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CHAPTER X....concluded
One of the latest improvements in the Emigration Depôt at Castle Garden is its direct connection by telegraph with every part of the United States and the British Provinces; so that an emigrant, on landing, may at once communicate with expecting friends in any part of North America.
Having referred to some of the most salient features of the establishment at Castle Garden, I may briefly glance at Ward's Island, which is the crowning feature of the whole, combining everything necessary for the care and comfort and protection of the stranger which enlightened benevolence and practical experience could suggest, or the most liberal expenditure could provide. When one remembers the bed of broken straw, the rotten flour, the decayed vegetables, the putrid meat, specially procured for the sick emigrants of 1847 and 1848, by the ship-brokers of that day, one may well invoke a blessing on the noble-hearted men to whose humanity, courage, and perseverance the existing system is mainly due.
Removed, by its insular position, from all contact with the city, its shores washed by the ever-moving tide of the Sound, lies Ward's Island, 110 acres of which are now in possession of the Commissioners, and devoted to the varied purposes of the institution. The stranger is astonished at beholding the splendid groups of buildings that, as it were, crown the island--asylums, refuges, schools, hospitals; the latter for surgical, medical, and contagious cases. These buildings were capable last year of accommodating more than 1,500 persons, and they are added to according to the means at the disposal of the Commission. On the 10th of August, 1864, was laid the foundation stone of an hospital with accommodation for 500 patients; which hospital, designed and furnished with all the latest improvements, is admitted by competent judges--including Miss Nightingale*--to be one of the most complete in the world. I visited this hospital in March, 1867, and though not qualified to pronounce an opinion which would be of any practical value, I cannot refrain from expressing the admiration with which I beheld so noble an institution, equal in every respect to the best I had seen in London, Rome, Paris, or Vienna; and, from its peculiar position, especially its entire isolation from other buildings, and being erected on an island, more favourable to the treatment and recovery of the patient than any hospital in a great city. The Commissioners have been careful to provide an unlimited supply of the pure Croton for the inmates of the different establishments under their charge; and to another essential requisite of health--a thorough system of drainage and sewerage--they have devoted considerable attention. The result is a low rate of mortality in hospital and asylum, among infants and adults; which contrasts most favourably with institutions of a similar nature, but not enjoying the special advantages that distinguish those of Ward's Island. The staff, surgical and medical, is equal to the necessity, and consists of men eminent in their different branches of the healing art.
It may be interesting to contrast the number of persons, patients or inmates, at Ward's Island on the 30th of June, 1867, with the number at the corresponding periods of the three previous years. It proves two things--the increased demand on the resources of the institution; also the difficulty of procuring employment, arising not only from the continued overcrowding of New York, but from the inability of these emigrants to push on to the West. The total number of inmates in 1864, while the war was raging, was 1,000. In 1865 it fell to 851. But since then the number has been seriously added to. In 1866 it was 1,251, and on the 30th of June, 1867, it rose to 1,428. The number of able-bodied working men on the island, at a time when the best chances of employment are offered to those inclined to work, is still more significant. In 1864 the number was 42; in 1865 it fell to 34; in 1866 it rose to 100; and in 1867 it was as high as 123. The sick average at least 600, the balance consisting of women and children.
There may be other features of this unpaid Commission to which I should have referred, inasmuch as it has afforded to the whole country an example of what practical benevolence and public spirit are capable of accomplishing; but other subjects of interest demand my attention. It is, however, satisfactory to know that the active attention of Congress and the Government of the United States has been directed to the protection of foreign emigrants, and that an efficient organisation may be expected in the most important of the seaports. From the Report of the Government Commissioner of Emigration, presented to Congress on the 28th of February, 1866, one may learn how formidable is the evil against which it is necessary to combat with unabated energy, as well for the protection of the helpless stranger, as for the interests and the honour of the great country to which, from many motives and causes, he is attracted. The Government Commissioner states that upon entering upon the duties of his office he found himself in conflict with a host of persons who had been long accustomed, in the various ports, to prey upon the immigrant.
Companies, boards, and agencies, with sounding titles and high professions, were ready to deceive and plunder him at every turn, and it required prompt and decisive action to meet this great and growing evil. Many organisations, proper in themselves, but representing special interests, were simply subserving their own plans and the views of some single locality, regardless of the welfare of the immigrant. He states that through the appointment of a superintendent at New York, his bureau has been enabled to break up many swindling agencies with their runners, and protect thousands of emigrants; and he adds: 'This work, however, never ceases. New schemes of fraud spring up whenever occasion offers, and they require continued vigilance to suppress them.' The 'passenger laws' would appear, from this Report, to be systematically violated, indeed boldly set at defiance; and more stringent powers are demanded for their enforcement.†
It is satisfactory to perceive that, at least up to the time of the publication of the Report in question, the policy of the Government Bureau of Emigration was to act in harmony with the unpaid Commission in New York; and for the interests of humanity I may venture to express an earnest hope that no change, however apparently beneficial, may have the effect--the fatal effect--of interfering with the operation or impairing the efficiency of an organisation which has rendered inestimable services to the poor, the feeble, the unprotected, and in a special degree to those of the Irish race. The words of Florence Nightingale, when acknowledging, in 1866, the annual Reports which had been sent to her, may fittingly conclude this branch of my subject: 'These Reports are most businesslike. They testify to an amount of benevolent and successful efforts on behalf of the over-crowded old States of Europe of which America may well be proud.' ‡
END OF CHAPTER X.
