Richmond Whig

HOUSE OF CORRECTION WANTED.—A little girl, named Ellen Martin, was before the Mayor, yesterday, charged with vagrancy and begging in the streets. She has become notorious throughout the city for her intrusions, impertinence and depravity. The hotels have been her chief resorts, but she has also frequented other public places and annoyed whoever she might chance to meet with her importunities and obscenity. The wonder is that she has escaped arrest until this time, but at last she has fallen into the clutches of the police, and it is to be hoped that a stop will now be put to her career of vice. But how? The prisoner when confronted with the Mayor begged and whined most piteously for a discharge, but his Honor was inexorable, and committed her to jail, where it is not possible that her morals can be improved, though she cannot be contaminated by association with the inmates of the jail.

There should be a work house, or reformatory school, for this class of offenders. The City Council falls short of its duty to the community by not getting possession of the new Alms House, and putting it to the uses for which it was erected, one of which was the establishment of a house of correction for juvenile offenders and female delinquents. We hope the Mayor will send a special message to the Council on this subject.