All amusements were not as reputable and comparatively harmless as theatre going, nor all employments as honest. A passion for gambling possessed the greater number of the prisoners, and the secret of much of the strenuous industry previously mentioned, on the part of the ragged and naked “Romans,” was to be found in the craving for funds to venture in games of chance. It drove the idle and impecunious to break the strict rules forbidding the prisoners to make away with rations or clothing despite the penalties attached of forfeiture and the issue of a yellow suit in the second case as a badge of ignominy. The attempt to stop play was futile, for although cards were not permitted within the limits, a hundred ingenious plans were devised for trying the luck of the players. A day’s rations, a week’s, a month’s were risked on the toss of a coin, or the length of a straw pulled out of a mattress. Bets were laid as to the number of turns a sentry would make on his beat, or whether or not the doctor would appear with a newly curled wig. An amusing and most original game was played with the assistance of the prison rats, who after “lights out,” when the ship’s lantern alone feebly illuminated a ward, ventured out of their holes hunting for crumbs of food that might have fallen beneath the hammocks. A specially tempting morsel having been placed in an open space, the arrival of the performers was anxiously looked for. They were all known by name and thus each player was able to select his champion for the evening. As soon as a certain number had gained the open, a sudden whistle given by a disinterested spectator sent them back to their holes and the first to reach his hole was declared the winner. An old grey rat called “Père Ratapon” was a great favourite with the gamblers; for though not so active as his younger brethren, he was always on the alert to secure a good start when disturbed.

Whatever the reason, whether the baneful effects of previous training, or the pressure of greed and the opportunities offered to gratify it by the absence of any close supervision, one section of the French prisoners was constantly and successfully engaged in criminal pursuits. Dartmoor was long an active centre for coiners and bank-note forgers; some of the prisoners possessed uncommon skill in these nefarious processes. No precautions could check the manufacture or prevent the passing out and circulation of spurious money through the kingdom. The traffic was flourishing and very largely profitable; the intermediary, for the most part the military guard, brought in the Spanish silver dollars collected and sent up from Plymouth and each coin worth four shillings was converted into eight of that value. The necessary materials for fabricating bank-notes came through the same channel and although no doubt imperfect, so much skill was displayed in their manufacture that the imitation was so nearly exact that even at the banks themselves the forged notes often passed undetected. As the military guard was always suspected, the men were searched on going on and coming off duty and if caught were, of course, severely punished. Nevertheless many thousand notes were put in circulation and great numbers of bad shillings.

Speaking in general terms, the condition of the French prisoners at Dartmoor was not particularly irksome, apart from the continual aching sense of exile and loss of freedom. The mass of the French at Dartmoor lived well and made money to lay up. They admitted themselves that they were at times “fort gais” and scrupulously kept up their demonstrations on fête days and great anniversaries when they promenaded the yard in procession behind the Tricolor and made loud cries of Vive la France and Vive l’Empereur. They were entirely neglected by their own government, which as a rule contributed nothing to their support, and they must have known that but for the obstinate policy of Napoleon, in refusing to allow exchanges of war prisoners, some of them at least, if not all, might long since have returned to their own country. They do not appear to have fraternised very cordially with the American prisoners when they began to arrive. The latter were generally much discontented, not only on account of their loss of liberty, but that they felt themselves neglected and in an inferior position to their French colleagues, who had the best quarters and were longer residents and more at home. For some time the Americans shared the block occupied by the “Romans,”—a very sufficient cause of grievance. Prolonged confinement in Dartmoor had, not strangely, an evil effect on their tempers. The men were apt to be quarrelsome and easily annoyed over small things, and under the prevailing code of honour disputes could only be settled in one way, by personal encounter. The authorities did not entirely prohibit duelling until the use of foils as a recreation gave encouragement to hostile encounters. It was easy enough in a community, trained to the use of arms, to remove the guard buttons from the foils and convert the harmless toy into a lethal weapon. So much mischief ensued that fencing with foils was forbidden, but on one occasion a hostile meeting was declared inevitable between a French corporal of the marines and a privateer’s man. It was necessary to find weapons and great ingenuity was displayed in providing them. Two long strips of hard wood were obtained from the carpenters employed in fixing the roof of a Roman Catholic chapel. One end of each strip was fashioned into a handle with a proper guard; at the other end, knife blades were fixed, ground down to a fine point, and thus armed, the opponents met. In the fierce fight which ensued the marine received a severe wound in his shoulder and a great gash on the sword arm. When taken to the hospital it was impossible to conceal the cause of these wounds. A search was made for the weapons which were seized and confiscated.

