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Prisoners of War
1861-65
A Record of Personal Experiences, and a Study of the
Condition and Treatment of Prisoners on Both
Sides During the War of the Rebellion

By
Thomas Sturgis
Late 1st Lieut. 57th Regt., Mass, Vet. Vols., and Aide-de-Camp 3rd Brig., 1st Div. 9th A.C.

Reprinted from the Report of an Address Delivered Before the
N. Y. Commandery of the Military Order of the
Loyal Legion, Feb. 1 , 1911

Illustrated

G. P. Putnam's Sons
New York and London
Zbe Hcnickerbochet flJreas
1912

Copyright, igzz
BY
THOMAS STURGIS

Ube Untcftcrbocfeer press* IRevp Kovft

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE
Guard and Guard-house at Camp Morton Frontispiece
From the original photograph in possession of the Author
View inside the Prison at Camp Morton showing
the ample space for alr and exercise . ." 268
From the original photograph in possession of the Author
View inside the Prison at Camp Morton showing
the substantial and comfortable barracks . 272
From the original photograph in possession of the Author
View inside the Prison at Camp Morton showing
the Prisoners supplied with Blankets ". . 276
From the original photograph in possession of the Author
Libby Prison, Richmond, Va  280
From a photograph taken April 6, 1865
Garrison Flag of the Libby Prison .... 286
Photographed from the flag now in possession of Gen. Edw. H. Ripley
Facsimile of the Cover of the Libby Prison Order
Book ......... 290
Photographed from the original
Facsimile ofthe Letter of Col. Robert Ould, C. S. A.,
and the Key of Libby Prison .... 292
From original photographs. The Key is in the possession of Gen.
Edw. H. Ripley

iv ILLUSTRATIONS
Sample of Coal loaded with Dynamite . . . 296
From the original photograph in possession of the Author
The Interior of Danville Prison .... 304
From a drawing by Henry Vander Weyde

PRISONERS OF WAR.
Read before the New York Commandery
by Companion Lieut. Thomas Sturgis, February i, 1911.

PRISONERS OF WAR.
Read before the New York Commandery
by Companion Lieut. Thomas Sturgis, February i, 1911.
Commander and Companions of the New York Commandery
Loyal Legion:
OUR Commander has asked me to address you on the
subject of "Prisoners of War." Remembering my
youth at the time of the War of the Rebellion, and
the modest rank I attained as a soldier, I should hesitate to
obtrude my experiences in the presence of the many older
officers of high rank and distinguished service who sit
around us, were it not for the fact that my army life in
cluded a duality of events connected with the topic of the
evening, which taken together form, if not a unique, at least
an unusual combination.
In 1864, the regiment of which I was adjutant was
placed on guard over Camp Morton near Indianapolis,
Indiana, then one of the largest prisons for rebels in the
North, and in the winter of 1865 I was made a prisoner at
the battle of Fort Stedman in front of Petersburg, Virginia,
and was confined in the well-known Libby Prison at Rich
mond. I thus had the opportunity of seeing at first hand
both sides of this much mooted question, the treatment of
prisoners. The facts as I saw and experienced them, and
the conclusions I reached, I shall try to give you.
I listened with great interest to the addresses on this
subject delivered to us last December, to Companion Read's
eloquent tribute to our martyred comrades, and to Compan-
266

prisoners of war 267
ion Putnam's humorous and pathetic story. But I confess
to a depression of spirit as I listened. When Read selected
Camp Morton as his illustration of Northern prisons, and
quoted its statistics from the records (though not as a
personal experience), and when Putnam landed at Libby
Prison, I felt that what I had to offer had been in some degree
anticipated. You will understand why when you recall
that my only apology for accepting our Commander's
suggestion that I should prepare a paper on "Prisoners of
War" was the fact, previously stated, that I had seen and
known both sides of prison life, coupled with which was the
further fact that my recollections centred around the two
prisons already described. Yet as there is always some
interest in a personal experience, I trust you will bear with
fortitude any repetition that may appear in my accounts
of Camp Morton and the Libby and follow me into the wider1
field which I have tried to analyze and illustrate.
Both the earlier speakers disavowed the intention of
oing deeper into the question than a recital of the suffering
of themselves and comrades, but I think the occasion is
fitting for an unimpassioned and judicial review of the facts
as they tend to show the attitude of the Southern people1
upon this question, and the intent, purpose, and policy of
their leaders as shown by the Confederate records now in
our possession. I speak in no spirit of present animosity.
I do not seek to place upon present generations responsi
bility for the acts of their fathers. Edmund Burke said:
"I should not know how to draw an indictment against an
entire people, " and I do not intend to do so, nor is it needed
here. But we helped to make history. We are the living
witnesses. We are rapidly passing away from this scene,
and it is fitting, in the interest of history, in justice to the
way our people conducted the war, and to the contrast pre
sented by the actions of our antagonists, that we should
leave our testimony before we go.
At that time Indianapolis was a crude Western town,
giving little promise of its present importance, except to the
far-seeing ones who appreciated its value as a railroad junc-

268 prisoners of war
tion. The country was as level as a table, the streams
flowed sluggishly with hardly fall enough to move their
waters; the streets were wide, unpaved, and dusty, and the
buildings of wood, low and insignificant. The soil was rich
with Nature's centuries of fertilization, and the timber of
white oak, walnut, and beech was magnificent. Even then,
before conservation had become a "progressive" gospel,
it seemed shocking to my Yankee sense of thrift to see our
men felling and splitting this grand timber for firewood.
In 1864, Indianapolis was a Hve wire. Vallandigham
was openly making vehement treasonable speeches in the
adjoining State of Ohio. He had organized two secret
orders of very militant Southern sympathizers, with a large
membership in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Missouri. Ken
tucky was debatable ground overrun alternately by both
armies. The plan of making a military movement north
ward in force through Ohio and Indiana to free the rebel
prisoners at Camp Johnson, Ohio, and Camp Morton,
Indiana, was long cherished by the Confederacy. These
secret orders were called the "Knights of the Golden Circle "
and the "American Knights," and the former had their
headquarters and were in great force in Indianapolis. Oliver
P. Morton, the famous war governor, was in office, and Gen
eral Alvin P. Hovey was in command of our troops. Under
him Brigadier General Henry B. Carrington commanded the
recruiting and draft (or conscript) camp, named for him, and
General A. A. Stevens commanded Camp Morton, the rebel
prison adjoining. Carrington became well-known subse
quently when, as Colonel of the 18th Regular Infantry, he
commanded at the time of the "Fetterman Massacre" by
the Sioux Indians in Wyoming in 1866. Stevens was an
invalid though still doing duty.
We had relieved an active regiment upon our arrival and
found that the only troops remaining were part of a regiment
of men who had been incapacitated for active service by
wounds or disease and were organized for guard and garrison
duty. The Government had designated the troops of this
character as the "Invalid Corps," and they wore the insignia

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prisoners of war 269
"I. C." on the light blue uniforms that distinguished them
from active service regiments. These letters are those
placed by our government quartermasters upon useless
animals and property and mean simply "inspected and
condemned." The rebels soon got hold of the identity of
lettering and promptly christened our Invalid Corps "Con
demned Yanks." The epithet was used so publicly and
offensively that these gallant veterans resented the stigma,
and the Government changed the title to " VeteranReserves,"
by which they were afterward known. Upon the departure
of our predecessors my regiment was placed on guard over
the prison, and I was detailed as post-adjutant.
Camp Morton was originally established for the custody
of wounded prisoners, but was later used for all classes of
enlisted men. Its site had a slightly rolling surface, as well
selected as the topography of the country permitted.
Colonel Hoffman, Commissary-General of Prisoners at
Washington, reported of it on April, 23, 1863: "It is a very
favorable place for a prison, but occupies a large area. It
has a stream of water running through it, and many shade
trees standing." It was enclosed by a wooden stockade.
Surrounding this on the outside, and at a suitable level to
enable them to watch the interior, was the platform upon
which the guards were stationed. Inside the stockade,
and about twenty feet from it, was a low fence which the
prisoners were forbidden to cross, as doing so would have
brought them to the foot of the wall. This was not difficult
to scale by active men using either a rude ladder or a long
plank torn from their barracks. Such attempts were made
several times during our stay. They were made at night
and by a small number of men, probably not over a dozen
at a time. In at least one case the outbreak was successful.
The wall was scaled, the guard overpowered, and several
men escaped. The surrounding country was well timbered,
and the occupants of the small farms were, without excep
tion, sympathizers with the rebel cause. Concealment and
subsequent escape across the Ohio River were therefore easy.
We never used bloodhounds to track fugitives as was done

