We will not follow Mr. Graydon now to Long Island. It was then late in January, 1777. The survivors of the American prisoners were, many of them, exchanged for healthy British soldiers. The crime had been committed, one of the blackest which stains the annals of English history. By the most accurate computation at least two thousand helpless American prisoners had been slowly starved, frozen, or poisoned to death in the churches and other prisons in New York.

No excuse for this monstrous crime can be found, even by those who are anxiously in search of an adequate one.

We have endeavored to give some faint idea of the horrors of that hopeless captivity. As we have already said scarcely any one who endured imprisonment for any length of time in the churches lived to tell the tale. One of these churches was standing not many years ago, and the marks of bayonet thrusts might plainly be seen upon its pillars. What terrible deeds were enacted there we can only conjecture. Weknow that two thousand, healthy, high-spirited young men, many of them sons of gentlemen, and all patriotic, brave, and long enduring, even unto death, were foully murdered in these places of torment, compared to which ordinary captivity is described by one who endured it as paradise. We know, we say, that these young men perished awfully, rather than enlist in the British army; that posterity has almost forgotten them, and that their dreadful sufferings ought to be remembered wherever American history is read.

We have already said that it is impossible now to obtain the names of all who suffered death at the hands of their inhuman jailors during the fall and winter of 1776-7. But we have taken Captain Abraham Shepherd's company of riflemen as a sample of the prisoners, and are able, thanks to the pay roll now in our care, to indicate the fate of each man upon the list.

It is a mistake to say that no prisoners deserted to the British. After the account we have quoted from Ethan Allen's book we feel sure that no one can find the heart to blame the poor starving creatures who endeavored to preserve their remains of life in this manner.

Henry Bedinger gives the names of seven men of this company who deserted. They are Thomas Knox, a corporal; William Anderson, Richard Neal, George Taylor, Moses McComesky, Anthony Blackhead and Anthony Larkin. Thomas Knox did not join the British forces until the 17th of January, 1777; William Anderson on the 20th of January, 1777. Richard Neal left the American army on the tenth of August, 1776. He, therefore, was not with the regiment at Fort Washington. George Taylor deserted on the 9th of July, 1776, which was nine days after he enlisted. Moses McComesky did not desert until the 14th of June, 1777. Anthony Blackhead deserted November 15th, 1776, the day before the battle was fought; Anthony Larkin, September 15th, 1776. We cannot tell what became of any of these men. Those who died of the prisoners are no less than fifty-two in this one company of seventy-nine privates and non-commissioned officers. This may and probably does include a few who lived to be exchanged. The date of death of each man is given, but not the place in which he died.

A very singular fact about this record is that no less thanseventeen of the prisoners of this company died on the same day, which was the fifteenth of February, 1777. Why this was so we cannot tell. We can only leave the cause of their death to the imagination of our readers. Whether they were poisoned by wholesale; whether they were murdered in attempting to escape; whether the night being extraordinarily severe, they froze to death; whether they were butchered by British bayonets, we are totally unable to tell. The record gives their names and the date of death and says that all seventeen were prisoners. That is all.

The names of these men are Jacob Wine, William Waller, Peter Snyder, Conrad Rush, David Harmon, William Moredock, William Wilson, James Wilson, Thomas Beatty, Samuel Davis, John Cassody, Peter Good, John Nixon, Christopher Peninger, Benjamin McKnight, John McSwaine, James Griffith, and Patrick Murphy.

Two or three others are mentioned as dying the day after. Is it possible that these men were on board one of the prison ships which was set on fire? If so we have been able to discover no account of such a disaster on that date.

Many of the papers of Major Henry Bedinger were destroyed. It is possible that he may have left some clue to the fate of these men, but if so it is probably not now in existence. But among the letters and memoranda written by him which have been submitted to us for inspection, is a list, written on a scrap of paper, of the men that he recruited for Captain Shepherd's Company in the summer of 1776. This paper gives the names of the men and the date on which each one died in prison. It is as follows:

Dennis Bush, Fourth Sergeant. (He was taken prisoner at Fort Washington, but lived to be exchanged, and was paid up to October 1st, 1778, at the end of the term for which the company enlisted.)

Conrad Cabbage, Prisoner, Died, Jan. 7th, 1777.
John Cummins, Prisoner, Died, Jan. 27th, 1777.
Gabriel Stevens, Prisoner, Died, March 1st, 1777.
William Donally, Prisoner, Died, Jan. 10th, 1777.
David Gilmer, Prisoner, Died, Jan. 26th, 1777.
John Cassady, Prisoner, Died, Feb. 15th, 1777.
Samuel Brown, Prisoner, Died, Feb. 26th, 1777.
Peter Good, Prisoner, Died, Feb. 13th, 1777.
William Boyle, Prisoner, Died, Feb. 25th, 1777.
John Nixon, Prisoner, Died, Feb. 18th, 1777.
Anthony Blackhead, deserted, Nov. 15th, 1776.
William Case, Prisoner, Died, March 15th, 1777.
Caspar Myres, Prisoner, Died, Feb. 16th, 1777.
William Seaman, Prisoner, Died, July 8th, 1777.
Isaac Price, Prisoner, Died, Feb. 5th, 1777.
Samuel Davis, Prisoner, Died, Feb. 15th, 1777.

William Seaman was the son of Jonah Seaman, living near Darkesville. Isaac Price was an orphan, living with James' Campbell's father. Samuel Davis came from near Charlestown.

Henry Bedinger.

This is all, but it is eloquent with what it does not say. All but two of this list of seventeen young, vigorous riflemen died in prison or from the effects of confinement. One, alone had sufficient vitality to endure until the 8th of July, 1777. Perhaps he was more to be pitied than his comrades.

We now begin to understand how it happened that, out of more than 2,600 privates taken prisoner at Fort Washington, 1,900 were dead in the space of two months and four days, when the exchange of some of the survivors took place. Surely this is a lasting disgrace to one of the greatest nations of the world. If, as seems undoubtedly true, more men perished in prison than on the battle fields of the Revolution, it is difficult to see why so little is made of this fact in the many histories of that struggle that have been written. We find that the accounts of British prisons are usually dismissed in a few words, sometimes in an appendix, or a casual note. But history was ever written thus. Great victories are elaborately described; and all the pomp and circumstance of war is set down for our pleasure and instruction. But it is due to the grand solemn muse of history, who carries the torch of truth, that the other side, the horrors of war, should be as faithfully delineated. Wars will not cease until the lessons of their cruelty, their barbarity, and the dark trail of suffering they leave behind them are deeply impressed upon the mind. It is our painful task to go over the picture, putting in the shadows as we see them, however gloomy may be the effect.

In the winter of 1761 a boy was born in a German settlement near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, the third son of Henry Bedinger and his wife, whose maiden name was Magdalene von Schlegel. These Germans, whom we have already mentioned, moved, in 1762, to the neighborhood of the little hamlet, then called Mecklenburg, Berkeley County, Virginia. Afterwards the name of the town was changed to Shepherdstown, in honor of its chief proprietor, Thomas Shepherd.

Daniel was a boy of fourteen when the first company of riflemen was raised at Shepherdstown by the gallant young officer, Captain Hugh Stephenson, in 1775.

The rendezvous of this company was the spring on his mother's farm, then called Bedinger's Spring, where the clear water gushes out of a great rock at the foot of an ancient oak. The son of Daniel Bedinger, Hon. Henry Bedinger, Minister to the Court of Denmark in 1853, left a short account of his father's early history, which we will quote in this place. He says: "When the war of the Revolution commenced my father's eldest brother Henry was about twenty-two years of age. His next brother, Michael, about nineteen, and he himself only in his fifteenth year. Upon the first news of hostilities his two brothers joined a volunteer company under the command of Captain Hugh Stephenson, and set off immediately to join the army at Cambridge.

"My father himself was extremely anxious to accompany them, but they and his mother, who was a widow, forbade his doing so, telling him he was entirely too young, and that he must stay at home and take care of his younger brothers and sisters. And he was thus very reluctantly compelled to remain at home. At the expiration of about twelve months his brothers returned home, and when the time for their second departure had arrived, the wonderful tales they had narrated of their life in camp had wrought so upon my father's youthful and ardent imagination that he besought them and his mother with tears in his eyes, to suffer him to accompany them. But they, regarding his youth, would not give their consent, but took their departure without him.

"However, the second night after their arrival in camp (which was at Bergen, New Jersey), they were astonished by the arrival of my father, he having run off from home and followed them all the way on foot, and now appeared before them, haggard and weary and half starved by the lengths of his march. * * * My father was taken prisoner at the battle of Fort Washington, and the privations and cruel treatment which he then underwent gave a blow to his constitution from which he never recovered. After the close of the Revolution he returned home with a constitution much shattered. * * *"

Many years after the Revolution Dr. Draper, who died in Madison, Wisconsin, and left his valuable manuscripts to the Historical Society of that State, interviewed an old veteran of the war, in Kentucky. This venerable relic of the Revolution was Major George Michael Bedinger, a brother of Daniel. Dr. Draper took down from his lips a short account of the battle of Fort Washington, where his two brothers were captured. Major G. M. Bedinger was not in service at that time, but must have received the account from one or both of his brothers. Dr. Draper says: "In the action of Fort Washington Henry Bedinger heard a Hessian captain, having been repulsed, speak to his riflemen in his own language, telling them to follow his example and reserve their fire until they were close. Bedinger, recognizing his mother tongue, watched the approach of the Hessian officer, and each levelled his unerring rifle at the other. Both fired, Bedinger was wounded in the finger: the ball passing, cut off a lock of his hair. The Hessian was shot through the head, and instantly expired. Captain Bedinger's young brother Daniel, in his company, then but a little past fifteen, shot twenty-seven rounds, and was often heard to say, after discharging his piece, 'There! take that, you ----!'

"His youthful intrepidity, and gallant conduct, so particularly attracted the attention of the officers, that, though taken prisoner, he was promoted to an ensigncy, his commission dating back six months that he might take precedence of the other ensigns of his company.

"These two brothers remained prisoners, the youngest but a few months, and the elder nearly four years, both on prison ships, with the most cruel treatment, in filthy holds, impure atmosphere, and stinted allowance of food. With such treatment it was no wonder that but eight hundred out of the 2800 prisoners taken at Fort Washington survived.

"During the captivity of his brother Henry, Major Bedinger would by labor, loans at different times, and the property sold which he inherited from his father, procure money to convey to the British Commissary of Prisoners to pay his brother Henry's board. Then he was released from the filthy prison ship, limited on his parole of honor to certain limits at Flatbush, and decently provisioned and better treated, and it is pleasant to add that the British officers having charge of these matters were faithful in the proper application of funds thus placed in their hands. Major Bedinger made many trips on this labor of fraternal affection. This, with his attention to his mother and family, kept him from regularly serving in the army. But he, never the less, would make short tours of service."

So far we have quoted Dr. Draper's recollections of an interview with George Michael Bedinger in his extreme old age. We have already given Henry Bedinger's own acount of his captivity. What we know of Daniel's far severer treatment we will give in our own words.

It was four days before the privates taken at Fort Washington had one morsel to eat. They were then given a little mouldy biscuit and raw pork. They were marched to New York, and Daniel was lodged with many others, perhaps with the whole company, in the Old Sugar House on Liberty Street. Here he very nearly died of exposure and starvation. There was no glass in the windows and scarce one of the prisoners was properly clothed. When it snowed they were drifted over as they slept.

One day Daniel discovered in some vats a deposit of sugar which he was glad to scrape to sustain life. A gentleman, confined with him in the Old Sugar House, used to tell his descendants that the most terrible fight he ever engaged in was a struggle with a comrade in prison for the carcass of a decayed rat.

It is possible that Henry Bedinger, an officer on parole in New York, may have found some means of communicating with his young brother, and even of supplying him, sometimes, with food. Daniel, however, was soon put on board a prison ship, probably the Whitby, in New York harbor.

Before the first exchange was effected the poor boy had yielded to despair, and had turned his face to the wall, to die. How bitterly he must have regretted the home he had been so ready to leave a few months before! And now the iron had eaten into his soul, and he longed for death, as the only means of release from his terrible sufferings.

