Great Britain-Naturalization. ican officer who shall hereafter fall into my power, to the number of forty-six, inclusive of those who had been confined previous to the receipt of your Excellency's letter, and so to keep them confined until I shall receive the further directions of His Majesty's Government on this subject. Extract of a letter from Major General Wilkinson to Lieutenant General Sir George Prevost, commanding the British forces in Canada, dated HEADQUARTERS, MALONE, Dec. 20, 1813. SIR: Your Excellency's letter of the 11th instant reached my outpost, on Chateaugai, the evening of the 18th, and came to my hand yesterday. I regret the resolution you have adopted in respect to the retaliatory system forced on the Executive of the United States by the resurrection of dormant pretensions which had ceased for a long time to torment mankind, and which (your Excellency will pardon the observation) have not been invariably asserted by the British Government. Several instances might be quoted to support the fact; but I will trespass the remarkable case of the late Major General Charles Lee only on your Excellency's attention, because it is most directly in point. Some time after the capture of that officer by Colonel Harcourt, his exchange was demanded by Congress, and refused by the British commander on the express grounds for which you now contend; in consequence of which, Lieutenant Colonel Campbell, of the seventy-first regiment, and five Hessian field officers, were thrown into ignominious confinement, as hostages for his safety; and here the contest terminated-the British Government yielding its pretensions, and admitting General Lee to be exchanged as an ordinary prisoner of war. But while I deplore the course you have marked out for your conduct, I should fail in courtesy if I did not acknowledge my obliga tions to you for the candid avowal of your intentions in respect to the American officers who may hereafter fall into your hands, because this avowal will, I flatter myself, constitute their safeguard against imprisonment. Extract of a letter from Colonel Thomas Barclay to the Commissary General of Prisoners, dated HARLEM, December 15, 1813. SIR: I have the honor to enclose you a copy of a letter received yesterday from Lieutenant Colonel Grant, of the militia of Lower Canada, dated from the jail at Worcester; and I have to request you will inform me for whom the nine British officers and the volunteer mentioned therein have been placed in a more than ordinary state of strict retaliatory confinement. I had understood from you, that the officers and men on whom you intended to retaliate for the fifty-nine soldiers sent to England, and the forty-six placed in close confinement, by way of retaliation, by his Excellency Sir George Prevost, were those at Newport and Chilicothe; and I am certain that the officers now in jail at Worcester, who are a part of the British troops captured by Commodore Chauncey on Lake Ontario, are a part of the British prisoners you promised me should be sent from Salem, in return for the military prisoners now daily expected from Nova Scotia. Why your original plan has been changed, and what British prisoners are intended to be released by you and sent to Halifax for the Americans expected at Salem, are questions to which I entreat your answer. I beg also to be informed on what principles you have directed restrictions, independent of the strictest imprisonment, to be exercised on them; and whether they receive the usual allowance of three shillings sterling per day. These are important questions to be resolved, and admit not of my being kept in sus pense. WORCESTER JAIL, December 6, 1813. SIR: From the tenor of your letter of the 22d of October, addressed to Lieutenant Colonel Myers, I was led to expect that an arrangement for the mutual exchange of prisoners had been made between the two Governments, by which the British prisoners then in the United States were to be immediately marched to Burlington for that purpose. On application to the deputy marshal at Pittsfield, I was informed that he had received a letter from the Commissary General of Prisoners, instructing him that all prisoners taken after the 5th of October were to be exchanged by the way of Halifax. It was in vain I complained of the unreasonableness of this measure. I was informed that the arrangement was decisive, and that a cartel was expected from Halifax in a short time for that purpose. Finding that it would be useless to make any further remonstrance, I proceeded to Worcester on my parole, that I might be enabled to take advantage of the opportunity which, I was informed, would shortly offer for my exchange. I have now the honor to inform you that, by an order from the President of the United States, I have, with the undermentioned officers, been placed in close confinement, notwithstanding the assurances which have been so frequently made to my being a militia officer, and the only inme of my being exchanged, without any regard stance of the kind which has presented itself during the war, that of a militia officer being even detained in the United States. Major Villette, Captain Zehender, } De Watteville's, Lieutenant Steele, 89th regiment, I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient ser- vant. THOMAS BARCLAY, Esq. Great Britain-Naturalization. HARLEM, December 21, 1813. SIR: In my letter to you of the 15th current, I stated, in addition to