The Depot for Prisoners of War at Norman Cross, Huntingdonshire. 1796 to 1816

by Thomas Walker

A note in the register of the soldiers received at Norman Cross states that with certain chasseurs français who arrived at the prison on 9th September 1809, arrived two women and a child. How they were disposed of between that date and 24th December of the same year, when they were discharged to France, is not recorded. One of the women got only as far as Lynn on her way home, and in the following March returned to Norman Cross; her further adventures are not recorded.

The numbers of those on parole varied greatly in the course of the war. In the year 1796, in which the building of Norman Cross was commenced, the number was 1,200; on 30th April 1810, out of a total of 44,583 prisoners, 2,710; and on 11th June 1811, out of 49,132 prisoners, 3,193. The number on parole would greatly increase as more prisoners passed into the country. The Duke of Wellington, in one of his despatches dated 23rd December 1812, summarising the result of the campaign in Spain, mentions that “In the months which have elapsed since January, this army has sent to England little short of 20,000 prisoners.” Of these many came to Norman Cross. The number continued to increase until the total in Britain reached 67,000, that being the number returned to France after the Treaty of Paris was signed on 30th May 1814.

The prisoners on parole were widely distributed in various towns, many of them distant from any large depot. [192] Agents were appointed in each place to look after and pay the prisoners who lodged either in the town itself or in the neighbouring villages. Of the 1,200 on parole in 1797, 100 were in Peterborough and its neighbourhood, and the agent who accepted the responsibility of looking after them, paying them and mustering them at stated intervals when they had to report themselves to him, was Mr. Thomas Squire, a merchant and banker living in the Bridge House, in whose field, on the river bank, the second batch of prisoners consigned to Norman Cross in April 1797 landed from the barges which had brought them from Lynn. The only parole register relating to Peterborough which the author could find in the Record Office is a volume dating from 1795 to 1800, and refers mainly to the Dutch. In this volume there are entered, between 10th November 1797 and 3rd July 1800, the names of 100 Dutch prisoners on parole at Peterborough. The first French were the captain, four lieutenants, the purser, surgeon, and first pilot of La Jalouse, in June 1797.

No corresponding record has been found as to the disposal of those who arrived at Norman Cross in the second period of the war, 1803–15, and who by their rank or social status were entitled to parole. It is probable that on the officer who received them at the port where they landed, devolved the duty of selecting the parole prisoners and sending them direct to the towns where they were to be interned when the general body of prisoners went to Norman Cross.

From the general register of the prisoners at Norman Cross between 1803 and 1810 we can, however, gather a few notes which sufficiently indicate that the custom was not to allocate them in the immediate neighbourhood, but at more distant depots for parole prisoners. Thus we find that Jean Casquar, a boatswain’s mate, was sent to Tiverton; Antoine Sivié, a passenger, to Leek; Pierre Kervain, a servant on parole, to Ashbourne; Eustache, a black, to Ashbourne; Jean C. Le Prince, a clerk, to Montgomery; Captain Nicholas Lanceraux to Lichfield; Jean Maistey, second mate on a privateer, with three passengers taken in the same ship, to Leek. Then a more complicated transaction is shown: Louis Feyssier, a passenger on parole at Leek, was sent to Norman Cross, it being noted that he had not previously been there; he was probably sent for imprisonment, as a punishment for breach of his parole at Leek.

Another transaction helps us to learn what was going on at home in the long years of this terrible war, when only high polities and the military and naval events beyond our bounds were occupying the pens of historical writers. Captain A. Strazynski escaped with a midshipman from Ashbourne in September 1810. The pair of them were retaken at Chesterfield, whence they were sent to the Norman Cross Prison, where they arrived on 10th December of the same year. Again, Ensign Louis Pineau escaped from Greenlaw. He made his way south, until he was retaken and lodged in Northampton Gaol, whence he was sent to Norman Cross.

These are almost all the notes bearing on the question of the parole prisoners which occur in the register.

As has been already mentioned, these registers are very incomplete, and the notes and remarks are few and far between, but there is one long note dealing with the practice of one prisoner assuming the name of another. This was sometimes done with the object of establishing a man’s right to have the privileges of parole. One instance noted is that of a man entered as Mathuren Nazarean, his real name being Pierre Dussage; the assumed name was that of the first lieutenant of the Alerte, who was left ill at Lisbon. Dussage hoped to pass himself off as the lieutenant, and thus to be allowed out on parole.

No record has been found of the precise distribution in the town and the surrounding villages of the 100 prisoners registered as on parole in Peterborough. On 25th November 1797 the whole of the prisoners on parole in England were ordered, without any distinction of rank whatever, to be imprisoned at Norman Cross. For the sick and the baggage, covered conveyances were provided. The others of all ranks marched to the Depot, some of them hundreds of miles. This step was taken in part fulfilment of the threat already referred to in Chapter V., which had been held out against the French as a means of compelling them to clothe their own countrymen in the English prisons, and to withdraw their opposition to certain proposals of the English Government as to the terms of Exchange, and especially as to the restoration of Captain Sir Sydney Smith, whose liberation no expostulations of the Government could obtain.

In the later plans of the Depot is seen one block in the south-east quadrangle fenced off for the officers’ prison. It was probably in this block, or in No. 13 in the north-eastern quadrangle, that Jean de la Porte executed his wonderful straw marquetry pictures. At what date the order for the reincarceration of the officers was cancelled has not been ascertained, but it is certain that their close confinement was not of long duration, and that the privileges of parole were soon restored. This was, however, not the only occasion when such an order was issued, and when the prisoners on parole were placed in close confinement. Parole was very frequently broken by the French officers, and a considerable number were successful in making their escape. Those who failed to do so or were recaptured were severely treated. In extreme cases, such as repeated breaking of parole, officers were sent to the hulks. A cadet of the Utrecht, Dutch man-of-war, who broke his parole at Tenterden, when recaptured was sent to the hulks at Chatham. Unless there had been some gross misconduct, this punishment cannot fail to be regarded by some as unduly harsh. On the other hand, it must not be forgotten that the full term was parole d’honneur. The word of honour of an officer was assumed to be of a specially binding character; the poor, ignorant soldier or sailor was not trusted, the officer was, because his “word of honour” was deemed binding. In addition, the officer signed a document corresponding to the following parole paper, which was the form used for a prisoner restored on parole to France. This constituted a legal document.