When the grave questions which for years agitated our country had reached the crisis, and there remained but the _ultima ratio regum_, they were submitted to the arbitrament of the battlefield. We of the South accepted the result of that contest and laid down our arms in good faith. But when we are asked, like a whipped child, to say we were wrong and are sorry for what we did, and promise to sin no more, it is asking too much. We fought for what we considered our rights, and lost. Yet our men, who fought and lost, and those who died in the struggle, were just as brave and as honest as the men who wore the blue. _They_ fought for the Union, _we_ fought for our homes, for our wives and our dear ones. For those of our dead who were consigned to death and ignominy we do not ask pity, but only for that justice which was denied them in life--that the blot upon their reputations be effaced and their names stand out clear and stainless. The little episode in relation to the Fairfax Court House raid will need no apology for its introduction, as I have already had occasion to refer to that affair in my diary. The illustrations here given are from drawings made by my son, B. F. Williamson. JAMES J. WILLIAMSON. _West Orange N. J., April, 1911._ ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE Old Capitol Prison [_Frontispiece_] Exemption Certificate 16 Pass Through Confederate Lines 17 Carroll Prison (Duff Green’s Row) 21 Arch Window in Room No. 16 24 Colonel William P. Wood, Superintendent 33 James J. Williamson 39 Stove in Room No. 16 55 Map of James River, from Fortress Monroe to Richmond 93 John H. Barnes 96 Lieutenant Albert Wrenn 99 Colonel John S. Mosby 106 Lieutenant Frank Fox 109 Brigadier-General Edwin H. Stoughton 116 Certificate of Membership 118 Major Henry Wirz 133 Rev. F. E. Boyle 140 Rev. Bernardin F. Wiget, S. J. 143 Gunnell House (General Stoughton’s Headquarters) 155 CONTENTS PAGE INTRODUCTORY 11