Even his Majesty's enemies allow him great understanding. [fol. 87.] Nor has any one of them imputed breach of honour to him. His abilities and sense of our situation would move him to interpose in favour of his subjects, and are equal (if human abilities are so) to extricate us out of the various perplexities and intricacies we have been brought into by negotiations for thirty years, for the preservation of the balance of power, to the disappointment of every Briton's hope and the ridicule of all our enemies.
If you once think, my brethren, you must repent. If you repent you must make the constitution just reparation; which can only be done by calling in your lawful king, James the Third, who has justice to attempt and wisdom to compleat a thorough reformation in the constitution and to fix it in its pristine happy state; and which, in spite of all chicane and prejudice, without a restoration, will never be done.
[fol. 88.] I am to declare my happiness in having such a wife and daughter that forgive my involving them in my misfortunes, and having an undeserved share in them. I heartily thank them and wish them both temporal and eternal happiness, and hope that those who are friends to my King will look upon them as the relict and orphan of a fellow-subject that has suffered in the royal cause.
I glory in the honour I have had of seeing his royal highness, Charles, Prince Regent, and of being admitted into his confidence. And I here declare it the greatest happiness I ever knew and the highest satisfaction; and such as even my vainest thoughts could never have suggested to me – an honour to every rational creature that can judge of the many requisite virtues of a prince centred in him truly, tho' so often falsly assign'd to the worst. His character exceeds anything I could have imagined or conceived. An attempt to describe him [fol. 89.] would seem gross flattery, and nothing but a plain and naked narrative of his conduct to all persons and in all scenes he is engaged in can properly shew him, – a prince betrayed by the mercy he shewed his enemies, in judging of the dispositions of mankind by the benignity of his own. His fortitude was disarmed by it, and his ungrateful enemies think they have reaped the benefit of it. But let them not rejoice at his misfortunes, since his failure of success will, without the immediate interposition of providence, be absolutely their ruine. What a contrast is there between his royal highness the Prince and the Duke of Cumberland! The first displays his true courage in acts of humanity and mercy; the latter a cruelty in burning, devastation and destruction of the British subjects, their goods and possessions. I would ask, Who is the true heroe?
The report of my having betrayed his royal highness or his friends is scandalously false. My appeal to the counsel for the [fol. 90.] prosecution on my trial and my suffering death must refute it to all honest men. And I hereby declare I had rather suffer any death the law can inflict. I deem death infinitely preferable to a life of infamy. But the death I suffer for my King gives me vast consolation and honour that I am thought worthy of it.
To conclude, my brethren and fellow-subjects, I must make profession of that religion I was baptized, have continued and shall, through the Divine permission, die in, which is that of the Church of England, and which I hope will stand against the malice, devices and assaults of her enemies, as well those of the Church of Rome as those equally dangerous, the followers of Luther and Calvin, covered under and concealed in the [fol. 91.] specious bugbears of Papacy and arbitrary power. This my faith I have fully set forth in a poem of two books, intitled, The Christian Test, or, The Coalition of Faith and Reason, the first of which I have already published, and the latter I have bequeathed to the care of my unfortunate but very dutyful daughter, Mrs. Mary Morgan, to be published by her, since it has pleased God I shall not live to see it. To this poem I refer, which I hope will obviate all cavil to the contrary.
I freely forgive all my enemies, from the Usurper to Weir and Maddox, the infamous witnesses in support of his prosecutions of me. And I must also and do from my heart forgive my Lord Chief Justice50 for his stupid and inveterate zeal in painting my loyalty to my King with all the reproaches he had genius enough to bestow on it, when he passed sentence on seventeen at once, and which he did without precedent, because it was without concern.
[fol. 92.] I beg all I have offended that they will forgive me for Jesus Christ sake, my only Mediator and Advocate. To whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit be all adoration, praise, glory, dominion and power for ever. Amen!
Kennington Common, Wednesday, July 30, 1746.
The Speech of Mr. James Bradeshaw. 51
1746 28 Nov.
[fol. 93.] It would be a breach of duty in me to omit the last opportunity of doing justice to those who stood in need of it. I think it incumbent upon me the rather because I am the only Englishman in this part of the world who had the honour to attend his royal highness in Scotland.
When I first joined the King's forces I was induced by a principle of duty only, and I never saw any reason since to convince me that I was in the least mistaken. But, on the contrary, every day's experience has strengthened my opinion that what I did was right and necessary. That duty I discharged to the best of my power; and as I did not seek the reward of my service in this world, I have no doubt of receiving it in the next.
Under an opinion that I could do more good by marching [fol. 94.] with the army into Scotland than by remaining with the Manchester regiment at Carlisle, I obtained leave to be in my Lord Elcho's corps, for I was willing to be in action.
After the battle of Culloden I had the misfortune to fall into the hands of the most ungenerous enemy that I believe ever assum'd the name of a soldier, I mean the pretended Duke of Cumberland, and those under his command, whose inhumanity exceeded anything I could have imagined in a country where the bare mention of a God is allowed of. I was put into one of the Scotch kirks together with a great number of wounded prisoners who were stript naked and then left to die of their wounds without the least assistance; and tho' we had a surgeon of our own, a prisoner in the same place, yet he was not permitted to dress their wounds, but his instruments [fol. 95.] were taken from him on purpose to prevent it; and in consequence of this many expired in the utmost agonies. Several of the wounded were put on board the Jean, of Leith, and there died in lingering tortures. Our general allowance while we were prisoners there was half a pound of meal a day, which was sometimes increased to a pound, but never exceeded it; and I myself was a eye-witness that great numbers were starved to death. Their barbarity extended so far as not to suffer the men who were put on board the Jean to lie down even upon planks, but they were obliged to sit on large stones, by which means their legs swell'd as big almost as their bodies.
These are some few of the cruelties exercised, which being almost incredible in a Christian country, I am obliged to add an asseveration to the truth of them; and I do assure you [fol. 96.] upon the word of a dying man, as I hope for mercy at the day of judgment, I assert nothing but what I know to be true.
The injustice of these proceedings is aggravated by the ingratitude of them, for the Elector of Hanover's people had been often obliged by the prince, who ordered his prisoners the same allowance of meal as his own troops, and always made it his particular concern that all the wounded should be carefully dressed and used with the utmost tenderness. His extreme caution to avoid