ESCAPES OF PRISONERS ON PAROLE
The newspapers of our forefathers during the eighteenth and early
nineteenth centuries contained very many advertisements like the two
following. The first is from the _Western Flying Post_, of 1756, dated
from Launceston, and offering Two Guineas reward for two officers, who
had broken their parole, and were thus described:
‘One, Mons. Barbier, a short man, somewhat pock-marked, and has a very
dejected look, and wore a snuff-coloured coat; the other, Mons. Beth, a
middle-aged man, very strongly set, wore his own hair and a blue coat.
The former speaks no English, but the latter very well. They were both
last seen near Exeter, riding to that city.’
The second is from the London _Observer_ of April 21, 1811:
BREACH OF PAROLE OF HONOUR.—Transport Office, April 12, 1811.
‘Whereas the two French Officers, Prisoners of War, named and described
at the foot hereof, have absconded from Chesterfield in violation of
their Parole of Honour; the Commissioners for conducting His Majesty’s
Transport Service, etc., do hereby offer a Reward of Five Guineas for
the recapture of each of the said Prisoners, to any Person or Persons
who shall apprehend them, and deliver them at this office, or otherwise
cause them to be safely lodged in any of the Public Gaols. Joseph
Exelman, General of Brigade, age 36, 5 feet 11½ inches high, stout, oval
visage, fresh complexion, light brown hair, blue eyes, strong features.
‘Auguste de la Grange, Colonel, age 30, 6 feet high, stout, round
visage, fair complexion, brown hair, dark eyes, no mark in particular.’
Excelmans was one of Bonaparte’s favourites. He and De la Grange induced
Jonas Lawton, an assistant to Doctor John Elam, the surgeon at
Chesterfield, to make the necessary arrangements for escape, and to
accompany them. They left Chesterfield concealed in a covered cart, and
safely reached Paris. Here Lawton was liberally rewarded, and provided
with a good post as surgeon in a hospital, and retained the position
long after the conclusion of peace.
Merely escaping from the parole town did not become frequent until it
was found necessary to abolish virtually the other method of returning
to France which we allowed. By this, an officer on parole upon signing a
declaration to the effect that unless he was exchanged for a British
officer of similar rank by a certain date he would return to England on
that date, was allowed to go to France, engaging, of course, not to
serve against us. But when it became not a frequent but a universal rule
among French officers to break their honour and actually to serve
against us during their permitted absence, the Government was obliged to
refuse all applications, with the result that to escape from the parole
town became such a general practice as to call into existence that
profession of escape-aiding which was dealt with in the last chapter.
The case of Captain Jurien, now to be mentioned, is neither better nor
worse than scores of others.
On December 10, 1803, the Transport Office wrote to him in Paris:
‘As the time allowed for your absence from this Kingdom expired on
November 22nd, and as Captain Brenton, R.N., now a prisoner of war in
France, has not been released in exchange for you agreeably to our
proposal, you are hereby required to return to this country according to
the terms of your Parole Agreement.’
But on March 16, 1804, Jurien had not returned. One result was that when
a Colonel Neraud applied to be sent to France upon his giving his word
to have a British officer exchanged for him, the Transport Office
reminded him that Jurien had been released on parole, August 22, 1803,
on the promise that he would return in three months, if not exchanged
for Captain Brenton, and that seven months had passed and he was still
away. They added that the French Government had not released one British
officer in return for 500 French, who had been sent on parole to France,
some of whom, furthermore, in violation of their parole, were in arms
against Britain. ‘Hence your detention is entirely owing to the action
of your own Government.’
As time went on, and Jurien and the others did not return, the Transport
Office, weary of replying to the frequent applications of French
officers to go to France on parole, at last ceased to do so, with the
result that attempted escapes from parole places became frequent.
At the same time it must not be understood that laxity of honour as
regards parole obligation of this kind was universal. When in 1809 the
Transport Office, in reply to a request by General Lefebvre to be
allowed to go to France on parole, said that they could not accede
inasmuch as no French officer thus privileged had been _allowed_ to
return, they italicized the word ‘allowed’, and cited the case of
General Frescinet, ‘who made most earnest but ineffectual Intreaty to be
allowed to fulfil the Parole d’Honneur’ he had entered into, by
returning to this country.
Thame seems to have been a particularly turbulent parole town, and one
from which escapes were more than usually numerous. One case was
peculiar. Four prisoners who had been recaptured after getting away
justified their attempt by accusing Smith, the Agent, of ill-behaviour
towards them. Whereupon the other prisoners at Thame, among them
Villaret-Joyeuse, testified against them, and in favour of Smith.
