Zebulon Brockway

I have a love for many many things with history and true crime, and a love for when all my interests overlap.

I studied criminology briefly and plan to continue learning on my own, and in one of the articles I'd read I'd learned about a man by the name of Zebulon Reed Brockway.

Zebulon Brockway was born on April 27th, 1827 in Lyme, Connecticut to his parents, Zebulon and Caroline Brockway. He had several siblings, and on April 13th, 1853 he married a woman named Jane Woodhouse.

Zebulon Brockway began his career in 1848, as a worker at a state prison in Wethersfield, Connecticut, and by 23 years old he was a clerk at the prison. He worked in Albany as an assistant superintendent of the Municipal Alms House.

He was made the superintendent of the Monroe County NY prison in 1854 and he focused mainly on the rehabilitation of the prisoners. In 1861 he ran a prison in Detroit Michigan. There, he attempted to introduce a work and release program. While in Detroit, he also got inspired to begin his prison reforms, but was reassigned in 1872, when his views were no longer accepted anymore.

Brockway was already made the superintendent of the Elmira Reformatory before it was even built in 1876, and he was the warden until 1900. While there, he claimed to introduce education, trades, p.e., inmate classifications and an incentive program. All of which, wasn't widely accepted at the time.

Publicly, it seemed Brockway believed prisons should be used to rehabilitate criminals, instead of just simply punish them. These claims were made based on “prison science”. Brockway also advocated to provide Christian moral education, manual labor, and such as a hope to reform an individual.

However, by 1895, the State Board of Charities had opened an investigation, based on claims of brutality in the Elmira prison. John Gilmore, a man who'd been imprisoned there, appeared before a judge and begged to be sent to the State Prison instead of returned to the Elmira one. This investigation revealed that Brockway himself regularly inflicted violent punishments on those incarcerated at the prison, utilizing forced labor, solitary confinement, refusal to give medical care and starvation as ways to control and govern them.

Many individuals incarcerated at the prison also testified, claiming many were sexually abused, that the grading system in place was actually used as method to keep prisoners for longer terms, and that Brockway wouldn't let some out unless they agreed to work for the prison - one individual even committed suicide over this.

The final report, released March 14th, 1894, revealed “That the charges and allegations against the general superintendent Z.R. Brockway, of ‘cruel and unusual punishment of the inmates’ was proven and most apply sustained by the evidence, that he is guilty of the same.”

Brockway retired in 1900, at 72 years old, after continuing to recieve criticism and backlash for the 1894 reveal. He was still a popular individual in Elmira though and in 1905 he was elected the mayor. He served as mayor until 1907, and he wrote an autobiography in 1912.

Zebulon Reed Brockway passed in October, 1920, at the old age of 93 years old. He'd lived in Elmira for the rest of his life, and left behind two daughters, who both lived in Elmira.

And honestly? Some of you in Elmira NY may be descended from him - I've started his tree now for this research!

Blessed be,

Valkyrie