We caught the last tour of the Galleries of Justice, the old Nottingham courthouse and prison that had been converted into a museum. The tour was a lot of fun - our guides were actors who played the parts of a lawyer and a jailer. One of the members of our group was "put on trial" in the old courtroom, another played a witness, another played a judge. After that, we descended into the prison cells and we were all convicts for an afternoon. There were Madame Tussaud-like wax figures in the different part of the prison to show what life was like there.   

Apart from displaying the historical interest of the building, the exhibits were a thought-provoking lesson on the evolution of the justice system in Britain. We were surprised to find out how extremely appalling conditions once were for British prisoners, how there had been for many decades an utter lack of regard for the well-being of inmates, and how harsh the practices of the "justice" system had once been. The segment regarding the old British practice of "transportation" confirmed something I had learned on a trip to Australia: that many of the convicts who were banished all the way to Australia and other prison colonies were often no more than petty thieves - some who had simply been caught stealing a bit of food because of sheer hunger.

The exhibit also showed, however, how the British government had learned from their mistakes of the past, how British prisons became more and more humane over the decades, and how the evolution of the British prison system was one of the hallmarks of the worlds' development in appreciating the notion of human rights. "What's interesting about the British," my husband said, "is that in so many things, they were the first to make mistakes, so they wrote the book on how to do things better."

The Crime & Punishment Tour of the Galleries of Justice is open everyday, except Monday, from 10am to 4pm (last admission) during peak season (8 April to 10 September). In the off-peak season (11 September to 7 April), it is open from Tuesday to Friday 10am - 3pm (last admission), and weekends from 11am - 4pm (last admission). Adult tickets are GBP 8. The tours are about an hour and a half.