Dec., 1864.

When Sherman's army entered Savannah the people of that city were on the verge of starvation. The Rebel authorities had not accumulated sufficient supplies for a long defence. They were ignorant of the intentions of Sherman when he left Atlanta, and were unable to see through his plan till too late to put the place in condition to withstand a siege. Breastworks were hastily thrown up on the west side of the city. The eastern approaches were strongly protected by a series of forts, turrets, and batteries built by slaves at the beginning of the war, in which were heavy guns commanding the river and the roads. No one had dreamed that the Yankees would come from the west. When Sherman was fairly on his march there was consternation in all the cities along the coast. Charleston expected him. Would he not aim directly toward the cradle of Secession? The people of Mobile believed that the fleet which was gathering in the Gulf was destined to co-operate with the "ruthless invader" in an attack upon them. The inhabitants of Brunswick expected to see him there. The citizens of Savannah were equally alarmed. Proclamations and manifestoes were issued. Governor Brown called upon the Georgians to rise in their might; but their former might was weakness now. They had lost heart. They saw that their cause was failing. Their armies, successful in the beginning, had won no victory for many months. The appeals of the Governor, the manifestoes of the Rebel generals, the calls of municipal authorities, and the exhortations of Davis, awakened no enthusiasm. The planters did not hasten to the rendezvous, nor respond to the call to send provisions. The Rebel quartermasters and commissaries were active in making forced levies, and the conscription bureau was vigilant in bringing in reluctant recruits; but before preparations for defending the city were completed Sherman was thundering at the door. When he saw the destitution, he made an appeal to the humanity of the people of the North. Boston, New York, and Philadelphia were quick to respond. In Boston thirty thousand dollars were contributed in four days, a steamer chartered, loaded, and despatched on its errand of mercy. The occasion being so unusual, I deemed it worth while to visit Savannah, to be an eye-witness of the reception of the timely and munificent gift.

The employment of the steamer Greyhound on such a mission added to the interest. She was a captured blockade-runner, built at Greenock, Scotland, in 1863, purposely to run the blockade. She made one trip into Wilmington, and was seized while attempting to escape from that port. In every timber, plank, rivet, and brace was England's hatred of the North, support of the South, and cupidity for themselves; but now she carried peace and good-will, not only to the people of Savannah, but to men of every clime and lineage, race and nation. The Greyhound speeding her way was a type and symbol of the American Republic, freighted with the world's best hopes, and sailing proudly forward to the future centuries.

Among the passengers on board at the time of her capture was Miss Belle Boyd, of notoriety as a spy,—bold, venturesome, and dashing, unscrupulous, bitter in her hatred of the Yankees, regardless of truth or honor, if she could but serve the Rebels. She was of great service to them in the Shenandoah. Being within the Union lines, she obtained information which on several occasions enabled Jackson to make those sudden dashes which gave him his early fame.

It was nearly dark on Saturday evening, January 14th, when the Greyhound discharged her pilot off Boston Light. The weather was thick, the wind southeast, but during the night it changed to the northwest and blew a gale. The cold was intense. Sunday morning found us in Holmes's Hole, covered with ice. At noon the gale abated, and we ran swiftly across the Vineyard Sound, shaping our course for Hatteras. Off Charleston we passed through the blockading fleet, which was gayly decorated in honor of the taking of Fort Fisher. The Rebel flag was floating defiantly over Sumter. On Thursday evening we dropped anchor off Port Royal, where a half-day was lost in obtaining permission from the custom-house to proceed to Savannah. The obstructions in Savannah River made it necessary to enter Warsaw Sound and go up Wilmington River. With a colored pilot,—the only one obtainable, recommended by the Harbor-Master of Hilton Head,—the Greyhound put to sea once more, ran down the coast, and on Sunday morning entered the Sound. Our pilot professed to know all the crooks and turns of the river, but suddenly we found ourselves fast on a mud-bank. It was ebb-tide, and the incoming flood floated us again. Then the engines refused to work, the pumps having become foul, and the anchor was dropped just in season to save the steamer from drifting broadside upon a sandbar. It was ten miles to Thunderbolt Battery. The captain of a pilot-boat was kind enough to send Messrs. Briggs and Baldwin, of the committee of the citizens of Boston in charge of the supplies, Mr. Glidden, of the firm owning the Greyhound, and the writer, up to that point. We landed, and stood where the Rebels had made sad havoc of what was once a pleasant village. Some Iowa soldiers, on seediest horses and sorriest mules, were riding round on a frolic. Shiftless, long-haired, red-eyed men and women, lounging about, dressed in coarsest homespun, stared at us. A score of horses and mules were in sight, and here were collected old carts, wagons, and carriages which Sherman's boys had brought from the interior.

