THE PRISONS ASHORE
6. GREENLAW—VALLEYFIELD
About a mile and a half on the Edinburgh side of Penicuik, on the great
south road leading to Peebles and Dumfries, is the military station of
Glencorse, the dépôt of the Royal Scots Regiment. Until about ten years
ago the place was known as Greenlaw, but the name was changed owing to
postal confusion with Greenlaw in Berwickshire.
In 1804, when, for many reasons, war-prisoners were hurried away from
England to Scotland, the old mansion house of Greenlaw was bought by the
Government and converted into a dépôt for 200 prisoners of war. It was
situated in the south-west corner of a park of sixty acres, and
consisted of a great square building, which was surrounded by a high
wooden palisade, outside which was an airing ground, and space for the
necessary domestic offices, guard rooms, garrison quarters, and so
forth, within an outer stone wall. Other buildings, chiefly in wood,
were added, and until 1811 it was the only Scottish war-prison south of
Edinburgh.
For a year Greenlaw depended upon regulars from Edinburgh for its
garrison, but after 1805 the drain upon the army for foreign service was
so great, that the Militia was again requisitioned to do duty at the
war-prisons. The garrison at Greenlaw consisted of one captain, four
subalterns, eight sergeants, four drummers, and 155 rank and file, the
head-quarters being at the Old Foundry in Penicuik. Discipline seems to
have been strict, and special attention was given to the appearance and
turn-out of the men. Eleven sentries were on duty night and day, each
man having six blank and six ball cartridges, the latter only to be used
in case of serious need—a very necessary insistance, as the militiamen,
although of a better class generally than their successors of recent
years, were more apt to be carried away by impulse than seasoned
regulars. A private of the Stirling Militia was condemned in 1807 to
receive 800 lashes for being drunk and out of quarters after tattoo, for
having struck his superior officer, and used mutinous language—and this
was a sentence mitigated on account of his previous good conduct and his
expression of regret.
After the Peace of 1814, Greenlaw seems to have remained untenanted
until 1846, when extensive buildings were added—mostly of wood—and it
was made the military prison for Scotland. This it continued to be until
1888. In 1876 still further additions were made in a more substantial
fashion, as it was decided to make it also the Scottish South Eastern
Military Dépôt. In 1899 the old military prisons in wood were
demolished, and with them some of the original war-prison buildings, so
that all at present existing of the latter are the stone octagon Guard
House, in the war-times used as the place of confinement for officers,
and the line of building, now the married men’s quarters, then the
garrison officer’s quarters, and some of the original stone boundary
wall.
In 1810 the Government bought the Esk Mills at Valleyfield, and on
February 6, 1811, the first batch of 350 prisoners arrived. Building was
rapidly pushed forward to provide accommodation for 5,000 prisoners at a
cost of £73,000, the new war-prison being known as Valleyfield.
‘About nine miles south of Edinburgh,’ says a writer in _Chambers’s
Journal_ for 1887, ‘on the main road to Peebles, stands the village of
Penicuik, for the most part built on the high road overlooking and
sloping down the valley of the North Esk. Passing through the village,
and down the slope leading to the bridge that spans the Esk and
continues the road, we turn sharply to the left just at the bridge, and
a short distance below are the extensive paper-mills of Messrs.
Alexander Cowan and Sons, called the Valleyfield Paper Mills.’
I followed this direction, and under the courteous guidance of Mr. Cowan
saw what little remains of one of the most famous war-prisons of
Britain.
Until 1897 one of the original ‘casernes’ was used as a rag store. In
August of that year this was pulled down. It measured 300 feet long,
‘and its walls were eleven feet six inches thick.’[8] It had formed one
of the first buildings at Glencorse. Valleyfield House, now the
residence of Mr. Cowan, was in the days of the war-prison used as the
Hospital.
