THE PRISON SYSTEM
PRISONERS ON PAROLE
When we come to the consideration of the parole system, we reach what is
for many reasons the most interesting chapter in a dark history. Life on
the hulks and in the prisons was largely a sealed book to the outside
public, and, brutal in many respects as was the age covered by our
story, there can be little question that if the British public had been
made more aware of what went on behind the wooden walls of the prison
ships and the stone walls of the prisons, its opinion would have
demanded reforms and remedies which would have spared our country from a
deep, ineffaceable, and, it must be added, a just reproach.
But the prisoners on parole played a large part in the everyday social
life of many parts of England, Wales, and Scotland, for at least sixty
years—a period long enough to leave a clear impression behind of their
lives, their romances, their virtues, their vices, of all, in fact,
which makes interesting history—and, although in one essential
particular they seem to have fallen very far short of the traditional
standard of honour, the memory of them is still that of a polished,
refined, and gallant race of gentlemen.
The parole system, by which officers of certain ratings were permitted,
under strict conditions to which they subscribed on their honour, to
reside in certain places, was in practice at any rate at the beginning
of the Seven Years’ War, and in 1757 the following were the parole
towns:
In the West: Redruth, Launceston, Callington, Falmouth, Tavistock,
Torrington, Exeter, Crediton, Ashburton, Bideford, Okehampton, Helston,
Alresford, Basingstoke, Chippenham, Bristol, Sodbury (Gloucestershire),
and Bishop’s Waltham. In the South: Guernsey, Ashford, Tenterden,
Tonbridge, Wye (Kent), Goudhurst, Sevenoaks, Petersfield, and Romsey. In
the North: Dundee and Newcastle-on-Tyne. Kinsale in Ireland, Beccles in
Suffolk, and Whitchurch in Shropshire. At first I had doubts if
prisoners on parole were at open ports like Falmouth, Bristol, and
Newcastle-on-Tyne, but an examination of the documents at the Record
Office in London and the Archives Nationales in Paris established the
fact, although they ceased to be there after a short time. Not only does
it seem that parole rules were more strictly enforced at this time than
they were later, but that violation of them was regarded as a crime by
the Governments of the offenders. Also, there was an arrangement, or at
any rate an understanding, between England and France that officers who
had broken their parole by escaping, should, if discovered in their own
country, either be sent back to the country of their imprisonment, or be
imprisoned in their own country. Thus, we read under date 1757:
‘René Brisson de Dunkerque, second capitaine et pilote du navire _Le
Prince de Soubise_, du dit port, qui étoit détenu prisonnier à Waltham
en Angleterre, d’où il s’est évadé, et qui, étant de retour à Dunkerque
le 16ème Oct. 1757, y a été mis en prison par ordre du Roy.’
During 1778, 1779, and six months of 1780, two hundred and ninety-five
French prisoners alone had successfully escaped from parole places, the
greatest number being, from Alresford forty-five, Chippenham
thirty-three, Tenterden thirty-two, Bandon twenty-two, Okehampton
nineteen, and Ashburton eighteen.
In 1796 the following ratings were allowed to be on parole: 1. Taken on
men-of-war: Captain, lieutenant, ensign, surgeon, purser, chaplain,
master, pilot, midshipman, surgeon’s mate, boatswain, gunner, carpenter,
master-caulker, master-sail-maker, coasting pilot, and gentleman
volunteer.
2. Taken on board a privateer or merchantman: Captain, passenger of
rank, second captain, chief of prizes, two lieutenants for every hundred
men, pilot, surgeon, and chaplain.
No parole was to be granted to officers of any privateer under eighty
tons burthen, or having less than fourteen carriage guns, which were not
to be less than four-pounders.
In 1804 parole was granted as follows:
1. All commissioned officers of the Army down to sous-lieutenant.
2. All commissioned officers of the Navy down to gardes-marine
(midshipmen).
3. Three officers of privateers of a hundred men, but not under fourteen
guns.
