George Reynolds (Mormon) - Party To Polygamy Test Case - Imprisonment

Imprisonment

Reynolds had been imprisoned in Utah since his second conviction was confirmed by the Utah Supreme Court in June 1876. After his failed appeal to the Supreme Court, Reynolds was transferred from a jail in Utah to the Nebraska State Penitentiary in Lincoln, where he became U.S. Prisoner Number 14 and was appointed to be the bookkeeper in the knitting department. Reynolds only remained in the Nebraska penitentiary for twenty-five days, after which he was transferred to the Utah Territory Penitentiary, where regulations were more primitive and vermin more abundant. Reynolds reported that the prisoners were not permitted to have a fire for fear that the prison would burn down; as a result, on many winter mornings he would awake and his beard would be one solid mass of ice. Reynolds was released from prison on January 20, 1881, having served his full sentence, less 5 months for good behavior.