"We want to get a horse and wagon to take us to Savannah," said one of the party to a little old man, standing at the door of a house.

"Wal, I reckon ye can take any one of these yere," he said, pointing to the horses and mules. Such animals! Ringboned, spavined, knock-kneed, wall-eyed, sore-backed,—mere hides and bones, some of them too weak to stand, others unable to lie down on account of stiff joints.

"How far is it to Savannah?" we asked of the residents of the village.

"Three miles," said one.

"Two miles and a half, I reckon," said a second.

"Three miles and three quarters," was the estimate of a third person. A woman, dressed in a plaid petticoat, a snuff-colored linsey-woolsey tunic, with a tawny countenance, black hair, and flashing black eyes, smoking a pipe, said: "I'll tell yer how fur it be. Savannah be a frying-pan and Thunderbolt be the handle, and I live on the eend on it. It be four miles long, zactly."

Two colored soldiers rode up, both on one horse, with "55" on their caps.

"What regiment do you belong to?"

"The Fifty-Fifth Massachusetts."

Their camp was a mile or so up river. A steamboat captain, who wished to communicate with the quartermaster, came upstream in his boat and kindly offered to take us to the Fifty-Fifth. It began to rain, and we landed near a fine old mansion surrounded by live-oaks, their gnarled branches draped with festoons of moss, where we thought to find accommodations for the night; but no one answered our ringing. The doors were open, the windows smashed in; marble mantels, of elaborate workmanship, marred and defaced; the walls written over with doggerel. There were bunks in the parlors, broken crockery, old boots,—dÉbris everywhere.

The committee took possession of the premises and made themselves at home before a roaring fire, while the writer went out upon a reconnoissance, bringing back the intelligence that the camp of the Fifty-Fifth was a mile farther up the river. It was dark when we reached the hospitable shanty of Lieutenant-Colonel Fox, who, in the absence of Colonel Hartwell, was commanding the regiment, which had been there but twenty-four hours. The soldiers had no tents.

One of the committee rode into Savannah, through a drenching rain, to report to General Grover. The night came on thick and dark. The rain was pouring in torrents. Colonel Fox, with great kindness, offered to escort us to a house near by, where we could find shelter. We splashed through the mud, holding on to each other's coat-tails, going over boots in muddy water, tumbling over logs, losing our way, being scratched by brambles, falling into ditches, bringing up against trees, halting at length against a fence,—following which we reached the house. The owner had fled, and the occupant had moved in because it was a free country and the place was inviting. He had no bed for us, but quickly kindled a fire in one of the chambers and spread some quilts upon the floor. "I haven't much wood, but I reckon I can pick up something that will make a fire," said he. Then came the pitch-pine staves of a rice-cask; then a bedstead, a broken chair, a wooden flowerpot!

The morning dawned bright and clear. General Grover sent out horses for us, and so we reached the city after many vexatious delays and rough experiences.

The people in Savannah generally were ready to live once more in the Union. The fire of Secession had died out. There was not much sourness,—less even than I saw at Memphis when that city fell into our hands, less than was manifested in Louisville at the beginning of the war.

At a meeting of the citizens resolutions expressive of gratitude for the charity bestowed by Boston, New York, and Philadelphia were passed, also of a desire for future fellowship and amity.

