In December the cold increased, and the prisoners suffered acutely. Captain Cotgrave, the governor and superintendent, ordered the prisoners to turn out every morning at the hour of nine and stand in the yard till the guards counted them. This generally took more than an hour. Many prisoners were without stockings and some without shoes and many without jackets. They cut up their blankets to wrap up their feet and legs that they might be able to endure the cold snow while they were attending this ceremony. Complaints were numerous and this practice was denounced as much too severe for the prisoners but the superintendent pleaded his orders which as agent he was bound to obey. Yet there were painful incidents which should have touched the heart of any feeling man who saw them. Several of these naked men, chilled and benumbed with cold, and generally half-starved, fell down lifeless before him and in the presence of the guards and turnkeys. It was a cruelty exceeding murder to expose naked helpless creatures to perish in the pitiless blast of this bleak mountain side. “We remonstrated,” continues Andrews, “with the infamous author but all our applications and remonstrances were in vain; the wretch was inexorable; his feelings had become callous by continuing so long among the sufferings of the French prisoners. After these men had fallen down in the yard they were taken up and carried to the hospital and with some difficulty restored to life again; they were then immediately sent back to prison, there to lie on the stone floor without bed or covering.
“The name of Isaac Cotgrave, agent at Dartmoor, of cruel memory, will ever be engraven in odious characters on the minds of every American who witnessed his unparalleled cruelty.”
Presently the iron sceptre was wrested from his hand and placed beyond his reach. The new agent, Captain Thomas G. Shortland, at this time, December, 1812, superseded Cotgrave. Shortland was a man whose feelings had not yet grown callous, and at his first arrival he was shocked at the scenes of misery which presented themselves in every shape. Touched with compassion he could not continue the cruel practice of counting over the prisoners every morning in the yard. He countermanded the order which his predecessor pretended he was obliged to enforce, and he declared to the prisoners that he would do all in his power to procure them better treatment from his government.
The year 1814 began with as cold weather as was ever experienced in the city of New York. The buckets in the prison containing ten or twelve quarts froze in the short space of four hours to a solid mass, and the prisoners must have inevitably frozen were not the hammocks placed so near together as to communicate the animal heat from one man to another. The running stream that supplied the prison was set hard and the weather was said to be colder than it had been for fifty years before. The water was all frozen and the prisoners obliged to eat snow for drink. The guards were driven to abandon their posts on the walls and retire to the guard house; not one sentry was on duty except inside the barracks. At midnight eight prisoners, thinking to take advantage of the night to make their escape as no sentries were in sight, formed a ladder and with it ascended and descended the first wall directly against the guard house; in ascending the second the soldiers in the guard house discovered them and prevented seven; the eighth got over the wall and got away. Those recaptured were at once carried to the black-hole, the first destination of all who tried and failed to escape. The weather was bitterly cold; still despite their sufferings they were passed on to the inner dungeon and lay there for ten days and nights on the straw; worse threatened, and for the whole of the inhabitants of Dartmoor communication with Plymouth was interrupted and supplies promised to run short. Everyone was put on half or two-thirds allowance. Salt rations, a reserve of which was always kept in stock, were issued to garrison and prisoners alike and the total, it was estimated, would not last for more than ten days for the large population shut in, amounting to nine thousand French and American prison troops, and numbering fifteen hundred with officers, doctors and turnkeys besides.
The situation mended when the labours of many hands with spades and snowplough broke through the deep snowdrifts, and sledges with provisions arrived. The Americans were also gladdened by the receipt of a letter from their agent announcing an increase of their money allowance, intended to pay for coffee and sugar as rations on the salt fish days. This was to have been distributed in kind but it was thought the cash,—three and a half pence per head, would be preferred, and the money was therefore sent, sevenpence per man per week, and was very heartily appreciated; and the total allowance was increased to six and eightpence on the understanding that this was to continue being paid monthly.
