A journal, of a young man of Massachusetts, late a surgeon on board an American privateer, who was captured at sea by the British in May, eighteen hundred and thirteen and was confined first, at Melville Island, Halifax, then at Chatham, in England, and last at Dartmoor prison : $b Interspersed with observations, anecdotes and remarks, tending to illustrate the moral and political characters of three nations. To which is added, a correct engraving of Dartmoor prison, representing the massacre ofWaterhouse, Benjamin
History
A journal, of a young man of Massachusetts, late a surgeon on board an American privateer, who was captured at sea by the British in May, eighteen hundred and thirteen and was confined first, at Melville Island, Halifax, then at Chatham, in England, and last at Dartmoor prison : $b Interspersed with observations, anecdotes and remarks, tending to illustrate the moral and political characters of three nations. To which is added, a correct engraving of Dartmoor prison, representing the massacre of
Waterhouse, Benjamin
Dartmoor Prison; United States -- History -- War of 1812 -- Prisoners and prisons
The language and phraseology of these market people are very rude.
When puffing off the qualities of their goods, when they talk very
fast, we can hardly understand them. They do not speak near so good
English as our common market people do in America. The best of them
use the pronoun _he_ in a singular manner--as can _he_ pay me? Can
_he_ change? For can _you_ pay me? Or _you_ change? I am fully of
opinion with those who say that the American people taken
collectively, as a nation, speak the English language with more purity
than the Britons, taken collectively. Every man or boy of every part
of the United States would be promptly understood by the men of
letters in London; but every man and boy of Old England would not be
promptly understood by the lettered men in the capital towns of
America. Is it not the bible that has preserved the purity of our
language in America? These English men and women do not speak with the
grammatical correctness of our people. As to the Scotch, their
barbarisms that are to be found even in print, are affrontive to the
descendants of Englishmen. Where, among the white people of the United
States, can we find such shocking barbarities as we hear from the
common people of Scotland? And yet we find that the Prince Regent is
at the head of an institution for perpetuating the unwritten language
to the highlanders. We shall expect to hear of a similar undertaking,
under the same patronage, for keeping alive the language of his dear
allies, the _Kickapoos_ and _Pottowattomies_!! for the language of
slaves or savages, are the needed props of some of the thrones in
Europe.
I am sorry to remark that the Christmas holy-days have been recently
marked with no small degree of intoxication, and its natural
consequence, quarrelling among the prisoners. The news of peace; and
the expectation of being soon freed from all restraint, have operated
to unsettle the minds of the most unruly, and to encourage riot.
Drinking, carousing, and noise, with little foolish tricks, are now
too common.--Some one took off a shutter, or blind, from a window of
No. 6, and as the persons were not delivered up by the standing
committee, Captain Shortland punished the whole, college fashion, by
stopping the market, or as this great man was pleased wittily to call
it, _an embargo_. At length the men were given up to Shortland, who
put them in the _black hole_ for ten days.
To be a cook is the most disagreeable and dangerous office at this
depot. They are always suspected, watched and hated, from an
apprehension that they defraud the prisoner of his just allowance. One
was flogged the other day for skimming the fat off the soup. The grand
Vizier's office at Constantinople, is not more dangerous than a
cook's, at this prison, where are collected four or five thousand
hungry American sons of liberty. The prisoners take it upon themselves
to punish these pot-skimmers in their own way.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account