The experiences of Baron Le Jeune are among the most interesting, and
his case is peculiar inasmuch as although he was nominally a prisoner on
parole, he was not so in fact, so that his escape involved no breach. In
1811 he was taken prisoner by Spanish brigands, who delivered him to the
English garrison at Merida. Here he was treated as a guest by
Major-General Sir William Lumley and the officers, and when he sailed
for England on H.M.S. _Thetis_ he had a state-cabin, and was regarded as
a distinguished passenger. On arriving at Portsmouth his anxiety was as
to whether the hulks were to be his fate. ‘And our uneasiness
increased’, he writes in the _Memoirs_, whence the following story is
taken, ‘when we passed some twenty old vessels full of French prisoners,
most of them wearing only yellow vests, whilst others were perfectly
naked. At this distressing sight I asked the captain if he was taking us
to the hulks. To which he replied with a frown: “Yes, just as a matter
of course.” At the same moment our boat drew up alongside the _San
Antonio_, an old 80–gun ship. We ascended the side, and there, to our
horror, we saw some five to six hundred French prisoners, who were but
one-third of those on board, climbing on to each other’s shoulders, in
the narrow space in which they were penned, to have a look at the
newcomers, of whose arrival they seemed to have been told. Their
silence, their attitude, and the looks of compassion they bestowed on me
as I greeted them _en passant_ seemed to me omens of a terrible future
for me.’
The captain of the hulk apologized to the baron for having no better
accommodation. Le Jeune, incredulous, made him repeat it, and flew into
a rage. He snatched a sword from an Irishman and swore he would kill any
one who would keep him on a hulk. The French prisoners shouted: ‘Bravo!
If every one behaved as you do, the English would not dare treat us so!’
The captain of the hulk was alarmed at the possible result of this with
1,500 desperate prisoners, and hurried the baron into his boat.
Thus Baron Le Jeune escaped the hulks!
He was then taken to the Forton Dépôt, where he remained three days, and
was then ordered to Ashby-de-la-Zouch. So rapidly was he hurried into a
coach that he had not time to sign his parole papers and resolved to
profit by the omission. He passed many days on a very pleasant journey
via Andover and Blenheim, for he paused to see all that was interesting
on the way, and even went to theatres. He found about a hundred French
prisoners at Ashby (some of whom, he says, had been there fifteen
years!), and reported himself to the Agent, Farnell, a grocer,
‘certainly the tallest, thinnest, most cadaverous seller of dry goods in
the world.’
At Ashby he found old friends, and passed his time with them, and in
learning English. He was invited to Lord Hastings’ house about a mile
from Ashby. Hastings was brother to Lord Moira, a friend of the Prince
of Wales, and here he met the orphan daughter of Sir John Moore. He was
most kindly treated, and Lord Hastings said he would try to get leave
for him to live in London.
Then came a change.
‘A man came to me one morning, and said to me privately that the Duke of
Rovigo, minister of Police in France, authorized by the Emperor, had
sent him to propose to me that I should let him arrange for me to get
out of England, and return to France. I distrusted him, for I had heard
of the tricks of escape Agents, and said I would first consult my
friend, Colonel Stoffel. I did so. Stoffel said it was a _bonâ fide_
offer, but the emissary had brought no money with him, and it would cost
probably 200 guineas.’
Where was the baron to get such a sum? He went to Baudins, a merchant,
and asked him for a loan, and at a ball that night Baudins signalled
that the loan was all right. Farnell was at the ball, and the baron
describes his comical assumption of dignity as the guardian of the
French prisoners. Baudins lent Baron Le Jeune the money in gold without
asking interest on it.
‘I was invited to a grand dinner by General Hastings the very evening we
were to start, and I duly appeared at it. The evening passed very
brightly, and at dessert, after the ladies had retired, the men remained
behind to drink wine together, beginning with a toast to the ladies. As
a matter of taste, as well as of design, I kept my head clear, and when
my companions were sufficiently exhilarated by the fumes of the claret
they had drunk, they returned with somewhat unsteady steps to the
drawing-room, where tea had been prepared by the ladies.’
The baron won the goodwill of all and was invited to return the next
day.
