Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 32.djvu/351

 Prison Life of Jefferson Dams. 339

Tuscarora, Commander James Madison Frailey, sailed at the same time with Messrs. Stephens and Reagan for Fort Warren.

The orders for the Clyde were changed, and she was directed to take the ladies and children to Savannah, Ga., without restraint, and arriving there to give them perfect liberty.

As the prisons could not be prepared for Messrs. Davis and Clay at once, they were held on the Clyde until the 22d of May; then the prelude to the infamy of the nineteenth century began.

General Halleck ordered Major-General Nelson A. Miles to pro- ceed at i P. M. on a tug with a guard from the garrison to bring the prisoners from the Clyde to the engineer's wharf, thence through the battery to their prisons.

MILES ON THE SCENE.

At precisely i o'clock General Miles left for the Clyde, and at 1 130 o'clock the tug left the Clyde, landing at the engineer's wharf. The procession to the prison was led b}' cavalrymen from Colonel Pritchard's command, and moved through the water battery on the front of the fortress and entered by a postern leading from that battery. The cavalrymen were followed by General Miles, holding Mr. Davis by the right arm. Next came half a dozen soldiers, and then Colonel Pritchard with Mr. Clay, and last, the guard of soldiers which Miles took with him from the garrison.

The distinguished prisoners asked to see General Halleck, but were denied. They were incarcerated, each in a separate inner room of a casemate, with a window heavily barred, and a sentry was placed before each of the doors leading into the outer room. These doors were secured by bars fastened on the outside, and two other sentries stood outside of these doors, and an officer was put on duty in the outer room, with instructions to see the prisoners every fifteen minutes. The outer door of all was locked on the outside, and the key kept exclusively by the general officer of the guard, and two sentries were also stationed without that door.

UNNECESSARY SENTINELS.

A strong line of sentries was posted to cut off all access to the vicinity of the casemate; another line stationed on the top of the parapet overhead, and a third line posted across the moats on the counterscarp opposite the places of confinement. The casemates on each side and between those occupied by the prisoners were used as guard rooms, so that soldiers would always be at hand. Mr.