Germany

Germany 17´th century.
Heidi´s confessor had felt forbidden feelings when looking at her in the church.
He told his bishop about his problem.  It was decided,to lock poor Heidi up for life, as the devil must have taken residence in her sinfull body.  As extra punishment she was to wear a spiked punishment collar.  Nobody could see anything wrong in doing so, and if someone did, he or she would keep quiet.  Nobody outside the prison ever heard from her again.

Been born rich, or having been so lucky as from nature´s hand to be provided with a stunning body, or a brilliant brain,  has through time proved not to have been a guarantee for a happy life in the sunshine.  
Politics, religious fanaticism, family affairs,  jealousy, strict moral laws or pure unluck has transformed many good lifes into a life in pain, need and misery
 

She goes to trial
18´th century
 

Germany in the 16´th century. 
 

A rich noble woman visits a prisoner.  It is one of her former maids. She often accused her servants for stealing from her.  This one, she said, had stolen a ring.  In her lifetime a half a dozen of her maids ended up dying in prison.
 

 Noble girl.
A victim of politics.
17´th century
 

A young woman´s life is on stake. 
An insignificant checker in a trial about heresy.
 

"No ! - Come back ! - Don´t leave me here !
I will do anything to please you !"
 
An nobleman dismisses his mistress.. 
 

Torture in Germany in the 16´th century.
 

After the torture. 
 
 Germany 16´th century.
 

Germany.
She rejected the nobleman´s advances. 
Now she is facing her first night in the cellar. 
 

She still has a good looking body, the jailor thinks.  But she has only been a prisoner for a few weeks until now.   In two or three years she will look quite different. 
 

"Here is something to eat, little thiefs." 

Pia waits a moment, until the dry bread has sucked up some of the dirty water, before she with a practised movement, picks it up with her dissolved feet.  She finds it much easier to do it, while the cell is still lightened by the jailors torch.   Her sister Lisa, on the other hand, always turns her back and tries to hide her female attributes, until the jailor has left them to the pitch-darkness again.  Then she can use hours, trying to find the crumbled pieces with her toes, among all the filth drifting around. 

"Wake up - sluts ! We can´t having you strangling yourselfs, while you sleep ! " 

In the next cell are 3 girls.  They too are straining to keep standing up in the filth filled water. 

All the basement cells are connected together with a small barred openning at the floor, so the water is kept in the same level in all of the cells. 

"Your father has not paid, so 
now you are going into a real prison !" 

Heidi´s parents had gone bankrupt. 
To keep them and her brothers out of trouble, Heidi volunteered to go into the debtors' prison instead of them.  But after a few days, they all fleed the country, leaving their depts and Heidi behind them.

Heidi in her prison cell 5 years later. 

This was something very different from the more comfortable deptors-prison, where she had been allowed both clothing and real food, and where she had expected to spend only a few weeks in chains, and not the rest of her life.  

"I confess ! - Please tell the judge I confess.  I took the money without my husbands permission !"
 
Not able to stand sitting in the stocks in the dark and damp cellar anymore, Marlene, even completely innocent, has become ready to confess anything to get out of there. 


 

Contented with Marlene´s confession, the judge had her transfered to a more comfortable cell.  
Here she stayed the rest of her life. 

Her crime?  She had married a handsome young man, not knowing he was a gambler.  When confronted with the fact, that a large amount of the family means was missing, he accused his young wife of stealing it. 
 

France 

French prostitute after arrest 
18´th  century
 

Young thief.
She stole a bread.

France in the 15`th century. 
 

Chained to a wall 
 France 17´th century
 

"Well, well - So you thought, you could say no to me!"
 

In the 13´th century. 
A young woman is brought to her first interrogation. 

Four months later on her way to the Court to receive her final sentence. 
 

England

19´th century England. 
Just being poor could resulted in being grabed by the police in the streets and send to the treadmills.
 

Punished for laziness.
 

Not only people who were born poor risked ending up in the mines. 
This picture shows the Wolverton sisters.  In 1780 both their parents died in a carriage accident.
An uncel and an aunt were assigned to be their guardians, and administer their large fortune, until the girls became of age.   At the time the eldest sister became 25, all the fortune was gone, and only depts remained.  The creditors couldn´t tuch the uncel and the aunt, as they had protected themselfs legally against any claims.  

One early morning the two young women were fetched by a carrige, and were driven to a coal mine.
Registers shows that five years later, they were still alive working in the mine. 
What happened later, nobody outside the mine knows.
 

In the early days of colonization most of the slaves, were white people. 

"Keep those hands up stupid wench !"

This Irish girl was deported to the West Indies in the late 1700´th.  Put on display, she had to stand for hours, while holding her heavy irons up.  This was so she should fetch a better price, by showing her strength.  She was at the end of the day, sold to a plantation owner to be used as a labourer. 

Spain

"Please listen to me!  This is a mistake!"
Spain 17 century 
 

Beggar girl deported to hard labour. 
 Spain 17´th century.
 

Transport to the bagnes for hard labor
 

She was declared insane.
Now her brother alone inheritated the estate.
 

The Spanish Inquisition

The Spanish Inquisition. 

Waiting ! 
 

The victims were held in pain to save their souls.

Some had to wait for many months in the cellars. 

This Spanish girl had to wait 6 months before her sentence was carried out. 

A monk-confessor visits a victim in the inguisition´s prison in the 16´th century
 .

Inquisitorial torture.
 

After the verdict the victims were sometimes forced to wait for weeks, suffering from their burns, and from thirst and hunger, before their execution.

At last months of pain is about to be over. 
She had been arrested for being an atheist. 
The monks and nuns had not tortured her of cruelty.  They had done it, because they believed, it would save her soul from hell. 

