ltogether. We were not
given a bottle and glasses to help ourselves as is usual, but the
bartender poured out a wine glass full for each. How much do you want I
asked, pulling out a roll of Confederate; forty dollars was his reply. I
handed him a fifty dollar bill and receiving my change, went on, stopping
at two or three stores on the way back to make other purchases. We had a
jolly time that night and whooped things up a little, for by the time we
got back into prison, the applejack, which was old and powerful, began to
work, and we were just in the proper frame of mind to make things look
cheerful to us. I am afraid we were somewhat annoying to some of our
comrades who wanted to sleep that night, and not having had any applejack
could not appreciate the fun.

I shall never forget the Christmas dinner I ate in Danville prison in
1864, and I do not think any of the half dozen who dined with me that day,
will ever forget it either. I bought a turkey weighing thirteen and
three-fourths pounds for forty dollars, and took it over to the bake-shop
to be roasted. The cooks were Union soldiers, who did the baking for the
sake of getting better rations, and I got them to stuff the turkey with
crusts of white bread, that they had baked for the rebs.

They brought it in nicely roasted, and I managed, by giving one of the
guards ten dollars, to get a canteen of applejack, and I also bought a
loaf of white bread, so that we had quite a civilized dinner. Six of us
sat down together, viz: General Hayes, Captain Seeley, Captain Albert
Thomas, Lieutenant Leyden, Lieutenant VanDerweed, and myself, "and we
drank from the same canteen." Talk about starvation in Southern prisons!
Why just see what a dinner six of us had that day; and all it cost was
about seventy dollars. We could live like that nearly two weeks on a
thousand dollars.

Of course every prisoner did not have the money to afford these luxuries,
and were obliged to put up with the corn bread ration, served out by the
rebel authorities; but the Confederate government "of course was not to
blame if the poor boys starved, because they did not have money to buy
all they wanted." There was plenty to eat, only our boys did not have the
money to buy it with. I never asked Riggs & Co. whether they ever paid
that check for seven hundred dollars or not, and have forgotten the name
of the generous hearted reb who loaned it to me, but this I know, that I
am still indebted to some one f