Princetown Prison at Dartmoor The great war prison of Princetown on the wilds of Dartmoor was erected in 1806. The American prisoners were held here, during the War of 1812, and among them was a large contingent of colored men. At this time the prison held war prisoners from many countries, Frenchmen, Spaniards, Portuguese, Italians, Swiss, Germans, Poles, Swedes, Dutchmen, and Orientals.Princetown Prison at DartmoorThe great war prison of Princetown on the wilds of Dartmoor was erected in 1806. The American prisoners were held here, during the War of 1812, and among them was a large contingent of colored men. At this time the prison held war prisoners from many countries, Frenchmen, Spaniards, Portuguese, Italians, Swiss, Germans, Poles, Swedes, Dutchmen, and Orientals.
Princetown Prison at Dartmoor
The great war prison of Princetown on the wilds of Dartmoor was erected in 1806. The American prisoners were held here, during the War of 1812, and among them was a large contingent of colored men. At this time the prison held war prisoners from many countries, Frenchmen, Spaniards, Portuguese, Italians, Swiss, Germans, Poles, Swedes, Dutchmen, and Orientals.
prisoners. The general plan of the new buildings consisted of a series of stone blocks radiating from a central point. Each block was of three stories, two of them intended for long sleeping rooms, the third or top story being used for a living room during the day and for exercise when the weather, often inclement, forbade it in the open air. The floorings of rooms and passages resembled those of a ship and were made of hard timbers with caulked seams. These blocks or main buildings, seven in number, were enclosed at a distance of forty feet by a circular line of palisading, composed of stout iron bars with sharp points. As a further obstacle were two granite walls fourteen feet high and twenty two feet apart, and around the whole exterior ran a military road on which were erected at intervals high stages overlooking the yards, for the sentries, always on duty.
The original edifice and the boundary walls cost about £130,000 and were completed in December, 1808. The several buildings were allotted as far as possible to the various nationalities of which there were many, including representatives of almost every European country, bearing witness to the extent and diversity of the empire over which Napoleon ruled. There were Frenchmen, Spaniards, Portuguese, Italians, Swiss, Germans, Poles, Swedes, Dutchmen, and Orientals in the service of Holland, which was then closely allied to France, some of them Malays and Chinese. Later on alarge influx of American prisoners swelled the total and among them as many as a thousand coloured people, who, in deference to the strong national prejudice, were kept entirely separate and always restricted to a distinct block, that known as Number Four. All sorts and conditions of men were included in this heterogeneous collection which amounted at one time to ten thousand souls, members of every conceivable trade and profession. Soldiers and sailors were in the majority, of course, and the crews of merchant ships taken as prizes were very numerous; there were artists of every category, painters and actors, literary men and men of scientific pursuits, and many who had been priests but had left the church in the troublous times. The permanent garrison to overawe this despairing multitude so easily intimidated, constantly discontented and quick to rise into insubordination, was seldom more than a single regiment of militia or line serving practically on a war footing, with an army of guards, patrol and pickets, forever on duty and ready to turn out at a moment’s notice to quell disturbances, give chase to fugitives and hunt them down to the utmost limits of the moor.
There was an aristocracy of the prison; one of its blocks, to which the French inmates gave the name of “le petit cautionnement” and which the Americans called “the Commodore,” was set aside for the officers of merchant ships, state officers whohad broken parole and had been retaken, and many of those (among them a negro general) attached to the expedition against San Domingo under General Rochambeau, in 1803. These West Indian officers had in their prison an excellent military band, which was permitted to play daily.
As soon as the prisons were filled the French of their own accord proceeded to organise a constitution. First of all, the inhabitants of each prison elected a president, and then each separate apartment chose its own commissary who was to exercise authority under the former. The suffrage was universal and the election by ballot. As a necessary consequence bribery and corruption were altogether banished from this retreat of equality and fraternity. The authority of the presidents and commissaries extended to every point on which it could possibly be exercised. They were at once magistrates, judges and policemen, and sometimes had to carry their own judicial sentences into execution. On one occasion the cooks of a certain ward were condemned to death by the president and the commissary because, unfortunately, a number of rats were found boiled in the soup. They were respited, however, on making a sufficient apology and laying the crime of the unhappy pottage to the door of the perfidious British guard. At another time a prisoner convicted of having stolen a shirt, was deprived of his political privileges, declared incapable of voting at any elections, and finally sent to Coventryfor a period of six months. He was taken to the hospital and died there of “langueur,” a disease common enough in the place, a sort of loss of hope and fatal fading away. We will add that all offenders did not escape so easily as the cooks. It is known that very many murders,—judicial or otherwise,—took place within the prisons. Among their inmates were men well acquainted with various methods of secret despatch, so that the judges of the DartmoorVehm-Gerichthad no difficulty in finding officers who could carry out their sentences with scarcely a mark of external violence.