Daniel's father was born in Alsace, and he himself had been brought up in a family where German was the familiar language of the household. It seems that, in some way, probably by using his mother tongue, he had touched the heart of one of the Hessian guards. When the officers in charge went among the prisoners, selecting those who were to be exchanged, they twice passed the poor boy as too far gone to be moved. But he, with a sudden revival of hope and the desire to live, begged and entreated the Hessian so pitifully not to leave him behind, that that young man, who is said to have been an officer, declared that he would be responsible for him, had him lifted and laid down in the bottom of a boat, as he was too feeble to sit or stand. In this condition he accompanied the other prisoners to a church in New York where the exchange was effected. One or more of the American surgeons accompanied the prisoners. In some way Daniel was conveyed to Philadelphia, where he completely collapsed, and was taken to one of the military hospitals.

Here, about the first of January, 1777, his devoted brother, George Michael Bedinger, found him. Major Bedinger's son, Dr. B. F. Bedinger, wrote an account of the meeting of these two brothers for Mrs. H. B. Lee, one of Daniel's daughters, which tells the rest of the story. He said:

"My father went to the hospital in search of his brother, but did not recognize him. On inquiry if there were any (that had been) prisoners there a feeble voice responded, from a little pile of straw and rags in a corner, 'Yes, Michael, there is one.'

"Overcome by his feelings my father knelt by the side of the poor emaciated boy, and took him in his arms. He then bore him to a house where he could procure some comforts in the way of food and clothing. After this he got an armchair, two pillows, and some leather straps.

"He placed his suffering and beloved charge in the chair, supported him by the pillows, swung him by the leather straps to his back, and carried him some miles into the country, where he found a friendly asylum for him in the house of some good Quakers. There he nursed him, and by the aid of the kind owners, who were farmers, gave him nourishing food, until he partially recovered strength.

"But your father was very impatient to get home, and wished to proceed before he was well able to walk, and did so leave, while my father walked by his side, with his arm around him to support him. Thus they travelled from the neighborhood of Philadelphia, to Shepherdstown (Virginia) of course by short stages, when my father restored him safe to his mother and family.

"Your father related some of the incidents of that trip to me when I last saw him at Bedford (his home) in the spring of 1817, not more than one year before his death. Our uncle, Henry Bedinger, was also a prisoner for a long time, and although he suffered greatly his suffering was not to be compared to your father's.

"After your father recovered his health he again entered the service and continued in it to the end of the war. He was made Lieutenant, and I have heard my father speak of many battles he was in, but I have forgotten the names and places."*

* Letter of Dr B. F. Bedinger to Mrs H. B. Lee, written in 1871.

After Daniel Bedinger returned home he had a relapse, and lay, for a long time, at the point of death. He, however, recovered, and re-entered the service, where the first duty assigned him was that of acting as one of the guards over the prisoners near Winchester. He afterwards fought with Morgan in the southern campaigns, was in the battle of the Cowpens, and several other engagements, serving until the army was disbanded. He was a Knight of the Order of the Cincinnati. His grandson, the Rev. Henry Bedinger, has the original parchment signed by General Washington, in his possession. This grandson is now the chaplain of the Virginia branch of the Society.

In 1791 Daniel Bedinger married Miss Sarah Rutherford, a daughter of Hon. Robert Rutherford, of Flowing Springs, in what is now Jefferson County, West Virginia, but was then part of Berkeley County, Virginia.

Lieutenant Bedinger lived in Norfolk for many years. He was first engaged in the Custom House in that city. In 1802 he accepted the position of navy agent of the Gosport Navy Yard. He died in 1818 at his home near Shepherdstown, of a malady which troubled him ever after his confinement as a prisoner in New York. He hated the British with a bitter hatred, which is not to be wondered at. He was an ardent supporter of Thomas Jefferson, and wrote much for the periodicals of the time. Withal he was a scholarly gentleman, and a warm and generous friend. He built a beautiful residence on the site of his mother's old home near Sheperdstown; where, when he died in 1818, he left a large family of children, and a wide circle of friends and admirers.

What we have been able to glean from the periodicals of the day about the state of the prisons in New York during the years 1776 and 1777 we will condense into one short chapter.

We will also give an abstract taken from a note book written by General Jeremiah Johnson, who as a boy, lived near Wallabout Bay during the Revolution and who thus describes one of the first prison ships used by the British at New York. He says: "The subject of the naval prisoners, and of the British prisons-ships, stationed at the Wallabout during the Revolution, is one which cannot be passed by in silence. From printed journals, published in New York at the close of the war, it appeared that 11,500 American prisoners had died on board the prison ships. Although this number is very great, yet if the numbers who perished had been less, the Commissary of Naval Prisoners, David Sproat, Esq., and his Deputy, had it in their power, by an official Return, to give the true number taken, exchanged, escaped, anddead. Such a Return has never appeared in the United States.

"David Sproat returned to America after the war, and resided in Philadelphia, where he died.* The Commissary could not have been ignorant of the statement published here on this interesting subject. We may, therefore, infer that about that number, 11,500, perished in the Prison ships.

* This is, we believe, a mistake. Another account says he died at Kirkcudbright, Scotland, in 1792.

"A large transport called the Whitby, was the first prison ship anchored in the Wallabout. She was moored near Remsen's Mill about the 20th of October, 1776, and was then crowded with prisoners. Many landsmen were prisoners on board this vessel: she was said to be the most sickly of all the prison ships. Bad provisions, bad water, and scanted rations were dealt to the prisoners. No medical men attended the sick. Disease reigned unrelieved, and hundreds died from pestilence, or were starved on board this floating Prison. I saw the sand beach, between a ravine in the hill and Mr. Remsen's dock, become filled with graves in the course of two months: and before the first of May, 1777, the ravine alluded to was itself occupied in the same way.

"In the month of May, 1777, two large ships were anchored in the Wallabout, when the prisoners were transferred from the Whitby to them. These vessels were also very sickly from the causes before stated. Although many prisoners were sent on board of them, and none exchanged, death made room for all.

"On a Sunday afternoon about the middle of October, 1777, one of these prison ships was burnt. The prisoners, except a few, who, it was said, were burnt in the vessel, were removed to the remaining ship. It was reported at the time, that the prisoners had fired their prison, which, if true, proves that they preferred death, even by fire, to the lingering sufferings of pestilence and starvation. In the month of February, 1778, the remaining prison ship was burnt, when the prisoners were removed from her to the ships then wintering in the Wallabout."

One of the first notices we have in the newspapers of the day of American prisoners is to the following effect: "London, August 5th, 1775. As every rebel, who is taken prisoner, has incurred the pain of death by the law martial, it is said that Government will charter several transports, after their arrival at Boston to carry the culprits to the East Indies for the Company's service. As it is the intention of Government only to punish the ringleaders and commanders capitally, and to suffer the inferior Rebels to redeem their lives by entering into the East India Company's service. This translation will only render them more useful subjects than in their native country."

This notice, copied from London papers, appeared in Holt'sNew York Journal, for October 19th, 1775. It proved to be no idle threat. How many of our brave soldiers were sent to languish out their lives in the British possessions in India, and on the coast of Africa, we have no means of knowing. Few, indeed, ever saw their homes again, but we will give, in a future chapter, the narrative of one who escaped from captivity worse than death on the island of Sumatra.

An account of the mobbing of William Cunningham and John Hill is given in both the Tory and Whig papers of the day. It occurred in March, 1775. "William Cunningham and John Hill were mobbed by 200 men in New York, dragged through the green, Cunningham was robbed of his watch and the clothes torn off his back, etc., for being a Tory, and having made himself obnoxious to the Americans. He has often been heard blustering in behalf of the ministry, and his behavior has recommended him to the favor of several men of eminence, both in the military and civil departments. He has often been seen, on a footing of familiarity, at their houses, and parading the streets on a horse belonging to one of the gentlemen, etc., etc."

TheVirginia Gazette in its issue for the first of July, 1775, says: "On June 6th, 1775, the prisoners taken at Lexington were exchanged. The wounded privates were soon sent on board the Levity. * * * At about three a signal was made by the Levity that they were ready to deliver up our prisoners, upon which General Putnam and Major Moncrief went to the ferry, where they received nine prisoners. The regular officers expressed themselves as highly pleased, those who had been prisoners politely acknowledged the genteel kindness they had received from their captors; the privates, who were all wounded men, expressed in the strongest terms their grateful sense of the tenderness which had been shown them in their miserable situation; some of them could do it only by their tears. It would have been to the honor of the British arms if the prisoners taken from us could with justice have made the same acknowledgement. It cannot be supposed that any officers of rank or common humanity were knowing to the repeated cruel insults that were offered them; but it may not be amiss to hint to the upstarts concerned, two truths of which they appear to be wholly ignorant, viz: That compassion is as essential a part of the character of a truly brave man as daring, and that insult offered to the person completely in the power of the insulters smells as strong of cowardice as it does of cruelty."*

* The first American prisoners were taken on the 17th of June, 1775. These were thrown indiscriminately into the jail at Boston without any consideration of their rank. General Washington wrote to General Gage on this subject, to which the latter replied by asserting that the prisoners had been treated with care and kindness, though indiscriminately, as he acknowledged no rank that was not derived from the King. General Carleton during his command conducted towards the American prisoners with a degree of humanity that reflected the greatest honor on his character." From Ramsay's "History of the American Revolution"

At the battle of the Great Bridge "the Virginia militia showed the greatest humanity and tenderness to the wounded prisoners. Several of them ran through a hot fire to lift up and bring in some that were bleeding, and whom they feared would die if not speedily assisted by the surgeon. The prisoners had been told by Lord Dunmore that the Americans would scalp them, and they cried out, 'For God's sake do not murder us!' One of them who was unable to walk calling out in this manner to one of our men, was answered by him: 'Put your arm about my neck and I'll show you what I intend to do.' Then taking him, with his arm over his neck, he walked slowly along, bearing him with great tenderness to the breastwork."Pennsylvania Evening Post, January 6th, 1776.

The Great Bridge was built over the southern branch of the Elizabeth River, twelve miles above Norfolk. Colonel William Woodford commanded the Virginia militia on this occasion.

"The scene closed with as much humanity as it had been conducted with bravery. The work of death being over, every one's attention was directed to the succor of the unhappy sufferers, and it is an undoubted fact that Captain Leslie was so affected with the tenderness of our troops towards those who were yet capable of assistance that he gave signs from the fort of his thankfulness for it."Pennsylvania Evening Post, Jan. 6th, 1776.

The first mention we can find of a British prison ship is in theNew York Packet for the 11th of April, 1776: "Captain Hammond * * * Ordered Captain Forrester, his prisoner, who was on board the Roebuck, up to the prison ship at Norfolk in a pilot boat."

The Constitutional Gazette for the 19th of April, 1776, has this announcement, and though it does not bear directly on the subject of prisoners, it describes a set of men who were most active in taking them, and were considered by the Americans as more cruel and vindictive than even the British themselves.

"Government have sent over to Germany to engage 1,000 men called Jagers, people brought up to the use of the rifle barrel guns in boar-hunting. They are amazingly expert. Every petty prince who hath forests keeps a number of them, and they are allowed to take apprentices, by which means they are a numerous body of people. These men are intended to act in the next campaign in America, and our ministry plume themselves much in the thought of their being a complete match for the American riflemen."

From Gaine'sMercury, a notorious Tory paper published in New York during the British occupancy, we take the following: "November 25th, 1776. There are now 5,000 prisoners in town, many of them half naked. Congress deserts the poor wretches,--have sent them neither provisions nor clothing, nor paid attention to their distress nor that of their families. Their situation must have been doubly deplorable, but for the humanity of the King's officers. Every possible attention has been given, considering their great numbers and necessary confinement, to alleviate their distress arising from guilt, sickness, and poverty."

This needs no comment. It is too unspeakably false to be worth contradicting.

"New London, Conn., November 8th, 1776. Yesterday arrived E. Thomas, who was captured September 1st, carried to New York, and put on board the Chatham. He escaped Wednesday sennight."

"New London, Nov. 20th, 1776. American officers, prisoners on parole, are walking about the streets of New York, but soldiers are closely confined, have but half allowance, are sickly, and die fast."

"New London, Nov. 29th, 1776. A cartel arrived here for exchange of seamen only. Prisoners had miserable confinement on board of store ships and transports, where they suffered for want of the common necessaries of life."

