Union Prisoners South -- Salisbury.

- Michael Stansbury. 48 years of age, a sea-faring man, a Southerner by birth and raising, formerly Captain of U. S. light ship Long Shoal, station'd at Long Shoal Point, Pamlico Sound -- though a Southerner, a firm Union man -- was captur'd Feb. 17, 1863, and has been nearly two years in the Confederate prisons; was at one time order'd releas'd by Governor Vance, but a rebel officer re-arrested him; then sent on to Richmond for exchange -- but instead of being exchanged was sent down (as a Southern citizen, not a soldier,) to Salisbury, N. C., where he remain'd until lately, when he escaped among the exchanged by assuming the name of a dead soldier, and coming up via Wilmington with the rest. Was about sixteen months in Salisbury. Subsequent to October '64, there were about 11,000 Union prisoners in the stockade; about 100 of them Southern Unionists, 200 U. S. deserters. During the past winter 1500 of the prisoners, to save their lives, join'd the Confederacy, on condition of being assign'd merely to guard duty, &c. Out of the 11,000 not more than 2,500 came out; 500 of these were pitiable, helpless wretches -- the rest were in a condition to travel. There were often 60 dead bodies to be buried in the morning; the daily average would be about 40. The regular food was a meal of corn, the cob and husk ground together, and sometimes once a week a ration of sorghum molasses.  A diminutive ration of meat might possibly come once a month, not oftener....... In the stockade, containing the 11,000 men, there was a partial show of tents, (not enough for 2,000.) A large proportion of the men lived in holes in the ground, in the utmost wretchedness. Some froze to death, others had their hands and feet frozen. The rebel guards would occasionally, and on the least pretence, fire into the prison from mere demonism and wantonness. All the horrors that can be named, cruelty, starvation, lassitude, filth, vermin, despair, swift loss of self-respect, idiocy, insanity, and frequent murder, were there.......Stansbury has a wife and child living in Newbern -- has written to them from here -- is in the U. S. Light House employ still -- (had been home to Newbern to see his family, and on his return to light ship was captured in his boat.).......Has seen men brought there to Salisbury as hearty as you ever see in your life -- in a few weeks completely dead gone, much of it from thinking on their condition -- hope all gone.......Has himself a hard, sad, strangely expressive, deaden'd kind of look, as of one chill'd for years in the cold and dark, where his good manly nature had no room to exercise itself.

The Million Dead, too, summ'd up -- The Unknown.

The Dead in this War -- there they lie, strewing the fields and woods and valleys and battle-fields of the South -- Virginia, the Peninsula -- Malvern Hill and Fair Oaks -- the banks of the Chickahominy -- the terraces of Fredericksburgh -- Antietam bridge -- the grisly ravines of Manassas -- the bloody promenade of the Wilderness -- the varieties of the strayed dead, (the estimate of the War Department is 25,000 National soldiers kill'd in battle and never buried at all, 5,000 drown'd -- 15,000 inhumed strangers or on the march in haste, in hitherto unfound localities -- 2,000 graves cover'd by sand and mud, by Mississippi freshets, 3,000 carried away by caving-in of banks, &c.,) -- Gettysburgh, the West, Southwest -- Vicksburg -- Chattanooga -- the trenches of Petersburgh -- the numberless battles, camps, Hospitals everywhere pass'd away since that War, and its wholesale deaths, burials, graves. (They make indeed the true Memoranda of the War -- mute, subtle, immortal.) From ten years' rain and snow, in their seasons -- grass, clover, pine trees, orchards, forests -- from all the noiseless miracles of soil and sun and running streams -- how peaceful and how beautiful appear to-day even the Battle-Trenches, and the many hundred thousand Cemetery mounds! Even at Andersonville, to-day, innocence and a smile. (A late account says, 'The stockade has fallen to decay, is grown upon, and a season more will efface it entirely, except from our hearts and memories. The dead line, over which so many brave soldiers pass'd to the freedom of eternity rather than endure the misery of life, can only be traced here and there, for most of the old marks the last ten years have obliterated. The thirty-five wells, which the prisoners dug with cups and spoons, remain just as they were left. And the wonderful spring which was discover'd one morning, after a thunder storm, flowing down the hillside, still yields its sweet, pure water as freely now as then. The Cemetery, with its thirteen thousand graves, is on the slope of a beautiful hill. Over the quiet spot already trees give the cool shade which would have been so gratefully sought by the poor fellows whose lives were ended under the scorching sun.')

   And now, to thought of these -- on these graves of the dead of the War, as on an altar -- to memory of these, or North or South, I close and dedicate my book.