The prisoners were self-arranged under the following heads:—
“The Lords:” These were the richer prisoners, who received regular supplies from home, and carried on a traffic within the walls, making their own purchases at the grating of the market square. They had from sixty to eighty shops in each prison, where they sold tobacco, thread, soap, coffee, etc.
“The Labourers:” Those who worked at different trades, thereby supplying themselves with the means of procuring something more than the ordinary prison comforts.
“The Indifferents:” Those who did nothing, but resigned themselves to the tender mercies of the English government.
“The Minables:” Gamblers who were ready to sell their last shirt to satisfy their love of play.
“The Kaiserlichs:” Gamblers like the Minables, but who had attained an utter obliviousness to human cares and necessities. When the annual supply of clothing was distributed—a pair of trousers, a yellow jacket marked with black letters, a shirt, and a pair of shoes—they at once sold their allotments to the highest bidder and went all the rest of the year barefoot and shirtless.
“The Romans:” The lowest class of all; so called because they occupied the highest story of each prison, called the “capitol.” They possessed no single article of clothing. Each man wore only a blanket, looked upon as common property, with a hole cut in the middle, through which the head was passed. In order to become a Roman, it was necessary that the candidate’s hammock should be sold, and tobacco bought with the proceeds, for the enjoyment of the whole society. They might be seen in the common passages of the prison, five or six together fighting like dogs for some chance bone or potato peeling, and it was said that on one occasion when the governor’s cart had been sent into the court of the prison, the “Romans” seized the horses, and killed and devoured them. When the “capitol” was closed for the night, their general, who alone had a hammock, but without mattress or covering, arranged his men in two lines on either side, and at the word “bas!” all stretched themselves on the floor in perfect order and silence. Even the solitary blanket was laid aside in theirown wards; but the general, besides the dignity of a hammock, was allowed on certain occasions to wear a kind of uniform, of which the embroidery was of straw, curiously worked. Once, when the whole body of the “Romans,” about six hundred in number, had been permitted to visit the interior of another prison, they seized the supplies in the kitchen en route, actually made prisoners of the guard sent to suppress the riot, and then paraded the court with loud cries of “Vive l’Empereur.” The guards were speedily reinforced, and the “Roman” general dismissed to thecachot. The scanty military strength which could be spared for Dartmoor was a source of considerable apprehension during the whole time the prisons were occupied.
Many details respecting these unhappy “Romans” are here purposely omitted, although the authority quoted, L. Catel, does not hesitate to relate them. They exhibited perhaps the lowest degradation of which humanity is capable. An intense passion for play, manifested more or less by the whole body of prisoners, was the main cause of their wretched condition; but crime in all its shapes was common among them, not the less horrible on account of the reckless and frantic merriment with which it was accompanied. And yet among them were some of the best educated of the prisoners. What was exhibited at Dartmoor was that same dark tendency of human nature which in all ages has led men encompassed by great and irremediabledifficulties to catch at the first enjoyments that present themselves. The throng of prisoners, housed together for long and dreary years, was, it must be remembered, without any of that surveillance which they would have had as criminals or convicts. The sole aim of authority was merely to retain them safely.
The general sanitary condition of Dartmoor was, considering the great number of men, remarkably good. The hospital was well appointed and the patients well cared for; the humane treatment afforded them is gratefully acknowledged on all sides. Fevers and small-pox at one time committed great ravages, and the Americans suffered much. But those disorders were most skilfully treated, and letters to that effect were afterward sent by the released prisoners to Sir George McGarth, the surgeon in attendance. There were a few instances of suicide both among French and Americans.
It is worth notice that the “Romans” of Dartmoor, in spite of their ten years’ imprisonment, winter and summer, utterly without clothing, were more healthy than any other men in the depot. They were, however, frequently brought to the hospital in a state of suspended animation, from which they were recovered by the usual processes. They were at last removed altogether to prison Number Four, that appropriated in part to the coloured population, which was separated from the others. Regular supplies of money and clothingwere issued to them by the government four times during the year, but they got rid of these within even a day or two. At last they were removed from Dartmoor, clothed afresh, and put on board a hulk at Plymouth, where they were debarred from intercourse with the guards on the ship and closely watched, under strict discipline, until their release at the end of the war in 1814. They were then four hundred and thirty-six in number.
Life at Dartmoor must have been almost intolerable to this polygot collection of foreigners with little in common among them but never ending misery. Strangers in a strange land, surrounded by dreary wastes, shivering under leaden skies, seldom seeing the sun which to many was as the breath of life, all alike were consumed with inappeasable nostalgia, hopelessly cut off from their native soil and seemingly separated forever from their kith and kin and all they held most dear. Yet many strove bravely in various ways to combat their wretchedness, to rise superior to ever torturing despair. Occupation was a constant craving with the larger number. Work of any kind was thankfully undertaken to pass the weary hours. All who possessed any handicraft gladly offered their services to the authorities. Ready employment offered to masons, blacksmiths, carpenters, coopers, painters and so forth, in the many buildings in progress around. By their aid two of the main blocks were completed and the walls of the prisonchapel were raised entirely by the French captives, after their arrival on the moor. Road making and the improved approaches and communications gave work to many more beyond the enclosures. All permitted to work outside the prison limits carried a tin plate or badge on their caps and were always engaged under the eyes of the guards. If any got away the working pay of the rest was forfeited for a time, not always an effectual plan, however, in checking escapes.
