The Yankee rule in Norfolk.
The North is so engaged in howling over their prisoners in Richmond that they forget that Confederates sometimes get beyond their lines who have experienced their tender mercies in prison. We have had some conversation with a gentleman who has just been relieved from Fort Norfolk, where there are about 75 prisoners, including soldiers and citizens. He was in there for a month, and says that the fare is infinitely worse there than in the Confederate prisons. A small loaf of bread and two ounces of meat per day, is the allowance, with some slosh which appears under the various names of tea, coffee and soup. The citizens are charged with "gross offences" against the Yankee Government, which means acting as guerillas. Many of them never had a gun in their hands, and were arrested merely to gratify the cruelty of their captors. The citizens of Norfolk, before Beast Butler took command, were allowed to visit their friends in the prison every day, but now they can only go twice a week. The following is a copy of the order discharging a citizen prisoner from Fort Norfolk:Office of the Judge Advocate.
Department of Virginia and North Carolina,
Fortress Monroe, Va., Nov. 23, 1863.
Brig.-Gen. Barnes, Military Commandant Norfolk and Portsmouth:
I am directed by the Major-General Commanding to request that the following named persons now confined at Fort Norfolk, having refused to take the oath of allegiance, and being traitors to the Government, and suspected of gross offences against it, be at once transported across the lines, nor be permitted within them again, and that they, moreover, be informed that should they be either taken within the lines, or apprehended in practices or offences against the Government, they will be dealt with according to the strict rigor of the law.
Among the prisoners in Fort Norfolk are Nelson Gray, of the 5th Virginia cavalry; a Captain in the Confederate navy, who went down from Richmond into Matthews county shortly after Capt. John Y. Beall was taken prisoner, and was captured, with 11 men; Digges and Hudgins, formerly employed at the Navy-Yard in Richmond; Leander James, a citizen; and Dr. Baker. Among all the prisoners, but one had taken the oath, and that was a very old man named Daniels, an overseer for Mr. Tabb. Major Roy and a soldier named Read escaped from the fort a few days since by cutting through the top of the house in which they were confined. Every effort was made to catch them, and the order was to take them dead or alive, but they were not afterwards heard from. The negro enlisting is going on briskly in Norfolk. Offices have been opened along Main street, where white Yankee officers attend to the business. On "thanksgiving day" (Thursday last) they made a grand liberating raid into the surrounding country, bringing in negroes of both sexes and all ages. The men were put into the army, and the women were placed in a contraband camp near the city. Twelve citizen prisoners were released from the fort on the 23d ult., and sent by flag of truce to City Point.