In 1906, during excavations for the new enamelling house at the Mills, a
dozen coffins were unearthed, all with their heads to the east. The new
buildings of 1812 at Valleyfield consisted of six ‘casernes’, each from
80 to 100 feet long, of three stories, built of wood, with openings
closed by strong wooden shutters. They were without fire-places, as it
was considered that the animal heat of the closely-packed inmates would
render such accessories unnecessary! The whole was surrounded by a stout
wooden stockade, outside which was a carriage-road.
Notwithstanding apparent indifference to the comfort of the prisoners,
the mortality at Valleyfield during three years and four months was but
309, being at the rate of 18·5 per mille, and in this is included a
number of violent deaths from duels, quarrels, and the shooting of
prisoners attempting to escape.
In the beautiful hillside garden of Valleyfield House is a monument,
erected by Mr. Alexander Cowan, to the memory of these prisoners,
inaugurated on June 26, 1830, the day on which George IV died. On it was
inscribed:
‘The mortal remains of 309 prisoners of war who died in this
neighbourhood between 21st March, 1811, and 26th July, 1814, are
interred near this spot.’
‘Grata Quies Patriae: sed et Omnis Terra Sepulchrum.’ ‘Certain
inhabitants of this parish, desiring to remember that all men are
brethren, caused this monument to be erected in the year 1830.’
On the other side:
‘Près de ce Lieu reposent les cendres de 309 Prisonniers de Guerre morts
dans ce voisinage entre le 21 Mars 1811 et le 26 Juillet 1814. Nés pour
bénir les vœux de vieillissantes mères, par le sort appelés à devenir
amants, aimés époux et pères.
‘Ils sont morts exilés. Plusieurs Habitants de cette Paroisse, aimant à
croire que tous les Hommes sont Frères, firent élever ce monument l’an
1830.’
It may be noted that Sir Walter Scott, who showed a warm interest in the
erection of the monument, suggested the Latin quotation, which is from
Saumazarius, a poet of the Middle Ages. Despite the inscription, the
monument was raised at the _sole expense_ of Mr. Alexander Cowan.
[Illustration:
MONUMENT AT VALLEYFIELD TO PRISONERS OF WAR.
]
An interesting episode is associated with this monument. In 1845, Mr.
John Cowan of Beeslack, on a visit to the Paris Invalides, found an old
Valleyfield prisoner named Marcher, and on his return home sent the old
soldier a picture of the Valleyfield Memorial, and in the Cowan
Institute at Penicuik, amongst other relics of the war-prison days, is
an appreciative letter from Marcher, dated from the Invalides, December
1846.
Marcher, when asked his experience of Valleyfield, said that it was
terribly cold, that there were no windows, no warmth, no fruit, but that
the cabbages were very large. He lost an arm at Waterloo.
The guard consisted of infantry of the Ayr and Kircudbright militia and
artillery, who had their camp on the high ground west of Kirkhill
Village. On one occasion an alarm that prisoners were escaping was
given: the troops hurried to the scene of action, the artillery with
such precipitancy that horses, guns, and men were rolled down the steep
hill into the river, luckily without injuries.
The attempts to escape were as numerous here as elsewhere, and the Black
Hole, made of hewn ashlar work, never lacked occupants. One man, a
sailor, it was impossible to keep within, and, like his fellow
countryman, Dufresne, at Portchester, was used to getting in and out
when he liked, and might have got away altogether, but for his raids
upon farm-houses and cottages around, which caused the natives to give
him up. On one occasion three prisoners rigged a false bottom to the
prison dust-cart, hid themselves therein, and were conveyed out of the
prison. When the cart stopped, the prisoners got out, and were entering
a wood, when a soldier met them. Him they cut at, and he, being unarmed,
let them go. They were, however, recaptured. On December 18, 1811,
fourteen prisoners got out, but were all recaptured. One memorable
attempt to get out by a tunnel from one of the original buildings, to
another in course of erection, and thence to the outer side of the
stockade, was made in the same year. The tunnel was one hundred yards
long, and the enormous quantity of earth excavated was carried out in
the men’s pockets, dropped about on the airing ground, and trodden down.
