<h3><SPAN name="CHAPTER_XXXVI" id="CHAPTER_XXXVI">CHAPTER XXXVI.</SPAN></h3>
<div class="chapquot">
<div>
<p>The miserable have no other medicine, But only hope.</p>
<p class="citation">Measure for Measure.</p>
</div>
</div>
<div class="chapquot">
<div>
<p>Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,<br/>
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow?</p>
<p class="citation">Macbeth.</p>
</div>
</div>
<p>Truly saith the Italian proverb, "There are no ugly loves and no
handsome prisons." Still we found Salisbury comparatively endurable.
Captain Swift Galloway, commanding, though a hearty Confederate, was
kind and courteous to the captives. Our sleeping apartment, crowded
with uncleanly men, and foul with the vilest exhalations, was filthy
and vermin-infested beyond description. No northern farmer, fit to be
a northern farmer, would have kept his horse or his ox in it.</p>
<div class="sidenote">The Open Air and Pure Water.</div>
<p>But the yard of four acres, like some old college grounds, with
great oak trees and a well of sweet, pure water, was open to us
during the whole day. There, the first time for nine months, our
feet pressed the mother earth, and the blessed open air fanned our
cheeks.</p>
<p>Mr. Luke Blackmer, of Salisbury, kindly placed his library of
several thousand volumes at our disposal. Whenever we wished for
books we had only to address a note to him, through the prison
authorities, and, in a few hours, a little negro with a basket of
them on his head would come in at the gate. It seemed more like life
and less like the tomb than any prison we had inhabited before.</p>
<div class="sidenote">The Crushing Weight of Imprisonment.</div>
<p>And yet those long Summer months were very dreary to bear, for we
had upon us the one heavy, crushing
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_402" id="Page_402">[Pg 402]</SPAN></span>
weight of captivity. It is not hunger or cold, sickness or death,
which makes prison life so hard to bear. But it is the utter
idleness, emptiness, aimlessness of such a life. It is being, through
all the long hours of each day and night—for weeks, months,
years, if one lives so long—absolutely without employment,
mental or physical—with nothing to fill the vacant mind, which
always becomes morbid and turns inward to prey upon itself.</p>
<div class="blockquot">
<p>What exile from his country Can flee himself as well?</p>
</div>
<p>It was doubtless this which gave us the look peculiar to the
captive—the disturbed, half-wild expression of the eye, the
contraction of the wrinkled brow which indicates trouble at the
heart.</p>
<p>We were most struck with this in the morning, when, on first going
out of our sleeping quarters, we passed down by the hospital and
stopped beside the bench where those were laid who had died during
the night. As we lifted the cloth, to see who had found release, the
one thing which always impressed me was the perfect calm, the sweet,
ineffable peace, which those white, thin faces wore. For months I
never saw it without a twinge of envy. Until then I never felt the
meaning of the words, "where the wicked cease from troubling and the
weary are at rest." Until then I never realized the wealth of the
assurance, "He giveth his beloved sleep."</p>
<div class="sidenote">Bad News from Home.</div>
<p>Some prisoners had an additional weight to bear. They were
southern Unionists—Tennesseans, North Carolinians, West
Virginians, and Mississippians—whose families lived on the
border. They knew that they were liable any day to have their houses
robbed or burned by the enemy, and their wives and little ones turned
out to the mercy of the elements, or the charity of friends.
