Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1863, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of York. то EDWIN M. STANTON, SECRETARY OF WAR, U. S. A. Sir,-Having considered for some time to whom it was most appropriate to dedicate a work describing the kidnapping of American freeman by arbitrary power, and their incarceration, without trial or the judgment of any court in Military Prisons, no one has occurred to my mind who has so well earned the unenviable distinction as yourself of having your name connected imperishably with the infamy of the acts of outrage, tyranny and despotism which the book, I hereby dedicate to you, will publish to the American People. You it was, sir, who after setting at liberty the victims immured in Forts Lafayette and McHenry by your predecessors in tyranny, Messrs. Cameron and Seward, and after causing the great heart of the People to leap with joy and swell with gratification at this, one of the first of your official acts, and exult in hope that by you, the Constitution of our country, violated and abrogated by your predecessors in infamy, would be restored-you it was, who, after thus exciting emotions in the American People that they should again be governed by the Constitution of their country and not by the will of a partisan, united in your person and committed by your acts the treacherous tyranny of Seward and the arbitrary des tinction of connecting your name with this work, not only the memory of the deeds which you have caused to be co but to be kept forever present in the American mind wh recurs in time to come to that period in American history Constitution of the United States was first abrogated, w Government of the Union was subverted, and when the r liberties of the American People were trampled like dus the feet of a person clothed in a little brief authorit is used to subvert and destroy that which it should prese tect and defend, and who uses as the heel of his despot Edwin M. Stanton. In this character which you have assumed towards the People be handed down in this work, and by your ey to posterity, and receive as your just reward the execrat maledictions of those present and future whom you have means of depriving of their inheritance of personal ri political liberty. I am, sir, one of the many hundred victims of the des the arbitrary power of which you have become the willin and pensioned tyrant. D. A. MA .... ....... Assumption of Arbitrary Power-Increase of the regular army by Proclamation--Extending the period of volunteer en- listments beyond the period prescribed by law .......... Other authorities and proofs to show that the rightful power is not in the President to suspend the privileges of the writ of Habeas Corpus, or to arrest a citizen otherwise than as pre- Conflict with Missouri-Capture of Camp Jackson-Massacre in St. Louis-Missouri driyen into rebellion......... Suppression of the Maryland Legislature-Arrest of the mem- Usurpation of Legislative powers by the President-Creation of a Judicial Tribunal with civil jurisdiction in New Or- ...... ...... ...... .... .... .... .... ...... ....... ...... .... ...... ...... .... ...... a fellow-prisoner-Introduction to and description of t Address of D. A. Mahony to the citizens of the Third Congre sional District, Iowa.... ............ .... .... ....... Effect of the Address on the tyrants and their satellites..... My Journal in the Old Capitol ..... ............ .... .... Incidents in the Old Capitol-How free citizens became trar formed into servile soldiers.... .... .... .... ........ ...... .... Application for trial-no trial granted..... ......... ...... .... .... .... ... Belle Boyd-Defeat of General Banks attributed to her strat gy—Arrested and taken to the Old Capitol-Subjected solitary confinement,-Makes the acquaintance of a Co federate officer-Romantic sequel ................ Murder of two prisoners in the Old Capitol-Jesse W. Whart and Harry Stewart ...... ........ ...... .... Arrest of sympathizing females, and their subjection to insu |