Mr. Sweetman continues:
‘In February 1812, a company of infantry and a troop of cavalry arrived at the South Gate, one morning at roll-call time. Before the roll had been completed the troop entered the town and surrounded the captives. The infantry followed, and those who had not presented themselves at roll-call were sent for. So sudden had been the call, that although many had wished for years to leave, they were unprepared when the time came. At 4 o’clock those who were ready departed; some had not even breakfasted, and no one was allowed to have any communication with them. They were marched to Mere, where they passed the night in the church. Early next morning, those who were left behind, after having bestowed their goods (for many of them had furnished their own houses), followed their brethren, and, joining them at Mere, were marched to Kelso. Deep was the regret of many of the inhabitants at losing so many to whom they had become endeared by ties of interest and affection. A great gap was made in the life of the town which it took years to fill.’
Seventeen burials are recorded in the Wincanton registers from the end of July 1806 to the end of May 1811.
Prominent prisoners at Wincanton were M. de Tocqueville, Rear-Admiral de Wailly-Duchemin, and Rochambeau, whom Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, in his story The Westcotes, the scene of which he lays at ‘Axcester’—i.e. Wincanton—paints as quite an admirable old soldier. It was the above-named rear-admiral who, dying at Wincanton, lay in state in the panelled ‘Orange Room’ of The Dogs. This is now the residence of Dr. Edwards, who kindly allowed me to inspect the paintings on the panels of this and the adjoining room, which were executed by French officers quartered here, and represent castles and landscapes, and a caricature of Wellington, whose head is garnished with donkey’s ears.
The ‘Orange Room’ is so called from the tradition that Dutch William slept here on his way from Torbay to London to assume the British crown.
Later on a hundred and fifty of the French officers captured at Trafalgar and in Sir Richard Strachan’s subsequent action, were quartered here, and are described as ‘very orderly, and inoffensive to the inhabitants’.
The suicide mentioned above was that of an officer belonging to a highly respectable family in France, who, not having heard from home for a long time, became so depressed that he went into a field near his lodgings, placed the muzzle of a musket in his mouth, and pushed the trigger with his foot. The coroner’s jury returned a verdict of ‘Lunacy’.
I have said that the frequency of escapes among the prisoners was one of the causes of their removal from Wincanton. The Commissary, Mr. George Messiter, in November 1811 asked the Government to break up the Dépôt, as, on account of the regularly organized system established between the prisoners and the smugglers and fishermen of the Dorsetshire coast, it was impossible to prevent escapes. Towards the close of 1811 no fewer than twenty-two French prisoners got away from Wincanton. The Commissary’s request was at once answered, and the Salisbury Journal of December 9, 1811, thus mentions the removal:
‘On Saturday last upwards of 150 French prisoners lately on their parole at Wincanton were marched by way of Mere through this city under an escort of the Wilts Militia and a party of Light Dragoons, on their way to Gosport, there to be embarked with about 50 superior officers for some place in Scotland. Since Culliford, the leader of the gang of smugglers and fishermen who aided in these escapes, was convicted and only sentenced to six months’ imprisonment, they have become more and more daring in their violations of the law.’