Prisons and Prayer Part 32

gasped the official. Quick as a flash came the answer, "To heaven!" But by this time the railroad man had recovered from his surprise, and seemed equal to the emergency, and proved himself to be a gentleman as well, for he said quietly: "If that is your destination, madam, I am unable to accommodate you, for I regret to say the place is not on our line; but if you want a pa.s.s to any place on our road you can have it." In relating the incident in the prison chapel Mother Wheaton added that she secured her pa.s.s to Fort Madison, and that when she reached here she thought she was next to heaven, for here she had first attempted her work for souls, in State's Prisons, and here she believed many precious trophies for the Master had been given her.

I noticed on her last visit that while she seemed in usual health, her hair was whiter, betokening the gathering years. I could wish that now she who for so many years has not known the blessing of home, might find a place in which to spend in rest and communion with G.o.d, and helpful but gentle ministrations, the balance of her life, until He whom she has followed in her efforts to do good, may say: "Come up higher, thou blessed of my Father. Inasmuch as ye did it unto the least of these my brethren ye did it unto me."

A. H. JESSUP, Chaplain Iowa State Penitentiary.

Fort Madison, Iowa, April 18, 1904.

WORK IN SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO.

Several interesting experiences have occurred in connection with my visits to the prison at Santa Fe, New Mexico. At one time I found there a good old Christian man, "a trusty," who had charge of the Superintendent's horses, driving the family to town, etc., and had much liberty given him. One day he sat in front of me, driving to town, and I said to him, "I am going to pray to G.o.d to remove the 'stripes' from you." He said, "Pray for my release--I know G.o.d hears prayer." I did so, as did also my good co-workers, returned missionaries home from Africa on a visit. In three or four days the warden gave him citizens' clothes; and soon after the governor gave him his pardon.

We were led to pray for a pardon for brother T. of the same prison, and in three months he was a free man. At the time I had a sister with me from j.a.pan. On my return from the Pacific coast we again held services in the prison at Santa Fe, and during the meeting I said, "What do you want me to sing, boys?" One said, "Sing, 'Some Mother's Boy.'" I did so, and in the morning, before I left the prison, the officer said to me, "Here is two dollars a man sent in from the prison for you." Upon inquiring the name of the prisoner I found it was J. L.

As they told me he was a good man, a Christian, and a good prisoner, I took his case also to the Lord in prayer. Within three weeks he was given a pardon by the governor. The three men mentioned were all Christians.

In none of these cases did I go to the governor, but just left all in G.o.d's hands, and prayed if G.o.d was pleased to set these men free, that He would impress the governor to give them their release. These cases occurred at different times. I am sure that the hope of pardon has in many cases saved the lives of prisoners, and also saved them from insanity.

I give below a letter received from Brother T., also quote from a sketch of his life, as published by McAuley Water Street Mission, N.

Y., and sent me by himself; also letters from the Secretary of the Christian Endeavor Society of the Santa Fe Prison, and very kind letters from Governor Thornton, Superintendent H. O. Bursom, and Brother S. H. Hadley, of Water Street Mission.

May 26, 1903.

Dear Mother Wheaton:

I suppose you will be surprised to hear from me. The last time I saw you was in the Santa Fe Territorial Prison. You had a meeting in the cell house. I was the trusty who went with you to the depot. If you remember, you prayed for the removal of the number from the back of No. 917 and that he would be freed; you also told me you would pray that I would get out of prison. Your prayers have been answered. I was pardoned last Christmas, and am here working among the criminal cla.s.ses as a missionary. You remember of my having been converted before your visit to the prison. It is a great blessing to me to spend the balance of my life thus, who had been sent to prison for forty years, under conviction and sentence for a crime of which I was perfectly innocent, although I was a great sinner in other respects.

Yours in the grand work, E. U. T.

SENTENCED TO FORTY YEARS IN PRISON.

