The Bright Side of Prison Life Part 19

Going on to Shreveport, I found everything in a chaotic condition. There were batteries without horses, officers without men, and most of the stores had been looted by the departing troops.

We were two days about town, awaiting transportation, and saw that every horse that came within range was confiscated by soldiers, even to stopping wood wagons in the road and taking the animals away from them, the soldiers then leaving for home.

There was much expectation of seeing some of the Union fleet come up the river as transports, but they did not put in an appearance, and the citizens of the town were nearly frantic in consequence, on account of the plundering that was being done. During a conversation with several gentlemen, who were eager to ascertain what was known of the possible coming of the fleet, they told me that only the coming of the Federal army could save them from total financial ruin. The actions of these men were in accordance with their words, and, apparently, they voiced the sentiments of the entire business community.

The Confederate soldiers, realizing that the war was practically over, and being in need of nearly everything, made no apologies for the liberties taken, but, on the principle that "might makes right,"

appropriated everything in sight that was likely to be of use to them in solving the problem of how to live after peace had been declared. The situation, while full of excitement for all, had its amusing aspect, and I thought of it as another ill.u.s.tration of the fact that "those who dance must pay the fiddler."

Early in our march from the stockade I had had my sympathy greatly excited by the increasing illness of one of the sick men. His birthplace and residence had been in Pennsylvania, but he had gone over the State line and enlisted in the 3d Maryland. He had been sick for some time previous to our departure from the stockade, and had grown rapidly worse while on the road, despite the stimulation of being on his way to home and friends. He had been so brave and cheerful, notwithstanding his youthful age of only eighteen years, that I had become much interested in him. While prostrated on his bed of cotton, he had talked to me of his home and mother, and had spoken bravely of his chances of dying.

With a bright look on his face, he had said:

"I may pull through, Captain, and I may not; but I won't give up till I have to, for mother needs me; only I want you to let her know if anything happens."

I had done what I could for the boy, and on several occasion had gotten him milk and other things. He had given me his mother's name and address, but the absence of writing material at the time had prevented the making of other than a mental memorandum, and the necessity for a better record had been overlooked in the confusion and excitement of the trip. When the main body of our command caught up with me at Shreveport I was shocked to learn that he was dead. I had had doubts as to his living to get home, but so early a death was a surprise and shock, which latter was turned to self-reproach and sorrow when I found that I could not recollect the name and address given to me.

Fifteen years afterward, during which time I frequently tried in vain to recollect the data necessary to identify him, the name, address and other knowledge suddenly came to me one day when I was not thinking about it. At once I sat down and wrote to the mother, and in due time received a beautiful letter in reply. My letter was the first word she had received of the boy since he had last written to her in good health and spirits, except that the books of his company bore his name, with an "absent without leave" score against it. I recollected that he had told me of his having slipped off to forage a little on his own account at the time of his capture. Making an affidavit of the facts as I knew them, I sent it to her, and the pension which she could not get upon the records as they stood was promptly allowed her on the affidavit furnished.

After waiting for the Federal transports until tired, our guards placed us on a couple of rebel boats, and we started down the river for the Yankee fleet.

I was on the boat with Colonel Samansky, a Pole. He had been an officer in his own country, had enlisted in the Confederate army, and had gained the rank of Colonel. He lived in Texas and expected to remain there.

When he asked me how I had been treated, the only complaint that I could consistently make against those having me in charge was that I had not been exchanged with my regiment. I claimed to him that I had been of more service to the Union as a prisoner than I could have been if I had remained in the service, as I had kept, on an average, two men busy watching me ever since I had been captured. I showed him some samples of my work as exchange commissioner, and purposely magnified the matter. He only laughed and complimented me upon my enterprise, he being the rebel exchange commissioner.

At the mouth of the Red River we met some Federal boats coming up with prisoners. While exchanging boats, all who desired it had a chance to take a swim, and a number of us enjoyed the luxury. Possibly 500 men were in the water at one time.

One notable feature of this occasion was the fact remarked by everyone that you could tell a Yankee from a rebel as far as you could see him, even without his clothes. The reason for this was that our confinement in the open air had caused us to be burned brown by the sun, even through our clothing, while the rebels were white from confinement within walls.

