a cartel for the exchange of prisoners on the very basis offered by the Confederates in the beginning. These negotiations were commenced on the 14th of February, 1862, Gen. John E. Wool representing the Federals and Gen. Howell Cobb the Confederates the only unsettled point at that time being that General Wool was unwillmg that each party should agree to pay the expenses of transporting their prisoners to the frontier; and this question he promised to refer to his Government. At a second interview on March 1st, 1862, General Wool informed General Cobb that his Government would not consent to pay these expenses, and thereupon General Cobb promptly receded from this demand and agreed to accept the terms offered by General Wool. General Wool had stated m the beginning that he alone was clothed with full power to effect this arrangement, but lie now stated that his Government "had changed his instnictions." And so these negotiations were broken off, and matters left as before they were begun.
The real reason for this change was that in the meantime the capture of Forts Henry and Donaldson had given the Federals a preponderance in the number of prisoners. Soon, however, Jackson's Valley campaign, the battles around Richmond, and other Confederate successes, gave the Confederates the preponderance, and this change of conditions induced the Federals to consent to terms, to which the Confederates had always been ready to accede.
And so on July 22nd, 1862, Gen. John A. Dix, representing the Federals, and Gen. D. H. Hill, the Confederates, at Haxall's Landing, on James river, in Charles City county, entered into the cartel which thereafter formed the basis for the exchange of prisoners during the rest of the war whenever it was allowed by the Federals to be in operation. Article four of this cartel provided as follows:
"All prisoners of war, to be discharged on parole, in ten days after their capture, and the prisoners now held and those hereafter taken, to be transferred to the points mutually agreed upon, at the expense of the capturing party."
Article six provided that—
"The stipulations and provisions above mentioned are to be
