fifteen executions,’ he said, ‘one part of the horrible instrument
broke, and a workman was sent for to mend it. M. de Chateaubrun was,
with the other victims, near the scaffold, with his hands tied behind
his back. The repairing took a long time. The day began to darken; the
great crowd of spectators were far more intent on watching the repairing
of the guillotine than on looking at the victims who were to die; and
all, even the gendarmes themselves, had their eyes fixed on the
scaffold. Resigned, but very weak, the condemned man leant, without
meaning it, on those behind him; and they, pressed by the weight of his
body, mechanically made way for him, till gradually, and by no effort of
his own, he came to the last ranks of the crowd. The instrument once
repaired, the executions began again, and they hurried to the end. A
dark night concealed both executioners and spectators. Led on by the
crowd, De Chateaubrun was at first amazed at his situation, but soon
conceived the hope of escaping. He went to the Champs Elysées and
there, addressing a man who looked like a workman, he told him,
laughingly, that some comrades with whom he had been joking had tied his
hands behind his back, and taken his hat, telling him to go and look for
it. He begged the man to cut the cords, and the workman pulled out a
knife and did so, laughing all the while at the joke. M. de Chateaubrun
then proposed going into one of the small wineshops in the Champs
Elysées. During a slight repast he seemed to be expecting his comrades
to bring back his hat; and seeing nothing of them, he begged his guest
to carry a note to some friend, whom he knew would lend him one, for he
could not go bareheaded through the streets. He added that his friend
would bring him some money, for his comrades, in fun, had taken away his
purse. The poor man believed every word M. de Chateaubrun told him, took
the note, and returned in half an hour, accompanied by the friend, who
embraced Chateaubrun, and gave him all the help he
required.’"--(_Memoirs of M. de Vaublanc._)
_SYDNEY SMITH._
1797.
Commodore William Sydney Smith, afterwards admiral, had been made
prisoner at the mouth of the Seine, where he had ventured in his
frigate, then stationed at Havre. This enterprise seemed so daring that
the English sailor was suspected of having wished to favour a royalist
attempt, and of being a dangerous spy. The suspicions as to the nature
of his mission seemed confirmed by the fact that his secretary was an
exile, named De Trommelin, who had been with him a long time, in the
hopes of being in some way useful
[Illustration: The woodman pulled out a knive and did so.]
to the royal cause. If the nationality of this man had been recognised,
he would have been instantly put to death, according to the law then
existing in France; but the commodore passed him as his servant. In vain
England begged the exchange of Sydney Smith; the Directory refused,
knowing how dangerous an enemy to France he was. Imprisoned at the
Abbaye, then at the Temple, he was more than once on the point of
escaping, in spite of the vigilance of the police. Several ladies, as
well as Trommelin, attempted to aid him at various periods. Trommelin’s
wife--who could, at least, invoke duty as the motive of her
conduct--came to Paris, and hired a house near the Temple. A mason was
bribed to open a communication between this house and the Temple, by way
of the cellar, and everything seemed sure of success, when the fall of a
few stones gave the alarm. The prisoners were more strictly watched than
ever. In a short time Trommelin, having a better fate than a man
deserves who carries arms against his country, was exchanged; but Sydney
Smith was obliged to forego that advantage. After the 18th Fructidor, he
was still more rigorously treated; but the moment of his freedom was
drawing nigh.
Among the royalists then hidden and conspiring in Paris, was an officer
named Philippeaux, formerly the fortunate rival of Bonaparte at the
military school, and, since that time, his sworn enemy. Certainly
without any idea that Sydney Smith and himself would, two years
afterwards, be together in the presence of General Bonaparte at St. Jean
d’Acre, and without any other motive than that of injuring the republic,
Philippeaux determined to deliver the commodore. He associated himself
with other royalists, and notably with an opera dancer, named
Boisgirard; and he entered into relations with the daughter of one of
the Temple gaolers, by whose aid he succeeded in deceiving her father.