The prisoners found many outlets for their steady and intelligent industry. With the native ingenuity of the Frenchmen they employed themselves constantly in the manufacture of fancy articles, which were presently sold and some of which are still preserved as art treasures in many English country homes. There is one ivory box possessed by Maclaine of the island of Mull, originally made by a French war prisoner confined in Edinburgh Castle, which is a marvel of artistic excellence and covered with intricate carving. Another fine piece is mentioned: the model of a ship only two inches in length constructed of bone by a French sailor in Dartmoor prison, and which fetched the high price of five hundred francs. Considerable sums were earned in this way; and it is stated that when the day of release came prisoners often took with them as much as one hundred pounds. Facilities for traffic in these products were afforded by the prison authorities. A daily market was held in an openspace arranged within the innermost yard of the prison, and to this people from the neighbourhood were admitted, bringing articles of food for sale and to bargain for the commodities offered by the prisoners, who also sold surreptitiously their rations and their clothing in their hunger for ready money. The rations at that time consisted of one pound of bread, half a pound of fresh meat, a quarter of a pint of peas and a modicum of salt. Many of the Frenchmen had special aptitude for trading and did a large business with the outsiders. Some established coffee houses inside for the convenience of their comrades; others set up as cooks and one invented a certain ragout composed of mutton pies and potatoes calledratatouillewhich was highly commended.
More intellectual occupations were followed by the well educated. Professors of various forms of learning might be found within its walls, masters of most European languages, teachers of drawing, mathematics, music and dancing. Books were by no means scarce, and it is said that many who had arrived quite illiterate and ignorant, left the prison possessing a good stock of general learning. Amusement of the higher sort was not wanting, for a theatre existed with a respectable company and many popular French comedies were regularly represented.
All amusements were not as reputable and comparatively harmless as theatre going, nor all employmentsas honest. A passion for gambling possessed the greater number of the prisoners, and the secret of much of the strenuous industry previously mentioned, on the part of the ragged and naked “Romans,” was to be found in the craving for funds to venture in games of chance. It drove the idle and impecunious to break the strict rules forbidding the prisoners to make away with rations or clothing despite the penalties attached of forfeiture and the issue of a yellow suit in the second case as a badge of ignominy. The attempt to stop play was futile, for although cards were not permitted within the limits, a hundred ingenious plans were devised for trying the luck of the players. A day’s rations, a week’s, a month’s were risked on the toss of a coin, or the length of a straw pulled out of a mattress. Bets were laid as to the number of turns a sentry would make on his beat, or whether or not the doctor would appear with a newly curled wig. An amusing and most original game was played with the assistance of the prison rats, who after “lights out,” when the ship’s lantern alone feebly illuminated a ward, ventured out of their holes hunting for crumbs of food that might have fallen beneath the hammocks. A specially tempting morsel having been placed in an open space, the arrival of the performers was anxiously looked for. They were all known by name and thus each player was able to select his champion for the evening. As soon as a certain number had gained the open,a sudden whistle given by a disinterested spectator sent them back to their holes and the first to reach his hole was declared the winner. An old grey rat called “Père Ratapon” was a great favourite with the gamblers; for though not so active as his younger brethren, he was always on the alert to secure a good start when disturbed.
Whatever the reason, whether the baneful effects of previous training, or the pressure of greed and the opportunities offered to gratify it by the absence of any close supervision, one section of the French prisoners was constantly and successfully engaged in criminal pursuits. Dartmoor was long an active centre for coiners and bank-note forgers; some of the prisoners possessed uncommon skill in these nefarious processes. No precautions could check the manufacture or prevent the passing out and circulation of spurious money through the kingdom. The traffic was flourishing and very largely profitable; the intermediary, for the most part the military guard, brought in the Spanish silver dollars collected and sent up from Plymouth and each coin worth four shillings was converted into eight of that value. The necessary materials for fabricating bank-notes came through the same channel and although no doubt imperfect, so much skill was displayed in their manufacture that the imitation was so nearly exact that even at the banks themselves the forged notes often passed undetected. As the military guard was always suspected, the men weresearched on going on and coming off duty and if caught were, of course, severely punished. Nevertheless many thousand notes were put in circulation and great numbers of bad shillings.