"Exact from a letter written on board the Whitby Prison Ship. New York, Dec. 9th, 1776. Our present situation is most wretched; more than 250 prisoners, some sick and without the least assistance from physician, drug, or medicine, and fed on two-thirds allowance of salt provisions, and crowded promiscuously together without regard, to color, person or office, in the small room of a ship's between decks, allowed to walk the main deck only between sunrise and sunset. Only two at a time allowed to come on deck to do what nature requires, and sometimes denied even that, and use tubs and buckets between decks, to the great offence of every delicate, cleanly person, and prejudice of all our healths. Lord Howe has liberated all in the merchant service, but refuses to exchange those taken in arms but for like prisoners." (This is an extract from the Trumbull Papers.)

From a Connecticut paper: "This may inform those who have friends in New York, prisoners of war, that Major Wells, a prisoner, has come thence to Connecticut on parole, to collect money for the much distressed officers and soldiers there, and desires the money may be left at Landlord Betts, Norwalk; Captain Benjamin's, Stratford; Landlord Beers, New Haven; Hezekiah Wylly's, Hartford; and at said Well's, Colchester, with proper accounts from whom received, and to whom to be delivered. N. B. The letters must not be sealed, or contain anything of a political nature." Conn. Papers, Dec. 6th, 1776.

"Conn.Gazette, Feb. 8th, 1777. William Gamble deposes that the prisoners were huddled together with negroes, had weak grog; no swab to clean the ship; bad oil; raw pork; seamen refused them water; called them d----d rebels; the dead not buried, etc."

"Lieut. Wm. Sterrett, taken August 27, 1776, deposes that his clothing was stolen, that he was abused by the soldiers; stinted in food; etc., those who had slight wounds were allowed to perish from neglect. The recruiting officers seduced the prisoners to enlist, etc."

"March 7th, 1777. Forty-six prisoners from the Glasgow, transport ship, were landed in New Haven, where one of them, Captain Craigie, died and was buried." (Their names are published in the ConnecticutCourant.)

ConnecticutGazette of April 30th, 1777, says: "The Connecticut Assembly sent to New York a sufficient supply of tow shirts and trousers for her prisoners, also L35 to Col. Ethan Allen, by his brother Levi."

"Lt. Thos. Fanning, now on parole from Long Island at Norwich, a prisoner to General Howe, will be at Hartford on his return to New York about September 8th, whence he proposes to keep the public road to King's Bridge. Letters and money left at the most noted public houses in the different towns, will be conveyed safe to the prisoners. Extraordinaries excepted." ConnecticutGazette, Aug. 15th, 1777.

"Jan. 8th, '77. A flag of truce vessel arrived at Milford after a tedious passage of eleven days, from New York, having above 200 prisoners, whose rueful countenances too well discovered the ill treatment they received in New York. Twenty died on the passage, and twenty since they landed." New Haven, Conn.

We will now quote from the Trumbull Papers and other productions, what is revealed to the public of the state of the prisoners in New York in 1776 and 1777. Some of our information we have obtained from a book published in 1866 called "Documents and Letters Intended to Illustrate the Revolutionary Incidents of Long Island, by Henry Onderdonk, Jr." He gives an affecting account of the wounding of General Woodhull, after his surrender, and when he had given up his sword. The British ruffians who held him insisted that he should cry, "God save the King!" whereupon, taking off his hat, he replied, reverently, "God save all of us!" At this the cruel men ran him through, giving him wounds that proved mortal, though had they been properly dressed his life might have been spared. He was mounted behind a trooper and carried to Hinchman's Tavern, Jamaica, where permission was refused to Dr. Ogden to dress his wounds. This was on the 28th of August, 1776. Next day he was taken westward and put on board an old vessel off New Utrecht. This had been a cattle ship. He was next removed to the house of Wilhelmus Van Brunt at New Utrecht. His arm mortified from neglect and it was decided to take it off. He sent express to his wife that he had no hope of recovery, and begged her to gather up what provisions she could, for he had a large farm, and hasten to his bedside. She accordingly loaded a wagon with bread, ham, crackers, butter, etc., and barely reached her husband in time to see him alive. With his dying breath he requested her to distribute the provisions she had brought to the suffering and starving American prisoners.

Elias Baylis, who was old and blind, was chairman of the Jamaica Committee of Safety. He was captured and first imprisoned in the church at New Utrecht. Afterwards he was sent to the provost prison in New York. He had a very sweet voice, and was an earnest Christian. In the prison he used to console himself and his companions in misery by singing hymns and psalms. Through the intervention of his friends, his release was obtained after two months confinement, but the rigor of prison life had been too much for his feeble frame. He died, in the arms of his daughter, as he was in a boat crossing the ferry to his home.

While in the Presbyterian church in New Utrecht used as a prison by the British, he had for companions, Daniel Duryee, William Furman, William Creed, and two others, all put into one pew. Baylis asked them to get the Bible out of the pulpit and read it to him. They feared to do this, but consented to lead the blind man to the pulpit steps. As he returned with the Bible in his hands a British guard met him, beat him violently and took away the book. They were three weeks in the church at New Utrecht. When a sufficient number of Whig prisoners were collected there they would be marched under guard to a prison ship. One old Whig named Smith, while being conducted to his destination, appealed to an onlooker, a Tory of his acquaintance, to intercede for him. The cold reply of his neighbor was, "Ah, John, you've been a great rebel!" Smith turned to another of his acquaintances named McEvers, and said to him, "McEvers, its hard for an old man like me to have to go to a prison! Can't you do something for me?"

"What have you been doing, John?"

"Why, I've had opinions of my own!"

"Well, I'll see what I can do for you."

McEvers then went to see the officers in charge and made such representations to them that Smith was immediately released.

Adrian Onderdonk was taken to Flushing and shut up in the old Friends' Meeting House there, which is one of the oldest places of worship in America. Next day he was taken to New York. He, with other prisoners, was paraded through the streets to the provost, with a gang of loose women marching before them, to add insult to suffering.

Onderdonk says: "After awhile the rigor of the prison rules was somewhat abated." He was allowed to write home, which he did in Dutch, for provisions, such as smoked beef, butter, etc. * * * His friends procured a woman to do his washing, prepare food and bring it to him. * * * One day as he was walking through the rooms followed by his constant attendant, a negro with coils of rope around his neck, this man asked Onderdonk what he was imprisoned for.

"'I've been a Committee man,'" said he.

"'Well,' with an oath and a great deal of abuse, 'You shall be hung tomorrow.'"

This mulatto was named Richmond, and was the common hangman. He used to parade the provost with coils of ropes, requesting the prisoners to choose their own halters. He it was who hung the gallant Nathan Hale, and was Cunningham's accessory in all his brutal midnight murders. In Gaine's paper for August 4th, 1781, appears the following advertisement: "One Guinea Reward, ran away a black man named Richmond, being the common hangman, formerly the property of the rebel Colonel Patterson of Pa.

"Wm. Cunningham."

After nearly four weeks imprisonment the friends of Adrian Onderdonk procured his release. He was brought home in a wagon in the night, so pale, thin, and feeble from bodily suffering that his family scarcely recognized him. His constitution was shattered and he never recovered his former strength.

Onderdonk says that women often brought food for the prisoners in little baskets, which, after examination, were handed in. Now and then the guard might intercept what was sent, or Cunningham, if the humor took him, as he passed through the hall, might kick over vessels of soup, placed there by the charitable for the poor and friendless prisoners.

"The wounded prisoners taken at the battle of Brooklyn were put in the churches of Flatbush and New Utrecht, but being neglected and unattended were wallowing in their own filth, and breathed an infected and impure air. Ten days after the battle Dr. Richard Bailey was appointed to superintend the sick. He was humane, and dressed the wounded daily; got a sack bed, sheet, and blanket for each prisoner; and distributed the prisoners into the adjacent barns. When Mrs. Woodhull offered to pay Dr. Bailey for his care and attention to her husband, he said he had done no more than his duty, and if there was anything due it was to me."

Woodhull's wounds were neglected nine days before Dr. Bailey was allowed to attend them.

How long the churches were used as prisons cannot be ascertained, but we have no account of prisoners confined in any of them after the year 1777. In the North Dutch Church in New York there were, at one time, eight hundred prisoners huddled together. It was in this church that bayonet marks were discernible on its pillars, many years after the war.

The provost and old City Hall were used as prisons until Evacuation Day, when O'Keefe threw his ponderous bunch of keys on the floor and retired. The prisoners are said to have asked him where they were to go.

"To hell, for what I care," he replied.

"In the Middle Dutch Church," says Mr. John Pintard, who was a nephew of Commissary Pintard, "the prisoners taken on Long Island and at Fort Washington, sick, wounded, and well, were all indiscriminately huddled together, by hundreds and thousands, large numbers of whom died by disease, and many undoubtedly poisoned by inhuman attendants for the sake of their watches, or silver buckles."

"What was called the Brick Church was at first used as a prison, but soon it and the Presbyterian Church in Wall Street, the Scotch Church in Cedar Street, and the Friends' Meeting House were converted into hospitals."

Oliver Woodruff, who died at the age of ninety, was taken prisoner at Fort Washington, and left the following record: "We were marched to New York and went into different prisons. Eight hundred and sixteen went into the New Bridewell (between the City Hall and Broadway); some into the Sugar House; others into the Dutch Church. On Thursday morning they brought us a little provision, which was the first morsel we got to eat or drink after eating our breakfast on Saturday morning. * * * I was there (in New Bridewell) three months. In the dungeons of the old City Hall which stood on the site of what was afterwards the Custom House at first civil offenders were confined, but afterwards whale-boatmen and robbers."

Robert Troup, a young lieutenant in Colonel Lasher's battalion, testified that he and Lieut. Edward Dunscomb, Adjutant Hoogland, and two volunteers were made prisoners by a detachment of British troops at three o'clock a m. on the 27th of August, 1776. They were carried before the generals and interrogated, with threats of hanging. Thence they were led to a house near Flatbush. At 9 a. m. they were led, in the rear of the army, to Bedford. Eighteen officers captured that morning were confined in a small soldier's tent for two nights and nearly three days. It was raining nearly all the time. Sixty privates, also, had but one tent, while at Bedford the provost marshal, Cunningham, brought with him a negro with a halter, telling them the negro had already hung several, and he imagined he would hang some more. The negro and Cunningham also heaped abuse upon the prisoners, showing them the halter, and calling them rebels, scoundrels, robbers, murderers, etc.

From Bedford they were led to Flatbush, and confined a week in a house belonging to a Mr. Leffert, on short allowance of biscuit and salt pork. Several Hessians took pity on them and gave them apples, and once some fresh beef.

From Flatbush after a week, he, with seventy or eighty other officers, were put on board a snow, lying between Gravesend and the Hook, without bedding or blankets; afflicted with vermin; soap and fresh water for washing purposes being denied them. They drank and cooked with filthy water brought from England. The captain charged a very large commission for purchasing necessaries for them with the money they procured from their friends.

After six weeks spent on the snow they were taken on the 17th of October to New York and confined in a house near Bridewell. At first they were not allowed any fuel, and afterwards only a little coal for three days in the week. Provisions were dealt out very negligently, were scanty, and of bad quality. Many were ill and most of them would have died had their wants not been supplied by poor people and loose women of the town, who took pity on them.

"Shortly after the capture of Fort Washington these officers were paroled and allowed the freedom of the town. Nearly half the prisoners taken on Long Island died. The privates were treated with great inhumanity, without fuel, or the common necessaries of life, and were obliged to obey the calls of nature in places of their confinement." It is said that the British did not hang any of the prisoners taken in August on Long Island, but "played the fool by making them ride with a rope around their necks, seated on coffins, to the gallows. Major Otho Williams was so treated."

"Adolph Myer, late of Colonel Lasher's battalion, says he was taken by the British at Montresor's Island. They threatened twice to hang him, and had a rope fixed to a tree. He was led to General Howe's quarters near Turtle Bay, who ordered him to be bound hand and foot. He was confined four days on bread and water, in the 'condemned hole' of the New Jail, without straw or bedding. He was next put into the College, and then into the New Dutch Church, whence he escaped on the twenty-fourth of January, 1777. He was treated with great inhumanity, and would have died had he not been supported by his friends. * * * Many prisoners died from want, and others were reduced to such wretchedness as to attract the attention of the loose women of the town, from whom they received considerable assistance. No care was taken of the sick, and if any died they were thrown at the door of the prison and lay there until the next day, when they were put in a cart and drawn out to the intrenchments beyond the Jews' burial ground, when they were interred by their fellow prisoners, conducted thither for that purpose. The dead were thrown into a hole promiscuously, without the usual rites of sepulchre. Myer was frequently enticed to enlist." This is one of the few accounts we have from a prisoner who was confined in one of the churches in New York, and he was so fortunate as to escape before it was too late. We wish he had given the details of his escape. In such a gloomy picture as we are obliged to present to our readers the only high lights are occasional acts of humanity, and such incidents as fortunate escapes.