270 prisoners of war
in the South, and in the midst of a population friendly to
them the fugitives could not have been identified. Our
men escaping from Southern prisons picked their way at
night for weeks together through a hostile country where
every man and woman was an enemy, except possibly some
timid negro. Swamps were their beds and raw corn and
berries their food. The prisoners escaping from Camp
Morton found food, clothing, shelter, and sympathy at every
farm they approached. I have spoken of the inner fence
which the prisoners could not cross. There was no need
of their crossing it, as will appear later, for their necessities
were otherwise cared for, but it was not a "dead line" in
the sense commonly used. In these instances where deter
mined attempts to break out were made, the guards of
course used their guns, but I do not recall an instance at
Camp Morton where a prisoner was shot, in cold blood,
for a real or fancied infringement of this rule. The records
of the adjutant-general's office show several such cases as
having occurred at other prison camps in the North, per
haps a half dozen in all. Each was made a matter of close
inquiry by a duly appointed Board, and in each instance the
act of the soldier was found justified by the orders he had
received. It is clearly estabhshed that there was no desire
on the part of our men anywhere or at any time wantonly to
take a prisoner's life. That the reverse was often the case
in the Southern prisons is unfortunately well attested, but
these facts and the feeling that led to them will be given and
analyzed farther on.
Within the enclosure wooden barracks had been erected
for the prisoners. They were substantial buildings from ioo
to 1 20 feet long by 20 wide, fully enclosed on the sides, and
well roofed. There were two places devoted to sinks. Both
were wooden buildings, one of them a large structure in
the centre of the camp, and both had seats for the use of the
men. By filling in with earth, and at intervals changing the
location, a good degree of decency and an approach to
hygienic conditions were preserved, but the large number
of men confined, in my time about 7000, and the constant

prisoners of war

271

use of various parts of the enclosure for this purpose for a
year, undoubtedly infiltrated the ground with an amount
of poisonous matter dangerous to health. These conditions,
which prevailed to a greater or less degree in the other
Northern prison camps, were fully recognized by the authori
ties. The records show that these prisons were frequently
and minutely inspected by officers under orders of the
Commissary General of Prisons at Washington, and that
everything was done to minimize any unsanitary conditions.
The only radical cure, removal of the entire prison to a new
location, was impossible, but the enclosure was much
enlarged in 1864. What could be done to mitigate trouble
was done. The hospital accommodations, which from the
outset had been fair, were extended, ample medical supplies
were kept on hand, the barracks were kept as cleanly as
possible, sufficient clothing was supplied, and the food,
which was regularly and frequently inspected, was of good
quality and ample in amount. Under standing orders from
Washington the daily ration was as follows:

Hard bread

per

man

14 ounces

or

Soft bread
11
11
16 "
or
Corn meal
11
<i
16 ounces
Fresh beef
11
11
14 "
or
Pork or bacon
<i
11
10 "
Beans
per
100 men
6 quarts
or
RiceSugar
Coffee, ground
or raw
<i
11
11 11
<i
111111
1111
i« 11
8 pounds
12 "
5 "
7 "
or
Tea
SoapSalt
Vinegar
11 ii
11
11
1111
<i
ii
¦<
1111
11
1 pound
4 pounds
2 quarts
3 "
272 prisoners of war
Molasses per ioo men i quart
Potatoes 15 pounds
During the summer of 1864, it was ordered that sugar, coffee,
and tea should be issued only to the sick and wounded, the
amounts remaining the same. The unused part of all
rations was sold and from it was formed a "prison fund."
This was applied to the purchase of green vegetables and
other articles conducive to the health of the prisoners, and
was administered with scrupulous fidelity.
On August 6, 1864, C. T. Alexander, Surgeon, U. S. A.,
reported to the Commissary-General of Prisons that the
"prison fund" at Camp Morton was $36,215.52; that it was
well managed; that the individual accounts of prisoners
were satisfactory to them; that the prisoners fully under
stood their privileges and traded with the sutler by cheques.
The ration above described is identical with that then pre
scribed by law for the United States soldier. It was ample
in amount and sufficiently varied in character to keep men
in sound physical condition, but also, on account of the un
usually large saving, due to the fact that these men consumed
much less than men in active service, it permitted the
purchase through the "prison fund" of many varieties of
food and delicacies particularly useful and welcome to the
sick and wounded.
At the time of which I write the cooking at Camp Morton
was done by my details. We baked daily from 5000 to 7000
loaves, about six inches cube, of good white bread, which
gave to each prisoner a loaf, appetizing and healthful. Our
own men were then drawing only hard tack as an equiva
lent. On their arrival the prisoners were given necessary
clothing and blankets. Each man received one of the latter,
and as two usually bunked together, they joined forces.
As the cold weather of the autumn approached we made
a further issue of a blanket apiece, and some of the men
fashioned the old ones into capes or cloaks, and the sight of
a sturdy Confederate strolling about with Uncle Sam's
U. S. branded between his shoulders was not uncommon.

prisoners of war 273
As before stated, the distressing but unavoidable feature of
all such prisons, idleness, with its accompanying nostalgia
and depression, was present of course. To relieve this in
some degree the prisoners practised many small trades, of
which I recall especially jewelry making and carving. Bone
and rubber or gutta-percha coat buttons and small silver
coins, dimes, and quarters, were supplied by our men, and
from these were made rings, shirt studs, collar buttons,
sleeve links, and Masonic and Odd Fellows insignia, very
neatly finished, with the designs set in silver. These
trinkets found a ready market among our men, or were sold
by them in town and the proceeds faithfully turned over to
the manufacturer.
One distressing feature of all the Southern prisons was
happily lacking here. The area enclosed afforded room for
the inhabitants. This is shown by the fact that at night
when the men were in barracks the grounds were empty, and
in the day time the men could stroll about with ample room
for air, exercise, and health. The terrible contrast to this
afforded by Southern prison conditions will appear when we
reach the reverse of the picture.
As official corroboration of the foregoing account given
from memory of the conditions at Camp Morton, I quote
briefly from the following documents.
On March 23, 1863, Capt. H. W. Freedley, 3d Regt.,
U. S. Infantry, reported to Colonel Wm. Hoffman, Com
missary-General of Prisons, Washington, as follows :
" Camp Morton contains accommodations for a large number
of prisoners. They are well provided with quarters and fuel
and have ample space for exercise. All are well provided for;
every care has been taken of the wounded and all appear as
cheerful and happy as could be expected of men in their cir
cumstances. The policing of the camp is good and space allotted
to prisoners for exercise kept neat and clean. The barracks
are in good order, floors cleanly scoured and swept, bedding well
aired and clean. They indulge in games of amusement and
exhibit life and activity. The ration was found to be good and
wholesome in all its parts."
18

274 PRISONERS of war
On August 28, 1864, Lieutenant J. W. Davidson, Veteran
Reserve Corps, Inspector of Camps, reported through
Colonel Stevens to Captain Harz, Asst. Adjutant-General,
Washington: "The kitchens are in good condition and kept clean. The
grounds undergo a thorough policing each day. Drainage as
perfect as locality will permit. The prisoners will require the
following to make them comfortable for winter, viz. : 530 woollen
blankets, 835 pair trousers, 1250 pair shoes, 850 shirts, 350 coats.
Rations furnished daily in compliance with circular order,
(already quoted). Rations of soap large, but not more than
required. "
The records show that these supplies were furnished within
two months.
On September 4, 1864, the same officer reports:
" Sanitary condition good. Rations issued as per circular, and
antiscorbutics, potatoes, and onions three times a week. "
Further reporting, October 16th, he says:
"General health of prisoners greatly benefited by thorough
policing and exercising. Clothing and bedding have been issued
to all destitute men. Potatoes issued every day at rate of eight
ounces per man. "
I close with his report of November 6th, when my regi
ment was ordered away:
"Conduct: prisoners quiet; no attempts to escape. Clean
liness, clothing, bedding all good. Quarters good, thoroughly
policed daily. Kitchen good. Food first-class. Quantity
sufficient. Water sufficient and good. Sinks sufficient and
kept thoroughly clean. Drainage complete. Police of hospital
thorough. Attendance of sick good. Hospital diet first-class.
General health of prisoners good."
Let us glance briefly at other Northern prisons. The