“As it was natural to expect,” continues Andrews, “this payment produced great spirits and animation among the prisoners and was as welcome as a thousand pounds when we were free and had plenty.” With this money the prisoners purchased many necessary little articles of clothing such as shirts, shoes, trousers, etc., which could be bought very cheap of the French who always kept a store of second-hand clothing which was supplied by the officers.
The weather then became fine—for the place—and the prisoners’ health began to improve. They were quite comfortable when their condition was compared to the distress of the cold winter they had just passed through. Their little salary seemed to command some respect from the turnkeys, soldiers, officers and subalterns who were themselves as poor and meagre as Hamlet’s apothecary. It brought them many indulgences, such as full liberty of the markets, which had before been proscribed, when they had been compelled to purchase of the French at the gratings. This was a great benefit to them, for they could trade with the country people much cheaper. To regulate the rations they were also allowed to appoint a committee of two to attend at the store house to see that the director gave good weight in those articles allowed by the Board.
This year of 1814 saw the end of the French war and the release of the French prisoners from Dartmoor. “The Americans still detained,” says another authority, “were dispersed through the prisons, thus obtaining more space and liberty. They immediately set to work upon a plan for their escape which the French had never dreamed of attempting.[8] It was found that a passage two hundred and fifty feet long would carry them from three of the prisons to the road beyond the wall. Upon this they set to work in each building, digging by night in alternate parties, and carrying the earth from the passages into the stream that ran through their yard. About sixty feet of ground had been got through in this manner, when the proceedings in one of the prisons were discovered and stopped. After some delay the work was continued in the others until the passages were within forty feet of the road without the wall. Every man was then provided with a dagger, made by the prisoners who worked as blacksmiths; and they proposed on escaping to make at once for Torbay. But at this point, one of the prisoners, who perhaps had some discreet doubt as to the result of the enterprise, walked out in open day before all then in the yard—went up to the turnkeys, and marching off with them to the keeper’s house, gave him information of all the operation and designs—and we never saw him after. Quite as well, perhaps, for the informer.”
The confirmation of the treaty of Ghent was confidently expected to set free the Americans. There was still, however, much delay in the arrangements for the final release; and considerable excitement was the result. They hung Beasley, the American agent, in effigy; and a few days later a very serious disturbance took place at the prisons, owing to some mismanagement in distributing the bread allowances. They broke open the first three gates, drove the sentries to the guard-house, and were only checked by the soldiers of the garrison, who advanced upon them with fixed bayonets. Not a blow, however, was struck; but the alarm was great and the governor brought additional strength from the troops at Plymouth. On the evening of that day it was found that an attempt had been made to pierce the wall between the prisoners’ yards and an adjoining court, in which were kept the arms of the guard who were off duty. As soon as this discovery was made, it was thought proper to place an additional force on the wall commanding the courts, and to ring the alarm bell, as a signal of disturbance. Unfortunately the prisoners, who seemed to have had no intention of creating a disturbance, crowded to the first gate; the iron chain by which it was fastened was broken, and as many as were able pressed into the market square. It was naturally inferred that they were on the point of a desperate attempt at escape; and the governor, after some time vainly endeavouring to induce the prisoners to return to their yards, at last ordered the guard to charge them back. This they did; but the Americans still refused to enter their prisons, insulting the soldiers, daring them to fire, and at last pelting them with large stones. Whether any command to fire was given is uncertain; but it then commenced, and was without doubt continued and renewed without orders, in spite of the governor’s attempts to stop it. At first, the muskets were fired over the heads of the prisoners, who raised a cry of “blank cartridges” and continued their attack on the guard. It is not to be wondered at that the soldiers lost their temper. Seven of the prisoners were killed, and sixty more or less dangerously wounded.
The jury who attended the inquest returned a verdict of justifiable homicide; and both the American and English commissioners who conducted the subsequent inquiry found it impossible to do more than express their sorrow at the whole affair.