"Where is he?"
"This way, Bunker." (I followed to the far end of the yard.) "There he is."
The reader can judge of my horror and surprise at the sight before me. There lay the trunk of the man in one place and the head in another, looking as if pulled asunder by fastening the neck to a tree and the feet to a span of mules. The mules were still fastened to the feet of the lifeless form.
As much used to scenes of bloodshed and slaughter as I have been, and as much as I felt myself wronged by the ill-treatment of the doctor, the sight was revolting indeed. While I have no doubt but that the doctor would have rejoiced to have caused the death of myself and ten others, I am clear from ever having desired his death by acts of barbarism and cruelty. I regret very much that Federal soldiers have ever felt constrained to resort to such acts of retaliation.
It is a fact, however, in the prosecution of this war, that oftentimes the worst of traitors, after having been captured, have escaped the penalty of the law, and then, in their last state, have acted sevenfold worse than in the first. It is in consequence of such evasions of justice, that individuals have felt compelled to deal out punishment themselves. In the face of the cruelties that our men have suffered at the hands of the rebels, contrary to all the rules of war, it is a wonder to me that they have committed so few acts of retaliation.
When arrested, the doctor declared, with most emphatic assertions, that he was a loyal man, though the men that confronted him knew, by sad experience, that such assertions were false. Such provocation, coupled with the fear that he would escape punishment, caused this summary execution. I only regret that a more civilized mode was not resorted to. The next day the troops moved on toward Memphis, and no complaint was ever made about it at head-quarters.
CHAPTER XVIII.
Arrival in Memphis—Daring robbery—Detailed by the Provost-marshal General—Assumes the character of a rebel Major—Secesh acquaintances—Captures a rebel mail—A jollification—A rebel trader—Plan to run the pickets—Escape of the outlaws.