Chapter XVII: Appendix: D

EXTRACTS FROM PARLIAMENTARY REPORT SUPPLEMENT 1801 TO APPENDIX NO. 59, REPORT OF THE TRANSPORT BOARD TO THE HOUSE OF COMMONS 1798, BEING CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE FRENCH GOVERNMENT RELATIVE TO PRISONERS OF WAR

AT a former period of the present War it became necessary in order to vindicate the Character of this Country for good Faith and Humanity, to render publick the Proceedings and Correspondence of the Governments of Great Britain and France with respect to Prisoners of War. The whole was submitted to a Committee of the House of Commons and became the subject of a Report, followed by certain Resolutions unanimously adopted by the House. The following Correspondence may be considered as a Supplement to the Documents which were printed with that Report, and the motives for rendering it publick are the same as on the former occasion.

DOWNING STREET,
6_th January_ 1801.

DOWNING STREET,
15_th December_ 1799.

MY LORDS,

In the absence of Mr. Secretary Dundas, I lost no time in laying before the King your Lordship’s Letter to Him of the 12th Instant inclosing the Communication made to Captain Cotes at Paris, respecting the future maintenance of the English and French Prisoners of War, now detained in respective Countries.

It is the less necessary on this Occasion, to recall the Circumstances which gave rise to the Arrangement under which Two Governments agreed to provide for the wants of their respective subjects during their Detention as they have been submitted to Parliament and published to the World, in Refutation of the false and unwarrantable Assertions brought forward by the French Government on this Subject; but His Majesty cannot witness the Termination of an Arrangement, founded on the fairest principles of Justice and Protection, due by the Powers at War to their respective Prisoners, and proved by Experience to be the best calculated to provide for their Comfort, without protesting against this Departure (on the Part of the French Government) from an Agreement entered into between the Two Countries, and which tended so materially to mitigate the Calamities of War.

To prevent the Effect of this Alteration as much as possible with respect to the British Prisoners not on Parole in this Country, it is His Majesty’s Command that from the Date of the French Agent, ceasing to supply them, the Commissioners of Transports and for taking care of Prisoners of War, should furnish them indiscriminately with the same Rations of Provisions as were granted before the late Arrangement took place.

As no mention is made of Clothing, or other necessaries, in Captain Cotes’ letter, I think it right to add that the Commissioners of Transports and for taking care of Prisoners of War are on no Account to furnish any to the French Prisoners, as this Charge has at all times been supported by the French.

It will be proper that his letter should be communicated to Monsieur Niou the French Agent in London, and to the Agents at the several Depots of Prisoners, in order that the real Grounds of the Change which is about to take place, may not be mistaken or misrepresented.

I am, etc.,
(Signed) PORTLAND.

To the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, &c., &c., &c.

* * * * *

SIR,

Having received Directions from the Consuls of the Republic to inform you of a Measure they have adopted upon an important Deliberation, the Principles and Bearings of which they are perfectly well known to you, I have felt it my duty to address myself directly to you in order to guard against delay.

The Consuls of the Republic having been engaged in an Investigation of its Interests, both at home and abroad, have turned their attention to the mode at present observed by France and England with respect to the Subsistence and Treatment of Prisoners of War in the Hands of these two belligerent Powers.

They have caused all the papers relative to the Adoption of this system to be carefully examined and a report having been made to them in this subject they perceive.

1st. That in your letter to the Lords of the Admiralty of the 6th of October 1797 after having claimed the Admission of Captain Cotes into France and the Exchange or at least the Liberation on Parole of Sir Sidney Smith, you proposed in order to put an end to the Recriminations relative to the Treatment of Prisoners continually renewed on both sides that the Prisoners should be furnished in the Country where they were detained with Clothing, Subsistence, and Medicines at the Expence of the Government to which they belonged.

2ndly. That the said Arrangement took place in consequence of the Communications respecting this Proposal made to M. Charretie the French Commissary by the Commissioners of the Transport Office on the 12th October and the 13th November following in pursuance of the orders of the Lords of the Admiralty.

I shall not revert here, Sir, to the circumstances which preceded this Arrangement, but it is my Duty to declare to you, that the Consuls of the Republic having remarked that it was not founded upon any authentic Stipulation, that the Cartel of Exchange signed nearly Ten Months afterwards took not the least notice of it and that it was an obvious contradiction of all the usages and Laws of War, were of opinion, that on the one Hand, the further execution of it was derogatory both to the Interests and to the Dignity of the Republic, and, on the other that neither the good Faith the Government wishes to manifest on every occasion, nor the peculiar solicitude it owes to its Fellow Citizens, did in any manner call upon it to continue to observe this Arrangement.

