Prisoners in the American Revolutionary War

During the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783) the management and treatment of prisoners of war (POW) was very different from the standards of modern warfare. Modern standards, as outlined in the Geneva Conventions, expect captives to be held and cared for by their captors. One primary difference in the eighteenth century was that care and supplies for captives were expected to be provided by their own army, their government, or private resources.

However, it was not until seven years into the conflict and only one year before the Treaty of Paris (1783) officially ended the war, and primarily only as a consequence of the Battle of Yorktown in 1781 resulting in the second British army of the war being captured, that American combatants were finally recognized by the British Parliament as POWs in 1782.

Background

Throughout the war, there were exchanges of prisoners. These were made in the field or at higher levels of organization. Usually high ranking officer exchanges were negotiated for specifically named people. There were some exchanges based on numbers for random lower ranking people, but these were limited.

Three other aspects were different from those normally seen in modern warfare. The first is that letters were permitted and sometimes even encouraged. Prisoners could buy or exchange for food and clothing, including any money sent by their families. The second was the use of 'Parole' by both sides. This would allow prisoners some freedom, in exchange for their promise not to resume the war. The last is that prisoners were encouraged to enlist in the army of the other side. Over the course of the war, as much as a quarter of each army had actually seen service on the other side.Fact|date=July 2007

American prisoners

George III of Great Britain had declared American forces traitors in 1775, which denied them prisoner of war status. However, British strategy in the early conflict included pursuit of a negotiated settlement and therefore officials declined to try and/or hang them, the usual procedure for treason, to avoid unnecessarily risking any public sympathy the British might have enjoyed in the Americas. The Continental Army capture of a British army at the Battle of Saratoga in 1777 resulted in thousands of British prisoners in the hands of the Americans. This had the effect of further disuading British officials from hanging prisoners, despite the abandoned hopes of a settlement by this stage, as they feared reprisals on prisoners being held by the Americans. Neither policy, however, prevented the British from treating common American military members being held prisoner far more harshly than the standards of the day for POWs allowed. In actuality, a malicious British neglect resulted in starvation and disease slowly and torturously achieving the same results as hanging for many American prisoners, or disbility and inhumane suffering for most others who were not officers or otherwise likely to be useful in prisoner exchanges.

The British forces held relatively few places in strength for long periods. American prisoners tended to be accumulated at these sites. New York City was the major site; Philadelphia in 1777 and later Charleston, South Carolina, were also important. Facilities at these places were limited. At times the occupying army was actually larger than the total civilian population.

The British solution to this problem was to use obsolete, captured, or damaged ships as prisons. Conditions were appalling, and many more Americans died of neglect while imprisoned than were killed in the war. While the Continental Army named a commissary to supply them, the task was almost impossible. Elias Boudinot, as one of these commissaries, was competing with other agents seeking to gather supplies for George Washington's army at Valley Forge.

During the war, at least 16 hulks, including the infamous HMS "Jersey", were placed by British authorities in the waters of Wallabout Bay off the shores of Brooklyn, New York as a place of incarceration for many thousands of American soldiers and sailors during about 1776–83. Over 10,000 of these prisoners died from intentional neglect. Their corpses were often tossed overboard, though sometimes they were buried in shallow graves along the eroding shoreline. Many of the remains became exposed or washed up and were recovered by local women over the course of following years, later to be interred nearby in the Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument at Fort Greene Park, once the scene of a portion of the Battle of Long Island. [Stiles, Henry Reed. "Letters from the prisons and prison-ships of the revolution." Thomson Gale, December 31, 1969. ISBN 978-1432812225] [Dring, Thomas and Greene, Albert. "Recollections of the Jersey Prison Ship" (American Experience Series, No 8). Applewood Books. November 1, 1986. ISBN 978-0918222923] [Taylor, George. "Martyrs To The Revolution In The British Prison-Ships In The Wallabout Bay." (originally printed 1855) Kessinger Publishing, LLC. October 2, 2007. ISBN 978-0548592175.] [Banks, James Lenox. "Prison ships in the Revolution: New facts in regard to their management." 1903.] [Hawkins, Christopher. "The life and adventures of Christopher Hawkins, a prisoner on board the 'Old Jersey' prison ship during the War of the Revolution." Holland Club. 1858.] [Andros, Thomas. "The old Jersey captive: Or, A narrative of the captivity of Thomas Andros...on board the old Jersey prison ship at New York, 1781. In a series of letters to a friend." W. Peirce. 1833.] [ Lang, Patrick J.. "The horrors of the English prison ships, 1776 to 1783, and the barbarous treatment of the American patriots imprisoned on them." Society of the Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick, 1939.] [Onderdonk. Henry. "Revolutionary Incidents of Suffolk and Kings Counties; With an Account of the Battle of Long Island and the British Prisons and Prison-Ships at New York." Associated Faculty Press, Inc. June, 1970. ISBN 978-0804680752.] [West, Charles E.. "Horrors of the prison ships: Dr. West's description of the wallabout floating dungeons, how captive patriots fared." Eagle Book Printing Department, 1895.]

Additionally, Continental Army prisoners from Cherry Valley were held by Loyalists at Fort Niagara near Niagara Falls and at Fort Chambly near Montreal.Campbell, William W.: "Annals of Tyron County; or, the Border Warfare of New-York during the Revolution", J. & J. Harper, New York (1831) pp. 110–11, 182, regarding prisoners (i.e., Lt. Col. William Stacy) held at Fort Niagara.] McHenry, Chris: "Rebel Prisoners at Quebec 1778-1783, Being a List of American Prisoners Held by the British during the Revolutionary War", Lawrenceburg, Indiana (1981) regarding prisoners held at Fort Chambly.]

British prisoners

Some British and Hessian prisoners were paroled to American farmers. Their labor made up for shortages caused by the number of men serving in the American army. Usually their return was room and board, supplied by the contractor.

References

Further reading

* Joseph Lee Boyle (editor); "Their Distress is Almost Intolerable: The Elias Boudinot Letterbook, 1777-1778"; 2002, Heritage Books (paperback), ISBN 0-7884-2210-3.
* Dandridge, Danske. "American Prisoners of the Revolution". Baltimore. Genealogical Publishing Company. 1911. (reprinted 1967)
* Armbruster. Eugene L. "The Wallabout Prison Ships: 1776-1783". New York, 1920.

External links

* [http://www.usmm.net/revdead.html List of Prison Ships]
* [http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig/north5.html Britain's Prison Ships, 1776-1783]