My Capture and Prison Life
By William McCommon, Co. A, 149th O. V. I.
By William McCommon, Co. A, 149th O. V. I.
By William McCommon, Co. A, 149th O. V. I.
I was taken prisoner at Berryville, Va., on August 13th, 1864, at 4 A. M., together with James Ghormley, Edward Armstrong, Eldridge Whipple and George Fix, with one man by the name of Sayre of Co. P. These are all that I can recall now. We were cooking coffee by the roadside when all at once we heard the report of a cannon and the shell burst just over our heads and came down through the branches of the trees we were under. At that moment four hundred of Mosby’s mounted guerrillas came down on us demanding our money, watches, jewelry or anything else of value we had on our person. I had one dollar and forty cents. They told me to give them the dollar and I could keep the forty cents, as I would need that before we got back, which I found was the gospel truth. That rebel was honest, anyhow.
They ordered us each to mount a mule and carry a six pound shell in each hand until we crossed the Shenandoah river and then they would provide some other way to carry them. I was riding a small mule and when about the middle of the stream myself, mule and shells dropped into a hole, and the shells are now lying on the bottom of the Shenandoah river. When we got across a rebel sergeant asked me where my shells were. I told him I did not know. He replied “I will report you to Col. Mosby and you will have to pay for them.” That would be the first whack at my lone fortycents. I heard no more about it until noon, when they drew us up in line to count us. The sergeant asked “who is you all men that lost the shells in the river?” Nobody knew anything about any shells and he did not recognize me. He said to me, “You look like the man” but of course I did not know anything about his old shells. That is the last I heard of them.
Our dinner the first day was one loaf of bread cut in four pieces for four men. I can say that none of us had to let out our trouser straps. We marched thirty miles the first day and were pretty well tired out by night, when they issued to each of us one pint of flour. This we mixed with water and slapped it on a flat stone, which we propped up opposite the fire and baked it. This tasted good to us but I am afraid it would not pass muster at the Waldorf Astoria. Armstrong said he could not eat his without butter, but we told him his complexion would be better if he would abstain from butter. Finally he concluded that we were right and let it go at that. A Lieutenant came along and asked how we were making out. We told him that we were perfectly delighted with the menu. He said “I am glad you have nothing to complain of.” The next day’s ride took us to Culpepper C. H., the bracing air of Virginia still keeping our appetites in fine shape. No breakfast this morning but had a bounteous feast at noon. They cut a loaf in two for two men. It tasted good while it lasted but the time seemed so short.
That afternoon Ghormley said he was going to make a break into the bushes and get away. He jumped off his mule and had not gone more than ten feet from the road when a guard spied him and fired six shots into the bushes, when Ghormley came back in a hurry. He told theguard that he only wanted to get some blackberries. He watched him closely after that and told him “the next berriesyouget will be lead berries.” At the end of the third day we reached Lynchburg, Va., where we were put into an old tobacco warehouse. There were three hundred prisoners there when we arrived. We were quartered on the dirty floor, covered with tobacco dust. You could hear the men sneeze in all languages. Our fare was still one loaf of bread for two men. At this place our largest and strongest man, Henry Benner, a wagon maker from Chillicothe, said “Boys, we will never get out of this alive.” He began to weaken right there, and in three weeks from that time he died of home sickness. We tried to shame him out of it, saying, “You are the healthiest man in the bunch and you will live through it if any one will.” One morning I found him lying dead on the ground, the first one of our little party to go. They kept us at this place for four weeks and then moved us to Richmond, Va. As we marched past Libbey Prison we heard some one calling from an upper window, “Hey! there! old 149th.” It was Major Rozell who had been captured the same morning that we were. In the fight at Berryville the Major was wounded in the elbow and had been taken direct to Libbey. We were not allowed to speak to him and I have never seen him since. I hear that he is still living in Missouri, having received a letter from him some time ago.
We remained in Richmond one night, when they took us across the river to Belle Island, where the hardest part of our prison life began. It was a bleak spot, bare of trees. Some few of the prisoners had tattered tents, the majority had none. It rained every day while we werethere and the fog was so thick you could almost cut it until about noon, when it would fix for another rain. We had no protection whatever from this weather, and we would walk around in the night in the rain until we fell asleep on the muddy ground. We would lie there until awakened by the intense cold, to get up and walk again. Here they fed us on wild pea soup, flavored with ox tail, without dressing. No napkins went with this course, and the meals were never on time, as it took the cooks an hour or more to skim the maggots off the soup, as they wanted our meals to come to us perfectly clean, so we could not tell our folks at home that they did not understand their business.
