Capture and Escape: A Narrative of Army and Prison Life

by John Azor Kellogg

"Who are these men around you? Who and what are they?" I asked.

"Old Libby prisoners," he replied. "Officers, all of them. We only arrived a few days since. No hope of exchange, I suppose?"

I told him of the rumor we had heard on starting from Danville. He laughed. "That's an old ruse," said he. "We are always told that when being moved, to prevent our trying to escape."

My heart sank within me. Hungry and tired, we began to look around for a place to sleep, or at all events to lie down and rest. There was a long frame building in the yard, that had formerly been used for a fair building. Three or four wooden sheds had been erected, open at the sides, but everything in the shape of a building was already crowded to its fullest capacity.

At length a few of us dug a hole under the structure first described, and burrowed there. We were fortunate, for the larger proportion of our comrades were compelled to camp in the open air, without either fire or blankets, subjected to the heavy dews at night and the scorching sun by day.

On the inside of the pen, about ten feet from the high fence already described, was a picket fence, about five feet high. This was the "Dead Line." All were forbidden to approach within three feet of it, under penalty of death, and the sentinels were judges as to distance.

A small stream ran through one corner of the pen. Over this were the sinks, and by the side of it the spring, from which we obtained water. This spring was about ten feet from the "Dead Line." There were two or three trees scattered through the yard, that, for a favored few, afforded shade from the sun's burning rays, and a partial protection from the dew.

There were about twelve hundred old Libby prisoners in this pen when we arrived, and with the accession of our squad it was crowded to its fullest capacity. It was easy by the expression of their faces alone, to distinguish the "Fresh fish" from the old prisoners. Those of the latter had a starved, hopeless look, that must have been seen to be realized. Long confinement and starvation have the effect of deadening all the finer feelings. They are brutalizing. All the selfish propensities are developed. The mind becomes gangrened. Long brooding over the deplorable situation, with hunger constantly gnawing at the vitals, gradually saps away all that is noble and God-like, leaving active only the animal nature.

I saw two Lieutenants belonging to the regular army, snap, snarl, and actually fight over the distribution of a tablespoonful of corn meal; yet these men were educated gentlemen, and under ordinary circumstances would have resented as an insult the imputation that they could ever be guilty of such conduct. I looked at them, and wondered if we too would become like the pitiable objects around us.

With these thoughts came visions of the longing, waiting hearts at the North. These men represented homes, scattered through every loyal State, in which sat the patient wife or mother, anxiously watching for tidings of husband or son. In the reports she had read with sinking heart the fearful words, "missing in action," or "wounded and missing," and the cry had gone up from quivering lips, "Oh God, let me not be left a widow and my children fatherless!" Then had commenced the long agony of suspense, of waiting, waiting, waiting—how drear an ordeal, only those who have passed through it can tell.