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_403" id="Page_403">[Pg 403]</SPAN></span>
This gnawing anxiety took away their elasticity and power of
endurance. They had far less capacity for resisting disease and
hardship than the northeners, and died in the proportion of four or
five to one. I could hardly wonder at the fervor with which, in their
devotional exercises, night after night, they sung the only hymn
which they ever attempted:</p>
<div class="poem">
<div class="stanza">
<span class="i0">"There I shall bathe my weary soul</span>
<span class="i2">In seas of heavenly rest;</span>
<span class="i0">And not a wave of trouble roll</span>
<span class="i2">Across this peaceful breast."</span></div>
</div>
<p>The cup of others, yet, had a still bitterer ingredient, which
filled it to overflowing. I wonder profoundly that any one drinking
of it ever lived to tell his story. They had received bad news from
home—news that those nearest and dearest, finding their load
of life too heavy, had laid it wearily down. During the long prison
hours, such had nothing to think of but the vacant place, the hushed
voice, and the desolate hearth. Hope—the one thing which
buoys up the prisoner—was gone. That picture of home, which
had looked before as heaven looks to the enthusiastic devotee, was
forever darkened. The prisoner knew if the otherwise glad hour of
his release should ever come, no warmth of welcome, no greeting of
friendship, no rejoicing of affection, could ever replace for him the
infinite value of the love he had lost.</p>
<div class="sidenote">The Great Libby Tunnel.</div>
<p>Early in the Spring we were delighted to learn from Richmond that
Colonel Streight had succeeded in escaping from Libby. The officers
constructed a long tunnel, which proved a perfect success, liberating
one hundred and fourteen of them. Streight, whose proportions tended
toward the Falstaffian, was very apprehensive
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_404" id="Page_404">[Pg 404]</SPAN></span>
that he could not work his way through it. Narrowly escaping the fate
of the greedy fox which "stuck in the hole," he finally squeezed
through. The Rebels hated him so bitterly that, by the unanimous
wish of his fellow-prisoners, he was the first man to pass out. A
Union woman of Richmond concealed him for nearly two weeks. The
first officers who reached our lines announced through the New York
papers that Streight had arrived at Fortress Monroe. This caused the
Richmond authorities to relinquish their search; and finally, under
a skillful pilot, having traveled with great caution for eleven
nights to accomplish less than a hundred miles, Streight reached the
protection of the Stars and Stripes.</p>
<p>Our prison rations of corn bread and beef were tolerable,
in quantity and quality. The Salisbury market also afforded a
few articles, of which eggs were the great staple. We indulged
extravagantly in that mild form of dissipation—our mess of five
at one time having on hand seventy-two dozen, which represented, in
Confederate currency, about two hundred dollars.</p>
<p>We soon made the acquaintance of several loyal North Carolinians.
Citizens of respectability were permitted to visit the prison. Those
of Union proclivities invariably found opportunity to converse with
us. Like all Loyalists of the South, white and black, they trusted
northern prisoners implicitly. The reign of terror was so great that
they often feared to repose confidence in each other, and cautioned
us against repeating their expressions of loyalty to their neighbors
and friends, whose Union sympathies were just as strong as theirs.</p>
<div class="sidenote">Horrible Sufferings of Union Officers.</div>
<p>Captains Julius L. Litchfield, of the Fourth Maine Infantry,
Charles Kendall, of the Signal Corps, and Edward E. Chase, of the
First Rhode Island Cavalry, were imprisoned in the upper room of the
factory. Held as hostages
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_405" id="Page_405">[Pg 405]</SPAN></span>
for certain Rebel officers in the Alton, Illinois,
penitentiary, they were sentenced to confinement and hard labor
during the war. In one instance only was the hard labor imposed. In
the prison yard they were ordered to remove several heavy stones
a few yards and then carry them back. For some minutes they stood
beside the Rebel sergeant, silently and with folded arms. Then Chase
thus instructed the guard:</p>
<p>"Go to Captain Galloway, and tell him, with my compliments, that
perhaps I was just as delicately nurtured as he—that, if he were in
my place, he would hardly do this work, and that I will see the whole
Confederacy in the Bottomless Pit before I lift a single stone!"</p>
<p>Chase and his comrades were never afterward ordered to labor.
Other Union officers, held as hostages, arrived from time to time.
