“He looked at me in perfect amazement. He did not answer me a word; only when I got through he said, ‘I’d give a thousand dollars if I had not met you!’ I got down to drink from a ditch by the road. Then he said, ‘I’ve got a canteen at the house which you might have.’ That was the first intimation I received that he would help me.
“He told me to stay where I was and he would bring me something better to drink than ditch-water. I looked him through. ‘I’ll trust you,’ I said; for no man ever looked as he did who wasn’t sincere. Yet there was danger he might change his mind; and I waited with great anxiety to see whether he would bring the canteen or a guard of soldiers. At last he came—with the canteen! It was full of the most delicious spring water. I can’t begin to tell you how good that water tasted! The nectar of the gods was nothing to it.
“That night he hid me between two bales of cotton in his gin-house. He brought me bacon and biscuits enough to last me two or three days. What was more to the purpose, he gave me a suit of citizens’ clothes to put on. While it was yet early, he brought me out, and went with me a mile or so on my way. He gave me the names of several citizens of the country, so that I could claim to be going to see them if anybody questioned me. I carried my uniform with me tied up in a bundle, which I intended to drop in the first piece of woods at a safe distance from his house. I never parted with a man under more affecting circumstances. An enemy, he had risked his life to save me,—for we both knew that if the part he took in my escape was discovered, his reward would be the halter.
“I had a valuable gold watch, which the Rebels had not taken from me, and I urged him to accept it. ‘If I am recaptured,’ I said, ‘some Confederate soldier will get it. If I escape, it will be the greatest source of satisfaction I can have to know that you keep this token of my gratitude.’ At last he consented to accept it, and we parted.
“I travelled due north all that day, and lay by at night in a canebrake. How it rained again! The next day, in avoiding the main roads, as I had been careful to do whenever I could, I got entangled among streams that put into the Ocmulgee River. I came to a large one, and as I was turning back from it, I saw a squad of soldiers going down to it to bathe. I was in a complete cul de sac, and I must either run for the river or meet them. I put on a bold face, and went out towards them. As it was an extraordinary situation for a stranger to be in, they naturally suspected everything was not right. They asked me where I was from, and where I was going. I said I came from near Macon, and that I was going to visit my uncle, Dr. Moore, in De Kalb County. I suppose my speech betrayed me. They didn’t suspect me of being an escaped prisoner; but their captain said, ‘I believe you’re a damned Yankee spy.’
“That sealed my fate. I was taken to Forsyth, on the Macon and Western Railroad, where I was finally recognized by the guard I had escaped from.
“While I was sitting in the depot, in my citizens’ clothes, a half-drunken Confederate soldier came in, flourishing a loaded pistol, and inquiring for the ‘damned Yankee.’ ‘What do you want of him?’ I asked. ‘To shoot his heart out!’ said he. ‘What!’ said I, ‘would you shoot a prisoner? I hope you are too chivalrous to do that.’ ‘It’s a part of my chivalry to kill every Yankee I find,’ said he. ‘Just show him to me, and you’ll see.’ ‘I’ll show him to you. I am the man. Now let’s see you shoot him.’
“He swore I was joking. He wouldn’t believe I was the Yankee, even when the guard told him I was; and he went blustering away again. I suspect that he was a fellow of more talk than courage.
“Meanwhile Mr. T——, who gave me my citizens’ dress, heard of my recapture, and came over to Forsyth, in great anxiety lest I should betray him. I pretended not to recognize him, but gave him to understand by a look that his secret was safe. He said it was very important to ascertain how I came by my clothes, and questioned me. I said I obtained them of a good and true man, whom I should never name to his injury; but that I would tell where I left my uniform, because I wished to get it again. When I described the spot, he said he believed he recognized it, and, if so, that it was on one of his neighbors’ plantations. He sent to search, and the next day I received my uniform. I forgot to state that when I was retaken, my drawers were mildewed from my lying out in the cane-brakes in the rain.
“From Forsyth I was sent to the stockade at Macon, where I found my companions from whom I separated when I jumped from the car. I hadn’t been there three days when I formed a new plan of escape. I got the other prisoners enlisted in it, and we went to tunnelling the ground under the stockade. Each man worked with a knife, or a piece of hoop,—anything that he could scratch with,—and filled a haversack with the dirt, which was brought out and scattered over the ground. As prisoners exposed to the weather were always burrowing in caves, our design was not suspected. It was exceedingly toilsome work, and it was carried on principally by night. You would be astonished to see how much a man will accomplish, with not much besides his finger-nails to do with, when his liberty is at stake. We worked six tunnels, three feet high, and extending well out beyond the stockade. The very night when we were going to open them up on the outside, one of the prisoners, a Kentuckian, betrayed us. If we had found out who he was, he wouldn’t have lived a minute. Then, just as I was maturing another plan, I was sent here.”