Great Britain -- History -- 18th century -- Sources; Pitt, William, Earl of Chatham, 1708-1778; Walpole, Robert, Earl of Orford, 1676-1745
+Source.+--T. B. Howell: _State Trials_. Vol. xvii., pp. 300-302.
The Committee of enquiry found amongst other things. That the said
Thomas Bambridge ... caused one Jacob Mendez Solas[10] ... to be seized,
fettered, and carried to Corbett's, the spunging-house, and there kept
for upwards of a week, and when brought back into the prison, Bambridge
caused him to be turned into the dungeon, called the Strong Room of the
Master's side.
This place is a vault like those in which the dead are interred, and
wherein the bodies of persons dying in the said prison are usually
deposited, till the coroner's inquest hath passed upon them; it has no
chimney nor fire-place, nor any light but what comes over the door, or
through a hole of about eight inches square. It is neither paved nor
boarded; and the rough bricks appear both on the sides and top, being
neither wainscotted nor plastered: what adds to the dampness and stench
of the place is, its being built over the common sewer.... In this
miserable place the poor wretch was kept by the said Bambridge, manacled
and shackled, for near two months. At length, on receiving five guineas
from Mr. Kemp, a friend of Solas's, Bambridge released the prisoner from
his cruel confinement. But though his chains were taken off, his terror
still remained, and the unhappy man was prevailed upon by that terror,
not only to labour _gratis_, for the said Bambridge, but to swear also
at random all that he hath required of him; and the Committee themselves
saw an instance of the deep impression his sufferings had made upon him;
for on his surmising, from something said, that Bambridge was to return
again, as Warden of the Fleet, he fainted, and the blood started out of
his mouth and nose.
[The sufferings of Captain John Mackpheadnis, who was ruined by being
surety for a man in the South Sea Bubble, are then narrated. He was
forced to pay double fees, his room, which he duly rented and had
himself furnished, was wrecked, and he was forced "to lie in the open
yard called the Bare," where the little hut he built was pulled down,
and he was exposed to the rain all night. Finally Bambridge used actual
torture.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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