Disguised as a prison commissary, and accompanied by his accomplices,
wearing the uniform of gendarmes--one of whom, Boisgirard, represented a
general--Philippeaux went at night to the Temple. Boisgirard, at the
gate, showed an order of release, signed by the minister of foreign
affairs, and demanded that the prisoner might be given up. Either
bribed, or deceived by appearances, the gaolers and director of the
prison obeyed, and Sydney Smith was brought out. Playing his part
perfectly, he affected great surprise; and on hearing his immediate
transfer to another prison spoken of, he vehemently protested against
it. Then, feigning obedience, he followed his liberators, and entered a
carriage that conveyed him to Rouen, from whence he crossed to Havre.
There he succeeded in getting on board an English ship, the _Argo_,
which took him to London. The English captain, Brenton, certifies, in
his “History of the Navy,” that he knows, from good authority, that
£3000 sterling (75,000 francs), given by the English government, opened
the doors of Sydney Smith’s prison, and smoothed all obstacles as far as
the coast. He adds that Lord St. Vincent (Jervis) assured him he had
seen the order from the Treasury.
_PICHEGRU, RAMEL, BARTHELEMY, DELARUE, ETC._
1797.
A short time after the 18th Fructidor, a certain number of those who had
taken part in the counter-revolutionary riots were transported to
Guiana. They all belonged, more or
[Illustration: He affected great surprise.]
less, to the royalist party. Among them were--Pichegru, one of the
greatest soldiers and one of the worst citizens France ever produced;
Barthélemy, a member of the Directory; Ramel, adjutant-general,
commander of the grenadiers of the Corps Législatif; Delarue, a member
of the council of the Five Hundred; and generals Aubry and Willot, who
had been among the first arrested. To the names of these party-men it is
but right to add that of Letellier, Barthélemy’s servant, who having
begged, as a favour, that he might be allowed to follow his master to
prison, accompanied him in his exile, and died, at last, the victim of
his devotion. At Cayenne, and then at Sinnamary, the deputies saw, with
sorrow, several of their companions struck down by the influence of the
climate; and, to fly from a similar fate, they resolved on escaping and
making their way to Dutch Guiana. Of this adventure we have two very
different versions--one by Ramel, who, on his return to London,
published the journal of his escape; and the other by Delarue, who, long
after, under the restoration, wrote a “History of the 18th Fructidor,”
where this escape is related. Seen from our point of view, Ramel’s
journal is, in all probability, nothing more than a romance; while the
narrative of Delarue, far simpler, seems to be the expression of truth.
We give both, beginning with the first:--
“We were accustomed to walk,” says Ramel, “on the ramparts along the
river. We often contemplated, with deep sighs, the western coast, but
saw nothing, either on land or water, that could give us the faintest
hope of escape. At the foot of the bastion, outside the fort and on the
edge of the river, there was a small boat, used for conveying the guard
to and fro. This little boat, with its moorings, was consigned to the
care of the sentinel placed near the battlements of the fort, in which
the guards were stationed. We had often looked with longing eyes at this
boat; but it was only by degrees, and when impelled by despair, that we
became accustomed to the idea of venturing out to sea in so frail a
skiff. None of us knew how to manage a boat; we had no compass, and
should have been obliged to trust ourselves to some Indian or sailor.”
The first attempt proved fruitless. Pichegru having tried to win over an
Indian, who sold vegetables to the fort, this latter spread abroad
suspicions which the general’s half offer had created in his mind. But
this check was only a temporary one. A person at that time in the fort,
whom Ramel does not otherwise specify, gave them much information as to
the road they should take, and as to the proper means of insuring their
flight. They procured passports under supposed names, and ripened their
plans, without divulging them to those of their companions who were not
in the plot, and several of whom inspired them with a not unfounded
mistrust.
A pirate captain, named Poisvert, having captured an American ship,
commanded by a certain Tilly, the owner of the cargo, brought his
capture to Sinnamary, and lodged the crew and their captain in the fort.