Speaking in general terms, the condition of the French prisoners at Dartmoor was not particularly irksome, apart from the continual aching sense of exile and loss of freedom. The mass of the French at Dartmoor lived well and made money to lay up. They admitted themselves that they were at times “fort gais” and scrupulously kept up their demonstrations on fête days and great anniversaries when they promenaded the yard in procession behind the Tricolor and made loud cries ofVive la FranceandVive l’Empereur. They were entirely neglected by their own government, which as a rule contributed nothing to their support, and they must have known that but for the obstinate policy of Napoleon, in refusing to allow exchanges of war prisoners, some of them at least, if not all, might long since have returned to their own country. They do not appear to have fraternised very cordially with the American prisoners when they began to arrive. The latter were generally much discontented, not only on account of their loss of liberty, but that they felt themselves neglected and in an inferior position to their French colleagues, who had the best quarters and were longer residents and more at home. For some time the Americans shared the block occupied by the “Romans,”—a very sufficient cause of grievance.Prolonged confinement in Dartmoor had, not strangely, an evil effect on their tempers. The men were apt to be quarrelsome and easily annoyed over small things, and under the prevailing code of honour disputes could only be settled in one way, by personal encounter. The authorities did not entirely prohibit duelling until the use of foils as a recreation gave encouragement to hostile encounters. It was easy enough in a community, trained to the use of arms, to remove the guard buttons from the foils and convert the harmless toy into a lethal weapon. So much mischief ensued that fencing with foils was forbidden, but on one occasion a hostile meeting was declared inevitable between a French corporal of the marines and a privateer’s man. It was necessary to find weapons and great ingenuity was displayed in providing them. Two long strips of hard wood were obtained from the carpenters employed in fixing the roof of a Roman Catholic chapel. One end of each strip was fashioned into a handle with a proper guard; at the other end, knife blades were fixed, ground down to a fine point, and thus armed, the opponents met. In the fierce fight which ensued the marine received a severe wound in his shoulder and a great gash on the sword arm. When taken to the hospital it was impossible to conceal the cause of these wounds. A search was made for the weapons which were seized and confiscated.
Description of theProteus—Story of a French sufferer—Aspect of his fellow prisoners—Below decks—System of discipline—Overcrowding and bad sanitary conditions—Dietaries coarse and insufficient—Employments on board—The “Rafalés,” their misery and degradation—Attempts at escape often successful—Escapes at Dartmoor—Prisoner walled up in a chimney—Naval officer’s uniform stolen—Some figures giving number of French prisoners in custody.
Description of theProteus—Story of a French sufferer—Aspect of his fellow prisoners—Below decks—System of discipline—Overcrowding and bad sanitary conditions—Dietaries coarse and insufficient—Employments on board—The “Rafalés,” their misery and degradation—Attempts at escape often successful—Escapes at Dartmoor—Prisoner walled up in a chimney—Naval officer’s uniform stolen—Some figures giving number of French prisoners in custody.
WEmay leave Dartmoor for a time and return to the Hulks, which it was intended to supplement and in a measure replace. It is well known that they were viewed with horror, and some personal experiences of one who was confined on board one for nearly nine years will be read with interest. M. Louis Garneray, the author, was a French painter, who came from a family of artists, and who took to a seafaring life from a love of adventure. He sailed to the East on a French ship and made the homeward voyage on theBelle Poule, one of a squadron which was to cruise on the west coast of Africa, and was captured on the 30th of March, 1806, by the English sloopRamillies. Mr. Louis Garneray was wounded and made prisoner and from that date, as he tells us, began a torture whichlasted for the nearly nine years of his imprisonment on board the English hulks. He relates as follows: “I thought I was dead to the past, but my blood boils with indignation when I recall the unheard-of sufferings that I endured in those tombs of the living. The lot of a solitary prisoner awakens compassion, but at least he is not tortured by witnessing the woes of a herd of poor wretches, brutalised and exasperated by privations and misery. Far from exaggerating I would even wish to abate something of the truth in my account of the terrible miseries of the English hulks.
“It took six weeks to reach Portsmouth Roads, and on the morning after our arrival, I was transferred with some others to the hulkProteus. For the benefit of those who do not know what a hulk is, I may explain that it is an old dismasted vessel, a two or three decker, which is moored fast so as to be almost as immovable as a stone building.
“I passed between rows of soldiers on to the deck, and was brutally thrust into the midst of the wretched, hideous mortals that peopled the hulk. No pen, however powerful, could bring before the reader the sight on which my eyes fell. Imagine a crowd of corpses leaving their graves for a moment—hollow eyes, wan, cadaverous complexions, bent backs, beards neglected, emaciated bodies, scarcely covered with yellow rags, almost in shreds, and you will then have some notion of the scene that I saw.
“Scarcely had I set foot on the deck, when the warders laid hold of me, tore off my clothes with violence, forced me into an icy cold bath, and then dressed me in a shirt, a pair of trousers, and waistcoat of an orange yellow. Not an inch of stuff had been wasted in making these garments; the trousers came to an end half way down my legs, and the waistcoat obstinately refused to button. These garments bore the initials T. O. stamped on them in black; those letters stood for Transport Office. When dressed, I and my companions had our names entered, and then each of us had a post assigned to him.
“The forecastle and the space between it and the quarter-deck were the only parts where the prisoners were allowed to take air and exercise, and not always even there. This space was about 44 feet long by 38 wide. This narrow space was called by the prisoners ‘the park.’ Fore and aft were the English; at one end the lieutenant in command; the officers, their servants and a few soldiers at the other. The part allotted to the prisoners was strongly boarded over, and the planks were thickly studded with broad-headed nails, making them almost as impenetrable as a wall of iron; and at intervals were loopholes, which, in case of an outbreak, would enable the garrison to fire upon us without exposing themselves. The prisoners’ berths were on the lower gun-deck and the orlop-deck, each of which was about 130 feet long by 40 wide.In this space were lodged nearly seven hundred men. The little light which could have reached us through the portholes was obscured by gratings two inches thick, which were inspected daily by our jailers. All round the vessel ran a gallery with open floor, so that, had anyone attempted to hide underneath, he would have been immediately seen by the sentinels, who were always on duty in this gallery. Our guard consisted of about forty or fifty soldiers; about twenty sailors and a few boys were also on board. Sentinels were placed all over the vessel and on the quarter-deck were always eight or ten men ready to take arms at the least noise. At night we heard every quarter of an hour the monotonous cry of the sentinels: ‘All’s well.’
“At six o’clock in the evening, during summer, and two in winter, the English went round striking the sides of the hulk and the gratings over the portholes, to see that all was right; later, soldiers armed with loaded and bayoneted muskets came into our part of the hulk, and made us go on deck that we might be counted. After this, the hatches and portholes were closed, in winter at least, for in summer the portholes were left open or we should have been all dead in the morning. As it was the air was so poisoned by the close shutting up together of so many persons, that the English, after opening the hatches in the morning, rushed away from them immediately. The furniture of the hulk was very simple; it consisted of a long bench placed againstthe walls, and four others in the middle. Each prisoner was given, on coming on board, a hammock, a thin blanket, and a flock mattress. The seven hundred hammocks were arranged in two rows, one above the other. There was no distinction of rank among us, but those of the prisoners who could afford it, had made a sort of frame, which they themselves fitted with mattresses; they were thus a little more comfortable, but the poisonous air and vermin were the lot of all alike.
“It was, however, in our provisions that the hatred of the English showed itself most clearly. Each prisoner’s ration consisted of a pound and a quarter of brown bread, and seven ounces of cow-beef; for soup at noon we were allowed three ounces of barley and an ounce of onion for every four men. One day in the week, instead of meat and soup, we had a pound of red herring and a pound of potatoes; and on another, a pound of dried cod, with the same quantity of potatoes. These quantities would have been sufficient, but the contractors always cheated; there were also deductions made from a prisoner’s allowance for any attempted escape, and for other alleged misconduct; and we had made a rule that each should contribute his share towards these diminutions. There were also other reductions made voluntarily by ourselves to pay for a newspaper clandestinely introduced, and to supply money to those who had escaped. The provisions were cooked by some of our number. We breakfastedon dry bread; at noon we had our soup with bread in it, and the meat was reserved for supper. The herrings were so detestable that we generally sold them back again to the contractors at a low price; they came round to us the next week; and in this way some of them did duty faithfully for more than ten years! With the money realised by their sale, we bought a little butter or cheese. The dried cod was bad, but we could manage to swallow it. The bread was often heavy as lead, but heavy as it was, the weight given to us was frequently so insufficient that we were compelled to make complaint; and in that case we had to wait fasting till the evening, before the proper authority could find time to give his decision. Water was brought to us by little boats, from which we ourselves had to raise it; those who were too weak, too old or too dignified to share in this task, paid a halfpenny to their substitutes. We had also to take each his part in cleaning our decks and ‘the park.’ Crimes and disorders, the reader may suppose, would be frequent enough in such an assembly of men, exasperated by suffering and misfortune.
“In theProteusorder was preserved as far as possible by a committee of eight members, chosen by the majority, and their task was to issue orders relating either to our general life or to particular cases, and also to give decisions without appeal in all differences that arose. In the event of a crime, however, the committee had only the power to summonall the prisoners, who, in grave cases, were the judges. The right of pardon did not exist in our community. To these means of keeping order must be added the moral influence of the officers on board, for although there was no distinction of rank, they were generally esteemed, and could mostly get a hearing from the crowd.