Eight, who came from Richmond, had been confined one hundred
and forty-five days in that horrible Libby cell where the mold
accumulated on the beard of the Pennsylvania lieutenant. While there
they suffered intensely from cold, ate daily all their scanty ration
the moment it was issued, and were compelled to fast for the rest
of the twenty-four hours, save when they could catch rats, which
they eagerly devoured. Some came out with broken constitutions, and
all were frightfully pallid and emaciated. Starving and freezing
are words easily said, but these gentlemen learned their actual
significance.</p>
<p>Four of them were held for Kentucky bushwhackers, whom one of our
military courts had sentenced to death, which they clearly deserved
under well-defined laws of war. Had they been promptly executed, the
Rebels would never have dared, in retaliation, to hurt the hair of a
prisoners head. But Mr. Lincoln's kindness of heart induced him to
commute their sentence to imprisonment,
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_406" id="Page_406">[Pg 406]</SPAN></span>
and made him unwittingly the cause of this barbarity toward our own
officers.</p>
<p>The hostages were plucky and enterprising, frequently attempting
to escape. One night they suspended from their fourth-story window
a rope which they had constructed of blankets. Captain Ives, of the
Tenth Massachusetts Infantry, descended in safety. A daring and loyal
Rebel deserter, from East Tennessee, named Carroll, who designed to
pilot them to our lines, attempted to follow; but the rope broke,
and he fell the whole distance, striking upon his head. It would
have killed most men; but Carroll, after spending the night in the
guard-house, bathed his swollen head and troubled himself no further
about the matter.</p>
<p>Captain B. C. G. Reed, from Zanesville, Ohio, was constantly
trying to secure his own release. It always seemed to make him
unhappy when he passed two or three weeks without making attempts to
escape. They usually resulted in his being hand-cuffed and ballasted
by a ball and chain, or confined in a filthy cell.</p>
<div class="sidenote">A Cool Method of Escape.</div>
<p>But, sooner or later, perseverance achieves. Once, while so weak
from inflammatory rheumatism, contracted in a Richmond dungeon, that
he could hardly walk, he made a successful endeavor, in company with
Captain Litchfield. At nine o'clock, on a rainy March night, with
their blankets wrapped about them, they coolly walked up to the gate.
They rebuked the guard who halted them, indignantly asking him if he
did not know that they belonged at head-quarters! Impudence won the
day. The innocent sentinel permitted them to pass. They went directly
through Captain Galloway's office, which fortunately happened to
be empty; reached the outer fence; Litchfield helped over his weak
companion, and the world was all before them, where to choose.
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_407" id="Page_407">[Pg 407]</SPAN></span>
They traveled one hundred and twenty miles, but, in the mountains of
East Tennessee, were recaptured and brought back.</p>
<p>Nothing daunted, Reed repeated the attempt again and again.
Finally, he jumped from a train of cars in the city of Charleston,
found a negro who secreted him, and by night conveyed him in a skiff
to our forces at Battery Wagner. Reed returned to his command in
Thomas's Army, and was subsequently killed in one of the battles
before Nashville. Entering the service as a private, and fairly
winning promotion, he was an excellent type of the thinking bayonets,
of the young men who freely gave their lives "for our dear country's
sake."</p>
<div class="sidenote">Captured through an Obstinate Mule.</div>
<p>Early in the summer, our mess was agreeably enlarged by the
arrival of Mr. William E. Davis, Correspondent of <cite>The Cincinnati
Gazette</cite> and Clerk of the Ohio Senate. Davis owed his capture to
the stupidity of a mule. Riding leisurely along a road within the
lines of General Sherman's army, more than a mile from the front,
he was compelled to pass through a little gap left between two
corps, which had not quite connected. He was suddenly confronted
by a double-barreled shot-gun, presented by a Rebel standing
behind a tree, who commanded him to halt. Not easily intimidated,
Davis attempted to turn his mule and ride for a life and liberty.
