Page:Devonshire Characters and Strange Events.djvu/783

Rh mile from the prison, when news reached him, whilst at mess, that there was a riot in the prison. He at once called out his grenadiers and marched to the prison, where he found firing going on, and he entered the inner yard and stopped the firing. The firing was done by the Somersetshire and Derbyshire militia.

10. Shortland at the same time or a little earlier, and conjointly with Joliffe, urged the soldiers to cease from firing.

Such, as far as can be made out from the account given by the witnesses on oath, both before the coroner and, subsequently, before the magistrates and the commissioners, appears to have been the sequence of events. Captain Shortland was not drunk at the time; indeed, as Dr. Magrath, the prison surgeon, testified that "having observed him on the evening of the 6th, no man could be more free from it; and from my acquaintance with him and with his general habits in his family, I do not think any man can be more abstemious."

Governor Thomas George Shortland, Captain, R.N., gave his account on oath later, before the commissioners, and from it he appears to have been unarmed and in undress. His account is very confused, and speaks for the condition of his mind at the time that he had lost his head, and did not know well what he did or did not do. It shall be given verbatim, only omitting unimportant particulars:— "On the evening of the 6th, a little before 7 o'clock, Mr. Holmsden, 1st clerk, came to my house and informed me there was a disposition of the prisoners to be riotous, as they had got between the railings and wall of No. 7 yard; in consequence, I walked down to the upper gate. On coming there, I was informed the prison barrack wall had been breached. I went to the yard and saw a large hole, and the military guarding it