Alcatraz Citadel island and replaced the lower prison, with a capacity of 307 inmates. Alcatraz was renamed as the "Pacific Branch, U.S. Military Prison” in 1907, and as the importance of the Island citadel became less and less obvious due to modernization of the naval facilities, infantry soldiers were shifted and prison guards brought in their place. It developed a reputation for its brutal methods of torturing prisoners, placing prisoners in pitch black cells for up two weeks. Alcatraz was barely affected by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake which devastated the city, and the prison population dramatically increased as prisoners were temporarily
Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary Prisons. The purpose of this transfer was to punish those involved in the rampant crime which prevailed in the country in the 1920s and 1930s. The United States Disciplinary Barracks on Alcatraz was acquired by the United States Department of Justice on October 12, 1933, and the island became a Federal Bureau of Prisons federal prison in August 1934. The $260,000 conversion to the federal prison took place from January 1934. George Hess of the United States Public Health Service was appointed the chief medical officer of the prison and Edward W. Twitchell became a consultant in psychiatry for Alcatraz