On the night of July 6, 18----, I was playing the banjo in a notorious gambling house in Albuquerque, New Mexico. It had been my business for years and I liked the surroundings; they suited me exactly; in fact, I have traveled from my home in the East, from city to city, through all the slumdum of the western cities playing my banjo; I thoroughly enjoyed it and the company which it brought me. * * * I was arrested on suspicion and locked in jail. I had no money, no friends and no character, and I began to realize for the first time what my life was bringing me. I was finally brought to trial and convicted on circ.u.mstantial evidence, and sentenced to forty years in prison for a crime that I knew nothing more about than the judge who sat upon the bench.

Dear reader, can you enter into this story with me; can you form an idea of my despair as I received practically a life sentence for something which I did not do? My heart was hard and bitter against myself and everybody else as I was taken to the Territorial penitentiary at Santa Fe, New Mexico. I was in the prime of life, only 28 years old, but, oh, what steps I had already taken in the downward path that leadeth unto death. Every evil habit had fastened itself upon me, and after I had taken my place in the prison I almost went wild with terror and despair when I realized what was before me. I was soon set to work with pick and shovel digging out trenches on the grounds, and I tried to do the work the best I could and be a good prisoner. I presume I was, for a little time afterward I was placed in the library, and had charge of the greenhouse as well.

One Sunday afternoon in the chapel the speaker took for his text, St. John, 3, 14th and 15th verses: "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up;"

"That whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

The speaker dwelt at length on this actual occurrence and also how G.o.d commanded Moses to erect a pole with the bra.s.s serpent, and although there were there people dying by the thousands, those that looked on that brazen serpent were healed. He brought the application home to us prisoners--how the serpent of sin had stung us so deeply and our only remedy was to look to Jesus Christ, who was lifted up on the cross, and my hard heart began to melt and a desire came to me to be healed of this terrible serpent's bite. The speaker instructed us when we got back to our cells to read this whole chapter, and when I got back to my cell I took up the book and read, and I prayed to G.o.d to open my heart so that I could understand what He wanted of me, and as I read the blessed Holy Spirit came to my poor soul and showed me what a sinful man I was, and I then and there became a child of G.o.d.

Great peace came to my soul, which at first I could scarcely understand, but although still a prisoner and wearing the stripes, I was a free man in Christ Jesus, and I rejoiced in my new found life. After this, prison life was not so dreary as it was before.

Among the many different workers who came to the prison was Mr.

and Mrs. J. E. Wood, of Santa Fe; he is Mail Agent on the road.

He is a blessed man, and one who loves the prisoners. Another person I would like to mention is the person known as "Mother Wheaton." I think I should speak of a little circ.u.mstance that happened to one prisoner who went by the number 917, and who wore this number in great big cloth figures on his back; he drove "Mother Wheaton" to town, as he was a "trusty," and she said that she was going to pray that the Lord would take that number off his back, and in a few days after that the Warden came in with a new suit of clothes for him without the stripes or number--citizen's clothes. She once said to me: "I am going to pray to the Lord to get you out of here," reminding me of the prayer she made for No. 917. "Mother Wheaton" prayed for my release. On Christmas day, 1902, three months after the above conversation took place, I was in the chapel of the prison in the entertainment that was going on. Governor Otero sat in the balcony.

The custom is that someone shall receive a pardon on Christmas day, and no one has any intimation who it is excepting the Governor. I had not the slightest idea that I would be the lucky man, and after the a.s.sistant Superintendent asked that I play a certain composition of my own, he requested me to step out and he read the pardon; to my surprise my name was in the pardon, and, oh, the joy that came to me when I began to realize that I was a free man, but, dear reader, this pardon, great as it was, did not compare with the joy that came in my soul as I realized that I had received the pardon from my Redeemer, and that all my sins were forgiven and all my past crimes blotted out.