At 11 p.m., it being very dark, he slipped out through the park to meet
Colonel Stoffel and a guide. He waited an hour, but at last they arrived
in a post-chaise, and they drove off. Passing through Northants, North
Middlesex [_sic_], London, and Reigate, they came to Hythe, where they
stopped the next night. They pretended to be invalids come for a course
of sea baths, and the baron was actually assisted out of the carriage by
Custom-house officers. The chaise dismissed, tea was ordered while the
guide went to make inquiries about Folkestone. He returned with a
horror-struck face, and wrote on a slate: ‘Pay at once and let us be
off.’ Le Jeune gave the girl of the house a guinea, and told her to keep
the change, which made her look suspicious, as if the money had not been
honestly come by. No time was to be lost, for Hythe was full of troops.
The guide advised the baron to drop the erect bearing of a soldier, and
assume a stoop. They got away, and hid in a wheat-field during the day
while the guide again went into Folkestone. He was away seventeen hours.
At length they got to Folkestone, and Le Jeune was introduced to a
smuggler named Brick, a diabolical-looking man, who said he would take
them safely over to France.
Brick asked the Baron for 200 guineas, and got them. The wind was
contrary, he said, but he would lodge them well. A decent room was hired
with a trap-door under the bed for escape, and here they remained
thirteen days. Le Jeune became impatient, and at last resolved to risk
weather and everything else and go. ‘Well! follow me! like the others!’
growled Brick ferociously to the sailor with him. But the woman of the
house implored Le Jeune and Stoffel not to go with Brick: they remained
determined, but she persisted and held them back, and so, now persuaded
that she had good reasons for her action, and she seeming a decent body,
they remained. Later on they learned how close to danger they had been,
for the woman told them that Brick had taken the money of a score of
fugitives like themselves, promising to land them in France, hiding them
under nets to avoid the coast-guard, and as soon as they were well out,
murdering them and flinging their bodies overboard with stones tied to
them, knowing that transportation awaited him if he was caught aiding
prisoners to escape.
They asked the woman to help them, for now they had no money. The baron
told the sailor that he would give him fifty livres at Boulogne, if he
landed them there. He was an honest fellow, brought them a sailor’s
clothes, and went along the beach with them, replying, ‘Fishermen’ to
the many challenges they got. Finding a small boat, they shoved it off,
and got in, so as to board a fishing-smuggling smack riding outside. It
was a foul night, and three times they were hurled back ashore, wet to
the skin; so they returned. The next day the weather moderated and they
got off, under the very lee of a police boat, which they deceived by
pretending to get nets out. In six hours they were within sight of
Boulogne, but were obliged to keep off or they would be fired upon,
until they had signalled and were told to come in.
At this time England sent by smugglers a quantity of incendiary
pamphlets which the French coast-guard had orders to seize, so that Le
Jeune and Stoffel were searched and, guarded by armed men, marched to
the Commissary of Police, ‘just as if’, Le Jeune said, ‘we were infected
with the plague.’
Luckily, the Commissary was an old friend of the baron, so they had no
further trouble, but paid the sailor his fifty livres, and went to
Paris. At an interview with the Emperor, the latter said to Le Jeune,
‘And did you see Lefebvre-Desnouettes?’
‘No, sire, but I wrote to him. He is extremely anxious to get back to
you, and is beginning to lose hope of being exchanged. He would do as I
have done if he were not afraid of your Majesty’s displeasure.’
‘Oh! Let him come! Let him come! I shall be very glad to see him,’ said
the Emperor.
‘Does your Majesty give me leave to tell him so in your name?’
‘Yes, yes. Don’t lose any time.’
So Madame Lefebvre-Desnouettes got a passport, and went over to England,
and her presence did much to distract the attention of the general’s
guardians, and made his escape comparatively easy. The general, as a
German or Russian Count, Madame in boy’s clothes as his son, and an
A.D.C. got up as a valet-de-chambre, went in a post-chaise from
Cheltenham to London, where they rested for a couple of hours at
Sablonière’s in Leicester Square, then at midnight left for Dover and
thence to Paris.
General Osten, second in command at Flushing, on parole at Lichfield,
was another gentleman who was helped to get off by a lady member of his
family. His daughter had come with him from Flushing, and in December
1809 went away with all her father’s heavy baggage. In February 1810,
Waddell, the escape agent, met the general and two other officers in
Birmingham, and forty-six hours later landed with them in Holland.
In this year, 1810, the escapes were so numerous by boats stolen from
the shores that the Admiralty issued a warning that owners of boats on
beaches should not leave masts, oars, and tackle in them, and in 1812
compensation was refused to a Newton Abbot and to a Paignton fisherman,
because prisoners had stolen their boats, which had been left with their
gear on the beach, despite warning, and when the prisoners were
recaptured it was found that they had destroyed the boats.
