MAGGOTS, LICE AND RAIDERS--PRACTICES OF THESE HUMAN VERMIN--PLUNDERING
THE SICK AND DYING--NIGHT ATTACKS, AND BATTLES BY DAY--HARD TIMES FOR
THE SMALL TRADERS.
With each long, hot Summer hour the lice, the maggot-flies and the
N’Yaarkers increased in numbers and venomous activity. They were
ever-present annoyances and troubles; no time was free from them. The
lice worried us by day and tormented us by night; the maggot-flies
fouled our food, and laid in sores and wounds larvae that speedily
became masses of wriggling worms. The N’Yaarkers were human vermin that
preyed upon and harried us unceasingly.
They formed themselves into bands numbering from five to twenty-five,
each led by a bold, unscrupulous, energetic scoundrel. We now called
them “Raiders,” and the most prominent and best known of the bands were
called by the names of their ruffian leaders, as “Mosby’s Raiders,”
“Curtis’s Raiders,” “Delaney’s Raiders,” “Sarsfield’s Raiders,”
“Collins’s Raiders,” etc.
As long as we old prisoners formed the bulk of those inside the
Stockade, the Raiders had slender picking. They would occasionally
snatch a blanket from the tent poles, or knock a boy down at the
Creek and take his silver watch from him; but this was all. Abundant
opportunities for securing richer swag came to them with the advent of
the Plymouth Pilgrims. As had been before stated, these boys brought
in with them a large portion of their first instalment of veteran
bounty--aggregating in amount, according to varying estimates, between
twenty-five thousand and one hundred thousand dollars. The Pilgrims
were likewise well clothed, had an abundance of blankets and camp
equipage, and a plentiful supply of personal trinkets, that could be
readily traded off to the Rebels. An average one of them--even if his
money were all gone--was a bonanza to any band which could succeed in
plundering him. His watch and chain, shoes, knife, ring, handkerchief,
combs and similar trifles, would net several hundred dollars in
Confederate money. The blockade, which cut off the Rebel communication
with the outer world, made these in great demand. Many of the prisoners
that came in from the Army of the Potomac repaid robbing equally
well. As a rule those from that Army were not searched so closely as
those from the West, and not unfrequently they came in with all their
belongings untouched, where Sherman’s men, arriving the same day, would
be stripped nearly to the buff.
The methods of the Raiders were various, ranging all the way from sneak
thievery to highway robbery. All the arts learned in the prisons and
purlieus of New York were put into exercise. Decoys, “bunko-steerers”
at home, would be on the look-out for promising subjects as each crowd
of fresh prisoners entered the gate, and by kindly offers to find them
a sleeping place, lure them to where they could be easily despoiled
during the night. If the victim resisted there was always sufficient
force at hand to conquer him, and not seldom his life paid the penalty
of his contumacy. I have known as many as three of these to be killed
in a night, and their bodies--with throats cut, or skulls crushed
in--be found in the morning among the dead at the gates.
All men having money or valuables were under continual espionage,
and when found in places convenient for attack, a rush was made for
them. They were knocked down and their persons rifled with such swift
dexterity that it was done before they realized what had happened.
At first these depredations were only perpetrated at night. The quarry
was selected during the day, and arrangements made for a descent. After
the victim was asleep the band dashed down upon him, and sheared him
of his goods with incredible swiftness. Those near would raise the cry
of “Raiders!” and attack the robbers. If the latter had secured their
booty they retreated with all possible speed, and were soon lost in
the crowd. If not, they would offer battle, and signal for assistance
from the other bands. Severe engagements of this kind were of continual
occurrence, in which men were so badly beaten as to die from the
effects. The weapons used were fists, clubs, axes, tent-poles, etc.
The Raiders were plentifully provided with the usual weapons of their
class--slung-shots and brass-knuckles. Several of them had succeeded in
smuggling bowie-knives into prison.
They had the great advantage in these rows of being well acquainted
with each other, while, except the Plymouth Pilgrims, the rest of the
prisoners were made up of small squads of men from each regiment in
the service, and total strangers to all outside of their own little
band. The Raiders could concentrate, if necessary, four hundred or five
hundred men upon any point of attack, and each member of the gangs had
become so familiarized with all the rest by long association in New
York, and elsewhere, that he never dealt a blow amiss, while their
opponents were nearly as likely to attack friends as enemies.
By the middle of June the continual success of the Raiders emboldened
them so that they no longer confined their depredations to the night,
but made their forays in broad daylight, and there was hardly an hour
in the twenty-four that the cry of “Raiders! Raiders!” did, not go up
from some part of the pen, and on looking in the direction of the cry,
one would see a surging commotion, men struggling, and clubs being
plied vigorously. This was even more common than the guards shooting
men at the Creek crossing.
One day I saw “Dick Allen’s Raiders,” eleven in number, attack a man
wearing the uniform of Ellett’s Marine Brigade. He was a recent comer,
and alone, but he was brave. He had come into possession of a spade,
by some means or another, and he used this with delightful vigor and
effect. Two or three times he struck one of his assailants so fairly
on the head and with such good will that I congratulated myself that
he had killed him. Finally, Dick Allen managed to slip around behind
him unnoticed, and striking him on the head with a slung-shot, knocked
him down, when the whole crowd pounced upon him to kill him, but were
driven off by others rallying to his assistance.
The proceeds of these forays enabled the Raiders to wax fat and lusty,
while others were dying from starvation. They all had good tents,
constructed of stolen blankets, and their headquarters was a large,
roomy tent, with a circular top, situated on the street leading to
the South Gate, and capable of accommodating from seventy-five to one
hundred men. All the material for this had been wrested away from
others. While hundreds were dying of scurvy and diarrhea, from the
miserable, insufficient food, and lack of vegetables, these fellows
had flour, fresh meat, onions, potatoes, green beans, and other
things, the very looks of which were a torture to hungry, scorbutic,
dysenteric men. They were on the best possible terms with the Rebels,
whom they fawned upon and groveled before, and were in return allowed
many favors, in the way of trading, going out upon detail, and making
purchases.
Among their special objects of attack were the small traders in the
prison. We had quite a number of these whose genius for barter was
so strong that it took root and flourished even in that unpropitious
soil, and during the time when new prisoners were constantly coming in
with money, they managed to accumulate small sums--from ten dollars
upward, by trading between the guards and the prisoners. In the period
immediately following a prisoner’s entrance he was likely to spend
all his money and trade off all his possessions for food, trusting to
fortune to get him out of there when these were gone. Then was when
he was profitable to these go-betweens, who managed to make him pay
handsomely for what he got. The Raiders kept watch of these traders,
and plundered them whenever occasion served. It reminded one of the
habits of the fishing eagle, which hovers around until some other bird
catches a fish, and then takes it away.