Daily Kennebec journal., 1880-05-05
AFTER FIFTEEN YEARS.
An AMERICAN SOLDIERS Story

.leS. they had hard time of il there.
says 4 short, sallow. keen-eyed man,
gancing over the Illustrated Newspaper,
which contains an engraving of Mr.. Au-
gustus Van Clef's fine monument 10 the
unknown dead" at Salisbury, North
Carolina. Il guess ought TO know some-
thing of what the Southern prisons were
like during the war, for | had five months
of il in Andersonvilc myself"
In a Pennsylvania train. among men oi
whom not few have taken part in the
great struggle themselves, and who have
each and all had ut least one relative en-
gagged in it. such an announcementisq quite
sufficient TO command general attention.
mo, did YOU. though ?''
'.S'pose YOU tell us the story. Mister;
there's time enough for New York.
reckon
''All right, if You care TO hear it. You
see, when | first came over from England
the war was just about beginning; and as
there didn't seem to be anything for me
to do | thought I'd better soldier than
starve; so | went and listed right away.
wasn't longin finding out that soldering
and starving might sometimes mean pref
ty much the same thing. for rations were
mighty scarce with us once or twice, when
we get down on the Mississippi. tell
We. after lying all night in II rice-swamp.
stiff and wet and miserable, with nothing
to eat and only marsh-watcr TO drink, il
was Just like the breath Of life 10 me to
hear the alarm sounded. and to know that
we'd be at the enemy in few minutes
more
At this moment a pale-faced man. who
was going from seat to seat with basket
of newspapers and magazines, paused for
a moment to listen. with a look Of mucI,
evident appreciation that il hardly required
the testimony of his empty sleeve to show
that he. too. had been Il soldieA in his
time.
I'VE had plenty of fighting down there"
pursued the narrator. a. the newspaper
man passed "but most of il was the sort
that | didn't like-skirmishing among
thick woods, where all you could see OF
your enemy was the smoke of his piece rs
he let fly nj you, and where lots of our
fellows were shot down without ever know
ing who hurt 'em. I'd pretty narrow
escape myself that way one night. was
standing sentry at the outposts when
Reb let slap at me from the thicket. and
Just caught me across the cheek here you
see the mark. got behind a tree quick
as winking. and there | stuffed my
jacket with grass, and put ii up against q
tree with stick through it and my cap on
the top. to look as if ! was peering around
for a shot; and then dropped down and
crawled away into the bushes. Presently
! heard the crack of the Rebs piece again
and looking out just caught sight Of his
arm and shoulder. and brought him down
| with one shot.
"Well not long after that | and some
more got picked up by the Southern cav
airy. and if wasn't a great while before we
all found ourselves hard and fast in An
dcrsonville: and there we did have time,
sure enough.
''The place has been described so often
that dare say you have aprctty good idea
what il was like II was n great, wide,
swampy field with stockadc around it,
inside which thousands of us were cooped
up just like cattle in pen. If man hap
pencd to have a blanket and two or three
bits Of sticks. so he could rig up shelter
against the sun and rain. all the better for
him il he hadn't, he just took his chance /;
and can tell YOU there were mighty few
blankets among rs, and many OF US had
little enough clothes either.
''All day long the sun kept roasting us
alive. and at night the damp and chill ate
into our very bones. and set US shivering
till our teeth ratified again. As to food,
many's the time I've gone all day upon a
couple OF biscuits, and small ones at that /;
and as to water, all we had was from a
stream that ran through cypress swamp.
and you may think what kind Of stuff that
was"
lyon must have been powerful hungry,
/ reckon remarked a sympathetic lis
tener.
Hungry? Well. I'll justtelI you some-
thing about that. One day young fellow,
the son of the general that had US in
charge. came into the pen to look around
with his little poodle dog following him.
He'd hardly turned his back when that
dog was chopped up and eaten bodily
and when his master came to look for him
there was nothing LETT but bit of skin
about so big. They stopped our food for
a whole day because we wouldn't say who
did it; but we told no tales-not we!''
Now should tell you that to make
sure Of our not 'scaping they'd run wirs
all around inside, about eighteen feet from
TContinued on fourth page.