“There come the tug-boats, Colonel,” says an officer, as I stand on the deck of the “Alice Counce,” waiting for my regiment. I am a stranger to it, and only assume command to-day. From the East river come the boats, laden as many other boats have been, with a dark swarm of men, who cover the deck and hang upon the bulwarks. The boats come alongside and throw their lines to the ship, and then rises a concord of those sounds that generally start with a new regiment. “ Attention! Officers and men w

Westward from New Orleans stretches the Opelousas railroad, and along this road we are now doing guard duty. Guarding a railroad is the most unwelcome task that can be thrust on the Colonel of a new regiment—scattering the companies, demoralizing the men, destroying the regiment, and therefore a Colonel, under such circumstances, has a right to be a little discontented, and very cross. I am a little discontented, and have wished a hundred times that I were back, writing on the sunny hill-side of

Some weeks after the pay-day, I found myself stretched upon a bed, in a little shanty, at Tigerville. I had some hazy recollections of having moved my quarters to Tigerville—of having left my tent one evening, after dress-parade, for a ride—of having ridden to the hospital and dismounted, with a dizzy head and aching frame—of the surgeon telling me, that I was very ill and must not go back—and then of horrible fever-visions. The long days travelled slowly, and the sultry nights wore away wearily

It was Sunday morning, about sunrise, when Lieutenant Duncan appeared at the door, and informed us that we must start immediately. There was an instantaneous springing up—a hurried toilet—a rapid rolling of blankets, and a hastily-snatched breakfast of bread and coffee. I remarked, with more unconcern in my manner than I really felt, that I supposed Lieutenant Stevenson would remain. The lieutenant’s countenance fell, and, looking another way, he said, nervously, “Orders have come to move all im

The road ran, for several miles, between hedges and among plantations, and close to gardens and houses, with their fields and fences, until it suddenly emerged on a broad, unbounded prairie. Our guards’ eyes sparkled when they saw it, and they declared that this began to look like Texas. We all felt better at the sight, and the fresh breeze that swept over it almost swept away the weary weakness of the previous days. There is a profound sense of loneliness and littleness on these great seas of g

It is not a pleasant thing to be a prisoner; I never enjoyed it, and never made the acquaintance of any prisoner who said that he did. True is it that you have but few cares and responsibilities. In the prisoners’ camp you take no heed of what you shall eat, or what you shall drink, or wherewith you shall be clothed. If the rations come, you can eat them; and if they do not, you can go without; in neither case have your efforts any thing to do with the matter. Your raiment need not trouble you;

There was some coffee in Camp Groce, when we arrived—not much—and a little was bought afterward for “morning coffee,” with some tea for the sick, at fifteen dollars per pound. It was poor stuff, and not worth the price. The messes that I found there used corn; or, as they called it, corn coffee. This was made from the meal. Burnt in a frying-pan upon the stove, by a sailor-cook, some particles in charcoal and some not singed at all, it formed a grayish compound, and made as horrible a beverage a

Autumn was drawing to a close, the leaves had fallen from the trees, the grass was no longer green, and prairie and timber seemed alike bare and cold. Still no exchange had come. We knew of the thirty-seven thousand prisoners taken at Vicksburg, and the six thousand taken at Port Hudson, and therefore we listened hopefully to rumors of exchange, and coined a few of our own, and remained prisoners of war. Within the prison-camp, affairs had not grown brighter. There was increased sickness with de

The prisoners at Camp Ford were poor. They even thought themselves too poor to borrow. They possessed no supplies to sell; and in manufactures they had not risen above carved pipes and chessmen. They lived on their rations and cooked those rations in the simplest manner. Half of them had no tables, and more than half no table furniture. The plates and spoons did treble duty, travelling about from “shebang” to “shebang” (as they called the hovels they had built) in regular succession. We rated th

Through illness, changes, toil and trouble, the subject of escape never left our minds. At Camp Groce, weakness and ill-health constantly postponed intended attempts. Moreover, the open prairie country around the camp, the nearness of the coast-guard, and, above all, the absence of any point or outlet to which to run, were disheartening obstacles. At Camp Ford, it was somewhat different; for the woods came down nearly to the stockade, and the country was one vast forest. The troubles that beset

The work upon the tunnel was interrupted for a day by an event, which I think must be without a parallel in any other prison-camp. At the breaking out of the rebellion, Miss Mollie Moore was a school girl of sixteen. After Galveston was re-taken by the Confederates, the “Houston Telegraph” was adorned with several heroic ballads, written by the young lady, whom the editor sometimes called “our pet,” and sometimes the “unrivalled star of Texan literature.” The 42d Massachusetts had been quartered