Here is where Armstrong told us “Boys we are never going to make it.” We answered “Now you commence and you will go like Benner.” All the sick men at Belle Isle were to be transferred to City Point, an order having been issued to that effect. Whipple was not feeling well so I told him that I would try to get him off on the boat. I told him as we neared the boat for him to fall down and I would call the officers attention to him. As we had not rehearsed the part, he fell down too soon. I said “You fell down too soon. Wait until I give the word and then fall.” We came near making a mess of it, as it was. He began to laugh about the time for him to fall, but the officers did not see him laugh. The doctor asked me “what is the matter with that man?” I told him “I did not know but he was awful sick.” He finally passed him to City Point. I heard after getting home that he got as far as Annapolis, Md., and had died there. I fully expected to see him when I got home, as I knew the others were dead. He was a baker by trade and worked in Chillicothe before his enlistment. We remainedfor seven weeks on Belle Isle, when we were sent to Salisbury, N. C. We thought Belle Island was awful, but this place, no man can describe it, only an ex-prisoner of war. The stockade, I think, contained twenty acres and was fenced with trees split in half, with several large gates. A large brick building occupied part of the ground, which was formerly the North Carolina Penitentiary. It had three stories, the upper story, when we were there, being used as a jail for rebel deserters and other outlaws from the rebel army. If there ever was a more villainous looking set of men, I never saw them. The first night I was there I went up to this third story to sleep, as it was raining hard, not knowing anything about the place. A man came to me and asked me if I knew what kind of a place I was in? I told him I did not. He said “get out of here as quietly as possible or they would throw me out of the window.” I went instanter.
Within a month Ghormley and Armstrong both died. I was going around the grounds one morning (we had long lost all dates) when I saw Edward Armstrong lying dead on the ground. I scarcely recognized him, he was so black from stooping over the little pine knot fires. The dead wagon carried him away.
About a week later James Ghormley died. I was talking with him the night before. He said “I cannot last but a day or two.” I tried to cheer him up but it was of no use. This left me the only one of our boys alive that I knew of. The last I saw of Armstrong and Ghormley they were piled on the dead wagon that came in twice a day to collect the dead. The corpses were piled in, one on top of another like so many logs, taken out and buried in trenches. I remained there three months longer and wasjust about ready to give up when one morning a rebel lieutenant came to me and said, “Here, you cussed Yank, get up to the gate, you are to be exchanged.” I told him that was an old story. He said “stay there then.” I told him I could not walk so he had me carried to the gate. There were a thousand loaves of corn bread lying on the ground. They told each man to take a loaf, as that would have to last us until we got into our lines. We were three days getting to the Union lines and our loaves looked very small when we arrived at Wilmington, N. C., where we were exchanged.
We ran in on a foggy morning. One of our boys cried out “there is our flag.” You cannot realize how we felt, how we tried to raise a feeble cheer, when we knew that we were in God’s country once more. We were ordered to “pile off” which we did in short order. There were piles of broken crackers and scraps of meat lying on the ground, which had been tramped upon by men and horses, and we began to eat it greedily until we were stopped by our officers putting a guard around us. They told us not to eat that garbage, as Uncle Sam’s rations would be ready in a few minutes. It seemed like a dream to us, we were in a heaven of happiness. We were kept in a hospital at Wilmington for about a week, and then we were sent to Annapolis, Md., by transport. At Annapolis we were put in tent hospital after burning all our clothes and the “varmints” that went with them. They then cut our hair close, turned the hose on us, gave each man a good scrubbing and clothed us innight gownsas our uniforms had not arrived from New York. We remained in hospital for two weeks, when we were sent to general hospital at Baltimore, Md., where our record was taken. My weight at thattime being 85 lbs., having lost 75 lbs. in rebel prisons, I could not well spare any more. I remained in hospital at Baltimore three months longer, when I was discharged and sent home. My own mother did not know me until I told her who I was.