Show EM DUNGEONS OF philadelphia cell just jot uncovered isid ald to been baut three abc ago an old english dungeon has been be en brought to light by the tearing down clown of a building in philadelphia according to the press of that city the building 13 is thought to have been more ore than three hundred years old every brick in it was brought from england and the building was once the pride of the little colony that lived here hem it was originally it is said the courthouse of the settlement and underneath the ground were those dungeons or cells in which prisoners were kept it is supposed i that the cells were used as temporary places of confinement and not for prisoners serving long terms much the came as the lookups lockups 1 or station houses of today to day the workmen who 1 i are tearing down the building say it is is 1 I 1 the toughest job they ever undertook I 1 I 1 the bricks stick together as though a S solid stone and it is only after long prying with a bar that they are separated the bricks themselves are as solid olid as in the days of old and will be ased used again in another building i the old prisoner prison or courthouse court honse was in 1 i the neighborhood well known to be the oldest in the city other big buildings hemmed it around until it was hidden entirely from right eight from the street it was a three story structure about twenty by fifty feet in size the first floor was originally used for court purposes but later had been turned i into a dwelling for fifteen years it I 1 has not been used at all leading i down stairs to the cellar was a flight of I 1 j broad steps the cellar itself during I 1 j the years that have passed and gone had become halt half filled with dirt I 1 in fact nobody knew of the existence of the dungeons that now see the light of I 1 day after three centuries the dungeons so BO far discovered are three in number two are about ten feet square and the other extends twenty feet to 2 ward the street and is about ten feet I 1 wide all are half filled with debris but are deep enough for a man to stand I 1 erect in the roof is vaulted and in I 1 the top of each is a hole which may have been a breathing place or a place through which to let down food to the prisoners near the cells is a big chimney place fully eight feet wide in which were found a handful of coins bearing date of 1637 aua some of much more recent date the old house has been burned out several times but the walls were never damaged much the whole neighborhood is an interesting one the building adjoining the one torn tom down has a fourth floor which is windowless instead of the usual windows it has port holes slanting downward from which in days of old when knights were bold men probably picked off indians or enemies of some kind |