PRISON LIFE, POINT LOOKOUT, MD.
[Illustration: IN THE HANDS OF COLORED TROOPS.]
In a few days the transports came along, and we boarded them quickly,
reaching Point Lookout May 20; and before getting in line each prisoner
was subjected to a search and relieved of any valuables or knives and
pistols. We found as guards here about eleven hundred colored soldiers,
in command of Major H. G. O. Weymouth, of the Nineteenth Massachusetts
Regiment. Major Weymouth lost a leg in the battle of Fredericksburg,
and this post was given him, and also because he was a good executive
officer.
General Grant knew how to economize in men; and as these colored
soldiers had not behaved well at the front, he replaced them with
white troops and sent the colored soldiers to Point Lookout. This
camp occupied some twenty acres of sandy land. It was a peninsula
with several wells, and the waters before the war were noted for
their medicinal properties. It was situated on Chesapeake Bay at the
confluence of the Potomac River. The bay was twenty-five miles wide,
and it was eight miles across the Potomac. The camp was surrounded by
a fence sixteen feet high, and three feet from the top was a parapet
walkway which was the beat of the guards, who were stationed some
forty feet apart; besides, there were also a garrison on the outside
and artillery, shotted, to be used in case of an insurrection by the
prisoners.
Much has been said, written, and spoken of the treatment of prisoners,
North and South. In the United States Senate it was on one occasion
the cause of a heated debate between Senators Hill and Blaine; and
no doubt Senator Hill got the better of the argument, for with the
Southern ports all blockaded, our people raising tobacco, cotton,
resin, and turpentine, we did not have provisions to feed the army,
and consequently the prisoners at Andersonville and other Southern
prisons had to fare the same as our army. On the other hand, the United
States was teeming with men, provisions, and money, all the ports were
open to the world, and a bounty of six hundred dollars had induced
a great flood of emigrants from the Old World. While the words I use
in describing prison life may be harsh, yet there is no bitterness in
my heart. When I took the oath of allegiance at Elmira, N. Y., nearly
three months after General Lee surrendered, I turned my back upon
the past, and buried it with all its prejudices and animosities. I
recognize the fatherhood of God, the brotherhood of man, and there is
no one with whom I cannot clasp hands.
The quarters at Point Lookout were large Sibley tents, which were
cone-shaped. These tents would accommodate seventeen men sleeping in a
circle. We did not need any blankets, and for a pillow we raked up a
bank of sand. It was very hot in these tents with so many bunkmates.
Our rations consisted of salt pork, bean soup, hard-tack, and
occasionally fresh meat. We had not been in prison long before we were
deprived of coffee. There were three large gates in the fence opening
out to Chesapeake Bay, and we bathed and did our washing there. Near
Major Weymouth’s headquarters was another gate, opening to the pier
where all the vessels unloaded prisoners and supplies. On the bay side
at night the gates were closed, and no one could get to the bay. I was
at the Point five weeks without change of clothing. I would go into the
bay, wash my clothes, hang them on sand to dry, and go into the water
up to my chin to keep from getting sunburned. At the end of five weeks
I resolved to get some clothing, so I denied myself a ration a day, and
after the two days’ fast I sold my two rations to a fellow-prisoner
for five cents, and with the money I purchased from the sutler one
postage stamp, in those days three cents, and one cent each for sheets
of paper and envelopes; and as soon as my letter reached a friend in
Baltimore he sent me a package of clothing and a ten-pound package
of Killikinnick smoking tobacco. In writing a letter you could use
only one side of the sheet, as all letters had to be examined and
approved before mailing, and you had to be careful not to write
anything contraband. The envelopes were stamped: “Prisoner’s letter,
examined and approved.” On receiving letters, they first came to the
commandant and were read and stamped approved by him. Remittances of
money, by mail or express, were receipted for by the commandant, and
then turned over to the sutler. In some prisons I have heard that the
commandant and sutler were partners; I do not think that this was the
case, however, at Point Lookout. At nine o’clock at night the bugle was
sounded for taps or lights out, and every one had to be in his tent at
that hour with lights out. The colored soldiers patroled after nine
o’clock along the avenues between the tents with six-shooters in their
hands; and if they heard any noise in a tent, they would shoot into it;
therefore, after 9 P.M. Point Lookout, with its army of ten thousand
men, was almost as quiet as a cemetery.
Of course it was very humiliating to Southern men to be thus guarded
by some of their former slaves. All the commissaries, wood, etc., was
unloaded by details of prisoners; and many of them were anxious to get
on this detail, as it gave them a day outside of prison walls, and
also sometimes an opportunity to appropriate some extra rations; and
again, they could hear what they called grapevine news. Newspapers were
not allowed in the prison, and our chance to hear anything from the
front was very limited. There was a line inside the prison called the
dead line, which was one of the guards’ beats, and no one was allowed
to cross this line. One evening a squad which had been on detail on the
outside entered the prison, and quite a crowd rushed up to them to hear
the news, and some of them were crowded over the dead line. Without
hesitation the guard fired into the group, severely wounding two of
our prisoners. Major Weymouth had the sentinel removed, but I never
heard of his court-martial. Our ears were frequently greeted with the
expression from the colored guards: “The bottom rail is on top now; my
gun wants to smoke.”