other matters, the more than ordinary severity of the treatment Colonel Grant and the nine other British prisoners, committed to Worcester jail by the Marshal of Massachusetts, experienced. I am since informed that, in order to render their situation still more unpleasant, they have, with the exception of one. been deprived of their servants, who have been marched to Boston or Salem as prisoners; and that their confinement, in every other respect, is the reverse of what gentlemen, even under sentence of death, ought to experience. I hope this treatment and privation have been exercised without the knowledge of the American Govern ment. and other British officers, confined in the State of Massachusetts, (first reminding you, as you have before been apprized, that it has been uniformly the practice of this Government, in matters of retaliation, to execute the measure intended before any official communication was made,) I have the honor to inform you that these officers have been so placed, to answer, in part, for the safety and proper treatment of the fortysix American officers, commissioned and noncommissioned, confined in the common jail at Quebec, a measure announced as determined on by the letter of the 17th October, from General Sir George Prevost to Major General Wilkinson, the execution of which was made known to me by your letter of the 26th November. Orders have been given for the confinement of other British commissioned officers in Massachusetts and elsewhere, to the number of forty-six, including those named by you, for the same purpose. So soon as the returns shall be received, they will be communicated to you. The treatment which the American officers in close confinement within His Majesty's colonies receive, is very different, and in every particular as liberal and comfortable as the nature of their imprisonment will permit. In proof of this, I enclose a copy of a letter published some days The reply to your inquiry, on what principle since in the Philadelphia Gazette, purporting to restrictions have been directed, independent of be a letter from a captain in the United States' the strictest imprisonment, to be exercised on service, a prisoner in Quebec, to his father. The your officers, is, that none such have been diletter, I consider, bears strong marks of authen-rected; and as to what you term more than orditicity. nary state of strict retaliatory confinement, since you have not been pleased to furnish me with any evidence of the manner in which our officers have been treated in their jail, it is not in my power to enter now upon that part of the subject. will assure you, however, that orders were given to show to your officers, whose close confinement has been made necessary by a previous act of your Government, all the mildness, and to afford them all the accommodation consistent with their unfortunate situation; and that the requisite inquiries have been made as to the execution of the intention of this Government. The paroles of these officers having been suspended, in lieu of the three shillings sterling per day, directions were given to supply their tables with good, plain fare, and their rooms with sufficient fuel and comfortable bedding; and, from the character of the marshal in whose custody they are, I cannot Having stated the treatment that British prisoners in these States, and American prisoners in His Majesty's dominions, both placed in strict confinement on retaliatory principles, receive, it rests with your Government to procure a contin-1 uation of the same comforts and conveniences to its prisoners which they now enjoy, by immediately directing that similar indulgences be extended to British subjects in these States under similar circumstances; or to compel His Majesty's Government to direct that the same severity be exercised towards American prisoners which His Majesty's subjects experience under their confinement in these States. Should your Government, upon this representation, think proper to adopt the former of these alternatives, you will be pleased to return me the enclosed letter. On the contrary, should a continuance of the severity and privation be consid-doubt that this has been done. ered necessary on the part of the United States, permit me to request that you will do me the favor to forward the enclosed letter, by a flag of truce, to his excellency Lieutenant General Sir George Prevost. You could never have understood from me, sir, that it was intended to retaliate, at any given place, for the violent conduct of your Government in placing in jail forty-six of our officers at Quebec. This highly offensive and novel pro time you last left the seat of Government, and you will find nothing written from me to that A return of the servants to the officers is neces-cedure was not known in this country at the sary, or at least in the proportion of one servant to two officers. I am under the necessity of requesting an answer to this. I have the honor to be, sir, your obedient servant, THOMAS BARCLAY. General MASON, &C. Extract of a letter from the Commissary General of WASHINGTON, December 26, 1813. SIR: In reply to your inquiries of the 15th instant, relative to Lieutenant Colonel Grant, effect. There is no doubt that the British officers now imprisoned at Worcester, in Massachusetts, to whom you allude, make part of the troops I proposed should have been sent to Halifax, by return of the British cartel which you engaged