Indeed, Sir, you have yourself declared, in your letter of the 6th October 1797 the one of the Motives which led you to wish for this Arrangement, was the Difficulty of judging whether the Complaints of the Prisoners were well or ill founded; that some of these Complaints were dictated by Passion by Prejudice or Animosity, whilst others arose solely from the Difference in their Mode of Living, and in the same Letter you acknowledged that the belligerent Powers in preceding Wars when the Account of Expences incurred for their respective Prisoners came to be adjusted admitted only the sums advanced for their Clothing.

The principal Motives alleged by you, Sir, were therefore the necessity of putting an end to the Complaints of the Prisoners and the Benefit they would derive from being subsisted and treated in a Manner conformable to their former Habits.

These motives were undoubtedly sufficient in support of your Proposal and although you added that War, though giving to the Captors an incontestable right over the Discipline and the Police of their Prisoners does not however impose upon them the Obligation of providing for their Wants you would certainly mean to allude to their secondary Wants only and in Proof of this the English Government, as you have already declared, always understood that it must have provided what was absolutely necessary for the subsistence of the French Prisoners even on the Supposition that none of the Demands contained in your letter had been acceded to. The respect paid by all civilized Nations to the immutable Laws of Humanity and the Empire of those Laws over the English Nation will not allow me to give any other Construction to your statement.

The result of this explanation, Sir, is that the mode adopted since November 1797 for the Subsistence and Treatment of Prisoners of War, had chiefly in view to ameliorate their Condition; the Consuls of the Republic in declining to observe this Mode any longer for the reasons before stated are nevertheless determined to neglect no means in order to ensure the same effect.

They have, in consequence, ordered me to assure you, that from the 1st of Nivose next when all remittances of money from England to France and from France to England for the Subsistence and Treatment of Prisoners of War are to cease your Countrymen in France shall be treated whether in Health or Sickness with every attention due to their Rank and Situation and that with a View to their Food being better adapted to their Mode of Living in their own Country; they shall receive both ashore and in any other Place of Detention the Ration fixed by the Fourth Article of the Cartel of Exchange.

As this Order of things will place France and England with regard to the Prisoners made by each of the Two Powers on the Footing on which they have stood previous to the 25th of November 1797 the Consuls of the French Republic desire that the English Commissary at Paris and the French Commissary at London may not interfere after the first of Nivose next in any Details relative to the Prisoners of War except in the cases specified in the 3rd Article of the Cartel of the 13th September 1798.

They have particularly directed me to assure you that the said Cartel shall be executed with that strict Attention to good Faith, which will characterize all the Acts of the French Consuls and that, if they have felt it their duty under the present Circumstances to re-establish the former System of Management with respect to Prisoners of War, they at the same time, understand that the two belligerent Powers may on the Return of a General Peace bring forward such Claims for Compensation as may then be deemed necessary.

I have the Honour to be, &c.,
(Signed) NIOU.

* * * * *

TRANSPORT OFFICE,
10_th September_ 1800.

SIR,

We inclose for your Information, a copy of a Letter we have this Day received from Captain Woodriff, the Superintendent at Norman Cross Prison, stating the distressed situation to which many of the French Prisoners confined to that place are reduced, from the want of Clothing and by disposing of their Provisions and Bedding.

We are, &c.,
(Signed) RUPERT GEORGE.
AMBROSE SERLE.
W. A. OTWAY.

M. OTTO. {276}

* * * * *

NORMAN CROSS,
9_th September_ 1800.

GENTLEMEN,

Inclosed, I transmit a packet for M. Otto from which you will observe, that notwithstanding all I have done, or can do to prevent the Prisoners from selling their ration of Provisions for Days to come, and their Bedding, it has not had, nor is likely to have the desired effect.

Since the commencement of the Wet weather many of them have been taken to the Hospital in a very weak state, in consequence of having sold their Provisions and Bedding and One or Two have died.

Several of the French Prisoners are without Clothing and having sold their Bedding they are destitute of either, and the present wet weather and the approaching winter will if they be not clothed fill the Hospitals.

I have, Gentlemen, thought it prudent to mention these circumstances to you, as I am firmly of opinion, that unless some clothing is issued to the Prisoners who are now destitute many of them will die should the Winter be severe.

I have the Honour to be, &c.
(Signed) D. WOODRIFF.

Commissioners for the Transport Service.

* * * * *

_Translation_

LONDON
7_th Brumaire_ 9_th Year of the French Republick_ 29_th October_ 1800

_The Commissary of the French Republick in England_, _To the Commissioners of the Transport Office_.