CHAPTER VII
THE HULKS

Description of the Proteus—Story of a French sufferer—Aspect of his fellow prisoners—Below decks—System of discipline—Overcrowding and bad sanitary conditions—Dietaries coarse and insufficient—Employments on board—The “Rafalés,” their misery and degradation—Attempts at escape often successful—Escapes at Dartmoor—Prisoner walled up in a chimney—Naval officer’s uniform stolen—Some figures giving number of French prisoners in custody.

WE may leave Dartmoor for a time and return to the Hulks, which it was intended to supplement and in a measure replace. It is well known that they were viewed with horror, and some personal experiences of one who was confined on board one for nearly nine years will be read with interest. M. Louis Garneray, the author, was a French painter, who came from a family of artists, and who took to a seafaring life from a love of adventure. He sailed to the East on a French ship and made the homeward voyage on the Belle Poule, one of a squadron which was to cruise on the west coast of Africa, and was captured on the 30th of March, 1806, by the English sloop Ramillies. Mr. Louis Garneray was wounded and made prisoner and from that date, as he tells us, began a torture which lasted for the nearly nine years of his imprisonment on board the English hulks. He relates as follows: “I thought I was dead to the past, but my blood boils with indignation when I recall the unheard-of sufferings that I endured in those tombs of the living. The lot of a solitary prisoner awakens compassion, but at least he is not tortured by witnessing the woes of a herd of poor wretches, brutalised and exasperated by privations and misery. Far from exaggerating I would even wish to abate something of the truth in my account of the terrible miseries of the English hulks.

“It took six weeks to reach Portsmouth Roads, and on the morning after our arrival, I was transferred with some others to the hulk Proteus. For the benefit of those who do not know what a hulk is, I may explain that it is an old dismasted vessel, a two or three decker, which is moored fast so as to be almost as immovable as a stone building.

“I passed between rows of soldiers on to the deck, and was brutally thrust into the midst of the wretched, hideous mortals that peopled the hulk. No pen, however powerful, could bring before the reader the sight on which my eyes fell. Imagine a crowd of corpses leaving their graves for a moment—hollow eyes, wan, cadaverous complexions, bent backs, beards neglected, emaciated bodies, scarcely covered with yellow rags, almost in shreds, and you will then have some notion of the scene that I saw.

“Scarcely had I set foot on the deck, when the warders laid hold of me, tore off my clothes with violence, forced me into an icy cold bath, and then dressed me in a shirt, a pair of trousers, and waistcoat of an orange yellow. Not an inch of stuff had been wasted in making these garments; the trousers came to an end half way down my legs, and the waistcoat obstinately refused to button. These garments bore the initials T. O. stamped on them in black; those letters stood for Transport Office. When dressed, I and my companions had our names entered, and then each of us had a post assigned to him.

“The forecastle and the space between it and the quarter-deck were the only parts where the prisoners were allowed to take air and exercise, and not always even there. This space was about 44 feet long by 38 wide. This narrow space was called by the prisoners ‘the park.’ Fore and aft were the English; at one end the lieutenant in command; the officers, their servants and a few soldiers at the other. The part allotted to the prisoners was strongly boarded over, and the planks were thickly studded with broad-headed nails, making them almost as impenetrable as a wall of iron; and at intervals were loopholes, which, in case of an outbreak, would enable the garrison to fire upon us without exposing themselves. The prisoners’ berths were on the lower gun-deck and the orlop-deck, each of which was about 130 feet long by 40 wide. In this space were lodged nearly seven hundred men. The little light which could have reached us through the portholes was obscured by gratings two inches thick, which were inspected daily by our jailers. All round the vessel ran a gallery with open floor, so that, had anyone attempted to hide underneath, he would have been immediately seen by the sentinels, who were always on duty in this gallery. Our guard consisted of about forty or fifty soldiers; about twenty sailors and a few boys were also on board. Sentinels were placed all over the vessel and on the quarter-deck were always eight or ten men ready to take arms at the least noise. At night we heard every quarter of an hour the monotonous cry of the sentinels: ‘All’s well.’