The Three Lieutenants

by William Henry Giles Kingston

“We reached Carthagena in the afternoon, and brought up before the town. As soon as the anchor was dropped, the commodore went on shore to communicate with the government, and to learn what he was to do with his prisoners; some time before nightfall he came back, and he gave orders that we were all to be landed forthwith and marched up to the common gaol; so I made this out from what the fat officer said to the young gentlemen.

“No one was allowed to speak to the colonel, not even his own daughter; as soon as she found that her father was to be taken on shore, she begged to accompany him, and the midshipmen said they would go too. Of course I went with them.

“The brig and schooners in the meantime had run higher up the harbour. The boats were at once manned, the fat officer, who was, I have a notion, the first lieutenant of the corvette, took charge of the young lady and us. She begged so hard that the colonel might come in the same boat, that our friend, who wasn’t a bad sort of chap after all, said he would speak to the commodore: he pressed the point, and the colonel was placed in our boat. He didn’t speak much; in truth, I suspect he had but little to say that was likely to comfort his daughter, while he knew that the officer was listening all the time. She asked him in a trembling voice if he thought that his life was in danger, and said that she would go and plead for him with General Carmona, who commanded the troops in the city.

“‘On no account,’ answered the colonel, ‘it would be useless, and you would only be exposing yourself to insult.’

“Speaking very low, so that he could not be overheard, he told her to get one of the midshipmen to escape if possible to the British Consul, as he would be better able than any one else to help him.

“As soon as we landed we were marched up together to the prison, the young lady being compelled to walk with the midshipmen and me alongside her; the colonel and skippers followed, and then came the crew, while the people rushed out of their houses and gathered in the streets to stare at us, some shouting and abusing us, and calling us pirates and all sorts of names in their lingo. I didn’t care what they said, but walked along with my head upright, looking on every side as if I was there for my own pleasure.

“The prison was a dirty tumbled-down-looking sort of a place, and says I, ‘I hope they are not going to put the young lady in there;’ but they were, though they allowed her a room to herself, with one close to it for the midshipmen and me. I was allowed to be with them, because they said I was their attendant and that they required my services, though not exactly as the Spaniard fancied. The colonel, though they saw he was a thorough gentleman, was thrust in with the skippers and the crew into a low dirty room paved with stone, with stout iron bars to the small windows. There were already a score or more of rough-looking ruffians in it; this we saw as we passed by before we were taken to our own room in an upper story. As many as could get to the windows, which looked out into the street, hung out old caps or baskets at the end of sticks, to receive money or food which the people outside might give them. The window of our room was strongly barred, and so was that of Miss O’Regan; but there was a door between the two, which we found we could open, and so she and the young gentlemen were able to consult what to do. The furniture of our room hadn’t much to boast of. Our beds were only heaps of straw, with bits of sacking on the top; there was no table, and only some rough benches to sit on. Miss O’Regan was very little better off. She had a sort of bed and chair, and a heap of straw for Polly; but after a time the gaoler’s wife, I suppose she was, brought her a basin of water and a few other things; but that was all the Spaniards’ boasted politeness made them think of providing her. She tried to interest the old woman to see if anything could be done for the colonel; but the dame said that it was as much as her place was worth to interfere, and she couldn’t say a word to give the young lady any hope that he would be better treated.

“When it was light we made an examination of the bars in the windows to see if we could by any means get through them. Those in our room were too strongly fixed to be moved in a hurry, though we might have done it in time. Miss O’Regan found one in hers which was looser than the rest, and Mr Rogers and I on examining it discovered that it was so eaten away with rust, that by hauling at it together we might wrench it out. What we wanted was to get free, and to go and find the British consul. The window looked into a yard surrounded by a high wall; but what was behind we couldn’t tell. The bar once out we could, we thought, lower ourselves into the yard; the wall we might easily scale, as it was full of big holes worn by time, and it would not cost us much to climb over it.

“‘I have a file in my knife,’ said Mr Gordon; ‘it’s a small one, but if we use it carefully it will cut through the bar in time.’

“The lower part of the bar we found was almost eaten away with rust. We agreed that the first thing was to scrape it clear of the rust with the blades of our knives and let the file do the rest. We were afraid, however, to begin till all in the prison was quiet. We could hear the warders walking about and talking loudly, and one now and then passed our door, so that we could not tell if one was going to look in on us or not. At last a fellow came bringing a jug of water and a bowl of greasy rice with some bits of meat in it, and a loaf of brown bread; he made us understand that it was for us.