We were obliged to take up our residence in the lower room and sleep on the floor at nights and use it to sit on in the day time, as we had no other seats furnished except stationary benches, at the tables. Shortly after taking up our lodgings there, we applied for some of our money, but we met with the reply that none of “the officers of Milroy’s command could have a d—d cent.” Nor did we get any from them until the 1st of October. We were also informed that we would not be allowed to purchase anything outside—as Straight’s command was then permitted to do—so we had to smuggle our purchases through them for some time, until their orders were tacitly countermanded.—During the first four weeks, while subsisting on the rations furnished, we were often glad to pick up crumbs from the table to satisfy our hunger. In speaking of the attaches of the prison, Gen. Johnson, a gentleman of color, should be mentioned, although he was a prisoner, as well as ourselves. His duty consisted in supplying us with smoke, which he did every morning, carrying a skillet of burning tar through the rooms, crying “Here’s your nice smoke, without money or price.” He also collected the soiled clothes once a week, which he was permitted to take out to be washed, returning them Sunday mornings, at the small charge of three pieces for one dollar. He also, for some time, monopolized the shaving and hair cutting, which operations he performed at the moderate price of twenty-five cents for the former and seventy-five cents for the latter; but he was finally superseded by an enterprising German Lieutenant, which compelled him to abandon this calling and take to that of “boot-black.” The old fellow was a regular fixture there, having been in the Prison about two years. He was an old soldier also, having accompanied a Pennsylvania regiment through the Mexican war. Every morning at nine o’clock A. M. “George” made his appearance, and, with his peculiar intonation of voice, would cry out: “Fall in, sick, and go down;” when those who wished to be prescribed for would huddle together and go down on the first floor, where they were examined by the surgeon—who was spoken of as a kind and attentive physician—and, after making a minute of their cases, would send them back to their rooms, excepting those whom it was deemed necessary to send to the hospital. In the course of two or three hours, the medicine would be brought up and distributed to the sick. Our enlisted men, prisoners of war who were so unfortunate as to become sick, suffered outrageously. They were often allowed to lie in their tents on Belle Isle, on the wet ground, until the last moment, when they would be brought over to the hospital to breath their last.