Cavalry Approach--Seven Removed from the Room--Suspense--Sentence of
Death--Heart-rending Separation--Death and the Future--Not
Prepared--Inhuman Haste--The Tragedy--Speech on the Scaffold--Breaking
Ropes--Enemies Affected--Gloom of Survivors--Prayer.
One day while we were very merry, amusing ourselves with games and
stories, we saw a squadron of cavalry approaching. This did not at
first excite any attention, for it was a common thing to see bodies of
horsemen in the streets; but soon we observed them halt at our gate,
and surround the prison. What could this mean?
A moment after, the clink of the officers' swords was heard as they
ascended the stairway, and we knew that something unusual was about to
take place. They paused at our door, threw it open, called the names
of our seven companions, and took them out to the room opposite,
putting the Tennesseeans in with us. One of our boys, named Robinson,
was sick of a fever, and had to be raised to his feet, and supported
out of the room.
With throbbing hearts we asked one another the meaning of these
strange proceedings. Some supposed they were to receive their
acquittal; others, still more sanguine, believed they were taken out
of the room to be paroled, preparatory to an exchange.
I was sick, too, but rose to my feet, oppressed with a nameless fear.
A half crazy Kentuckian, who was with the Tennesseeans, came to me and
wanted to play a game of cards. I struck the greasy pack out of his
hands, and bade him leave me.
A moment after, the door opened, and George D. Wilson entered, his
step firm and his form erect, but his countenance pale as death. Some
one asked a solution of the dreadful mystery, in a whisper, for his
face silenced every one.
"_We are to be executed immediately_," was the awful reply, whispered
with thrilling distinctness. The others came in all tied, ready for
the scaffold. Then came the farewells--farewells with no hope of
meeting again in this world! It was a moment that seemed an age of
measureless sorrow.
Our comrades were brave; they were soldiers, and had often looked
death in the face on the battle-field. They were ready, if need be, to
die for their country; but to die on the _scaffold_--to die as
murderers die--seemed almost too hard for human nature to bear.
Then, too, the prospect of a future world, into which they were thus
to be hurled without a moment's preparation, was black and appalling.
Most of them had been careless, and had no hope beyond the grave.
Wilson was a professed infidel, and many a time had argued the truth
of the Christian religion with me for a half day at a time; but in
this awful hour he said to me:
"Pittenger, I believe you are right, now! Oh! try to be better
prepared when you come to die than I am." Then, laying his hand on my
head with a muttered "God bless you," we parted.
Shadrack was profane and reckless, but good-hearted and merry. Now,
turning to us with a voice, the forced calmness of which was more
affecting than a wail of agony, he said:
"Boys, I am not prepared to meet Jesus."
When asked by some of us in tears to think of heaven, he answered,
still in tones of thrilling calmness, "I'll try! I'll try! But I
_know_ I am _not_ prepared."
Slavens, who was a man of immense strength and iron resolution,
turned to his friend Buffum, and could only articulate,
"Wife--children--tell"--when utterance failed.
Scott was married only three days before he came to the army, and the
thought of his young and sorrowing wife nearly drove him to despair.
He could only clasp his hands in silent agony.
Ross was the firmest of all. His eyes beamed with unnatural light, and
there was not a tremor in his voice as he said, "Tell them at home, if
any of you escape, that I died for my country, and did not regret it."
All this transpired in a moment, and even then the Marshal and other
officers standing by him in the door, exclaimed:
"Hurry up there! come on! we can't wait!"
In this manner my poor comrades were hurried off. Robinson, who was
too sick to walk, was dragged away with them. They asked leave to bid
farewell to our other boys, who were confined in the adjoining room,
but it was sternly refused!
Thus we parted. We saw the death cart containing our comrades drive
off, surrounded by cavalry. In about an hour it came back _empty_. The
tragedy was complete!
Later in the evening, the Provost-Marshal came to the prison, and, in
reply to our questions, informed us that our friends "Had met their
fate as brave men should die everywhere."
The next day we obtained from the guards, who were always willing to
talk with us in the absence of the officers, full particulars of the
seven-fold murder.
When our companions were mounted on the scaffold, Wilson asked
permission to say a few words, which was granted--probably in the hope
of hearing some confession which would justify them in the murder they
were about to commit. But this was not his intention. It was a strange
stand--a dying speech to a desperate audience, and under the most
terrible circumstances.