It would appear, from many proofs, that the Hessian soldier was naturally a good-natured being, and he seems to have been the most humane of the prison guards. We will see, as we go on, instances of the kindness of these poor exiled mercenaries, to many of whom the war was almost as great a scene of calamity and suffering as it was to the wretched prisoners under their care.

"Lieutenant Catlin, taken September 15th, '76, was confined in prison with no sustenance for forty-eight hours; for eleven days he had only two days allowance of pork offensive to the smell, bread hard, mouldy and wormy, made of canail and dregs of flax-seed; water brackish. 'I have seen $1.50 given for a common pail full. Three or four pounds of poor Irish pork were given to three men for three days. In one church were 850 prisoners for near three months.'"

"About the 25th of December he with 225 men were put on board the Glasgow at New York to be carried to Connecticut for exchange. They were aboard eleven days, and kept on coarse broken bread, and less pork than before, and had no fire for sick or well; crowded between decks, where twenty-eight died through ill-usage and cold." (This is taken from the "History of Litchfield," page 39.)

"The distress of the prisoners cannot be communicated in words. Twenty or thirty die every day; they lie in heaps unburied; what numbers of my countrymen have died by cold and hunger, perished for want of the common necessaries of life! I have seen it! This, sir, is the boasted British clemency! I myself had well nigh perished under it. The New England people can have no idea of such barbarous policy. Nothing can stop such treatment but retaliation. I ever despised private revenge, but that of the public must be in this case, both just and necessary; it is due to the manes of our murdered countrymen, and that alone can protect the survivors in the like situation. Rather than experience again their barbarity and insults, may I fall by the sword of the Hessians."

Onderdonk, who quotes this fragment, gives us no clue to the writer. A man named S. Young testifies that, "he was taken at Fort Washington and, with 500 prisoners, was kept in a barn, and had no provisions until Monday night, when the enemy threw into the stable, in a confused manner, as if to so many hogs, a quantity of biscuits in crumbs, mostly mouldy, and some crawling with maggots, which the prisoners were obliged to scramble for without any division. Next day they had a little pork which they were obliged to eat raw. Afterwards they got sometimes a bit of pork, at other times biscuits, peas, and rice. They were confined two weeks in a church, where they suffered greatly from cold, not being allowed any fire. Insulted by soldiers, women, and even negroes. Great numbers died, three, four, or more, sometimes, a day. Afterwards they were carried on board a ship, where 500 were confined below decks."

The date of this testimony is given as Dec. 15th, 1776: "W. D. says the prisoners were roughly used at Harlem on their way from Fort Washington to New York, where 800 men were stored in the New Bridewell, which was a cold, open house, the windows not glazed. They had not one mouthful from early Saturday morning until Monday. Rations per man for three days were half a pound of biscuit, half a pound of pork, half a gill of rice, half a pint of peas, and half an ounce of butter, the whole not enough for one good meal, and they were defrauded in this petty allowance. They had no straw to lie on, no fuel but one cart load per week for 800 men. At nine o'clock the Hessian guards would come and put out the fire, and lay on the poor prisoners with heavy clubs, for sitting around the fire.

"The water was very bad, as well as the bread. Prisoners died like rotten sheep, with cold, hunger, and dirt; and those who had good apparel, such as buckskin breeches, or good coats, were necessitated to sell them to purchase bread to keep them alive." Hinman, page 277.

"Mrs. White left New York Jan. 20th, 1777. She says Bridewell, the College, the New Jail, the Baptist Meeting House, and the tavern lately occupied by Mr. De la Montaigne and several other houses are filled with sick and wounded of the enemy. General Lee was under guard in a small mean house at the foot of King Street. Wm. Slade says 800 prisoners taken at Fort Washington were put into the North church. On the first of December 300 were taken from the church to the prison ship. December second he, with others, was marched to the Grosvenor transport in the North River; five hundred were crowded on board. He had to lie down before sunset to secure a place." Trumbull Papers.

"Henry Franklin affirms that about two days after the taking of Fort Washington he was in New York, and went to the North Church, in which were about 800 prisoners taken in said Fort. He inquired into their treatment, and they told him they fared hard on account both of provisions and lodging, for they were not allowed any bedding, or blankets, and the provisions had not been regularly dealt out, so that the modest or backward could get little or none, nor had they been allowed any fuel to dress their victuals. The prisoners in New York were very sickly, and died in considerable numbers."

"Feb. 11, 1777. Joshua Loring, Commissary of Prisoners, says that but little provisions had been sent in by the rebels for their prisoners." Gaine's Mercury.

Jan. 4th. 1777. "Seventy-seven prisoners went into the Sugar House. N. Murray says 800 men were in Bridewell. The doctor gave poison powders to the prisoners, who soon died. Some were sent to Honduras to cut logwood; women came to the prison-gate to sell gingerbread." Trumbull Papers.

TheNew York Gazette of May 6th, 1777, states that "of 3000 prisoners taken at Fort Washington, only 800 are living."

Mr. Onderdonk says: "There seems to have been no systematic plan adopted by the citizens of New York for the relief of the starving prisoners. We have scattering notices of a few charitable individuals, such as the following:--'Mrs. Deborah Franklin was banished from New York Nov. 21st, 1780, by the British commandant, for her unbounded liberality to the American prisoners. Mrs. Ann Mott was associated with Mrs. Todd and Mrs. Whitten in relieving the sufferings of American prisoners in New York, during the Revolution. John Fillis died at Halifax, 1792, aged 68. He was kind to American prisoners in New York. Jacob Watson, Penelope Hull, etc., are also mentioned.'"

"P. Dobbyn, master of a transport, thus writes from New York, Jan. 15th, 1777. 'We had four or five hundred prisoners on board our ships, but they had such bad distempers that each ship buried ten or twelve a day.' Another writer, under date of Jan. 14th, '77, says, 'The Churches are full of American prisoners, who die so fast that 25 or 30 are buried at a time, in New York City. General Howe gave all who could walk their liberty, after taking their oath not to take up arms against his Majesty.'" (From a London Journal.)

An old man named John Fell was taken up by the British, and confined for some months in the Provost prison. He managed to secrete writing materials and made notes of his treatment. He was imprisoned for being a Whig and one of the councilmen of Bergen, New Jersey. We will give his journal entire, as it is quoted by Mr. Onderdonk.

April 23rd, 1777. Last night I was taken prisoner from my house by 25 armed men (he lived in Bergen) who brought me down to Colonel Buskirk's at Bergen Point, and from him I was sent to Gen. Pigot, at N. Y., who sent me with Captain Van Allen to the Provost Jail.

24th. Received from Mrs. Curzon, by the hands of Mr. Amiel, $16, two shirts, two stocks, some tea, sugar, pepper, towels, tobacco, pipes, paper, and a bed and bedding.

May 1st. Dr. Lewis Antle and Capt. Thomas Golden at the door, refused admittance.

May 2nd. 6 10 P. M. died John Thomas, of smallpox, aged 70 & inoculated.

5th. Capt. Colden has brought from Mr. Curson $16.00.

11. Dr. Antle came to visit me. Nero at the door. (A dog?)

13. Cold weather.

20. Lewis Pintard came per order of Elias Boudinot to offer me money. Refused admittance. Capt. Colden came to visit me.

21. Capt and Mrs Corne came to visit me, and I was called downstairs to see them.

23. Lewis Pintard came as Commissary to take account of officers, in order to assist them with money.

24. Every person refused admittance to the Provost.

25. All prisoners paraded in the hall: supposed to look for deserters.

27. Rev. Mr. Hart and Col. Smith brought to the Provost from Long Island.

29. Stormy in Provost.

30. Not allowed to fetch good water.

31. Bad water; proposing buying tea-water, but refused. This night ten prisoners from opposite room ordered into ours, in all twenty.

June 1. Continued the same today.

2. The people ordered back to their own room.

3. Captain Van Zandt sent to the dungeon for resenting Captain Cunningham's insulting and abusing me.

4. Capt. Adams brought into our room. At 9 P.M. candles ordered out.

7. Captain Van Zandt returned from the dungeon.

8. All prisoners paraded and called over and delivered to care of Sergt. Keath. (O'Keefe, probably.) And told we are all alike, no distinction to be made.

10. Prisoners very sickly.

11. Mr Richards from Connecticut exchanged.

12. Exceeding strict and severe. "Out Lights!"

13. Melancholy scene, women refused speaking to their sick husbands, and treated cruelly by sentries.

14. Mr. James Ferris released on parole. People in jail very sickly and not allowed a doctor.

17. Capt. Corne came to speak to me; not allowed.

18. Letter from prisoners to Sergeant Keath, requesting more privileges.

19. Received six bottles claret and sundry small articles, but the note not allowed to come up.

20. Memorandum sent to Gen. Pigot with list of grievances.

21. Answered. "Grant no requests made by prisoners."

22. Mrs. Banta refused speaking to her son.

23. Mr Haight died.

24. Nineteen prisoners from Brunswick. Eighteen sent to the Sugar House.

25. Dr Bard came to visit Justice Moore, but his wife was refused, tho' her husband was dying.

26. Justice Moore died and was carried out.

27. Several sick people removed below.

30. Provost very sickly and some die.

July 3. Received from Mrs Curson per Mrs. Marriner, two half Joes.

6. Received of E. Boudinot, per Pintard, ten half Joes.

7. Capt. Thomas Golden came to the grates to see me.

9. Two men carried out to be hung for desertion, reprieved.

11. Mr Langdon brought into our room.

13. The Sergeant removed a number of prisoners from below.

14. Messrs Demarests exchanged. Dr. Romaine ordered to visit the sick.

15. A declaration of more privileges, and prisoners allowed to speak at the windows.

17. Peter Zabriskie had an order to speak with me, and let me know that all was well at home

19. Sergt. from Sugar House came to take account of officers in the Provost. Capt. Cunningham in town.

21. Sergt. took account of officers. Capt. Jas. Lowry died.

22. Mr. Miller died. Capt. Lowry buried.

Aug. 1. Very sick. Weather very hot.

5. Barry sent to the dungeon for bringing rum for Mr Phillips without leave of the Sergt. Everything looks stormy.

6. Warm weather. Growing better. Mr. Pintard came to supply prisoners of war with clothes.

10. Two prisoners from Long Island and four Lawrences from Tappan.

11. John Coven Cromwell from White Plains. Freeland from Polly (?) Fly whipped about salt.

12. Sergt. Keath took all pens and ink out of each room, and forbid the use of any on pain of the dungeon.

13. Abraham Miller discharged.

14. Jacobus Blauvelt died in the morning, buried at noon.

16. Capt. Ed. Travis brought into our room from the dungeon, where he had long been confined and cruelly treated.

17. Mr. Keath refused me liberty to send a card to Mr Amiel for a lb of tobacco.

21. Capt. Hyer discharged from the Provost.

25. Barry brought up from the dungeon, and Capt. Travis sent down again without any provocation.

26. Badcock sent to dungeon for cutting wood in the evening. Locks put on all the doors, and threatened to be locked up. Col. Ethan Allen brought to the Provost from Long Island and confined below.

27. Badcock discharged from below.

30. 5 P.M. all rooms locked up close.

31. A.M. Col Allen brought into our room.

Sep. 1. Pleasant weather. Bad water.

4. Horrid scenes of whipping.

6. Lewis Pintard brought some money for the officers. P.M. Major Otho H. Williams brought from Long Island and confined in our room. Major Wells from same place confined below. A. M. William Lawrence of Tappan died.

8. Campbell, Taylor, John Cromwell, and Buchanan from Philadelphia discharged.

10. Provisions exceedingly ordinary,--pork very rusty, biscuit bad.

12. Capt. Travis, Capt. Chatham and others brought out of dungeon.

14. Two prisoners from Jersey, viz: Thomas Campbell of Newark and Joralemon. (Jos. Lemon?)

16. Troops returned from Jersey. Several prisoners brought to Provost viz:--Capt. Varick, Wm. Prevost Brower, etc. Seventeen prisoners from Long Island.

