Those prisoners were crowded into one end of the room, while we were confined in the opposite. The next step was to examine us for boots and shoes. Previous to this I had secretly taken three twenty-dollar bills from my wallet, dampened them in my mouth, flattened them out a little, then slipped them into my watch pocket. But it was not money they wanted; they were looking for footwear. It was my misfortune to have on a new pair of shop made boots, which I had just received by express from northern Pennsylvania, having been made to order. The provost marshal came in with a small guard and a couple of lanterns and proceeded with his examination. I think I was the first man approached, the officer giving the order, "Examine that man's feet." The order was quickly obeyed. The guards rolled up my pant legs to observe the length of their boot tops and the quality thereof. Their report was "Good." Another of the guard carried an old sack filled with old shoes which had been cast off by men of our army. The officer politely told me "to pick out a pair of shoes from the sack, and get out of them boots." Having no option in the matter I very reluctantly surrendered my new boots, and replaced them with a pair of the cast-off shoes. Later we will hear from those boots. They examined every man's feet, made a number of good trades, then raised the blockade. After this we were allowed the privilege of the whole room, and laid ourselves down for a good night's rest. Next morning (October 20th) we were marshaled out into the street, put under a mounted guard in command of a lieutenant, and started for Culpepper. This guard proved to be an exception to most guards; they were very gentlemanly, worthy of the responsibility they had undertaken and would frequently dismount and give some one of the poor fagged and footsore prisoners a seat in the saddle. We reached Culpepper about dark, and were ushered into another old storeroom, similar to that at Warrenton, for the night. Here we found the first infantry we had seen since our capture, and were turned over to their charge. The next morning, two other officers and myself were taken across the street to the provost marshal's office and were asked to give our parole not to leave the building, except to look after the welfare of our men when they wanted to report their grievances to the provost marshal, Major Richardson, whose office we were to be permitted to visit. We willingly gave the parole. Major Richardson assured us that our private property should and would be protected, and enjoined upon us to report, for the benefit of all the prisoners, any and all cases of extortion that came to our knowledge.