"[5]: 57 According to a major history of Richmond, the Cage was three stories tall and topped with a dome "with stocks and whipping post in the rear.
"[6] The Cage was "open on three sides, except for iron gratings, and those within were visible to passers-by.
The need for such a facility was stressed by a grand jury which found an excessive number 'of vagrants, beggars, free Negroes and runaway slaves' which 'daily infest the streets and by night plunder the inhabitants.
'"[6] People of color who could not present free papers or a slave pass were sometimes placed in the Cage until their legal status could be ascertained.
[7] In 1853, when slave traders were in a dispute over a woman named Sally who was thought to be insane, the Richmond Dispatch reported, "Captain Wilkinson stated, that on two several occasions the watch found Sally sitting on the side walk and took her to the cage.