In October 1811, six French officers—Bouquet, army surgeon, Leclerc,
lieutenant of hussars, Denguiard, army surgeon, Jean Henry, ‘passenger’
on privateer, Gaffé, merchant skipper, and Glenat, army lieutenant,
under the guidance of one Johns, left Okehampton, crossed the moor to
Bovey Tracey, where they met a woman of whom they asked the way to
Torbay. She replied, and while they consulted together, gave the alarm
so that the villagers turned out and caught three of the runaways. The
other three ran and were pursued. Johns turned on the foremost pursuer
and stabbed him so that he died, and two others were wounded by the
Frenchmen, but the latter were caught at Torquay. Johns got off, but on
November 2 was seen at Chesterfield, where he got work on a Saturday;
instead of going to it on Monday morning, however, he decamped, and was
seen on the Manchester road, eight miles from Chesterfield. In 1812 a
man named Taylor, of Beer Alston, said to be Johns, was arrested, but
proved an alibi and was discharged.
In 1812 General Maurin, who may be remembered in connexion with the
Crapper trouble at Wantage, escaped with his brother from Abergavenny,
whither he had been sent, the smuggler Waddell being paid £300 for his
help. At the same time General Brou escaped from Welshpool. Both these
officers had been treated with particular leniency and had been allowed
unusual privileges, so that the Transport Office comments with great
severity upon their behaviour.
On November 8, 1812, a girl named Mary Clarke went in very foggy weather
from Wolverhampton to Bridgnorth to meet a friend. She waited for some
time, but he did not come; so she turned back towards her inn, where her
chaise was waiting. Here was Lieutenant Montbazin, a French naval
officer, who had broken his parole from Lichfield, who politely accosted
her and asked her if she was going to Wolverhampton. She replied that
she was. Was she going to walk? No; she had her chaise. Would she let
him have a seat if he paid half expenses? She agreed, and went back for
the chaise while he walked on, and she picked him up half a mile on,
between some rocks by the roadside. So they went on to Wolverhampton—and
to Birmingham. In the meantime he had been missed at Lichfield, and
followed, and in the back parlour of the _Swan_ at Birmingham was
arrested with the girl.
This was Mary Clarke’s evidence in court.
In defence, Montbazin said that he had been exchanged for four British
seamen, who had been landed from France, but that the Transport Office
had refused to let him go, so he had considered himself absolved from
his parole.
It is hardly necessary to say that the girl’s story was concocted, that
her meeting with Montbazin was part of a prearranged plan, and the Court
emphasized their opinion that this was the case by sending the
lieutenant to a prison afloat, and Mary Clarke to one ashore.
In October 1812, eight French officers left Andover quietly in the
evening, and, a mile out, met two mounted escape-aiders. Behind each of
them a prisoner mounted, and all proceeded at a walk for six miles, when
they met another man with three horses. On these horses the remaining
six prisoners mounted, and by daybreak were at Ringwood, thirty-six
miles on their road to liberty. All the day they remained hidden in the
forest, living upon bread, cheese, and rum, which their guides procured
from Ringwood. At nightfall they restarted, passed through Christchurch
to Stanpit, and thence to the shore, where they found a boat waiting for
them; but the wind being contrary and blowing a gale, they could not
embark, and were obliged to remain hidden in the woods for three days,
suffering so much from exposure and want that they made a bargain with a
Mrs. Martin to lodge in her house for £12 until the weather should
moderate sufficiently for them to embark. They stayed here for a week,
and then their suspense and anxiety, they knowing that the hue and cry
was after them, became unbearable, and they gave the smuggler-skipper of
the _Freeholder_ a promissory note for six hundred guineas to hazard
taking them off. He made the attempt, but the vessel was driven ashore,
and the Frenchmen were with difficulty landed at another spot on the
coast; here they wandered about in the darkness and storm, until one of
them becoming separated from the others gave himself up, and the
discovery of his companions soon followed.
The result of the trial was that the officers were, of course, sent to
the hulks, the master of the _Freeholder_ was transported for life, four
of his men for seven years, and the _aiders acquitted_. This appears
curious justice, which can only be explained by presuming that the
magistrates, or rather the Admiralty, often found it politic to get
escape-aiders into their service in this way.
