Nothing remarkable happened until the end of the old year. A tolerable amount of rations was issued, and our life was pretty much the same with prison life elsewhere. The new year brought a terrible change. General Foster ordered us to be retaliated upon for alleged ill treatment of prisoners at Andersonville, Georgia. Our rations were reduced to less than one pint of meal and about a half pint of pickle per day. No meat and no vegetables of any kind were allowed us. The meal issued was damaged. It was in lumps larger than a man's head, and as hard as clay: it was sour, and generally filled with bugs and worms. We either had to eat this or lie down and die at once. This regimen lasted forty-three days. I cannot do justice to the misery and suffering experienced by myself and seen everywhere around me during this period. It is only one year since, and yet I can hardly believe I really passed through such scenes as memory brings before me. Our diet soon induced scurvy. This loathsome disease, in addition to the pangs of hunger, made life almost insupportable. The disease first made its appearance in the mouth, loosening the teeth, and in many cases making the gums a mass of black, putrid flesh. It next attacked the limbs, appearing first in little spots, like blood blisters. One of them, after being broken, would become a hard, dark-colored knot. These spots would increase until the whole limb was covered, by which time the muscles would have contracted and the limb be drawn beyond all power of straightening. I have seen cases where not only the legs and arms but the back was thus affected. Another feature of the disease was the fainting produced by very slight exercise. I have walked down the prison, and stumbled upon men lying on the floor to all appearance dead, having fainted and fallen while exerting themselves to get to the “sinks.”
Terrible as was the above state of things, our sufferings were increased by as heartless and uncalled — for a piece of cruelty as has ever been recorded. Our poor fellows generally were supplied, and that slimly, with summer clothing, such as they brought from Fort Delaware in August. United States blankets (and many had no other kind) had been taken away at Morris' Island. Not only were blankets and clothing not issued, but we were not allowed to receive what friends had sent us. We had only so much fuel as was needed for cooking. Can a more miserable state of existence be imagined than this? Starved almost to the point of death, a prey to disease, the blood in the veins so thin that the least cold sent a shiver through the whole frame! No fire, no blankets, scarcely any clothing I Add to this the knowledge on our part that a few
