Estonia Paterai Prison

I visited this prison with Lauris and Alex while on our 8 day road trip around Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia. In 1828, Tsar Nicholas I of Russia commissioned the construction of a prison near Tallinn on the Estonian coast. It was completed in 1840 and remained in use until 2004, a potent symbol of the troubled relationship between Estonia and Russia. The prison was a transit location for thousands of prisoners en route to the fearsome gulags in Siberia. Conditions inside the prison were horrific, with frequent overcrowding; one winter, 25 inmates were housed in a cell designed for just 7. 

 The prison was the scene of many hangings, with a specific chamber devoted to this purpose. Following execution, the bodies of the hanged would be thrown over the cliffs into the Baltic Sea below. After the death of Stalin in 1953, the resultant thaw in relations between the Soviet Union and Estonia led to an improvement in prison conditions. While standards remained harsh by Western European ideals, prisoners were now at least permitted such luxuries as flushing toilets and central heating.