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NOTES:-
* Miss Nightingale addressed the following letter to the General Agent:--
'32, South Street, Park Lane, London, W.; April 22, '65.
'SIR,--I have extreme pleasure in acknowledging your kind note of February 22, and some copies of an account of your proceedings at the laying of the stone of your new Emigrant Hospital.
'It will be an admirable building, and much better than any civil hospital of the size in this country.
'It is a noble thing to do, to build such a building--not for your poor, but ours.
'All to whom I have shown copies of your Report feel, as deeply as I do, the importance and nobleness of your work.
'I have distributed the copies you have been good enough to send me, to our Government officials, to our Commissioners of Emigration, and to persons in authority who would feel a deep interest in your work.
'When completed, you will have a magnificent example of sound hospital construction, and one which certainly deserves to be followed elsewhere, and no doubt will be.
'I wish that my health permitted me to acknowledge more worthily your noble works, or to come over and see them, than which nothing would delight me more.
'But I am overwhelmed with business--complete prisoner to my room from illness, from which there is no recovery: and I can only beg that you will believe me, Sir,
'Your most faithful and grateful servant,
'FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE.
'Bernard Casserly, Esq., General Agent Commissioner of Emigration, N. Y.'
† The Commissioner thus reports on this important point:--'In order to ascertain such violations, it was found necessary to appoint two officers, with the consent of the Secretary of State, whose duty it should be to board every immigrant ship, and report to the superintendent whether the provisions of the "passenger Acts" had in each case been complied with. The importance of this course will be felt when it is stated that the superintendent reports to this bureau that of the ships which arrived at New York since the existence of his office, there were none which had not violated the provisions of the Act of 1860, for the better protection of female passengers. One hundred and eighteen complaints were brought before him, which he was directed to refer to the United States' district attorney, under whose advice he dismissed such as he was satisfied were caused by ignorance of the law, and where no injury had been sustained by the immigrant. Even where the injury had been gross, the superintendent found a successful prosecution almost impossible under the condition of the law and his own limited powers. Under the existing laws it is necessary that the complainant institute a suit against the master, owner, or consignee of the vessel, and for this few have the knowledge, ability, time, or means, and fewer the courage. Besides, the immigrant cannot remain for the purposes of prosecution. The remedy for this seems to be in a change of the laws.'
‡ One of the most recent cases on record is the worst that has been for many years brought to the notice of the public. It was of the ship 'Giuseppe Baccariel,' which arrived in New York on July 20, 1867, from Antwerp, where she was chartered by A. Straus & Co. The emigrants--180 in number--were Germans and German Swiss. Eighteen persons died on the passage, and two more immediately after arrival. The emigrants complained to the Commissioners that they were short of provisions; that the water was not drinkable, being kept in petroleum casks; that there was neither tea nor sugar on board; and that the potatoes were rotten. The Commissioners instituted an inquiry, which resulted in proving the truth of all the charges; to which might be added another--that there was neither a doctor nor a drug store on board! Had the ship been longer at sea, the mortality would have been more terrible, as the survivors were pale and feeble, worn and emaciated, and some suffering from diarrhoea and disorders of the bowels. One little child was left as the sole representative of a family of five who sailed from Antwerp in perfect health; the boy's father, brother, and sister having died on board, and his mother in the hospital-ship soon after reaching quarantine. One would suppose this paragraph, from the Report of the gentleman by whom the atrocious case was investigated on the part of the Commissioners, had been written twenty years before:--
'Second--The water. I found it in large sperm oil casks, the oil swimming on the surface. I tried to taste a glass, but the smell was so offensive that I could not overcome my disgust. Captain True (referred to above), however, says he drank a half tumbler of the water, with the object of testing it, and he was shortly afterwards taken with a severe diarrhoea. John Bertram, a passenger from Ahrbuch, Rhenish Prussia, says, under oath, that his dying child asked for some water, and that the cook gave him some, but that it was so bad it had to be boiled, in order to make it drinkable, and that deponent had to pay five francs to the cook for attending to him and his family. Third--The bread. Captain True says that the bread was the worst he ever saw--mouldy and disgusting, and that from one piece an entire bean was taken. I examined the biscuit, of which I tasted a piece; it was of the worst quality--sandy, burned, and hardly digestible --even its appearance was loathsome.'
Among other proceedings of the Commissioners was the adoption of a resolution, proposed by the Hon. Richard O'Gorman,--one of those Irishmen who is a credit and an honour to his country,--referring the case to the urgent attention of the Government.
Mr. O'Gorman is one of the ex-officio members of the Commission. The others are the Mayors of New York and Brooklyn, and the President of the German Society.
Mr. O'Gorman is the President of the Irish Emigrant Society of New York--an admirable institution; but one which might be rendered still more useful, not only in diffusing information valuable to the emigrant, but in imparting a healthful impetus to the occupation of the land by the agricultural class of Irish emigrants.