Читать книгу Prisoners of War in Britain 1756 to 1815. A record of their lives, their romance and their sufferings онлайн
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FRANCIS ABELL
London, 1914.
CHAPTER I
INTERNATIONAL RECRIMINATIONS
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He who, with the object of dealing fairly and squarely with that interesting and unaccountably neglected footnote to British history, the subject of prisoners of war in Britain, has sifted to the best of his ability all available sources of information both at home and abroad, as the present writer has done, feels bound to make answer to the questions:
1. Did we of Britain treat our prisoners of war with the brutality alleged by foreign writers almost without exception?
2. Did our Government sin in this respect more than did other Governments in their treatment of the prisoners taken from us?
As an Englishman I much regret to say in reply to the first question, that, after a very rigorous examination of authorities and weighing of evidence, and making allowance for the not unnatural exaggeration and embellishment by men smarting under deprivation of liberty, I find that foreigners have not unduly emphasized the brutality with which we treated a large proportion of our prisoners of war, and I am fairly confident that after a study of the following pages my readers will agree with me.