, which was granted, to hold a street meeting for religious purposes.

After singing some hymns, which, from their superior rendition, attracted a large crowd, Mrs. Wheaton, an elderly lady who has devoted seven years of her time entirely to prison evangelical work, began an earnest exhortation to sinners. After preaching for a few minutes Officer C. came up and said that the mayor had ordered him to put a stop to the proceedings.

Mrs. Wheaton said she would do her duty without fear of man and continued for a moment longer. Then the party knelt on the snow and began to pray for the mayor and the policeman. While they were praying the officer came up closely followed by Mayor J., and roughly pushed Mrs. Wheaton over. The mayor with fire in his eye as well as his complexion, spoke in a very rude manner to the ladies, practically endorsing the rough treatment already accorded the party.

Mrs. Wheaton showed The Dispatch credentials from very high sources and a very bulky bundle of railroad passes which gave substantial evidence of the manner in which she and her work are regarded elsewhere.

She has traveled over the United States and Mexico, and parts of Europe, and it remained for a Leadville mayor to break the record and treat her with indignity. She was very much shocked and grieved and said she felt deeply sorry for Leadville, which she had often heard spoken of as a wicked city.

The Dispatch is free to say that Mayor J. acted without adequate provocation and displayed an unnecessary exercise of authority. If the services had been prolonged to any great extent he might have sent a request to have them discontinued, but there was no occasion for any such arbitrary exhibition of power as was made.

Far greater blockades with less meritorious objects have existed without protest in Leadville. A medicine faker who pays a few dollars license can yell and sing and make night hideous for hours and it is all right, but a humble evangelical missionary, whose sincerity and good intentions are not doubted, however persons may differ concerning the methods, is unceremoniously made to move on. If the authorities displayed as much zeal in suppressing vice as they do in shutting off missionaries, Leadville would be a model city.

The prison evangelists, after having been ordered off Harrison avenue, visited both city and county jails, where they were kindly received and permitted by the officers to hold services among the prisoners. It is said that this is the first religious service held in the Leadville jails.—Leadville, Colo., Dispatch, March, 1891.

Disgraceful

Last night, when the ladies who have been conducting religious services in the park, were preparing to close, some miscreant in human form threw a small torpedo at them and struck Mrs. Wheaton above the right eye. It did not produce any serious injury, but was very painful at the time, and may terminate worse than at first supposed. This act evidently issued from some low, depraved fiend whom the darkness of the hour shielded from justice. The ladies departed from the city this morning, and the exact result of the disgraceful episode cannot be learned. As soon as it was done some man in the crowd offered $100 reward for the identification of the party who did the dastardly trick, but of course no one knew who the miscreant was except he himself.—Jacksonville, Ill., paper, June 26, 1887.

The Prison Evangelist

"Elizabeth Rider Wheaton, prison evangelist, Chicago, Ill. Meet me in heaven. No home but heaven." This is what is printed on the card of a remarkable woman who visited the penitentiary and talked to the convicts at 11 o'clock on Sunday. This woman has been engaged in this work for about nine years, and she has visited nearly every prison and jail in the United States, Canada and Mexico. She is the Moody of the convict world. She asks for no money. She gives her services free, and trusts to Providence for her support. "The Lord provides," she says. She has held services in a different state or territorial prison the past five Sundays, from Stillwater, Minn. (where Cole Younger is confined and assists in and sometimes leads religious services), to Salem, Oregon. Mrs. Wheaton also visits reform schools. She is one of the chief advocates of the reformatory system being adopted in some of the Eastern prisons whereby convicts of different classes are graded and kept separate, wear different uniforms, etc., and are also let out on furloughs on trial or probation. Mrs. Wheaton devotes her whole time to prison work. She certainly accomplishes some good from all this effort. She was a Methodist before taking up this life work, but now holds to no sect.—Salem, Oregon, paper, Nov. 16, 1891.

A Noble Work

Among the evangelistic workers who go out among the people seeking the low and degraded and trying to lift them up to be better men and women, Elizabeth R. Wheaton is one of the chosen few who is well adapted to this work. She asks no pay and receives none, but with noble purpose and with heart and mind fully in the work which has been given her, she travels from Maine to California and from British Columbia to the Gulf of Mexico.

