Forgery was a prominent Dartmoor industry. Bank of England notes were forged to some extent, but local banks such as Grant, Burbey and Co. of Portsmouth, Harris, Langholme, and Harris of Plymouth, the Plymouth Commercial Bank, the Tamar Bank, the Launceston and Totnes Bank, were largely victimized. To such an extent were these frauds carried out that it was ordered that an official should attend at the prison market to write his name on all notes offered by prisoners in payment for goods received.
It was no doubt with reference to the local knowledge of soldiers on guard being valuable to intending escapes from the prison that the authorities refused the application of the 1st Devon Militia to be on guard at Dartmoor, as there were ‘several strong objections to the men of that regiment being employed’.
There were distinct grades among the Dartmoor prisoners. First came ‘Les Lords’—‘broke parole’ officers, and people with money. Next came ‘Les Laboureurs’, the clever, industrious men who not only lived comfortably by the sale of the articles they manufactured, but saved money so that some of them left the prison at the Declaration of Peace financially very much better off than when they came. These were the ‘respectable prisoners’. After the labourers came the ‘Indifférents’—loafers and idlers, but not mischief-makers or harm-workers; the ‘Misérables’, mischievous rascals for ever plotting and planning; and finally, the most famous of all, the ‘Romans’, so called because they existed in the cock-loft, the ‘Capitole’, of one of the barracks. These men, almost entirely privateersmen, the scum and sweepings of sea-port towns, or land rascals with nothing to lose and all to gain in this world, formed a veritable power in the prison. Gamblers to a man, they were mostly naked, and held so faithfully to the theory of Communism, that when it was necessary that someone should descend from the cock-loft eyrie in order to beg, borrow, or, what was more usual, to steal food or rags, the one pair of breeches was lent to him for the occasion. The only hammock among them belonged to the ‘General’ or, to be more correct, was his temporarily, for not even in Hayti were generals made and unmade with such dispatch. The sleeping arrangement was that, mention of which has already been made, known as the ‘spoon’ system, by which the naked men lay so close together for warmth that the turn-over of the ranks had to be made at certain intervals by word of command. Catel tells an excellent story of the ‘Romans’. These gentry held a parade on one of the anniversaries, and were drawn up in order when a fine plump rat appeared on the airing ground—a new arrival, clearly, or he would have kept carefully away. This was too much for half-famished men; the ranks were instantly broken and the chase began. As luck would have it, the rat ran into the garrison kitchens, where the day’s rations were being prepared, and in a very few minutes the pots and pans were cleared of their contents. Soldiers were at once hurried to the scene, but being few in number they were actually overpowered and disarmed by the ‘Romans’, who marched them to the Governor’s house. Here the ‘General’, with a profound salute, spoke as follows:
‘Sir, we have come here to deliver over to you our prisoners and their arms. It is a happy little occurrence this, as regards your soldiers, quiet now as sheep. We beg, you, therefore, to grant them as reward double rations, and to make up the loss we have caused in the provisions of our honoured visitors.’
Catel adds that the rat was caught and eaten raw!
Gradually, their violence and their thieving propensities made them a terror to the other prisoners; the Americans, in particular, objected to their filthy habits, and at length their conduct became so intolerable that they were marched off to the Plymouth hulks, on which they were kept until the Peace of 1814.
It is an interesting fact that when an epidemic swept the prisons and carried off the decent and cleanly by hundreds, the impregnable dirt-armour of the ‘Romans’ kept them unscathed. This epidemic was the terrible visitation of malignant measles which from November 1809 to April 1810 inclusive, claimed about 400 victims out of 5,000 prisoners. The burial-ground was in the present gas-house field; the mortuary, where the bodies were collected for burial, was near the present General Hospital. No funeral rites were observed, and not more than a foot of earth heaped over the bodies.
Catel also relates a very clever and humorous escape. Theatricals were largely patronized at Dartmoor, as in the other prisons. A piece entitled Le Capitaine Calonne et sa dame was written in eulogy of a certain British garrison officer and his lady, and, being shown to them in manuscript, so flattered and delighted them, that, in order that the piece should not lack local colour at the opening performance, the Captain offered to lend a British suit of regimentals, and his lady to provide a complete toilette, for the occasion.
These, of course, were gladly accepted. The theatre was crowded, and the new piece was most successful, until the opening of the third act, when the manager stepped forward, and, amidst whistles and catcalls, said: ‘Messieurs, the play is finished. The English Captain and his lady are out of the prison.’ This was true. During the second act the prisoner-Captain and his lady quietly passed out of the prison, being saluted by guards and sentries, and got away to Tavistock. Catel relates with gusto the adventure of the real captain and his wife with the said guards and sentinels, who swore that they had left the prison some time before.
The delight of the prisoners can be pictured, and especially when it was rumoured two days later that the real Captain received his uniform, and his lady her dress, in a box with a polite letter of thanks from the escaped prisoners.