4. Captains and next officers of merchant ships above fifty tons.
The parole form in 1797 was as follows:
‘By the Commissioners for conducting H.M’s. Transport Service, and for
the care and custody of Prisoners of War.
‘These are to certify to all H.M’s. officers, civil and military, and to
whom else it may concern, that the bearer ... as described on the back
hereof is a detained (French, American, Spanish or Dutch) prisoner of
war at ... and that he has liberty to walk on the great turnpike road
within the distance of one mile from the extremities of the town, but
that he must not go into any field or cross road, nor be absent from his
lodging after 5 o’clock in the afternoon during the six winter months,
viz. from October 1st to March 31st, nor after 8 o’clock during the
summer months. Wherefore you and everyone of you [_sic_] are hereby
desired and required to suffer him, the said ... to pass and repass
accordingly without any hindrance or molestation whatever, he keeping
within the said limits and behaving according to law.’
The form of parole to be signed by the prisoner was this:
‘Whereas the Commissioners for conducting H.M’s. Transport service and
for the care and custody of French officers and sailors detained in
England have been pleased to grant ... leave to reside in ... upon
condition that he gives his parole of honour not to withdraw one mile
from the boundaries prescribed there without leave for that purpose from
the said Commissioners, that he will behave himself decently and with
due regard to the laws of the kingdom, and also that he will not
directly or indirectly hold any correspondence with France during his
continuance in England, but by such letter or letters as shall be shown
to the Agent of the said Commissioners under whose care he is or may be
in order to their being read and approved by the Superiors, he does
hereby declare that having given his parole he will keep it inviolably.’
In all parole towns and villages the following notice was posted up in
prominent positions:
‘Notice is hereby given,
‘That all such prisoners are permitted to walk or ride on the great
turnpike road within the distance of one mile from the extreme parts of
the town (not beyond the bounds of the Parish) and that if they shall
exceed such limits or go into any field or cross-road they may be taken
up and sent to prison, and a reward of Ten Shillings will be paid by the
Agent for apprehending them. And further, that such prisoners are to be
in their lodgings by 5 o’clock in the winter, and 8 in the summer
months, and if they stay out later they are liable to be taken up and
sent to the Agent for such misconduct. And to prevent the prisoners from
behaving in an improper manner to the inhabitants of the town, or
creating any riots or disturbances either with them or among themselves,
notice is also given that the Commissioners will cause, upon information
being given to their Agents, any prisoners who shall so misbehave to be
committed to prison. And such of the inhabitants who shall insult or
abuse any of the Prisoners of War on parole, or shall be found in any
respect aiding or assisting in the escape of such prisoners shall be
punished according to law.’
The rewards offered for the conviction of prisoners for the violation of
any of the conditions of their parole, and particularly for recapturing
escaped prisoners and for the conviction of aiders in escape, were
liberal enough to tempt the ragamuffins of the parole places to do their
utmost to get the prisoners to break the law, and we shall see how this
led to a system of persecution which possibly provoked many a foreign
officer, perfectly honourable in other respects, to break his parole. I
do not attempt to defend the far too general laxity of principle which
made some of the most distinguished of our prisoners break their
solemnly pledged words by escaping or trying to escape, but I do believe
that the continual dangling before unlettered clowns and idle town
loafers rewards varying from ten guineas for recapturing an escaped
prisoner to ten shillings for arresting an officer out of his lodging a
few minutes after bell ringing, or straying a few yards off the great
turnpike, was putting a premium upon a despicable system of spying and
trapping which could not have given a pleasurable zest to a life of
exile.
Naturally, the rules about the correspondence of prisoners on parole
were strict, and no other rules seem to have been more irksome to
prisoners, or more frequently violated by them. All letters for
prisoners on parole had to pass through the Transport Office.
Remittances had to be made through the local agent, if for an even sum
in the Bank of England notes, if for odd shillings and pence by postal
orders. It is, however, very certain that a vast amount of
correspondence passed to and from the prisoners independently of the
Transport Office, and that the conveyance and receipt of such
correspondence became as distinctly a surreptitious trade called into
existence by circumstances as that of aiding prisoners to escape.