prisoners of war 275
report of Surgeon A. M. Clark, Medical Inspector of Prisoners
of War, dated April 8, 1864, and applying to the prison at
Rock Island, 111., gives a fair idea of conditions existing
at all the Northern prisons named below. From this I
abstract as follows:
"Barracks well warmed by stoves. Cooking done by detail.
Kitchens and utensils generally clean and in good order. Rations
sufficient in quantity and of good quality. All prisoners (6950)
well supplied with blankets, and in general well clothed. Polic
ing of barracks and grounds not satisfactory, must be im
proved. Drainage ordered but not completed. Sinks well
arranged. Laundry. Caldrons provided but not enough used by
prisoners. Hospital — 560 beds — 17 surgeons."
Lieutenant-Colonel S. Eastman, U. S. A., command
ing depot, reports as follows regarding the Elmira (N. Y.)
prison May 23, 1864:
"The barracks will comfortably accommodate 4000 prisoners
without crowding; buildings in excellent condition, well ventila
ted; Mess room will seat 1200 to 1500. Kitchen can cook daily
for 5000; excellent bakery; daily capacity 6000 rations."
Colonel B. J. Sweet, 8th Reg. Veteran Reserve Corps,
commanding post, reports as follows regarding Camp
Douglas, rebel prison near Chicago, on June 1, 1864:
" The grounds of Camp Douglas are thoroughly policed and
drained. Barracks arranged on streets fifty feet wide, twenty-five
feet between ends; whitewashed inside and out and raised four
feet above ground. The present thirty-two barracks, each ninety
feet long, will hold comfortably 165 men each. Recommends
thirty-nine more barracks giving capacity for 12,000 prisoners at a
cost of $19,000."
Certainly our Government dealt with its prisoners with
conscientious regard for hfe, and in no niggardly spirit.
In lighter vein let these extracts made by D. B. Tiffany,
U. S. Prison Provost Marshall, from the letters of rebel

276 prisoners of war
prisoners at Camp Chase, Ohio, to their friends in the South
speak for themselves:
"I want nothing; I have everything that heart could
wish except my freedom. I am doing well and living fine
and fat." — Jonathan Musgrave (Virginia).
"We get plenty to eat and are treated very well by the
officers." — W. A. Womack (Kentucky).
" Bill of fare at the Virginia House, Christmas day: Bean
soup, hog and corn, pork and hominy, roast beef, turkey,
duck, chicken, oysters, apple dumplings, cakes, peach pie," —
M. E. Russell and Ed. (Virginia).
" We have nothing to do but eat and sleep. We have
plenty to eat and to drink, and a very good bed. We have no
reason to complain." — John A. Carson (Virginia).
' ' We are doing very well. The officers are very pleasant,
and agreeable men about the prison." — F. P. M. Estis
(Missouri). "I received a letter from you dated the 18th of this
month. You express a great deal of uneasiness about my
sufferings here. I have a good husk mattress, a parcel of
cotton comforts, and two pillows, so I can sleep quite com
fortably. The good Being has blest me in my afflictions."
— D. D. Davidson (Virginia).
From Post Hospital, Cape Girardeau (Missouri) comes
this: "Col. J. O. Shelby, C. S. A., Commanding Mo. Cavalry
Division. Colonel, We, the wounded officers of your brigade,
take pleasure in testifying that our treatment by the Fed
eral authorities here has been kind, gentlemanly, generous,
and disinterested. All our wants have been supplied, and
our wishes gratified, and General McNeil and officers have
shown by constant and repeated kindnesses that they have
no enmity beyond the hot blood and the excitement of the
battlefield, and that Confederate prisoners deserve and do
receive every attention which courtesy requires. Three
of us at present are unable to be moved." — Y. H. Blackwell
(Major), H. M. Woodsmall (Capt.), W. H. Ferrill (Lieut.),
J. N. Edwards (Adjt.)
In this connection I wish to call attention to the fact that

prisoners of war 277
the above official reports, with one exception, which is
necessary to complete the sequence, relate to and treat of the
conditions existing during the spring, summer, and autumn of
1864. This period is selected for several reasons. It was
the year during which the greatest accumulation of pris
oners occurred on both sides, and it was the year when the
greatest mortality occurred in the Southern prisons, and
when the inhumanity and barbarity of the treatment of our
men by the rebel authorities reached its maximum. The
comparison therefore, which is made between conditions in the
two sections, evidenced by the above reports and by those
from Confederate sources given later on, must be recognized
by every one as eminently fair. No attempt has been made
to select a period of the best Northern conditions and con
trast it with the worst Southern period. In 1864 the war
had been in progress for three years. Sectional animosity
was at its height. No truce or settlement was contemplated
by any one other than might come from the exhaustion of
one belligerent or the other, and the consequent abandon
ment of the conflict. All the embittering elements that
entered into and exasperated the feelings upon either side to
the highest pitch had done their work. The forts and arsen
als of the Government had been seized by the rebels, and
hundreds of army officers had foresworn their allegiance to
the United States and had joined the Rebellion. The slaves
had been freed and armed as soldiers. Their death, and that
of their officers in case of capture, had been proclaimed, and
was being generally practised. Exchanges upon equal
terms had been refused and had ceased. The sufferings of
Union soldiers in Southern prisons and the frightful mor
tality there were known at the North and testified to abun
dantly by the appearance and the words of those who
returned alive. The time selected is, therefore, in all respects
the fittest for comparison. The people of either side felt the
wrongs they believed inflicted upon them with an intensity
far greater than existed earlier in the war, before the loss
of kindred, friends, and property had been felt at every
fireside, North and South, and had converted the impulses

278 PRISONERS of war
of loyalty to country, state, or party into that concen
trated, deadly purpose which accompanies a struggle for
the "survival of the fittest. " If, under these circumstances,
we find one combatant increasing and elaborating its care
for the prisoners' wants, and its tenderness for the sick and
wounded, and find the other, confessedly and "with malice
aforethought," maintaining and intensifying conditions of
suffering, exposure and starvation, which it was in its power
to remedy, or at least to alleviate; intensifying them until
brutality merged into inhumanity and neglect became crime ;
if, I say, we find this to have been the case, we have a fair
measure of the spirit that actuated each of the contending
parties. To draw that comparison without extenuation
and also without malice, to present the true picture without
deepening the shadows or heightening the sunlight, is the
object sought by me in quoting the official reports just given
and those from Confederate sources which will follow.1
In concluding these sketches of prison camps in the
Union States I wish to make clear one salient point. From
it arose the chief, though not the only, cause of the appalling
difference between the treatment of prisoners in the North
and of those in the South. Our men did not regard their
prisoners as enemies. No inherited or imbibed enmity, no
deep-seated grudge, no hatred because of the locality from
which they came, nor any trace of it, existed in their minds or
hearts toward their rebel prisoners. The ideas and concep
tions of our army deliberately and persistently taught to the
Southern soldiers by the rebel leaders and press, which found
expression in the thousands of printed records of the war,
the scornful contempt as toward an inferior race, the imputa
tion of innate inhumanity and love of cruelty, joined with
cowardice, formed no part of the creed of our men. The
latter felt that their antagonists were brave men who had
fought fairly and gallantly and were prisoners by the fortune
of war. Abusive language or abusive treatment of them did
not enter into the code of the Union soldier. In their
rough way they were sorry for the prisoner and wanted his
1 On this important subject, see note, page 326.

prisoners of war 279
needs supplied, from clothing to tobacco, and were ready to
contribute from their own stores. How this compares with
the feeling that met them when the situation was reversed,
our story will tell. It is worth noting here that our Govern
ment did not swerve from its humane policy for purposes of
general retaliation. Special instances there were when the
acts of the rebel authorities, such as the killing of the white
officers of colored regiments in cold blood after surrender,
the confining of them in dark and wet dungeons below ground,
heavily manacled, and on a scanty diet of raw meal and
water, and the placing of them in shackles under the fire of
guns, necessitated similar action by us to compel redress and
save the lives of our men, but these were exceptional. When
the statements of our released soldiers, corroborated by their
emaciated and pitiful condition, convinced our officers
charged with the exchanges, that great cruelty was being
practised by the Confederate authorities, Mr. Lincoln was
repeatedly urged by officials and officers of high rank to
treat all rebel prisoners as our men were being treated. But
this he steadily declined to do, saying that he would observe
the usages of civilized warfare whatever our antagonists
might do.
And this was also the attitude of Congress. Those prison
ers who, after exchange, appeared before the United States
Senate Committee on Prisoners of War, were asked what was
best to be done to secure good treatment for our captive
soldiers in the South. The ready answer was, "Retaliation
in kind." But the chairman, bluff Senator Ben Wade,
truly said that no government could stand the odium of such
an act; that it would become accursed of God and man and
would perish from the earth.
The facts I have given are intended to establish the
humane purpose and acts of our Government toward its
prisoners, but I do not wish to convey the idea that the
utmost effort can do more than minimize the sad condition
of all prisoners of war. The hardships that have preceded,
and the wounds and sickness often existing at the time of
capture, form predisposing causes to which must be added