The venture only failed owing to the first man mistaking the hour of
day, and emerging before sunset, whereupon he was seen by a sentry and
fired on.
It was at the daily market when the country people were brought into
acquaintance with the prisoners, that many attempts to escape were made,
despite the doubling of the guards. One prisoner had arranged with the
carter who came every morning to take away the manure that he would
conceal himself in the cart, keep himself covered up with the filth, and
thus pass the sentries. The field where the rubbish was emptied was just
outside the village, and the prisoner would know that it was time for
him to crawl out and run away when the cart halted. All started well;
the cart passed through the gate, and passed the first, second, and
third sentries, and was close to where the Free Church manse now stands,
when a friend of the carter hailed him in a loud voice. The cart pulled
up, and the poor prisoner, thinking that this was the signal, jumped
out, and was shot down before he had gone many yards.
Another prisoner, by name Pirion, broke his parole, and was making his
way to London by the coach road, and took shelter from the rain when he
had got as far south as Norman Cross, not knowing where he was. He was
recognized as an old Norman Cross prisoner, and was arrested and brought
back.
In 1812 the report upon the condition of Valleyfield was very bad, and
in particular it was recommended that a special stockade should be built
to hide the half-naked prisoners from public view at the market.
In 1813 a Valleyfield prisoner was released in order that he might help
a Mr. Ferguson in the cod and herring fishery: almost as easy a release
as that of the Norman Cross prisoner who was freed because he had
instructed the Earl of Winchester’s labourers at Burleigh, by Stamford,
in the use of the Hainault scythe!
At one time very few of the prisoners at Valleyfield were Frenchmen.
About twenty of them were allowed to live on parole outside the prison,
and some of them enjoyed the friendship of the Cowan family; one in
particular, Ancamp, a Nantes merchant, had been a prisoner nine and a
half years, and had had a son born to him since his capture, whom he had
never seen.
In 1814, Valleyfield was evacuated, and remained unoccupied until 1820,
when, after having been advertised for sale and put up to auction
several times without success, it was purchased by Cowan for £2,200.
In Penicuik many relics of the prisoners’ manufactures may still be
seen, and what is now the public park was formerly the vegetable garden
of the prison.
An elderly lady at Lasswade told Mr. Bresnil of Loanhead that she
remembered in her childhood an old farmer who was pointed out as having
made his fortune by providing oatmeal to the prisoners at Valleyfield of
an inferior quality to that for which he had contracted.
I shall now give two accounts of life at these prisons. The first is by
Sergeant-Major Beaudouin, of the 31st Line Regiment, whom we have met
before in this book on the hulks at Chatham. He was captured off Havana,
26th Germinal, An XII, that is, on April 16, 1804, on board one of the
squadrons from St. Nicholas Mole, San Domingo, and brought via Belfast
to Greenock, at which port he happened to arrive on June 4, in the midst
of the celebrations of the King’s birthday. (It may be mentioned that he
quitted England finally, eight years later, on the same day.) Bonaparte
in effigy, on a donkey, was being paraded through the street preparatory
to being burned, and the natives told him that they hoped some fine day
to catch and burn Bonaparte himself, which upset Beaudouin and made him
retort that despite all England’s strength France would never be
conquered, and that 100,000 Frenchmen landed in England would be
sufficient to conquer it, whereupon a disturbance ensued.
Beaudouin landed at Port Glasgow, and thence to Renfrew and Glasgow, of
which city he remarks:
‘Cette ville paraît très grande et belle; costume très brillant. Ce
qu’il y a de remarquable c’est que les paysans sont aussi bien mis comme
ceux de la ville; on ne peut en faire la différence que par le genre. Ce
qui _jure_ beaucoup dans leur costume, c’est que les femmes marchent
presque toujours nu-pieds. La quantité de belles femmes n’est pas
grande, comme on dit; en outre, en général elles out les bouches commes
des fours.’
From Glasgow the prisoners marched to Airdrie, ten miles, where the
people were affable. For the six prisoners there was an escort of a
sergeant, a corporal, and eight men.