The American captain soon found out Pichegru, Ramel, and their
companions, with whom he was well acquainted, and gave them news of
their families and friends. They informed him of their plans, and showed
him the boat. After trying to convince them of the impossibility of
putting out to sea, and attempting a journey of several days in such a
vessel; and seeing, at last, that they were fully determined to perish
rather than remain at Sinnamary, the brave Tilly resolved on joining his
fate to theirs. “I give up all,” he said, “to save you. I will take my
pilot, Barrick, with me, and we will set out together.”
Everything was settled, when they learnt that Tilly was to be
immediately transferred to Cayenne. He went away, leaving them Barrick
in his place, who soon disappeared, and remained hidden in the wood near
by for thirty-six hours, perched on a tree, to escape from the serpents.
“It had been agreed that the following day, the 3rd of June, at nine in
the evening, he should go down to the edge of the river near the fort,
and should jump into the boat on seeing us appear.”
Everything seemed in favour of the fugitives. Captain Poisvert gave a
dinner on board the American capture to the commander of the place; and
the wine soon began to flow freely both on the ship and in the
fort--soldiers, officers, convicts, even, were at the feast. All were
soon drunk, except the eight conspirators, who simply feigned
intoxication, and quarrelled, to ward off suspicion.
“Night came on. We saw the commander taken home quite insensible, and
carried as if he were dead. Silence had succeeded to songs and drunken
shouts; soldiers and slaves were lying here and there; the service was
forgotten; the guard-house left empty.
“The final hour of our stay at Sinnamary rang at last. At nine o’clock
Dessonville, who was watching, warned each of us. We went out and met at
the gate of the fort, the bridge of which was not yet taken up.
Everything was profoundly quiet. I went with Pichegru and Aubry to the
top of the guard-house, and walked straight to the sentinel. He was a
wretched drummer, who had worried us to his utmost. I asked him what
time it was; he raised his eyes to the stars; I sprang at his throat;
Pichegru disarmed him; and we dragged him away, tightening our hold to
prevent his crying out. We were on the parapet; the man struggled
violently, slipped from us, and fell into the river. We joined our
companions at the foot of the rampart, and seeing no one in the
guard-house, we ran in and took out arms and cartridges, left the fort,
and flew into the boat. Barrick was there, and carried us into the
skiff. Barthélemy, an infirm man, and not so active as we were, fell and
stuck in the mud. Barrick, with his strong arm, caught him, pulled him
out, and placed him in the boat. The cable was cut; Barrick took the
helm; motionless and silent we drifted with the current. The tide and
the current together impelled our frail vessel. We listened, but could
hear nothing but the murmur of the waters, and the land breeze, which
soon swelled our little sail. We were then unable to distinguish the
tower of Sinnamary. On approaching the watch on the point we took down
the sail, so as to make ourselves less visible. We knew that the eight
men on guard there had received their full share of the captain’s
bounty, and that, consequently, they must be as drunk as their comrades.
We were not hailed; the tide carried us across the bar. We left on our
right our brave friend Tilly’s ship, and passed close to _The Victoire_,
just come from Cayenne, and commanded by Captain Brochet, who was much
pleased at our escape, and who certainly would not have opposed it.
“The breeze freshened, the sea was calm; but in going out far we ran the
risk of losing ourselves; while, hugging the coast too closely, we were
in danger of wrecking the ship on the rocks, which extend as far as
Iracouba. The moon shone out suddenly, as if to light up our path. The
moment was delicious; we congratulated ourselves; we thanked Providence
and our generous pilot, Barrick, who was in a dreadful state from the
mosquito bites. We sailed safely on for about two hours, when we heard
three cannon-shots--two from the Sinnamary fort, and one from the Point.
Soon after the watch at Iracouba repeated the three reports. We could no
longer doubt of our escape being discovered. We did not now fear direct
pursuit from Sinnamary, where there was not a single boat they could
arm; besides, we had a good start. The only thing we dreaded was the
detachment from Iracouba, composed, as we knew, of twelve men. They
could only have met us in a boat similar to ours, with eight or ten men.
We kept sailing on near the coast, all the while preparing our arms, and
fully determined on defending ourselves if they attacked, or attempted
to bar the passage under the fort of Iracouba.