A store at the corner of Bay and Barnard Streets was taken for a depot, the city canvassed, and a registry made of all who were in want. I passed a morning among the people who came for food. The air was keen. Ice had formed in the gutters, and some of the jolly young negroes, who had provided themselves with old shoes and boots from the camp-grounds of Sherman's soldiers, were enjoying the luxurious pastime of a slide on the ice. The barefooted cuddled under the sunny side of the buildings. There was a motely crowd. Hundreds of both sexes, all ages, sizes, complexions, and costumes; gray-haired old men of Anglo-Saxon blood, with bags, bottles, and baskets; colored patriarchs, who had been in bondage many years, suddenly made freemen; well-dressed women wearing crape for their husbands and sons who had fallen while fighting against the old flag, stood patiently waiting their turn to enter the building, where through the open doors they could see barrels of flour, pork, beans, and piles of bacon, hogsheads of sugar, molasses, and vinegar. There were women with tattered dresses,—old silks and satins, years before in fashion, and laid aside as useless, but which now had become valuable through destitution. There were women in linsey-woolsey, in negro and gunny cloth, in garments made from meal-bags, and men in Confederate gray and butternut brown; a boy with a crimson plush jacket, made from the upholstering of a sofa; men in short jackets, and little boys in long ones; the cast-off clothes of soldiers; the rags which had been picked up in the streets, and exhumed from garrets; boots and shoes down at the heel, open at the instep, and gaping at the toes; old bonnets of every description, some with white and crimson feathers, and ribbons once bright and flaunting; hats of every style worn by both sexes, palm-leaf, felt, straw, old and battered and well ventilated. One without a crown was worn by a man with red hair, suggestive of a chimney on fire, and flaming out at the top! It was the ragman's jubilee for charity.

One of the tickets issued by the city authorities, in the hand of a woman waiting her turn at the counter, read thus:—

Andersonville, Belle Isle, Libby Prison, Millen, and Salisbury will forever stand in suggestive contrast to this City Store in Savannah, furnished by the free-will offering of the loyal people of the North.

"At Libby," reads the report of the United States Sanitary Committee, "a process of slow starvation was carried on. The corn-bread was of the roughest and coarsest description. Portions of the cob and husk were often found grated in with the meal. The crust was so thick and hard that the prisoners called it 'iron clad.' To render the bread eatable they grated it, and made mush of it; but the crust they could not grate. Now and then, after long intervals, often of many weeks, a little meat was given them, perhaps two or three mouthfuls. At a later period they received a pint of black peas, with some vinegar, every week; the peas were often full of worms, or maggots in a chrysalis state, which, when they made soup, floated on the surface.... But the most unaccountable and shameful act of all was yet to come. Shortly after this general diminution of rations, in the month of January, the boxes (sent by friends in the North to the prisoners), which before had been regularly delivered, and in good order, were withheld. No reason was given. Three hundred arrived every week, and were received by Colonel Ould, Commissioner of Exchange; but instead of being distributed, they were retained and piled up in warehouses near by, in full sight of the tantalized and hungry captives."[75]

While these supplies were being distributed to the people of Savannah, thirty thousand Union prisoners in the hands of the Rebels in Southwestern Georgia were starving to death,—not from a scarcity of food, but in accordance with a deliberately formed plan to render them unfit for future service in the Union ranks by their inhuman treatment, should they live to be exchanged.

What a page of darkness for the future historian!

On the other hand, the Rebel prisoners in the North received invariably the same rations, in quality and quantity, given to the Union soldiers in the field, with ample clothing, fuel, and shelter. So unexceptional was their treatment, that since the war a Southern writer, desirous of removing the load of infamy resting upon the South, has advertised for statements of unkind treatment in Northern prisons![76]

Of the treatment of Union soldiers in the Southern prisons the United States Sanitary Commission says:—

"The prisoners were almost invariably robbed of everything valuable in their possession; sometimes on the field, at the instant of capture, sometimes by the prison authorities, in a quasi-official way, with the promise of return when exchanged or paroled, but which promise was never fulfilled. This robbery amounted often to a stripping of the person of even necessary clothing. Blankets and overcoats were almost always taken, and sometimes other articles; in which case damaged ones were returned in their stead. This preliminary over, the captives were taken to prison."

At the trial of Wirz, the commandant of Andersonville, Dr. John C. Bates, a surgeon of the Rebel service, testified as follows:—

