TREATMENT OF PRISONERS OF WAR

BY

THE REBEL GOVERNMENT.

PRELIMINARY.

THE advancing civilization of centuries, the cultivation of literature, the diffusion of knowledge, the extension of commerce, the increasing intercourse of nations, and above all, the prevalence of Christianity with its benign and subduing influences, has not been without effect on the treatment of prisoners of war. Once it was the rule that they should be slain without mercy, or reduced to a state of abject bondage. But now we are horrified by the accounts of such conduct which have come down to us from past ages, and execrate the memory of the cruel and bloody men who showed no mercy to the unfortunate prisoner of war. Even a Roman triumphal procession, however imposing, is to us revolting, on account of the position and treatment of the captive.

Now, it is required among civilized and Christian nations, that prisoners of war should be treated hu

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manely; that, in ordinary cases at least, their lives should be spared, their persons protected, their feelings regarded, their wounds dressed, their pains assuaged, and their wants supplied. The opposite of this is justly regarded as barbarous, and branded as infamous. How all these rules have been violated by the Rebel Government and its authorized agents, the following pages will

show.

How differently have Confederate prisoners of war been treated by our own government! Instead of being subjected to indignity and wrong, how generally have they been treated with great kindness! As yet Fort Pillow remains unavenged, although the cry runs through the revolted States, "Repeat Fort Pillow!"

BULL RUN ATROCITIES.

THAT barbarities of a hideous nature were perpetrated by the Rebels upon the Union soldiers who fell into their hands at the battle of Bull Run; that prisoners of war were shot and bayoneted; that the wounded and dying were treated with neglect and inhumanity; that the dead were outraged, and the very grave was desecrated and despoiled, in a manner supposed to be characteristic only of savages; are abundantly confirmed by the sworn testimony of men of the highest standingsuch as Senator Sprague of Rhode Island, General James B. Ricketts, Mr. Daniel Bixby of Washington, D. C., Surgeons J. M. Honiston and William F. Swalen, Fourteenth New York Volunteers, Dr. James B. Greeley, Rev. Frederic Denison, and Frederic Scholes, Esq., of Brooklyn, New York.

TESTIMONY OF SURGEON HONISTON.

I was made prisoner on the field, and immediately taken inside the enemy's lines. I told them that my wish was to attend to the wounded men, there were so many of them wounded and crippled; that I had remained voluntarily with them for that purpose. I asked as a privilege that I should be permitted to attend them. Two of the surgeons then permitted me to go to work and attend to the wounded. I did so until dark, when a guard came up and said that I must accompany them. I told them that it was my wish to remain on the field; that I desired to remain all night with the wounded men, as there were so many who needed attention, and some of them in a very helpless and painful condition, and suffering for water. I protested against being sent from the field at that time.

They became very rude, and talked in a very ugly way, and insisted on my going with them. They marched me, with a party of prisoners, mostly privates, to Manassas; they did not offer us even water, let alone anything in the shape of food; we stood in the streets of Manassas about an hour with a guard around us; a crowd collected about us, hooting and threatening, in a very boisterous way, what they would do with us. We were finally put into an old building, and left to sleep on the floor there, without anything in the shape of food being given us. In the morning, those of us who were surgeons, were brought before the medical director, as he was called, who took our names, and then sent us back to the battle-field; there were three of us in that party. We told them we were already faint and exhausted, having been without food for twenty hours. They gave us some cold bacon, and sent us back to the battle-field.

When we reached the battle-field they took us to the Lewis House, as it is called; they had commenced bringing the wounded in there, mostly their own. They finally allowed us to have an ambulance, and we commenced picking up our wounded, and bringing them in ourselves, a guard all the while accompanying us; we were then ordered to report ourselves to a Secession surgeon, a Dr. Darby, of South Carolina. He said he had been sent there by General Beauregard to take-charge of the wounded. He would not allow us to perform operations upon our own men, but had them performed by his assistants, young men, some of them with no more knowledge of what they attempted to do than an apothecary's clerk. They performed the operations upon our men in a most horrible manner; some of them were absolutely frightful.

It was almost impossible for us to get anything for our wounded men there to cat; they paid no attention to us whatever. We suffered very much on account of the want of any kind of food for our men. They would not even bring water to us. On the Monday night after the battle, all the wounded in that old house were lying there upon the floor as thickly as they could be laid. There was not a particle of light of any kind in the house to enable us to move about among the wounded. They were suffering very much for water; but with all the persuasion I could use they would not bring us any water, and the guard stationed about the house prevented us from going after any. Fortunately, I might say, it rained that night, and through the open windows the rain beat in, and ran down the floor among the wounded, wetting and chilling them; still I was enabled, by setting some cups under the eaves, to catch a little water for our poor soldiers to drink, and in that way I spent all the night,