280 prisoners of war
nostalgia, or homesickness, constantly mentioned in our
surgeons' reports as an active evil. When you add to this
the lack of regularly enforced exercise, and the ignorance or
recklessness as to personal cleanliness and hygiene of the
average rebel prisoners, you have bad conditions to face.
In confirmation of my analysis of the attitude of the
Union soldier toward his antagonists, I give one illustration
(space will not permit more) taken, like most of my quota
tions, from Confederate records. Writing from Lee Hospi
tal, Columbus, Ga., May io, 1864, Surgeon-in-Charge Wm.
A. Robertson, C. S. A., addresses Hon. J. P. Benjamin,
Secretary of State, C. S. A. :
"I notice among the captives General T. Seymour, U. S. A.,
and think it my duty to inform the Government of his conduct
toward the wounded, taken prisoners at the battle of Sharpsburg
(Antietam), September, 1862. I was brigade surgeon and was
left in charge of 1 17 wounded. We were very destitute, but were
visited on the next day by General Seymour. He immediately
ordered the chief surgeon of his division to turn over to me any
and all articles in his possession that I might need for our wounded.
During our stay he visited the hospital daily , and whenever
any men were pointed out by me as needing a change, he visited
General McClellan in person and procured paroles for them to
visit Baltimore until exchanged. He supplied those dangerously
wounded with delicacies from his own table and a sufficiency of
tobacco for all, thereby mitigating the sufferings of our wounded
and exhibiting a most commendable spirit. I refer for further
evidence to Captain Harper, Lieutenant Knox, and Surgeon
Davis, 7th Louisiana, to Surgeon Aiken, 15th Alabama, and
Brigade Surgeon Howard."
It is a sad commentary on this that on June 1, 1864, less
than one month later we find an official recommendation
made by Ribly, Assistant Adjutant-General, C. S. A., to
the Secretary of War, "that General Seymour (on account
of his rank) and fifty others be confined under the enemy's
fire in the city of Charleston. " Of his own prison experi
ence General Seymour writes, August 10, 1864, to Colonel
Hoffman, U. S. A., Commissary of Prisoners:

J-+

PRISONERS OF WAR 28 1
"To us who have personally experienced the attentions of
Southern jailers, the subject is one of bitter remembrance. For
our rebel prisoners we construct elegant accommodations and
admit luxuries, while our people rot with dirt and scurvy. At
Andersonville, the scene would disgrace a race of cannibal
barbarians. Scores die daily from sheer neglect and with less
care than a rotten sheep would receive from a brutal owner. . . .
I have written fully for the benefit of the thousands who will
starve and die in Southern bondage. Had you, like us, been
locked in felon cells, and been treated, like us, as outlaws and
felons, or worse, there would be no need to pray you to show
them (rebel prisoners) [the same treatment, and this in pure
mercy toward those (our men) still in their hands. "
As it has been often and falsely stated that the deaths in
our prisons closely approximated those of Belle Isle, Ander
sonville, and Salisbury, I give here an extract from the report
of Charles J. Kipp, Surgeon-in-Charge, dated Camp Morton,
July 30, 1864. He reports that in the preceding twelve
months 558 deaths had occurred from all causes and adds:
" Most of the diseases show malarial poisoning, and are com
plicated with nostalgia, scurvy, bronchitis, pneumonia, and dys
entery. The malarial character of Central Indiana then and
now is well known, our regimental sick list was large, and for
the reason above given the prisoners undoubtedly felt its effects
in a greater degree."
Similarly on June 12, 1864, Major E. A. Scoville 128th
Ohio, Superintendent of the Prisons, Johnson's Island, Ohio:
' ' The sanitary condition of prisoners is good. Whole number
of prisoners 2145; number in hospital 34; deaths last week none."
When, however, we compare these records, covering an
average prison population of 6000 to 7000 men in a prison,' —
perhaps the most sickly one in the North by reason of its
location in a miasmatic region with rich alluvial soil, — re
grettable as they are, with the wagon loads of dead approxi
mating one hundred corpses a day (by Confederate official
reports) hauled out of the Andersonville stockade at this

282 PRISONERS OF WAR
same period (15,000 during 1864 alone), words are not needed
to emphasize the mendacity and the absurdity of any attempt
by Southern or sympathetic Northern writers to claim or
establish a similarity of treatment or any approximation of
numerical equality in the death record.
Nor were these striking contrasts and wide dissimilarity
in death-rates confined to the stockade or open air-camps.
One citation is sufficient, and it is taken from the Richmond
prisons, a locality where, it being the seat of the Confederate
Government, the best medical ability and the largest amount
and variety of medical supplies were concentrated. On
April 1, 1864, Surgeon G. Wm. Semple, C. S. A., rendered to
the Surgeon-General, C. S. A., his "quarterly report of
General Hospital No. 21 — for Federal prisoners at Richmond
Va." He states:
"Total cases for three months, 2779; total deaths same
period, 1396, fifty per cent." It follows that the death-rate
was two hundred per cent, per annum of the number of
men that the hospital could contain at any one time.
Further comment is unnecessary.
In his Reminiscences of the Civil War, Gen. John B.
Gordon, of the Confederate service, describes his plan for
an attack on Grant's lines in front of Petersburg during
March, 1865. This plan, which was approved by Lee,
contemplated the capture of Fort Stedman in our main line,
the turning of our flank, a rush to City Point, only ten miles
distant, and the capture of the vast quantity of supplies
there, on land and on the transports, and as a sequence, the
creation of such confusion among our troops as would
enable Lee safely to evacuate Petersburg. While this plan
was being matured by our antagonists, an incident occurred
on our side to which was due in large measure the temporary
success of their attack when it was made later on. Deser
tions from the rebel army were very numerous at this time,
and at least fifty men came in to our lines nightly, along the
front of our division. This steady depletion of their fighting
strength was valuable to us, and General Grant conceived
the idea of increasing it and at the same time diminish-

PRISONERS OF WAR 283
ing their supply of guns by offering additional inducements.
He, therefore, had printed a large number of leaflets in which
the rebel soldiers were told that if when deserting to our lines,
they brought in their guns, they would be paid a fair value
for them and upon reaching City Point would be transported
without charge to New York, or any seaboard city in the
North. Accompanying these leaflets were orders to distri
bute them among our pickets with instructions to get the
papers into the hands of the rebel pickets by any convenient
means. These orders came to us under the written author
ity of Colonel T. S. Bowers, Assistant Adjutant-General on
General Grant's staff at City Point. I well remember the
substance of the comment made by General McLaughlen,
upon whose staff I was serving as aide-de-camp, when he re
ceived these unusual orders. He was an officer of the old
school and a thorough soldier. He had been with Kearny
and the Second Dragoons in Mexico, in 1848, and his lan
guage was not always tempered for a drawing-room. Turning
to me he said : " Lieutenant, by God, sir, that is the first time
in my life, from sergeant-major to brigadier, that I was ever
ordered to let an enemy approach my post with a gun in his
hand!" Those leaflets, no doubt, suggested to Gordon a
justifiable ruse, and when, later on, he made his attack, his
men approached our pickets calling out, "Don't shoot, we 're
coming in!" It was the dark hour before dawn, and they
took our picket line practically without firing a shot. The
distance between the lines was very short, not over a hundred
yards, and in the daytime not a head could be shown on
either side without bringing a shot.
This is well illustrated by another extract from Gordon's
Memoirs, which richly deserves quotation also as showing
the truth of what I have asserted regarding our men.
Gordon says that he had standing by him on top of their
works a single soldier with his musket, who was to fire the
attacking signal.
" My men in cutting away our own cheveaux defrise to allow
the column passage were heard by a Union picket, who was on