22. Nothing material. Major Wells brought from below upstairs.

24. Received from Mr. Curson per Mr. Amiel four guineas, six bottles of wine, and one lb tobacco.

26. Mr. Pintard carried list of prisoners and account of grievances to the General Capt. Chatham and others carried to dungeon.

28. Yesterday a number of soldiers were sent below, and several prisoners brought out of dungeon. Statement of grievances presented to General Jones which much displeased Sergt. Keath who threatened to lock up the rooms.

29. Last night Sergt. K. locked up all the rooms. Rev. Mr. Jas. Sears was admitted upstairs.

30. Sent Mr. Pintard a list of clothing wanted for continental and state prisoners in the Provost. Sergt. locks up all the rooms.

Oct. 2. Candles ordered out at eight.--Not locked up.

4. Locked up. Great numbers of ships went up North River. Received sundries from Grove Bend. Three pair ribbed hose, three towels.

5. Garret Miller, of Smith's Cove, signed his will in prison, in presence of Benjamin Goldsmith, Abr. Skinner, and myself. C. G. Miller died of small-pox--P. M. Buried.

7. Wm. Prevost discharged from Provost.

8. Capt. Chatham and Lewis Thatcher brought out of dungeon.

10. Mr. Pintard sent up blankets, shoes, and stockings for the prisoners.

12. Lt. Col. Livingstone and upwards of twenty officers from Fort Montgomery and Clinton, all below.

13. Received from Mr. Pintard a letter by flag from Peter R. Fell, A. M. Mr. Noble came to the grates to speak to me.

14. Sergt. Keath sent Lt. Mercer and Mr. Nath. Fitzrandolph to the dungeon for complaining that their room had not water sufficient.

15. Mr. Pintard brought sundry articles for the prisoners.

17. Mr. Antonio and other prisoners brought here from up North River.

19. Ben Goldsmith ill of smallpox, made his will and gave it to me. Died two A. M. Oct. 20.

21. Glorious news from the Northward.

22. Confirmation strong as Holy Writ. Beef, loaf bread, and butter drawn today.

23. Weather continues very cold. Ice in the tub in the hall. A number of vessels came down North River. Mr. Wm. Bayard at the door to take out old Mr. Morris.

24. Prisoners from the Sugar House sent on board ships.

25. Rev. Mr. Hart admitted on parole in the city. Sergt. Woolley from the Sugar House came to take names of officers, and says an exchange is expected.

28. Last night and today storm continues very severe. Provost in a terrible condition. Lt. Col. Livingston admitted upstairs a few minutes.

Nov. 1. Lt. Callender of the train ordered back on Long Island; also several officers taken at Fort Montgomery sent on parole to Long Island.

3. In the evening my daughter, Elizabeth Colden, came to see me, accompained by Mayor Matthews.

5. Elizabeth Colden came to let me know she was going out of town. Yesterday Sergt refused her the liberty of speaking to me. Gen. Robertson's Aid-decamp came to inquire into grievances of prisoners.

16. Jail exceedingly disagreeable.--many miserable and shocking objects, nearly starved with cold and hunger,--miserable prospect before me.

18. The Town Major and Town Adjutant came with a pretence of viewing the jail.

19. Peter and Cor. Van Tassel, two prisoners from Tarrytown, in our room.

20 Mr. Pintard sent three barrels of flour to be distributed among the prisoners.

21. Mr. Pintard came for an account of what clothing the prisoners wanted.

24. Six tailors brought here from prison ship to work in making clothes for prisoners. They say the people on board are very sickly. Three hundred sent on board reduced to one hundred.

25. Mr. Dean and others brought to jail from the town.

26. Dean locked up by himself, and Mr. Forman brought upstairs attended by Rev. Mr. Inglis, and afterwards ordered downstairs. New order--one of the prisoners ordered to go to the Commissary's and see the provisions dealt out for the prisoners. Vast numbers of people assembled at the Provost in expectation of seeing an execution.

27. John, one of the milkmen, locked upstairs with a sentry at his door. A report by Mr. Webb that a prisoner, Herring, was come down to be exchanged for Mr Van Zandt or me.

30. Captain Cunningham came to the Provost.

Dec. 1. Capt. Money came down with Mr Webb to be exchanged for Major Wells.

2. Col. Butler visited the Provost and promised a doctor should attend. Received from Mr Bend cloth for a great coat, etc. Mr. Pmtard took a list of clothing wanted for the prisoners.

3. Several prisoners of war sent from here on board the prison shop, & some of the sick sent to the hospital, Dr Romaine being ordered by Sir H. Clinton to examine the sick Prisoners sickly: cause, cold. Prisoners in upper room (have) scanty clothing and only two bushels of coal for room of twenty men per week.

5. Mr. Blanch ordered out; said to be to go to Morristown to get prisoners exchanged. Cold.

7. Mr. Webb came to acquaint Major Wells his exchange was agreed to with Capt. Money.

8. Major Gen. Robertson, with Mayor came to Provost to examine prisoners. I was called and examined, and requested my parole. The General said I had made bad use of indulgence granted me, in letting my daughter come to see me. * * *

9. Major Wells exchanged.

10. Mr. Pintard sent 100 loaves for the prisoners. A. M. Walter Thurston died. Prisoners very sickly and die very fast from the hospitals and prison ships.

11. Some flags from North River.

12. Abel Wells died, a tailor from the prison ship. Mr. Pintard brought letters for sundry people.

14. Sunday. Guards more severe than ever notwithstanding General Robertson's promise of more indulgence. Capt. Van Zandt brought from Long Island.

16. Sent message to Mr Pintard for wood. Cold and entirely out of wood.

17. Commissary Winslow came and released Major Winslow on his parole on Long Island.

18. Mr Pintard sent four cords of wood for the prisoners.

19. Capt. John Paul Schoot released on parole. Mr Pintard with clothing for the people.

21. A paper found at the door of the Provost, intimating that three prisoners had a rope concealed in a bag in one of the rooms in order to make their escape. The Sergt. examined all the rooms, and at night we were all locked up.

22. Received from Mr Pintard 100 loaves and a quarter of beef.

24. Distributed clothing, etc., to the prisoners.

28. Gen. Robertson sent a doctor to examine me in consequence of the petition sent by Col. Allen for my releasement. The doctor reported to Dr. Mallet.

29. Gen. Robertson sent me word I should be liberated in town, provided I procured a gentleman in town to be responsible for my appearance. Accordingly I wrote to Hon. H. White, Esq.

30. Dr Romaine, with whom I sent the letter, said Mr White had a number of objections, but the doctor hoped to succeed in the afternoon. Mr. Winslow came and told the same story I heard the day before.

31. Sergt. Keath brought a message from the General to the same purpose as yesterday. N. B. I lost the memoranda from this date to the time of my being liberated from the Provost on Jan. 7, 1778.

New York Feb. 11. '78. Received a letter from Joshua Loring, Esq, Commissary of Prisoners, with leave from Gen. Robertson for my having the bounds of the city allowed me.

March. 23. Wrote to Major Gen. Robertson and told him this was the eleventh month of my imprisonment."

Fell's note to the general follows, in which he begs to be liberated to the house of Mrs. Marriner, who kept an ordinary in the town. A card in reply from the general states that it is impossible to comply with his request until Mr. Fell's friends give him sufficient security that he will not attempt to escape. A Mr. Langdon having broken his faith in like circumstances has given rise to a rule, which it is out of the general's power to dispense with, etc, etc.

"Feb. 4, 1778. I delivered to Mr. Pintard the wills of Garret Miller and Benjamin Goldsmith, to be forwarded to their respective families. Present E. Boudinot.

"May 20 '78, I had my parole extended by order of Gen. Daniel Jones, to my own house in Bergen County, for thirty days.

"July 2. I left town, and next day arrived safe home.

"Nov. 15, 1778 I received a certificate from A. Skinner, Deputy Com. of Prisoners of my being exchanged for Gov. Skene. Signed by Joshua Loring, Commissary General of Prisoners, dated New York, Oct 26 1778."

Mr. Fell's notes on his imprisonment present the best picture we can find of the condition of the Provost Jail during the term of his captivity. We have already seen how Mr Elias Boudinot, American Commissary of Prisoners, came to that place of confinement, and what he found there. This was in February, 1778. Boudinot also describes the sufferings of the American prisoners in the early part of 1778 in Philadelphia, and Mr. Fell speaks of Cunningham's return to New York. He had, it appears, been occupied in starving prisoners in Philadelphia during his absence from the Provost, to which General Howe sent him back, after he had murdered one of his victims in Philadelphia with the great key.

It appears that the prisoners in the Provost sent an account of their treatment to General Jones, by Mr. Pintard, in September, 1777, several months before the visit of Mr. Elias Boudinot. They complained that they were closely confined in the jail without distinction of rank or character, amongst felons, a number of whom were under sentence of death: that their friends were not allowed to speak to them, even through the grates: that they were put on the scanty allowance of two pounds hard biscuit, and two pounds of raw pork per week, without fuel to dress it. That they were frequently supplied with water from a pump where all kinds of filth was thrown, by which it was rendered obnoxious and unwholesome, the effects of which were to cause much sickness. That good water could have been as easily obtained. That they were denied the benefit of a hospital; not permitted to send for medicine, nor to have the services of a doctor, even when in the greatest distress. That married men and others who lay at the point of death were refused permission to have their wives or other relations admitted to see them. And that these poor women, for attempting to gain admittance, were often beaten from the prison door. That commissioned officers, and others, persons of character and reputation, were frequently, without a cause, thrown into a loathsome dungeon, insulted in a gross manner, and vilely abused by a Provost Marshal, who was allowed to be one of the basest characters in the British Army, and whose power was so unlimited, that he had caned an officer, on a trivial occasion; and frequently beaten the sick privates when unable to stand, "many of whom are daily obliged to enlist in the New Corps to prevent perishing for want of the necessaries of life.

"Neither pen, ink, or paper allowed (to prevent their treatment being made public) the consequence of which indeed, the prisoners themselves dread, knowing the malignant disposition of their keeper."

The Board of War reported on the 21 of January, 1778, that there were 900 privates and 300 officers in New York, prisoners, and that "the privates have been crowded all summer in sugar houses, and the officers boarded on Long Island, except about thirty, who have been confined in the Provost-Guard, and in most loathsome jails, and that since Oct. 1st, all those prisoners, both officers and privates, have been confined in prisons, prison ships, or the Provost." Lists of prisoners in the Provost; those taken by the Falcon, Dec. 1777, and those belonging to Connecticut who were in the Quaker and Brick Meeting House hospitals in Jan. 1778, may be found in the Trumbull Papers, VII, 62.

It seems that General Lee, while a prisoner in New York, in 1778, drew a prize of $500 in the New York Lottery, and immediately distributed it among the prisoners in that city. A New London, Connecticut, paper, dated Feb. 20, 1778, states that "it is said that the American prisoners, since we have had a Commissary in New York, are well served with good provisions, which are furnished at the expense of the States, and they are in general very healthy."

We fear this was a rose-colored view of the matter, though there is no doubt that our commissaries did what they could to alleviate the miseries of captivity.

Onderdonk quotes from Gaine'sMercury an advertisement for nurses in the hospital, but it is undated. "Nurses wanted immediately to attend the prison hospitals in this city. Good recommendations required, signed by two respectable inhabitants. Lewis Pintard."

From the New YorkGazette, May 6, 1778, we take the following: "Colonel Miles, Irvin, and fifty more exchanged."

"Conn.Gazette. July 10, '78. About three weeks ago Robert Shefield, of Stonington, made his escape from New York after confinement in a prison ship. After he was taken he, with his crew of ten, were thrust into the fore-peak, and put in irons. On their arrival at New York they were carried on board a prison ship, and to the hatchways, on opening which, tell not of Pandora's box, for that must be an alabaster box in comparison to the opening of these hatches. True there were gratings (to let in air) but they kept their boats upon them. The steam of the hold was enough to scald the skin, and take away the breath, the stench enough to poison the air all around.

"On his descending these dreary mansions of woe, and beholding the numerous spectacles of wretchedness and despair, his soul fainted within him. A little epitome of hell,--about 300 men confined between decks, half Frenchmen. He was informed there were three more of these vehicles of contagion, which contained a like number of miserable Frenchmen also, who were treated worse, if possible, than Americans.

