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
of humanity, could bear to see, without great emotion, even a thief,
or a robber, so severely punished. But what must be the feelings of an
American, to see such a cruel operation upon the body of his
countryman, of his mess-mate and companion? We will venture to say,
that if a dog, or an horse, were tied fast to a post, in any street of
any town in America, and lashed with such an heavy knotted whip, swung
by the strong arm of a vigorous man, although their skins were covered
and defended by their hair, or fur, we do not believe that the
inhabitants would see it inflicted on the poor beast, without carrying
the whipper before a magistrate, to answer for his cruelty. Yet what
is the whipping of a beast, devoid of reason, and covered with fur, to
this severe operation upon the delicate skin and flesh of one of our
young men? And all, for what? For nobly maintaining and upholding the
first and great principle of our nature. Yet has this heroism of our
enslaved seamen been overlooked; and even derided by the federal
merchant and the federal politician, and the federal member of
congress, and the federal clergyman! Some of our brave fellows have
been brought upon deck, every punishing day, and undergone this horrid
punishment, three or four times over, until the crews of the men of
war were disposed to cry out shame, upon their own officers! Some of
our poor fellows could not sustain these repeated tortures, which is
not to be wondered at, and have finally gone to work as soon as they
recovered from their barbarous usage. Others, of firmer frames and
firmer minds, have wearied out their persecutors, whose infernal
dispositions they have defied, and triumphed over; such have been sent
out of the ship into our prison-ships; and here they are, to tell
their own story, to show to their countrymen the everlasting marks of
their tormentors, the British navy officers. With what indignation,
rage and horror, have I seen our brave fellows actuated, while one of
these heroes of national rights, and national character, has been
relating his sufferings, and showing his degrading scars, made on his
body by the accursed whip of a boatswain's mate, by order of an
infamous captain of the British navy! You talk of peace, friendship
and cordiality with the nation from whom most of us sprang! It is
well, perhaps, that the two nations should be at peace politically;
but can you ever expect cordiality to subsist between our impressed
and cruelly treated sailor, and a British navy officer. It is next to
impossible. Our ill treated sailor, lacerated in his flesh, wounded in
his honor, and debased by the slavish hand of a boatswain's mate,
never can forget the barbarians; nor ever can, nor ever ought to
forgive them. The God of nature has ordained that nations should be
separated by a difference of language, religion, customs, and manners,
for wise purposes; but where two great nations, like the English and
American, have the same language, institutions and manners, he may
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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