Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 1.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

[266] whole truth about him from his own people. If he had not avoided a court-martial by resigning his position, it is likely that even a military commission would have found it impossible to screen his brutality to the sick, although the fact that the United States hanged no one for the massacre of Indian women and sucking infants during the year 1865, inspires the fear that this systematic * * * * of Confederate prisoners would have been commended for his patriotism.

He was assisted by Dr. Rider, of Rochester, one of the few “copperheads” whom I met in any office, great or small, at the North. My association was rather more intimate with him than with any one of the others, and I believe him to have been a competent and faithful officer. Personally, I acknowledge his many kindnesses with gratitude. The rest of the “meds” were, in truth, a motley crew in the main, most of them being selected from the impossibility, it would seem,.of doing any thing else with them. I remember one of the worthies, whose miraculous length of leg and neck suggested “crane” to all observers, whose innocence of medicine was quite refreshing. On being sent for to prescribe for a prisoner, who was said to have bilious fever, he asked the druggist, a “reb,” in the most naive manner, what was the usual treatment for that disease! Fortunately, during his stay at Elmira, which was not long, there were no drugs in the dispensary, or I shudder to picture the consequences. This department was constantly undergoing changes, and I suspect that the whole system was intended as part of the education of the young doctors assigned to us, for as soon as they learned to distinguish between quinine and magnesia they were removed to another field of labor.

The whole camp was divided into wards, to which physicians were assigned, among whom were three “rebel” prisoners, Dr. Lynch, of Baltimore, Dr. Martin, of South Carolina, and Dr. Graham, formerly of Stonewall Jackson's staff, and a fellow-townsman of the lamented hero. These ward physicians treated the simplest cases in their patients' barrack, and transferred the more dangerous ones to the hospitals, of which there were ten or twelve, capable of accommodating about eighty patients each. Here every arrangement was made that carpenters could make to insure the patients against unnecessary mortality, and, indeed, a system was professed which would have delighted the heart of a Sister of Charity; but, alas! the practice was quite another thing. The most scandalous neglect prevailed even in so simple a matter as providing food for the sick, and I do not doubt that many of those who died perished from actual starvation.

One of the Petersburg prisoners having become so sick as to be sent to the hospital, he complained to his friends who visited him that he could get nothing to eat, and was dying in consequence, when they made application for leave to buy him some potatoes and roast them for him. Dr. S. not being consulted, the request was granted, and when, a few hours afterwards, the roasted potatoes