"The heat was so intense that (the hot sun shining all day on deck) they were all naked, which also served the well to get rid of vermin, but the sick were eaten up alive. Their sickly countenances, and ghastly looks were truly horrible; some swearing and blaspheming; others crying, praying, and wringing their hands; and stalking about like ghosts; others delirious, raving and storming,--all panting for breath; some dead, and corrupting. The air was so foul that at times a lamp could not be kept burning, by reason of which the bodies were not missed until they had been dead ten days.

"One person alone was admitted on deck at a time, after sunset, which occasioned much filth to run into the hold, and mingle with the bilge water, which was not pumped out while he was aboard, notwithstanding the decks were leaky, and the prisoners begged permission to let in water and pump it out again.

"While Mr. Sheffield was on board, which was six days, five or six died daily, and three of his people. He was sent for on shore as evidence in a Court of Admiralty for condemning his own vessel, and happily escaped.

"He was informed in New York that the fresh meat sent in to our prisoners by our Commissary was taken by the men-of-war for their own use. This he can say: he did not see any aboard the ship he was in, but they were well supplied with soft bread from our Commissaries on shore. But the provision (be it what it will) is not the complaint. Fresh air and fresh water, God's free gift, is all their cry."

"New London, Conn. July 31. 78. Last week 500 or 600 prisoners were released from confinement at New York and sent out chiefly by way of New Jersey, being exchanged."

"New London Conn. Sep. 26, 78. All American prisoners are nearly sent out of New York, but there are 615 French prisoners still there."

"Oct 18, 78. The Ship, Good Hope, lies in the North River."

"New London Dec. 18, 78. A Flag with 70 men from the horrible prison ships of New York arrived: 30 very sickly, 2 died since they arrived."

"N. London. Dec. 25, 78. A cartel arived here from New York with 172 American prisoners. They were landed here and in Groton, the greater part are sickly and in most deplorable condition, owing chiefly to the ill usage in the prison ships, where numbers had their feet and legs frozen"

We will now take our readers with us to the Sugar House on Liberty Street, long called the Old Sugar House, and the only one of the three Sugar Houses which appear to have been used as a place of confinement for American prisoners of war after the year 1777.

We have already mentioned this dreary abode of wretchedness, but it deserves a more elaborate description.

From Valentine's Manual of the Common Council of New York for 1844 we will copy the following brief sketch of the British Prisons in New York during the Revolution.

"The British took possession of New York Sep. 15, '76, and the capture of Ft. Washington, Nov. 16, threw 2700 prisoners into their power. To these must be added 1000 taken at the battle of Brooklyn, and such private citizens as were arrested for their political principles, in New York City and on Long Island, and we may safely conclude that Sir William Howe had at least 5000 prisoners to provide for.

"The sudden influx of so many prisoners; the recent capture of the city, and the unlooked-for conflagration of a fourth part of it, threw his affairs into such confusion that, from these circumstances alone, the prisoners must have suffered much, from want of food and other bodily comforts, but there was superadded the studied cruelty of Captain Cunningham, the Provost Marshal, and his deputies, and the criminal negligence of Sir Wm. Howe.

"To contain such a vast number of prisoners the ordinary places of confinement were insufficient. Accordingly the Brick Church, the Middle Church, the North Church, and the French Church were appropriated to their use. Beside these, Columbia College, the Sugar House, the New Gaol, the new Bridewell, and the old City Hall were filled to their utmost capacity.

"Till within a few years there stood on Liberty Street, south of the Middle Dutch Church, a dark, stone building, with small, deep porthole looking windows, rising tier above tier; exhibiting a dungeon-like aspect. It was five stories high, and each story was divided into two dreary apartments.

"On the stones and bricks in the wall were to be seen names and dates, as if done with a prisoner's penknife, or nail. There was a strong, gaol-like door opening on Liberty St., and another on the southeast, descending into a dismal cellar, also used as a prison. There was a walk nearly broad enough for a cart to travel around it, where night and day, two British or Hessian guards walked their weary rounds. The yard was surrounded by a close board fence, nine feet high. 'In the suffocating heat of summer,' says Wm. Dunlap, 'I saw every narrow aperture of these stone walls filled with human heads, face above face, seeking a portion of the external air.'

"While the gaol fever was raging in the summer of 1777, the prisoners were let out in companies of twenty, for half an hour at a time, to breathe fresh air, and inside they were so crowded, that they divided their numbers into squads of six each. No. 1 stood for ten minutes as close to the windows as they could, and then No. 2 took their places, and so on.

"Seats there were none, and their beds were but straw, intermixed with vermin.

"For many days the dead-cart visited the prison every morning, into which eight or ten corpses were flung or piled up, like sticks of wood, and dumped into ditches in the outskirts of the city."

Silas Talbot says: "A New York gentleman keeps a window shutter that was used as a checkerboard in the Sugar House. The prisoners daily unhinged it, and played on it."

Many years ago a small pamphlet was printed in New York to prove that some of the American prisoners who died in the Old Sugar House were buried in Trinity church-yard. Andrew S. Norwood, who was a boy during the Revolution, deposed that he used to carry food to John Van Dyke, in this prison. The other prisoners would try to wrest away the food, as they were driven mad by hunger. They were frequently fed with bread made from old, worm-eaten ship biscuits, reground into meal and offensive to the smell. Many of the prisoners died, and some were put into oblong boxes, sometimes two in a box, and buried in Trinity church-yard, and the boy, himself, witnessed some of the interments. A part of Trinity church-yard was used as a common burying-ground,--as was also the yard of St. George's Church, and what was called the Swamp Burying-Ground.

This boy also deposed that his uncle Clifford was murdered during the Revolution, it was supposed by foreign soldiers, and he was buried in Trinity church-yard.

Jacob Freeman, also a boy during the Revolution, deposed that his father and several other inhabitants of Woodbridge were arrested and sent to New York. His grandfather was sixty years old, and when he was arrested, his son, who was concealed and could have escaped, came out of his hiding-place and surrendered himself for the purpose of accompanying his father to prison. The son was a Lieutenant. They were confined in the Sugar House several months. Every day some of the prisoners died and were buried in Old Trinity church-yard. Ensign Jacob Barnitz was wounded in both legs at the battle of Fort Washington. He was conveyed to New York and there thrown into the Sugar House, and suffered to lie on the damp ground. A kind friend had him conveyed to more comfortable quarters. Barnitz came from York, or Lancaster, Pa.

Little John Pennell was a cabin boy, bound to Captain White of the sloop of war, Nancy, in 1776. He testified that the prisoners of the Sugar House, which was very damp, were buried on the hill called "The Holy Ground." "I saw where they were buried. The graves were long and six feet wide. Five or six were buried in one grave." It was Trinity Church ground.

We will now give an account of Levi Hanford, who was imprisoned in the Sugar House in 1777. Levi Hanford was a son of Levi Hanford, and was born in Connecticut, in the town of Norwalk, on the 19th of Feb., 1759. In 1775 he enlisted in a militia company. In 1776 he was in service in New York. In March 1777, being then a member of a company commanded by Captain Seth Seymour, he was captured with twelve others under Lieut. J. B. Eels, at the "Old Well" in South Norwalk, Conn. While a prisoner in the Old Sugar House he sent the following letter to his father. A friend wrote the first part for him, and he appears to have finished it in his own handwriting.

New York June 7. 1777

Loving Father:--

I take the opportunity to let you know I am alive, and in reasonable health, since I had the small-pox.--thanks be to the Lord for it. * * * I received the things you sent me. * * * I wish you would go and see if you can't get us exchanged--if you please. Matthias Comstock is dead. Sam. Hasted, Ebenezer Hoyt, Jonathan Kellog has gone to the hospital to be inoculated today. We want money very much. I have been sick but hope I am better. There is a doctor here that has helpt me. * * * I would not go to the Hospital, for all manner of disease prevail there. * * * If you can possibly help us send to the Governor and try to help us. * * * Remember my kind love to all my friends. I am

Your Obedient son, Levi Hanford.

Poor Levi Hanford was sent to the prison ship, Good Intent, and was not exchanged until the 8th of May, 1778.

In the "Journal of American History," the third number of the second volume, on page 527, are the recollections of Thomas Stone, a soldier of the Revolution, who was born in Guilford, Conn., in 1755. In April, 1777, he enlisted under Capt. James Watson in Colonel Samuel Webb's Regiment, Connecticut line. He spent the following campaign near the Hudson. The 9th of December following Stone and his comrades under Gen. Parsons, embarked on board some small vessel at Norwalk, Conn, with a view to take a small fort on Long Island. "We left the shore," he says, "about six o'clock, P. M. The night was very dark, the sloop which I was aboard of parted from the other vessels, and at daybreak found ourselves alongside a British frigate. Our sloop grounded, we struck our colors-fatal hour! We were conducted to New York, introduced to the Jersey Prison Ship. We were all destitute of any clothing except what we had on; we now began to taste the vials of Monarchial tender mercy.

"About the 25th of Jan. 1778, we were taken from the ships to the Sugar House, which during the inclement season was more intolerable than the Ships.

"We left the floating Hell with joy, but alas, our joy was of short duration. Cold and famine were now our destiny. Not a pane of glass, nor even a board to a single window in the house, and no fire but once in three days to cook our small allowance of provision. There was a scene that truly tried body and soul. Old shoes were bought and eaten with as much relish as a pig or a turkey; a beef bone of four or five ounces, after it was picked clean, was sold by the British guard for as many coppers.

"In the spring our misery increased; frozen feet began to mortify; by the first of April, death took from our numbers, and, I hope, from their misery, from seven to ten a day; and by the first of May out of sixty-nine taken with me only fifteen were alive, and eight out of that number unable to work.

"Death stared the living in the face: we were now attacked by a fever which threatened to clear our walls of its miserable inhabitants.

"About the 20th of July I made my escape from the prison-yard. Just before the lamps were lighted. I got safely out of the city, passed all the guards, was often fired at, but still safe as to any injury done me; arrived at Harlem River eastward of King's Bridge.

"Hope and fear were now in full exercise. The alarm was struck by the sentinels keeping firing at me. I arrived at the banks of Harlem,--five men met me with their bayonets at my heart; to resist was instant death, and to give up, little better.

"I was conducted to the main guard, kept there until morning then started for New York with waiters with bayonets at my back, arrived at my old habitation about 1 o'clock, P. M.; was introduced to the Prison keeper who threatened me with instant death, gave me two heavy blows with his cane; I caught his arm and the guard interfered. Was driven to the provost, thrust into a dungeon, a stone floor, not a blanket, not a board, not a straw to rest on. Next day was visited by a Refugee Lieutenant, offered to enlist me, offered a bounty, I declined. Next day renewed the visit, made further offers, told me the General was determined I should starve to death where I was unless I would enter their service. I told him his General dare not do it. (I shall here omit the imprecations I gave him in charge.)

"The third day I was visited by two British officers, offered me a sergeant's post, threatened me with death as before, in case I refused. I replied, 'Death if they dare!'

"In about ten minutes the door was opened, a guard took me to my old habitation the Sugar House, it being about the same time of day I left my cell that I entered it, being three days and nights without a morsel of food or a drop of water,--all this for the crime of getting out of prison. When in the dungeon reflecting upon my situation I thought if ever mortal could be justified in praying for the destruction of his enemies, I am the man.

"After my escape the guard was augmented, and about this time a new prison keeper was appointed, our situation became more tolerable.

"The 16th of July was exchanged. Language would fail me to describe the joy of that hour; but it was transitory. On the morning of the 16th, some friends, or what is still more odious, some Refugees, cast into the Prison yard a quantity of warm bread, and it was devoured with greediness. The prison gate was opened, we marched out about the number of 250. Those belonging to the North and Eastern States were conducted to the North River and driven on board the flag ship, and landed at Elizabethtown, New Jersey. Those who ate of the bread soon sickened; there was death in the bread they had eaten. Some began to complain in about half an hour after eating the bread, one was taken sick after another in quick succession and the cry was, 'Poison, poison!' I was taken sick about an hour after eating. When we landed, some could walk, and some could not. I walked to town about two miles, being led most of the way by two men. About one half of our number did not eat of the bread, as a report had been brought into the prisonthat the prisoners taken at Fort Washington had been poisoned in the same way.

