Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 18.djvu/339

 Prison Pens North. 339

less wretches I never saw, and yet I have seen more than one con- signment of Federal prisoners on their way home. Several died between their parole and the day of departure."

SEVEN DEAD ON THE TRAIN.

" We arrived in Baltimore with seven dead men on the train," and ''left in Baltimore a number whose condition was such that their further progress would have been certain death " one, a gray-haired old man, who there died.

They had to be landed at Point Lookout to await further consign- ments of prisoners for exchange. And here " a plank was stretched from the side of the ship to the dock, and down this ' shoot ' the poor, helpless, maimed creatures were slid like coal into a vault."

They were turned into their former pen, where they found "a scanty supply of tents, and, after some days, a scanty supply of straw. The water was scant, the rations scant," and all this for men just taken out of the hospital, condemned thus to sleep on the bare ground with insufficient food and clothing.

Here they remained until the number for exchange sent from vari- ous points amounted to five thousand, when they were all re-embarked in three ships and sent South, first having " all their blankets and every extra coat or pair of pants taken from them."

In Hampton Roads they were detained ten days.

"Every day," continues Mr. Keiley, " we saw coffins going over the sides of the other ships. On the Atlantic alone were forty deaths during our stay in the harbor a stay obviously unnecessary and there- fore shamefully cruel, since it compelled the confinement of hundreds of sick men in the filthy and unventilated holds of the vessels, with- out proper food, medicine, or attendance. Captain Grey, of the Atlantic, protested loudly against its inhumanity.

Arrived at length at Savannah, Ga., they were landed amid the enthusiastic welcome of the populace, and here found the Richmond ambulance corps awaiting them that excellent institution which rendered service alike to the suffering of both armies."

A FULL CORROBORATIOX.

It will be noted that in this account is a corroboration of all that is charged by Dr. Wyeth in his mention of the treatment of Confed- erate prisoners at Camp Morton i. e., the criminal neglect of the sick; their starvation, where every species of food was abundant, until they