TRANSPORTATION, PENAL. Banishment from society in the form of exile, ostracism, or For further statistics and general discussion of this subject, see RAILWAYS and STEAM NAVI GATION.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Van der Borght, Das VerBibliography. Van der Borght, Das Ver- kehrswesen (Leipzig, 1894) ; Lindsay, History of Merchant Shipping (4 vols., London, 1874 76) : Hadley, Railroad Transportation (New York, 188(i) ; Picard, Traite des chemins de fer (4 vols.. Paris, 1887) Cotz. Die rerkehrs wege inn Dicnstc des Welthandels (Stuttgart, 1888); Van Oss, American Railroads as In vestments (New York, 1893): Davis. The Union Pacific Railway (Chicago, 1894) ; Fry, History of North Atlantic Steam. Navigation (London, 1896) ; Bibliographies in Borght, op. cit., and Publications of Stanford University, 1895 (Hop kins Railroad Library): Interstate Commerce Commission Reports (annual) ; Poor's Manual of Railroads (annual) ; Reports of the Commission er of (annual) ; Archly fiir Eisen bahnwese n ; Statistical Abstract of the United Kingdom Statistischcs Jahrbuch des Deutschen Reichs (annual) ; etc.
nations and in medimval Europe. In England, under a statute of Elizabeth (1597), 'dangerous rogues' might be banished by justices in quar ter sessions, but no system of transportation can be said to have arisen till the time of Charles H., when justices were empowered to send certain offenders to America instead of inflicting the death penalty. In 1717 trans portation was authorized as a substitute for other punishments than hanging, and the con tract system, by which individuals agreed to transport convicts in return for their labor• during the period of sentence, was established. The business was profitable at first, but be came less and less so, until a payment had to be made for each criminal transported. Pro tests from America were frequent, but were un availing. After 1770 a twofold system was de veloped. To meet the immediate need, hulks stationed in the Thames (later at Portsmouth and other places) were arranged to receive con victs; and though this was begun merely as a temporary expedient, it endured as a legalized system for over three-quarters of a century. In volving as it did the crowding of prisoners under extremely bad sanitary and moral conditions, the hulk system was severely criticised by sev eral Parliamentary committees, but it was abol ished only gradually, as penitentiaries were constructed.
Within a decade after 1776 another settlement for criminals had been found in Australia. In 17S7 the first lot of convicts left for New South Wales. In 1804 they began to be sent to Tasmania. The number transported was at first small. The annual average up to 1816 was less than 500, but it rose to 3000 during the twenties and thirties. The spirit and prac tice of the system were essentially penal, not reformatory, and conditions of life in a colony where the majority of persons were convicts were almost inevitably bad. The report of the
Parliamentary committee of 183S condemned the system at almost all points, and a few years later (1842) a 'probation system' was planned by which prisoners were classified and might pass through various stages toward pardon or freedom. The essential difficulty of the scheme was to find work in the colonies for ticket-of leave men or 'probationers,' while the matter was further complicated by an increasing ob jection of the colonists to the importation of con victs. Transportation to New South Wales ceased after 1849, and to Tasmania after ]S52. Thenceforth Western Australia was the only outlet, and though the probation system, im proved in 1847, worked there successfully, the colony was quite unable to provide for all Eng lish convicts. With the development of the system of penal servitude (1853-63) transporta tion declined, and the last shipment of criminals to Western Australia was in 1867.
In France penal transportation was estab lished by a law of 1854. Guiana was at first utilized as a place to send criminals, but its climate proved quite unsuitable, and except for negro convicts it has been abandoned as a penal settlement since 1867. Mention might be made, however, of the notable exception of Captain Al fred Dreyfus (q.v.). In 1864 convicts were sent to New Caledonia, where conditions have been much more favorable; but, though the system still continues in use, it is not regarded with much favor. Russia is the only other modern nation which has practiced transportation on a large scale. Siberia was made a place of settle ment in the seventeenth century, and after the discovery of the mines the system grew apace. Between 1807 and 1S99 it was estimated that 865,000 persons had been transported to Siberia. Since 1869 the island of Saghalien (q.v.) has been used largely as a penal colony. In 1896 it contained 5,000 convicts and exiles, and less than 3,000 free settlers. The horrors of Siberian exile which Krapotkin, Dostoyevsky, and others have told to the Western world, have been considerably mitigated in recent years. Convict labor does not prove of permanent eco nomic advantage, and in Siberia, as elsewhere, it has been found impossible to colonize a coun try with convicts. In 1900, following the in vestigation of a commission of 1S99, the Rus sian penal system was radically reformed. Im prisonment is to take the plane of exile for all except political and religious offenders. No further attempt is to be made to settle convicts as colonists, but all those exiled will remain imprisoned during their sentences. Consult: Du Cane, Punishment and Prevention of Crime (London, lSS5) ; Wines, Punishment and Reformation. (ib., 1895) ; Holtzendorff, Die Deportation. als Stratmittcl (Leipzig, 1S59) ; Krapotkin, In Russian Prisons (London, 1887) ; Kennan, Siberia, and the Emile System (New York, 1S91) ; De Windt, The :Veio Siberia, (London, 1S96).