Previous to 1813 the money allowance to officers on parole above and
including the rank of captain was ten shillings and sixpence per week
per man, and below that rank eight shillings and ninepence. In that
year, complaints were made to the British Government by M. Rivière, that
as it could be shown that living in England was very much more expensive
than in France, this allowance should be increased. Our Government
admitted the justice of the claim, and the allowances were accordingly
increased to fourteen shillings, and eleven shillings and eightpence. It
may be noted, by the way, that this was the same Rivière who in 1804 had
denied our right to inquire into the condition of British prisoners in
France, curtly saying: ‘It is the will of the Emperor!’
The cost of burying the poor fellows who died in captivity, although
borne by the State, was kept down to the most economical limits, for we
find two orders, dated respectively 1805 and 1812, that the cost was not
to exceed £2 2_s._, that plain elm coffins were to be used, and that the
expense of gloves and hat-bands must be borne by the prisoners. Mr.
Farnell, the Agent at Ashby-de-la-Zouch, was called sharply to order for
a charge in his accounts of fourteen shillings for a hat-band!
In 1814 funerals at Portsmouth were cut down to half a guinea, but I
presume this was for ordinary prisoners. The allowances for surgeons in
parole places in 1806 were:
For cures when the attendance was for more than five days, six shillings
and eightpence, when for less, half that sum. Bleeding was to be charged
sixpence, and for drawing a tooth, one shilling. Serious sick cases were
to be sent to a prison hospital, and no allowance for medicines or extra
subsistence was to be made.
We must not allow sentimental sympathy with officers and gentlemen on
parole to blind our eyes to the fact constantly proved that it was
necessary to keep the strictest surveillance over them. Although, if we
except their propensity to regard lightly their parole obligations,
their conduct generally may be called good, among so many men there were
necessarily some very black sheep. At one time their behaviour in the
parole towns was often so abominable as to render it necessary to place
them in smaller towns and villages.
In 1793 the Marquis of Buckingham wrote thus to Lord Grenville from
Winchester (_Dropmore MSS._):
‘I have for the last week been much annoyed by a constant inundation of
French prisoners who have been on their route from Portsmouth to
Bristol, and my officers who, during the long marches have had much of
their conversation, all report that the language of the common men was,
with very few exceptions, equally insolent, especially upon the subject
of monarchy. The orders which we received with them were so perfectly
proper that we were enabled to maintain strict discipline among them,
but I am very anxious that you should come to some decisions about your
_parole prisoners_ who are now nearly doubled at Alresford and
(Bishop’s) Waltham, and are hourly more exceptionable in their language
and in their communication with the country people. I am persuaded that
some very unpleasant consequences will arise if this practice is not
checked, and I do not know how it is to be done. Your own good heart
will make you feel for the French priests now at Winchester to whom
these people (230 at Alresford, 160 at Waltham) have openly avowed
massacre whenever the troops are removed.... Pray think over some
arrangement for sending your parole prisoners out of England, for they
certainly serve their country here better than they could do at sea or
in France (so they say openly).’
The authorities had to be constantly on their guard against deceptions
of all kinds practised by the paroled prisoners, in addition to the
frequent breaches of parole by escape. Thus applications were made
almost daily by prisoners to be allowed either to exchange their places
of residence for London, or to come to London temporarily ‘upon urgent
private affairs’. At first these permissions were given when the
applicants were men whose positions or reputations were deemed
sufficient guarantees for honourable behaviour, but experience soon
taught the Transport Office that nobody was to be trusted, and so these
applications, even when endorsed by Englishmen of position, were
invariably refused.
For instance, in 1809, the Office received a letter from one Brossage,
an officer on parole at Launceston, asking that he might be removed to
Reading, as he was suffering from lung disease. The reply was that as a
rule people suffering from lung disease in England were only too glad to
be able to go to Cornwall for alleviation or cure. The truth was that M.
Brossage wanted to exchange the dullness of a Cornish town for the life
and gaiety of Reading, which was a special parole town reserved for
officers of distinction.
