THE IMMORTAL SIX HUNDRED
We knew the Richmond authorites were doing all they could for us, and, like the dying Csesar, we were too proud to let our Yankee jailors see that we suffered. It seems like blasphemy to charge the creation of such a creature as this fellow to nature, and really an insult to his satanic majesty to say he created such a caricature on the human race as was Hallowell.
As I stated before, acute dysentery, caused by the bad water we drank, and miserable rations of rotten, worm-filled hardtack crackers, put our men in very bad condition. On the night of September 28, 1864, Lieutenant Frank Peake, of Morgan's men, who was one of my tent mates, was taken very sick, with every symptom of cholera. We had nothing to relieve his pain, and did not dare go out to call for help. Had one of us left the tent or called for help, the negro guard would have fired on us and been glad of the opportunity to do so. Their orders were to shoot any man who left his tent after taps, except to obey the
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