American Suffering Aboard the HMS Jersey
The prison ships used by the British throughout the course of the Revolutionary War were nothing less than a nightmare for tens of thousands of American prisoners. The most infamous of these prisons was the HMS Jersey. The HMS Jersey, colloquially called Jersey, was previously a sixty-four-gun man-of-war that was now old and run down, but it turned into the most infamous of all the British prison ships. Silas Talbot, who was a prisoner aboard Jersey, said,
“The scantiness of the allowance, the bad quality of the provisions, the brutality of the guards, and the sick, pining for comforts they could not obtain, altogether furnished continually one of the greatest scenes of human distress and misery ever beheld… The Jersey prison-ship had been as destructive as a field of battle.”1
This analogy would prove to be true as it is estimated that between 8,500-18,000 men died in British prison ships throughout the duration of the Revolutionary War.2
Christopher Hawkins was just a boy apprenticing to learn the tanner’s trade when war broke out between the thirteen colonies and Great Britain. In 1777, with patriotism and adventure in mind, Hawkins ran away from this apprenticeship and enlisted as a privateer. When his ship was subsequently captured by the British, he would soon face the cruel reality of life on a British prison ship.
When Hawkins first stepped on board the vessel, there were approximately eight hundred prisoners being held there. There were no benches to sit upon or ample room to lie down. There was no ventilation in the prison, making any fresh air that the prisoners were able to get extremely precious. Sickness swept over the prisoners like a rolling tide. Dysentery was the primary culprit leaving many prisoners dead or dying. Thomas Andros, who was a prisoner aboard Jersey, described the situation as follows, “All the most deadly diseases were pressed into the service of the king of terrors, but his prime ministers were dysentery, small-pox, and yellow fever.”3 The miasma of death, sickness, and despair gave the dank, gloomy prison a hopeless and morbid ambience that shook the Americans to the core. Food was as scarce as freedom for these prisoners, with many of them reduced to eating the vermin they scavenged on the ground or found in their clothes. Many desperately tried to steal food only to be met by severe British repercussions in the form of the lash, the whip, and the closed fist. Through Hawkins' eyes, The HMS Jersey lived up to its nickname of the “floating hell”.” 4
Not resigned to his fate, Hawkins was determined to escape and devised a plan that led to his freedom from Jersey after a mere two days aboard the ship. Following his escape, he heard several stories about other prisoners who tried to escape, but were immediately killed, or caught then punished severely. Hawkins had survived the HMS Jersey, where thousands of his fellow patriots had suffered and died.
The prison ships deployed by the British were some of the most frightening and despairing places for one to be. A cornucopia of sickness, hunger, agony, and death plagued the ships like rats. It was aboard The HMS Jersey where Christopher Hawkins came face to face with the horrible realities which tens of thousands of Americans were forced to endure. The British prison ships pushed its prisoners to some of the most extreme conditions known to man. Despite all of this, Hawkins was one of the fortunate ones to survive and share his ordeal with the world.
1.) Hawkins, Christopher, “The Adventures of Christopher Hawkins” New York: Privately printed (1864): pp. 11.
2.) Ibid., pp.64
3.) Hawkins, Christopher, “The Adventures of Christopher Hawkins” New York: Privately printed (1864): pp. 11.
4.) 4 Ibid., pp. 22-60.