Another trick which the authorities characterized as ‘an unjustifiable
means of gaining liberty’, was to bribe an invalid on the roster for
France to be allowed to personate him. Poor officers were as glad to
sell their chance in this way, as were poor prisoners on hulks or in
prisons.
In 1811 some officers at Lichfield obtained their release because of
‘their humane conduct at the late fire at Mr. Lee’s house’. But so many
applications for release on account of similar services at fires came in
that the Transport Office was suspicious, and refused them, ‘especially
as the French Government does not reward British officers for similar
services.’
In the same year one Andoit got sent to Andover on parole in the name of
another man, whom no doubt he impersonated, although he had no right to
be paroled, and at once made use of the opportunity and escaped.
Most touching were some of the letters from paroled officers praying to
have their places of parole changed, but when the Transport Office found
out that these changes were almost invariably made so that old comrades
and friends could meet together to plan and arrange escapes, rejection
became the invariable fate of them. For some time many French officers
on parole had been permitted to add to their incomes by giving lessons
in dancing, drawing, fencing, and singing in English families, and for
these purposes had special permits to go beyond the usual one mile
limit. But when in 1811, M. Faure applied to go some distance out of
Redruth to teach French, and M. Ulliac asked to be allowed to exceed
limits at Ashby-de-la-Zouch to teach drawing, the authorities refused,
and this despite the backing up of these requests by local gentry,
giving as their reason: ‘If complied with generally the prisoners would
become dispersed over all parts of the country without any regular
control over their conduct.’ Prisoners were not even allowed to give
lessons away from their lodgings out of parole hours.
Very rarely, except in the cases of officers of more than ordinarily
distinguished position, were relaxations of parole rules permitted.
General Pillet at Bishop’s Waltham in 1808, had leave to go two miles
beyond the usual one mile limit two or three times a week, ‘to take the
air.’ General Pageot at Ashbourne was given eight days’ leave to visit
Wooton Lodge in 1804, with the result related elsewhere (p. 414).
In 1808 General Brenier, on parole at Wantage, was allowed 3_s._ a day
‘on account of the wound in his thigh’, so unusual a concession as to
cause the Transport Office to describe it as ‘the greatest rate of
allowance granted to any prisoner of war in this country under any
circumstances’. Later, however, some prisoners at Bath were made the
same allowance.
At first sight it seems harsh on the part of the Transport Office to
refuse permission for a prisoner at Welshpool to lodge with the
postmistress of that place, but without doubt it had excellent reason to
think that for purposes of escape as well as for carrying on an
unsuspected correspondence, the post-office would be the very place for
a prisoner to live at. Again, the forgery of documents was very
extensively carried on by the prisoners, and in 1803 the parole agents
were advised:
‘With respect to admitting prisoners of war at Parole we beg to observe
that we think it proper to adhere to a regulation which from frequent
abuses we found it absolutely necessary to adopt last war; namely, that
no blank form of parole certificates be sent to the agents at the
depots, but to transmit them to the Agents, properly filled up whenever
their ranks shall have been ascertained at this office, from lists sent
by the agents and from extracts from the _Rôle d’Équipage_ of each
vessel captured.’
Of course, the reason for this was that blank parole forms had been
obtained by bribery, had been filled up, and that all sorts of
undesirable and dangerous rascals got scattered among the parole places.
So long back as 1763 a complaint came from Dover that the Duc de
Nivernois was in the habit of issuing passes to prisoners of war on
parole in England to pass over to Calais and Boulogne as ordinary
civilians, and further inquiry brought out the fact that he was not the
only owner of a noble name who trafficked in documents which, if they do
not come under the category of forgeries, were at any rate false.
In 1804 a letter from France addressed to a prisoner on parole at
Tiverton was intercepted. It was found to contain a blank printed
certificate, sealed and signed by the Danish vice-consul at Plymouth.
Orders were at once issued that no more certificates from him were to be
honoured, and he was accused of the act. He protested innocence, and
requested that the matter should be examined, the results being that the
documents were found to be forgeries.