should bring over to Salem, from that place, such of our land troops as had been carried there from Quebec; nor is there less doubt that the forty-six American officers, a list of whom you have furnished me in your letter of the 26th November, are part of the American prisoner troops you en Great Britain—Naturalization. gaged with me should be immediately released from Canada; the soldiers and non-commissioned officers to be delivered on the lines, and the commissioned officers to be paroled, to return directly on the reception of your despatches by your com-positively denied, as having been in any degree manding officer in Canada, in return for a like number to be released to you; with which arrangement your commanding General in Canada has refused to comply, even as to those he yet holds there, uninterfered with by retaliatory measures. When your cartel shall arrive from Halifax with American prisoners, I shall have from the adjacent depots a corresponding number of British prisoners to be returned by her. But in the uncertainty of a disposition according with your arrangements, as evinced by the late experiment in Canada, it is certainly best for your prisoners, and most prudent on my part, that they should not be removed until we are more certainly informed of the coming of our prisoners. OFFICE COMM'RY GEN'L OF PRISONERS, WASHINGTON, Dec. 26, 1813. must see the impossibility of making them as comfortable as, from their habits and rank in life, would be otherwise desirable. But that they have been treated with unnecessary severity is directed or countenanced by the Government, nor is it believed as practised by the officer in whose charge they are." You might, sir, at least, on this occasion, have refrained from attributing unworthy motives. If their servants have been withdrawn, they shall be restored so soon as it is ascertained that our officers, closely confined, receive that accommodation. It is the intention of this Government to make their situation in every respect similar to that of our officers held in prison, and, to that end, we shall be very glad to receive from you any information you may be able to communicate; but you must permit me, sir, to say, that we cannot take the anonymous newspaper paragraphs you have sent for authority on that subject. You will remark, sir, by the documents sent you in my letter of yesterday, that Colonel Gard SIR: In your letter of the 26th ultimo, trans-ner, our agent at Quebec, has been refused permitting copy of a letter from Sir George Prevost have been able to give me any information about mission to visit them; he may, therefore, not of the 27th October, and a list of forty-six Ameri- their situation. I have the honor to be, &c. can officers confined in jail at Quebec, you offer J. MASON. to furnish, if desired, a copy of a letter from Earl Bathurst to Sir George Prevost; as that paper forms part of the documents in the case to which your communication has reference, I will thank you to send it to me. Returns of all the prisoners, confined in retaliation in this country, shall be sent you as soon as they can be made complete. I have, &c. J. MASON. Col. THOMAS BARCLAY, &c. OFFICE COMM'RY GEN'L OF PRISONERS, WASHINGTON, Dec. 29, 1813. SIR: In answer to your letter of the 21st inst., I beg leave to assure you, that it is very far from the intention of this Government, or the desire of any of its officers charged with that painful service, to cause to be felt by British officers confined in retaliation for the American officers put in jail in Quebec, more inconvenience than has been made necessary by the conduct of the enemy in regard to our officers, on whose account they are so held. Before you advanced such a declaration as the following: "I am since informed that, in order to render their situation still more unpleasant, they have, with the exception of one, been deprived of their servants, who have been marched to Boston, or Salem, as prisoners; and that their confinement, in every other respect, is the reverse of what gentlemen, even under the sentence of death, ought to experience. I hope this treatment and privation have been exercised without the knowledge of the American Government;" it is to be regretted that you had not taken pains to have been better informed. The unfortunate situation of these gentlemen is sincerely to be lamented; when confined in a jail, however, you Col. THOMAS BARCLAY, &C. I, Timothy Whiting, of Lancaster, in the county Worcester on the day of the commitment of the of Worcester, do testify and say, that being at British officers, (meaning those who had been at Worcester on parole,) I heard the marshal direct Doctor Lincoln (his reputed agent for taking care of prisoners) to be particularly careful, and see that they were treated with great humanity, and well provided with good and wholesome provisions, bedding, &c. The marshal appeared very solicitous that the humanity of the United States should not suffer from any neglect in this respect; and he observed to Doctor Lincoln, that by the cartel three shillings sterling per day was allowed to each gentleman for subsistence, and he presumed there would be no objection to his allowing to the extent of four dollars per week; that it was not intended that these officers should be served with prison beds, as, for this additional sum, the jailor would provide good, comfortable beds for them. This was fully acquiesced in by Doctor Lincoln and