Alcatraz Federal Penitentiary prisoners would frequently report acts of brutality and inhumane conditions which severely tested their sanity. Ed Wutke was the first prisoner to commit suicide in Alcatraz. Rufe Persful chopped off his fingers after grabbing an axe from the firetruck, begging another inmate to do the same to his other hand. One writer described Alcatraz as "the great garbage can of San Francisco Bay, into which every federal prison dumped its most rotten apples." In 1939, the new U.S. Attorney General Frank Murphy attacked the penitentiary, saying "The whole institution is conductive to psychology that builds up a sinister ambitious attitude
Alcatraz Citadel Alcatraz Citadel Alcatraz Citadel, also known as Fort Alcatraz, was the original military defense and prison on Alcatraz Island, off the coast of San Francisco, California, United States. The citadel was built in 1859 as a U.S. Army military defense, and began function as a war camp in 1861 and long-term military prison in 1868. During the American Civil War, the citadel and its batteries provided an important line of defense. The island continued to develop in the 1870s and 1880s, and in 1893, the first hospital on Alcatraz opened. A new upper prison was built in 1904, but after