Of course, the parole agents, that is to say, the men chosen to guard
and minister to the wants of the prisoners in the parole towns, occupied
important and responsible positions. At first the only qualifications
required were that they should not be shopkeepers, but men fitted by
their position and their personality to deal with prisoners who were
officers, and therefore _ipso facto_, gentlemen. But during the later
years of the great wars they were chosen exclusively from naval
lieutenants of not less than ten years’ standing, a change brought about
by complaints from many towns and from many prisoners that the agents
were palpably underbred and tactless, and particularly perhaps by the
representation of Captain Moriarty, the agent at Valleyfield near
Edinburgh, and later at Perth, that ‘the men chosen were attorneys and
shopkeepers for whom the French officers have no respect, so that the
latter do just what they like’, urging that only Service men should
occupy these posts.
The duties of the parole agent were to see that the prisoners under his
charge fulfilled all the obligations of their parole, to muster them
twice a week, to minister to their wants, to pay them their allowances,
to act as their financial agents, to hear and adjust their complaints,
to be, in fact, quite as much their guide, philosopher, and friend as
their custodian. He had to keep a strict account of all receipts and
payments, which he forwarded once a month to the Transport Office: he
had to keep a constant watch on the correspondence of the prisoners, not
merely seeing that they held and received none clandestinely, but that
every letter was to pass the examination of the Transport Office; and
his own correspondence was voluminous, for in the smallest parole places
there were at least eighty prisoners, whilst in the larger, the numbers
were close upon four hundred.
For all this the remuneration was 5 per cent. upon all disbursements for
the subsistence of the prisoners with allowances for stationery and
affidavits, and it may be very naturally asked how men could be found
willing to do all this, in addition to their own callings, for such pay.
The only answer is that men were not only willing but anxious to become
parole agents because of the ‘pickings’ derivable from the office,
especially in connexion with the collection and payment of remittances
to prisoners. That these ‘pickings’ were considerable there can be no
doubt, particularly as they were available from so many sources, and as
the temptations were so many and so strong to accept presents for
services rendered, or, what was more frequent, for duty left undone.
On the whole, and making allowance for the character of the age and the
numberless temptations to which they were exposed, the agents of the
parole towns seem to have done their hard and delicate work very fairly.
No doubt in the process of gathering in their ‘pickings’ there was some
sharp practice by them, and a few instances are recorded of criminal
transactions, but a comparison between the treatment of French prisoners
on parole in England and the English _détenus_ in France certainly is
not to our discredit.
The Transport Office seems to have been unremitting in its watchfulness
on its agents, if we are to judge by the mass of correspondence which
passed between the one and the others, and which deals so largely with
minutiae and details that its consideration must have been by no means
the least heavy of the duties expected from these gentlemen.
Mr. Tribe, Parole Agent at Hambledon, seems to have irritated his
superiors much by the character of his letters, for in 1804 he is told:
‘As the person who writes your letters does not seem to know how to
write English you must therefore in future write your own letters or
employ another to write them who can write intelligibly.’
And again:
‘If you cannot really write more intelligibly you must employ a person
to manage your correspondence in future, but you are not to suppose that
he will be paid by us for his trouble.’
Spettigue, Parole Agent at Launceston, got into serious trouble in 1807
for having charged commissions to prisoners upon moneys paid to them,
and was ordered to refund them. He was the only parole agent who was
proved to have so offended.
Smith, Parole Agent at Thame, was rebuked in February, 1809, for having
described aloud a prisoner about to be conveyed from Thame to Portsmouth
under escort as a man of good character and a gentleman, the result
being that the escort were put off their guard, and the prisoner
escaped, Smith knowing all the time that the prisoner was the very
reverse of his description, and that it was in consequence of his having
obtained his parole by a ‘gross deception’, that he was being conveyed
to the hulks at Portsmouth. However, Kermel, the prisoner, was
recaptured.
Enchmarsh, Parole Agent at Tiverton, was reprimanded in July 1809 for
having been concerned in the sale, by a prisoner, of a contraband
article, and was reminded that it was against rules for an agent to have
any mercantile transactions with prisoners.
