oners immediately around us, expecting no less than that the next
instant we would be swept with grape and canister, stampeded
tumultuously. There were quite a number of wells right around us, and
all of these were filled full of men that fell into them as the crowd
rushed away. Many had legs and arms broken, and I have no doubt that
several were killed.

It was the stormiest five minutes that I ever saw.

While this was going on two of my company, belonging to the Fifth Iowa
Cavalry, were in hot pursuit of Curtis. I had seen them start and
shouted to them to come back, as I feared they would be set upon by the
Raiders and murdered. But the din was so overpowering that they could not
hear me, and doubtless would not have come back if they had heard.

Curtis ran diagonally down the hill, jumping over the tents and knocking
down the men who happened in his way. Arriving at the swamp he plunged
in, sinking nearly to his hips in the fetid, filthy ooze. He forged his
way through with terrible effort. His pursuers followed his example, and
caught up to him just as he emerged on the other side. They struck him
on the back of the head with their clubs, and knocked him down.

By this time order had been restored about us. The guns remained silent,
and the crowd massed around us again. From where we were we could see
the successful end of the chase after Curtis, and could see his captors
start back with him. Their success was announced with a roar of applause
from the North Side. Both captors and captured were greatly exhausted,
and they were coming back very slowly. Key ordered the balance up on to
the scaffold. They obeyed promptly. The priest resumed his reading of
the service for the condemned. The excitement seemed to make the doomed
ones exceedingly thirsty. I never saw men drink such inordinate
quantities of water. They called for it continually, gulped down a quart
or more at a time, and kept two men going nearly all the time carrying it
to them.

When Curtis finally arrived, he sat on the ground for a minute or so, to
rest, and then, reeking with filth, slowly and painfully climbed the
steps. Delaney seemed to think he was suffering as much from fright as
anything else, and said to him:

"Come on up, now, show yourself a man, and die game."

Again the priest resumed his reading, but it had no interest to Delaney,
who kept calling out directions to Pete Donelly, who was standing in the
crowd, as to