284 PRISONERS OF WAR .
guard a few rods from me. ' What are you doing, Johnny?
Answer quick or I '11 shoot,' came the challenge. ' Never mind,
Yank,' was the answer, ' lie down and go to sleep; we are just
gathering a little corn' — [there were some stalks between the lines] ;
'you know rations are mighty short here.' To which the Union
picket promptly replied : 'All right, Johnny, go ahead and get your
corn, I '11 not shoot at you while you 're drawing your rations.' "
Let me give the end of the little story; again I quote the
rebel general:
"I ordered the private to fire the signal. He hesitated.
His conscience seemed to get hold of him. He was going into
a fearful charge with the lie on his lips which had thrown the
Union picket off his guard. He felt it was not fair to take ad
vantage of the soldierly sympathy of his foe, and when I again
ordered: 'Fire your gun, sir,' he shouted, 'Hello, Yank! Wake
up, we are going to shell! Look out, we are coming!' and with
that fired the shot that launched the attack. "
Here, Companions, is that ' ' touch of Nature which makes
the whole world kin." We ought not to miss such incidents,
for they stand out against the dark background of war's
brutality as stars peep through the breaks in the black
clouds of a stormy night.
In an article entitled Glimpses of the Confederate Army,
by Randolph H. McKim, pubhshed in the April number of
Review of Reviews, the writer narrates the following incident
referring to General Gordon's attack above described:
"When the order to advance was given, a big Texan stepped
out and said: 'General Gordon, this column can't move before
1 a.m. The men have a truce with the Yanks, and it ain 't up
till one o'clock.' The column did not move till that hour.
The private in the ranks had taken command. "
This is in keeping with the somewhat sentimental charac
ter of the article and its idealized Southern soldier, but it is
not history, though much history is made in this way. It is
apochryphal. On page 401 , of Gordon's Memoirs, he quotes

PRISONERS OF WAR 285
his statement to Lee three days before the attack, naming,
4 a.m. as the hour. On page 407, he quotes Lee's letter of
the 24th, which said, "The cavalry is ordered to report to you
at 3 a.m. to-morrow" (the 25th), and on the same page he
says, "All things ready at 4 a.m. I stood on the top of
the breastworks." The attack from its inception was
intended for the "hour before dawn," the well-known
favorite time with officers of both sides for attempting a
surprise, and it was made as intended.
To return to the attack. It failed, but the rebels occu
pied temporarily a mile of our line extending northward from
Fort Haskell, and retreating, swept away with them about
1500 prisoners, of whom I was one. Having carried some
orders for the general, I was returning to report, and had
reached the entrenchments, when I met one of our officers
running and stumbling to the rear, with a white face and fear
written all over him. Without stopping he shouted, "All 's
lost!" and plunged on. (It is interesting to note that I met
him two months later in Washington in the glory of a new
double-breasted uniform, having been promoted two grades
to the rank of major for "gallant services at the battle of
Fort Stedman ! ") I went on, and quickly found myself with
a group which, in the darkness, I took for my own men, and
for a few moments I gave them orders about repelling the
next attack from without. They moved about rather
sullenly, and as the Hght brightened I saw a man climbing
through a gun embrasure, who wore a soft felt hat. The
conviction that they were rebels flashed through me, and
telling them I would return, I turned away, and got out of
their sight among the bomb-proof huts. Still trying to
reach my general, however, of whose earher capture I was
ignorant, I walked into another body of the rebel gentry,
was recognized and, with a musket at my breast to ensure
promptness, and the assurance from the holder thereof that
he would rather kill me than not, was stripped of sabre and
overcoat. I was then sent under guard the short distance to
Petersburg, where, in a warehouse, I found my companions
in misfortune. Just within the rebel Hnes I passed close to

286 PRISONERS OF WAR
General Lee, who was awaiting the result of Gordon's attack.
He wore on his head a broad-brimmed gray sombrero, and
over his shoulders an army cape. The white horse he rode
was, I presume, the weU-known "TraveUer. " In Peters
burg we were stripped of our small personal belongings, such
as pocket-knives, pocket combs, etc., and were then marched
several miles toward Richmond under guard. At a point
beyond the reach of Union sheUs we found box-cars, and by
5 p.m., we were unloaded in Richmond.
Our route to our hotel, the famous, or infamous Libby
Prison, lay down Main Street, and I was impressed by the
fact that every man we saw of fighting age was in uniform.
The "crowd" consisted of old men, boys, and women, and
it was evident that the saying that the Confederacy had
"robbed the cradle and the grave" for soldiers, lacked Httle
of reaHty. The boys welcomed us with shouts of "Here
come the Yanks!" and "Here are the blue belHes!" but no
violence was offered. At the Libby, a brick and stone prison,
we were received by Dick Turner, who, with his brother
Major Thomas P. Turner, and Gen. John H. Winder, gained
a reputation for causeless brutafity to prisoners during the
war that was second only to that of Wirz of Andersonvule,
and the keepers of the other open-air, or/' stockade " prisons,
as they were caned, at SaHsbury and elsewhere.
[At this point in the address was exhibited on the wall
the original garrison flag, the "Stars and Bars " which floated
over Libby Prison when we entered it, and which was
captured by Gen. Edward H. Ripley when he entered at
the head of the first Union troops after the evacuation of
Richmond by the rebels.]
At our entrance our money was taken away, the officers
were separated from the enHsted men, and we were instaUed
for permanent detention in a room on the second floor of the
old tobacco warehouse, our men being placed in other parts
of the building. No blankets or food were given us, and
each, picking out the softest board he could find, lay down
for the night.

PRISONERS OF WAR 287
The room we occupied was a rectangle 100 feet by 45.
One end looked upon the street, and one upon the James
River. There were three windows openings at each end,
grated with iron bars, but having no sashes or shutters, and
entirely open to the wind and cold. At one end was a rough
toilet sink and a water faucet with an iron basin. The
furniture consisted of a medium-sized iron stove and a table
of rough boards, — no chairs, stools, or benches.
Life here quickly assumed a monotonous routine in
which, of course, the first thought in my mind was the pre
servation of health, physical and mental. I reafized that it
was going to be a question of endurance, and planned accord
ingly. I was young and unusuaHy strong and vigorous, and
the idea that death was imminent did not impress me. I
was the first up every morning, and going to the water faucet
I would strip to the buff and wash all over with the cold
yeUow water, using my single handkerchief very cautiously
to dry my face. I would then hang the handkerchief up
to dry, and dressing, would walk the floor for exercise.
Under such circumstances men seek a chum, and I found
one in a young Swiss officer who had obtained a long fur
lough from home and enfisted with us for practical experience.
This I am sure he got. He had been weU educated at a
military school in Europe, and I determined at once to go
to school to him and pump as much information out of
him as possible. His readiest asset was his knowledge
of French, and hour after hour, in the days that foUowed,
we paced the room, he talking fluently and I patching
sentences together in response. Another of his possessions
was a knowledge of fencing. Borrowing a knife that had
escaped confiscation, we split some long strips off the table
with infinite labor, and equipped with these rapiers passed
many an hour in tierce and carte.
The overpowering anxiety, however, was the question
of food, of which it was immediately apparent that we should
not get enough to maintain strength or possibly Hfe. It was
sent to us twice a day, viz., at 10 and 4, and consisted of
corn bread, baked in the prison ovens. In substance it

288 PRISONERS OF WAR
was a composite of the inner leaf or shuck of the plant,
together with the cob and the grain coarsely ground together.
The exterior was generally burned black through careless
ness or indifference. This came to us in round cakes
twelve or fourteen inches across, and about three inches
thick in the centre. These cakes were measured with mathe
matical accuracy, and divided by our house committee
into as many pieces as there were mouths to feed. The
proportion to each, however, was painfully small. I brought
away with me the last half-day ration. It was between
three and four inches long, two inches high, and one inch
thick. Rare variations occurred by way of substitution.
On one occasion several pails of so-caUed bean soup were
sent up. These were the usual horse buckets used in stables
and contained a black water, bitter, without nutrition and
undrinkable, and at the bottom about a half pint of beans.
Hungry as we were, we threw away the water and carefully
coUected the beans, dried them in the sun, and although
they were half raw, gladly chewed up our teaspoonful
apiece. Confirmation of my recoUection of this appetizing ( ?)
dish is found in the writings of Lieut. Asa B. Isham, 7th
Michigan Cavalry, who was also in the Libby and says
of the soup: "It was made up of brown beans, black bugs,
and long brown worms in about equal proportions, suspended
in a liquor having the color and flavor of tan- vat water."
Another day a smoked shoulder of ham was suppHed, but
on trying to lift it by the knuckle the whole bone puUed
out revealing the interior a mass of wriggling maggots. So
we turned down the poisonous mess preferring to go decently
hungry to bed. I do not recaU any material deviation or
addition furnished us by our rebel hosts from their suppHes.
We did not see either fresh or smoked meat, or any vegetable,
during our imprisonment. The diet was cob-meal solely,
ground with the shuck and in the amounts described. In
many official communications sent to our exchange officers,
in many official reports (now accessible) which passed
between Confederate authorities, and in many histories and
memoirs written from a Southern standpoint since the war,