From Airdrie they proceeded to Bathgate, fourteen miles, thence to
Edinburgh, twenty-two miles, where they were lodged for the night in the
guard-house of the Castle. From Edinburgh they came to Greenlaw, ten
miles, June 10, 1804.
Beaudouin thus describes Greenlaw:
‘Cette prison est une maison de campagne. À deux milles où loge le
détachement qui nous garde est Penicuik. Cette maison est entourée de
deux rangs de palissades avec des factionnaires tout autour; à côté est
situé un petit bois qui favorise quelquefois des désertions.’
At first they were quartered with Dutch prisoners, but when peace was
made between Britain and Holland, these latter left.
At Greenlaw there were 106 French and 40 Spanish prisoners. The
Spaniards were very antagonistic to the French, and also among
themselves, quarrelling freely and being very handy with their knives.
Beaudouin gives many instances of their brutality. At call-over a
Spaniard waited for another to come through the door, and stabbed him in
the face. An Italian and a Spaniard fought with knives until both were
helpless. Two Spaniards quarrelled about their soup, and fought in
public in the airing ground. The guard did not attempt to interfere—and
wisely.
‘Les Espagnols,’ says Beaudouin, ‘possèdent toutes les bonnes qualités.
Premièrement ils sont paresseux à l’excès, sales, traîtres, joueurs, et
voleurs comme des pies.’
He describes Valleyfield as cold, with very little fine weather, but
healthy. At the end of a week or so the newly arrived prisoners settled
to work of different kinds. Some plaited straw for bonnets, some made
_tresse cornue_ for baskets and hats; some carved boxes, games, &c.;
some worked hair watch-chains; some made coloured straw books and other
knick-knacks, all of which they sold at the barriers.
Beaudouin learned to plait straw, and at first found it difficult as his
fingers were so big. The _armateur_, the employer, gave out the straw,
and paid for the worked article three sous per ‘brasse’, a little under
six feet. Some men could make twelve ‘brasses’ a day. Beaudouin set to
work at it, and in the course of a couple of months became an adept.
After four years came the remonstrance of the country people that this
underpaid labour by untaxed men was doing infinite injury to them; the
Government prohibited the manufactures, and much misery among the
prisoners resulted. From this prohibition resulted the outside practice
of smuggling straw into the prison, and selling it later as the
manufactured article, and a very profitable industry it must have been,
for we find that, during the trial of Matthew Wingrave in 1813, for
engaging in the straw-plait trade with the prisons at Valleyfield, it
came out that Wingrave, who was an extensive dealer in the article, had
actually moved up there from Bedfordshire on purpose to carry on the
trade, and had bought cornfields for the purpose. The evidence showed
that he was in the habit of bribing the soldiers to keep their eyes
shut, and that not a few people of character and position were
associated with him in the business.
Beaudouin then learned to make horsehair rings with names worked into
them: these fetched sixpence each: rings in human hair were worth a
shilling. For five years and a half he worked at this, and in so doing
injured his eyesight. ‘However,’ he said, ‘it kept me alive, which the
rations would never have done.’
Nominally the clothing was renewed every year, but Beaudouin declares
that he had only one change in five and a half years. To prevent the
clothes from being sold, they were of a sulphur-yellow colour.
‘En un mot, les Anglais sont tous des brigands,’ he says, and continues:
‘I have described many English atrocities committed in the Colonies;
they are no better here. In the prison they have practised upon us all
possible cruelties. For instance, drum-beat was the signal for all
lights to be put out, and if by chance the drum is not heard and the
lights remain, the prisoners are fired upon without warning, and several
have been shot.’
The prisoners signed a petition about their miserable condition
generally, and this outrage in particular, and sent it up to the
Transport Board. Fifteen days later the Agent entered the prison
furious: ‘I must know who wrote that letter to the Government,’ he
roared, ‘and I will put him into the _blokhall_ (Black Hole) until he
says who put it in the post.’
