‘Dark tourism’ reactions at Peterhead Prison Museum researched

Researchers exploring so-called “dark tourism” are analysing the reactions of visitors to the most gruesome parts of Peterhead Prison Museum.

The prison closed its doors more than 10 years ago and then later reopened as a museum.

It remains largely unchanged, giving visitors a taste of what life was like, including some of the darker sides – such as brutal attacks by prisoners on each other, a punishment station where officers used a whip, a violent riot by inmates, and dirty protests.

Reactions of people are being filmed, and it is hoped the conclusions about how they responded could help the curators of museums in the future.

The data is being gathered and analysed by researchers at Aberdeen’s Robert Gordon University (RGU).

It is hoped the study will provide a better understanding of how people react when faced with more troubling aspects of human history.

The project is called Talking about Prisons, with the RGU’s Rachael Ironside the lead researcher.

“What we’re looking at is how visitors interact with some of the museum spaces, in particular those spaces that deal with a more difficult type of heritage,” she told BBC Scotland News.

“This particular project is looking at those in-the-moment interactions, that’s what we’re really interested in. Where do they look, what do they say?”

She explained that “subtle” cameras are set up in rooms to catch “natural reactions”.

She said the researchers were already finding that some people’s coping mechanism appeared to be laughter rather than being disturbed.

“People use humour, that’s a kind of interesting interaction,” she said.

“We’re coming to the end of data collection, and will bring our findings together.”

Peterhead Prison was once known as Scotland’s toughest jail.

Alex Geddes, the operations manager at Peterhead Prison Museum, thinks he knows what fascinates visitors, of all ages.

“I look back to the first week we opened in 2016 and we were speaking to people leaving, ‘did you enjoy your tour?’,” he told BBC Scotland News.

“This one guy stopped and looked back and I did think ‘he doesn’t look impressed’.

“And his comment was ‘I’ve always wanted to see in it but I’ve never wanted to be in it’.

“And I think that captures 99% of people coming through here. They’ve always wondered what’s happening in here, but they never want to do anything wrong to end up in here.”

Mr Geddes added: “Maybe morbid’s not the right word, but there’s that dark side to things. People are intrigued. But they want to come in and get out on the same day.

“Everybody looks at things in history, probably want to go back in history just to see it, but not actually be part of it.

“A lot of people leave and they now have a full understanding of the work of the prison service.”

He said the number one objective was that they “didn’t want a Disneyland” but had wanted to keep it real.

“You get a wide range of feedback, some are shocked, others are kind of glad, they sometimes feel prisoners get an easy life in here, once they’ve been in and seen the conditions they change their views as well.”

Having been built in 1888, Peterhead Prison eventually closed in 2013.

It was replaced in the town by HMP Grampian, which opened in 2014.