Part 4

Calculating our direction by the moon and stars, as near as we could, we left the railroad and plunged into a South Carolina swamp. Of all the doleful places on the face of God's green earth, I do not think there is another so hideous. The timber is a species of cypress, from which hangs a gray moss, from three to twenty feet in length. When it is high tide, the water is from two to six feet deep. At low tide the surface has the appearance of solid earth; but in fact there are only a few inches of soil, supported by the cypress roots, which spread over, or rather just under the surface, and form a network, through which the unwary traveler is liable to break at any moment, and find himself unceremoniously seated on a root with his feet hanging either in water, or in space below, as the case may be. Every few rods there is a bayou, or slough, frequented by alligators. All kinds of vines and hanging plants interlace the spaces between the trees, and render it tiresome and difficult to penetrate. Several kinds of birds with mournful cries, and myriads of frogs, make night hideous, while the air is fairly alive with mosquitoes and gnats, and every tussock of grass seems tenanted by the poisonous moccasin snake. Occasionally a huge alligator will flop into a neighboring slough with a splash, and the snap of his hungry jaws can be heard for rods.

Altogether, the traveling is neither pleasant nor swift; but through it all we toiled on. Starvation and imprisonment were behind us, and liberty and the dear old home to the front. Our progress was necessarily slow, and before we were fairly started, the sun began to gild the east with his rosy beams. As nearly as we could calculate, we had traveled in the neighborhood of five miles since leaving the railroad. By the rise and the fall of the tide, we knew that we could not be far from the coast. We had no provisions; we must either reach the shore or starve. Safety dictated that we should seek a thicket and hide during the daytime, but necessity commanded us to travel while we had strength, and so we toiled on.

At length we came to a ridge running through the swamp, at about a right angle to our line of march. While crossing it we suddenly saw two horsemen moving leisurely along over what we discovered to be a well-traveled road. Fortunately seeing them before they saw us, we threw ourselves on the ground among the scrub pines. They proved to be a Confederate officer and his negro servant, and passed within perhaps three or four rods without discovering us. It was a narrow escape. We carefully reconnoitered the ground, crossed the road, and again plunged into the swamp.

After traveling a mile or two farther, we again met with an obstruction that compelled us to come to a halt. We had reached an outpost of the enemy. Peering through the underbrush we reconnoitered the ground. Before us, in a ridge running through the swamp, was a squadron of Confederate cavalry. There was but one thing for us to do, and that was to keep quiet until night.

Throughout the whole long summer afternoon we lay in a thicket, within a quarter of a mile of the enemy's cavalry. Occasionally the long-drawn-out note of a horn was heard, followed by the baying of hounds. We had read of the famous "negro dogs," and had been told by friends who had escaped and been recaptured, that they were used by our enemies to hunt down fugitives, so that these sounds did not serve to lessen our disquietude, or to render our situation more pleasant.

The sun at length disappeared, however, without our being discovered, and darkness almost immediately followed the setting of the sun. Unfortunately, the night was cloudy. The moon and stars, which had been our guides the night before, were obscured. We could only guess our course by the direction of the wind, and an occasional glance at the heavens through a break in the clouds. We were nearly exhausted by fatigue and want of food.

The enemy's pickets were in our front, and must be passed that night or never. Watching, crawling, now through quagmire and slime, now over fallen trees and through creeping vines, our eyes blinded by the stings of poisonous gnats and mosquitoes, we toiled on.

Hark! What is that? A human voice in our front! It must be the picket line. No chance to pass it here. The ground is dry, and the snapping of a twig might betray us. Back--silently, stealthily, and then by the left flank, to the swamp. Wading out into it, we found a slough. Getting into the middle of that, we waded down in the direction of the picket line. If we made an occasional splash, we knew it could do no harm; alligators were plenty, and the noise might be attributed to them.

