Читать книгу Prisoners of War in Britain 1756 to 1815. A record of their lives, their romance and their sufferings онлайн

65 страница из 159

No amount of investigation, not the most careful sifting of evidence, can blind our eyes to the fact that the British prison hulks were hells upon water. It is not that the mortality upon them was abnormal: it was greater than in the shore prisons, but it never exceeded 3 per cent upon an average, although there were periods of epidemic when it rose much higher. It is that the lives of those condemned to them were lives of long, unbroken suffering. The writer, as an Englishman, would gladly record otherwise, but he is bound to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. True it is that our evidence is almost entirely that of prisoners themselves, but what is not, is that of English officers, and theirs is of condemnation. It should be borne in mind that the experiences we shall quote are those of officers and gentlemen, or at any rate educated men, and the agreement is so remarkable that it would be opening the way to an accusation of national partiality if we were to refuse to accept it.