Prison Second division 1921

[Jane65]

It seems an ancestor of mine was convicted in 1921 and sent to a Second Division prison for 1 year.  After that he was put in the hands of the Home Office due to mental illness.
Does anyone know what a second division prison was? & what might have happened to him when the Home office got involved?

Many thanks

[stanmapstone]

Welcome to RootsChat
The Prison Act 1898 made provision for the courts to classify into three divisions those sentenced to imprisonment without hard labour.
The Second Division of Misdemeanants were subject to a less rigorous treatment than those sentenced to "Hard Labour". They included debtors and offenders whose acts, though legally criminal, involved nothing dishonourable or disgraceful.
For details of the three divisions see http://www.rootschat.com/links/01hsp/

Just to add that Section 1 of the Criminal Justice Act 1948 abolished the prison divisions together with penal servitude and hard labour.

Stan

[stanmapstone]

Does anyone know what a second division prison was? & what might have happened to him when the Home office got involved?

Many thanks

The Home Office was responsible for running  mental health asylums such as Broadmoor Hospital, as well as Rampton and Moss Side Hospitals in the north of England. So he could have been sent to one of them.

Stan

[Jane65]

Thank you Stanmapstone all i could find was about suffragetts in the 2nd.
 I wonder if there is anyway to find out what happened if he did get sent to a hospital after?  The next record i find on him is his marriage in '25
More research to do!!

[Timbottawa]

My grandfather was imprisoned in the second division in 1922 for 6 weeks.  Would he have (most likely) gone to the nearest prison, or could he have gone to any prison?

Thanks for all thoughts!