PRISONERS OF WAR 289
it is asserted that Union prisoners were given the same rations
as the Confederate troops. No troops could have Hved and
fought on what we received. Nor was the statement true
of any Southern prison. An exhaustive examination of the
records shows conclusively that our food and treatment were
as good as, if not better than, any other, and that in many
prisons the conditions were infinitely worse. That this was a
regular condition is shown by the letter of General Neal Dow
to Secretary Stanton, dated Richmond, November 13, 1863,
when the rebeUion was yet prosperous.
One or two rays of sunlight reached us from our own
people later on ; we did not know whether they came from our
own Government or the Sanitary Commission. We each
received a half blanket, and a smaU amount of white flour
and molasses, about one meal apiece, was given to us in
bulk. The flour was uncooked, and we had no cooking uten
sils, nor, during aU this time, any fire. But on this festive
occasion we begged some fuel, lighted the stove, mixed the
flour with James River water from the pipe, moulded it
into dough with our hands, and spread it as thinly as possible
on the lid of the stove. When it had gained aU that heat
would accompHsh it was cut into strips, and each man got
one. They were not unlike bits of whitish gutta-percha.
We dipped these sticks into the molasses and then labori
ously chewed off a chunk devoting such a time to its masti
cation as would have made the most ardent disciple of
Fletcherism green with envy. Of course during all this time
belts were being drawn tighter daily, and the fearful possibili
ties of the future, the "coming events that cast their shadows
before, " were having their effect on the minds of the men.
We had been there but a short time when other prisoners
were brought in. They usuaUy arrived in the evening and
were always greeted with the cry, "Fresh fish! Fresh fish!"
which was a prison slogan that I then heard for the first time.
These additions brought the number in this room to ninety-
three, and we were pretty closely packed on the floor at night.
The new men were indeed objects for the deepest sympathy.
They came from other Southern prisons and had been in
19

29O PRISONERS OF WAR
confinement for one or two years. Clothing they had
none; what hung about their persons was a mass of rags. A
gunny-sack, a piece of blanket or carpet, or a fragment of a
wooUen shirt or shelter tent, was variously worn about the
body or tied around the feet if the latter were not entirely
bare. They were emaciated, and tottered as they walked.
Most of them had chronic dysentery, scurvy, or malarial
fever. Their hair and beards had not been combed for
months, and all were infested with vermin to a degree that
was strange and horrible to us. Their eyes seemed vacant,
their faces hopeless. They talked Httle and sat against the
waU or lay on the floor, hardly able to comprehend or to
respond to a friendly greeting or a word of cheer. And these
men, then at the lowest ebb of physical and mental power,
had been vigorous, athletic, inteUigent officers when the
fortune of war made them prisoners of the South.
Above and beyond these definable His was that intense
mental depression, born of present suffering and apprehension
for the future, which the strongest minded does not escape,
and which only one who has been a prisoner can under
stand. To know that you are absolutely at the mercy of an
enemy embittered by personal resentment (hatred would
not be too strong a word) and made desperate by the know
ledge of the approaching failure of the cause he had fought
for; to know that iron bars guard aU windows and doors,
and to see comrades weakening and dying day by day in
increasing ratio, forms a combination which, by paralyzing
the mind, destroys the body. The words of the dear old
hackneyed song, Tramp, tramp, tramp, the boys are march
ing, have a very vital meaning to us. We have known
what is meant by
" In the prison cell I sit, thinking, mother dear, of you,
And the dear and happy home so far away,
And the tears they fill my eyes, spite of all that I can do,
As I try to cheer my comrades and be gay.
" In the dreary prison cell, we are waiting for the day
Which shall come to open wide the prison door,

Photographed from the original.
Facsimile of the cover of the Libby Prison Order Book

PRISONERS OF WAR 291
And the careworn eye grows bright and the poor heart almost
gay,
As we think of seeing home and friends once more!"
That the mind may reaHze what the eye hath not seen, I
quote again from Lieutenant Isham, who was exchanged at
Charleston, S. C, in December, 1864.
"Six hundred men who had been at Andersonville were
exchanged with us. Many were entirely destitute of clothing
and shivering in the piercing wind from the sea, and such rags
as were possessed by others were covered with masses of lice.
A large number were mere skeletons. In many instances the bones
of hips, spine, and shoulders projected bare through the skin.
Not less than a dozen gaping and grinning idiots were among
them with vacant eyes, sunk deep in their bony sockets. The
skin was like black parchment from the ravages of scurvy, and
bleeding, spongy bones, from which the flesh had rotted away
appeared at the feet. Over one-half of these men died on the
way, and probably less than one hundred ever regained health.
Of these men a Confederate officer, who had been a prisoner, said
to Major George B. Cox of the 75th Ohio, 'If I had been the
Confederate Exchange Commissioner my regard for the reputation
of the people of the South would never have permitted me to
turn over such physical wrecks as your men are to proclaim to the
world the infamous barbarity of the Confederate Government.' "
Of BeUe Island, Colonel W. Hoffman 3d U. S. Infantry,
and Commissary- General of Prisoners, reports to Secretary
Stanton, May 3, 1864:
"The enfisted men who had endured so many privations at
Belle Isle were, with few exceptions, in very sad plight mentally
and physically, having for months been exposed to all the changes
of the weather, with an allowance of food scarcely sufficient to
prevent starvation, even if of wholesome quality, but as it was
... if it did not kill by starvation it was sure to do it by the
disease it created. Some of these poor fellows were wasted to
mere skeletons and had scarcely life enough remaining to appre
ciate that they were now in the hands of their friends. Many
faces showed that there was scarcely a ray of intelligence left.

292 PRISONERS OF WAR
That our soldiers, when in the hands of the rebels, are starved to
death, cannot be denied. Every returning flag-of-truce boat
brings too many living and dying witnesses to admit of a doubt
of this terrible fact. . . . While a practice so shocking to
humanity is persisted in by the rebel authorities, I would re
spectfully urge that retaliatory measures be at once instituted."
Let us turn to a brighter scene. The day did come when
the door opened to some of us. It was a Sunday morning
when we saw the rebel troops with the star and bar battle
flags marching through the city toward the southwest, and
we knew that they were withdrawing from the front of our
troops advancing up the James. Then we heard cannon to
the southward aU day, and finally came word that we were
to go down by flag-of-truce boat to be exchanged. We left
Richmond at 5 p.m. Going down the river I stood with
General McLaughlen and Colonel Robert Ould, the rebel
Commissioner of Exchange, near the pilot house. This
Colonel Ould deserves notice in this connection. Through
out the war he fiUed this position and was the chief medium
on their side, as Colonel Mulford was on ours, through whom
the two governments communicated regarding prisoners.
His letters to Mulford are often long and argumentative.
They are filled with the high flown expressions common to
many Southerners, and with repeated denunciation of our
(asserted) brutal treatment of their men. Of their sincerity,
and of the spirit that actuated him let his own letters speak.
On March 17, 1863, he writes from City Point, Va., to
General Winder at Richmond:
"I wish you to send me Wednesday morning all the military
prisoners you have. . . . The arrangement I have made works
largely in our favor. We get rid of a set of miserable wretches
and receive some of the best material I ever saw. "
On March 21, 1863, he writes from Richmond to their
Commissary-General, Colonel A. C. Myers, as follows:
"If the exigencies of our army require the use of trains for

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From original photographs. The Key is in the possession of Gen. Edw. H. Ripley.
I. Facsimile of letter of Col. Robert Ould, C. S. A., Commissioner
of Exchange of Prisoners, containing notorious sentence regarding
condition of Union prisoners. 2. Key of the Libby Prison
PRISONERS OF WAR 293
the transportation of corn, pay no regard to the Yankee prisoners.
I would rather they should starve than our own people suffer.
I suppose I can safely put it in writing ' Let them suffer. ' The
words are memorable, and it is fortunate in this case they can be
applied properly. Your friend, Robt. Ould."
And on May 2, 1864, he writes to James A. Sedden,
Secretary of War, C. S. A. :
"The chief difficulty (in exchanges) is the inadmissible
claim of the enemy that recaptured slaves shall be treated as
prisoners of war. As yet the Federals do not appear to have
found any well-authenticated case of the retention of a negro
prisoner. They have made several specific inquiries, but in
each case there was no record of such a party, and I so responded.
Having no especial desire to find any such case it is more than
probable the same answer will be returned to every such inquiry.
Respectfully, Robt. Ould, Agent of Exchange. "
Finding the river dangerous from torpedoes, which the
pilot said had been shifted by spring floods, we did not
attempt to reach Varina Landing but were put ashore at a
bend two miles above. Our general gave his parole for aU,
and we started to march overland to the point where lay
the U. S. vessel. The ground was rolHng and our progress
slow, as some of the long-time prisoners could hardly walk,
even with our assistance. At last, however, we mounted a
low eminence and saw before us a sight, the meaning of
which to us no words of mine can convey to you. On the
summit of the next hill, with the setting sun shining fair upon
it, floated the Stars and Stripes, and around it were clustered
the blue uniforms and the gleaming gun-barrels of the black
troops of the Army of the James! The flag was there to
protect us. The sturdy arms of the men were there to fight
for us. Behind them lay God's country, and for a moment
the sufferings of the past were forgotten. What it meant
to those enfeebled men, who had lost nearly aU that manhood
values in their two years of prison life, I wiU not attempt to
express, but the words of thankfulness that came from their

