Privateers and Privateering

by Edward Phillips Statham

The Pomona, however, was destined to have her career cut short by capture, and then there commenced a series of adventures for Joshua Barney as a prisoner of war. We are not told when or by whom the Pomona was captured; Mr. Maclay, on page 148, says: "In the chapter on 'Navy Officers in Privateers', mention was made of the capture of the armed brig, Pomona, commanded by Captain Isaiah Robinson, who had, as his first officer, Lieutenant Joshua Barney, also of the regular service." There is nothing, however, to be found, in the chapter referred to, about the capture of the Pomona. The final allusion is to her safe arrival in America from Bordeaux, probably in September 1779.

However, it appears that Joshua Barney became a prisoner some time between September 1779 and the autumn of 1780, and was placed in one of the prison-ships. The arrival of Admiral Byron, it is said, brought about a welcome change in the prison administration; some additional ships were ordered for the accommodation of the American officers, and the admiral personally inspected all the prison-ships once a week; while some of the officers who belonged to the regular navy were taken on board the flagship Ardent.

Barney, it appears, was selected for special consideration by Admiral Byron, having a boat placed at his service, and being entrusted with the duty of visiting the prison-ships in which his compatriots were confined and reporting upon their condition to the admiral. The only restriction placed upon his liberty was the obligation to sleep on board the Ardent: he was certainly a most highly favoured prisoner of war.

Upon one occasion, landing in New York in his American naval uniform, to breakfast with one of the admiral's staff, he was seized upon by an infuriated mob, who were proceeding to throw him into a fire which was raging, alleging that he had originated the conflagration. A British officer fortunately intervened and explained the situation.

Upon the advent of Admiral Rodney, however, this pleasant time came to an end; and in November—not December, as in Mr. Maclay's account—1780, Barney, in company with about seventy other American officers, was placed on board the Yarmouth, a 64-gun ship, under the command of Captain Lutwidge, for conveyance to England; and here is Mr. Maclay's description of the treatment they received.

"From the time these Americans stepped aboard the Yarmouth their captors gave it to be understood, by hints and innuendoes, that they were being taken to England to 'be hanged as rebels'; and, indeed, the treatment they received aboard the Yarmouth on the passage over led them to believe that the British officers intended to cheat the gallows of their prey by causing the prisoners to die before reaching port. On coming aboard the ship of the line these officers were stowed away in the lower hold, next to the keel, under five decks, and many feet below the water-line. Here, in a twelve-by-twenty-foot room, with up-curving floor, and only three feet high, the seventy-one men were stowed for fifty-three days like so much merchandise, without light or good air, unable to stand upright, with no means and with no attempt made to remove the accumulating filth! Their food was of the poorest quality, and was supplied in such insufficient quantities that, whenever one of the prisoners died, the survivors concealed the fact until the body began to putrefy, in order that the dead man's allowance might be added to theirs. The water served them to drink was so thick with repulsive matter that the prisoners were compelled to strain it between compressed teeth.

"From the time the Yarmouth left New York till she reached Plymouth, in a most tempestuous winter's passage, these men were kept in this loathsome dungeon. Eleven died in delirium, their wild ravings and piercing shrieks appalling their comrades, and giving them a foretaste of what they themselves might soon expect. Not even a surgeon was permitted to visit them. Arriving at Plymouth the pale, emaciated, festering men were ordered to come on deck. Not one obeyed, for they were unable to stand upright. Consequently they were hoisted up, the ceremony being grimly suggestive of the manner in which they had been treated—like merchandise. And what were they to do, now that they had been placed on deck? The light of the sun, which they had scarcely seen for fifty-three days, fell upon their weak, dilated pupils with blinding force, their limbs unable to uphold them, their frames wasted by disease and want. Seeking for support, they fell in a helpless mass, one upon the other, waiting and almost hoping for the blow that was to fall upon them next. Captain Silas Talbot was one of these prisoners.

"To send them ashore in this condition was 'impracticable,' so the British officers said, and we readily discover that this 'impracticable' served the further purpose of diverting the just indignation of the landsfolk, which surely would be aroused if they saw such brutality practised under St. George's cross. Waiting, then, until the captives could at least endure the light of day, and could walk without leaning on one another or clutching at every object for support, the officers had them moved to old Mill Prison."

This is a terrible picture of the treatment of American prisoners of war, in striking contrast to the generous conduct of Vice-Admiral the Hon. John Byron—to give him his correct title—towards Barney and his fellow-prisoners. If it is to be accepted as absolutely true, it should make Englishmen blush to read it, constituting a shameful record against us, as represented by Captain Lutwidge and his subordinates.

But is it absolutely true? This question is suggested, in the first instance, by the utter wildness of the writer's chronology with regard to the pleasing episode in connection with Admiral Byron; for it was during Joshua Barney's first period of imprisonment that he came in contact with Byron, in the year 1778. It could not have been after the capture of the Pomona, as Byron was in the West Indies in the summer of 1779, in pursuit of the French Admiral D'Estaing, and returned thence to England, arriving on October 10th in that year—he was not employed again. Moreover, during the time of Barney's second imprisonment, at New York, there was no Ardent on the Navy List: she was captured by the French on August 17th, 1779—while Barney was on his homeward voyage in the Pomona—and recaptured in April 1782.