Page:Devonshire Characters and Strange Events.djvu/800

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DEVONSHIRE CHARACTERS

or otherwise he should be obliged to use means which he should be very sorry for. That the prisoners were very riotous, calling out 'Keeno' several times, and advanced instead of retiring, when some of the soldiers came to a charge, and this informant made the best of his way to the rear, and just after he got in the rear he heard a single musket, and soon after he heard several muskets discharged, but the muskets were at first elevated high, that he does not think a single shot touched either of the prisoners … when some of them called out, 'Fire, you ——, you have no shot in your guns,' when the military fired again, … and almost immediately he heard Capt. Shortland call for the turnkeys to help the wounded away. That this informant did not hear any person give any orders to fire, that he was near to Capt. Shortland when the firing first begun, and if Capt. Shortland had given any orders to fire he thinks that he must have heard them. … That he did not see the prisoners armed with any offensive weapons, nor did he see them throw any stones at the military."[1]

Stephen Hall, one of the turnkeys, gave information almost identical with that of Richard Arnold. He did not hear any orders given to fire.

Richard Cephus, an American prisoner of war, gave no evidence of value, as he was not present in the affray.

George Magrath, surgeon of the hospital at the prison. Hearing the alarm bell he ran from his dwelling into the Market Square, where he saw a line of soldiers drawn up and the prisoners breaking out at the inner gate. "He advanced towards them and began to exhort them to return quietly into the prison

  1. The stone-throwing did not take place in the outer yard or Market Square where these two warders were, but later in the inner yard.