GENTLEMEN,

I have had the honour of making various Representations to you relative to the insufficiency of the Ration allowed by the British Government to the French Prisoners whom the Fortune of War has thrown into its hands. The fatal effects of this Diminution of Food are already but too sensibly felt. I have now before me a list of those who have died and I perceive that the Number is almost Four times greater than that of last year at the same period, for during the course of One month only, the number of deaths has amounted to One Hundred And Ten while they did not exceed twenty during the same month of the preceding year. But this comparison however afflicting it may appear is only the first outline of the Picture, I shall be obliged to lay before you in a few months unless the most effectual means are speedily adopted in order to prevent the consequences which must otherwise result from the wretched situation of the Prisoners. Indeed it is impossible to look at the state of the different depots without being convinced of the fate which infallibly awaits them.

“It would be useless to state the misery endured by the Prisoners here (writes my Correspondent at Norman Cross) many of them hasten by their own Imprudence or Misconduct the Fate which awaits them all, if things remain in the state they now are. Hunger compels them to sell everything they possess and in so doing they only add to their own wretchedness. Many are literally naked. Amongst those who by their Fortitude and good Conduct have avoided these excesses are to be perceived the melancholy and slow, but certain Effects of a ruined constitution, and if an immediate remedy is not applied, a cruel death must soon terminate their sufferings.”

These details, Gentlemen, are accompanied by bitter Reflections which I forbear to repeat. I shall also pass over in Silence the Accounts received from the other Depots which would only be an afflicting repetition of what you have just read. The Ration issued to the Prisoners proved insufficient even during the fine weather. On this Point I appeal to Persons who have seen the Prisons and experience is a sufficient Proof of it. Urged by the most pressing wants, the Prisoners have employed their small Resources in making up the Deficiency of the Ration. Those who were without pecuniary means Sold even their Clothing. They are now naked and enfeebled by Privations of every kind. The keen air of Winter will sharpen the cravings of Hunger and they must soon experience the Severity of cold Weather without possessing the means of defending themselves against it.

Such is the situation of French Prisoners in England. In France, on the contrary, the English, the Russians, and the Austrians, who have fallen into our hands, not only receive a wholesome and plentiful Subsistence, but are clothed at the expense of the Republic and enjoy a Degree of Liberty which the French Prisoners are not allowed in this Country. At every Period of the War, a great Number of Prisoners have had permission to leave the depots to carry on different trades and to earn by the Fruits of their Labour even more than would have provided them with a comfortable support.

Whatever may be the intentions of the British Government with respect to the Frenchmen now groaning in Irons I request, in the name of Humanity, and the sacred Law of Nations that you will lay before that Government this Picture of their Situation. It cannot fail to affect every feeling mind. It has already made an impression upon you, Gentlemen, and you have ordered a great number of Invalids to be sent home. The Agents entrusted with the charge of selecting the Prisoners falling under this description have discharged their duty in the most humane manner and I owe to you as well as to them my grateful Thanks for their Conduct on this Occasion.

I cannot conclude this letter without replying to two Objections which may appear at first sight to palliate the Difference of Treatment experienced by the Prisoners of the Two Nations “The Republic (it has been said) may easily provide for the subsistence of English Prisoners because there are very few in France.” But if the Chance of War has thrown a greater number of Prisoners into the Power of Great Britain the Duties of Humanity ought certainly to plead more forcibly in their favour in proportion as their numbers Increase at the respective Depots. And on the other Hand, ought not the Russians, the Austrians, the Neapolitans and the Bavarians now Prisoners in France to be taken into the account? Their number is at least equal to that of the French confined in England. Are they not subsisted at the expence of the Republic? And do not the Subsidies paid to their respective Sovereigns appear to assimilate them to British Subjects?

I have also been told “That the People here are not better fed than the Prisoners.” If the scarcity of Provisions is so notorious that Government notwithstanding its Solicitude cannot relieve the wants of the people, why should Government unnecessarily increase the Consumption by feeding more than 22,000 individuals? I have already had the Honour of laying before you two Proposals on this subject, namely that of ransoming the Prisoners, or that of sending them back to France on Parole. Either of these alternatives would afford an effectual remedy for the Evil in question; the Plan of Parole has already been adopted with respect to French Fishermen. No complaint of want of punctuality in this Arrangement has hitherto arisen. A measure of the same nature for all the other Prisoners would be held equally sacred, for no Government unquestionably would allow itself to break an Engagement of this description.

