346 HISTORY OF BROOKLYN.

Frequently the dying, in the last mortal throes of dissolution, would throw themselves across their sick comrades, who, unable to remove the lifeless bodies, were compelled to wait until morning before they could be freed from the horrid burden. Dysentery, small-pox, yellow fever, and the recklessness of despair, soon filled the hulk with filth of the most disgusting character. “The lower -hold,” says Andros, “and the orlop deck, were such a terror, that no man would venture down into them. Humanity would have dictated a more merciful treatment to a band of pirates, who had been condemned and were only awaiting the gibbet, than to have sent them here.”(1) And, again: “Utter derangement was a common symptom of yellow-fever, and to increase the horror of the darkness that shrouded us (for we were allowed no light betwixt decks), the voice of warning would be heard, ‘Take heed to yourselves; there is a madman stalking through the ship, with a knife in his hand.’ I sometimes found the man a corpse in the morning, by whose side I laid myself down at night. At another time he would become deranged and attempt, in darkness, to rise, and stumble over the bodies that everywhere covered the deck. In this case, I had to hold him in his place by main strength. In spite of my efforts, he would sometimes rise, and then I had to close in with him, trip up his heels, and lay him again upon the deck. While so many were sick with raging fever, there was a loud cry for water; but none could be had, except on the upper deck, and but one allowed to ascend at a time. The suffering then from the rage of thirst during the night, was very great. Nor was it at all times safe to attempt to go up. Provoked by the continual cry for leave to ascend, when there was already one on deck, the sentry would push them back with his bayonet”(2) This guard, which usually numbered about thirty, was

1 Old Jersey Captive, p. 16.

2 William Burke, a prisoner on board the Jersey for about fourteen months dur Ing the Revolution, says: “During that time, among other cruelties which were committed, I have known many of the American prisoners put to death by the bayonet: in particular, I well recollect, that it was the custom, on board the ship for but one prisoner at a time to be admitted on deck at night, besides the guards or sentinels. One night, while the prisoners were many of them assembled at the grate at the hatchway, for the purpose of obtaining fresh air, and waiting their turn to go on deck, one of the sentinels thrust his bayonet down among them, and in the mornIng twenty-five of them were found wounded, and stuck in the head, and dead of the