Experience of a Confederate States Prisoner / Being an Ephemeris Regularly Kept by an Officer of the Confederate States Army

The cover was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected. Variations in hyphenation and consistent non-standard spelling remain unchanged.
BEING
AN EPHEMERIS
REGULARLY KEPT BY
An Officer of the Confederate States Army.
RICHMOND: WEST & JOHNSTON, PUBLISHERS. 1862.
G. W. GARY, Printer.
The gallant Morgan has said that our independence is an achieved fact. “Privation and suffering have won it.” It is true that the noble South has been deprived of many of its wonted necessaries, not to say luxuries, by the present invasion of those disciples of Satan, commonly called “Yankees.” Paper, among other things, is scarce in the South, and paper may be turned into excellent account in the composition of cartridges, while metal that might be moulded into bullets is run into type. Yet newspapers and books are printed, and most of them eagerly read, especially any that have the most remote bearing upon the present contest. In these stern times of war’s realities, plain facts challenge our attention rather than the gaudy fiction of novels. Honey from Mount Hybla, or Nectar from Olympus, would fail on the palate, unless relieved by homelier viands; and it would certainly require considerable stoicism to sit down to a tale of imaginary woes and sorrows while one great wail is going up from our sick and wounded—an incredible amount of apathy to sit leisurely down to such a book under the shade of a tree while the nation is sending out a heartcry for reinforcements to our brave legions, in order to speedily defeat the unscrupulous enemy. This little book is intended as, and professes no more than a plain statement of facts, so that others may learn what I have read, seen and heard, without undergoing the pain of incarceration in the hands of Yankees, whose tyranny increases in proportion to the power they possess over their victims.
May, 1862. A “heavy march” on the 6th and 7th instant resulted in a Confederate victory at McDowell, Highland county, at which place a battle was fought on the 8th. General Jackson routed and drove the enemy, commanded by the Yankee Generals, Milroy and Schenck, twenty-five miles into Pendleton county, and captured a large amount of ammunition, commissary stores, arms, and many prisoners. Our forces afterwards completely routed Banks’ column at Winchester, and thoroughly defeated Fremont and Shields at Cross Keyes and Port Republic. After the battle at Front Royal, I remained at that place upon the recommendation of the regimental surgeon, on account of having strong symptoms of the Typhoid fever, which turned out to be the genuine disease. Dr. Brown, the resident physician, attended me; and a member of my own company, Mr. Oxford, nursed me faithfully from the 23d May, the day our forces entered Front Royal, to the 30th May, the day that the Yankees under General Shields recaptured it. The 12th Georgia regiment was the only force left at Front Royal. The Provost Marshal, or the Colonel commanding the 12th Georgia, gave us notice but one hour before the Yankees were in the town that they were advancing. When Mr. Oxford informed me of the near approach of the Yankees, I quickly jumped out of bed, and we hastily made a retreat towards Winchester. The salutary and kind attentions of Dr. Brown and Mr. Oxford had much improved me in strength, but I soon discovered that I could not keep pace with the latter in our eager efforts to escape. We succeeded in getting about one mile and a half from the town when the Yankee cavalry were heard closing on us so fast that we leaped over a fence on the left of the road, thinking that we might conceal ourselves in the high grass until the cavalry passed, and be enabled to elude them by getting into the woods near by. In the confusion, however, Mr. Oxford and I became separated, and by this time the Yankee cavalry were close enough to fire twice on myself and two others from the 33d Virginia, who attempted to make their escape in the same direction. The cavalry soon after had surrounded us, and we were compelled to surrender, and were marched into town under a heavy guard. The commissioned officers were carried before General Shields, and the non-commissioned officers and privates to the building used by our army as a hospital, where we had some hundred sick at the time. The commissioned officers at first confined to any house they might select, were afterwards paroled the town. I was taken to Mr. John B. Petty’s house, and ordered to remain there “for the present” by one of General Shields’ staff. About an hour after I was left at the above named house, a Pennsylvania Major came into the room where I was, and very abruptly asked me, “What are you doing here?” I informed him that by order of General Shields I was to remain there “until further orders;” he would not believe me, and placed two sentinels in the room until he found that my statement was correct. Captain Keogh (on General Shields’ staff) gave me the following note, saying, when he did so, that I would not be “any further annoyed by officers in other regiments” that had nothing to do with my case: