United States or Niue ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
As the historic British showman said, in reply to the question as to whether an animal in his collection was a rhinoceros or an elephant, "You pays your money and you takes your choice." The rations issued to us, as will be seen above, though they appear scanty, were still sufficient to support life and health, and months afterward, in Andersonville, we used to look back to them as sumptuous.
This Congress is bound to look after them until they can take care of themselves. If we do not hedge them around with protecting laws, if we leave them to the legislation of their old masters, we had better have left them in bondage. Their condition will be worse than that of our prisoners at Andersonville.
The peasantry of Italy believed firmly in the evil eye. Did they ever know any such men as Winder and his satellite, I could comprehend how much foundation they could have for such a belief. Lieutenant Davis had many faults, but there was no comparison between him and the Andersonville commandant.
At Andersonville Hopkins became one of the officers in charge of the Hospital. One day a Rebel Sergeant, who called the roll in the Stockade, after studying Hopkins's pin a minute, said: "I seed a Yank in the Stockade to-day a-wearing a pin egzackly like that ere." This aroused Hopkins's interest, and he went inside in search of the other "feller."
He died of scurvy and diarrhea, some months afterward, in Andersonville. The almost hourly scenes of violence and crime that marked the days and nights before the Regulators began operations were now succeeded by the greatest order. The prison was freer from crime than the best governed City. There were frequent squabbles and fights, of course, and many petty larcenies.
I had a wonderful trip to Andersonville. Everybody was very kind to me, and there were lovely things to see out the window. The conductor came in and spoke to me several times not the way you would look after a child, but the way a gentleman would tend to a lady. I liked him very much. There was a young gentleman in the seat in front, too, who was very nice.
There were three exceptions to this rule while we were in Andersonville. The next was after Hood made his desperate attack on Sherman, on the 22d of July, and the third was when Stoneman was captured at Macon. At each of these times about two thousand prisoners were brought in. By the end of May there were eighteen thousand four hundred and fifty-four prisoners in the Stockade.
I find that the report of the Smithsonian Institute gives the average annual rainfall in the section around Andersonville, at fifty-six inches nearly five feet while that of foggy England is only thirty-two. Our experience would lead me to think that we got the five feet all at once. We first comers, who had huts, were measurably better off than the later arrivals.
There were few exceptions to this rule in the army there were none in Andersonville. I can recall few or no instances where a large, strong, "hearty" man lived through a few months of imprisonment.
In many instances money was paid to secure this privilege, and I have been informed on good authority that Jack Huckleby, of the Eighth Tennessee, and Ira Beverly, of the One Hundredth Ohio, who kept the big sutler shop on the North Side at Andersonville, paid Davis five hundred dollars each to be allowed to go with the sailors.
Word Of The Day