Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 01.djvu/167

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The rigid observance of the above cartel would have prevented all the horrors of prison life, North and South, and have averted the great mortality in Southern prisons and the greater mortality in Northern prisons. The Confederate authorities carried out in good faith the provisions of the cartel, until the other side had not only frequently violated nearly every article, but finally repudiated the cartel itself.  Judge Ould's letter-book gives the most incontrovertible proof of this statement; but we reserve the detailed proofs for the present, and pass to consider further the

We have given above the testimony of General Lee—that the orders were to treat the whole field alike, caring for wounded, friend and foe, without discrimination, and that "these orders were respected on every field." Time and again, after some great victory, has the writer seen our brave soldiers, though well nigh worn out with the conflict, ministering to their wounded foes—sharing with them their scant rations, carrying them water, binding up their wounds, and bearing them gently back to our field hospitals, where we gave them every attention in our power. We were personal witnesses of that scene at Port Republic, when Fremont, who had been so badly whipped by Ewell at Cross Keys the day before, stood idly by until Jackson had routed Shields, and then amused himself by shelling the Confederate ambulances and litter-bearers who were caring for the Federal wounded. It is by no means affirmed that there were not individual instances of cruelty to prisoners on the part of Confederate soldiers (especially in the latter part of the war, when their passions were aroused by the heart-rending stories of Federal outrages to helpless women and children which came from every quarter), but we do most emphatically assert that our 