We were taken down to New Orleans and housed there ten days in a cotton press, arriving on Sunday afternoon in our prison garb. We were a rather hard-looking crowd, but never was there a happier one.

The boys in New Orleans knew that we were coming, and Capt. S. H.

Harper, formerly a sergeant in my company, hunted me up and took me home with him. He was there on a detail, and was delighted to see me. I was fed on the best he had, and arrayed in a spare uniform of his. When I went back to the cotton press the boys did not know me.

From the time of my capture to that of my arrival in New Orleans I had only once been able to get word through to my wife, and I wrote to her as soon as I had a chance to do so after reaching that place. My first knowledge of her, after my capture, was acquired through Captain Harper, who told me that she was well when he had heard from home the last time, and also told me that she had heard of me through an escaped prisoner.

All the officers crowded about the paymaster's office in New Orleans, trying to get some money, and he had quite a time with them, as, while he believed what they told him of themselves, he could pay out no money until some person known to him would vouch for the recipient.

Captain Harper satisfactorily identified me to the paymaster, and I drew two months' pay. A proper voucher was now easily secured by as many of the officers as were personally known to me, and all such received a like amount.

While in New Orleans I met Honeycut on the street. I had left him in the Washington guardhouse, confined as a spy. We spent the day together, and I learned his later story, as follows:

"Two days after you left they started me off south alone, giving me orders to report to Kirby Smith, but it didn't take me long to discover that they had a spy on my track. When I reached Smith's headquarters and told my story they allowed me to go on to Matamoras, but somebody would overtake me every day and try to pump me. I bluffed 'em all off, and kept on my way in a natural manner, getting through all right, but I didn't lose any time, after I once got clear, in getting here by water to report.

"Had a funny little experience on the way; worth telling. A woman I know, up in Ohio, gave me the address of her brother in Texas before I left, in case I got down that way. I hunted him up on my way down, and told him a fairy story about my being the woman's husband and her being in Matamoras, bringing in what I told you in Washington and spinning him a long yarn about my treatment while trying to join my wife. Guess he believed me--looked like it, anyhow, for he treated me royally and let me have two hundred and fifty in gold."

When we left New Orleans we were put on a boat and started up the river for Benton Barracks, St. Louis. When we landed at the mouth of White river we were allowed to go on sh.o.r.e for an hour or two, and I then learned that my regiment was up the river at Duval's Bluffs. I did not go on board again, and the boat left without me.

After spending two days among the mosquitoes of that region I at last secured transportation and started up the river to join my regiment. We had to be convoyed by a gunboat.

When I reached Duval's Bluffs my company was doing guard duty. I found all hands and had a great reception, learning all the home news. This was the first positive information of a recent date, about home matters, received by me since my capture.

After spending three or four days with the boys, I went home, and my wife and myself renewed our acquaintance.

She had heard of me through an escaped prisoner, who had reported me as being in the stockade, but she had received no other information concerning me until the boys had gotten home after the exchange. My letter from New Orleans had been a very welcome missive.

My friends at home flocked to see me, and I was kept busy telling my story.

Having gone through it all, I was disposed to drop the hardships from the story, except when questioned, and to treat the thing as a huge picnic. My natural disposition being to see the bright side only, the hardships of which I had to tell were made to have another aspect than the usual one presented of prison life. As a consequence of this fact, my story differed considerably from that of a number who had been prisoners with me.

Friends would come to me and hear my story, frequently saying:

"My! Swiggett, you do not seem to have had such a bad time of it. The others tell such horrible stories that it is a relief to hear yours; and yet you were in the same prison. How is it?"

I replied in such cases that most of my time as a prisoner had been spent outside of the stockade, in one way or another, and that, aside from the monotony and the separation from family, we did not see much more hardship than comes in the every-day life of lots of people out of prison, and that there was a bright side to it all.

"But you don't d.a.m.n the rebels, Swiggett, like the others," they would say, to which I would reply that the rebels had treated me as well as they could under the circ.u.mstances, and that when people did the best they could they should not be d.a.m.ned for what they failed to do, especially as prison life was necessarily a hardship at its best.

There were cases of personal ill-treatment which came under my notice, but they were the great exceptions, and, as a rule, the rebels of my acquaintance did for their prisoners all that was possible with the means in their power, and treated them as well as prisoners could expect to be treated.

