"Yes, you are Lieutenant Davis, and you had charge of the prison when I was in Andersonville," persisted the soldier. A crowd of passengers quickly surrounded the parties, and seeing that his stubborn cross-questioners would not be convinced, the Confederate yielded, and said:
"Well, boys, you've got me. I am Lieutenant Davis."
The provost marshal of Newark was summoned, and the prisoner was speedily hurried to the common jail. A search of his person failed to disclose any secret papers, and he was left in the main room with a number of ordinary county criminals. Soon after the military had left the place the stranger was seen to remove from inside his coat-lining a number of despatches and drawings upon white silk, and to burn them in the fire which was blazing in an open stove. The link that would have removed all doubt as to his purposes and condemned him to the gallows was thus hopelessly destroyed; but a court martial held that his presence in the Union lines in disguise constituted the offence for which the penalty is death. When the evidence was all in and the case clear against him, the prisoner rose, facing the officers and witnesses, every one wearing the colors of his mortal enemies, and some of them scarred with the conflicts in which he and his own had been pitted against them. There was no reason to expect mercy, and he did not ask it.
After stating his case briefly, he looked over his accusers and judges, and said: "I do not fear to die. I am young and would like to live, but I deem him unworthy who should ask pity of his foemen. Some of you have wounds and scars; I can show them, too. You are serving your country as best you may; I have done the same. I can look to God with a clear conscience; and whenever the chief magistrate of this nation shall say, 'Go,' whether upon the scaffold or by the bullets of your soldiery, I will show you how to die."
The sentence was that he be confined in the military prison at Johnson Island, in Lake Erie, until the 17th of February, 1865, then "to be hung by the neck until he is dead."
During the night of the 16th of February, when all preparations had been made, and Davis had, as he believed, beheld the last sunset on earth, a reprieve came from President Lincoln. He was placed in a dungeon at Fort Warren, Boston Harbor, and before the reprieve ended the war closed. Then the authorities permitted him to go free. To the end he kept the secret of his mission to Ohio.
| THE BATTLE FLAGS AND MARKERS OF THE FOURTEENTH REGIMENT NEW YORK ARTILLERY. |
| ENGAGEMENTS IN WHICH THE REGIMENT, WITH THESE FLAGS, TOOK PART. | |
| WILDERNESS, VA., | May 5-7, 1864. |
| SPOTTSYLVANIA C. H., | May 10-19, 1864. |
| NORTH ANNA RIVER, VA., | May 23-26, 1864. |
| TOCOPOTOMY CREEK, VA., | May 30, 1864. |
| BETHESDA CHURCH, VA., | May 31, 1864. |
| SHADY GROVE ROAD, VA., | June 2, 1864. |
| COLD HARBOR, VA., | June 3-12, 1864. |
| PETERSBURG FRONT, VA., | June 16-18, 1864. |
| SIEGE OF PETERSBURG, FIRST, | June 19 to August 19, 1864. |
| CRATER, VA., | July 30, 1864. |
| BLIELL'S STATION, VA., | August 19, 1864. |
| WELDON RAILROAD, VA., | August 21, 1864. |
| PEEBLES FARM, VA., | September 29, 1864. |
| POPLAR SPRINGS CHURCH, VA., | September 30, 1864. |
| SIEGE OF PETERSBURG, SECOND, | November 29, 1864 to April 3, 1865. |
| FORT HASKELL, VA., | March 25, 1865. |
| FORT STEADMAN, VA., | March 25, 1865. |
| CAPTURE OF PETERSBURG, VA., | April 3, 1865. |
| APPOMATTOX, VA., | April 9, 1865, Surrender of Lee and his Army of Northern Virginia. |