1812
Narrative of Sergeant Vampbell
19:3
ART. VI. – Narrative of sergrant l'ampbell's capture, and treatment
from the Chinese while at Hángchau fú.
SERGEANT Campbell had been employed in the commissariat depart- ment at Chusan, since the 1st of February last, on the 24th of March he went to Tinghái to purchase some fowls; but after a fruitless search in the market, he was on the point of returning home, when a Chinese boy, whom he had employed for several months, told him if he went to the east gate, he would get plenty of them. He followed him; and on coming to the gate, the boy pointed to a house about a hundred yards further on. The boy ran into the house, at the door of which, sergeant Campbell waited for his return; but after standing at the place for ten minutes, and getting tired, was retracing his steps, when at the corner of the building he was attacked by twenty or thirty Chinese. Four of them he knocked down with his stick, but the odds were too great; he was felled to the ground by a stone that struck him over the left eye. They then sprung on him, tied his hands and feet, and filled his mouth with clay. Immediately after he was put into a bag, and two man carried him on a bamboo. Walking at a good pace for two hours, they brought him to a row of houses, on the southern part of the island. Here he was taken out of the bag, only to lose his left ear, which one of his captors cut off with a pair of scissars, upon which they put him back into the bag, and traveled as before till 10 o'clock P. M., when the Chinese ate their suppers. This done they took him up on their shoulders, and twenty minutes' walk brought them to a creek, where, through the sack, he could see several small junks. Into the hold of one of these he was lowered, and left three days and three nights, his clothes saturated with water, without a single morsel to eat, and supported entirely by some shamshoo and water which they gave him at long intervals.
On the fourth day after capture he was landed at a place, which he subsequently ascertained to be Chipú. There he was taken before the chief officer, who immediately ordered his hands and feet to be untied, and treated him very kindly, giving him an abundance to eat and drink. They kept him there but two hours, after which he was sent, under the escort of a petty officer and twelve soldiers, to the canal, and embarked in a flat-bottomed boat This officer was most civil, and insisted on his eating in company with him.
The canal runs through a perfectly flat country, so they had no locks to get over: at times, whenever the bank of the canal would