Our fab nephew was over here for a visit recently, all the way from Australia. We haven’t seen much of him lately, obviously, and it was great to meet up again. I’ll say he’s our favourite nephew as I know he’s likely to read this. He’s a big fan of our various blogs and wanted to know why I never include any reminiscences of my working life. It’s a question that’s been posed many times and the reason is quite simple, I aren’t allowed to give out names or details relating to much of the work I did. This will be a very different blog post to the usual fare, but fear not, it’s a one-off.
Even now, what I can write about many aspects of my former job is restricted, but here’s a (very) non specific recollection prompted by the discovery of a few scribbled notes I made at the time, thirty years ago, intending to use them for a (obviously, post retirement ) ‘trying to write a novel project.’ I actually used sections of two sentences from these scribblings in my very first published novel, almost twenty years later. Please remember these recollections are from thirty years ago and situations may have changed markedly in the interim.
Thoughts from a maximum-security mental hospital.
Ashworth Hospital on Merseyside is one of only three high-security specialist psychiatric hospitals in England, the others being Rampton and Broadmoor. Ian Brady spent many years in Ashworth and died there in 2017.
As part of the job I used to do, yes, the one I aren’t allowed to talk about in any detail, I had occasion to visit all of them and interview ‘patients’ there on several occasions. Violent criminals, detained under conditions of maximum security, as their nature made them far too dangerous to be confined in even the most secure prison. Scary people, the most disconcerting being those who appeared entirely ‘normal’ ‘ calm, polite, eager to assist me with my questions ‘ an hour with these people and I could guarantee I’d leave the interview room bathed in perspiration.
I’d experienced the usual convoluted system of repeatedly proving my identity and my reasons for attendance. Even for a repeat attendance, when the staff greet me by name, it takes an hour. Minimum. The endless corridors, the double-locked doors, the cameras. Lots of cameras.
Today I wanted to interview a particular inmate ‘ to be strictly accurate I ‘needed’ to see him as distinct from ‘wanted’ to see him ‘ and as the person in question was classified as ‘highly dangerous’ there were extra levels of security in place. In addition to the cameras and the triple strands of razor wire, iron bars covered the windows and thick mesh provided extra protection for the glass itself.
Colditz came to mind. All that was missing was a moat and drawbridge. The defensive screens reinforced my initial conclusions. This was an awful place.
All this security has its place. The intention is not to deter intruders. The whole point of the CCTV systems and barred windows is to prevent anyone from leaving. It seems more oppressive somehow this way round.
Scudding clouds careened across the sky, driven by the wind whose ubiquitous presence had dominated the past two days, but the view from the small, grimy windows would be gloomy whatever the weather. I was hanging around because a scribbled note on a piece of paper said the senior administrator wanted to talk to me before I was allowed to visit the man I’d come to see.
This was unusual. I’d been here before, more times than I’d have wished, and this was a break in routine. I was happy to wait. For a short time.
Cracked vinyl tiles covered the floor and paint had blistered and peeled from the harsh sterile walls. This was a functional room without a hint of compromise. It fulfilled a specific purpose and there were no concessions to artistic expression. A hard, brutal room designed expressly with hard brutal individuals in mind. There were other areas within the same complex where soft pastel shades and comfortable furniture helped to sooth a tormented nature, but this room was not intended to assist a process of rehabilitation.
A figure appeared at the door, winked at me and gestured for me to follow. We’d met before, several times. He liked me. I’d been responsible, in part, for some of the inhabitants of this unit being in here, and no longer causing mayhem on the streets. This earned a wink, if not an offer of coffee and biscuits.
‘He’s on his way,’ my guide said, ‘Just need to hang on for a minute or two, he knows you’re here.’ He indicated I should follow him along yet another corridor. Double swing doors had broad metal bands running across their width at trolley height, presumably a necessary precaution against damage when the trolley pusher was working alone. Despite the protective strips, the paint on the doors suggested that herds of stampeding cattle passed through on a regular basis.
Our destination was a bare room with a single window, containing frosted glass. There wasn’t much to see anyway, even less anything likely to impress or raise the spirits. Two swivelling typists chairs: a lime green plastic monstrosity without arms that looked potentially lethal and a larger model with armrests, all visible areas covered in a rough tweed material. I didn’t fancy sitting on either of them for any length of time.
The desk was real wood, not chipboard, but that was its solitary virtue. The top was marred by deep scratches, cigarette burns, coffee cup rings and a complete art gallery of ink stains while four sharp corners threatened the safety of passers- by. A bottle green metal filing cabinet, four drawers, and a Victorian coat stand tilted alarmingly to one side were the only other furniture.
