Part 63 (1/2)

Answer. I was treated a great deal better there than I was at Belle Isle. We got meat twice a day, rice once, and Indian bread once. We got very near as much as we wanted to eat.

Question. How were you treated at Richmond?

Answer. I suffered there terribly with hunger. I could eat anything.

Question. Can you tell us what kind of food you got there?

Answer. Dry Indian bread, and, when I first went there, a very little meat.

Question. When were you taken sick?

Answer. I was taken sick--I was sick with the diarrhoea a fortnight before I went to the hospital, and I was in the hospital a little over a week before I was exchanged. I was released on the 7th of March, and got here the 9th.

Question. How were you treated while in the hospital?

Answer. I was treated there worse than on Belle Isle. We did not get any salt of any account--only a little piece of bread that would hardly keep a chicken alive.

Question. Did you get any rice?

Answer. No, sir.

Question. Any soup?

Answer. Once in a while of mornings I would get a little.

Question. Did the physician come round to see you every day?

Answer. Yes, sir.

Question. Did he give you any medicine?

Answer. He gave me some pills.

Question. What was their manner towards you after you were taken sick and in the hospital? Were they kind, or rough?

Answer. They were neither kind nor rough, but indifferent. The corn-bread I got seemed to burn my very insides. When I would go down to the river of mornings to wash myself, as I put the water to my face it seemed as though I wanted to sup the water, and to sup it, and sup it, and sup it all the time.

Question. Did you make no complaint to the officers on Belle Isle of your food?

Answer. No, sir.

Question. Did you ask them for any more?

Answer. No, sir; I knew there was no use. I do not think I spoke to an officer while I was there.

Question. Did you ever tell those who furnished you with the food you did get, of the insufficiency of it?

Answer. Yes, sir.

Question. What answer did they give you?