I
shall give you nothing but a plain simple statement of facts that
cannot be controverted. And I begin my narrative from the time of my
leaving the South Carolina frigate.
"In June, 1782, I left the above-mentioned frigate in the Havana, on
board of which I had long served as a mid-ship-man, and made several
trading voyages. I sailed early in September, from Baltimore, for the
Havana, in a fleet of about forty sail, most of which were captured,
and we among the rest, by the British frigate, Ceres, Captain Hawkins,
a man in every sense of the word a perfect brute.
"Though our commander, Captain Hughes, was a very gentlemanly man, he
was treated in the most shameful and abusive manner by said Hawkins,
and ordered below to mess with the petty officers. Our officers were
put into the cable tier, with the crew, and a guard placed at the
hatchway to prevent more than two going on deck at a time. The
provisions were of the very worst kind, and very short allowance even
of them. They frequently gave us pea-soup, that is pea-water, for the
pease and the soup, all but about a gallon or two, were taken for the
ship's company, and the coppers filled up with water, and brought down
to us in a strap-tub. And Sir, I might have defied any person on
earth, possessing the most acute olfactory powers and the most refined
taste to decide, either by one or the other or both of these senses,
whether it was pease and water, slush and water, or swill.
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