ath or been sent back to the hell of
slavery from which he had escaped. The bloody massacre of black
prisoners at Murfreesboro, brooked, so far as the public knows,
no retaliation at Washington. The black servants captured at
Galveston--free men and citizens of Massachusetts--were sold into
slavery and remained there. In every instance in which they have
had the opportunity, the rebels have enforced their barbarous
proclamation. How much longer are they to be suffered to do it
without remonstrance?

"Gen. Hunter--at this moment in the field,--General. Butler, and
hundreds of other white officers are included in this
Proclamation, or were previously outlawed and adjudged a felon's
death. Delay remonstrance much longer, and retaliation must
supersede it. If the Government wishes to be spared the necessity
of retaliating, it has only to _say_ that it will retaliate--to
declare by proclamation or general order that all its soldiers
who may be captured must receive from the Rebels the treatment to
which, as prisoners of war, they are, by the usages of war,
entitled. The Government can know no distinction of color under
its flag. The moment a soldier shoulders a musket he is invested
with every military right which belongs to a white soldier. He is
at least and above all things entitled to the safeguards which
surround his white comrades.

"It is not possible to suppose the Government means to withhold
them; we only urge that the wisest, safest, and humanest, as well
as the most honorable policy, is at once to announce its
purpose."[112]

The able article just quoted had a wholesome effect upon many
thoughtful men at the South, and brought the blush to the cheek of the
nation. A few of the Southern journals agreed with Mr. Greeley that
the resolves of the Confederate Congress were unjustifiable; that the
Congress had no right to say what color the Union soldiers should be;
and that such action would damage their cause in the calm and humane
judgment of all Europe. But the Confederate Congress was unmoved and
unmovable upon this subject.

Three Colored men had been captured in Stone River on the gun-boat
"Isaac Smith." They were free men; but, notwithstanding this, they
were placed in close confinement and treated like felons. Upon the
facts reaching the ear of the Government, Secretary Stanton