Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 18.djvu/435

 Prison Life at Point Lookout. 435

exposure, and most of them had impaired health. As for the young man, he was never punished for what he did, but in a few weeks he was acting courier for Major Brady in the prison.

While I was not one of the sufferers, I was in the prison at the time, and much of it was related to me by a Mr. Jones, of Georgia, who occupied the same tent with me, and who worked outside daily on detail ; also, Mr. Sam Puckett, of Laurens county, S. C., who was one of those who underwent that terrible ordeal of suffering, has a number of times related to me the whole story. He is a man of character and influence in his community. If any doubt this story of reckless cruelty let them write to Mr. Sam Puckett, Waterloo, S. C., who will endorse all I have written, and who has several times asked me to write it out for the papers. I was paroled, and left Point Lookout February 18, 1865. While free from any special sick- ness, I was reduced sixty-five pounds in weight, purely for want of sufficient food. What I have written is in no spirit of vindictiv.eness, but merely to preserve the facts of history.