Of course, all ‘escapes’ were bad offences from an honourable point of
view, but some were worse than others. For instance, in 1812, the Duc de
Chartres wrote a strong letter of intercession to the Transport Office
on behalf of one Du Baudiez. This man had been sent to Stapleton Prison
for having broken his parole at Odiham, and the duke asked that his
parole should be restored him. The Transport Office decidedly rejected
the application, and in their reply to the duke quoted a letter written
by Du Baudiez to his sister in France in which he says that he has given
his creditors in Odiham bills upon her, but asks her not to honour them,
because ‘Les Anglais nous ont agonis de sottises, liés comme des bêtes
sauvages, et traités toute la route comme des chiens. Ce sont des
Anglais; rien ne m’étonne de ce qu’ils ont fait ... ce sont tous des
gueux, des scélérats depuis le premier jusqu’au dernier. Aussi je vous
prie en grâce de protester ces billets ... je suis dans la ferme
résolution de ne les point payer.’
On one occasion an unexpected catch of ‘broke-paroles’ was made. The
Revenue Officers believed that two men who were playing cards in an inn
near Canterbury were escaped prisoners, and at 8 p.m. called on a
magistrate to get help. The magistrate told them that it was of no use
to get the constable, as at that hour he was usually intoxicated, but
authorized them to get the military.
This they did, but the landlord refused to open the door and, during the
parleying, two men slipped out by the back door, whom the officers
stopped, and presently two others, who were also stopped. All four were
French ‘broke-paroles’ from Ashby-de-la-Zouch, and the card-players
within were not prisoners at all. The captured men said that on
Beckenham Common they had nearly been caught, for the driver of the cart
stopped there at 10 p.m. to rest the horse. The horse-patrol, passing
by, ordered him to move on. As he was putting the horse to, the
Frenchmen, all being at the back of the cart, tilted it up and cried
out. However, the horse-patrol had passed on and did not hear.
In the two next cases English girls play a part. In 1814 Colonel Poerio
escaped from Ashbourne with an English girl in male attire, but they
were captured at Loughborough. At the trial an Ashbourne woman said that
one day a girl came and asked for a lodging, saying that she was a
worker at ‘lace-running’; she seemed respectable, and was taken in, and
remained some days without causing any suspicion, although she seemed on
good terms with the French prisoners on parole in the town. One evening
the woman’s little girl met the lodger coming downstairs, and said:
‘Mam! _she_ has got a black coat on!’ When asked where she was going,
she replied, ‘To Colonel Juliett’s. Will be back in five minutes.’
(Colonel Juliett was another prisoner.) She did not return, and that was
the last witness saw of her.
Upon examination, the girl said that she kept company with Poerio, but
as her father did not approve of her marrying him she had resolved to
elope. She took with her £5, which she had saved by ‘running’ lace. They
were arrested at the _Bull’s Head_, Loughborough, where the girl had
ordered a chaise. Counsel decided that there was no case for
prosecution!
I am not sure if this Colonel Poerio is identical with the man of that
name who, in 1812, when on a Chatham hulk, applied to be put on parole,
the answer being a refusal, inasmuch as he was a man of infamous
character, and that when in command of the island of Cerigo he had
poisoned the water there in order to relieve himself of some 600
Albanian men, women, and children, many of whom died—a deed he
acknowledged himself by word and in writing.
Colonel Ocher in 1811 got off from Lichfield with a girl, was pursued by
officers in a chaise and four, and was caught at Meriden, on the
Coventry road, about two miles beyond Stone Bridge. Upon examination,
Ann Green, spinster, lodging at 3, Newman Street, Oxford Street, London,
said that she came to Birmingham by the ‘Balloon’ coach, according to
instructions she had received from a Baron Ferriet, whom she knew. He
had given her £6, paid her fare, and sent her to the _Swan with two
Necks_ in Ladd Lane, where she was given a letter, which, as she could
not read, the waiter read to her. The letter told her to go to Lichfield
to the _St. George_ hotel, as the baron had business to attend to which
kept him in London. At the Lichfield hotel there was a letter which told
her to go to Mr. Joblin’s, where Colonel Ocher lodged. Here she left
word she would meet him in the fields, which she did at 9 p.m., when
they went off, and were captured as above.
In defence, ‘Baron Ferriet’ told a strange story. He said he had been in
the British Secret Service in France. He lived there in constant danger
as there was a reward of 40,000 francs offered for him by the French
Government. At Sables d’Olonne, Colonel Ocher’s family had hidden him
when the authorities were after him, and had saved him, and Madame Ocher
had looked after his wife and family. So, in a long letter he explains
in very fair English that he determined to repay the Ochers in France
for their kindness to him by procuring the escape of General Ocher, a
prisoner on parole in England, and regarded him as ‘his property’.
