In defence, Montbazin said that he had been exchanged for four British seamen, who had been landed from France, but that the Transport Office had refused to let him go, so he had considered himself absolved from his parole. It is hardly necessary to say that the girl’s story was concocted, that her meeting with Montbazin was part of a prearranged plan, and the Court emphasized their opinion that this was the case by sending the lieutenant to a prison afloat, and Mary Clarke to one ashore. In October 1812, eight French officers left Andover quietly in the evening, and, a mile out, met two mounted escape-aiders. Behind each of them a prisoner mounted, and all proceeded at a walk for six miles, when they met another man with three horses. On these horses the remaining six prisoners mounted, and by daybreak were at Ringwood, thirty-six miles on their road to liberty. All the day they remained hidden in the forest, living upon bread, cheese, and rum, which their guides procured from Ringwood. At nightfall they restarted, passed through Christchurch to Stanpit, and thence to the shore, where they found a boat waiting for them; but the wind being contrary and blowing a gale, they could not embark, and were obliged to remain hidden in the woods for three days, suffering so much from exposure and want that they made a bargain with a Mrs. Martin to lodge in her house for £12 until the weather should moderate sufficiently for them to embark. They stayed here for a week, and then their suspense and anxiety, they knowing that the hue and cry was after them, became unbearable, and they gave the smuggler-skipper of the _Freeholder_ a promissory note for six hundred guineas to hazard taking them off. He made the attempt, but the vessel was driven ashore, and the Frenchmen were with difficulty landed at another spot on the coast; here they wandered about in the darkness and storm, until one of them becoming separated from the others gave himself up, and the discovery of his companions soon followed. The result of the trial was that the officers were, of course, sent to the hulks, the master of the _Freeholder_ was transported for life, four of his men for seven years, and the _aiders acquitted_. This appears curious justice, which can only be explained by presuming that the magistrates, or rather the Admiralty, often found it politic to get escape-aiders into their service in this way.