Stories behind inmates released to public

Victorian Perth Prison records, when the institution was Scotland's only unit for prisoners with mental illnesses, have gone online.

- ALASTAIR MCNEILL

Website Scotland's People has released hundreds of records of prisoner-patients admitted to what had been titled Perth (General) Prison Criminal Lunatic Department between 1846 and 1902.

The online material gives researchers the opportunity to discover patients' experiences of the institution, what treatments the patients were given and the circumstances of their illnesses.

There are case notes available for over 400 prisoner-patients. Records of over 900 Perth Prison general population admissions for the years 1922-1924 are also available.

The 19th cenutury records include those of those of two men incarcerated at Perth Prison:

■Colin Sinclair Murray Brown killed his landlady in Edinburgh on August 6, 1902. When he appeared in court in September 1902 his lawyer appealed that Brown was insane, and had been at the time of the alleged offence.