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The Prisoners' Hidden Life or Insane Asylums Unveiled
This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.
496 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1868
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Elizabeth Parsons Ware Packard
50 books23 followersAKA E.P.W. Packard was an advocate for the rights of women and people accused of insanity.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
March 3, 2015
This is an incredible book. A first hand account of a part of American and women's history that has almost been lost in time. Mrs. Elizabeth Packard documents her abduction and sentence of three years in an Insane Asylum with incredible clarity and presence of mind.
This account speaks of a time when married women were non-entities in the eyes of the law, their identity belonging solely to their husbands. As such, in the state of Illinois it was legal for a woman to be committed to an Insane Asylum by her husband even if she was not insane.
Mrs. Packard displays an incredible faith in her God and was a highly articulate, intelligent, well balanced woman who strove to serve her God in a way that she determined to be the right way rather than what her church and her husband deemed to be the right way. For this reason her husband, at the urging of his church, had his wife committed and denied of her children and her personal effects.
Mrs. Packard then set about her arduous journey of fighting for her rights to her own mind, freedoms and religion and she advocated to get these rights for women.
My parting thought on reading this fantastic book was "Thank you Elizabeth Packard for what you were forced to go through and for changing our world because of it!"
This account speaks of a time when married women were non-entities in the eyes of the law, their identity belonging solely to their husbands. As such, in the state of Illinois it was legal for a woman to be committed to an Insane Asylum by her husband even if she was not insane.
Mrs. Packard displays an incredible faith in her God and was a highly articulate, intelligent, well balanced woman who strove to serve her God in a way that she determined to be the right way rather than what her church and her husband deemed to be the right way. For this reason her husband, at the urging of his church, had his wife committed and denied of her children and her personal effects.
Mrs. Packard then set about her arduous journey of fighting for her rights to her own mind, freedoms and religion and she advocated to get these rights for women.
My parting thought on reading this fantastic book was "Thank you Elizabeth Packard for what you were forced to go through and for changing our world because of it!"
January 30, 2026
The book I probably should have read instead of this one is The Woman They Could Not Silence: One Woman, Her Incredible Fight for Freedom, and the Men Who Tried to Make Her Disappear, by Kate Moore. That book, I suspect, is more readable than this one, and probably contains more about Elizabeth Packard's legal struggles. Famously, Elizabeth Packard was instrumental in getting the 1867 Illinois Act for the Protection of Personal Liberty passed. It was a landmark law which required a jury trial before any person, especially a married woman, could be committed to an insane asylum.
In the case of Elizabeth Packard, her husband, who was a Presbyterian minister, had his wife of 20 years and mother of his six children committed to an insane asylum because she disagreed with him on religious matters. Two evidences of Mrs. Packard’s insanity brought forth by Mr. Packard’s were "that his wife invited Universalist ministers to his house for entertainment during a Convention. Another evidence of insanity he alleged against me, was that I gave a dollar towards building a Catholic church in Manteno."
But the main sticking point between the two seems to be on the subject of total depravity, a doctrine believed in the Presbyterian church, but not by Mrs. Packard. Mr. Packard seemed intent on keeping her in the asylum until she was "cured" of the insane belief that this doctrine was not true. One of the evidences of insanity that Mr. Packard alleged was that Mrs. Packard called him a "son of perdition." In fact what she said was, "I have sometimes been tempted to say, 'Well, Mr. Packard, I do not know but what you are what you claim to be, a totally depraved man, or the "son of perdition," for whom there is not found a ransom.' When I come to admit his own position, and express an agreement of opinion with him, on this point, then he uses this concession as a weapon against me, as though I had accused him of being the 'son of perdition.'" "This was the pivot on which my reputation for sanity was suspended ; for I could not be made to confess that God made a bad or sinful article when he made human nature ; but on the contrary, I claimed that all which God made was 'good.'"
I wish I could have found out more about Elizabeth Packard's religious beliefs. She seems to have been a Universalist, but this is just an impression, not something that was ever said outright. At one point she says, "Is it not the spirit that repents? Why then cannot the spirit repent when disconnected from the body?" This is a question I have asked for a long time. The implication seems to be that spirits in Hell will have an opportunity to repent.
Much of the book was devoted to describing the abuses, both mental and physical, the patients at the asylum suffered. One of the appendices to Elizabeth Packard’s testimony was Mrs. Olsen's Narrative of her One Year Imprisonment at Jacksonville Insane Asylum. This appendix focused on the physical abuses the patients were made to endure, especially at the hands of a sadistic attendant, Lizzy Bonner, who made nurse Ratched look like a pussycat. Not only would Lizzy beat the patients, she would hold them under the water in the bath until they nearly choked. Mrs. Olsen also describes the terrible food, which rarely included fruits or vegetables and did include almost inedible butter.
It seems as though Elizabeth Packard had a mitigating effect on the abuses in the asylum, as though the doctors and attendants knew she was observing and writing. Mrs. Olsen writes, "Mrs. Packard! that dear name! how little did I then know its import! How my heart throbs even now, at the sweet, the golden memories inseparably blended with that beloved name!" Elizabeth Packard herself writes, "My friends have assured me that the 'reign of terror commenced anew when I left, so that abuse and cruelty again became the rule of the house, to a greater degree even than ever before."
While Mrs. Olsen describes mostly physical abuse, Mrs. Packard often describes mental abuse, especially by Dr. McFarland, the head of the institution. Although Dr. McFarland treated her well for the first four months of her stay, after she reproved him in a written report, his attitude totally changed. It was then that "they hope to torture me into an acknowledgement of the Presbyterian church creed." So, "Dr. McFarland accused me yesterday of defending a principle which he claims would be subversive of all family government. He maintains that the government of the family is vested entirely in the husband, that the wife has no right to her identity ; she must live, move and have her being in him alone," and "Dr. McFarland assures me, too, that so long as I claim my right of opinion and conscience, no church will extend fellowship to me."
