A single man only was sent
with me, from whom my escape would have been easy, as he
very soon got drunk from a bottle of whiskey I placed before
him, but I had given him my parole that, if he would permit
me to walk about the house and garden without following
me, I would not attempt to escape, and therefore I did not
entertain the thought. After spending two or three hours
at home, and bidding my wife and children
adieu, I returned with my drunken companion of the guard
to Col Kingsbury's Headquarters
where I was conducted to an upstairs room to sleep. On opening
the door, my eyes were greeted with such a sight of compound
and concentrated misery as I never before beheld, and comical
it was too. The ten gentlemen I have previously named (together
with Mr John F Scott, who had been brought
in during my absence) were lying on the floor, in every
conceivable position, and with countenance indicating every
shade of wretchedness. All trying their utmost to sleep,
but not one meeting with the least success. A single candle
dimly illuminated the scene. Now, I felt pretty gloomy myself
under the recent parting from my family and the fact that
I neither knew the accusation upon which I had been arrested,
nor the fate which awaited me, but I could not stand the
sight of that room. I felt that if my sorrows were added
to that heap, the condition of things would be insufferable.
Besides having taken some brandy and water before leaving
home, as a precaution against the night air, I determined
at once that it was better to laugh than to cry. Having
no blanket myself, I hauled half of Slaughter's
from under him, and seating myself on the floor (there were
no chairs) commenced an onslaught of fun on each one present,
individually, and on all collectively, and in a very short
time had the whole party wide awake and roaring with laughter.
Singularly, I fell asleep unceremoniously in about fifteen
minutes, and slumbered soundly until waked by the rising
of my fellow prisoners who scolded me well for having destroyed
their nights rest. A single basin, a single towel, and a
single pitcher of water constituted the whole toilet accommodations
for all twelve of us. Some kind friends sent us a breakfast,
and soon thereafter we were permitted to pass down stairs
into a reception room where we met quite a number of friends
and relations assembled to bid us goodbye, and after a speech
from the colonel to the assembled families (mainly ladies)
wherein they were informed that being now subjugated they
must act accordingly, we were marched over the temporary
wire bridge built by the Federal army to Chatham, the H'd
Quar's of Maj General Burnside's commanding the division
of the U. S. Army encamped on the lower line of the Rappahannock.
