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JCHN E. ROBINSON.

N 20th of September, 1864, Mr. John E. Robinson, a resident of Philadelphia, was arrested on the streets of the city of Sandusky, Ohio, at which place he was then sojourning. He had been in bad health for some time previously, and in August, at the solicitation of his father, determined to make a tour of the Northern States. He had peen but a short time in Sandusky when his arrest took place. As he was returning from a funeral service, he was accosted by an officer with a squad of marines, from the United States gunboat Michigan, then lying in the offing of Sandusky Bay, a body of water about twenty miles long by five or six wide, making inland from Lake Erie. The officer, without further parlance, arrested and proceeded to convey him on board the gunboat.

To Mr. Robinson's inquiry as to the cause of his arrest, he was informed by the officer that he would be made acquainted with it on his arrival on the gunboat. He was hurried forward through the crowd toward the landing, whence he was taken on board the vessel and confined. The streets through which he passed were crowded with people, many of whom threatened him with personal violence. The cries from the crowd of "Hang him," "Bring a rope," "Lynch him," etc., added to personal abuse and maledictions, were calculated to appal the stoutest heart. When the prisoner arrived on board the gunboat, he was taken into the presence of the Captain, who, surrounded by his subordinate officers, closely questioned him. At the close of the examination he was told that he would be detained, and was consigned to a small state-room, where he was confined for five days. From the purport of the examvation, Mr. R. concluded that he

was arrested on suspicion of having been concerned in the "Lake Erie raid," although he was not openly charged with any offence. On the 25th, he was removed from the stateroom, and conveyed to Johnson's Island, once known as "the Beautiful Isle of the Lake," but more recently familiar to the world as the place where Confederate prisoners of war were confined. Here Mr. R. was placed in a tent, and guarded day and night by two sentinels, the one pacing in front, and the other in the rear of his tent. He was forbidden to converse with any person except the commanding officer or the officer of the day. Books and newspaper were denied him, and he was prohibited writing more than one page of common note-paper once a week. On the 29th, after four days of incarceration in the tent, he was taken to Cleveland, and placed among thieves, pickpockets, burglars, and negroes, in the County Jail. Here he remained until the 8th of October, when he was taken from the jail, handcuffed, and marched through the streets of Cleveland, and again transported to Johnson's Island, and assigned his old quarters in the tent. His food, although not good, was com paratively better than his bed. Accustomed to the luxury of a good bed, and all the surrounding comforts of home, and being in delicate health, he soon began to break down from the ill effects experienced from lying on the ground. He had no mattress, and but one old blanket, so narrow that it would not cover his entire person. This he used to lie upon, to protect his person from the damp ground. In his misery he many times begged for some straw or hay to lie upon, which was often promised him, and as often forgotten. The chilly winds admonished him of the approach of winter, and tended to increase the horrors of his situation. Alone, illy clad, sick, and in prison, without any direct charge having been preferred, without counsel, and denied a triɛi, 't seemed as if he had been taken there to perish.

While in 18 condition he was given a small sheet iron stove, such as are used in tents. To keep the tent comfort. able require him to keep the fire burning briskly. This

was possible during the day, but at "taps," he was compelled to let the fire go out, as the opening of the stove-door to put fuel on the fire, caused the light to flash out into the camp, which produced from the sentinel the peremptory order of "put out that fire." This order, of course, had to be obeyed, and during the remainder of the night the prisoner sat and shivered with cold, or walked a few steps backward and for ward in the tent, to keep up the circulation of his blood. This treatment continued until about the first of December, when a sort of shed was built. In this shed the prisoner was placed, but the change was far from mitigating his condition. The boards, green when worked, soon shrank from exposure to the sun and wind, until large crevices appeared on all sides.

The wind howled and moaned round this shed, and whistled as it came through the cracks, upon its unhappy occupant. The day on which Mr. R. was transferred from the tent to this shed was intensely cold, and the ground covered with about two feet of snow. In walking backward and forward through the snow, the prisoner's feet were badly frosted, the right one so badly, indeed, that the skin came off, thus incapacitating him from walking, and causing excruciating pain.

