Numbers 20 Rampart street. At this place we were kept in strict confinement, fed on salt beef and flour bread with coffee. Pork was issued us only once or twice during our stay in the city. Applications to be allowed the parole of the city for a few hours each day were frequently made and as frequently refused.

On the evening of the 4th of April the surgeons confined with me were allowed the parole of the city from 3 o'clock until 8 o'clock next morning, on our parole not to escape, to visit no places of public amusement, and to dress in citizens' clothing. At 8 o'clock on the morning of the 5th we were again escorted by a file of soldiers to the transport steamer Polar Star, when many of the previous restrictions were withdrawn, and paying our passage money and for our meals we were able to enjoy a more generous diet and feel more the liberty of free action.

From this time until the period of our discharge, on the evening of the 14th, I have no complaint to make. Finding that the surgeons would in all likelihood be again returned to prison life in New Orleans, I made a personal appeal to General Banks in behalf of myself, Surgeon Estarge, and Assistant Surgeons Griffin and Thompson to return us to our lines, to which he promptly responded and granted our application.

They placed the released surgeons, Doctors Estarge, Thompson, and myself (Griffin being retained to attend sick on transport), blindfolded and guarded by a sentinel, in an ambulance, and drove us six miles in that condition to our picket-post. Such is a statement of the facts in regard to the medical officers from 20 Rampart street, New Orleans.

R. T. GIBBS, M. D.,

Surgeon, C. S. Army.

HEADQUARTERS CAMP PAROLE,
Near Annapolis, Md., May 8, 1864.

Colonel W. HOFFMAN,

Commissary-General of Prisoners, Washington, D. C.:

COLONEL: I beg leave respectfully to forward for your information the inclosed copy of a quarterly report of cases treated and deaths at the hospital for Federal prisoners at Richmond, Va. * The original report was rendered to the Confederate surgeon (Semple) by Sergt. William C. Robinson, Thirty-fourth Illinois Volunteers, who was (April 1, 1864) on duty at the general hospital at Richmond, Va. Sergeant Robinson has arrived here and vouches for the correctness of the inclosed report. Of course this report does not include the deaths which occurred on Belle Isle.

I remain, colonel, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

ADRIAN R. ROOT,

Colonel Ninety-fourth New York Vet. Vols., Commanding Camp Parole.

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* See also similar statement published in Report of the Joint Committee on the Conduct of the War as Report Numbers 142, Senate, Thirty-eighth Congress, second session, p. 55, Miscellaneous.

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9 R-SERIES II, VOL VII.