Lewis, Parole Agent at Reading, was removed in June 1812, because when
the dépôt doctor made his periodical round in order to select invalids
to be sent to France, he tried to bribe Dr. Weir to pass General Joyeux,
a perfectly sound man, as an invalid and so procure his liberation.
Powis, Parole Agent at Leek in Staffordshire, son of a neighbouring
parson, was removed in the same year, having been accused of withholding
moneys due to prisoners, and continually failing to send in his
accounts.
On the other hand, Smith, the Agent at Thame, was blamed for having
shown excessive zeal in his office by hiring people to hide and lie in
wait to catch prisoners committing breaches of parole. Perhaps the
Transport Office did not so much disapprove of his methods as un-English
and mean, but they knew very well that the consequent fines and
stoppages meant his emolument.
That parole agents found it as impossible to give satisfaction to
everybody as do most people in authority is very clear from the
following episodes in the official life of Mr. Crapper, the Parole Agent
at Wantage in 1809, who was a chemist by trade, and who seems to have
been in ill odour all round. The episodes also illustrate the keen
sympathy with which in some districts the French officers on parole were
regarded.
On behalf of the prisoners at Wantage, one Price, J.P., wrote of
Crapper, that ‘being a low man himself, he assumes a power which I am
sure is not to your wish, and which he is too ignorant to exercise’. It
appears that two French officers, the generals Maurin and Lefebvre, had
gone ten miles from Wantage—that is, nine miles beyond the parole
limit—to dine with Sir John Throckmorton. Crapper did his duty and
arrested the generals; they were leniently punished, as, instead of
being sent to a prison or a hulk, they were simply marched off to
Wincanton. The magistrates refused to support Crapper, but, despite
another letter in favour of the generals by another J.P., Goodlake, who
had driven them in his carriage to Throckmorton’s house, and who
declared that Crapper had a hatred for him on account of some
disagreement on the bench, the Transport Office defended their agent,
and confirmed his action.
From J. E. Lutwyche, Surveyor of Taxes, in whose house the French
generals lodged, the Transport Office received the following:
‘GENTLEMEN,
‘I beg leave to offer a few remarks respecting the French generals
lately removed from Wantage. Generals Lefebvre and Maurin both lodged at
my house. The latter always conducted himself with the greatest
Politeness and Propriety, nor ever exceeded the limits or time
prescribed by his parole until the arrival of General Lefebvre. Indeed
he was not noticed or invited anywhere till then, nor did he at all seem
to wish it, his time being occupied in endeavouring to perfect himself
in the English language. When General Lefebvre arrived, he, being an
object of curiosity and a man of considerable rank, was invited out, and
of course General Maurin (who paid him great attention) with him, which
certainly otherwise would never have been the case. General Lefebvre has
certainly expressed himself as greatly dissatisfied with the way in
which he had been taken, making use of the childish phrase of his being
entrapped, and by his sullen manner and general conduct appeared as if
he was not much inclined to observe the terms of his parole.’
Another anti-Crapperist writes:
‘GENTLEMEN,
‘I take this liberty in informing you that in case that the Prisoners of
War residing here on Parole be not kept to stricter orders, that they
will have the command of this Parish. They are out all hours of the
night, they do almost as they have a mind to do: if a man is loaded ever
so hard, he must turn out of the road for them, and if any person says
anything he is reprimanded for it.
‘They have too much liberty a great deal.
‘I am, Gentlemen,
‘With a good wish to my King and Country,
‘A TRUE ENGLISHMAN.’
Another correspondent asserted that although Mr. Crapper complained of
the generals’ breach of parole, he had the next week allowed thirty of
the French prisoners to give a ball and supper to the little tradesmen
of the town, which had been kept up till 3 a.m.
Crapper denied this, and said he had refused the application of the
prisoners for a dance until 10 p.m., given at an inn to the ‘ladies of
the town—the checked apron Ladies of Wantage’.