It may be of interest to the reader to learn that all the men who were my companions in escape are still living, except Capt. J. B. Gedney and Adjt. Stephen K. Mahon.

The rebels did not treat us as well as we might have been treated, as it was possible for Jeff Davis to have invited us to Richmond, arrayed us in his Sunday clothes, fed us at his own table and confined us in his front parlor. It may have been only an oversight that he did not do so, but it was not expected, and we harbored no ill-feelings because of the neglect. On the other hand, we were not treated as badly as we might have been, inasmuch as we were not deprived of companionship, and, as a rule, were allowed to sleep when we pleased, to rest as much as we desired, to be late for dinner if we wished, and to eat in our shirt sleeves without protest. Many a man is deprived of these privileges in his own home, and I have eaten food of a less nourishing character than that given us by the rebels, even at the table of a newly-married couple, where perfect bliss should reign supreme.

The war is over. Our foes had neither our resources nor our advantages in its prosecution, and many things that were easy for us were impossible for them. Abuse of authority is not a trait of man, but of men, and those who are indirectly responsible should not be too harshly censured for what they cannot altogether control. Incidents by the thousand of heroic, heart-touching actions performed for humanity's sake during our war by those on one side for those on the other reflect as much credit upon rebels as upon Yankees, and I have always felt that, on the whole, our antagonists did the best they could for their prisoners.

THE END.

APPENDIX.

Brief Sketches of my Companions.

FRANCIS MARION DRAKE, GOVERNOR OF IOWA.

The parents of Governor Drake were John Adams Drake and Mrs. Harriet O'Neil Drake. They were natives of the Old North State; removed to Rushville, Ill., where the son, Francis Marion, was born December 30, 1830. From Rushville they removed to Fort Madison, Iowa, in the fall of 1837. The father was a merchant in Illinois, but served as judge of probate of Lee county, Iowa, when a resident of Fort Madison, until the spring of 1846. He then removed to Davis county, Iowa, and founded the village of Drakeville. Francis Marion received his early education in the common schools, and also acquired a knowledge of law.

When the gold excitement in California was at its height he crossed the plains in 1852 with ox-teams, and again in 1854 with a drove of cattle.

On the first trip across, his company of sixteen men had a severe engagement with the p.a.w.nees at Sh.e.l.l Creek, Neb., in which they encountered about 300 Indians, who were defeated with heavy loss and driven across the Platte river. On his return from California, October 1, 1854, he was a pa.s.senger on the ill-fated steamer "Yankee Blade,"

which was wrecked and totally lost, and he was picked up five days later on a barren coast which he had succeeded in reaching.

He had been successful in his California ventures, and on the 1st of January, 1855, entered the mercantile business with his father, and brother, J. H. Drake, under the firm name of Drake & Sons, at Drakeville. In June, 1861, he enlisted as a private in the volunteer service of the United States and served until the close of the war, being promoted to captain, major, lieutenant-colonel and from lieutenant-colonel to the rank of brigadier-general by brevet. He was in many severe engagements, in one of which he was seriously, at first thought mortally, wounded, and from which wound he has never entirely recovered. His record for bravery and efficiency was universally commended by his superior officers, and his military career is one of which he may well be proud.

On resuming civil life, General Drake engaged in the practice of law, in which he was eminently successful, for a period of three years, when he entered the railroad business, organizing and building what is now known as the Keokuk & Western Railroad. He resumed his law practice for another period of three years, a.s.sociated with Gen. A. J. Baker, who became attorney-general of the State, when he again entered upon the railroad business, and has organized and built by his own efforts over 400 miles of railroad, a large part of which he still controls, being president of the Indiana, Illinois & Iowa, Albia & Centerville and director in the Iowa Central and Keokuk & Western railroads. He has also been successful as a banker, and is president of the Centerville National Bank.

His material interests have not prevented him from taking an active interest in educational matters and missionary work. He is president of the board of trustees of Drake University, at Des Moines, named after him, on account of his great liberality to that inst.i.tution in its building and endowment. He has also been a contributor to many other educational inst.i.tutions.

In 1895 he accepted the nomination of the republican party for Governor of the State of Iowa, and was elected by a large majority, having received the largest vote ever given for a candidate for Governor of the State.