An indescribable sickening stench arose from these fermenting masses of human filth.
There were near five thousand seriously ill Federals in the Stockade and Confederate States Military Prison Hospital, and the deaths exceeded one hundred per day, and large numbers of the prisoners who were walking about, and who had not been entered upon the sick reports, were suffering from severe and incurable diarrhea, dysentery, and scurvy.

The sick were attended almost entirely by their fellow-prisoners, appointed as nurses, and as they received but little attention, they were compelled to exert themselves at all times to attend to the calls of nature, and hence they retained the power of moving about to within a comparatively short period of the close of life.

Owing to the slow progress of the diseases most prevalent, diarrhea, and chronic dysentery, the corpses were as a general rule emaciated.
I visited two thousand sick within the Stockade, lying under some long sheds which had been built at the northern portion for themselves.

At this time only one medical officer was in attendance, whereas at least twenty medical officers should have been employed.
Died in the Stockade from its organization, February 24, 186l to September 2l ....................................................3,254 Died in Hospital during same time ...............................6,225 Total deaths in Hospital and Stockade ...........................9,479 Scurvy, diarrhea, dysentery, and hospital gangrene were the prevailing diseases.

I was surprised to find but few cases of malarial fever, and no well-marked cases either of typhus or typhoid fever.