[Third indorsement.]

WASHINGTON, May 13, 1864.

This furnishes additional evidence, but on points now well understood and published in a record from the Committee on the Conduct of the War.

No immediate use can be made of it, but the paper should be carefully preserved. It may become of considerable importance.

E. A. HITCHCOCK,

Major-General of Volunteers.

[Inclosure.]

SUFFERINGS AND PRIVATIONS OF FEDERAL PRISONERS WHILE IN RICHMOND, VA.

Immediately on being captured, in the majority of cases, they are deprived of everything they have, viz, overcoats, blankets, boots or shoes (if in good condition), money, watches, &c., and then they have to perform a long and exhausting march without anything to eat, and subjected to every kind of insult and indignity. On their arrival in Richmond, Va., they are either sent to Belle Isle or to some one of the tobacco warehouses that are used as prisons, where they arrive in an exhausted condition, having had no food, probably, for forty-eight hours.

Here they undergo a very strict examination, being stripped to the skin in order that all the money they have may be found and secured. The condition of those in the warehouses was much more comfortable than those poor fellows who were sent to Belle Isle, from the fact that they were not exposed to the cold and damp night air or to the biting cold wind of the island, which, being situated in the James River, is very much exposed.

The rations at first received were made up as follows, viz: Corn bread, one-quarter of a loaf (weighing about four ounces), sweet potatoes (nearly rotten), a quarter of a pound, with about two ounces of meat, and at this time four-tack, daily. Soon after the hard-tack war expended, when they increased the corn bread to half a loaf, but from this time out meat was seldom given us, and then only in a very small quantity. The potatoes also were discontinued. The above was not sufficient for any one in health, and consequently there was a large amount of sickness. The amount of filth and vermin cannot be described, and, as the men had no opportunity to wash their clothing, it was constantly accumulating.

The winter was a very severe one for Richmond, and those on Belle Isle suffered horribly, for there was no shelter but a few old and worn-out tents of the Sibley pattern, and these were crowded to their utmost capacity, and yet half of the men were without any shelter at all. When you consider that the men were almost naked you can imagine what they must have suffered, exposed to as severe weather as I ever experienced so far north as Albany, N. Y., during the winter. Many of them froze to death, and, instead of a burial, the hogs disposed of their remains. There were hundreds of cases of frostbitten feet and legs, which, in a great many instances, had to be amputated in order to save their lives.

I was unable to sleep in the prison about half of the time because it was very cold, and I had to walk the floor all night long in order to