In and Out of Rebel Prisons by A. Cooper

Author:A. Cooper [Cooper, A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, United States, Civil War Period (1850-1877), Law, Essays, Literary Collections, General
ISBN: 9788026890478
Google: qu_wywEACAAJ
Publisher: e-artnow
Published: 2019-10-15T00:54:02+00:00

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CHAPTER XVIII.

Table of Contents

in prison again.

We arrived at the house of Captain Sanderson about ten o’clock that night, and were treated by him like gentlemen. Late as it was, after placing us in an out-house, in which was a weaver’s loom, he brought us a good lunch, and gave us every possible privilege he could.

We were strictly guarded, but were made to feel our captivity as little as possible.

We were allowed to go down to a stream near the house the next day, and wash our clothes, which we had worn nearly a month, and the captain, in every way, treated us more like guests than prisoners.

Captain Sanderson was in command of a company of home guards, and had never seen active service. He was a well-to-do farmer, and most of his command were his neighbor’s sons, who, like himself, did not care to go into the regular service, and most of them were strongly tinctured with Union sentiments. I don’t think he was a very bitter Confederate himself.

The next afternoon, after having washed and dried our clothes and took a good bath in the stream near by, we were started under guard for Franklin. We walked about three miles, when we stopped at the house of a Union man named Johnson, and whose son had joined Captain Sanderson’s company of home guards to save conscription, and who was detailed as one of our guard.

They filled our haversacks with choice fruit, and Captain Lyons, of the 1st Georgia Regiment, whom we met there, loaned me a horse to ride. Our guard the first day was Lieutenant R. N. Leatherwood, Sergeant Dick Hancock, and D. J. Johnson. We found by talking to Mr. Johnson that he was a Union man, and that Captain Lyons, who had so kindly loaned me his horse, was one also, but they dare not show it. We only went three miles the first afternoon, and the next morning Tom Hubbard overtook us, leading a mule for me to ride, as I had only borrowed Captain Lyons’s horse for the first afternoon. Tom Hubbard soon found an opportunity to tell me, that his brother and a Captain Tidwell were going to try to assist us to escape. This Captain Tidwell was in command of another company of home guards, and we had not gone far on this second day of our march, before he met us as if by chance, and we halted, and after chatting a few minutes, Tom asked him to ride along with us.

He had a canteen of applejack, and invited all hands to take a drink. This we all did, though Captain Alban and I drank very sparingly. The canteen was passed quite often, and though we all seemed jolly, I noticed that it held out pretty well, and concluded that they were all trying to get the rest drunk, without getting drunk themselves. What we wanted was, to get enough of this apple brandy down Lieutenant Leatherwood and Sergeant Dick Hancock, to affect them, and then make a break; but it did not work.

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