According to the log, _five_ prisoners, not eleven, died on the voyage, the deaths and burials at sea being precisely recorded.
So here we have the official record that, while the ship's company were too much enfeebled by sickness to work the pumps--in addition, of course, to constant handling of the heavy sails and spars in tempestuous weather--the American prisoners were sufficiently robust to perform this duty, and probably save the vessel from serious peril through her leaky condition.
In order to do this they must have been called on deck and mustered, placed in watches, and subsequently summoned in regular turn for their "spell" at the pumps.
This story is obviously incompatible with the other, and it is, to say the least of it, very remarkable that this pumping in watches, and full provision allowance, should have been entirely forgotten by Barney in his narration.
It is certainly open to any one, in view of this omission, to question the accuracy of other statements; to hesitate before accepting the story of seventy-one men being confined in a space twenty feet by twelve and only six inches higher than an ordinary table; of eleven of them dying in shrieking delirium, denied medical attendance, and six out of eleven deaths being suppressed. The treatment of our American prisoners was undoubtedly sometimes unduly harsh, but it is impossible to accept this story as literally true.
Mr. Maclay's book and Mary Barney's memoirs are alike accessible to any one, and for this reason it is necessary that the other side should be heard--Joshua Barney having been a very prominent American privateersman.
While on the subject, it is as well to refer to the treatment of prisoners in Mill Prison, at Plymouth, of which Mr. Maclay has a good deal to say; and in support of his contention as to their being placed upon a different diet from other prisoners of war, he has two sentences in inverted commas (page 152), which are stated in a footnote to be quoted from the _Annual Register_ of 1781, page 152; but no such passages occur there, nor in adjacent pages.
It is, however, perfectly true that a petition was presented, on June 20th, 1781, to the House of Lords, and discussed on July 2nd following, from these prisoners. The only complaint which was found to be substantiated was that the Americans were allowed half a pound less bread daily than the French and other nationalities. It would have been more accurate to put it that the French had half a pound more--for this was stated to be supplied, as being equal to the allowance to British prisoners in France. The question of increasing the allowance was put to the vote, and negatived; but it was shown that the American prisoners' diet was, as a whole, superior to that allowed to our own troops on board transports; and their health was stated to be excellent, which is borne out by the fact, as stated by Mr. Maclay, that they indulged in athletic games as a pastime. Men who are half naked and nearly starving do not indulge in such pastimes.