Lights and shadows in Confederate prisons

A first-person memoir recounts capture during a Civil War engagement and subsequent confinement in several Confederate prisons, tracing forced marches from Winchester to Staunton and transfers to Libby, Danville, and Salisbury. The author documents daily routines, exact rations, vermin, roll calls, escapes and tunneling attempts, theatrical and study efforts to occupy time, and deaths among inmates, drawing on a contemporaneous diary. Interwoven are logistical details of camp life and candid reflections on military strategy, prisoner-exchange policy, and the moral ambiguities of wartime necessity, together with repeated acknowledgment of kindnesses received from some captors.