If neither of these proposals is acceded to by the British Government, there still remains another resource hitherto solicited in vain by the Prisoners themselves, but which however has never before been denied by any Government, to the Greatest Criminals. The resource of their own Industry. The ingenious but frivolous Articles manufactured by these unfortunate Persons from the Bones which are left of their Rations are admired. What advantage might they not derive from their Industry, if they were allowed to employ it upon Objects of Trade! Labour would beguile the Hours of tedious Captivity and even the Nation at whose expence they are subsisted would be benefited by their exertions.

I have the Honour to be, &c.,
(Signed) OTTO.

* * * * *

SIR,

We have received your Letter of the 29th of last month relative to the present state of the French Prisoners of War in this Country and have agreeably to your Desire, transmitted it to the Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty, for their consideration; but, at the same time, we cannot help observing that the distressed situation which you represent the Prisoners to be in is entirely owing either to their being totally destitute of clothing or to their own Imprudence in disposing of their Provisions by Gaming and not as you assert, to an Insufficiency of the Rations of Provisions issued to them which is fully enough to keep men living without labour, in a general state of good health and certainly affords more subsistence than a great part of the labouring People of this Country is able to procure, a full pound of bread, eight ounces of fresh beef, and above a quart of soup compounded of Vegetables or Pease for each Man per diem.

We reiterated to you in our several letters of the 21st March, 24th of May, 28th of August, 11th of September, and 17th of last month the miserable situation of the Prisoners at all the Depots from the Want of Clothing and the melancholy consequences that were to be expected to ensue if the French Government did not cause them to be supplied with that necessary article previous to the commencement of the cold weather.

In giving you such timely premonition we certainly did all that was incumbent on us to do, or that Humanity dictated, and we have no hesitation in saying that if the French Government had expended a few thousand pounds in providing clothing for their People in this Country in proper time the greater part of the evils of which you now complain would not have existed.

As it is certainly the Duty of every State to provide for the support of its people while in Captivity, so whatever may have been its arrangements with respect to victualling it has been the custom in all former wars between Great Britain and France for each Country to provide Clothing for its own Subjects and agreeably to this Custom all the British Prisoners in France as well as the Russian Prisoners taken in Holland, are now actually supplied with clothing by our Agent Captain Cotes at the expence of this Country although you state as a reason for the French Government not clothing their people here that the British Prisoners in France are clothed at the expence of your Government.

Whatever may latterly have been the effects of the prisoners wanting clothing it cannot be denied, that until very lately, the prisoners at all the depots were generally in as good a state of health as at any former period even when victualled by their own Country. Some indeed had fallen victims to an incurable spirit of Gaming, by sporting away their allowance of Provisions as well as their clothing and the Bedding with which they had been amply supplied by us, but we believe that the number that has suffered has hitherto not been very considerable. In our letter of the 22nd April and 20th of May last we represented to you fully the effects of this pernicuous Practise, which had become so prevalent in the Prisons and we proposed to you a measure which if adopted we doubt not would have greatly tended to put a stop to it, but for what reason we know not, you have not hitherto taken any notice to us of our communications on that subject and from the want of your concurrence the utmost exertions of our Agents in pursuance of our orders for prohibiting Gaming have as yet proved ineffectual. While this practise continues it is evident that if the Ration of the Prisoners were tenfold what it is they would still sport it away, and the circumstance of their now disposing of the Rations issued to them is a proof that it is not on Account of the Insufficiency of those Rations, but merely from the Gambling spirit above mentioned, that they also dispose of their bedding and clothing. Indeed, so far from their being obliged to part with their clothing to purchase provisions it appears even from your own Statement respecting the Prisoners at Liverpool that they actually dispose of a part of their Subsistence to procure clothes.

With respect to your observation of the Prisoners not being permitted to increase their means of Subsistence by Labour which you say “the most severe Administration would not refuse to the greatest criminals” we think it proper to acquaint you that the prisoners at all the depots in this Country are at full liberty to exercise their Industry within the Prisons in manufacturing and selling any articles they may think proper excepting hats which would effect the Revenue in opposition to the Laws; Obscene Toys, and drawings, and articles made either from their clothing or the Prison Stores and by means of this privilege some of them have been known to earn and to carry off upon their release, more than 100 guineas each.

Upon this occasion it has become highly expedient for us once more solemnly to impress upon your mind the necessity of a speedy relief being afforded to your people with respect to the article of Clothing a supply of which would materially if not entirely remove the principal causes of their present distress.