While in the prison I read an account in a paper of the experience of S. H. Hadley, who was then in New York connected with the Jerry McAuley Mission, and I was desirous of going to New York to meet this man. I did so, and before I had been ten minutes in his office he told me what already was filling my soul, that I should be a worker for Christ and try to save those who had fallen, and the down-trodden. I stepped out on the Lord's promises with but very little knowledge, except the knowledge of sins forgiven, and a big hope in my soul of eternal life, and a love that I cannot express, without one dollar in my pocket, but with the simple faith in Jesus. I am working every night and day at every door that is open, and every one that I can open, where I can tell the wonderful story of Jesus' love to sinners. Dear reader, pray for me that G.o.d may wonderfully use me.

"The dying thief rejoiced to see The Fountain in his day, And there I do, though vile as he, Wash all my sins away."

New York, ---- 18, 1904.

Dear Mother:

It gives me much pleasure when I think of your going from prison to prison telling the poor boys and girls behind the bars of Jesus. It always gave me great joy when I heard that our dear mother was going to speak to her boys at ---- Prison; because I knew you were our friend. I wish to again thank you for the day that you prayed that G.o.d would open the prison doors for me. G.o.d answered your prayer, and after serving about seven years of a forty years' sentence the prison doors were opened for me, and G.o.d sent me to New York to labor for souls. He sent me to Mr. S.

H. Hadley, the present superintendent of the old McAuley Mission, and he has been indeed a father to me.

I am so thankful that G.o.d sent me to such a good man--one who loves the lost sinner; and one who is willing to do anything in his power to help the helpless. May G.o.d's richest blessings be your portion is the prayer of your son in the Gospel.

E. U. T.

McAuley Water Street Mission, New York, Sept. 11, 1903.

"Mother Wheaton," as the boys behind the prison-bars, yes, and those who have by her prayers gone out from behind the prison-bars, affectionately call her, is one of the unique, missionary characters in this country. She travels all over this land with but one object in view and that is to tell sinners of the powerful, deathless love of Jesus and how no one can be too bad for Him to save. She brings suns.h.i.+ne to many sorrowing hearts and hope to thousands who never knew what hope was until they met her. An ex-convict, who is one of my helpers now, was prayed out of practically a life sentence by Mother Wheaton.

I have seen her curled up in some seat in a day coach at three o'clock in the morning on a Southern railroad because she had not money enough to take a "sleeper" and had to travel all night or lose an appointment to speak at some stockade or prison.

G.o.d bless her book and speed it on.

S. H. HADLEY.

Santa Fe, N. M., May 26, 1903.

Elizabeth Wheaton, Prison Evangelist, Los Angeles, Cal.

Dear Friend in Christ: Yours of 23d received, and am happy to say that Mr. Trout (No. 99) has been pardoned, and is now engaged in bringing souls to Christ down on Water street in the McAuley Mission, New York City, using his musical talents to further the cause in which he is now devoting the rest of his life. I am sure he would be more than pleased to hear from you. All the boys are as well as could be expected, and a visit from you would be much appreciated.

The C. E. S. has increased by seventy, making a total of one hundred and five. G.o.d bless you in all your efforts in the cause of Christ is the wish of all.

Respectfully, P. M., sec. Prison C. E. S.

Santa Fe, N. M., July 28, 1903.

Dear Mother: ... Your letter to Mr. J. W. L. came to hand in due time. I wrote you at Tabor, Iowa, in regard to the G.o.d-given gift, sweet liberty, which came to him on the twelfth of July.

G.o.d has answered your prayer sooner than he had expected. He left the prison gates with full trust and confidence in the mercies of the omnipotent power of G.o.d. He is now in W---- with his brother.

May G.o.d's benign countenance look down upon you and increase the manifold blessing and grace that He has so richly endowed you with. I will distribute the tracts and learn the song. All your boys send their respects and wish to be remembered in your prayers.

Yours in Christ Jesus, P. M., Sec. C. E. S.