With the true instinct of his race, the animal resisted the rein,
seeming to require a ten-acre lot and three days for turning
around—wherefore the rider fell into the hands of the
Philistines.</p>
<p>Books whiled away many weary hours. As Edmond Dantes, in the Count of
Monte Christo, came out from his twelve years of imprisonment "a very
well-read man," we ought to have acquired limitless lore; but reading
at last palled upon our tastes, and we would none of it. </p>
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_408" id="Page_408">[Pg 408]</SPAN></span></p>
<div class="sidenote">Concealing Money when Searched.</div>
<p>Our Salisbury friends supplied us liberally with money. The
editors of the migratory <cite>Memphis Appeal</cite> frequently
offered to me any amount which I might desire, and made many attempts
to secure my exchange.</p>
<p>The prison authorities sometimes searched us; but friendly guards,
or officers of Union proclivities, would always give us timely
notice, enabling us to secrete our money. One (nominally) Rebel
lieutenant, after we were drawn up in line and the searching had
begun, would sometimes receive bank-notes from us, and hand them back
when we were returned to our own quarters.</p>
<p>Once, as we were being examined, I had forty dollars, in United
States currency, concealed in my hat. That was an article of dress
which had never been examined. But now, looking down the line, I saw
the guard suddenly commence taking off the prisoners' hats, carefully
scrutinizing them. Removing the money from mine, I handed it to
Lieutenant Holman, of Vermont; but, turning around, I observed that
two Rebel officers immediately behind us had witnessed the movement.
Holman promptly passed the notes to "Junius," who stood near, reading
a ponderous volume, and who placed them between the leaves of his
book. Holman was at once taken from the line and searched rigorously
from head to foot, but the Rebels were unable to find the coveted
"greenbacks."</p>
<p>The prison officers, under rigid orders from the Richmond
authorities, would sometimes retain money received by mail. Two
hundred dollars in Confederate notes were thus withheld from me for
more than a year. Determined that the Rebel officials should not
enjoy much peace of mind, I addressed them letter after letter,
reciting their various subterfuges. At last, upon my demanding that
they should either give me the
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_409" id="Page_409">[Pg 409]</SPAN></span>
money, or refuse positively over their own signatures, the amount
was forthcoming. Thousands of dollars belonging to prisoners were
confiscated upon frivolous pretexts, or no pretext whatever.</p>
<div class="sidenote">Attempts to Escape Frustrated.</div>
<p>Persistent ill-fortune still followed all our attempts to escape.
Once we perfected an arrangement with a friendly guard, by which, at
midnight, he was to pass us over the fence upon his beat. Before our
quarters were locked for the night, "Junius" and myself hid under
the hospital, where, through the faithful sentinel, escape would be
certain. But just then, we chanced to be nearly without money, and
Davis waited for a Union <span lang="fr">attaché</span> of the
prison to bring him four hundred dollars from a friend outside. The
messenger, for the first and last time in eleven months, becoming
intoxicated that afternoon, arrived with the money five minutes too
late. Davis was unable to join us; we determined not to leave him,
expecting to repeat the attempt on the following night; but the next
day the guard was conscribed and sent to Lee's army.</p>
<p>These constant failures subjected us to many jests from our
fellow-prisoners. Once, in a dog-day freak, "Junius" had every
hair shaved from his head, leaving his pallid face diversified
only by a great German mustache. He replied to all <span
lang="fr">badinage</span> that he was not the correspondent for whom
his interlocutors mistook him, but the venerable and famous Chinaman
"No-Go."</p>
<div class="sidenote">Yankee Deserters Whipped and Hanged.</div>
<p>The Yankee deserters, having no friends to protect them, were
treated with great harshness. During a single day six were tied up to
a post and received, in the aggregate, one hundred and twenty-seven
lashes with the cat-o'nine-tails upon their bare backs, as punishment
for digging a tunnel. Many of them were "bounty-jumpers" and
desperadoes. They robbed each newly-arriving
<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_410" id="Page_410">[Pg 410]</SPAN></span>
deserter of all his money, beating him unmercifully if he resisted.
After being thus whipped, at their own request their <span
lang="la">status</span> was changed, and they were sent as prisoners
of war to Andersonville, Georgia. There the Union prisoners,
detecting them in several robberies and murders, organized a
court-martial, tried them, and hung six of them upon trees within the
garrison, with ropes furnished by the Rebel commandant.</p>
<p>For seven months no letters, even from our own families, were
permitted to reach us. This added much to our weariness. I never knew
the pathos of Sterne's simple story until I heard "Junius" read it
one sad Summer night in our prison quarters. For weeks afterward rung
in my ears the cry of the poor starling: "I can't get out! I can't
get out!" </p>
<hr class="chap" />
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_411" id="Page_411">[Pg 411]</SPAN></span></p>
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