Although the prisoners on parole had no lack of English sympathizers,
especially if they could pay, a large section of the lower class of
country folk were ever on the alert to gain the Government reward for
the detection and prevention of parole-breaking. The following is a
sample of letters frequently received by the ‘Sick and Hurt’ Office and
its agents:
‘MY LORDS AND GENTLEMEN,
‘This informs your lordships that on ye 30th July 1780, I was on
Okehampton road leading to Tavistock, saw four French prisoners, on
horseback without a guide. They signified to me that they had leave to
go to Tavistock from there company at Okehampton. After I was past
Tavistock four miles they came galloping on towards Buckland Down Camp.
I kept in sight of them and perceived them to ride several miles or
above out of the Turnpike Road taking of what view they could of
Gentlemen’s seats, and ye Harbour and Sound and Camp, and I thought
within myself it was very strange that these profest Enemies should be
granted such Libertys as this, by any Company whatever. Accordingly came
to a Resolution as soon as they came within the lines of the Camp ride
forward and stopt them and applyd to the Commanding Officer which was
Major Braecher of the Bedfordshire Militia, who broke their letter, and
not thinking it a proper Passport the Major ordered them under the care
of the Quarter Guard.
[Winds up with a claim for reward.]
‘JOSEPH GILES,
‘Near ye P.O., Plymouth Dock.’
It turned out in this case that the Agent at Okehampton had given the
Frenchmen permission to go to Tavistock for their trunks, so they were
released and returned. The ‘Sick and Hurt’ Office said that to allow
these prisoners to ride unguarded to Tavistock was most improper, and
must, under no circumstances, be allowed to occur again.
From a paper read by Mr. Maberley Phillips, F.S.A., before the Newcastle
Society of Antiquaries, I take the following instances of escapes of
parole prisoners in the North.
In 1813 there were on parole at Jedburgh under the Agent, George Bell,
about a hundred French prisoners. At the usual Saturday muster-call on
June I, all were present, but at that of June 4, Benoît Poulet and
Jacques Girot were missing. From the evidence at the trial of the
accomplices in this escape, all of whom except the chief agent, James
Hunter of Whitton, near Rothbury, were arrested, and three of whom
turned King’s evidence, the story was unfolded of the flight of the
men—who were passed off as Germans on a fishing excursion—across the
wild, romantic, historic fell-country between the Border and Alwinton on
the Coquet; and so by Whitton, Belsay, and Ponteland, to the _Bird in
Bush_ inn, Pilgrim Street, Newcastle; whence the Frenchmen were supposed
to have gone to Shields, and embarked in a foreign vessel for France.
I quote this and the following case as instances of the general sympathy
of English country people with the foreign prisoners amongst them. The
_Courant_ of August 28, 1813, says: ‘The trial of James Hunter occupied
the whole of Monday, and the court was excessively crowded; when the
verdict of Not Guilty was delivered, clapping of hands and other noisy
symptoms of applause were exhibited, much to the surprise of the judge,
Sir A. Chambers, who observed that he seemed to be in an assembly of
Frenchmen, rather than in an English court of justice. The other
prisoners charged with the same offence, were merely arraigned, and the
verdict of acquittal was recorded without further trial.’
Hunter had been arrested in Scotland, just before the trial. Quoting
from Wallace’s _History of Blyth_, Mr. Phillips says:
‘One Sunday morning in the year 1811, the inhabitants were thrown into a
state of great excitement by the startling news that five Frenchmen had
been taken during the night and were lodged in the guard-house. They
were officers who had broken their parole at Edinburgh Castle [?
Jedburgh], and in making their way home had reached the neighbourhood of
Blyth; when discovered, they were resting by the side of the Plessy
wagon-way beside the “Shoulder of Mutton” field.
‘A party of countrymen who had been out drinking, hearing some persons
conversing in an unknown tongue, suspected what they were, and
determined to effect their capture. The fugitives made some resistance,
but in the end were captured, and brought to Blyth, and given into the
charge of the soldiers then quartered in the town. _This act of the
countrymen met with the strongest reprobation of the public_’ (the
italics are mine). ‘The miscarriage of the poor fellows’ plan of escape
through the meddling of their captors, excited the sympathy of the
inhabitants; rich and poor vying with each other in showing kindness to
the strangers. Whatever was likely to alleviate their helpless condition
was urged upon their acceptance; victuals they did not refuse, but
though money was freely offered them, they steadily refused to accept
it. The guard-house was surrounded all day long by crowds anxious to get
a glimpse of the captives. The men who took the prisoners were rewarded
with £5 each, but doubtless it would be the most unsatisfactory wages
they ever earned, for long after, whenever they showed their faces in
the town, they had to endure the upbraiding of men, women, and children;
indeed, it was years before public feeling about this matter passed
away.’
