The citadel, of brick, is 200 by 100 feet, and is two stories high above the basement, with bastion fronts facing the northwest and southeast. It is well ventilated by the main hall passages and windows. It is used as officers’ quarters, hospital, and quartermaster and subsistence offices and storerooms. The set for each officer consists of two large and comfortable rooms, with kitchen and dining room attached, and water –closets and bathrooms. The rooms set apart for hospital use comprises of a dispensary, and two wards, a kitchen, and an adjoining mess room, a store-room, bathroom, and a water-closet. The wards are each 35 by 26 by 17 feet, well floored and ceiled, and are furnished each with ten beds and bedside tables, chairs, dumbwaiter, closet, and a washstand. They are warmed by coal grates, lighted and ventilated by side windows. Air space per bed, 1,547 cubic feet; area, 91 feet...

The prison rooms are three buildings, ventilated by skylights and warmed by stoves in the main hall. They are arranged in two tiers (in one three), with galleries for the upper tiers. Ventilators are placed over the door of each cell, and air tubes in the walls. One building contains fourteen single and two double cells; the second has forty-five cells, and the third forty-eight single and four double cells. The average size is 8 ¹/ ₂by 6 by 3 ¹/ ₂feet, giving an airspace to each of 161 cubic feet. Adjoining these buildings are the kitchens and mess-rooms for the troops and prisoners, and the bakery for the post.

A 19th-century photograph showing the Lower Prison (to the right of the Sallyport and Guardhouse, with six visible skylights), and the Mess Hall (situated at the lower right, with four visible skylights). The small narrow building to the left of the Mess Hall was the prisoners’ bathhouse.

A rooftop view of the Lower Prison with an armed sentry patrolling his post, taken in 1893. The brick building on which the soldier is standing was the original jail, built in 1867. Following the completion of the larger three-story wooden prison structure, the brick building was converted into a guardhouse. The small wooden pinnacle was a bell tower. The bell was housed behind the grill, and was used for signaling escapes and other emergencies.

An interior view of the lower prison in 1902. The lower prison cellblock contained three tiers of cells, each with a closed-front wooden door. The cells were approximately three-feet by six-feet (about the size of a small closet), and were poorly ventilated despite the small exterior vent flues. The letters indicate a fallen oil lamp, which horrified the inmates by nearly turning the cellblock into a flaming inferno.

The lower prison mess hall facility. This narrow building was connected to the lower prison building, and was accessed via a small curved stairwell. Conditions were crowded in this hall, which could seat up to 200 men.

A circa-1902 view looking east toward the Lower Prison. The hospital can be seen on the right.

A photograph of the Prison Hospital taken in 1893 from the rooftop of the Lower Prison. Note the finely crafted lattice skirt covering the base of the structure, and the detail of the Lower Prison skylight on the right.

During the same decade, the military adopted the practice of sending what they termed as “troublesome Native Americans” to the post at Alcatraz. The first documented case of an American Indian incarcerated on Alcatraz was Paiute Tom, who arrived on June 5, 1873. There is no formal documentation providing a history of his prison time on Alcatraz, but it is recorded that he was fatally shot by a guard only two days after his arrival, presumably while attempting to escape. Four months later, two Modoc Indians named Barncho and Sloluck were transferred to Alcatraz following an attack on peace commissioners during the Modoc War in Northern California. Barncho died of scrofula (a disease associated with Tuberculosis) at Alcatraz on May 28, 1875, and he was buried on Angel Island and later moved to the Golden Gate National Cemetery. Sloluck was eventually transferred to Fort Leavenworth in February of 1878, having endured the longest prison term on Alcatraz of any Native American soldier. Several others would be arrested and sent to serve time at the prison, though some of them had not been convicted or sentenced for any specific crimes, but were held at Alcatraz for “safe keeping.”  Among others who were sentenced to serve time on the Rock were two privates from the Company “A” Indian Scouts. These soldiers had been involved in the mutiny at Cibicu Creek, Arizona Territory on August 30, 1881, in which Captain E.C. Hentig and six privates from the Sixth Cavalry were killed. Five Indian Scouts who mutinied at San Carlos, Arizona Territory in June 1887 were also imprisoned on the island, as were several Indian Chiefs, most notably Kae-te-na, a Chiricahua Apache and a friend of the famed Chief Geronimo.

In January of 1895 nineteen Hopi Indians were sent to Alcatraz from northern Arizona. The Hopi tribe had been involved in serious land disputes with the U.S. Government, and had refused to allow their children to attend government schools. Intense pressure had been levied on the Hopi people to “Americanize” by adopting governmental education for their children. However, the Hopi tribes fiercely opposed sending their children to distant schools to learn the trade skills of the white culture. References indicate that the school facilities were mostly inadequate to accommodate large numbers of children, and that potential outbreaks of disease were a concern. The Hopi used the tactic of passive resistance, making commitments to send their children, but never following through. The government grew increasingly frustrated with their defiance, and began using its troops to intimidate the Hopi villages. When the Hopi continued to resist, the government representatives finally imposed force, and arrested “the headmen who are responsible for the children not being sent to school. ”  During the course of their imprisonment at Alcatraz the Indians were brought to the mainland to tour San Francisco schools, in hopes that they would become interested in formalized education. They were released in September of 1895, after agreeing not to interfere with the “plans of government for the civilization and education of its Indian wards.”

A group of Hopi Indian prisoners posing in front of the original lighthouse in 1895. These Arizona Indians spent nine months on Alcatraz for refusing to establish a community farming system, and for keeping their children out of governmentally established schools. They are seen here wearing second-hand military uniforms.

Alcatraz in 1891. Note the small outline of a cannon visible on the parade ground.

Alcatraz in 1896.

Military inmates preparing the concrete foundation for new lavatories in the Upper Prison in 1902. Note the small exterior cell vent openings along the building exterior.