“At four in the morning two cannon-shots were heard towards the east,
and were immediately responded to by a report close to our ears. We were
in front of the fort. It was still dark; but at daybreak we found
ourselves to windward of Iracouba. We had nothing more to fear from
pursuit; the dangers of the sea were all we had to overcome.”
In such a vessel, which was so small, and so light that the waves filled
it at every moment, and had to be baled incessantly with a gourd, the
fugitives were in imminent danger of perishing. A movement of Ramel’s,
who wished to catch his hat, which fell in the water, almost upset the
boat; and Pichegru, who had been unanimously chosen captain, severely
reprimanded him. Without a compass, and without the necessary
instruments to show them the way, without food, and with two bottles of
rum as their sole sustenance, if Ramel is to be believed, they suffered
acutely from hunger for eight days. But their moral strength kept them
up, and they even had the courage to joke about their misery and their
hunger, which they bore with great patience.
After being fired at on their passage in front of fort Orange, because
they would not hoist their flag, they were thrown by a storm upon the
coast. On the following day they were reconnoitred by some Dutch
soldiers. There was at first some slight difficulty as to their
admission to the Dutch territory; but that being soon settled, they
found themselves the objects of the most generous
hospitality.--(_Journal of the Adjutant-General Ramel._)
According to Delarue, the convicts enjoyed great liberty at Sinnamary:
they could go about, so long as they kept within certain limits; they
had guns and ammunition, and could shoot. The post of Sinnamary, guarded
by a few soldiers, had no resemblance whatever to a fort; it was only a
poor village, inhabited by Indian or Creole fishermen; and the boat they
used for their escape belonged to a German, whom they knew to be engaged
in smuggling between Surinam and Cayenne. It was thought that such a
state of things did not guarantee much for the security of the convicts,
and it was decided to transport them to a much less healthy part of
Guiana. By the advice of Tilly, who could not accompany them, as he was
being transferred to Cayenne, and with the certainty of the help of
Barrick, his pilot, they determined to escape. They quietly went one
night with their firearms to a wood, where Barrick awaited them, without
all the attending circumstances of revelling Ramel speaks of. They had
no sentinel to disarm, but only to give help to a negro, who was trying
to master a turtle. The boat contained provisions--scanty, it is true,
but still more than sufficient to last them till their arrival in the
Dutch possessions. So they did not suffer a week from hunger, as Ramel
says: they heard no cannon fired, to signal their departure; in short,
they escaped without most of those episodes with which Ramel has thought
proper to embellish his recital.
_COLONEL DE RICHEMONT._
In the year 1807 the Baron de Richemont, a French colonel, was taken by
an English privateer in the ship bringing him from the Mauritius to
Europe. The town of Chesterfield was assigned to him for a residence.
Richemont had been in England about eighteen months, and every proposal
of exchange had been refused, when one morning he saw something in his
newspaper which made a deep impression on his mind. “I had just been
reading,” he says in his memoirs, “an account of Colonel Crawford who
had escaped from Verdun, where he was a prisoner on parole, and who, not
being willing to take the command of his regiment, until his conduct had
been approved of, had appealed to a jury. The jury had declared, that he
being detained prisoner against the law of nations, had acted rightly in
breaking through the obligation imposed on him. This narrative
interested me very much, and I read it several times over with deep
attention. I found all the details of the escape plainly set forth, with
an account of the ruse to which he had recourse to ensure without fail
the success of his plan. He had petitioned the French Government for
permission to drink the waters of Spa, promising to return and deliver
himself prisoner again at Verdun, and he had taken advantage of this
favour, granted with the confidence always inspired by the word of a
gentleman, to return to England.
“The various thoughts that such a recital gave rise to in my mind are
more easily felt than described. I also was detained against the law of
nations, and my position admitted of a far different statement from that
of the English colonel’s, a decree of the high court of admiralty having
declared neutral the ship on which I had been arrested. I had officially
protested against the injustice of my detention. I was moreover free
from any kind of engagement by the declaration of the jury who had
pronounced the acquittal of Colonel Crawford. I was not troubled now
with the slightest scruple of delicacy.”