“This was the community to which I was now introduced. When I went to take the post assigned to me, there seemed to me to hang about the long chamber a thick cloud, bearing in it the germs of epidemics. I had been in my life in a slaver with 250 slaves packed in the hold, I knew how poisonous was the atmosphere there, and thought that nothing could be worse—I now learnt my mistake. The horrible den in which I found myself was dimly lighted by the portholes covered with gratings; as my eyes became accustomed to the dim light, I saw around the pale corpse-like, ragged wretches I have described. Except a few who, stretched on the boards at full length, wan and dull-eyed, seemed at the point of death, all in this hideous den were busily engaged. Some, armed with planes, were carpentering; others were at work in bone, making ornaments and chessmen; others were making really beautiful models of ships; some were making straw hats, and others knitted night caps; there were also among them tailors, shoemakers and one man who manufactured, Heaven knows from what, tobacco; nor must I omit the professors of fencing, the baton,and, above all, dancing-masters, whose lessons were charged at the rate of a halfpenny for an hour’s instruction. Seated near the portholes were some of our officers, who by way of killing the time and earning a few pence, gave lessons in algebra or geometry, at a price not above that which the dancing-master received. Through this crowd moved dealers with their cries of ‘Who wants to sell? Who buys?’ Every now and then some poor wretch with hunger in his looks, would stop one of them, and dispose of the miserable rags from his back, and then, turning to another dealer, expend the amount in unattractive food. Some of the occupations of which I have spoken—such as, for example, straw-plaiting—were forbidden by the English, as coming into competition with their own manufactures; with slight interruptions, however, the prisoners worked continuously through the whole day.
“Did a soldier, sentinel or not, set foot on the gangway leading to our part of the hulk, the first prisoner who observed him raised the signal agreed on by us, and at the cry of ‘ship’ repeated from one end to the other, everything forbidden was stowed away, and any who might happen to be piercing the walls of the hulk in order to make their escape ceased working for a while.
“My adventurous life had brought me into contact with many hardships, but when I was shown the place assigned to me my heart sank. I had,however, a little money; and for three out of my five louis, I purchased from a soldier, who had succeeded to it within a fortnight, the right to the best place in the hulk. I got a table and bench into the bargain, and thus I was installed.
“I had not been long on board before I found that there was a particular class excelling the generality in utter misery. They were called the ‘Rafalés,’ and lived penned up by themselves in seclusion from the rest. Incorrigible gamblers, these wretches had long since parted with their hammocks and blankets; at night they would lie for the sake of warmth in a row on the bare boards, all on the same side; and when the one at the head of a row got tired of the position, he would cry out, ‘Tack,’ and the whole line would immediately change sides. The strange misery of this existence seemed, nevertheless, to have its charms, for outsiders would occasionally wish to enter this fellowship, but to do so, certain rules had to be complied with. The aspirant had to sell all he possessed, and to give a treat of beer and bread, after which a stone would be given to him as a pillow, and he was then received as a member. The experiment was tried of giving these men fresh hammocks, but they found their softness insupportable and sold them. Many of these wretches were all but naked; and when the roll was called, two or three in this condition would hire between them an old blanket, under cover of which they would come on deck; for thisaccommodation, the value of a halfpenny (for money was a thing unknown to them) was deducted from their next day’s rations. The rations of these men would be pledged for sometimes five or six days in advance, and then they would wander about looking with hungry eyes for potato-peelings or onion skins; a herring head or cabbage-stump would be a blessed discovery; not seldom, however, two ‘Rafalés’ in the extreme of hunger would even gamble for the prizes thus obtained. Most of them, of course, soon died, and others, when at the point of death, would be recovered by a course of treatment at the hospital.
“By way of whiling away the time and in order that when my liberation came I might be able to pass my examination, I determined to join those who were studying mathematics. The difficulties in our way were not slight; yet so earnestly did we study on board the hulks, that I have known rude, ignorant sailors, who at setting out could not form a single letter of the alphabet, become possessed in a few years not only of the power to write fluently, but also of a competent knowledge of geography and mathematics. Our first difficulty was to get books and instruments, and even when this was overcome we had made but little progress. The noise on deck by day rendered hopeless all attempt at study, and lights were forbidden at night. At night, however, we determined to work. The students were the poorest body on board, with the exceptionalways of our friends the ‘Rafalés;’ we had no money, yet to work at night we must have a lamp or candle. At dinner, therefore, every student was bound to set apart carefully every morsel of fat from his meat; this fat was collected in a large shell, and with the addition of a wick we had our lamp. When night came we drew our benches up to the table under our lamp, and then surrounded the whole with a sort of hat, built up of mattresses, hammocks and blankets. Every chink had to be stopped up to hide the light from the English, who were constantly on the watch through the loopholes. Sometimes the air became so bad in this sanctuary, that I have frequently seen men by no means weak or delicate fall senseless. These precautions were necessary, as, had we been discovered, not only should we have had three days in the black-hole (an awful den), on two-thirds of the allowance, but the authorities, by a refinement of cruelty, which I have always been at a loss to understand, were wont to destroy in the presence of prisoners books, papers, slates, and other things, thus breaking all rules.