Yet another writer declared that Crapper was a drunkard, and drank with
the prisoners. To this, Crapper replied that if they called on him as
gentlemen, he was surely entitled to offer them hospitality. The same
writer spoke of the French prisoners being often drunk in the streets,
of Crapper fighting with them at the inns, and accused him of
withholding money from them. Crapper, however, appears as Parole Agent
for Wantage, with 340 prisoners in his charge, some time after all this.
I have given Crapper’s case at some length merely as an instance of what
parole agents had to put up with, not as being unusual. Ponsford at
Moreton-Hampstead, Smith at Thame, and Eborall at Lichfield, seem to
have been provoked in much the same way by turbulent and defiant
prisoners.
For very palpable reasons the authorities did not encourage close
_rapprochements_ between parole agents and the prisoners under their
charge. At Tavistock in 1779, something wrong in the intercourse between
Ford, the Agent, and his flock, had led to an order that not only should
Ford be removed, but that certain prisoners should be sent to
Launceston. Whereupon the said prisoners petitioned to be allowed to
remain at Tavistock under Ford:
‘A qui nous sommes très sincèrement attachés, tant par les doux façons
qu’il a scu toujours avoir pour nous, même en exécutant ses ordres, que
par son honnêteté particulière et la bonne intelligence qu’il a soin de
faire raigner autant qu’il est possible entre les différentes claces de
personnes qui habitent cette ville et les prisonniers qu’y sont;—point
sy essentiel et sy particulièrement bien ménagé jusqu’à ce jour.’
On the other hand, one Tarade, a prisoner, writes describing Ford as a
‘petit tyran d’Afrique’, and complains of him, evidently because he had
refused Tarade a passport for France. Tarade alludes to the petition
above quoted, and says that the subscribers to it belong to a class of
prisoners who are better away. Another much-signed petition comes from
dislikers of Ford who beg to be sent to Launceston, so we may presume
from the action of the authorities in ordering Ford’s removal, that he
was not a disinterested dispenser and withholder of favours.
In Scotland the agents seem generally to have been on very excellent
terms with the prisoners in their charge, and some friendships were
formed between captors and captives which did not cease with the release
of the latter. Mr. Macbeth Forbes relates the following anecdote by way
of illustration:
‘The late Mr. Romanes of Harryburn (whose father had been Agent at
Lauder) says about M. Espinasse, for long a distinguished French teacher
in Edinburgh, who was for some time a parole prisoner at Lauder: “When I
was enrolled as a pupil with M. Espinasse some fifty years ago, he said:
‘Ah! your fader had _me_!’ supplying the rest of the sentence by
planting the flat part of his right thumb into the palm of his left
hand—‘Now I have _you_!’ repeating the operation. And when my father
called to see M. Espinasse, he was quite put out by M. Espinasse seizing
and hugging and embracing him, shouting excitedly: ‘Ah, mon Agent! mon
Agent!’“’
Smith at Kelso, Nixon at Hawick, Romanes at Lauder, and Bell at
Jedburgh, were all held in the highest esteem by the prisoners under
them, and received many testimonials of it.
The following were the Parole Towns between 1803 and 1813:
Abergavenny.
Alresford.
Andover.
Ashbourne.
Ashburton.
Ashby-de-la-Zouch.
Biggar.
Bishop’s Castle.
Bishop’s Waltham.
Brecon.
Bridgnorth.
Chesterfield.
Chippenham.
Crediton.
Cupar.
Dumfries.
Hambledon.
Hawick.
Jedburgh.
Kelso.
Lanark.
Lauder.
Launceston.
Leek.
Lichfield.
Llanfyllin.
Lochmaben.
Lockerbie.
Melrose.
Montgomery.
Moreton-Hampstead.
Newtown.
Northampton.
North Tawton.
Odiham.
Okehampton.
Oswestry.
Peebles.
Peterborough.
Reading.
Sanquhar.
Selkirk.
South Molton.
Tavistock.
Thame.
Tiverton.
Wantage.
Welshpool.
Whitchurch.
Wincanton.