This strange letter rather increased the great anxiety every man
was in, for we expected to have been informed something relative to
our speedy departure, and that he had made arrangements to clothe
the oldest prisoners, who were so naked that they were unfit to be
discharged.
On the nineteenth, an order arrived, informing Capt. Shortland to
discharge thirty men, as they had been applied for by American
captains, to man ships in France and up the east country; the Transport
Board had ordered them to be discharged.
On the twentieth, Capt. Shortland released those three men whom we
have mentioned were committed to close confinement in the cachot last
August, on suspicion of blowing up the vessel; the other, we have
mentioned, made his escape.
These men made as ghastly an appearance as it is possible for human
beings to make; they had been eight months confined within a damp stone
room, twenty feet square, floored with stone, and no light except a
dim ray that gleamed through the top of the gable end. They had lived
on two-thirds of a scant allowance till their trembling limbs could
scarce support their body.
On the same day, a writ came to remove the insane man who had
occasioned the death of Jonathan Paul to Exeter, to have his trial;
also one to bring forward about twenty persons as witnesses, in this
and the trial of the three men whom we mentioned had been taken there
for trial for marking the traitors.
The small-pox raged now in a most alarming manner; it being of the
African kind, scarce a man recovered after once being attacked and
conveyed to the hospital.
After the arrival of the ratification of the treaty, great numbers
visited the prison, from all parts of the country, with almost every
kind of article for sale in the markets, among whom were great numbers
of Jews, who came here to sell old clothes.
One of these Jew merchants, on his way to the prison, met a farmer who
lived about eight miles from the prison, and accused him of being an
American prisoner, making his escape from the depot, as great numbers
had lately made their escape; and, thinking to receive the reward,
which was three pounds, given by the government for apprehending any
prisoner making his escape from the prison, told the farmer he must
go back to the prison with him; and the farmer, having been once a
sailor, was willing to confirm him in his suspicions, and began the
song of Yankee Doodle; this confirmed the Jew in his belief of his
being an American, and he was sure he had got a prize worth three
pounds to him; but his prisoner refused to walk, and thinking he could
afford to hire a conveyance for him, gave half a guinea to a wagoner to
take him to the prison, and treated him very liberally along the way
with drink. About 11 o’clock the Jew arrived with his prisoner, and
applied to the keepers to take charge of him, and pay the reward of
three pounds; but to his astonishment, the clerks, turnkeys, and every
officer, immediately knew the farmer, and knew him to be a respectable
man residing on the edge of the moor. He now demanded of the Jew a
compensation for being detained several hours a prisoner, and the
demand being justified by Capt. Shortland, the Jew was obliged to pay
five pounds to prevent a suit.
The affair was made known to the prisoners, and every man forbid
purchasing anything of the Jew; he was therefore obliged to leave the
market without disposing of a single article.
On the twenty-fourth, a letter was received from Mr. Beasley, informing
those Americans who had been taken under the French flag, and had been
considered French prisoners till they were discharged, and from that
time till this, had been recognised by no government, that he was now
authorized to acknowledge them as Americans, and sent to each man a
suit of clothes. This was the first assistance these men had had from
any government since the French prisoners were discharged, and had
lived entirely on the charity of the other prisoners. They had been
prisoners four or five years.
The same letter informed us that he had taken three ships at London for
the conveyance of the prisoners to the United States.
The same day a passport for four prisoners, who were to be discharged,
was received.
During this month many prisoners made their escape, the government
appearing very careless; and it was supposed this negligence was
intentional, that they might escape for the purpose of impressing,
as the press was hot about this time; but some few were detected
when passing the wall, and sentenced to the cachot for ten days, on
two-thirds allowance, which stopped the escaping for that time.
On the twenty-fifth the prisoners began to be impatient of such delay
in the American agent, as eleven days had elapsed since the arrival of
the ratified treaty, and nothing in readiness to discharge them, no
means provided, and such delay too much to be borne; their situation
was such that they could not restrain their resentment against such
criminal neglect as their agent was guilty of; they were determined
to punish him as much as it lay in their power; they therefore caused
his effigy to be hanged on the top of one of the prisons, after which
it was taken down, and burnt in presence of all the officers and
soldiers--But I must not forget to mention the sentence of the court,
pronounced before his execution, and his dying confession, when under
the gallows.
_Sentence._
At this trial, held at Dartmoor on the twenty-fifth day of March,
one thousand eight hundred and fifteen, you, Reuben G. Beasley in
effigy, are found guilty, by an impartial and judicious jury of
your countrymen, upon the testimony of five thousand seven hundred
witnesses, of depriving many hundreds of your countrymen of their
lives, by the most wanton and most cruel deaths, by nakedness,
starvation, and exposure to pestilence. It therefore becomes the duty
of this court, as ought to be the duty of every court of justice, to
pronounce that sentence of the law, which your manifold and heinous
crimes so richly deserve.--And it is with the deepest regret that I am
compelled to say, our country has been imposed upon, by a man whose
crimes must cut him off from among the living. You this day must be
hanged by the neck on the top of the prison No. 7, until you are dead;
your body is then to be taken down and fastened to a stake, and burned
to ashes, which are to be distributed to the winds, that your name may
be forgotten, and your crimes no longer disgrace our nation.
On hearing the above sentence, the compunction of his conscience now
brought forth the following confession: