Carelessness or culpable recklessness of the guards.... Nellie Grey came near getting us in trouble Statement of the arrest of Joseph C. Wright, of 1 .......... ...... .... Statement of the Kidnapping of John Apple, of P Arrest of Aquila R. Allen, John H. Wise and their ind tion in the Old Capitol by order of General Wad Military Governor of Washington. Case of Dr. Bundy..... ...... ...... .... ...... ...... ... Dr. A. B. Hewitt and John W. Smith, or the War .... ......... Jew ...... .... ...... .......... of Illinois, with some other gentlemen Narrative of the arrests of J. Blanchard.. The Kidnapping of the Rev. Judson D. Benedict –Chris mon on the Mount regarded as treasonable-Mr. B brought before U. S. Judge Hall, of Buffalo, on a Habeas Corpus-Discharged from custody by the Ju one appearing against him—Kidnapped again, and to the Old Capitol ...... .... ...... ...... ...... .... Kidnapping and imprisonment of Geo. W. Wilson, of ...... ...... ...... .... .... ...... ...... ...... ...... ...... .. The case of Dr. Ellis, a Medical Director in the Army.. .... Duplicity of the Secretary of War-Public order for the releas of Prisoners of State-Private order to disregard the on publicly promulgated.... Conclusion...... INTRODUCTION. 1 THE extraordinary and unprecedented course of the Executive Department of the Federal Government, in suspending, or rather in violating the Constitution of the United States, under the plea of military necessity,-the arrest without legal warrant, and the incarceration of citizens of the United States in forts and other military prisons without judicial trial or the judgment of any court, has become a part of the history of this country, and, in the opinion of many, a reproach upon Americans as a sovereign and free people. In separating from the mother country, and setting up as a nation by themselves, the American people acted upon the principle that government was an institution deriving all its authority and power from the governed, and that, contrary to the principles which had theretofore been almost universally recognized as fundamental in European governments, the right to govern was in the people themselves, and not in any single person, family or dynasty. This principle of self-government was not only incorporated in the Constitution of the United States, the fundamental compact of government among the American people, but it was expressly stipulated in that compact that certain natural rights of the people individually, as well as collectively, should be reserved by them, and that certain other rights, called political, because appertaining to their government polity, should be enjoyed by them, and exercised without restraint or hindrance. It needs but to refer the reader to the Constitution of the United States to call attention to those provisions of that compact which specially reserve to the people in their individuality certain rights. Among these is the right of what is called. free speech, and a free press; the right of trial by jury when a person is accused of crime, and a conviction sought; the right of what is called the writ of habeas corpus, a personal right wrung by force from the tyrant rulers of Great Britain, and which was carefully transplanted into the American system of Government, and until the accession to power of the Lincoln Administration, guarded with the most vigilant and zealous care by the American people. These personal rights of the American people having been ruthlessly violated by Executive power, assumed arbitrarily, as the writer. of this believes, and exercised despotically towards a number, not less than hundreds of American citizens, who have been immured in forts, fortresses and oth er military prisons for exercising their constitutional rights of free speech and a free press, it is due to truth and justice that as much as possible of the testimony be gathered and preserved which will show to future ages how Constitutional Government was subverted in the United States of America, and how, in a few months, the American people, from being the freest politically, the most prosperous in wealth, and the most progressive in the civilized and enlighted arts and sciences, became the most abject subjects of despotism, the most acquiescent serfs of arbitrary power; nay, the advocates of the principle which was repudiated by their Revolutionary fathers that the rights and liberties of the people were at such disposal of any ruler as to violate and sacrifice them at his will and pleasure. Having been made one of the victims of this new American doctrine that all power is centered in the Executive head of the Federal Government, the writer of these pages proposes to furnish such portion of the history of the arbitrary arrests and imprisonment of American citizens by the Lincoln Administration, as he has experienced in his own person, and as have come under his observation. Before proceeding to this task, it might be well for me to put the reader in possession of some facts which, though of rather a personal nature, are nevertheless pertinent to the issue between the Executive head of the Government and the victims of his arbitrary assumption of power. The pretexts for most of the arrests and imprisonment of those, who, like myself, were incarcerated in the Old Capitol at Washington were that we |