If you or rather your Government delay to furnish this supply whatever evils may ensue and these may justly be apprehended, cannot, after such repeated notices as we have for a long time, given you, be imputed to this Country but to the state which in this instance has so entirely neglected its own people.

We are, etc.,
(Signed) RUPERT GEORGE.
AMBROSE SERLE.
JOHN SCHANK.

M. OTTO.

* * * * *

_Extract from a Report made by Commissioner Serle to the Transport Board dated_ 25_th July_, 1800.

The Prisoners complained of the smallness of the Ration but not of the Quality supplied. They wished for more bread and for beer instead of water. I found however that the ration by their mode of Cookery which is left to themselves is not quite so insufficient and destitute as some of them chose to represent it.

The French are generally great devourers of Bread and therefore what would be a very competent allowance to an Englishman appears a contracted one to them, while the meat which an Englishman would scarcely think enough is to them a reasonable allowance. The Ration of a pound of bread with half a pound of meat Vegetables etc. digested into a Broth or soup yielding seven quarts per diem to every six men affords a support which our labouring poor rarely have at any time, but certainly not during the present scarcity, and which to men living without labour seems enough to maintain them in a general state of good health. And I have been informed by some who are most qualified to know, that the French Prisons had never had so few sick as at the present time. {283} Some indeed who had sported away their allowance in Gambling to prevent which the Agents have taken every precaution in their Power are in fact destitute enough and so they might have been if their Ration had been ten times as great. But this is their own fault entirely and it cannot be expected that if a Prisoner be pleased to throw away his food by vice, that Government must be at the expence of supplying him again. However wherever this has been discovered particularly as it may be in the Article of Bread the whole has been seized by the agent of Officers of the Prison, from the Winners or Purchasers and distributed amongst the Prisoners at large.

Many of the Prisoners have stalls in a kind of Market within the walls in which among other articles they sell Provisions and vegetables and I am told acquire considerable sums of money. This interior market is supplied by another without where there is a free access of the Country People with all sorts of provisions Beer and Produce which they are not allowed to sell but at the fair Market Price so that Destitution is only to be found among those few who have been weak or wicked enough to lose their allowance by Gambling. I am also informed that many Thousand pounds have been already remitted, and that sums of money are now continually remitting from France, by the Friends of the Prisoners for additional comforts in their situation. This affords a considerable supply to many of their requirements.

Their clothing in general for which the French Government has ceased to provide (as well as for the victualling) is getting very bad, and to meet the winter fairly must by some means or other be supplied.

Besides the remittances from France, the Prisoners are allowed to sell any kinds of their own manufactures; Straw Hats (which would interfere with the Revenue) and Articles made from Stores excepted, by which means some have been known to earn and to carry off on their Release more than a Hundred Guineas each. This with an open Market as above mentioned operates much to their advantage and Comfort and they show their satisfaction in the Habits of Cheerfulness peculiar to themselves. The Prisoners have free access to the several Apartments from the opening of the Prison in the morning until they are shut up on the approach of night with the exception only of the times when they are fumigating or cleansing for the preservation of Health. Six Prisoners chosen by the body at large have access to the Cook rooms every morning when the Provisions are brought in that they may witness to their full weight and object to any deficiency.

In case of sickness the patients are immediately removed under the direction of the Medical people, to the Hospital and supplied with the necessary assistance.

Nothing can exceed the cleanliness and decency of the Hospitals.

* * * * *

_Translation_

LONDON
_Brumaire_ 9_th Year of the French Republic_, 4_th November_ 1800

_The Commissary of the French Republic in England_, _to the Commissioners of the Transport Office_.

GENTLEMEN,

I have just received the honour of your letter of the 1st of November in answer to mine of the 29th October. I shall immediately communicate it to my Government.

In making mention of the deplorable situation to which the Prisoners are reduced you appear to think that I have given no answer to the Communications you made to me respecting the very censurable practise of such of them as risk the loss of their Rations in Gambling. I request that you will refer to my letter of the 2nd of May in which you will find the following Paragraph. “I entirely approve of the Punishment you propose to inflict upon those who according to the information you have sent me, deal in Provisions; and I beg that you will communicate to me a list of the Persons guilty of this conduct. It even appears necessary in order that the Punishment may be the more felt, to separate them from their comrades and to collect them in a Depot for this purpose.” I have written to the Secretaries at the different Depots to the above effect, and I Have procured authority from the Minister to treat with the utmost severity those who made a traffic of the Rations of their comrades. I have done in this respect every thing my situation will admit of my doing, but until I shall know, who are the guilty it will be impossible for me to punish them.

I have the honour to be, &c.,
(Signed) OTTO.