My guide saw my expression and shrugged. ‘Not fancy, is it?’ I agreed. It was very far from fancy.
‘I’m supposed to bring visitors here. It’s this or the corridor.’
‘I’ll take the corridor,’ I said. He nodded and led the way outside. We reached an area where I would evidently be ‘parked’ until the senior manager deigned to allow me to be admitted to his inner sanctum to state my reasons for being there.
I’d been directed to an alcove, part of a communal area. Hard plastic chairs and a scored table, all firmly bolted to the floor. No natural light. No concession to the provision of a dignified sympathetic environment at all. The dividing walls were painted plasterboard. Not solid at all, just thin partitions. The minimal sound insulation they provided would have been a clue, but the hole in the wall next to my face, roughly the size of a human fist, was absolute confirmation. I looked intently at the hole in the wall, feeling the repressed rage that was part of the fabric of the building. A great many unhappy men and women had sat in this room, in this very chair perhaps? Violent people. Tormented people. Desperate people. I felt their presence all around me.
I wondered whether the man sitting opposite was feeling the same thing. He was waiting too, but looked as if he was resigned to a lengthy stay. The gloomy expression on his thin face had a distinct air of permanence. Seated, his legs appeared awkward, almost as if they belonged to someone else. A wide gap between trouser and sock revealed a slice of pale white skin, mottled like the dead flesh of a plucked goose. Thin to the point of emaciation he crossed one ankle over a knee and jiggled his foot nervously, adding to my suspicions that chemical influences were fuelling his surging metabolism.
A battered but expensive leather briefcase was on the chair alongside him. He reached into its depths and pulled out a buff folder. I recognised the form it contained, had seen a fair few of them in my time. A lawyer, almost certainly way down the pecking order at one of the big city firms. The top men didn’t volunteer to come here. I could have told him he was wasting his time, but his expression suggested he had already reached the same conclusion.
My reasons for being here were very different. This place was a sewer, I decided, scooping up human flotsam. Some form of cleaning product added a smell of pinewoods to the all-pervading mixture of urine and unwashed humanity. The perfume of the cleaning product was sickening, but nowhere near powerful enough to dominate the other smells.
A white-coated man rushed by, coat tails flapping. Patients were thin on the ground. I’d only seen one so far. Were they patients or inmates? As I gave the question some thought, a cadaverous young man, shaven headed and barefoot, shuffled past. He flicked dead eyes towards me, registering nothing in particular and shuffled onward. He was, without doubt, a scary-looking individual, but seemingly had the run of the place, meaning he must be one of the better residents. The man I’d come to see wouldn’t be walking around. That was an absolute certainty.
‘Sorry to keep you.’ I stood and shook hands with a distinguished looking man in a three piece suit. We’d met once before, but weren’t anywhere near the ‘polite chatting’ stage. The lawyer opposite didn’t even raise his head. As if he knew he’d be there for a while yet.
‘Just a quick chat,’ my besuited companion said as we walked to his office. ‘Hope that’s okay.’ I nodded. It wasn’t a problem. A few extra minutes delay was welcome. More time to work out the best method of getting information out of the man I’d come to see. He had last seen me over a year ago and our little chat hadn’t gone down too well. That meeting was significant for both of us, taking place on the evening before armed police smashed down his front door at three in the morning to be precise. We weren’t friends, but he still had information that would be useful.
The top man’s work-zone was genteel enough to have been the domain of an architect or advertising executive. An open-plan office was divided into smaller pods by screens set at just above waist height. Anyone seated at a workstation would have an impression of privacy, but by standing up would be able to see virtually everyone else in the room. Brass light-shades over dozens of desks gleamed brightly. A separate rectangle of space had been partitioned off from floor to ceiling to form an oasis of privacy and it was to this section that I was directed.
The framed scrolls and certificates behind the desk were certainly impressive. As were the professional standard photographs of a tall distinguished looking man with various celebrities. The person who sat at this desk couldn’t actually see the trophy wall behind him. The certificates and photographs weren’t there for his benefit. They were intended to send a clear message to visitors.
‘Look at me’, the wall screamed. ‘See how important I am’. I carefully studied each photograph in turn. Taking them all in. Image projection on a grand style. I formed the same opinion as I had on the other occasion I’d sat in this chair.
‘Tosser,’ I thought.
Gulliver Smith 