After this I visited two Hospitals of our Sick
Prisoners, and the Sugar House:--in the two first were 211 Prisoners,
and in the last about 190. They acknowledged that for about two
months past they fared pretty well, being allowed two pounds of good
Beef and a proportion of flour or Bread per week, by Mr. Lewis, My
Agent, over and above the allowance received from the British, which
was professed to be two thirds allowance; but before they had suffered
much from the small allowance they had received, and and that their
Bread was very bad, being mostly biscuit, but that the British
soldiers made the same complaint as to the bread. From every account I
received I found that their treatment had been greatly changed for the
better within a few months past, except at the Provost. They all
agreed that previous to the capture of General Burgoyne, and for some
time after, Their treatment had been cruel beyond measure. That the
Prisoners in the French church, amounting on an average to three or
four hundred, could not all lay down at once, that from the 15th
October to the first January they never received a single stick of
wood, and that for the most part they eat their Pork Raw, when the
Pews and Door, and Wood on Facings failed them for fuel.
"But as to my own personal knowledge I found General Robertson very
ready to agree to every measure for alleviating the miseries of War
and very candidly admitted many faults committed by the inferior
Officers, and even the mistakes of the General himself, by hearkening
to the representations of those around him.
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