Silently, scarcely breathing, we trudged through the water--stagnant and poisonous with malaria, among the alligators, lizards, frogs and snakes--and at last, thank God! past the pickets. Then working our way through a mass of tangled vines, we were again out on a dry ridge, with the enemy behind us, and Old Ocean and Liberty not far distant.

A few moments of rest and whispered congratulations, and then again on. On--yes, but in what direction? The wind had ceased to blow, thick clouds obscured the sky, we had no guide to direct us. A few moments' reflection convinced us that the attempt to travel farther that night would result in the useless expenditure of our little remaining strength. So, crawling into a thicket, we huddled together like swine, to save a little warmth to our bodies, while as patiently as we could, we waited for daylight.

Morning at last, and no clouds to obscure the sun. At our feet, all around us, glittering and sparkling in the dewdrops, kind Providence had provided us with a breakfast--whortleberries by the handsful. Eagerly gathering them, we satisfied the cravings of appetite.

Refreshed and invigorated by our breakfast, with our direction secured, and with renewed energy we again pushed on to the coast. It was past noon. We knew that we must be within a few miles of the ocean. Hark! What is that? Away back of us, at regular intervals, came the long-drawn-out yell of a pack of hounds. For several minutes we looked in each others' faces, and listened. Were they after us? The sound came from last night's camp. A short time sufficed to make our fears a certainty. The hounds were on our trail.

Now again for the bayou! A half-mile would take us to the swamp again. Can we reach it in time? Now, boys, keep together if you can! Like greyhounds, away we started. Our intelligence was matched against brute instinct. Which would succeed?

We had heard that water would baffle the keen scent of the dogs. The friendly bayou was at last reached, and into it we plunged, now unmindful of the lazy alligators, quite regardless of the dangerous moccasin snakes that infested it. We floundered along, now in mud and mire, now stumbling over logs, for perhaps a mile. Then, fainting and exhausted, we left this morass and started on our course. Ever and anon, however, we could hear the baying of the hounds, sometimes farther, sometimes nearer.

_Prisoners Again_

Would our ruse be successful? Could the beasts follow us through the water? At intervals we stopped and listened. We could easily tell when they struck the bayou. For a short time there was a cessation of their regular bay, and then it broke out again, accompanied by the sound of horses. Nearer and nearer they came. They were following our trail through the bayou.

Billings had that courage that never failed. He had been the life of the party. When it became evident that we must be overtaken, he selected the feeblest of us, directed them to crawl through a thicket of willows, one after the other, himself bringing up the rear, leaving but a single track for the brutes to follow; and then, under his direction, we armed ourselves with clubs and awaited the attack. Imagine, if you can, the feelings of that group of officers.

We had all been reared at the North, in a land of schools and churches. We were men of ordinary intelligence, accustomed to mingling in the society of our fellows, men who at home or in the army were qualified by education and character to be called gentlemen, and possessed at least the ordinary feelings of manhood. Yet there we were, run down and standing like brutes at bay, to defend ourselves from a pack of hounds. One glance at the faces of my comrades revealed more of their feelings than could printed pages.

With noses to the ground, on came the dogs, at a slow gallop, once in a while lifting their heads to emit their infernal howls. Behind them were a few cavalry men. At last the thicket was reached, and one after another the bloodhounds plunged in. Now could be seen the wisdom of Billings's plan. The dogs were compelled to follow each other in single file, for the track we made was but wide enough to admit one at a time.

With our clubs firmly grasped, standing on either side of the path, we awaited the appearance of the leader. Before his head appeared in sight, however, we were discovered by the hunters, who comprehended the situation at a glance. One or two sharp toots of the horn, and the dogs stopped.

Bringing his carbine to bear on us, the fellow called out: "Well, Yanks, do you surrender?"

We were unarmed, surrounded. "We can do nothing else," we replied.

"Throw down your clubs, then."

"But how about the dogs? We do not surrender to them. If they attack us we shall defend ourselves."

"I won't let the dogs bite you," he replied.

With this assurance we threw down our clubs, and were again prisoners. The dogs paid no further attention to us, except to smell about, acting very much like other hounds.