myself, and our official situation, as county officers connected with the jail, enabled us to know, and to state to the marshal, that it was in the power of the jailer to furnish as good bedding as is generally found in the best public houses in Worcester, and we had no doubt of the jailer's humane disposition. These observations were made to the marshal, from the solicitude he discovered to have the officers treated with all the kindness and attention which, he said, he thought was due to men so peculiarly situated as these officers were, and which could be done consistent with their safe-keeping. TIMOTHY WHITING. And you are further instructed to notify to Ma Extract of a letter from Colonel Barclay to the Com- jor General Dearborn, that the commanders of missary General of Prisoners. JANUARY 6, 1814. Agreeably to your request of the 26th ultimo, I enclose a copy of Earl Bathurst's letter to Lieutenant General Sir George Prevost of the 12th of August. DOWNING STREET, Aug. 12, 1813. SIR: I have had the honor of receiving your despatch No. 66, of the 6th June, enclosing a letter addressed to your Excellency by Major General Dearborn. In this letter it is stated that the American Commissary of Prisoners in London had made it known to his Government, that twenty-three soldiers, of the first, sixth, and thirteenth regiments United States' infantry, made prisoners, had been sent to England, and held in close confinement as British subjects; and that Major General Dearborn had received instructions from his Government to put into close confinement twenty-three British soldiers, to be kept as hostages for the safe-keeping and restoration, in exchange, of the soldiers of the United States who had been sent, as above stated, to England; and General Dearborn apprizes you, that, in obedience to those instructions, he had put twentythree British soldiers in close confinement, to be kept as hostages. The persons referred to in this letter were soldiers serving in the American army, taken prisoners at Queenstown, and sent home by you, that they might be disposed of according to the pleasure of His Royal Highness the Prince Regent, they having declared themselves to be British born subjects. Your Excellency has been directed to send home the necessary evidence upon this point, and they are held in custody to undergo a legal trial. You will lose no time in communicating to Major General Dearbon that you have transmitted home a copy of his letter to you, and that you are, in consequence, instructed distinctly to state to him that you have received the commands of His Royal Highness the Prince Regent forthwith to put in close confinement forty-six American officers and non-commissioned officers, to be held as hostages for the safe-keeping of the twenty-three British soldiers stated to have been put in close confinement by order of the American Government; and you will, at the same time, apprize him that, if any of the said British soldiers shall suffer death, by reason that the soldiers now under confinement here have been found guilty, and that the known law, not only of Great Britain, but of every independent State, under similar circumstances, has been in consequence exe His Majesty's armies and fleets on the coasts of America have received instructions to prosecute the war with unmitigated severity against all cities, towns, and villages, belonging to the United States, and against the inhabitants thereof, if, after this communication shall have been duly made to Major General Dearborn, and a reasonable time given for its being transmitted to the American Government, that Government shall unhappily not be deterred from putting to death any of the soldiers who now are, or who may hereafter be, kept as hostages, for the purposes stated in the letter from Major General Dearborn. I have the honor to be, &c. BATHURST. To Sir GEORGE PREVOST, Bart.&c. Extract of a letter from the Commissary General of Prisoners to Colonel Thomas Barclay. WASHINGTON, Jan. 26, 1814. SIR: I have the honor to enclose you extracts of letters lately received from Colonel Gardner, American agent for prisoners in Canada, to wit: one of the 25th of November and 17th of December, and a copy of a letter from him of the 10th of December, accompanied by copies of a correspondence between him and General Glasgow, to say, of the 8th and 9th of December from Colonel Gardner, and of the 9th and 10th from General Glasgow. By these you will perceive that now the American agent is barred altogether from visiting any prisoner in confinement, and that when he is permitted even to go into the lower town of Quebec, where no prisoners are held, to purchase any articles or transact any business for them, he is guarded and restricted to a few hours. In consequence of the last paragraph of the letter from Colonel Gardner of the 17th of December, and the relaxation of the commanding officer in Canada, towards some of our officers, I have with pleasure found myself enabled to ameliorate, in a degree, the situation of your officers of corresponding rank. I have instructed the Marshal of Kentucky to offer to the British field officers now confined at Frankfort a parole, restricting them to such houses and their premises as they can most conveniently be located in; in this order I have included Majors Chambers and Muir, understanding that they are majors by brevet, and Captain Crowther, because he has his family with him; to his lady and