After 2 years in gaol with hard labour, Oscar Fingal O’Fflahertie Will Wilde was finally released from prison.
The previous evening, he had passed through the gate of Reading gaol, as he was taken by rail to London, to be released via Pentonville prison, partly to avoid any media attention.
At the conclusion of his sentencing at the Old Bailey, Wilde spent the weekend in nearby Newgate prison before being sent to Pentonville. By July 1895, Wilde was in Wandsworth prison but during his time there his health declined. He was assessed by medical officers and in November that year, it was decided he should be sent to a ‘country prison’ and Reading was chosen.
As he wrote in The Ballad of Reading Gaol after his release:
“I know not whether laws be right.
Or whether laws be wrong;
All that we know who lie in gaol
Is that the wall is strong;
And that each day is like year,
A year whose days are long”
The previous evening, he had passed through the gate of Reading gaol, as he was taken by rail to London, to be released via Pentonville prison, partly to avoid any media attention.
At the conclusion of his sentencing at the Old Bailey, Wilde spent the weekend in nearby Newgate prison before being sent to Pentonville. By July 1895, Wilde was in Wandsworth prison but during his time there his health declined. He was assessed by medical officers and in November that year, it was decided he should be sent to a ‘country prison’ and Reading was chosen.
As he wrote in The Ballad of Reading Gaol after his release:
“I know not whether laws be right.
Or whether laws be wrong;
All that we know who lie in gaol
Is that the wall is strong;
And that each day is like year,
A year whose days are long”