It happened that the chief surgeon of the camp was an old neighbor of mine, Dr. M. C. Woodworth, and I questioned him closely as to the medical and sanitary condition. He was a man of the highest character in his profession and as a citizen. I had absolute confidence in his uprightness as well as his ability. His statements fully corroborated the conclusions I drew from my own observation. I was fully satisfied that the garrison administration was honest and humane, and that the prisoners suffered only such evils as were necessarily incident to confinement in a narrow space, and to life in temporary barracks of the kind used in all military camps. I learned that those prisoners who had means of their own were permitted to open private accounts with merchants and bankers in the city of Sandusky, and had little difficulty in increasing their physical comforts in many ways. Since the war I have conversed with business men of that town who personally knew of these arrangements, and who have given me details of remittances and credits furnished to prisoners, and of some considerable investments made for them. A certain surveillance was necessary in such cases to give assurance that no unlawful advantage was taken of such opportunities, but there was very little if any reason to believe such leniency was abused. CHAPTER XXX A WINTER RIDE ON THE CUMBERLAND MOUNTAINS Ordered to East Tennessee--Preparation for a long ride--A small party of officers--Rendezvous at Lexington, Ky.--Changes in my staff--The escort-A small train--A gay cavalcade--The blue-grass country--War-time roads--Valley of the Rockcastle--Quarters for the night--London--Choice of routes--Longstreet in the way--A turn southward--Williamsburg--Meeting Burnside--Fording the Cumberland--Pine Mountain--A hard pull--Teamsters' chorus--Big Creek Gap--First view of East Tennessee--Jacksboro--A forty-mile trot--Escape from unwelcome duty--In command of Twenty-third Corps--The army-supply problem--Siege bread--Starved beef--Burnside's dinner to Sherman.