Nonetheless Mrs. Packard holds out hope that Dr. McFarland will repent. "Again, my theology teaches me that in every human being there is a soul to be redeemed. That in every rock there is a well. Could I not therefore hope that the drill of long and patient perseverance might yet reach this spring in this Doctor's flinty heart?" I am a little unclear about whether the doctor did ever repent. He did allow Elizabeth Packard to eventually be released from the asylum, but I am unclear about the details. It is here and on other details where Kate Moore's biography would probably have been of more help.
I started reading this book on archive(dot)org, but I found that platform to be less satisfactory than hathitrust, which is going to be my goto site for online books from now on. Both sites have the negative feature of refreshing when you leave them and come back (often losing your place), but hathitrust seems to do it less often. In addition, not all the books on archive(dot)org are searchable and sometimes you cannot copy text. I haven’t had either of these problems on hathitrust.
In the case of Elizabeth Packard, her husband, who was a Presbyterian minister, had his wife of 20 years and mother of his six children committed to an insane asylum because she disagreed with him on religious matters. Two evidences of Mrs. Packard’s insanity brought forth by Mr. Packard’s were "that his wife invited Universalist ministers to his house for entertainment during a Convention. Another evidence of insanity he alleged against me, was that I gave a dollar towards building a Catholic church in Manteno."
But the main sticking point between the two seems to be on the subject of total depravity, a doctrine believed in the Presbyterian church, but not by Mrs. Packard. Mr. Packard seemed intent on keeping her in the asylum until she was "cured" of the insane belief that this doctrine was not true. One of the evidences of insanity that Mr. Packard alleged was that Mrs. Packard called him a "son of perdition." In fact what she said was, "I have sometimes been tempted to say, 'Well, Mr. Packard, I do not know but what you are what you claim to be, a totally depraved man, or the "son of perdition," for whom there is not found a ransom.' When I come to admit his own position, and express an agreement of opinion with him, on this point, then he uses this concession as a weapon against me, as though I had accused him of being the 'son of perdition.'" "This was the pivot on which my reputation for sanity was suspended ; for I could not be made to confess that God made a bad or sinful article when he made human nature ; but on the contrary, I claimed that all which God made was 'good.'"
I wish I could have found out more about Elizabeth Packard's religious beliefs. She seems to have been a Universalist, but this is just an impression, not something that was ever said outright. At one point she says, "Is it not the spirit that repents? Why then cannot the spirit repent when disconnected from the body?" This is a question I have asked for a long time. The implication seems to be that spirits in Hell will have an opportunity to repent.
Much of the book was devoted to describing the abuses, both mental and physical, the patients at the asylum suffered. One of the appendices to Elizabeth Packard’s testimony was Mrs. Olsen's Narrative of her One Year Imprisonment at Jacksonville Insane Asylum. This appendix focused on the physical abuses the patients were made to endure, especially at the hands of a sadistic attendant, Lizzy Bonner, who made nurse Ratched look like a pussycat. Not only would Lizzy beat the patients, she would hold them under the water in the bath until they nearly choked. Mrs. Olsen also describes the terrible food, which rarely included fruits or vegetables and did include almost inedible butter.
It seems as though Elizabeth Packard had a mitigating effect on the abuses in the asylum, as though the doctors and attendants knew she was observing and writing. Mrs. Olsen writes, "Mrs. Packard! that dear name! how little did I then know its import! How my heart throbs even now, at the sweet, the golden memories inseparably blended with that beloved name!" Elizabeth Packard herself writes, "My friends have assured me that the 'reign of terror commenced anew when I left, so that abuse and cruelty again became the rule of the house, to a greater degree even than ever before."
While Mrs. Olsen describes mostly physical abuse, Mrs. Packard often describes mental abuse, especially by Dr. McFarland, the head of the institution. Although Dr. McFarland treated her well for the first four months of her stay, after she reproved him in a written report, his attitude totally changed. It was then that "they hope to torture me into an acknowledgement of the Presbyterian church creed." So, "Dr. McFarland accused me yesterday of defending a principle which he claims would be subversive of all family government. He maintains that the government of the family is vested entirely in the husband, that the wife has no right to her identity ; she must live, move and have her being in him alone," and "Dr. McFarland assures me, too, that so long as I claim my right of opinion and conscience, no church will extend fellowship to me."
Nonetheless Mrs. Packard holds out hope that Dr. McFarland will repent. "Again, my theology teaches me that in every human being there is a soul to be redeemed. That in every rock there is a well. Could I not therefore hope that the drill of long and patient perseverance might yet reach this spring in this Doctor's flinty heart?" I am a little unclear about whether the doctor did ever repent. He did allow Elizabeth Packard to eventually be released from the asylum, but I am unclear about the details. It is here and on other details where Kate Moore's biography would probably have been of more help.
I started reading this book on archive(dot)org, but I found that platform to be less satisfactory than hathitrust, which is going to be my goto site for online books from now on. Both sites have the negative feature of refreshing when you leave them and come back (often losing your place), but hathitrust seems to do it less often. In addition, not all the books on archive(dot)org are searchable and sometimes you cannot copy text. I haven’t had either of these problems on hathitrust.
December 3, 2013
One of the original "indie" authors. Elizabeth Parsons Ware Packard is not a perfect heroine, but I admire her nonetheless.
Read
August 11, 2021really worth reading but i wish i'd had a more readable version, it's just a crappy scan of a 1800s book :(
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews