In the prison yard there was a deep well from which water for bathing and other uses was pumped to a large tank on the prison roof. The pump was manned by four prisoners who had to work in one-hour shifts. A gang of eight men were detailed each week for this work, which was not hard⁠—nothing more than exercise⁠—and no one ever complained. My name was called one Saturday evening and I was instructed to report at the pump the following Monday morning. I thought nothing of it, and would have pumped cheerfully. But that night Soldier Johnnie, who was something of a jail lawyer and agitator for his and his friends’ rights, remarked that they were wrong in forcing me to work because I had not been convicted of any crime and that I ought to refuse to do it. The other two took the matter up and it was argued pro and con. They were pretty technical about it, and the weight of opinion was that it would be establishing a dangerous precedent for an unconvicted man to do any work of any kind in the prison and a test case should be made of it.

I was willing enough, and, looking back at it now, I believe I was glad of the chance to do something to raise myself in the estimation of these distinguished characters.

Monday morning I refused to work, explaining to the officer in charge that I was not lazy, but felt they had no right to order me to work before I was convicted. He appeared surprised, and took me to the office of the prison captain. He heard me out, and turning to the guard, said: “Throw this fresh kid in the cooler and leave him there till he gets ready to work.”

I was given an old pair of overalls and a cotton shirt to wear in the “cooler,” where my outside clothes would have been ruined. The cooler or dark cell was the same as other cells, except that there was nothing in it and the door was solid, admitting no light. The floor and walls were of thin steel and very cold. I slept on the floor without any kind of bedding or cover. There was but one fixture in the cell, a sheet-metal bucket smelling strongly of chloride of lime. My sentence carried the further punishment of bread and water, one thick slice a day and about a quart of water.