Fifteen Months in Dixie; Or, My Personal Experience in Rebel Prisons

by William W. Day

VALE DIXIE.

“Breathes there a man with soul so dead,

Who never to himself hath said,

This is my own, my native land!

Whose heart hath ne’er within him burned,

As home his footsteps he hath turned,

From wandering on a foreign strand!

If such there breathe, go, mark him well;

For him no Minstrel rapture swell;

High though his titles, proud his name,

Boundless his wealth as wish can claim;

Despite those titles, power and pelf,

The wretch, concentrated all in self,

Living, shall forfeit all renown,

And, doubly dying, shall go down

To the vile dust, from whence he sprung,

Unwept, unhonored and unsung.”

The Lay of the last Minstrel.

Scott.

During the time of our stay at Charleston, the rebel officers had made great efforts to induce the prisoners to take the oath of allegiance to the Confederacy, promising good treatment, good pay, good clothing, a large bounty and service in a bomb proof position in return. If men had stopped to think, these promises carried with them abundant proof of their own falsity. Where was the evidence of good treatment, judging of the future by the past? What did good pay and large bounties amount to when it took two hundred dollars of that good pay and large bounty to buy a pair of boots? And the good clothing, yes they could clothe them with the uniforms stripped from their dead comrades upon the battlefield or stolen from the supplies sent to the prisoners.

But, lured by these specious promises, about a hundred and twenty-five prisoners went out one day and, as we supposed, took the oath. They were marched away cityward in the morning, but before night they returned. We saluted them on their return with groans and hisses and curses. They reported that they were to be sent to James Island to throw up earth-works in front of the rebel lines. This they refused to do, and they were returned to prison.

At Florence another effort was made to recruit men. The rebels wanted foreigners for the army, and artisans of all kinds particularly blacksmiths, shoemakers, carpenters and machinists for their shops. Many of our artisans went out thinking they would get a chance to work for food and clothing by simply giving their parole of honor they would not attempt to escape. But the rebs insisted that they must take the oath of allegiance. A few took the required oath, but most of the boys returned to prison, and most heartily anathematized the men who had the impudence and presumption to suppose that they would be guilty of taking the oath of allegiance to such a rotten, hell-born thing as the Southern Confederacy.

There was a great deal of discussion among the prisoners at the time about the question of the moral right of a man to take the oath of allegiance to save his life. It was argued on one side that our government had left us to rot like dogs, to shift for ourselves and that as winter was coming on and there was no prospect of exchange, a man had a perfect right to take the oath and save his life. On the other side it was argued that we had taken a solemn oath to support the government of the United States and not to give aid or comfort to any of its enemies; that war was hard at best, and that when we took the oath we knew that imprisonment was a probability just as much as a battle was a probability; that we had just as much right to refuse to fight and to turn traitor upon the battle field as we had in prison.

For my own part life was dear to me but it was dear on account of my friends; and supposing I should take the oath and save my life; the war would soon be over and when peace came and all my comrades had returned to their homes, where would my place be? Could I ever return to my friends with the brand of traitor upon me? Never. I would die, if die I must; but die true to the flag I loved and honored, and for which I had suffered so long. Right here we adopted the prisoners’ motto, “Death, but not dishonor.”

Soon after changing my quarters I succeeded in securing a position on the police force. Another of my tent mates was equally fortunate, so we had a little extra food in our tent. My health had been slowly improving ever since I left Andersonville, and with returning health came a growing appetite. We resorted to all sorts of expedients to increase the supplies of our commissariat. Ole Gilbert was a natural mechanic and he made spoons from some of the tin which he had procured near Macon; these were traded for food or sold for cash, and food purchased with the money. One day he traded three spoons for a pocket knife with an ivory faced handle. The ivory had been broken but I fished the remains of an old ivory fine comb out of my pockets and he repaired the handle of the knife with it. We sent it outside by one of the boys who had a job of grave digging, and who sold it for ten dollars, Confederate money. With this money we bought a bushel of sweet potatoes of the sutler at the gate, and then we resolved to fill up once more before we died. We baked each of us two large corn “flap jacks” eight inches across and half an inch thick. We then boiled a six quart pail full of sweet potatoes and after that made the pail full of coffee out of the bran sifted from our meal, and then scorched. This was equal to three quarts of food and drink to each one of us, but it only stopped the chinks.

