THREE HISTORYEXTRA PODCAST EPISODES ON IMPRISONMENT

In the red

Any mention of debtors’ prisons immediately makes me think of Charles Dickens. His father’s incarceration devastated the family – a humiliation later immortalised by the writer in Little Dorrit. But, as Alexander Wakelam explained on the podcast, Dickens’ experience was far from unusual. In fact, imprisonment for unpaid bills was a common part of life in a society built almost entirely on credit. But was the archaic system actually successful in reclaiming funds and deterring debtors! ;ou’ll have to listen to nd out. historyextra.com/debtors-prisons-pod

Captured in the castle

lot many places can rival Alcatraz’s reputation for escape attempts, but Castle Colditz could certainly give it a run for its money. As author Ben Macintyre told us, this eothic schloss witnessed more escape attempts than any other WW2 noW camp – partly because of the assortment of well-known troublemakers interned there. But it wasn’t all jolly japes. As Macintyre revealed, there’s also a darker side to the Colditz story, including racism, class divisions and mental breakdowns. historyextra.com/colditz-castle-pod

Floating hell

In 1776, the British authorities came up with a plan to ease prison overcrowding – vast, floating prison hulks. These “wicked loah’s arks” became infamous for deprivation, disease and decay. By 1842, more than 4,000 of cngland’s inmates were believed to be held in these ships, many of them children. As Anna Mciay revealed on the podcast, it was a system of incarceration “as rotten as the wooden timbers” of the hulks themselves. historyextra.com/prison-hulks-pod