"Would those dogs have bitten us, if you had not called them off?" I asked.

The fellow grinned as he replied: "I reckon they might; right smart, too. I've seen them hounds eat niggers, and I reckon they wouldn't know the difference atween them and you uns. You uns wuz green to take to the bayou," he again remarked.

"Why?" I asked.

"Well, if you traveled there for fun, it wuz all right; but if you did it to throw the dogs off the scent it wuz d----d green, for dogs will follow the scent in stagnant water as well as on dry land."

"How would it be in a running stream?" I asked.

"Well, ef you are in a running stream, ef you travel up and the dogs are close on your trail, they kin foller; but ef you travel down, they can't. But," he added, "ef you go down, and the dogs is throwed off the scent, then I kin foller, fer then I know you've gone down."

"How about rain?" I asked.

"A rain gits us," he replied. "It kinder washes out all the scent."

"Are you a soldier?" I asked.

"I suppose so," he answered. "I draw pay as a soldier; but my business has allers been catching niggers, and that wuz the business of my father before me. Me an' the dogs has done nothin' but hunt niggers, deserters, an' sich, ever sence the war."

"What pay do you draw?" I asked.

"Oh, just common pay," he said. "Pay don't amount to much anyway; but I draw a ration for each of them dogs."

"What kind of a ration?"

"Just the same as a soldier's. But I sell the rations and feed the dogs mostly on alligator meat an' scrapin's. I tell you, stranger," exclaimed he, waxing enthusiastic, "them dogs has catched more niggers an' deserters than all the Provost Marshals in South Carolina."

"But," said I, "have you no compunctions about making a business of hunting down human beings this way?"

"To be honest," said he, "it does go agen the grain to hunt white men, but I do as I'm ordered."

"Then the Confederate government recognizes the use of hounds for this purpose as legitimate warfare, does it?"

"Certainly it does, or how could I draw rations for the dogs?"

I looked the brutes over--sixteen four-legged Confederate soldiers, regularly mustered into the service.

"Well," said I, "you Southerners need not say anything more against the North employing negroes for soldiers, when you use dogs. I had rather fight by the side of a negro than a bloodhound."

"That's jest as a feller is raised," said he. "I think niggers is more ornery than dogs."

A year or two since this negro hunter, Davis, exhibited his pack of bloodhounds in New York City, and among those who attended the exhibition was my friend L. G. Billings. I should have supposed his curiosity would have been gratified in South Carolina. For my own part, although I am fond of dogs and of hunting, I confess that it makes all the difference in the world to me, which end of the dog is toward me when the hunting is being done.

We were taken by the negro hunter back to the camp of the Second South Carolina Cavalry, which was on outpost duty, and were placed in an inclosure that had evidently at one time been a hog pen. There a guard was thrown around us, and we were kept on exhibition until nearly dark. Some spicy, italicised conversation here took place between the prisoners and their captors, which finally resulted in our being removed to a log building used as a medical dispensary. By giving our parole not to attempt to escape during the night, we were relieved from the surveillance of a guard, and furnished with a good supper. Next morning, on extending our parole to our arrival at Charleston, we were escorted to the cars by the First Lieutenant, in whose charge we had been placed, and who finally accompanied us to Charleston.

_Confined at Charleston_

Upon our arrival in this latter place, we were confined in the Charleston jail and yard. The members of our party were placed in the jail for a few days, as a punishment for attempting to escape, although our right to do so if possible was not seriously questioned. On our release from close confinement we found our old companions in misery, in the jail yard.

This jail was a stone structure, two stories in height, situated very nearly in the centre of the city. On one side was the workhouse, wherein were confined a large number of the prisoners; on the other was the Marine Hospital. The jail yard was in the rear of the building; the fence surrounding it was about sixteen feet in height, and its top bristled with iron spikes. Both outside and inside the walls was stationed a line of sentinels, although for several days after our first introduction to the interior I did not discover the fact that there was a guard outside. Inside the walls was a well, a cistern, and a sink. Six hundred of us were confined here and within the building.