Some, like this girl, were kept in the dark dungeons for years, without knowing when it would be their turn. 
 

"Wake up bitch!  I have good new for you. 
You will be burned tomorrow!" 

Others were brought to the stake only a few days after their convictions. 
 

Nina tries to enjoy the sun and the fresh air.
It was six months since she last saw it. 
In half an hour it will be all over. 
 

The inguisition never slept .
While Nina was still burning on the stake,
a new girl was already stretched on the rack.
  

Trying tyo sleep. 
 

One more day has gone.
 

"We know you have confessed.  But
now we want you to confess again, so we
can be sure, you havn´t lied !"
 

After one week.
 

"Stop screaming and tell us the truth !"

A sensible girl. 
She told them straight away, 
what they wanted to hear ! 

She wouldn´t give up ! 
Even at this point, she still tried to free herself, 
but the chains were to strong. 
 

"They are not worth much, but
load them into the wagon." 
 

Facing a very different life, 
from what she was brought up to! 
 

This  muscular hard labor slave girl belonged to a craftsman. 
Aware of her strength, her owner always keept her locked in the stocks, when she was not working. 
 

Her decadent mistress became jealous of her beauty.
 Instead of simply selling her, 
she had her thrown into prison. 
 

This new slave from Britain did not fetch a reasonable price at her first auction.  She now awaits the next weeks auction.  If she is not sold then... ! 
 

 
In some states in the USA in the 19´th century, 
 young women and girls could get very long prison sentences for even minor offences, such as walking in the streets alone after dark, being a stubborn child, having run away from home, lewd behaviour, caught mastubating, or simply been seen kissing.  In some incidents just being a beautiful young girl, catching to much attention from the males in a small town, was enough to be seized by the local marshall in the street or at home, and receive an one way ticket into prison. 
 

 
In the madhouses the conditions could be even worse.
Those who were not insane, when they arrived, without doubt became it after some years.
 

This girl was locked into the chair. 
It was not unormal, that patients was locked permantly into it  like this for years.  They were feed with gruel once a day, and in the seat was a hole, under which stood a bucked for their waistes.

Another apparatus to keep patiens calm, was this wooden stock.  This was unbelievably also meant to be worn permantly.

In this case it was used together with a gag, as the staff had become tirred of constantly hearing the girl pleading her sanity, and crying and begging to be released.
 

Two girls help each other. 
 

This young woman was a prominent patient. 
To keep it a secret, who she was, she spended her life  alone in a cell in the basement.

 
In an American prison for women in the 1980´th.
 

A veiw from the punishment cells. 
 New long time prisoners always begane their sentences with a week in a punishment cell, as an introduction to their new life in prison.  This was also where they would end up if unruly.  They could be put there up to 6 month at a time.  Their days were divided into 12 hours chained to 2 rings in the floor, and 12 hours standing or walking about, in which they were not allowed to sit or lie down.  If they did so anyway, their senteces were prolonged. 
 

Another negress in handcuffs.
 

Punished for making fun in the prison.
 

In the punishment cell.
 

Chile,  political prisoner 1974. 

Stolen lifes!  Young girls expelled from their families.  Mostly for moral offences. 
Once inside, the institution will never let go of them again.
 

Two beautiful young blonds, pass each other in the street.  
They are of the same age, and only a few feet separates  them, but fate has given them two very different lifes.  One wears expencive clothes, jewellery and fine shoes.  The other a coarse prison dress, chains and has been barefooted for years.   One smells of perfume, the other of old sweat and dirt.  

The girl on the chain gang, Jane, recognize at once the expensively dressed young woman.  It is her former room mate and best friend at college.  Susan, on the other hand, don´t as much as look in her direction.  Jane keeps her mouth shut.  She don´t want Susan, or any other of her old friends to see her like this, a smelly slave in chains.  She also knows, she will be punished very hard, if she is seen talking to anyone in the streets.  How could this ever have happened to her ?   She is so ashamed.  She had been so naiv.  Why had she agreed to carry her boy friends bag through the customs, that horrible day so long ago. 
  

Many young girls from East Asia and the Philippines tries to get work abroad as house maids or factory workers, so they can earn some money, they can send back home to their families. 

For the most it goes well, but for others, specially those who try to seek their fortune in undemocratic countries with a low opinion concerning women, it sometimes goes disasteres.   

If they can´t pay the bribes to the police and immigration officers, they are simply thrown into prison until somebody pays for them.  If nobody do ----- ! 

 Please God, let one in my family win the lottery ! 
 

As long as the relatives send some money, the girls are at least allowed a cell with some sunlight
 and freash air. 
 

"Useless bitch - You go down to the basement now !" 
 

Once in the basement cells, there is no way out again.  The hatch is only openned once a day, so the guard can throw some rotten food into the cell.  
 

"Dirty slut ! 
 You better clean up after your self. 
Use your tongue !" 
 

Long long days in solitary. 
 

The Inquisition.
 

Being prepared for the Inquisition.
 

Punishment cell in an old American prison.
 

In a prison in South-East Asia: 

Sabine, a young blond French tourist, gasps for air, as the door to the punishment cell at last is opened.

Collective punishments are common.  If one prisoner breack the rules, all are punished. 

An evening, Sabine had been tempted by a local guy, she had met, to try to smoke a joint on the beach.   The police came.  Her new boyfriend got off by paying the police.  Sabine got 25 years in prison. 
 

Stocks in Germany in the old times.
 

Russia in the 1930´th. 
A girl after interrogation in one of Stalin`s prisons.  Tomorrow she will be interrogated again. 
 

Hidden experiments:  
Girls used for long-term clinical trials of new drugs.  Those who are to be examined by the doctor today, are standing with their hands tied to the hooks. Ready for the needles.