I remember that three or four desperate rebels in the condemned cell adjoining the apartment in which we were confined, freed themselves in an audacious manner, that entitled them to my admiration. They sawed through the floor, keeping up such a rattling of their chains while at work, that nobody could hear them, got down to the first floor, seized each a loaded musket from one of the racks, dashed out of the front entrance, shot one of the sentinels through the head, knocked another down with the butt of a gun, ran by the third, and disappeared in the darkness. The third sentinel fired his piece after them, and a general alarm was given; but, in spite of the fact that the Castle was in a much frequented part of the city, the bold fugitives got clearly away, and were never seen after in Richmond. They deserved a prosperous issue for their reckless courage; but there was something of luck in it, and I doubt, had I made the same attempt, if I should have been able to reach the outer door.
TREATMENT AT SALISBURY.
At Salisbury we were kept like cattle (except that we were not nearly so well treated), in a large enclosure, sleeping, or rather lying down, in an old building formerly used as a cotton factory. This building, with a number of miserable out-houses, was employed as the prison quarters, until some thousands of enlisted Union men were sent down there, when a system of freezing, starving, and murder seemed to be deliberately established by the rebel commandant.
Things soon became so bad that they could hardly get worse. It was death to remain, and even if an attempt to escape proved to be death also, we thought we should have the satisfaction of dying in an effort to obtain freedom, instead of perishing like rats in a hole.
Salisbury was the most hideous prison-pen, not even excepting Andersonville, in the entire South. Its one redeeming feature was, that it was not without facilities for tunnelling. These did not amount to a great deal, for the reason that we had spies in camp; the captives being made up of deserters from both armies, professional ruffians, and miscreants of every sort. Moreover, so intense was the suffering that not a few men, naturally loyal, but not of heroic stuff, could not resist the temptation to treachery, when they knew that their treachery would be rewarded by the food and raiment for the want of which they were perishing.
Tunnels were digging constantly, and were as constantly failing for the reasons I have mentioned. As my friend and myself were the only war correspondents at Salisbury, we were individualized to our fellow-captives, and having been longer in prison than anybody else, they were not only willing, but glad, to do anything which would aid us to escape. Consequently, we were informed of any and all plans, and given an interest in every tunnel that was projected, begun, or partially constructed. After one had fairly gotten under way, we would be invited to, and we would, examine it. Creeping on our hands and knees through its length, and then retreating in the fashion of a crab, we would pronounce the tunnel good, with the simultaneous instinct that it could not long remain undiscovered after we had made its acquaintance.
RIGID SEARCH OF PRISONERS.
No wonder we often thought we were destined to breathe our last in durance vile. Every scheme, contrivance, or device for our deliverance appeared doomed to an untimely nipping. I can recall a dozen occasions when I entered tunnels in the evening just ready to be tapped, and through which I intended the next night to take my departure. The first thing I would learn, the following morning, would be, that somebody had turned informer, and that we must have recourse to still another enterprise.
I never did much work myself. I was as willing as Barkis; but I had little skill in that species of practical engineering, and was so much excelled by my companions in captivity that I did not insist on performing my share of the labor. So many of our tunnels had exploded, as we used to style it, that the authorities put on double lines of sentinels, compelling us to carry a tunnel so far that the obtainment of oxygen became impossible. Sixty or seventy feet, or even eighty or ninety, may be managed; but one hundred and forty or fifty feet cannot be accomplished without a ventilating apparatus, and at Salisbury we were absolutely without implements of any kind. It was quite common there for our custodians to draw us up in a line, and compel us to surrender, not only our valuables, on pretence that we might bribe the guards, but also our pocket-knives, and anything that might in any way aid us in our liberation. Old scraps of iron, and whatever might be converted into a sharp instrument, were, therefore, in active demand, and the supply entirely inadequate. I recollect that I was hailed with joy, on a certain afternoon, when I exhibited an ancient case-knife that I had contrived to conceal, and which not the neediest rag-picker in Paris could be persuaded to throw into his basket.
How the poor unfortunates at Salisbury did toil at tunnels, and how perverse fortune always proved! I make no question that scores of the captives, at the rate of three dollars a day, would have earned hundreds of dollars each in digging, and all, alas! to no purpose. The fabled industry of the Trojans was not to be compared to theirs. No sooner was one tunnel discovered than they set about making another, and when that blew up, they turned to a third, and a fourth, and a fifth, and a sixth, as if they were incapable of discouragement. Hope springs eternal in the human breast, especially when the human breast is famishing by slow degrees, and freedom smiles never so faintly in the far-off distance.