Another trick which the authorities characterized as ‘an unjustifiable means of gaining liberty’, was to bribe an invalid on the roster for France to be allowed to personate him. Poor officers were as glad to sell their chance in this way, as were poor prisoners on hulks or in prisons.
In 1811 some officers at Lichfield obtained their release because of ‘their humane conduct at the late fire at Mr. Lee’s house’. But so many applications for release on account of similar services at fires came in that the Transport Office was suspicious, and refused them, ‘especially as the French Government does not reward British officers for similar services.’
In the same year one Andoit got sent to Andover on parole in the name of another man, whom no doubt he impersonated, although he had no right to be paroled, and at once made use of the opportunity and escaped.
Most touching were some of the letters from paroled officers praying to have their places of parole changed, but when the Transport Office found out that these changes were almost invariably made so that old comrades and friends could meet together to plan and arrange escapes, rejection became the invariable fate of them. For some time many French officers on parole had been permitted to add to their incomes by giving lessons in dancing, drawing, fencing, and singing in English families, and for these purposes had special permits to go beyond the usual one mile limit. But when in 1811, M. Faure applied to go some distance out of Redruth to teach French, and M. Ulliac asked to be allowed to exceed limits at Ashby-de-la-Zouch to teach drawing, the authorities refused, and this despite the backing up of these requests by local gentry, giving as their reason: ‘If complied with generally the prisoners would become dispersed over all parts of the country without any regular control over their conduct.’ Prisoners were not even allowed to give lessons away from their lodgings out of parole hours.
Very rarely, except in the cases of officers of more than ordinarily distinguished position, were relaxations of parole rules permitted. General Pillet at Bishop’s Waltham in 1808, had leave to go two miles beyond the usual one mile limit two or three times a week, ‘to take the air.’ General Pageot at Ashbourne was given eight days’ leave to visit Wooton Lodge in 1804, with the result related elsewhere (p. [414]).
In 1808 General Brenier, on parole at Wantage, was allowed 3s. a day ‘on account of the wound in his thigh’, so unusual a concession as to cause the Transport Office to describe it as ‘the greatest rate of allowance granted to any prisoner of war in this country under any circumstances’. Later, however, some prisoners at Bath were made the same allowance.
At first sight it seems harsh on the part of the Transport Office to refuse permission for a prisoner at Welshpool to lodge with the postmistress of that place, but without doubt it had excellent reason to think that for purposes of escape as well as for carrying on an unsuspected correspondence, the post-office would be the very place for a prisoner to live at. Again, the forgery of documents was very extensively carried on by the prisoners, and in 1803 the parole agents were advised:
‘With respect to admitting prisoners of war at Parole we beg to observe that we think it proper to adhere to a regulation which from frequent abuses we found it absolutely necessary to adopt last war; namely, that no blank form of parole certificates be sent to the agents at the depots, but to transmit them to the Agents, properly filled up whenever their ranks shall have been ascertained at this office, from lists sent by the agents and from extracts from the Rôle d’Équipage of each vessel captured.’
Of course, the reason for this was that blank parole forms had been obtained by bribery, had been filled up, and that all sorts of undesirable and dangerous rascals got scattered among the parole places.
So long back as 1763 a complaint came from Dover that the Duc de Nivernois was in the habit of issuing passes to prisoners of war on parole in England to pass over to Calais and Boulogne as ordinary civilians, and further inquiry brought out the fact that he was not the only owner of a noble name who trafficked in documents which, if they do not come under the category of forgeries, were at any rate false.