‘A French prisoner made himself a complete uniform of the Hertfordshire Militia, and a wooden gun, stained, surmounted by a tin bayonet. Thus equipped, he mixed with the guard, and when they were ordered to march out, having been relieved, Monsieur fell in and marched out too. Thus far he was fortunate, but when arrived at the guard room, lo! what befell him. ‘His new comrades ranged their muskets on the rack, and he endeavoured to follow their example; but, as his wooden piece was unfortunately a few inches too long, he was unable to place it properly. This was observed, so of course his attempt to get away was frustrated.’ The bribing of sentries was a very necessary condition of escape. One or two pounds would generally do it, and it was through the sky-light of the ‘cock-lofts’ that the prisoners usually got out of the locked-up barracks. In February 1811, four privates of the Notts Militia were heavily bribed for the escape of two French officers. One of them, thinking he was unfairly treated in the division of the money, gave information, and a picket was in waiting for the escaping Frenchmen. The three men were sentenced to 900 lashes each. Two were pardoned, but one, who had given the prisoners fire-arms, got 450. In March, 1812, Edward Palmer, a ‘moorman,’ was fined £5 and got twelve months’ imprisonment for procuring a disguise for a French prisoner named Bellaird. Early in the same year three prisoners escaped with the connivance of a Roscommon Militiaman. The sequel moves one’s pity. Pat was paid in bank-notes. He offered them for exchange, and, to his amazement, was informed not only that he could receive nothing for them, but that he must consider himself under arrest for uttering forged notes. It was too true. The three Frenchmen had paid him handsomely in notes fabricated by one Lustique. The Irishman would not say where he got the notes, and it really did not matter, for if he had admitted that he received them as the price of allowing French prisoners to escape, he would have been flogged to death: as it was, he and Lustique were hanged. Forgery was a prominent Dartmoor industry. Bank of England notes were forged to some extent, but local banks such as Grant, Burbey and Co. of Portsmouth, Harris, Langholme, and Harris of Plymouth, the Plymouth Commercial Bank, the Tamar Bank, the Launceston and Totnes Bank, were largely victimized. To such an extent were these frauds carried out that it was ordered that an official should attend at the prison market to write his name on all notes offered by prisoners in payment for goods received. It was no doubt with reference to the local knowledge of soldiers on guard being valuable to intending escapes from the prison that the authorities refused the application of the 1st Devon Militia to be on guard at Dartmoor, as there were ‘several strong objections to the men of that regiment being employed’.