One incident is sufficient to show the character of the officers in charge of the Island, and their treatment of the prisoners. During his confinement in the tent, Colonel Hill, the Post Commandant, had occasion to leave the Island on business, and Lieutenant Colonel Palmer was left in temporary command. During the forenoon, Mr. R. succeeded in borrowing, from one of the soldiers, a book with which to while away the long, tedious hours of his imprisonment. By some means, Colonel P. became acquainted with the fact, and immediately came to the quarters and made search for it. As the prisoner had no place to hide it, the object of his official wrath was quickly found. Palmer, in a hasty and supercilious manner, demanded the name of the party who had lent him the book, aud on the prisoner's refusal to reveal it, ordered a sergeant to remove from the tent the stove, blan

ket (?) and candle, together with his pipe and tobacco, concluding this display of authority with a tirade of personal abuse, threatening Mr. R. with bread and water, if he did not divulge the name of the person from whom he had obtained the book. This threat was never carried into execution, Mr. R. escaping it by the magnanimity of the soldier, who, on learning how matters stood, gave himself up. Thereupon the articles removed were returned, and the man sent to the guard-house.

Time dragged wearily on until the 25th of January, 1865, when Mr. Robinson was again taken to Cleveland and placed in the jail. Here the food was poor. The rations for breakfast consisted of rye coffee and hard bread. Dinner and supper were merged into one meal, at which the prisoners were given a poor, thin soup, with a few pieces of tough, stringy beef, probably the offal. He was detained a prisoner at this place until the 3d of February, when he was again returned to Johnson's Island, which, in the language of Whittier, seemed

"The fittest earthly type of hell.”

Immediately on his arrival he was taken to his old quarters in the shed, and was much pleased to find them occupied by several gentlemen from the interior of the State of Ohio, who had been arrested and were detained on the charge of resisting the draft. They were genial, companionable gentlemen, and their association tended much to relieve the ennui of prison life. Here he remained undisturbed until the 12th of May, when, as on former occasions, he was taken out of his hut to be conveyed he knew not whither. Cleveland was again his destination. There he was confined about four weeks. The first week he was imprisoned in the County Jail, as on previous occasions.

It was now deemed a "military necessity" to separate him from the other prisoners, and consequently he was conveyed to the city lock-up, where the nights were made hideous by the profanity of drunken men, and the sickening, indecent language of the debased women, who were separated from

the men only by a narrow corridor and a flight of stairs, they being in the second tier of cells, the men occupying the rooms beneath them. The grated iron doors all opened on the same hall. Their food was given them in the manner of feeding swine, that is, a basket of dry bread was thrust through the wicket in the door, and it was at the option of the prisoners whether they ate it or not. The drinking water was obtained from a hydrant in the back part of the hall. The cell into which Mr. R. was thrust, contained nothing but a board fastened along the wall, like a bench, upon which it was intended that the prisoners should sleep. It was void of all bedding, and swarmed with vermin.

Disgusted with such debasing associations, Mr. R. entered complaint to the United States Provost Marshal at Cleveland, who, thereupon, caused him to be immediately removed to better apartments. He was then placed in the women's department of the County Jail, which was without an occupant, save a large, savage-looking gray cat, that prowled around at will. Watching the movements of this grimalkiu served to pass away many otherwise weary hours. In the same department in which the prisoner was then confined, a woman had committed suicide, about four weeks previously. The deed had been done by hanging herself to the grating under the skylight. This event was not calculated to furnish very pleasant thoughts during the hours of solitude. Three weeks were passed in this prison, when he was again transferred to Johnson's Island, and confined with the rebel prisoners of war, in what was known as the "BULL PEN."

Why he was removed from the Island to Cleveland, and thence back to the Island so often, is a fact that he is unable to account for, never having been informed of the cause. From his advent among the "Rebs," until his removal to Fort Lafayette, he was doomed to suffer the gnawing pangs of hunger. He was much surprised, on going to draw his rations, and that of his messmates-they being then in a mess at getting only a loaf of bread, weighing twenty-two ounces. and a piece of salt meat, eighteen ounces in weight,