On 26 June 1803 a small group of Frenchmen were fishing off the coast near Calais in a boat called L’Abondance. Unluckily for them the British government had just changed its policy and decided that fishing boats were now legitimate targets in the war against Napoleon. Their boat was captured by a British ship with a French name, HMS Immortalité, and they were taken prisoner, ending up at the Norman Cross depot at the end of August. One of the seven captured men was Jean Marie Phillippe Habart, the son of a gunsmith. Like many of the prisoners, he was employed by the authorities and worked in one of the prison bakeries, producing bread for the inhabitants. Their daily ration was 1.5 pounds (approx 700gms) per person and baking bread for a population of up to 7,000 must have been a full-time occupation.  According to family tradition, Jean’s work brought him into contact with Elizabeth Snow. She was a farmer’s daughter and regularly delivered some of the milk which local producers supplied for use at the prison. It seems that they fell in love. In 1810, Jean was listed among 249 fishermen who were to be released and returned to France. He requested permission to remain in England. This was granted, though initially he was required to remain at Norman Cross. This restriction did not last long, and on 17 May 1811, Jean and Elizabeth were married at Yaxley. He was 28 and she was 21. Jean was formally released from Norman Cross on 20 June 1811. Jean’s father died while he was imprisoned. Jean inherited a share of his father’s property, which doubtless helped him settle in business as a baker and corn merchant in Stilton. Jean also became an “innkeeper and maltster”, and by 1843 if not before he was at The Talbot. Elizabeth and Jean’s daughter Ann was born in January 1812, the first of nine children. Their sons were involved in the establishment of Stilton’s first cricket club. By all accounts it was a happy and successful life. One of their granddaughters worked for Dr Thomas Walker, who published the previous definitive account of the Norman Cross prisoner of war depot in 1913. She must have supplied many of the details about her parents which appeared in Dr Walker’s book. It’s actually hard to find any evidence of a Snow family in the area so perhaps Elizabeth was a farmer’s servant rather than daughter. Their grandson Robert Snow Habart did become a farmer in Yaxley.  His father Robert Habart ran the Yaxley baker’s shop, carrying on one of the family’s trades. Sadly, everything changed in January 1846. Returning from Peterborough at about six o’clock – it was market day – two residents of Yaxley, Mr Southwell and Mrs Bradford, came across an empty cart. Nearby, they found Jean lying in the road and assumed he was drunk. They tried unsuccessfully to rouse him, and Mr Southwell rode off to the Royal Arms at Yaxley for help, while Mrs Bradford remained at the scene. In fact, Jean’s neck was broken. He was 63.  The cause of his death remains uncertain. Dr Walker, doubtless repeating stories provided by Jean’s granddaughter, says that his head was battered, his pockets were rifled, and his empty purse was found nearby. However, there is no mention of this in the newspaper report of the inquest (back at the Royal Arms), which returned a verdict of accidental death, presuming Jean had simply fallen from his cart. According to the Stamford Mercury, a young man was detained by the police for several days and was released without charge. Jean was buried in Stilton churchyard. The inscription on his tombstone describes his end in these words:

                An unexpected strike,
                When none was near to save,
                My thread of being broke
                And brought me to the grave.

Elizabeth died in September 1859 at the age of 69 and is buried alongside her husband. Other Habart gravestones can be found in the churchyard, including those of their son John and his wife, who was also called Eliza

Details of Norman Cross Prisoners Of War here