But he was equal to the occasion. Unterrified by the near approach of
death, he spoke his mind freely. He told them that "they were all in
the wrong; that he had no hard feelings toward the Southern people for
what they were about to do, because they had been duped by their
leaders, and induced by them to engage in the work of rebellion. He
also said, that though he was condemned as a spy, yet he was none, and
they well knew it. He was only a soldier in the performance of the
duty he had been detailed to do; that he did not regret to die for his
country, but only regretted the manner of his death. He concluded by
saying that they would yet live to regret the part they had taken in
this rebellion, and would see the time when the old Union would be
restored, and the flag of our country wave over the very ground
occupied by his scaffold."
This made a deep impression on the minds of those who listened, and I
often afterward heard it spoken of in terms of the highest admiration.
When he ceased, the signal was given, and the traps fell![4]
[4] A refugee from the State of Georgia, now in this city, who
witnessed the execution, but, from peculiar circumstances, does not
make his name public, corroborates this statement, and adds, that
these brave men were surrounded by three or four hundred guerillas and
partisan rangers, as they called themselves, who disputed for the
honor of being the executioners. The matter was settled by the party
taking a vote, when twelve were selected as the favored ones. The
rebel soldiers who perpetrated this outrageous murder, spent the rest
of the day in spreeing and jollification, many of them writing to
their friends at home an account of the pleasure they felt in
assisting in the hanging of "seven blue-bellies," as they termed the
Union soldiers.--_Note from a Pamphlet entitled "Ohio Boys in Dixie,"
published in New York in April, 1863._
Five only remained dangling in the air; for two of the seven, Campbell
and Slavens, being very heavy men, broke the ropes, and fell to the
ground insensible. In a short time they recovered, and asked for a
drink of water, which was given them. Then they requested an hour to
pray before entering the future world which lay so near and dark
before them. This last petition was indignantly refused, and as soon
as the ropes could be adjusted, they were compelled to re-ascend the
scaffold, and were again turned off!
The whole proceeding, from beginning to end, was marked by the most
revolting haste. They seemed to wish, by thus affording no time to
prepare for death, to murder soul and body both. Even the worst
criminals in our country are allowed some weeks to ask for God's
mercy, before they are thrust into his presence; but our poor boys,
whose only crime was loving and trying to serve their country, were
not allowed one moment! Could the barbarity of fiends go further?
That afternoon was one of deepest gloom for those who remained. We
knew not how soon we might be compelled to follow in the same path,
and drink the same bitter cup our comrades drank. Once during the
trial we had offered to accept the award of the court in one of the
cases as the sentence of all, since we could not see the slightest
reason for leaving some and taking others. At that time, however, we
believed that all would be acquitted. Now every hope had vanished.
But even without the addition of fear for ourselves, the parting from
our loved friends, whose voices were still ringing in our ears, while
they themselves had passed beyond the gates of death into the unknown
land of shadows, was enough to rend the stoutest heart. There were
tears then from eyes that shrank before no danger.
But I could not shed a tear. A cloud of burning heat rushed to my head
that seemed to scorch through every vein. For hours I scarcely knew
where I was, or the loss I had sustained. Every glance around the
room, which revealed the vacant places of our friends, would bring our
sorrow freshly on us again. Thus the afternoon passed away in grief
too deep for words. Slowly and silently the moments wore on, and no
one ventured to whisper of hope.
At last some voice suggested that we should seek relief in prayer. The
very idea seemed to convey consolation, and was eagerly accepted. Soon
we knelt around the bare walls of our strange sanctuary, and with
bleeding hearts drew near the throne of God. Captain Fry first led us,
and mingled sobs with strong supplications. Then each followed in his
turn, with but one or two exceptions, and even these were kneeling
with the rest. As the twilight deepened, our devotional exercises grew
more solemn. In the lonely shadow of coming night, with eternity thus
open tangibly before us, and standing on its very brink, we prayed
with a fervor that those who dwell in safety can scarcely conceive. We
besought our Father only that we might be prepared for the fate that
was inevitable, and that as he had led us through great trials, he
would be our Comforter, and sustain us still. Who will say that such
prayer was not effectual! It was heard in heaven. Even there, in that
prison, surrounded by an armed guard, amid the gloom of coming danger,
the peace of God, like a dove bearing the olive branch, descended into
every broken and believing heart. It was a holy hour, and if the
angels above ever bend from their bright mansions to comfort human
sorrow, I do believe that they were then hovering near. From that hour
I date the birth of an immortal hope, and I believe that many of my
companions also, on looking back, will realize that they passed from
death to life in that dreary prison-room!