294 PRISONERS OF WAR
trembling lips and the tears that roUed down from eyes
unused to weep, told the story. Companions, we have heard
and sometimes stiU hear of "drawing the color Hne, " but I
say to you that we saw the "color Hne" drawn that day, and
for those who can conceive the picture of those colored sol
diers interposing their sturdy frames as a bulwark between
that body of enfeebled white men and the brutal enemies
whom they had left, the "color Hne" can never again be
drawn in any other way.
We went down the river that night on Mulford's boat,
and an hour after sunset passed three small rebel gunboats.
On the after-deck of one sat the rebel Admiral Semmes,
formerly the commander of the weU-known piratical cruiser
the Alabama, which had been earlier sunk by the Kearsarge.
He probably reaHzed at this moment that his career was
ended. About midnight the sound of a heavy explosion
reached us, and we learned at Fort Monroe next day that he
had blown up his three vessels, and so disappeared from
history and from our story.
In the morning we touched at Fort Monroe where we were
told that Richmond was captured, and another day found us
at Parole Camp, Annapolis, Maryland. Our experiences
there need no comment, but they afforded an opportunity
to confirm our impressions of Southern prisons. Many
hundreds of exchanged men were being received by steamer
from Wflmington, North Carohna, and from Savannah
and Charleston. These men had been brought from the
Andersonville, SaHsbury, and Columbia stockades, and words
fail to express the sad condition of many of them. In these
cases aU flesh had disappeared, and the parchment-Hke skin
was tightly drawn over the bony frame. The legs were not
larger than a man's forearm, and the arms were the size
of a child's. These men weighed only about fifty to sixty
pounds, and the hospital stewards brought them from the
boat two at a time, easily carrying one on each arm. Our
hospitals gave them every care, but few survived to reach
their homes and famflies, and of those who did, helpless
invahdism was, in many cases, their lot.

PRISONERS OF WAR 295
In taking a broad survey of the question of "Prisoners
of War," one is at once impressed with the complications
introduced by the unique conditions existing in our War
of the RebelHon which would not have apphed in a war
with a foreign nation. For instance, both sides claimed the
border State of Kentucky, and parts of it were alternately
within our Hnes and within theirs. Southern officers would
return to their former homes there and in civflian dress visit
friends, obtain miHtary information, and recruit for the
rebel army. Captured by us and treated as spies, they
appealed to President Davis at Richmond, who invariably
sustained their claims for immunity and placed an equal
number of our officers in dark cens upon bread and water
and under sentence of death. Again, a favorable form of
warfare with them was gueriHa or bushwhacking. These
parties directed their raids into the sections where they had
formerly Hved. As a rule, they knew no mercy, but killed
the non-combatant, the old and young indiscriminately,
venting, under the guise of war, the private grudges and
personal quarrels that had previously existed. They were
without uniform, and when pursued were difficult to iden
tify from the rest of the population. Mosby's gueriUas in
Virginia and a large part of General SterHng Price's army
in Missouri were of this class, and our uniformed officers
and men were on repeated occasions shot by them in cold
blood after surrender. When we captured these guerilla
murderers and condemned them by court-martial, Mr.
Davis again came to their rescue, declaring them to be of
his regular forces and threatening retaHation. These bodies
of men owed their existence to the regular action of the
Confederate Congress. April 21, 1862, that body duly
authorized President Davis "to commission such officers
as he may deem proper with authority to form bands of
partizan rangers, in companies, battaHons, or regiments,
either as inf antry or cavalry"; and on May 17, 1862, the
Virginia Legislature further enacted:
" Whereas, this Assembly places a high estimate upon the value

296 PRISONERS OF WAR
of ranger or partizan service, and regards it as perfectly legiti
mate; and it being understood that a Federal Commander has
intimated his purpose, if such service is not discontinued, to
lay waste by fire a portion of our territory, be it resolved, that
the policy of employing such rangers or partizans ought to be
carried out energetically without the slightest regard to such
threats." A conspicuous instance occurred in October, 1864, in
Missouri. General Price turned over to Tim Reeves, a
well-known gueriHa, Major James Wilson and six enfisted
men of the 3d Missouri Cavalry who had been captured by
his command. Reeves caused the seven men to be shot.
In retafiation an equal number of rebel prisoners were
executed in St. Louis as soon as the facts had been fully
verified. But the greatest difficulty arose from the different status
of the negro soldier in the two sections; viz., in the South,
assumed to be a slave, and in the North, a uniformed soldier
of the U. S. Army and entitled to be treated as a prisoner of
war. Early in the conflict, Francis Lieber, LL.D., a high au
thority in international law and usage, compiled for our Gov
ernment in great detail a war code covering all miHtary
and naval subjects. This was issued as general instructions
to our troops everywhere, and formed the basis upon which
we fought the war. This Code deserves more than a pass
ing notice. It was so broad, just, humane, and altogether
admirable that it has eHcited most favorable comments from
European jurists on international law. One of the most
distinguished of these, Ernest Nys, Professor of the Univer
sity, Counsellor of the Court of Appeals of Brussels, and
Member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague,
has recently paid it a high tribute. In a pamphlet on the
subject of a "Permanent International Tribunal," he says,
"Another service rendered by the United States is not suffi
ciently appreciated, namely the promulgation by President
Lincoln of 'The Instructions for the Government of Armies
of the United States in the Field,' drawn up by Francis

From original photograph in possession of the Author.
Sample of coal loaded with dynamite to be smuggled on board Union
merchant vessels by order of the Confederate authorities

PRISONERS OF WAR 297
Lieber. They have exercised a powerful influence upon the
entire world, for they were the basis of the work of tne
Conference of Brussels in 1874, and through this conference
became the fundamental text of the conventions concerning
the laws of war adopted by The Hague Conferences of 1899
and 1907." But the Confederate Government claimed
the right to construe international usage in its application
to their affairs, and to make such departures from it as
seemed best to them, and as their situation became more
desperate we find, by their official records, that they sanc
tioned many acts which at other times they would probably
not have attempted to justify. For instance, we find Mr.
Davis telling John Surratt in Richmond that to kiU President
Lincoln did not differ from killing any Union soldier in arms ;
that the seizing of steamers on Lake Erie and kilfing the
crew, and the attempted burning of New York were justi
fiable acts of war.
But to return to the colored troops. In 1862, the United
States began the enlistment of colored troops, and in Decem
ber, President Davis addressed the Confederate Congress
on the subject. That Congress at once enacted a law.
Upon this Davis, on December 23, 1862, issued a proclama
tion, from which I abstract the foUowing:
"Finally the African slaves have not only been incited to
insurrection by every license and encouragement, but numbers
of them have actually been armed for a servile war — a war in its
nature far exceeding in horrors the most merciless atrocities of
the savages. . . . Now,, therefore, I issue this proclamation and
do order . . . That all negro slaves captured in arms be at
once delivered over to the executive authorities of the respective
States to which they belong, to be dealt with according to the laws
of those States, and, that the like orders, be executed in all cases
with respept to all commissioned 'officers of the United States
when found serving in company with armed slaves in insurrection
against the authoritiesof the different States of this Confederacy."
On January 12, 1863, he addressed the foUowing to the
Confederate Congress:

