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Updated: June 14, 2025
"Nay, nay," said the big fisherman, as a low, angry murmur arose, and ignoring the allusion to the fish debris lying about, "we don't want no press-gangs meddling here." "Yes, you do," said the sailor, angrily, as he applied a blue cotton neckerchief he had snatched off and shaken out, alternately to a cut on Aleck's forehead and to his swollen nose, which was bleeding freely.
Far from entering with enthusiasm into the king's ships when their country were menaced, the great body of English seamen, appalled at the discipline of the Navy, adopted unheard-of devices to escape its press-gangs. Some even hid themselves in caves, and lonely places inland, fearing to run the risk of seeking a berth in an outward-bound merchantman, that might have carried them beyond sea.
"You must keep a sharp look-out not to fall in with the press-gangs, master," observed the latter. "They are out every night, and are in no ways particular on whom they lay hands." "Thank you," answered Ralph; "I've no cause to fear them, and am not going where they are likely to be looking for their prey."
Alas! though press-gangs had been busy at their oppressive work, no such name as Hardman had been returned as having been one of their victims. The conviction slowly stole over him, that some fatal accident or rash determination had ended Herbert's term of life. The dislike of her son, of which Mrs Hardman had been suspected, now melted completely away into the fondest affection for his memory.
Press-gangs might seize men abroad in the streets of a town and, unless they could prove that they were gentlemen in rank, they could be sent in the fleet to serve in the remotest corners of the earth. In both navy and army flogging outraged the dignity of manhood. The liability to this brutal and degrading punishment kept all but the dregs of the populace from enlisting in the British army.
To the left of them the trees in Tower Gardens sighed, the stones of the Tower gleaming, seemed to stir in the play of light, as if remembering suddenly all the great joys and sorrows of the past, the fighting prototypes of these men; press-gangs; mutinous cries; the wailing of women by the riverside, and the shouts of men welcoming victories.
The dead were carried on shore to be buried, the wounded conveyed to hospitals, the Frenchmen were landed and marched off under an escort of marines to the prisons prepared for them, and press-gangs were soon busy at work to obtain fresh hands to supply the places of those who had fallen, although many prime seamen volunteered to serve on board a frigate which had already won a name for herself.
In the dead of night a cordon was formed round that town by a regiment stationed at Tynemouth barracks; the press-gangs belonging to armed vessels lying off Shields harbour were let loose; no one within the circle could escape, and upwards of two hundred and fifty men, sailors, mechanics, labourers of every description, were forced on board the armed ships.
We then called at other houses, where we picked up one or two men, but most of them escaped by getting out at the windows or the back doors, as we entered the front. Now there was a grog-shop which was a very favourite rendezvous of the seamen belonging to the merchant vessels, and to which they were accustomed to retreat when they heard that the press-gangs were out.
Without waiting for a reply, ships were ordered into commission, press-gangs swept the streets, and in a short time a powerful fleet was ready at Spithead to revenge the insult.
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