Part 69

Barney gazed intently at the stranger.

"You're right," said he. "Load the three-pounder with grape-shot."

"And here's a crow-bar as'll top it off nice," put in a sailor.

Captain Robinson laughed.

"Yes, spike her in, too. She'll plunk a hole clear through th' rascal," he cried. "I'll touch her off myself."

The British gun-boat drew nearer and nearer. Just as she was within striking distance--about ten yards--the three-pounder was touched off with a deaf'ning roar.

"So accurate was the aim," says an old historian, "that the British were completely baffled in their attempt; their foresails and all their weather foreshrouds being cut away."

"Give her a broadside!" called out Captain Robinson, as the brig sheered off in order to support its foremast, which tottered with its own weight; the rigging which supported it, being half cut away. And, as he spoke--the crew let drive a shower of balls and grape-shot. It was the last volley.

The Pomona kept upon her course, while the white sails of the attacker grew fainter and fainter upon the horizon.

"I saw her name as she ranged in close to us," said Joshua Barney, slapping Captain Robinson on the back. "And it was the Rosebud."

"I reckon that Rosebud has no thorns left," chuckled Captain Robinson, and he was still chuckling when the little Pomona safely sailed into the harbor of Bordeaux in France. The voyage had been a success.

Here a store of guns, powder and shot was purchased, and, having shipped a cargo of brandy, and raised the crew to seventy men, the staunch, little vessel set sail for America.

Not three days from the coast of France the cry of "Sail ho!" startled all on board, and, upon the starboard quarter--loomed a British privateer. Upon nearer view she was seen to have sixteen guns and seventy men.

"All hands for a fight!" cried Robinson. "Don't let th' fellow escape."

Now was a hard battle. It lasted for full two hours, and--in the end--the Britisher struck, with twelve killed and a number wounded, while the American loss was but one killed and two wounded. The Pomona kept upon her course, jubilantly.

But the saucy ship was not to have all smooth sailing. She was soon captured--by whom it is not known--and stout "Josh" Barney became a prisoner of war. In December, 1780, with about seventy American officers, he was placed on board the Yarmouth--a sixty-four-gun brig--and was shipped to England.

Now listen to the treatment given him according to a contemporaneous historian. Did you ever hear of anything more atrocious? Peace--indeed--had more horrors than war in the year 1780.

"From the time these Americans stepped aboard the Yarmouth their captors gave it to be understood, by hints and innuendos, that they were being taken to England 'to be hanged as rebels;' and, indeed the treatment they received aboard the Yarmouth on the passage over, led them to believe that the British officers intended to cheat the gallows of their prey, by causing the prisoners to die before they reached port.

"On coming aboard the ship-of-the-line, these officers were stowed away in the lower hold, next to the keel, under five decks, and many feet below the water-line. Here, in a twelve-by-twenty-foot room, with upcurving floor, and only three feet high, the seventy-one men were kept for fifty-three days, like so much merchandise--without light or good air--unable to stand upright, with no means to get away.

"Their food was of the poorest quality, and was supplied in such insufficient quantities, that, whenever one of the prisoners died, the survivors concealed the fact, in order that the dead man's allowance might be added to theirs. The water which they were served to drink was atrocious.

"From the time the Yarmouth left New York till she reached Plymouth, in a most tempestuous winter passage, these men were kept in this loathsome dungeon. Eleven died in delirium; their wild ravings and piercing shrieks appalling their comrades, and giving them a foretaste of what they, themselves, might expect. Not even a surgeon was permitted to visit them.

"Arriving at Plymouth, the pale, emaciated men were ordered to come on deck. Not one obeyed, for they were unable to stand upright. Consequently they were hoisted up, the ceremony being grimly suggestive of the manner in which they had been treated,--like merchandise. And what were they to do, now that they had been placed on deck?

"The light of the sun, which they had scarcely seen for fifty-three days, fell upon their weak, dilated pupils with blinding force; their limbs were unable to uphold them, their frames wasted by disease and want. Seeking for support, they fell in a helpless mass, one upon the other, waiting and almost hoping for the blow that was to fall upon them next. Captain Silas Talbot was one of these unfortunate prisoners.

"To send them ashore in this condition was 'impracticable,' so the British officers said, and we readily discover that this 'impracticable' served the purpose of diverting the indignation of the land's folk, which sure would be aroused, if they knew that such brutality had been practiced under the cross of St. George (the cross upon the British flag).

"Waiting, then, until the captives could, at least, endure the light of day, and could walk without leaning on one another, or clutching at every object for support, the officers had them removed to the old Mill Prison."

This story has been denied, for the reason that the log of the Yarmouth shows that she was forty-four and not fifty-three days at sea, and the captain writes:

"We had the prisoners 'watched' (divided into port and starboard watch) and set them to the pumps. I found it necessary so to employ them, the ship's company, from their weak and sickly state, being unequal to that duty, and, on that account to order them whole allowance of provisions."

It would have been impossible for men to be in the condition which the first historian describes if they had to man the pumps. It would have been impossible for them to have done an hour's work. Therefore, I, myself, believe the second story. Don't you?