The continuance and frequency of escapes by prisoners on parole
necessitated increased rigidity of regulations. The routes by which
prisoners were marched from place to place were exactly laid down, and
we find numberless letters of instruction from the Transport Office like
this:
‘Colonel X having received permission to reside on parole at
Ashby-de-la-Zouch, his route from Chatham is to be: Chatham, Sevenoaks,
Croydon, Kingston, Uxbridge, Wendover, Buckingham, Towcester, Daventry,
and Coleshill.’
The instructions to conductors of prisoners were as follows:
Prisoners were to march about twelve miles a day. Conductors were to pay
the prisoners sixpence per day per man before starting. Conductors were
to ride ahead of prisoners, so as to give notice at towns of their
coming, and were to see that the prisoners were not imposed upon.
Conductors (who were always mounted), were to travel thirty miles a day
on the return journey, and to halt upon Sundays.
Of course, it was in the power of the conductors to make the journeys of
the prisoners comfortable or the reverse. If the former, it was the
usual custom to give a certificate of this kind:
‘_April 1798._ This is to certify that Mr. Thomas Willis, conductor of
134 Dutch and Spanish prisoners of war from the _Security_ prison ship
at Chatham, into the custody of Mr. Barker, agent for prisoners of war
at Winchester, has provided us with good lodgings every night, well
littered with straw, and that we have been regularly paid our
subsistence every morning on our march, each prisoner sixpence per day
according to the established allowance.
‘(Signed).’
The ill-treatment of prisoners on the march was not usual, and when
reported was duly punished. Thus in 1804 a Coldstream guardsman on
escort of prisoners from Reading to Norman Cross, being convicted of
robbing a prisoner, was sentenced to 600 lashes, and the sentence was
publicly read out at all the dépôts.
In 1811 posters came out offering the usual reward for the arrest of an
officer who had escaped from a Scottish parole town, and distinguished
him as lacking three fingers of his left hand. A year later Bow Street
officers Vickary and Lavender, ‘from information received’, followed a
seller of artificial flowers into a public-house in ‘Weston Park,
Lincolns Inn Fields.’ The merchant bore the distinctive mark of the
wanted foreigner, and, seeing that the game was up, candidly admitted
his identity, said that he had lived in London during the past twelve
months by making and selling artificial flowers, and added that he had
lost his fingers for his country, and would not mind losing his head for
her.
In the same year a militia corporal who had done duty at a prisoner
dépôt, and so was familiar with foreign faces, saw two persons in a
chaise driving towards Worcester, whom he at once suspected to be
escaped prisoners. He stopped the chaise, and made the men show their
passports, which were not satisfactory, and, although they tried to
bribe him to let them go, he refused, mounted the bar of the chaise, and
drove on. One of the men presently opened the chaise-door with the aim
of escaping, but the corporal presented a pistol at him, and he
withdrew. At Worcester they confessed that they had escaped from
Bishop’s Castle, and said they were Trafalgar officers.
In 1812 prisoners broke their parole in batches. From Tiverton at one
time, twelve; from Andover, eight (as recorded on pp. 384–5); from
Wincanton, ten; and of these, four were generals and eighteen colonels.
In the _Quarterly Review_, December 1821, the assertion made by M.
Dupin, in his report upon the treatment of French prisoners in Britain,
published in 1816, and before alluded to in the chapter upon
prison-ships, that French officers observed their parole more faithfully
than did English, was shown to be false. Between May 1803, and August
1811, 860 French officers had attempted to escape from parole towns. Of
these, 270 were recaptured, and 590 escaped. In 1808 alone, 154 escaped.
From 1811 to 1814, 299 army officers escaped, and of this number 9 were
generals, 18 were colonels, 14 were lieutenant-colonels, 8 were majors,
91 were captains, and 159 were lieutenants. It should be noted that in
this number are not included the many officers who practically
‘escaped’, in that they did not return to England when not exchanged at
the end of their term of parole.
From the Parliamentary Papers of 1812, I take the following table:
Transport Office, June 25, 1812.