Having made up his mind, Richemont joined himself to a Frenchman, a
marine officer who had already proposed to him to escape. They first
decided on their plan, and then Richemont wrote a letter to the
gentlemen of the transport-office, in which he declared his intention of
leaving England, at the same time giving his reasons, and reminding his
gaolers of the verdict of their own countrymen in the Verdun case. “This
letter, posted two hours after my departure from Chesterfield, reached
the gentlemen of the transport-office on the day that I arrived in
London, and I only left England eight or ten days afterwards. I
evidently gave them all the necessary time to make their search; but in
all conscience they could not expect me to surrender myself to their
generosity.” The two fugitives, calling themselves Spaniards, and having
a well-filled purse, reached the capital without any difficulty. They
then immediately posted to Folkstone to the house of a certain smuggler,
about whom Richemont had very precise information. “I knocked, and went
in. The girl who had opened the door showed me into a very clean and
comfortably furnished parlour, where I found the man alone, smoking his
pipe, with a glass of grog before him. I nodded to him, and asked if I
had the honour of speaking to Mr. W. G----.
“‘Yes sir,’ he said; ‘I am the man.’
“Then going straight to the subject, I told him that we were two
Frenchmen, who looked to him for the means to return to France.
“‘What do you take me for?’ said he in an angry tone.
“‘Master,’ I answered directly, ‘don’t let us get angry; talk coolly. If
you have to complain of me in any way, you will always be free to do as
you please, but listen to me first. We are two honourable and discreet
gentlemen, who only wish to deal pleasantly with you; but I ought to
tell you, that I have taken measures to make you pay dearly, if
necessary, for an obstinate refusal, for I have about me all the
documents to prove that, at such a time, you came to Chesterfield, took
Captain X---- away in your post chaise, kept him hidden so many days in
your house, and at last carried him in your vessel to the other side of
the channel. I have now to offer you one hundred pounds sterling, and
the gratitude and friendship of two men of heart and loyalty besides.’
“‘A man that talks in that way,’ said he, taking my hand, and shaking it
vigorously, ‘is served in every country. Your manner suits me; there is
frankness and resolution in your words. You are welcome; I am your man;
you shall always have reason to think well of me. Don’t fear; _we_ are
the real kings of the sea, and not those upstarts of the royal navy.’
“‘Quite true,’ said I, and shook his hand cordially. ‘That’s a bargain,’
I added; ‘and now we must agree as to the carrying out of the plan.’ I
then told him where we had put up, and that the important thing was to
be able to wait in safety for decidedly favourable weather, and to
provide for everything during our stay.
“‘All right,’ said the master; ‘everything shall be done, and well done.
At such a time to-night, come to me here, and I will take you to a place
of safety, where you can drink, smoke, and sleep at your ease, without
thinking about anything.’
“At the time mentioned we went to the smuggler, who was expecting us. I
put into his hands the hundred pounds agreed on, telling him he must
expect to see on the walls, a notice of the transport-office, promising
a reward to whoever should arrest us.
“‘Never mind,’ said he quickly; ‘I might be offered the crown of
England, but never shall an act of cowardice or treachery be laid to my
door.’
“We started, and entered rather a mean looking place, a regular den of
smugglers, a house with innumerable doors or traps. Had they come to
arrest us here, we might have escaped in a dozen different directions.
The house was lighted, and consequently inhabited. We found in it a
woman, no longer young, who was introduced to us as our servant and
cook; we saw in the sitting-room a side table, laid out with plenty of
china. As for the kitchen, it was arranged _à l’anglaise_, with iron
ovens.
“‘You will only have to give your orders,’ said Master G----. ‘The
pantry is well furnished; beer, tobacco, and eatables are there in
abundance, and you can choose the best.’
“He showed us two bedrooms, each containing a bed, a table, and a few
chairs. In one was a writing table, with paper and ink. Installed thus,
and treated with more care and attention than even the strictest
hospitality demanded, when we could only expect security in the most
humble retreat, we thanked and shook hands with our liberator, who took
leave of us laughing, and wishing us a good night.