I then proposed to double the dose which we did, eating and drinking six quarts each within two hours. Of course it did not burst us but it started the hoops pretty badly, and yet we were hungry after that. It seemed impossible to hold enough to satisfy our hunger; every nerve, and fiber and tissue in our whole system from head to foot, was crying out for food, and our stomachs would not hold enough to supply the demand, and it took months of time and untold quantities of food to get our systems back to normal condition.

There are many ex-prisoners who claim that Florence was a worse prison than Andersonville. I did not think so at the time I was there, but those who remained there during the winter no doubt suffered more than they did at Andersonville, on account of the cold weather; but at the best it was a terrible place, worthy to be credited to the hellish designs of Jeff Davis and Winder, aided by the fiend Barrett. At one time Barrett, with some recruiting officers, came into prison accompanied by a little dog. Some of the prisoners, it is supposed, beguiled the dog away and killed him; for this act Barrett deprived the whole of the prisoners of their rations for two days and a half.

About the 4th of December some surgeons came in and selected a thousand men from the worst cases which were not in the hospital. It was said they were to be sent through our lines on parole. Then commenced an earnest discussion upon the situation. My comrades and I thought we were getting too strong to pass muster. How we wished we had not improved so much since leaving Andersonville. We were getting so fat we would actually make a shadow, that is if we kept our clothes buttoned up. After considering the question pro and con we came to the conclusion that we had better not build up any hopes at present. If we were so lucky as to get away, all right. If not we would have no shattered hopes to mourn over.

On the 6th another thousand was selected and sent away. This looked like business; this was no camp rumor started by nobody knew who, but here were surgeons actually selecting feeble men and sending them through the gates, and they did not return.

The 8th came and in the afternoon the 9th thousand was called up for inspection. I went out to the dead line where the inspection was going on to see what my chances probably were. The surgeons were sending out about every third or fourth man. The 9th and 10th thousand were inspected and then came the 11th, to which I belonged. I went to my tent and told the boys I was going to try my chances, “but,” I added, “keep supper waiting.” I took my haversack with me, leaving my blanket, which had fallen to me as heir of Rouse, and went to the dead line and fell in with my hundred, the 8th. After waiting impatiently for a while I told Harry Lowell, the Sergeant of my hundred, that I was going down the line to see what our chances were. It was getting almost dark, the surgeons were getting in a hurry to complete their task and were taking every other man. I went back and told Harry I was going out, I felt it in my bones. This was the first time I had entertained a good healthy, well developed hope, since I arrived in Richmond, more than a year previous.

The 6th hundred was called, then the 7th and at last the 8th. We marched down to our allotted position with limbs trembling with excitement. That surgeon standing there so unconcernedly, held my fate in his hands. He was soon to say the word that would restore me to “God’s Country,” to home and friends, or send me back to weary months of imprisonment.

My turn came. “What ails you?” the surgeon asked.

“I have had diarrhea and scurvy for eight months,” was my reply, and I pulled up the legs of my pants to show him my limbs, which were almost as black as a stove. He passed his hands over the emaciated remains of what had once been my arms and asked, “When is your time of service out?” “It was out the 10th of last October,” said I.

“You can go out.”

That surgeon was a stranger to me. I never saw him before that day nor have I seen him since, but upon the tablet of my memory I have written him down as FRIEND.

I did not wait for a second permission but started for the gate.

Just as I was going out some of my comrades saw me and shouted, “Bully for you Bill; you’re a lucky boy!” and I believed I was. After passing outside I went to a tent where two or three clerks were busy upon rolls and signed the parole. Before I left Harry Lowell joined me and together we went into camp where rations of flour were issued to us. After dark Harry and I stole past the guard and went down to the gravediggers’ quarters where we were provided with a supper of rice, sweet potatoes and biscuits. I have no doubt that to-day I should turn up my nose at the cooking of that dish, for the sweet potatoes and rice were stewed and baked together, but I did not then. After supper John Burk baked our flour into biscuits, using cob ashes in the place of soda; after which we stole back into camp.

Not a wink of sleep did we get that night. We had eaten too much supper for one thing, and besides our prison day seemed to be almost ended. We were marched to the railroad next morning, but the wind was blowing so hard that we were not sent away, as the vessels could not run in the harbor at Charleston.