It ended in his being dismissed and severely punished. Ensign Maxwell of
the Lanark Militia, who had ordered the sentry to fire into the prison
because a light was burning there after drum-beat, whereby a prisoner,
Cotier, was killed, was condemned to nine months’ imprisonment in the
Tolbooth. This was in 1807.[9] Many of the prisoners went to Edinburgh
as witnesses in this case, and thereafter an order was posted up
forbidding any firing upon the prisoners. If lights remained, the guard
was to enter the prison, and, if necessary, put the offenders into the
Black Hole, but no violence was to be used.
On March 30, 1809, all the French prisoners at Greenlaw were ordered to
Chatham, of which place very bad reports were heard from men who had
been on the hulks there.
‘Ils disent qu’ils sont plus mal qu’à Greenlaw. Premièrement, les vivres
sont plus mauvais, excepté le pain qui est un peu meilleur: en outre,
aucun ouvrage ne se fait, et aucun bourgeois vient les voir. Je crains
d’y aller. Dieu merci! Jusqu’à ce moment-ci je me suis monté un peu en
linge, car, quand je suis arrivé au prison mon sac ne me gênait point,
les Anglais, en le prenant, ne m’ont laissé que ce que j’avais sur le
dos. Quand je fus arrivé au prison ma chemise était pourrie sur mon dos
et point d’autre pour changer.’
On October 31, 1809, Beaudouin left Greenlaw, where he had been since
June 10, 1804, for Sheerness, Chatham, and the _Bristol_ prison-ship.
The next reference to Greenlaw is from James Anton’s _A Military Life_.
He thus describes the prison at which he was on guard:
‘The prison was fenced round with a double row of stockades; a
considerable space was appropriated as a promenade, where the prisoners
had freedom to walk about, cook provisions, make their markets and
exercise themselves at their own pleasure, but under the superintendence
of a turnkey and in the charge of several sentries.... The prisoners
were far from being severely treated: no work was required at their
hands, yet few of them were idle. Some of them were occupied in culinary
avocations, and as the guard had no regular mess, the men on duty became
ready purchasers of their _labscuse_, salt-fish, potatoes, and coffee.
Others were employed in preparing straw for plaiting; some were
manufacturing the cast-away bones into dice, dominoes, paper-cutters,
and a hundred articles of toy-work ... and realized considerable sums of
money.... Those prisoners were well provided for in every respect, and
treated with the greatest humanity, yet to the eye of a stranger they
presented a miserable picture of distress, while some of them were
actually hoarding up money ... others were actually naked, with the
exception of a dirty rag as an apron.... And strangers who visited the
prison commiserated the apparent distress of this miserable class, and
charity was frequently bestowed on purpose to clothe their nakedness;
but no sooner would this set of despicables obtain such relief, than
they took to the cards, dice, or dominoes, and in a few hours were as
poor and naked as ever.... When they were indulged with permission to
remain in their hammocks, when the weather was cold, they drew the
worsted out of the rags that covered them, wound it up in balls, and
sold it to the industrious knitters of _mitts_, and left themselves
without a covering by night. The inhabitants of Penicuik and its
neighbourhood, previous to the establishment of this dépôt of prisoners,
were as comfortable and contented a class of people as in any district
in Britain. The steep woody banks of the Esk were lined with prospering
manufactories.... When the militiamen were first quartered here, they
met with a welcome reception; ... in the course of a few years, those
kindly people began to consider the quartering of soldiers upon them
more oppressive than they at first anticipated. Trade declined as
prisoners increased.... One of the principal factories, Valleyfield, was
afterwards converted into another dépôt for prisoners, and Esk Mills
into a barrack for the military; this gave a decisive blow to trade.’
To Mr. Robert Black, and indirectly to Mr. Howden, I am much indebted
for information about Greenlaw. To Mr. Cowan for helping me at
Valleyfield I have already expressed my obligation, but I must not omit
to say that much of the foregoing information about Valleyfield and the
Esk Mills has been taken from _The Reminiscences of Charles Cowan of
Logan House, Midlothian_, printed for private circulation in 1878.