"The sick were conveyed in wagons to White Plains, where I expected to meet my regiment, but they had been on the march to Rhode Island I believe, about a week. I was now in a real dilemma; I had not the vestige of a shirt to my body, was moneyless and friendless. What to do I knew not. Unable to walk, a gentleman, I think his name was Allen, offered to carry me to New Haven, which he did. The next day I was conveyed to Guilford, the place of my birth, but no near relative to help me. Here I learned that my father had died in the service the Spring before. I was taken in by a hospitable uncle, but in moderate circumstances. Dr. Readfield attended me for about four months I was salivated twice, but it had no good effect. They sent me 30 miles to Dr Little of East Haddam, who under kind Providence restored me to such state of health that I joined my Regiment in the Spring following.

"In the year 1780, I think in the month of June, General Green met the enemy at Springfield, New Jersey, and in the engagement I had my left elbow dislocated in the afternoon. The British fired the village and retreated. We pursued until dark. The next morning my arm was so swollen that itcould not, or at least was not put right, and it has been ever since a weak, feeble joint, which has disabled me from most kinds of manual labor."

To this account the grandson of Thomas Stone, the Rev. Hiram Stone, adds some notes, in one of which he says, speaking of the Sugar House: "I have repeatedly heard my grandfather relate that there were no windows left in the building, and that during the winter season the snow would be driven entirely across the great rooms in the different stories, and in the morning lie in drifts upon our poor, hungry, unprotected prisoners. Of a morning several frozen corpses would be dragged out, thrown into wagons like logs, then driven away and pitched into a large hole or trench, and covered up like dead brutes."

Speaking of the custom of sending the exchanged prisoners as far as possible from their own homes, he says: "I well remember hearing my grandfather explain this strange conduct of the enemy in the following way. Alter the poison was thus perfidiously administered, the prisoners belonging at the North were sent across to the Jersey side, while those of the South were sent in an opposite direction, the intention of the enemy evidently being to send the exchanged prisoners as far from home as possible, that most of them might die of the effect of the poison before reaching their friends. Grandfather used to speak of the treatment of our prisoners as most cruel and murderous, though charging it more to the Tories or Refugees than to the British.

"The effects of the poison taken into his system were never eradicated in the life-time of my grandfather, a 'breaking out,' or rash, appearing every spring, greatly to his annoyance and discomfort."

In our attempt to describe the sufferings of American prisoners taken during the Revolution, we have, for the most part, confined ourselves to New York, only because we have been unable to make extensive research into the records of the British prisons in other places. But what little we have been able to gather on the subject of the prisoners sent out of America we will also lay before our readers.

We have already stated the fact that some of our prisoners were sent to India and some to Africa. They seem to have been sold into slavery, and purchased by the East India Company, and the African Company as well.

It is doubtful if any of the poor prisoners sent to the unwholesome climate of Africa ever returned to tell the story of British cruelties inflicted upon them there,--where hard work in the burning sun,--scanty fare,--and jungle fever soon ended their miseries. But one American prisoner escaped from the Island of Sumatra, where he had been employed in the pepperfields belonging to the East India Company. His story is eventful, and we will give the reader an abridgement of it, as it was told by himself, in his narrative, first published in a New England newspaper.

John Blatchford was born at Cape Ann, Mass., in the year 1762. In June, 1777, he went as a cabin boy on board the Hancock, a continental ship commanded by Capt. John Manly. On the 8th of July the Hancock was captured by the Rainbow, under Sir George Collier, and her crew was taken to Halifax.

John Blatchford was, at this time, in his sixteenth year. He was of medium height, with broad shoulders, full chest, and well proportioned figure. His complexion was sallow, his eyes dark, and his hair black and curly. He united great strength with remarkable endurance, else he could not have survived the rough treatment he experienced at the hands of fate. It is said that as a man he was temperate, grave, and dignified, and although his strength was so great, and his courage most undaunted, yet he was peaceable and slow to anger. His narrative appears to have been dictated by himself to some better educated person. It was first published in New London, Conn., in the year 1788. In the year 1797 an abstract of it appeared in Philip Freneau'sTime Piece, a paper published in New York. In July, 1860, the entire production was published in theCape Ann Gazette. We will now continue the narrative in Blatchford's own words:

"On our arrival at Halifax we were taken on shore and confined in a prison which had formerly been a sugar-house.

"The large number of prisoners confined in this house, near 300, together with a scanty allowance of provisions, occasioned it to be very sickly. * * * George Barnard, who had been a midshipman on the Hancock, and who was confined in the same room as myself, concerted a plan to release us, which was to be effected by digging a small passage under ground, to extend to a garden that was behind the prison, and without the prison wall, where we might make a breach in the night with safety, and probably all obtain our liberty. This plan greatly elated our spirits, and we were anxious to proceed immediately in executing it.

"Our cabins were built one above another, from the floor to the height of a man's head; and mine was pitched upon to be taken up; and six of us agreed to do the work, whose names were George Barnard, William Atkins, late midshipmen in the Hancock; Lemuel Towle of Cape Ann, Isaiah Churchill of Plymouth; Asa Cole of Weathersfield, and myself.

"We took up the cabin and cut a hole in the plank underneath. The sugar house stood on a foundation of stone which raised the floor four feet above the ground, and gave us sufficient room to work, and to convey away the dirt that we dug up.

"The instruments that we had to work with were one scraper, one long spike, and some sharp sticks; with these we proceeded in our difficult undertaking. As the hole was too small to admit of more than one person to work at a time we dug by turns during ten or twelve days, and carried the dirt in our bosoms to another part of the cellar. By this time we supposed we had dug far enough, and word was given out among the prisoners to prepare themselves for flight.

"But while we were in the midst of our gayety, congratulating ourselves upon our prospects, we were basely betrayed by one of our own countrymen, whose name was Knowles. He had been a midshipman on board the Boston frigate, and was put on board the Fox when she was taken by the Hancock and Boston. What could have induced him to commit so vile an action cannot be conceived, as no advantage could accrue to him from our detection, and death was the certain consequence to many of his miserable countrymen. That it was so is all that I can say. A few hours before we were to have attempted our escape Knowles informed the Sergeant of the guard of our design, and by his treachery cost his country the lives of more than one hundred valuable citizens,--fathers, and husbands, whose return would have rejoiced the hearts of now weeping, fatherless children, and called forth tears of joy from wives, now helpless and disconsolate widows.

"When we were discovered the whole guard were ordered into the room and being informed by Knowles who it was that performed the work we were all six confined in irons; the hole was filled up and a sentinel constantly placed in the room, to prevent any further attempt.

"We were all placed in close confinement, until two of my fellow-sufferers, Barnard and Cole, died; one of which was put into the ground with his irons on his hands.

"I was afterwards permitted to walk the yard. But as my irons were too small, and caused my hands to swell, and made them very sore, I asked the Sergeant to take them off and give me larger ones. He being a person of humanity, and compassionating my sufferings, changed my irons for others that were larger, and more easy to my hands.

"Knowles, who was also permitted to walk the yard, for his perfidy, would take every opportunity to insult and mortify me, by asking me whether I wanted to run away again, and when I was going home, etc?

"His daily affronts, together with his conduct in betraying, his countrymen, so exasperated me that I wished for nothing more than an opportunity to convince him that I did not love him.

"One day as he was tantalizing over me as usual, I suddenly drew my one hand out of my irons, flew at him and struck him in the face, knocked out two or three of his teeth, and bruised his mouth very much. He cried out that the prisoner had got loose, but before any assistance came, I had put my hand again into the hand-cuff, and was walking about the yard as usual. When the guard came they demanded of me in what manner I struck him. I replied with both my hands.

"They then tried to pull my hands out, but could not, and concluded it must be as I said. Some laughed and some were angry, but in the end I was ordered again into prison.

"The next day I was sent on board the Greyhound, frigate, Capt. Dickson, bound on a cruise in Boston Bay.

"After being out a few days we met with a severe gale of wind, in which we sprung our main-mast, and received considerable other damage. We were then obliged to bear away for the West Indies, and on our passage fell in with and took a brig from Norwich, laden with stock.

"The Captain and hands were put on board a Danish vessel the same day. We carried the brig into Antigua, where we immediately repaired, and were ordered in company of the Vulture, sloop of war, to convoy a sloop of merchantmen into New York.

"We left the fleet off Sandy Hook, and sailed for Philadelphia, where we lay until we were made a packet, and ordered for Halifax with dispatches. We had a quick passage, and arrived safe.

"While we lay in the road Admiral Byron arrived, in the Princess Royal from England, who, being short of men, and we having a surplusage for a packet, many of our men were ordered on board the Princess Royal, and among them most of our boat's crew.

"Soon after, some of the officers going on shore, I was ordered into the boat. We landed at the Governor's slip--it being then near night. This was the first time since I had been on board the Greyhound that I had had an opportunity to escape from her, as they were before this particularly careful of me; therefore I was determined to get away if possible, and to effect it I waded round a wharf and went up a byway, fearing I should meet the officers. I soon got into the street, and made the best of my way towards Irishtown (the southern suburbs of Halifax) where I expected to be safe, but unfortunately while running I was met and stopped by an emissary, who demanded of me my business, and where I was going? I tried to deceive him, that he might let me pass, but it was in vain, he ordered me to follow him.

"I offered him what money I had, about seven shillings, sixpence, to let me go, this too was in vain. I then told him I was an American, making my escape, from a long confinement, and was determined to pass, and took up a stone. He immediately drew his bayonet, and ordered me to go back with him. I refused and told him to keep his distance. He then run upon me and pushed his bayonet into my side. It come out near my navel; but the wound was not very deep; he then made a second pass at me, and stabbed me through my arm; he was about to stab me a third time, when I struck him with the stone and knocked him down. I then run, but the guard who had been alarmed, immediately took me and carried me before the Governor, where I understood the man was dead.

"I was threatened with every kind of death, and ordered out of the Governor's presence. * * * Next day I was sent on board the Greyhound, the ship I had run from, and we sailed for England. Our captain being a humane man ordered my irons off, a few days after we sailed, and permitted me to do duty as formerly. Being out thirteen days we spoke the Hazard sloop of war, who informed that the French fleet was then cruising in the English Channel. For this reason we put into Cork, and the dispatches were forwarded to England.

"While we lay in the Cove of Cork I jumped overboard with the intention of getting away; unfortunately I was discovered and fired at by the marines; the boat was immediately sent after me, took me up, and carried me on board again. At this time almost all the officers were on shore, and the ship was left in charge of the sailing-master, one Drummond, who beat me most cruelly. To get out of his way I run forward, he followed me, and as I was running back he came up with me and threw me down the main-hold. The fall, together with the beating was so severe that I was deprived of my senses for a considerable time. When I recovered them I found myself in the carpenter's berth, placed upon some old canvas between two chests, having my right thigh, leg and arm broken, and several parts of my body severely bruised. In this situation I lay eighteen days till our officers, who had been on business to Dublin, came on board. The captain inquired for the prisoners, and on being informed of my situation came down with the doctor to set my bones, but finding them callussed they concluded not to meddle with me.

"The ship lay at Cork until the French fleet left the Channel, and then sailed for Spithead. On our arrival there I was sent in irons on board the Princess Amelia, and the next day was carried on board the Brittania, in Portsmouth Harbor, to be tried before Sir Thomas Pye, lord high admiral of England, and President of the court martial.

"Before the officers had collected I was put under the care of a sentinel, and the seamen and women who came on board compassionated my sufferings, which rather heightened than diminished my distress.

"I was sitting under the awning, almost overpowered by the reflection of my unhappy situation, every morning expecting to be summoned for my trial, when I heard somebody enquire for the prisoner, and supposing it to be an officer I rose up and answered that I was there.

"The gentleman came to me, told me to be of good chear, and taking out a bottle of cordial, bade me drink, which I did. He then enquired where I belonged. I informed him. He asked me if I had parents living, and if I had any friends in England? I answered I had neither. He then assured me he was my friend, and would render me all the assistance in his power. He then enquired of me every circumstance relative to my fray with the man at Halifax, for whose death I was now to be tried and instructed me what to say on my trial, etc."

Whether this man was a philanthropist, or an agent for the East India Company, we do not know. He instructed Blatchford to plead guilty, and then defended him from the charge of murder, no doubt on the plea of self-defence. Blatchford was therefore acquitted of murder, but apparently sold to the East India Company as a slave. How this was condoned we do not know, but will let the poor sailor continue his narrative in his own words.