For a great deal of persecution from the guards I do not think that
Major Weymouth was responsible. They were, nearly all of them, young
negroes from the North Carolina tobacco fields. They were uniformed the
same as white troops, and of course they felt their importance. While
Major Weymouth was at the head of the troops, he was also to command
the prisoners and to see that there was no infringement of the rules
and regulations. Major Weymouth was a Mason, and allowed the prisoners
to make an appeal to the fraternity at Baltimore for clothing, which
was sent to the prison, and he distributed it to them.
Major Wirz occupied the same position at Andersonville in command of
our guards, who were all white. There is no doubt that many indignities
offered prisoners at Andersonville were without his knowledge or
consent. Mr. Oakley, who is at present yardmaster of the Louisville
and Nashville Railroad, was from an Ohio regiment, and served a term
in Andersonville. I heard him say that Wirz was a Mason, and that he
had known him on many occasions to read the Masonic burial service
over his dead. Mr. Oakley contends that Wirz was not a cruel man, yet
the poor fellow was denied the glorious death of a soldier by being
shot, but suffered an ignominious death by hanging. If we had gained
our independence, I do not think that Major Weymouth would have been
hanged for the many crimes committed by the colored sentinels at Point
Lookout; but there is no telling what feelings are engendered by a
civil war in which father is arrayed against son, brother against
brother, and neighbor against neighbor. We lived too close to our
brethren in East Tennessee and Kentucky not to be familiar with
the bitter sectional hate; but let me digress just here to give an
illustration between a civil and a foreign war, in which the treatment
of prisoners of war is in marked contrast. During the Spanish-American
War I was in Norfolk, Va., just after one hundred and twenty prisoners
had been received at the Naval Hospital from Admiral Cervera’s
fleet. Our ladies were very kind to them, sending them all sorts of
delicacies; and it will be remembered that some enthusiastic American
suggested that we purchase a mansion for the Admiral, and induce him to
reside with us.
A peculiar malady affected the prisoners at Point Lookout. After dark
about half of them were blind, and daylight would restore their sight.
One day I asked the doctor the cause, and he said that he thought that
the salty soup mixed with the mineral-water had something to do with
it, but that the prime cause was the sun’s heat and reflection from the
water, the sand, and the white tents.
One day there was quite a commotion in camp, and I saw a crowd
gathering near one of the tents. On inquiry I heard, “There is a woman
in camp.” It appeared that, in order to be with her lover, who was an
artilleryman, she had doffed her feminine garb, cut short her hair, and
donned the uniform of an artilleryman. Major Weymouth provided her with
feminine wearing apparel and sent her home. Whether either survived the
cruel war and afterwards married, “this deponent sayeth not.”
An enterprising prisoner whom I knew many years ago in Lynchburg, Va.,
made him a gambling house of pieces of cracker boxes, and here gambling
was going on from early morn till nearly nine o’clock at night. If the
prisoners did not have any money, they put up tobacco as stakes.
In July, 1864, the prison was overcrowded with captures from General’s
Lee’s army, and the government was building a new one at Elmira, N. Y.,
and about the 15th of July commenced to transfer a large number to that
point. I left July 30 on a transport. One thousand men were loaded on
one steamer. We were packed away in the hull and lower deck, and were
not allowed in the cabin. We steamed down the bay, and were en route
to Jersey City. Before reaching Elmira it may be well to give some
statistics:
White troops enlisted by the United States 1861-65, about 2,100,000
Colored troops 190,000
The Confederate States, about 650,000
The United States captured 220,000
The Confederate States captured 270,000
Died in Northern prisons 26,246
Died in Southern prisons 22,576
The death rate North was twelve per cent., while the death rate South
was only nine per cent., and we have already seen that there was
little in the South to feed prisoners or any one else. When we landed
at Jersey City, I saw a large crowd over at Governor’s Island, and
upon inquiring who they were, the answer came: “Bounty jumpers.” I
asked what constituted a bounty jumper, and the reply was that a lot
of foreigners came to the United States for the six hundred dollars
bounty, and after getting the money deserted.
Soon after reaching Jersey City we disembarked, and were loaded into
the cars, and a guard stationed at each door. The car windows were
small, and there was no chance to get out. While en route we were not
allowed to speak to any one at the various stations at which we stopped.
[Illustration: PRISON CAMP, ELMIRA, N. Y.]