Her work is chiefly among the state prisons, county jails and reform schools. Here she meets a class of people schooled in vice and who have been kept face to face with the different evils all their lives; these are the people whom she seeks to save.

Mrs. Wheaton has just returned from a successful trip through Mexico and the South and is now on her way to Walla Walla, Portland and British Columbia. She stopped off here to visit our penitentiary and jail. Through the kindness of the warden she held a song service last Sunday at the State penitentiary, and the amount of good which she did was shown by the eager attention of the convicts, and the tear-stained faces of some who, when the good old-fashioned hymns were sung, thought of their far-away homes and mothers. Sunday evening she held services at the jail and on the street, both of which were much appreciated.—Unidentified.

Gospel for the Prisoners

THE INMATES OF ATLANTA'S PRISONS HEARD PREACHING YESTERDAY

The prisoners at police headquarters, at the jail and at the city stockade listened to the gospel of Christ yesterday.

Mrs. Elizabeth Rider Wheaton, the famous prison evangelist, of Washington, held services at all these places. Her talks were of the most interesting character and evidently made deep impressions upon her hearers.

The service at the jail was held in the morning, the one at the stockade in the afternoon, and the one at the police station at night.

Mrs. Wheaton is perhaps the most famous evangelist of her kind in the country. She makes a specialty of this work and follows it closely week after week. She has preached to convicts and prisoners in every state in the Union, frequently traveling as far as 700 miles between Sundays in order to make an appointment. She has letters of introduction from the governors of many states, and free passes on railroads. She is here with the Christian Workers, but is not a delegate.—Atlanta, Ga., paper, Nov. 14, 1893.

Prison Evangelists

THE INMATES OF THE COUNTY JAIL TREATED TO A SERMON

Mrs. Elizabeth Rider Wheaton, the prison evangelist, who has been traveling over the United States for ten years past, and two sisters from Washington, D. C., and Kansas City, arrived in the city this morning and held religious service in the county jail. The twenty-four inmates of the bastile were much pleased with the service.

Mrs. Wheaton and her companions held services yesterday at the prison at Lansing, Kan., where 900 convicts are confined. Lately they have come from the convict camp of South Carolina and Mrs. Wheaton can tell many tales of the sufferings endured by the prisoners there.—Unidentified.

The News at Leavenworth

MOTHER WHEATON, PRISON EVANGELIST, VISITS THE UNITED STATES PRISON

Religious services at the federal penitentiary at Fort Leavenworth yesterday were somewhat out of the usual order. Mother Wheaton, the prison evangelist, late of Washington, D. C., now of Iowa, preached to the convicts at the morning hour. Her address was a most effective one and men all through the audience were moved to tears. At the close of the service she stood at the chapel door and shook the hand of each prisoner as he went out.

Her head is white with age, yet she has visited the prisons of the United States and many in Europe, bearing messages of hope and cheer to the condemned. She is not alone a woman of ready speech, but is a sweet singer as well. Her life is dedicated to her work, and many is the unfortunate who has cause to bless the visit of Mother Wheaton. Mrs. T., of this city, accompanied her to the prison.—Leavenworth, Kan., paper.

Jail Service

The inmates of the county jail were honored yesterday by a visit from that well known prison evangelist, Elizabeth Rider Wheaton, who was accompanied by a Mrs. S., of Kansas. Mrs. Wheaton conducted religious services and her talk had a deep effect upon murderer Williamson, the old man being visibly moved.

Mrs. Wheaton has made the visiting of prisons, condemned men and fallen women her life work, and in the course of her travels during the past seven years has visited Europe, the British provinces, Mexico and the United States. As an example of her earnest efforts it may be mentioned that during the past thirteen Sundays she has visited and held services in fourteen different state penitentiaries. Mrs. Wheaton is a lady of striking appearance. She has a motherly countenance and a magnetism which attracts the closest attention to what she says. Her discourse yesterday was eloquent, yet at times plain and pointed to severity. Mrs. Wheaton left yesterday on the afternoon train for the Pacific coast.—Sedalia, Mo., paper, November, 1891.