. From that time my hunger was appeased and my
nakedness clad. Thirty-five years have elapsed since Mrs. Mary Howard
wrote that letter, and to-day it is as much of a mystery to me as it
was on the day I received it--by whom or by what means or device
Mrs. Howard ever found out who I was, or what my condition and
circumstances were, I will never know. She and I corresponded
regularly during the balance of my prison life, and for sometime after
the war when I returned to South Carolina, and yet that mystery was
never explained. Mrs. Mary Howard! Grand, noble, heroic, Christian
woman! "She hath done what she could." Through her agency and her
means and her efforts she not only assisted and relieved me, but
hundreds of other poor, helpless Confederate prisoners. To-day she
is reaping her sublime reward, where there are no suffering hungry,
starving prisoners to relieve. God bless her descendants!

When General Lee surrendered we refused to believe it, notwithstanding
the prison was flooded with various newspapers announcing the fact,
and the nearby cities were illuminated, the big guns were belching
forth their terrific thunder in joy of the event. However, the truth
gradually dawned upon us, and we were forced to realize what we at
first thought impossible--that Lee would be forced to surrender. A few
days later we were all ordered into line, and officially notified
of General Lee's surrender. The futility of further resistence
was emphasized, and we were urgently requested to take the oath of
Allegiance to the United States Government. This was "a bitter pill,"
"the yellow pup," to swallow, and a very few solemnly complied. The
great majority still had a forlorn hope. Generals Johnston, Kirby
Smith, Mosby, and others were still in the field, and it seemed to be
a tacit understanding, that we would never take the oath of allegiance
as long as one Confederate officer contended in the field.

Finally, when there was no disguising the fact that General Johnston
and all others had honorably surrendered--that all was lost--on the
19th day of June, 1865, the last batch of officers in prison took the
oath of allegiance to the United States Government, bade farewell to
Fort Delaware, and inscribed on its walls, on its fences, in books,
and divisions the French quotation, "Font est perdeu l'honeur"--All is
lost but honor.

"A prison! Heavens, I loath the hated name,
Famine's metropolis, the sink of shame,
A nauseous