──────────────────┬────────┬────────┬─────────┬──────────┬─────────────────────
│ _Total │ │ │ │
│No. Com.│ _No. │ │ │
│Officers│ that │ │ │
│ on │ broke │ _Been │ │
│parole._│parole._│retaken._│_Escaped._│
──────────────────┼────────┼────────┼─────────┼──────────┼─────────────────────
Year ending 5th │ │ │ │ │N.B. The numbers
June 1810 │ 1,685│ 104│ 47│ 57│stated in this
Year ending 5th │ │ │ │ │account include those
June 1811 │ 2,087│ 118│ 47│ 71│persons only who have
Year ending 5th │ │ │ │ │actually absconded
June 1812 │ 2,142│ 242│ 63│ 179│from the places
│ —————│ ———│ ———│ ———│appointed for their
│ 5,914│ 464│ 157│ 307│residence.
Besides the above,│ │ │ │ │
the following │ │ │ │ │A considerable number
other prisoners │ │ │ │ │of officers have been
of rank │ │ │ │ │ordered into
entitling them │ │ │ │ │confinement for
to be on parole,│ │ │ │ │various other
have broken it │ │ │ │ │breaches of their
during the three│ │ │ │ │parole engagements.
years above │ │ │ │ │ (Signed)
mentioned. │ │ 218│ 85│ 133│ RUP. GEORGE.
│ —————│ ———│ ———│ ———│ J. BOWEN.
│ │ 682│ 242│ 440│ J. DOUGLAS.
──────────────────┴────────┴────────┴─────────┴──────────┴─────────────────────
During the above-quoted period, between 1803 and 1811, out of 20,000
British _détenus_, not prisoners of war, in France, it cannot be shown
that more than twenty-three broke their parole, and even these are
doubtful.
Sometimes the epidemic of parole-breaking was severe enough to render
drastic measures necessary. In 1797 orders were issued that all French
prisoners, without distinction of rank, were to be placed in close
confinement.
In 1803, in consequence of invasion alarms, it was deemed advisable to
remove all prisoners from the proximity of the coast to inland towns,
the Admiralty order being:
‘At the present conjunction all parole prisoners from the South and West
towns are to be sent to North Staffordshire, and Derbyshire—that is, to
Chesterfield, Ashbourne, and Leek.’
General Morgan at Bishop’s Waltham resented this removal so far away, in
a letter to the Transport Office, to which they replied:
‘This Board has uniformly wished to treat Prisoners of War with every
degree of humanity consistent with the public safety: but in the present
circumstances it has been judged expedient to remove all Prisoners of
War on Parole from places near the Coast to Inland towns. You will
therefore observe that the order is not confined to you, but relates
generally to all Prisoners on Parole: and with regard to your comparison
of the treatment of prisoners in this country with that of British
prisoners in France, the Commissioners think it only necessary to remark
that the distance to which it is now proposed to remove you does not
exceed 170 miles, whereas British prisoners in France are marched into
the interior to a distance of 500 miles from some of the ports into
which they are carried.’
Morgan was allowed eventually his choice of Richmond or Barnet as a
place of parole, a privilege accorded him because of his kindness to a
Mr. Hurry, during the detention of the latter as a prisoner in France.
In 1811, so many prisoners escaped from Wincanton that all the parole
prisoners in the place were marched to London to be sent thence by sea
to Scotland for confinement. ‘Sudden and secret measures’ were taken to
remove them, all of the rank of captain and above, to Forton for
embarkation, except General Houdetôt, who was sent to Lichfield. From
Okehampton sixty were sent to Ilfracombe, and thence to Swansea for
Abergavenny, and from Bishop’s Waltham to Oswestry in batches of twelve
at intervals of three days.
Many parole towns petitioned for the retention of the prisoners, but all
were refused; the inhabitants of some places in Devon attempted to
detain prisoners for debts; and Enchmarsh, the Agent at Tiverton, was
suspended for not sending off his prisoners according to orders. Their
departure was the occasion in many places for public expressions of
regret, and this can be readily appreciated when it is considered what
the residence of two or three hundred young men, some of whom were of
good family and many of whom had private means, in a small English
country town meant, not merely from a business but from a social point
of view.
In _The Times_ of 1812 may be read that a French officer, who had been
exchanged and landed at Morlaix, and had expressed disgust at the
frequent breaches of parole by his countrymen, was arrested and shot by
order of Bonaparte. I merely quote this as an example that even British
newspapers of standing were occasionally stooping to the vituperative
level of their trans-Channel _confrères_.