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at one time there were as many as one hundred and thirty-five.
When I and my companions reached the wharf, we were met by Lieut. Wood. I had seen him at Fort Hamilton some six weeks before, having gone there to try and see my father, who was then confined in Fort La Fayette. Wood recognized me, and requested me to introduce to him the gentlemen who were with me. This was the first and last occasion, as far as I know, on which he manifested a disposition to treat us with civility. His bearing at all times subsequently, was that of an ordinary jailor, except, perhaps, that he displayed even less good feeling than usually characterizes that class of people. We were marched into the gun battery I have mentioned, and as the prisoners already there, many of whom were our acquaintances or friends, crowded around us, Lieutenant Wood requested all to leave the room, except those comprised in what he elegantly termed the "last lot." We were then required to give up all the money in our possession. We were each furnished that night with an iron bedstead, a bag of straw, and one shoddy blanket. When we had time to look around us, we found there were some twenty prisoners already quartered in the battery, and the number of inmates was therefore increased to about thirty-five by the addition of our party. The beds, which were arranged between the guns, almost touched each other. If we had had other furniture, we should not have known what to do with it, three or four chairs and a couple of small tables being all that we could afterwards find space for.
We found in the morning that the gun battery adjoining ours was, if possible, more crowded than the one we occupied, and the casemates were as much crowded as the batteries. There were as I have stated, four casemates on the lower or ground floor, allotted to prisoners. Three of these contained nine or ten persons each, and into the fourth were thrust at that time very nearly thirty prisoners, who were either privateersmen, or sailors who had been taken while running the blockade on the Southern
