Henry E Shepherd

Johnson Island Prison Henry E Shepherd

I WAS captured at Gettysburg on the fifth day of July, 1863. A bullet had passed through my right knee during the fierce engagement on Culp's Hill, July 3rd, and I fell into the hands of the Federal Army. By the 6th of July Lee had withdrawn from Pennsylvania, and, despite the serious nature of my wound, I was removed to the general hospital, Frederick City, Md. Here for, at least a month, I was under the charge of the regular army surgeons, at whose hands I received excellent and skillful treatment. For this I have ever been grateful. I recall, also, many kindnesses shown me by a number of Catholic Sisters of Frederick, whose special duty was the care of the sick and the wounded. On the 14th of August I was taken to Baltimore. Upon arriving, I was forced to march with a number of fellow prisoners from Camden Station to the office of the Provost Marshal, then situated at the Gilmor House, directly facing the Battle Monument. The weather was intensely hot, and my limb was bleeding from the still unhealed wound. After an exhausting delay, I was finally removed in an ambulance to the "West Hospital" at the end of Concord street, looking out upon Union Dock and the wharves at that time occupied by the Old Bay Line or Baltimore Steam Packet Company. The West Building was originally a warehouse intended for the storage of cotton, now transformed into a hospital by the Federal government. It had not a single element of adaptation for the purpose to which it was applied.