Note from the Digital Tradition and from the Traditional Ballad Index that Marc is not the first to locate the song in London. This Google Search will lead you to several London versions. Here's what the Traditional Ballad Index says about the song:

Dans les prisons de Nantes (Within the Prisons of Nantes)

DESCRIPTION: French. A man is prisoner in Nantes. The jailer's daughter cries because he is to die next day. She unties him so he escapes. She is pregnant. On another shore he drinks and boasts of his escape.
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1954 (Creighton-Maritime)
KEYWORDS: foreignlanguage seduction warning escape rake prisoner
FOUND IN: Canada(Mar,Newf)
REFERENCES (2 citations):
Peacock, pp. 183-184, "Dans les Prisons de Nantes" (1 text, 1 tune)
Creighton-Maritime, pp. 170, "Dans La Prison de Nantes" (1 text, 1 tune)
ALTERNATE TITLES:
Dans la Prison de Londres
Notes: In Peacock's version the prisoner is on London Bridge; the escaped prisoner promises that, if he ever is in France he will have a dress made for her with gold buttons and they will embrace. In another version, all the girls of Nantes are taken prisoner.
The CD After the Tempest by Figgy Duff includes a different London version than Peacock's called, more reasonably, Dans la Prison de Londres: "Dans la prison de Londres Un prisonnier il y a" - BS
File: Pea183

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The Ballad Index Copyright 2007 by Robert B. Waltz and David G. Engle.