Tom took one glance at the chief of his captors and then saluted with real respect as he replied:
"I am Thomas Strong, sir, second-lieutenant, U. S. A."
"Upon my word, sir, I am sorry to hear it. We don't make war on boys. If you had been, as I thought, just masquerading as a soldier, I would have turned you loose at once. Now I must take you with us."
Ten minutes afterwards, the little group with Tom, disarmed but unbound, in the middle of it, was galloping northeastward. A few yards ahead of it the officer rode with a free bridle rein, chatting with an aide beside him. He rode like a centaur. Tom thought him one of the finest soldiers he had ever seen. And so he was. He was Gen. Basil W. Duke, brother-in-law, second in command, and historian of General Morgan. He was a soldier and a gentleman, if ever God made one.
A fortnight later, a fortnight of almost constant fighting, much of it with home-guards and militia who feared Morgan too much to fight him hard, but part of it with seasoned soldiers who fought as good Americans should, Morgan crossed the Ohio again into the comparative safety of West Virginia. He took across with him his few prisoners, including Tom. Then, finding that the mass of his brigade had been cut off from crossing, the Confederate general detached a dozen men to take the prisoners south while he himself with most of the troopers with him recrossed to where danger beckoned. On July 26, 1862, at Salineville, Ohio, not far from Pittsburg, trapped, surrounded, and outnumbered, he surrendered with the 364 men who were all that were left of his gallant band. Our government made the mistake of treating him and his officers not as captured soldiers but as arrested bandits. They were sent to the Ohio State Penitentiary, whence Morgan made a daring escape not long afterwards. He made his way to freedom on Southern soil. Meanwhile, Tom had been taken to captivity on that same soil. He was in Libby Prison, at the Confederate Capital, Richmond, Virginia.
His journey thither had been long and hard and uneventful, except for the gradual loss of the few things he had with him. His pistol and his money had been taken when he was first captured. Now, as he was turned over to one Confederate command after another, bit by bit his belongings disappeared. His boots went early in the journey. His cap was plucked from his head. His uniform was eagerly seized by a Confederate spy, who meant to use it in getting inside the Union lines. When he was finally turned over to the Provost Marshal of the chief Confederate army, commanded by Gen. Robert E. Lee, he was bareheaded and barefoot and had nothing to wear except an old Confederate gray shirt and the ragged remains of what had once been a pair of Confederate gray trousers, held about his waist by a string. He was hungry and tired and unbelievably dirty. The one good meal he had had on his long march had been given him at Frederick, Maryland, by a delightful old lady whom Tom always believed to be Barbara Frietchie.
It was August now. On July 4, Grant had taken Vicksburg and Meade had defeated Lee at Gettysburg. The doom of the Confederacy had begun to dawn. None the less Robert E. Lee's tattered legions, forced back from the great offensive in Pennsylvania to the stubborn defense of Richmond, trusted, worshiped, and loved their great general.
Meade, the Union commander, by excess of caution, had let Lee escape after Gettysburg. He did not attack the retreating foe. Lincoln was deeply grieved.
"We had them within our grasp," he said, throwing out his long arms. "We had only to stretch forth our hands and they were ours. And nothing I could say or do could make our army move."