"My attention was called to a patient in my ward who was only fifteen or sixteen years of age. I took much interest in him, owing to his youth. He would ask me to bring him a potato, bread, or biscuit, which I did. I put them in my pocket. He had scurvy and gangrene. I advised him not to cook the potato, but to eat it raw. He became more and more emaciated, his sores gangrened, and for want of food, and from lice, he died. I understood that it was against orders to take anything in to the prisoners, and hence I was shy in slipping food into my pockets. Others in the ward came to their death from the same causes. When I went there, there were two thousand or two thousand five hundred sick. I judge twenty or twenty-five thousand persons were crowded together. Some had made holes and burrows in the earth. Those under the sheds were doing comparatively well. I saw but little shelter, excepting what ingenuity had devised. I found them suffering with scurvy, dropsy, diarrhoea, gangrene, pneumonia, and other diseases. When prisoners died, they were laid in wagons, head foremost, to be carried off. I don't know how they were buried. The effluvia from the hospital was very offensive. If by accident my hand was abraded, I would not go into the hospital without putting a plaster over the affected part. If persons whose systems were reduced by inanition should by chance stump a toe or scratch the hand, the next report to me was gangrene, so potent was the regular hospital gangrene. The prisoners were more thickly confined in the stockade,—like ants and bees. Dogs were kept to hunt down the prisoners who escaped. Fifty per cent of those who died might have been saved had the patients been properly cared for. The effect of the treatment of the prisoners was, morally as well as physically, injurious. There was much stealing among them. All lived each for himself. I suppose this was superinduced by their starving condition. Seeing the dying condition of some of them, I remarked to my student, 'I can't resuscitate them; the weather is chilling; it is a matter of impossibility.' I found persons lying dead sometimes among the living. Thinking they merely slept, I went to wake them up and found they had taken their everlasting sleep. This was in the hospital. I judge it was about the same in the stockade. There being no dead-house, I erected a tent for the purpose, but I soon found that a blanket or quilt had been clipped off the canvas; and as the material could not be readily supplied, the dead-house was abandoned. I don't think any more dead-houses were erected. The daily ration was less in September, October, November, and December than it was from the 1st of January to the 20th of March. The men had not over twenty ounces of food in the twenty-four hours."

The prison at Andersonville was established in January, 1864, and was used a little more than a year. It was in the form of a quadrangle, 1,295 feet long, 865 feet wide. A small stream, rising from neighboring springs, flowed through the grounds. Within the enclosure, seventeen feet from the stockade, the dead-line was established, marked by small posts, to which a slight strip of board was nailed. Upon the inner stockade were fifty-two sentry-boxes, in which the guards stood with loaded muskets; while overlooking the enclosure were several forts, with field artillery in position, to pour grape and canister upon the perishing men at the first sign of insurrection.

Miss Clara Barton, the heroic and tender-hearted woman who, in the employ of government, visited this charnel-house to identify the graves of the victims, thus reports:—

"Under the most favorable circumstances and best possible management the supply of water would have been insufficient for half the number of persons who had to use it. The existing arrangements must have aggravated the evil to the utmost extent. The sole establishments for cooking and baking were placed on the bank of the stream immediately above and between the two inner lines of the pallisades. The grease and refuse from them were found adhering to the banks at the time of our visit. The guards, to the number of three thousand six hundred, were principally encamped on the upper part of the stream, and when the heavy rains washed down the hillsides covered with thirty thousand human beings, and the outlet below failed to discharge the flood which backed and filled the valley, the water must have become so foul and loathsome that every statement I have seen of its offensiveness must fall short of the reality; and yet within rifle-shot of the prison flowed a stream, fifteen feet wide and three feet deep, of pure, delicious water. Had the prison been placed so as to include a section of 'Sweet Water Creek,' the inmates might have drank and bathed to their hearts' content."[77]

The prisoners had no shelter from the fierce sun of summer, the pelting autumn rains, or the cold of winter, except a few tattered tents. Thousands were destitute of blankets. For refuge they dug burrows in the ground.

Miss Barton says:—

"The little caves are scooped out and arched in the form of ovens, floored, ceiled, and strengthened, so far as the owners had means, with sticks and pieces of board, and some of them are provided with fireplaces and chimneys. It would seem that there were cases, during the long rains, where the house would become the grave of its owner by falling upon him in the night.... During thirteen long months they knew neither shelter nor protection from the changeable skies above, nor the pitiless, unfeeling earth beneath....

"Think of thirty thousand men penned by close stockade upon twenty-six acres of ground, from which every tree and shrub had been uprooted for fuel to cook their scanty food, huddled like cattle, without shelter or blanket, half clad and hungry, with the dewy night setting in after a day of autumn rain. The hilltop would not hold them all, the valley was filled by the swollen brook. Seventeen feet from the stockade ran the fatal dead-line, beyond which no man might step and live. What did they do? I need not ask where did they go, for on the face of the whole earth there was no place but this for them. But where did they place themselves? How did they live? Ay! how did they die?"