Partial manuscript of a memoir on French prisoners of war.

4to-size (c. 25 x 19 cm): [82] ff. (incl. a few blanks; mainly bifolia, some ff. pinned together), French, paper, a few cancellations and corrections. In good condition (a few sm. stains).

The French officer Pillet (1761-1816), onetime aide-de-camp of La Fayette, American citizen (1795), was military commander of various French armies (1800-1815). Arrested in Paris in 1799 (for "propos menaçants contre le Directoire"), he was imprisoned in Pelagia until April 1800. Wounded in the Battle of Vimeiro (1808), he became a prisoner of the English. His account of his captivity was published as "L’Angleterre vue à Londres et dans ses provinces pendant un séjour de dix années, dont six comme prisonnier de guerre" (Paris, 1815). "There are several chapters upon crime and its punishments. Among these is one on Botany Bay, and others upon the hulks at Chatham, and the treatment of prisoners of war, which, in his experience, was very bad" (Ferguson). Our manuscript contains large extracts from this text and summaries.
Ref. Ferguson, Bibliography of Australia, 622.
Joined: 16 ff. with early 19th-c. secondary school notes and copied texts (poems, texts on mythology, geography and history). (2 pcs)