Andersonville, vol 4 | Page 4

SERGEANT LEROY L. KEY--HIS ADVENTURES SUBSEQUENT
TO THE EXECUTIONS-- HE GOES OUTSIDE AT
ANDERSONVILLE ON PAROLE--LABORS IN THE
COOK-HOUSE-- ATTEMPTS TO ESCAPE--IS RECAPTURED
AND TAKEN TO MACON--ESCAPES FROM THERE, BUT IS
COMPELLED TO RETURN--IS FINALLY EXCHANGED AT
SAVANNAH.

Leroy L. Key, the heroic Sergeant of Company M, Sixteenth Illinois
Cavalry, who organized and led the Regulators at Andersonville in
their successful conflict with and defeat of the Raiders, and who
presided at the execution of the six condemned men on the 11th of July,
furnishes, at the request of the author, the following story of his prison
career subsequent to that event:
On the 12th day of July, 1864, the day after the hanging of the six
Raiders, by the urgent request of my many friends (of whom you were
one), I sought and obtained from Wirz a parole for myself and the six
brave men who assisted as executioners of those desperados. It seemed
that you were all fearful that we might, after what had been done, be
assassinated if we remained in the Stockade; and that we might be
overpowered, perhaps, by the friends of the Raiders we had hanged, at
a time possibly, when you would not be on hand to give us assistance,
and thus lose our lives for rendering the help we did in getting rid of
the worst pestilence we had to contend with.
On obtaining my parole I was very careful to have it so arranged and
mutually understood, between Wirz and myself, that at any time that
my squad (meaning the survivors of my comrades, with whom I was
originally captured) was sent away from Andersonville, either to be
exchanged or to go to another prison, that I should be allowed to go
with them. This was agreed to, and so written in my parole which I
carried until it absolutely wore out. I took a position in the cook-house,
and the other boys either went to work there, or at the hospital or
grave-yard as occasion required. I worked here, and did the best I could
for the many starving wretches inside, in the way of preparing their
food, until the eighth day of September, at which time, if you
remember, quite a train load of men were removed, as many of us
thought, for the purpose of exchange; but, as we afterwards discovered,
to be taken to another prison. Among the crowd so removed was my
squad, or, at least, a portion of them, being my intimate mess-mates
while in the Stockade. As soon as I found this to be the case I waited on
Wirz at his office, and asked permission to go with them, which he
refused, stating that he was compelled to have men at the cookhouse to
cook for those in the Stockade until they were all gone or exchanged. I
reminded him of the condition in my parole, but this only had the effect
of making him mad, and he threatened me with the stocks if I did not

go back and resume work. I then and there made up my mind to
attempt my escape, considering that the parole had first been broken by
the man that granted it.
On inquiry after my return to the cook-house, I found four other boys
who were also planning an escape, and who were only too glad to get
me to join them and take charge of the affair. Our plans were well laid
and well executed, as the sequel will prove, and in this particular my
own experience in the endeavor to escape from Andersonville is not
entirely dissimilar from yours, though it had different results. I very
much regret that in the attempt I lost my penciled memorandum, in
which it was my habit to chronicle what went on around me daily, and
where I had the names of my brave comrades who made the effort to
escape with me. Unfortunately, I cannot now recall to memory the
name of one of them or remember to what commands they belonged.
I knew that our greatest risk was run in eluding the guards, and that in
the morning we should be compelled to cheat the blood-hounds. The
first we managed to do very well, not without many hairbreadth
escapes, however; but we did succeed in getting through both lines of
guards, and found ourselves in the densest pine forest I ever saw. We
traveled, as nearly as we could judge, due north all night until daylight.
From our fatigue and bruises, and the long hours that had elapsed since
8 o'clock, the time of our starting, we thought we had come not less
than twelve or fifteen miles. Imagine our surprise and mortification,
then, when we could plainly hear the reveille, and almost the Sergeant's
voice calling the