“It may be supposed that there was no lack of attempts to escape from this life, which, in one of the three different hulks on board of which I was during my imprisonment, was rendered still more miserable by the choleric and vindictive character of the lieutenant in command. The first of these attempts after my arrival was made in the followingmanner. I have stated that water was brought over to us by little boats; these boats carried back empty the barrels they had previously left. Accordingly, the night before the arrival of the water-boat, one of our number hid himself in an empty barrel. I and another were in the secret, and it happened to be our turn to assist in raising and lowering the casks. We had raised all the full barrels, and the order was given to lower the empty ones. I could hear my heart beat, when, after having lowered all but the row which would remain at the top, my companion and I moved towards a barrel marked with a notch, to show us that it was there our friend lay hidden. It descended safely and the boat, after a while, pushed off. The man who had invented this desperate means of escaping intended to remain till the following night in his barrel, and then, when all was quiet, to get somehow to shore. Wild as the undertaking seemed, it succeeded, nevertheless; but some time afterwards when, from not hearing of his capture, we concluded that he had made good his escape, and were about to repeat the attempt, we observed, to our bitter disappointment, that the English carefully inspected the barrels before lowering them.
“Various other methods were put in practice; and it was not seldom that, in the dead of night, we were awakened by the firing of a musket, followed perhaps by a cry, whereby we learnt that some attempt had been discovered. The waterwould be immediately illuminated and boats would put off from the other hulks to aid in the chase if necessary, and presently soldiers would invade our den, and wake up those who still slept with blows of the fist or the butt-ends of their muskets. Then, for two hours, perhaps, we should have to turn out on deck, while we were counted several times over; and when we at last regained our hammocks, the rest of the night would pass in questions and suppositions as to who had escaped, and whether he had got safely off. For an intended escape was made known only to those who were to share in it, and a few friends who could be relied on. Men driven desperate by hunger would, for the sake of a little relief, turn traitors, and inform against their companions in wretchedness. So many escapes were effected, that at last, in order to reduce their number, the English Government decreed that the flight of a prisoner should be punished by the death of two others, who were to be hanged in his place, in case he should not be retaken. Our officers met together and drew up a letter, addressed to the Privy Council; and from it, in support of what I have stated, and which else might appear my own invention, I cite the following passages: ‘We are unable adequately to express our astonishment at the order which you have addressed to us; we have had to read it over and over again before we could persuade ourselves that it was possible for persons belonging to a nation calling itself civilised, to putforward such barbarous threats as those contained in the order. You throw on us the responsibility of holding in safe custody our comrades, removing it from those to whom is confided their safekeeping. Prisoners are themselves to answer for prisoners, and at the hazard of their lives.’ And again: ‘We cannot doubt that it is your wish to reduce us to despair, and we swear all, that whatever you may have in store for us, we will meet it with a firmness that will not disgrace the great nation to which we have the honour to belong. We choose death rather than ignominy; and death we will face when called on in such a way as to leave behind us an example of courage and firmness as striking as that you afford of injustice and cruelty.’ ” This letter was followed by petitions from all the hulks, and the atrocious measure was never put in force. The imposition of such frightful penalties upon men who were only obeying the first dictates of nature as exhibited by every caged animal from man downwards, was, of course, perfectly indefensible. But England was no worse than France in this respect. Severe punishment was decreed for all English prisoners who sought to make their escape from French war prisons; at one time a proclamation was made that all taken in the act should be sentenced to the galleys; at another they were warned that they would be tried by court-martial. But these threats availed little, and constant and determined were the attempts to break away from the ruthless confinementof such strong places as Verdun, Bitche and Valenciennes.
Our authority, M. Garneray, speaks of three of his attempts to escape and no doubt he would have tried again but for the blessed advent of peace. He brings his story to a close with the following last words: “After long, patient labour, assisted by a companion, I had managed to cut through the side of the hulk, but we were seen as we ventured forth by some of the sentinels who laid rough hands upon us and wounded us severely. Again, with a companion I got overboard, but was recaptured when within an inch of drowning, the sad fate which overtook my friend.” Once more, with two others, he contrived to seize a boat and get out to sea, but when actually within sight of the French coast, they were overtaken by an English corvette and secured. He says: “I was utterly broken down. The ill-treatment we had so long suffered grew worse; news reached us of the disasters of the French arms, and every moment we had to listen to the grossest abuse of our emperor and our country. One day my patience was exhausted, and I knocked down a sailor who had grossly insulted me; others rushed up, and a fight ensued; the captain came up; and bruised and bleeding I was thrust into the black-hole. Five days had I been here when earlier in the morning than usual came the man who generally brought me the morsel of horrible bread which was to last till the following day: ‘You may come out.’he said kindly; ‘you are free.’ I rushed on deck to get fresh air, where, to my surprise, I found my comrades crying, laughing, dancing, shouting. The peace had been signed and we were free!”
