... prisoner to sit and pick apart a length of tarred naval rope into its various strands. The preciseness of this labour was so much so 'that the strands of the rope had to be pulled apart till they were as fine as silk'1. The very aims of these tasks were to break the spirit of the convict and to reinforce the idea that this was a punishment. Although some tasks were monotonous and without point, other work projects such as weaving were done by the prisoners in their cells and would have allowed them to learn a trade, that if they wished, could be used to their advantage once released into the general population. The main downside to hanging for a convicted felon is in its state of permanency. Convicts of the 19th century, given a choice, would probably have opted for the alternative sentences that could have been made available ...

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