"I was carried on board an Indiaman, and immediately put down into the run, where I was confined ten days. * * * On the seventh day I heard the boatswain pipe all hands, and about noon I was called up on board, where I found myself on board the Princess Royal, Captain Robert Kerr, bound to the East Indies, with six others, all large ships belonging to the East India Company." He had been told that he was to be sent back to America to be exchanged, and his disappointment amounted almost to despair.

"Our captain told me if I behaved well and did my duty I should receive as good usage as any man on board; this gave me great encouragement. I now found my destiny fixed, that whatever I could do would not in the least alter my situation, and therefor was determined to do the best I could, and make myself as contented as my unfortunate situation would admit.

"After being on board seven days I found there were in the Princess Royal 82 Americans, all destined to the East Indies, for being what they called 'Rebels.'

"We had a passage of seventeen weeks to St Helena, where we put in and landed part of our cargo, which consisted wholly of provisions. * * * The ship lay here about three weeks. We then sailed for Batavia, and on the passage touched at the Cape of Good Hope, where we found the whole of the fleet that sailed with us from England. We took in some provisions and necessaries, and set sail for Batavia, where we arrived in ten weeks. Here we purchased a large quantity of arrack, and remained a considerable time.

"We then sailed for Bencoulen in the Island of Sumatria, and after a passage of about six weeks arrived there. This was in June, 1780.

"At this place the Americans were all carried on shore, and I found that I was no longer to remain on board the ship, but condemned to serve as a soldier for five years. I offered to bind myself to the captain for five years, or any longer term if I might serve on board the ship. He told me it was impossible for me to be released from acting as a soldier, unless I could pay L50, sterling. As I was unable to do this I was obliged to go through the manual exercise with the other prisoners; among whom was Wm. Randall of Boston, and Josiah Folgier of Nantucket, both young men, and one of them an old ship-mate of mine.

"These two and myself agreed to behave as ignorant and awkward as possible, and what motions we learned one day we were to forget the next. We pursued this conduct nearly a fortnight, and were beaten every day by the drill-sergeant who exercised us, and when he found we were determined, in our obstinacy, and that it was not possible for him to learn us anything, we were all three sent into the pepper gardens belonging to the East India Company; and continued picking peppers from morning till night, and allowed but two scanty meals a day. This, together with the amazing heat of the sun, the island lying under the equator, was too much for an American constitution, unused to a hot climate, and we expected that we should soon end our misery and our lives; but Providence still preserved us for greater hardships.

"The Americans died daily with heat and hard fare, which determined my two comrades and myself in an endeavor to make our escape. We had been in the pepper-gardens four months when an opportunity offered, and we resolved upon trying our fortune. Folgier, Randall and myself sat out with an intention of reaching Croy (a small harbor where the Dutch often touched at to water, on the opposite side of the island). Folgier had by some means got a bayonet, which he fixed in the end of a stick. Randall and myself had nothing but staves, which were all the weapons we carried with us. We provided ourselves with fireworks [he means flints to strike fire] for our journey, which we pursued unmolested till the fourth day just at night, when we heard a rustle in the bushes and discovered nine sepoys, who rushed out upon us.

"Folgier being the most resolute of us run at one of them, and pushed his bayonet through his body into a tree. Randall knocked down another; but they overpowered us, bound us, and carried us back to the fort, which we reached in a day and a half, though we had been four days travelling from it, owing to the circle we made by going round the shore, and they came across the woods being acquainted with the way.

"Immediately on our arrival at the fort the Governor called a court martial, to have us tried. We were soon all condemned to be shot next morning at seven o'clock, and ordered to be sent into the dungeon and confined in irons, where we were attended by an adjutant who brought a priest with him to pray and converse with us, but Folgier, who hated the sight of an Englishman, desired that we might be left alone. * * * the clergyman reprimanded him, and told him he made very light of his situation on the supposition that he would be reprieved; but if he expected it he deceived himself. Folgier still persisted in the clergyman's leaving us, if he would have us make our peace with God, 'for,' said he, 'the sight of Englishmen, from whom we have received such treatment, is more disagreeable than the evil spirits of which you have spoken;' that, if he could have his choice, he would choose death in preference to life, if he must have it on the condition of such barbarous usage as he had received from their hands; and the thoughts of death did not seem so hideous to him as his past sufferings.

"He visited us again about midnight, but finding his company was not acceptable, he soon left us to our melancholy reflections.

"Before sunrise we heard the drums beat, and soon after heard the direful noise of the door grating on its iron hinges. We were all taken out, our irons taken off, and we conducted by a strong guard of soldiers to the parade, surrounded by a circle of armed men, and led into the midst of them, where three white officers were placed by our side;--silence was then commanded, and the adjutant taking a paper out of his pocket read our sentence;--and now I cannot describe my feelings upon this occasion, nor can it be felt by any one but those who have experienced some remarkable deliverance from the grim hand of death, when surrounded on all sides, and nothing but death expected from every quarter, and by Divine Providence there is some way found out for escape--so it seemed to me when the adjutant pulled out another paper from his pocket and read: 'That the Governor and Council, in consideration of the youth of Randall and myself, supposing us to be led on by Folgier, who was the oldest, thought proper to pardon us from death, and that instead we were to receive 800 lashes each.'

"Although this last sentence seemed terrible to me, yet in comparison with death, it seemed to be light. Poor Folgier was shot in our presence,--previous to which we were told we might go and converse with him. Randall went and talked with him first, and after him I went up to take my leave, but my feelings were such at the time I had not power to utter a single word to my departing friend, who seemed as undaunted and seemingly as willing to die as I was to be released, and told me not to forget the promises we had formerly made to each other, which was to embrace the first opportunity to escape.

"We parted, and he was immediately after shot dead. We were next taken and tied, and the adjutant brought a small whip made of cotton, which consisted of a number of strands and knotted at the ends; but these knots were all cut off by the adjutant before the drummer took it, which made it not worse than to have been whipped with cotton yarn.

"After being whipped 800 lashes we were sent to the Company's hospital, where we had been about three weeks when Randall told me he intended very soon to make his escape:--This somewhat surprised me, as I had lost all hopes of regaining my liberty, and supposed he had. I told him I had hoped he would never mention it again; but however, if that was his design, I would accompany him. He advised me, if I was fearful, to tarry behind; but finding he was determined on going, I resolved to run the risque once more; and as we were then in a hospital we were not suspected of such a design.

"Having provided ourselves with fire-works, and knives, about the first of December, 1780, we sat out, with the intent to reach the Dutch settlement of Croy, which is about two or three hundred miles distance upon a direct line, but as we were obliged to travel along the coast (fearing to risque the nearest way), it was a journey of 800 miles.

"We took each a stick and hung it around our neck, and every day cut a notch, which was the method we took to keep time.

"In this manner we travelled, living upon fruit, turtle eggs, and sometimes turtle, which we cooked every night with the fire we built to secure us from wild beasts, they being in great plenty,--such as buffaloes, tigers, jackanapes, leopards, lions, and baboons and monkies.

"On the 30th day of our traveling we met with nothing we could eat and found no water. At night we found some fruit which appeared to the eyes to be very delicious, different from any we had seen in our travels. It resembled a fruit which grows in the West Indies, called a Jack, about the size of an orange. We being very dry and hungry immediately gathered some of this fruit, but finding it of a sweet, sickish taste, I eat but two. Randall eat freely. In the evening we found we were poisoned: I was sick and puked considerably, Randall was sick and began to swell all round his body. He grew worse all night, but continued to have his senses till the next day, when he died, and left me to mourn my greater wretchedness,--more than 400 miles from any settlement, no companion, the wide ocean on one side, and a prowling wilderness on the other, liable to many kinds of death, more terrible than being shot.

"I laid down by Randall's body, wishing, if possible, that he might return and tell me what course to take. My thoughts almost distracted me, so that I was unable to do anything untill the next day, during all which time I continued by the side of Randall. I then got up and made a hole in the sand and buried him.

"I now continued my journey as well as the weak state of my body would permit,--the weather being at the time extremely hot and rainy. I frequently lay down and would wish that I might never rise again;--despair had almost wholly possessed me; and sometimes in a kind of delirium I would fancy I heard my mother's voice, and my father calling me, and I would answer them. At other times my wild imagination would paint to my view scenes which I was acquainted with. Then supposing myself near home I would run as fast as my legs could carry me. Frequently I fancied that I heard dogs bark, men cutting wood, and every noise which I have heard in my native country.

"One day as I was travelling a small dog, as I thought it to be, came fawning round me and followed me, but I soon discovered it to be a young lion. I supposed that its dam must be nigh, and therefore run. It followed me some time and then left me. I proceeded on, but had not got far from it before it began to cry. I looked round and saw a lioness making towards it. She yelled most frightfully, which greatly terrified me; but she laid down something from her mouth for her young one, and then with another yell turned and went off from me.

"Some days after I was travelling by the edge of a woods, which from its appearance had felt severely the effects of a tornado or hurricane, the trees being all torn up by the roots, and I heard a crackling noise in the bushes. Looking about I saw a monstrous large tiger making slowly towards me, which frightened me exceedingly. When he had approached within a few rods of me, in my surprise I lifted up my hands and hollowed very loud. The sudden noise frightened him, seemingly as much as I had been, and he immediately turned and run into the woods, and I saw him no more.

"After this I continued to travel on without molestation, only from the monkies who were here so plentiful that oftentimes I saw them in large droves; sometimes I run from them, as if afraid of them, they would then follow, grin, and chatter at me, and when they got near I would turn, and they would run from me back into the woods, and climb the trees to get out of my way.

"It was now 15 weeks since I had left the hospital. I had travelled most all of the day without any water and began to be very thirsty, when I heard the sound of running water, as it were down a fall of rocks. I had heard it a considerable time and at last began to suspect it was nothing, but imaginary, as many other noises I had before thought to have heard. I however went on as fast as I could, and at length discovered a brook. On approaching it I was not a little surprised and rejoiced by the sight of a Female Indian, who was fishing at the brook. She had no other dress on than that which mother nature affords impartially to all her children, except a small cloth which she wore round her waist.

"I knew not how to address myself to her. I was afraid if I spoke she would run, and therefore I made a small noise; upon which she looked round, and seeing me, run across the brook, seemingly much frightened, leaving her fishing line. I went up to her basket which contained five or six fish which looked much like our trout. I took up the basket and attempted to wade across where she had passed, but was too weak to wade across in that place, and went further up the stream, where I passed over, and then looking for the Indian woman I saw her at some distance behind a large cocoa-nut tree. I walked towards her but dared not keep my eyes steadily upon her lest she would run as she did before. I called to her in English, and she answered in her own tongue, which I could not understand. I then called to her in the Malaysian, which I understood a little of; she answered me in a kind of surprise and asked me in the name of Okrum Footee (the name of their God) from whence I came, and where I was going. I answered her as well as I could in the Melais, that I was from Fort Marlborough, and going to Croy--that I was making my escape from the English, by whom I had been taken in war. She told me that she had been taken by the Malays some years before, for that the two nations were always at war, and that she had been kept as a slave among them three years and was then retaken by her countrymen. While we were talking together she appeared to be very shy, and I durst not come nearer than a rod to her, lest she should run from me. She said that Croy, the place I was bound to, was about three miles distant: That if I would follow her she would conduct me to her countrymen, who were but a small distance off. I begged her to plead with her countrymen to spare my life. She said she would, and assured me that if I behaved well I should not be hurt. She then conducted me to a small village, consisting of huts or wigwams. When we arrived at the village the children that saw me were frightened and run away from me, and the women exhibited a great deal of fear and kept at a distance. But my guide called to them and told them not to be afraid, for that I was not come to hurt them, and then informed them from whence I came, and that I was going to Croy.

"I told my guide I was very hungry, and she sent the children for something for me to eat. They came and brought me little round balls of rice, and they, not daring to come nigh, threw them at me. These I picked up and eat. Afterwards a woman brought some rice and goat's milk in a copper bason, and setting it on the ground made signs for me to take it up and eat it, which I did, and then put the bason down again. They then poked away the bason with a stick, battered it with stones, and making a hole in the ground, buried it.

"After that they conducted me to a small hut, and told me to tarry there until the morning, when they would conduct me to the harbor. I had but little sleep that night, and was up several time to look out, and saw two or three Indians at a little distance from the hut, who I supposed were placed there to watch me.

"Early in the morning numbers came around the hut, and the female who was my guide asked me where my country was? I could no