The post. [volume] (Middleburg, Snyder County, Pa.) 1864-1883, 1882-09-07

sued, beaten over tho head with q
club, and rccaptured, when the rope
was again adjusted, hisprotostations
OF iuuoesnca wero unhe eded, aud he
was pushed from tho drop, aud hang
with his comrades in guilt,
Thds ended the lesson OF retriba-
ton, that PIT stop to m ird,rs in
prison, and broke up q gang Of
bounty jumping despera1oos.
Let me here record, in justice to q
man who has since met a similar fate
in retribution for crimes committed
against Union prisoners, that | and
many others OF the prison were
geratful to Capt. Wire for the pri-
vilege afforded us, to enable us to
give the accused q fair, impartial
trial. ! have purposely avoided, in
these pages, heaping unnecessary
odium upon the head Of ono who.
though guilty, | have good reasons
to suppose was ouly tho executive of
q system devised by men high in re-
Dol authority, and from whose orders
no inferior could devii'e
There never WAS hanging con-
Quoted in q moro orderly manner.
There was no clamor OF voices, but
silence and Iecoiun befitting such
scene, Thirty or forty thousand
men were its witnesses.
Thence forward raiding and flank
ing were of raro occurrence, aud tue
police became one Of the establish-
ments of the prison. That tho po-
lice done much to punish offenders
and preserve order, cannot be deni-
cd. They were mostly of the class
dopominated 'rouShs," selected for
their physical rather than their
mental qualifications, aud in some in.
stances became greater OWL, than
that which they were instituted to
correct. They levied tx upon all
trading stands, and occupations in
he pri son, Gu g He'd man ovor the
heads for small fanlts, and whipped
them upon tho bare back, with a cat
OF nine tails, most of whom, how-
ever, deserved the punishment in
Aicted. Yet they would not tolerate
any injustice done by others than
themselves, unless they were we'll
paid for not arresting offenders,
Reserving to themselves the right
of doing injustice and committing
abuses, they governed tho camp,
and corrected oil other abuses but
their own. So that the police force
became a regular nuisance and u
mockery,
AN sorry to record, that in
Florence sc military prison, whom
| w,I acting chief Of police, this
kind of police force became for
while, degraded tools in tho hands
Of the rebels, they whipped men at
the command upon tho bare back for
digging tunnels, sc. for which duty
service they wero rewarded with
extra rations.
have entered thus particularly
Into details which wero neeiful. that
the general reader should have, and
that ho may realize in some degree
the position OF prisoner at Ander-
sonville, aud to show, that anything
originally devised for our welfare
might be perverted to our misery,
1t was in July that l first noticed
negro prisoners among us, though
they were, doubtless, there previous
to that time. Scarcely any of them
but were victims of atrocious ampu-
tations performed by rebel surgeons.
IL was said that none of tho prison.
ers were captured except tho wouud>
ed.
Those in the prison were mostly
New England men. Some of them
had been captured at tho charge on
Fort Wagner, when Colonel Shaw
was killed, and at tho battle Of
Olustoe, Florida, I observed in the
negro prisoners a commendable
trait of cleanliness. Indeed, l may
say, their clothes wero, on On aver.
age, cleaner and better patched than
those Of other prisoners ofthe stock
ado.
Through exposure TO the sun and
rain, they were much blacker than
the common Southern negroes, aud
many were the ordinations OF SUR
prise among tho guard Of this fact.
"The blaokest niggers ever saw
was the common expression on see
inc them.