two small children, who, I understand, compose his family, I have directed to be paid subsistence equal to one and a half of the sum of the allowance to officers of the rank Great Britain-Naturalization. of her husband, to wit: at the rate of four shillings and sixpence sterling per day. I enclose you a list of all the officers now confined in the State of Kentucky; so soon as I can receive the reports from the other marshals, they shall be furnished. Extract of a letter from Colonel Thomas Barclay to the Commissary General of Prisoners. JANUARY 27, 1814. I am directed to acquaint you that, if it is the wish of your Government to release the whole or a part of the officers and men now in confinement on retaliatory measures, on its releasing British prisoners so confined, a similar number of American prisoners under the same kind of confinement, and of the same rank, shall be forthwith released in Canada and Nova Scotia, and be succeeded by an immediate exchange. Extract of a letter from the Commissary General of FEBRUARY 3, 1814. In your letter of the 27th of January, you state that you are directed to acquaint me, that if it is the wish of this Government to release the whole or a part of the officers and men now in confinement on retaliatory measures, on the release of British prisoners so confined, a similar number of American prisoners under the same kind of confinement, and of the same rank, shall be forthwith released in Canada and Nova Scotia. the proposal therein contained to relate to a general exchange of all the prisoners of war, including those under confinement on retaliatory principles. In answer to your question, whether it was intended to include in my proposal to you "those for whose confinement measures of retaliation have been resorted to," I beg leave to say it was not. With respect to characters of that description, I have no authority to make any proposition. Extract of a letter from the Commissary General of Prisoners to Thomas Steele, Esq., Deputy Marshal of Ohio, dated WASHINGTON, Jan. 29, 1814. It has become necessary, in order to meet by corresponding measures the treatment used by the enemy towards our officers in their power, to confine all British officers remaining in your custody. of War to Lieutenant Colonel Campbell, comI'enclose you a despatch from the Department manding officer at Chilicothe, requesting him to furnish an officer and guard to conduct safely to Kentucky such of the British officers as you may deliver him. You will keep the contents of this despatch entirely to yourself, until you see and deliver the despatch to Colonel Campbell, and you will consult confidentially with him as to the measures to be taken to secure all the officers before any alarm is excited, in order to prevent escapes. By your last returns it appears that you held, of the army, two cadets; of the navy, five lieutanants, two masters, three midshipmen, and six masters' mates. These and other officers or cadets of the British army or navy you may hold, of rank not lower than those designated, if I should have mistaken your returns, are by order of the President immediately to be placed in close confinement, and delivered to Colonel Campbell, to be conducted to Frankfort, in Kentucky, there to be delivered to the Marshal of that State. If you mean that all officers and men, prisoners of war, on either side, who have been confined in retaliation, or for whose confinement measures of retaliation have been resorted to, shall now be released by both Governments, your proposition will be promptly assented to; or if it is meant that leaving in each case which has occurred, those who constituted the first step of rigorous confinement on each side, to stand the one designation against the other, and to release all others held in retaliation by either nation, it will be as readily agreed to, and stipulated that exchanges. You will be pleased, as requested in the former for those so released, according to rank and equiv-order on a similar occasion, to conduct this proalent, shall immediately follow. cedure with all the humanity and tenderness the If I have understood you correctly as to either case may be susceptible of, guarding always mode of proceeding on this important subject, against risk of escape; and you will pay all the I am instructed, sir, to inform you that this Gov- officers up the arrearages due to the time that the ernment will enter with the least possible delay paroles are suspended, and see every justice done on such arrangements as may be found best cal-them in settling their accounts, &c., with the inculated to relieve the sufferings of the unfortunate habitants. persons implicated on both sides. Extract of a letter from Colonel Thomas Barclay to the Commissary General of Prisoners, dated FEBRUARY 10, 1814. Your letter of the 4th instant I have received. I had hoped I had expressed myself with so much perspicuity in my letter of the 27th of January, that my meaning would have been perfectly understood by you. If you will examine that letter, you will find Extract of a letter from the Commissary General of The British authorities at Quebec and Halifax having thought proper to confine closely a number of officers, (over and above the forty-six first confined at Quebec,) on plea of retaliation for their officers confined in the United States, to be held for the safety and proper treatment of these, I am commanded by the President to instruct |