At Dartmoor attempts at escape were frequent and, when backed up with much patient ingenuity and great daring, sometimes succeeded. A favourite method of passing out was by mining underneath the boundary wall. One case which narrowly involved the life of a boy of fourteen, who was suspected of having given information, may be transcribed from an official report:—“A poor boy called Philip Hamond,” says the report, “calls for commiseration. This lad was born at Guernsey and was pressed by a French privateer, which was taken by one of his Majesty’s cruisers. The prisoners began a mine, which they carried under the foundations for about forty yards at a depth of five feet below the surface and about four feet in diameter, towards the outer walls to which they had nearly approached. They were unable to work in a straight line on account of the boulders which they came upon in the gravel, and were frequently obliged to make a considerable deviation in order to turn these obstacles. The tools used were wooden spades with an edge of tin, cask hoops and old iron made into scrapers. The earth taken daily from the mine had been concealed below the floor and had also been taken out to the gardens in small quantities with ashes and refuse. The boy Hamond,observing earth concealed and distributed in several places, became alarmed lest he himself should become involved in a dangerous venture and secretly informed the authorities. Upon the discovery of the plot the prisoners rose in a body and arming themselves with daggers made of old nails, iron wire and pieces of glass fitted into wooden handles, they would instantly have made the boy the object of their vengeance if he had not taken refuge under the bayonets of the guard which was called in to suppress the rising.”
A captive will risk much and bear much to secure freedom. A Frenchman at Dartmoor, who was a good practical stone-mason, was employed with others in building the Princetown rectory-house. They had reached that part of the work which consisted in fixing a chimney flue, and left an inner recess large enough to hold a man standing upright, but walled only with thin stone especially selected for the purpose and easily removable. After six feet had been gained the strong work was resumed; the flue was made the proper thickness and the stones rendered in good mortar. Care was taken to leave air and eyelet holes for breathing and observation in the six feet of thin wall. One afternoon the intending fugitive entered the flue and took up his quarters in the above mentioned recess, while his comrades went on with their work above. They worked so well and with so much skill that they were particularly commended by their foreman,who complimented them highly on the excellent face put upon the flue. The man in hiding was not missed until after the party had left work, but his absence was discovered at evening roll call. A thorough search was then made of the rectory-house, inside and out, but the smooth surface of the walls negatived all idea of a practicable hiding place. A number of vigorous bayonet thrusts were made up the freshly built flue, but without betraying or injuring the man inside and the search was abandoned. It was believed the prisoner had absconded during the day, having successfully eluded the vigilance of the sentries posted in a cordon round the house. At nightfall, however, the immured man, finding all quiet, attacked the green masonry at its thinnest part and extricating himself without difficulty, made off unobserved. The state of the flue on the following morning pointed clearly to the method by which he had effected his escape.
The employment of the prisoners in the officers’ quarters outside the prison, inspired another clever and audacious Frenchman with a plan of escape. He was a man of the superior class, well educated, who had been taken prisoner when serving on board a French privateer. He was a quick and expert craftsman and was constantly employed in the officers’ quarters executing alterations and repairs. One day he was at work on a cupboard in the house of the prison doctor who was an officer in the British navy, and while thus engaged made friends withone of the maid-servants. With her assistance he received a complete suit of the doctor’s uniform including his sword and cocked hat. The prisoner was not unlike the doctor, of the same fair complexion and much the same height. With consummate coolness and skill he proceeded to change characters, assuming the uniform which fitted him well and providing himself with the doctor’s snuff box and silver topped cane. Just as the hour for evening roll-call approached he had put the finishing touches to the pigtail which he was careful to arrange as the doctor did, and then he calmly walked out of the house, gained the high road to Plymouth without observation and was beyond pursuit almost before his absence was discovered. The fugitive eventually reached France in safety, whence, with profuse thanks and acknowledgments, he returned the doctor’s possessions.
When the continental war was at its height, the total number of French prisoners was considerable. The majority of the prisoners were of course sailors and soldiers, civilians being chiefly passengers taken in merchant ships. All officers and civilians were ranked as gentlemen and were given parole, with permission to reside within assigned limits on certain conditions. They were kindly treated as a rule, were received in society and their position, although painful, was at least endurable. Great numbers, however, broke their parole between the years 1803-14. The private men were not admitted toparole and were more or less closely restricted to the hulks and prisons. It may be asserted on the authority of contemporary writers that the pictures drawn of the sufferings endured by the prisoners themselves were greatly exaggerated and overcoloured. Some degree of severity was unavoidable, but their treatment was generally mild and humane. The dietaries were sufficient in quantity; the rations good and wholesome; the clothing warm and serviceable, although in colour unsightly to lessen the chance of escape. As time passed and when good order was regularly established, close attention was paid to sanitary requirements, prisoners’ bedding was well aired and in good condition, the prison chambers and the between decks of the hulks were kept clean and dry and were thoroughly well ventilated.