Our situation was not as comfortable as at Macon. The height of the wall prevented a free circulation of air, which circumstance, together with the atmosphere generated by the sink, did not precisely furnish us with the air of Araby the Blest. The water was brackish, and unfit for anything but washing and culinary purposes. The cistern furnished a limited supply to quench our thirst. Taking it altogether, it was neither pleasant nor salubrious.

While a change from the everlasting corn meal, our rations were light, and not the most palatable to Northern stomachs. They consisted of rice and lard. Just what use we were expected to make of the lard, we never found out.

_Another Tunnel_

Here again another tunnel was projected. Our shelter consisted of wall tents. The one assigned to Lieutenant Brooks and myself was located near one of the walls. The soil was loose sand, easy to dig. The walk of the sentry was between the tent and the wall of the yard. An officer whose name has escaped me, possessed an air bed that could be inflated. We took him into the scheme, on condition that he would allow the party to use the bed to float down the river. Our plan was to mine out under the wall, and make either Cooper or Ashley River, and float out to our shipping in the harbor. It will be recollected that at this time the Union forces were in possession of the coast, had erected batteries that commanded the city, and were engaged in shelling it.

As before, the naval officers were taken into the secret of the mine, especially my friend Billings and Lieutenant Commodore Austin Pendergrast. These officers had been captured at the time the "Water Witch" was surprised and taken by the enemy in Ossabaw Sound, Georgia, June 3, 1864. Better nor braver men never lived. Billings, in particular, although strictly a non-combatant, was said by the Confederates to be the bravest man they ever fell in with. He was one of the first officers who succeeded in getting on deck when the vessel was surprised. Twice knocked on the head, and afterward being cut down on the deck, he refused to surrender until he had emptied his revolver, killing and wounding several of the enemy. Pendergrast--"the old man," as the sailors called him--was a large man, weighing, I should judge, in the neighborhood of three hundred pounds, and he stipulated with us to dig the hole large enough for him to crawl through.

The shaft was started in the tent. It was sunk for about six feet, then deviated until we struck the wall; then it ran almost perpendicularly beneath the wall, and rose again at an acute angle towards the surface. According to the best observations we could make from the inside of the yard, the building situated on the grounds adjoining the prison wall had the appearance of a private residence, and we did not imagine that the outside of the wall was guarded. So one night, all things being ready for our leave-taking, we concluded to set out on our journey.

I went ahead and broke a hole through the surface of the ground, and stuck my head through to reconnoitre. The first view I obtained was somewhat limited, for I discovered the muzzle of a musket about two feet from my face. I did not delay for any further investigations, but made the very quickest time on record, back through the tunnel under the wall and into my tent, and from there across the yard to the quarters of Commodore Pendergrast.

The Commodore was fastidious, and possessed all the hauteur and exclusiveness of old naval officers. But covered with dirt as I was, I crawled in beside him.

"Cover me up quick!" I cried.

"Ugh! D---- it! You are all sand!" he protested.

"Never mind the sand. Keep still! They are after me," I answered.

Just then there was a commotion in the yard. The reserve guard was called in, and the tents were inspected. Of course our tent was vacant, and the hole in plain sight, but both occupants had completely vanished. Brooks had concealed himself somewhere, and I was under the protection of Commodore Pendergrast, for by this time the "old man" had taken in the situation and had taken pains to turn upon his side, telling me to snuggle up to him as close as I could.

Soon the searchers entered the tent and commenced.

"Hello there!"

"Who in hell are you?" responded the "old man."

"Beg pardon, Commodore, but there has been an attempt to escape here, and we want the parties."

"Well, what do you want here? Do you think I can fly?"

"No. But this attempt was by mining under the wall."

"Well, do you suppose I am a woodchuck? It is bad enough to sleep here on the ground, without being disturbed in my first sleep. Get out of this!"

