The cell in which we were confined so long had a front of eleven feet, with a rear six feet four inches broad, in the tower, and its width was also six feet four inches; and often, for weeks together, we were not allowed to step beyond the doors of this narrow cage.
But why add more relative to the horrors of this filthy pen? He who has never experienced the torture of a Southern prison-house can form no idea of the wretchedness inclosed; while the tens of thousands who have been incarcerated therein, but who have been fortunate enough to escape death, need no words that they may appreciate the cruelties inflicted.
[CHAPTER XXXV.]
ADIEU TO CHARLESTON—ESCAPE FROM THE REBELS—ARRIVAL IN THE UNION LINES.
"It is a long lane that has no turn," says an old adage; and our captivity, like all things earthly, came to an end. When Gen. Sherman moved upon Branchville, the evacuation of Charleston became a military necessity; and when the rebels left the city, Gray and myself were sent to the jail at Columbia, the capital of South Carolina. The presence of Sherman's army appears to have almost worked a miracle, for from the time we were lodged at Columbia, we received the best possible treatment. Our keeper was Capt. Semmes, whose whole conduct toward us was that of a gentleman, though a bitter rebel; and I got along finely, except in a single instance.
We were put in a room in which there were about twenty-five persons, twenty-one of them being deserters from our army, and the remainder prisoners of war. Of course, we could never agree with the deserters; and they put at me to convert me to their "faith," or rather lack of faith, which occasioned me to insult them, and for this I was soundly whipped for it in less than three minutes. I was not strong enough to fight them, for they were just from the north, and had been well fed and were in good health; while I had been shut up so long on short allowance and unwholesome food, that I had little strength left; nevertheless I went in whenever opportunity offered, and always came out second best. Fearing if ever I got north again I would report them, they concluded to take time by the forelock, and reported me to the rebels as a spy; and either Capt. Semmes or his Lieutenant, gave an order that my hair should be cut off as a punishment: and accordingly four of them seized me and held me down, while a fellow named Jim Brown, a deserter from the 31st Illinois, hacked off my hair. This miscreant is a man about six feet high, with dark hair and eyes, and swarthy complexion—a very talkative man—and, I believe, a fiddler. He was raised in the Sequatchie valley, in Tennessee, but for several years has been living in Franklin county, Illinois; and he, together with the whole vile crowd, took the oath of allegiance to the Southern Confederacy, and were sent back north as a reward for their rascality. They should forever be excluded from society for their crimes.
When Gen. Sherman's army invested Columbia, the rebels took us out of jail, and put us under fire of our own guns; but what for, we did not know. There were about sixty of us altogether, and among the number was the Colonel of the 1st Georgia Federal regiment; also a Capt. Harris, of the 3d Tennessee Cavalry, who had been in close confinement for two years and a half—heavily ironed all the time; and during the whole period had been kept in one room, outside of which he had never been.
While we were under fire, a piece of one of our Rodman shells, weighing about five pounds, struck me on the left shoulder; but as it was a glancing blow, it did no other damage than to stiffen my arm a little.