Vargarnas Herde : En fallstudie om religionsvården på Varbergs straffängelse under 1860-talet

This essay is about the religious care in 19th century prisons in Sweden from a prison priest’s perspective. The spectacle of the study is Varberg former penal labour penitentiary, today fortress, and the main character is Hampus Franz August Lönegren. This case study is focused from a micro-historical perspective on the period 1867-1870 when Lönegren worked as a prison priest, with the goal to reverse the condemned prisoners from a sinful life to a Christian and moral life. The material used for the study consists of published and unpublished sources written by Lönegren himself and his work instructions. The survey aims to find out how he did his work, if he made local initiatives, which values he cared about and if he succeeded to discipline and/or civilize any prisoner through religious conversion. Discipline and civilizing are based on Michel Foucault and Norbert Elias respective theories: Discipline as the exercise of power and the Civilizing process. The results show that Lönegren followed the guidelines of his superiors as well as making several local initiatives. Values such as religion and friendship are promoted and a few prisoners become reversed and disciplined to civilized Christians, until their prison time was due, after which most of them relapsed to their earlier criminal life.