Note 52 — The Mother of the Teelings

“The Postlethwaite Tender, on which my father was confined, contained within the limits of one small apartment, thirty-four gentlemen, of respectable rank in life and independent circumstances. In this miserable prison-house, its inmates could never stand erect, and crowded together in a circumscribed space not fourteen feet square, they could only enjoy a partial and unrefreshing slumber in succession. Here, entombed on the ocean, during the sultry heat of a summer the most oppressive that has been remembered for thirty years, they inhaled the pestiferous atmosphere of a tender; in the depth of winter, when their numbers were reduced to a few, they were exposed with open port-holes to all the inclemency of the chilling blast. Nor were they permitted to receive a supply of wholesome food from their friends; nothing was allowed them beyond what the parsimonious bounty of Government afforded. At four o’clock in the evening the hatches were locked down, and the prisoners remained in darkness until nine on the following morning. Sometimes, forgetful of his situation, the prisoner would raise his form to stand erect ... when the hard repelling beam, in contact with his head, reminded him that the hand of man had prescribed his limits. My father, whose fine-formed head and silver locks are still present to my imagination, presented on his removal from this prison, a perfect encrustment of festered wounds from forehead to nape.”—C. H. Teeling’s “Narrative.”