THIS JAILHOUSE ROCKED - In order to protect escapes between lashings and other punishments, the Inferior Court of Laurens County ordered improvements to the jail in 1832. The justices ordered that a ditch, five feet deep, be constructed around the perimeter of the jail. The ditch would be of sufficient width to hold a vertical line of one-foot-thick timbers, which were to protrude from the ground to a height of three feet along the exterior walls. The interior walls, also to be made of the finest heart pine timbers, were constructed of timbers laid in horizontal positions to a height of one foot above the surface, to prevent tunneling by those who feared the whip.
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