Chapter 35

A COMMUNITY WITHOUT GOVERNMENT--FORMATION OF THE REGULATORS--RAIDERS
ATTACK KEY BUT ARE BLUFFED OFF--ASSAULT OF THE REGULATORS ON THE RAIDERS
--DESPERATE BATTLE--OVERTHROW OF THE RAIDERS.

To fully appreciate the condition of affairs let it be remembered that we
were a community of twenty-five thousand boys and young men--none too
regardful of control at best--and now wholly destitute of government.
The Rebels never made the slightest attempt to maintain order in the
prison. Their whole energies were concentrated in preventing our escape.
So long as we staid inside the Stockade, they cared as little what we did
there as for the performances of savages in the interior of Africa.
I doubt if they would have interfered had one-half of us killed and eaten
the other half. They rather took a delight in such atrocities as came to
their notice. It was an ocular demonstration of the total depravity of
the Yankees.

Among ourselves there was no one in position to lay down law and enforce
it. Being all enlisted men we were on a dead level as far as rank was
concerned--the highest being only Sergeants, whose stripes carried no
weight of authority. The time of our stay was--it was hoped--too
transient to make it worth while bothering about organizing any form of
government. The great bulk of the boys were recent comers, who hoped
that in another week or so they would be out again. There were no fat
salaries to tempt any one to take upon himself the duty of ruling the
masses, and all were left to their own devices, to do good or evil,
according to their several bents, and as fear of consequences swayed
them. Each little squad of men was a law unto themselves, and made and
enforced their own regulations on their own territory. The administration
of justice was reduced to its simplest terms. If a fellow did wrong he
was pounded--if there was anybody capable of doing it. If not he went
free.

The almost unvarying success of the Raiders in--their forays gave the
general impression that they were invincible--that is, that not enough
men could be concentrated against them to whip them. Our ill-success in
the attack we made on them in April helped us to the same belief. If we
could not beat them then, we could not now, after we had been enfeebled
by months of starvation and disease. It seemed to us that the Plymouth
Pilgrims, whose organization was yet very strong, should undertake the
task; but, as is usually the case in this world, where we think somebody
else ought to undertake the performance of a disagreeable public duty,
they did not see it in the light that we wished them to. They
established guards around their squads, and helped beat off the Raiders
when their own territory was invaded, but this was all they