In ship and prison

by William P. Chipman

“They may forget, too, that I am five years older now than when I first left the Saint George,” I added, “and so are looking for a younger person.”

“Possibly,” he acknowledged, “though I think the official record of your death does more to prevent the recognition than all else. But whatever the reason for this failure to identify in the lieutenant the runaway midshipman, let us be thankful for it. It will doubtless save us many anxious moments in the days that are to come.”

We were forty-eight hours in the Hind, and then she arrived at Charlottetown, where we were transferred to the garrison and put under the care of the commandant, General William Patterson, who was also the governor of the colony.

Within the walls of the fort there was a huge log building used as a prison, and in this we were confined. For some reason never known to us, our officers were now separated from our crew, the latter being put in the large room with the other prisoners, while we were given a small room directly back of the office of the prison overseer. It may be the authorities thought we would be safer where the superintendent could keep his eye on us.

Our confinement was irksome, but nothing like what I had experienced in the Halifax prison a few years before. We had a clean room, there was plenty of fresh air, good water, and wholesome, though coarse food, and there was no disease. As the hot months came on, however, the tediousness of our confinement grew upon us. We became restless, and one day the Captain put into words what for some time had been in the thoughts of us all:

“We can’t stand this much longer, lads. We must find a way to get out of here, and back to our homes. If we are ever to do it, this is the time. When the cold weather comes on everything will be against the attempt.”

From that day we talked of nothing else, planned for nothing else.

It was the Captain who finally hit upon a scheme which we hoped would succeed. Our room was in the south-west corner of the prison, the west side of the apartment forming a part of the rear of the building. This we knew could not be far from the west wall of the fort, but as there was no window on that side we could not tell exactly how far.

With a knife allowed us for cutting our food the Captain one day made a small aperture between the logs which had been hewed so smoothly as to fit tightly together. Placing his eye to this, he made his own estimation of the distance to the wall, and then had each of us in turn make his estimate. Comparing notes, we found we did not differ two feet in our opinions of the distance—ten feet being the longest amount guessed by any of us.

“Very well,” commented our leader, “we will now allow five feet for the thickness of the wall, an ample allowance. That will make fifteen feet from here to the outside—not a long distance, surely, and one the six of us here ought to be able to tunnel in two or three weeks.”