§ MR. NEWDEGATEsaid, he wished to put a couple of Questions to the Secretary of State for the Home Department. The first, with reference to a serious outbreak which had taken place in a Roman Catholic Reformatory, which was called St. Bernard, in Leicestershire, on the borders of Warwickshire. There were, he believed, 180 inmates in that reformatory, which was under the care of some Cistercian monks. The second Question related to the removal of the Roman Catholic Chaplain at Dartmoor. The Questions he had to put were:—First, Whether the Government has received any information with respect to an outbreak at the Roman Catholic Reformatory at St. Bernard, near Whitock, in Leicestershire; whether any investigation on the part of the Government has taken place as to the causes mid circumstances of the outbreak; and what steps have been taken, or are intended to be taken, with respect to it? Secondly, Whether the Roman Catholic visiting Priest at the Convict Prison at Dartmoor has been 675 dismissed by the Home Secretary; when this dismissal occurred; and whether there will be any objection to produce the correspondence which has taken place between the Home Office, the Priest, and the prison officials at Dartmoor?
§ SIR GEORGE GREYsaid, in answer to the first Question, that recently the magistrates of the district had reported to him that serious disturbances had taken place at this Roman Catholic Reformatory in Leicestershire. They stated that injury bad been inflicted on one or two of the police who had been called in on the occasion. He immediately referred their statement to Mr. Sidney Turner, the Government Inspector, directing him to inquire into the circumstance. Mr. Turner had not yet had time to make his Report. But the magistrates asked at the same time what course they should pursue; and while they were informed of the reference that had been made to the Government Inspector, they were also told that they must deal with these cases of assault according to the ordinary course of the law. With regard to the hon. Gentleman's second Question, the Rev. Mr. Henderson was last week removed from the performance of his duties at Dartmoor by the withdrawal of the approval of the Secretary of State to his continued employment there. Mr. Henderson had only been employed for a short time as visiting Priest at Dartmoor. In the course of last week copies were transmitted to the Home Office of a long list of letters addressed by that gentleman to the Governor and Chaplain of Dartmoor Prison, and amounting altogether to seventy or eighty. A perusal of that correspondence showed that Mr. Henderson had been wanting in that temper and discretion which were essential to the right discharge of his duties, and that his continued employment in that capacity with the sanction of the Government was incompatible with the discipline and good order of the prison. He was happy to be able to say that that was the only case in which he had been informed of the slightest difference having arisen between the visiting Roman Catholic Priest of a convict prison and the authorities of the prison, and the only instance in which it had been necessary to exercise the power of removal.