Just before night a ration of corn meal was issued to us and I have that ration yet. About ten o’clock that night we were ordered on board the cars and away we went to Charleston, where we arrived soon after daylight. We debarked from the cars and were marched into a vacant warehouse on the dock, where we remained until two o’clock p. m. when we were marched on board a ferry boat. The bells jingled, the wheels began to revolve and churn up the water and we are speeding down the harbor. All seems lovely as a June morning, when lo, we are ordered to heave to and tie up to the dock. We were marched off from the boat and up a street. It looked as though the Charleston jail was our destination, instead of that long wished for God’s Country.

It seemed that the last train load had not been delivered on account of the high winds, and that we were to wait our turn. But we were soon countermarched to the boat and this time we left Charleston for good and all.

My thoughts were busy as our boat was steadily plowing her way down the harbor to the New York, our exchange commissioner’s Flag Ship, which lay at anchor about a mile outside of Fort Sumter. To my left and rear Fort Moultrie and Castle Pinkney stood in grim silence. Away to the front and left, upon that low, sandy beach, are some innocent looking mounds, but those mounds are the celebrated “Battery Bee” on Sullivans Island. To my right are the ruins of the lower part of Charleston. Away out to the front and right stands Fort Sumter in “dim and lone magnificence.” To the right of Fort Sumter is Morris Island and still farther out to sea is James Island. What a scene to one who has had a deep interest in the history of his country from the time of its organization up to and including the war of the rebellion. Here the revolutionary fathers stood by their guns to maintain the independence of the Colonies. Here their descendants had fired the first gun in a rebellion inaugurated to destroy the Union established by the valor, and sealed with the blood of their sires. Misguided, traitorous sons of brave, loyal fathers. Such thoughts as these passed through my mind as we steamed down the harbor to the New York, but it never occurred to me that the waters through which our boat was picking her way, was filled with deadly torpedoes, and that the least deviation from the right course would bring her in contact with one of these devilish engines and we would be blown out of water.

But look! what is that which is floating so proudly in the breeze at the peak of that vessel?

“’Tis the Star Spangled Banner, oh! long may it wave,

O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave.”

Yes it is the old Stars and Stripes, and just underneath them on the deck of that vessel is “God’s Country,” that we have dreamed of and wished for so many long weary months.

My friends, do you wonder that the tears ran unbidden down our wan and ghastly cheeks? That with our weak lungs and feeble voices we tried to send a welcome of cheers and a tiger to that dear old flag? It was not a loud, strong cheer, such as strong men send up in the hour of victory and triumph; no the rebels had done their work too well for that, but it was from away down in the bottom of our hearts, and from the same depths came an unuttered thanks-giving to the Great Being who had preserved our lives to behold this glorious sight.

Our vessel steamed up along side the New York and made fast. A gang plank was laid to connect the two vessels, and at 4 o’clock, December 10th, 1864, I stepped under the protection of our flag and bade a long and glad farewell to Dixie.

After we had been delivered on board the New York we were registered by name, company and regiment, and then a new uniform was given us and then—can it be possible, a whole plate full of pork and hard-tack, and a quart cup of coffee. And all this luxury for one man! Surely our stomach will be surprised at such princely treatment. After receiving our supper and clothing we were sent on board another vessel, a receiving ship, which was lashed to the New York. Here we sat down on our bundle of clothes and ate our supper. If I was to undertake to tell how good that greasy boiled pork and that dry hard-tack and that muddy black coffee tasted, I am afraid my readers would laugh, but try it yourself and see where the laugh comes in. After supper we exchanged our dirty, lousy rags for the new, clean, soft uniform donated to us by Uncle Sam.

This was Saturday night. Monday morning we are on the good ship United States as she turns her prow out of Charleston harbor. We pass out over the bars and we are upon the broad Atlantic. Wednesday morning about 4 o’clock we heave to under the guns of the Rip Raps, at the entrance of Chespeake Bay, and reported to the commandant. The vessel is pronounced all right, and away we go up the bay. We reach Annapolis at 10 p. m. and are marched to Cottage Grove Barracks. Here we get a good bath, well rubbed in by a muscular fellow, detailed for the purpose. I began to think he would take the grime and dirt off from me if he had to take the cuticle with it. We exchanged clothing here and were then marched to Camp Parole, four miles from Annapolis. Here we were paid one month’s pay together with the commutation money for clothing and rations which we had not drawn during the period of our imprisonment. On the 24th I received a furlough and started for the home of my brother in western New York, where I arrived on the 26th, and here ends my story.