Do you wonder that we thought our Government had forgotton, or did not care for us? And yet when the crucial test came, when life and liberty, food and clothing, were offered us at the price of our loyalty to our Government, our reply was “no, we will let the lice carry us out through the cracks, before we will take the oath of allegiance to the Confederacy, we will accept death but not dishonor.”
Don’t blame us if we were discouraged and disheartened, if we did growl at, and find fault with, a government which we imagined had deserted us in the hour of our greatest need; we were true and loyal after all, and if you had been placed in the same condition you would have done just the same.
Third. Dr. Jones in speaking of those prisoners who were paroled and were at work on the outside of the stockade says: “These men were well clothed, and presented a stout and healthy appearance, and as a general rule they presented a much more robust appearance than the Confederate troops guarding them.”
Why not? they had plenty of exercise, good water, fresh air, and enough food so that they could purchase their good clothes with the surplus which accrued after their own wants had been satisfied. They were naturally more robust men than those Home Guards, and their situation had enabled them to keep in a normal condition. Had the prisoners in the stockade received the same treatment as the paroled men who were at work outside of the stockade, they would have presented the same robust appearance, but that stockade and those guards could not have held us and the rebels knew it.
I have introduced the report of Dr. Jones for the benefit of a class of persons who are inclined to doubt the statements of ex-prisoners, and I submit that he tells a more terrible story than any of us can tell.
“The news has flown frae mouth to mouth, The North for ance has bang’d the South”; SCOTT.
While we were waiting, and hoping, and starving, and dying at Andersonville our armies were fast solving the problem of the Rebellion. Jeff Davis had tired of the policy of General Joseph E. Johnson, who was in command of the army which confronted Sherman, and about the middle of July relieved him of his command and appointed Hood to his place.