And with a grunt the "old man" settled himself again as if for sleep.

"See here," said the inquisitive official, "this won't do; we must search the tent for form's sake, if for nothing more."

"Search away, then," said Prendergrast; "but be quick about it."

"All right, Com.," said the man. "We'll not disturb you more than we can help."

Entering the tent he looked it carefully over. I was on the opposite side from the searching party, and if ever a man shrank into small compass, I did then. I crept as close as I could to the huge mountain of flesh that overshadowed me. Even then I shook with laughter, for the Commodore fairly shuddered at feeling me, covered with dirt as I was, in close contact with his spotless undress uniform.

At last, with an apology, the Confederate left the tent. Nothing was said for about an hour, but Pendergrast was actually suffering. At last he whispered:

"Say!"

"Umph?" I responded.

"I've stood this as long as I can. I'm grit from head to foot."

"Never mind, Commodore. I dug that hole large for your especial benefit."

"Yes, I suppose so. But what has become of it?"

"I left it right there, and a fellow looking into it with a musket. Am glad it was crooked," I said reflectively.

"Why?" he asked.

"Because if it had been straight, he might have sent a bullet after me," I replied. And then I told him all about it.

As soon as daylight made its appearance, I decamped. The old fellow generously divided his blankets with me, however. But I was homeless, for neither Brooks nor myself dared to claim the tent for several days, and then we applied for it on the score that the tent where we were located was overcrowded. Our request was granted, but we were ever after regarded with suspicion. It may be asked how we concealed the dirt and obtained tools to dig with. The dirt we dumped into the sink, or packed on the bottom of the tent. We dug with clam shells, the soil being soft sand. The most serious mistake we made was in taking the Marine Hospital for a private residence; for, unknown to us, it was crowded with prisoners at the time, and more closely guarded than the jail yard, and I had broken ground almost under the feet of a sentinel. If he had realized the truth, no doubt he would have put an effective stop to all further mining operations as far as I was concerned; but very likely his surprise at seeing the ground yawn at his feet and a queer looking animal show its head, saved me.

Some few days after this occurrence, when the yard had resumed its tiresome monotony, our captors proposed to us that if we would give our parole not to attempt to escape while we were held in the city of Charleston, they would provide us with comfortable quarters in the city.

This offer caused a good deal of discussion among us. At first many were disposed to reject it. But we reflected upon the almost utter hopelessness of the task of attempting to escape from Charleston. It is a city built upon a point of land lying between the Cooper and Ashley rivers; the land side was securely guarded, and the only chance for escape was by the sea, with not more than one chance in a hundred of getting past the picket boats constantly patrolling the harbor. Added to this was our miserable condition, and our longing for restoration to a more civilized manner of living; so the offer was a greater temptation than the most of us could withstand. All but two of the prisoners accepted the proposition--Colonel La Grange of the First Wisconsin Cavalry, and the Colonel of a Pennsylvania regiment, whose name I have forgotten. These gentlemen refused the offer, not so much because they thought there was a chance to escape, as because they believed it their duty to hold themselves in readiness to do so if an opportunity occurred. We appreciated their motives, although we felt that they were mistaken in their ideas of duty.

_In the Line of Union Fire_

Shortly after this compact was entered into, we were removed from the pestilential atmosphere of the jail to comfortable quarters in the Roper Hospital buildings and grounds, and relieved from the immediate surveillance of the guard. Because now, at every turn, we failed to meet the watchful eye of a grey-coated sentinel, we were none the less prisoners. We were bound by invisible bonds, stronger than the combined forces of Lee and Johnson--a breath of air; a mere sound that ceased to vibrate almost as soon as spoken: We had pledged our honor that during the time we were confined in Charleston we would not attempt to escape, and that we would not pass certain defined limits. That pledge stood instead of bolts and bars. Our honor stood guard over us, and from its requirements we could only be relieved by ourselves; a part of the stipulation being that the parole might be dissolved at any time, by giving reasonable notice to that effect.