298 PRISONERS OF WAR
". . . So far as regards the action of this Government on
such criminals as may attempt its execution (leading colored
troops) I confine myself to saying . . . that I shall deliver to the
several State authorities all commissioned officers of the United
States that may hereafter be captured by our forces in any of the
States embraced in my proclamation, that they may be dealt
with in accordance with the laws of those States providing
for the punishment of criminals engaged in inciting servile
insurrection.' May 1, 1863, the Confederate Congress adopted resolu
tions from which I quote:
"That every white person being a commissioned officer
. . . who shall command negroes or mulattoes in arms against
the Confederate States . . . shall be deemed as inciting servile
insurrection, and if captured, shall be put to death ... at the
discretion of the Court. "
The United States stood loyaUy by its colored troops. It
first demonstrated by the laws and practice of all nations,
and from the Roman code to those of modern times, that
slaves once freed in war received the status of freemen, and
could not again be relegated to their former condition. It
then notified the Confederate Government that we should
retaHate strictly and in kind if Davis's threat was executed.
As a consequence of this, and as the rebels refused there
after to exchange colored soldiers or their officers, exchanges
ceased and were not generaUy resumed until the spring of
1864. The first exchange of officers of colored troops
occurred October 9th of that year.
To avoid the compHcations and pubhcity which must
have resulted from court trials and the condemnation of our
men as criminals, our antagonists resorted to a shorter, but
not less effective, method. The charge of kiHing prisoners
after capture is a very serious one to bring against the men
of any civifized nation, and the writer fuUy realizes the
gravity of it. But it is impossible to read the correspon
dence between the Confederate officials and consider simul-

PRISONERS OF WAR 299
taneously the evidence of the acts committed, without
reaching the conclusion that the rebel troops, officers and
men, understood that such acts would not be investigated,
criticised or condemned by their authorities, but, on the con
trary, would afford the easiest solution of a vexing prob
lem. The record also shows that the enfisted men
(colored) when not kiUed were, in many instances, sold
as slaves. The inconsistency and insincerity, to use no stronger
words, of the attitude of the rebel government, are shown
by the letter of Colonel Ludlow, U. S. A., exchange agent
to Colonel Ould, the rebel commissioner, June 14, 1863.
Ludlow says:
"... Before a single negro was mustered into the U. S.
service you had Indians and negroes organized in arms under
Albert Pike, in Arkansas, and . . . subsequently negroes were
captured (by us) at Antietam and delivered as prisoners of war
to you at Aiken's Landing and receipted for and counted in the
exchange. More recently the Tennessee Legislature passed an
act forcing into military service all free male persons of color
between the ages of fifteen and fifty."
In support of what I have said as to kilfing prisoners,
the slaughter of a large number by the command under the
rebel General Forrest, at Fort PiUow, caUs for especial
comment, as the facts are weU estabhshed and to my knowl
edge have never been successfuUy denied. I quote from
the Congressional report "On the Conduct of the War,"
which adds that aU the statements are supported by
abundant and unimpeachable evidence:
" General Forrest appeared before Fort Pillow sixty-five miles
above Memphis, on April 12, 1864. The garrison consisted of
nineteen officers and 538 men, of whom 262 were negroes. Ma
jor L. F. Booth was in command and after his death Major W.
F. Bradford succeeded him. After an engagement of some hours,
a flag of truce was sent in by Forrest, demanding unconditional
surrender. The rebel troops, in violation of the flag and while

300 PRISONERS OF WAR
protected by it, foUowed it closely and obtained positions within
one hundred yards of the fort. The demand for surrender upon
these terms was declined by Major Bradford, whereupon the
rebels stormed the fortifications shouting, ' No quarter ! ' There
followed a scene of cruelty and murder without a parallel in
civilized warfare, which needed but the tomahawk and scalping
knife to exceed the worst atrocities ever committed by savages.
The rebels began an indiscriminate slaughter, sparing neither age
nor sex, white nor black, soldier nor civilian. The officers and
men seemed to vie with each other in the work; men, women,
and even children were deliberately shot down, beaten and hacked
with sabres. Some of the children, not more than ten years old,
were forced to stand and face their murderers while being shot;
the sick and wounded were butchered without mercy, the rebels
entering the hospital and dragging them out to be shot, or killing
them as they lay unable to offer resistance. Numbers of our
men were collected in lines or groups and deliberately shot; some
were shot in the river; some on the bank, and the bodies of the
latter, many yet living, were kicked into the river. The huts
and tents where the wounded had sought shelter were set on fire,
both that night and the next morning, while the wounded were
stiU in them, and those who tried to get out were shot. One
man was fastened to the floor of a tent by nails through his
clothing and then burned, and one was similarly nailed to the
side of a building and then burned. These deeds were renewed
the next morning when any wounded who stiU lived were sought
out and shot. Of the 400 known to have been kiUed, at least
300 were murdered in cold blood after the post was in possession
of the rebels and our men had surrendered. Major Bradford
was held until the foUowing day, and then on the march to Jack
son was taken from the ranks by a rebel officer and five soldiers,
and shot in the presence of the command."
Forrest states that he "buried 228 Federals the evening of
the assault." Colonel Chalmere, his second in command,
was conspicuous for urging on his men and personaUy par
ticipating in the murder of the prisoners.
The foUowing are also typical. I shaU give but few
instances in the West and in the East to show that the
enforcement of this policy was not Hmited to one locality,

PRISONERS OF WAR 3OI
but was of general appHcation; they could be multipfied
indefinitely. On June 13, 1863, at Shreveport, Louisiana, Lieutenant-
General E. Kirby Smith, C. S. A., wrote to Major-General
Tayler, C. S. A., as foUows:
" I have been informed that some of your troops have cap
tured negroes in arms. I hope this may not be so, and that
your subordinates in command of capturing parties may have
recognized the propriety of giving no quarter to armed negroes
and their officers; in this way we may be relieved from a dis
agreeable dilemma."
On the same day his Adjutant-General writes:
"Referring to what disposition should be made of negro
slaves taken in arms, I am directed by Lieutenant-General Smith
to say no quarter should be shown to them."
On the 16th, General Smith cHnches the matter and
leaves no doubt in the minds of the rebel leaders by sending
copies of his letter (as above) to S. Cooper, Adjutant and
Inspector-General at Richmond.
July 11, 1864, Samuel Johnson, Orderly Sergeant, Co. D,
2d U. S. Colored Cavalry, testified before John Cassels,
Captain U. S. A., and Provost Marshal:
' ' I was captured at Plymouth, N . C. I puUed off my uniform
and got a citizen's suit. Upon the capture of the town aU
negroes found in blue uniform were killed. I saw some taken
to the woods and hung; others stood on the banks of the river
and were shot and others had their brains beat out with the
butts of muskets."
On February 16, 1864 at Port Hudson, La., General
George L. Andrews, U. S. A., writes to General Wirt Adams,
(_/. o. iv. :
"It is reported to me that several of the U. S. colored troops
have been shot by the Confederate soldiers after capture, and a

302

PRISONERS OF WAR

citizen of Jackson has made oath that he saw Lieutenant Shat-
tuck of Scott's Cavalry dismount and deliberately shoot dead a
wounded U. S. colored soldier lying on the ground; also that he
heard Shattuck say he had shot thirteen negro prisoners that day.
There was no fighting on the day referred to. Also that he saw
Confederate soldiers take negro soldiers out of town to shoot
them, as they said, and he afterward saw the bodies a nule and a
half distant from any battlefield. I can no longer doubt that
U. S. colored soldiers have been deliberately murdered by your
men after capture."
On December 20, 1864, Lieutenant Geo. W. Fitch, 12th
U. S. Colored Infantry, with Lieutenant Cooke, same
regiment, and Captain Penfield, 44th U. S. Colored Infantry,
were captured near Murfreesboro by a detachment of
General Forrest's command (C. S. A.). They were robbed
of everything of value, including much of their clothing.
Two days after, while riding under guard along the pike
road from Lewisburg to MooresvUle, aU three were shot
through the head by their guards and left for dead. Fitch
alone survived, being concealed and saved by compassionate
people of the neighborhood. The facts, which are well estab
hshed, were made the subject of correspondence between the
commanding generals, and were not denied by Forrest.
General George H. Thomas, addressing General Hood, C. S.
A., closes his letter thus:
"Should my troops, exasperated by such acts, take no
prisoners of war in future, I shaU in no manner interfere.
Your army and not mine is responsible for the inauguration
of this dreadful policy of extermination."
On March 14, 1865, General Grant wrote General
Lee caUing his attention to the murder of these officers
and adds:
"Of the skirmish at MiUiken's Bend, La., reHable in
formation has been received which convinces me that aU
the white officers (U. S.) captured were put to death. "
Further confirmation of a high character is found as
early as May 23, 1863, in a letter from Major-General
D. Hunter, U. S. A., at HUton Head to President Lincoln,

PRISONERS OF WAR 303
asking that certain rebel prisoners be deHvered to him as
hostages for the Hves of his men. He says:
"The retaliation resolutions, announced by the Charleston
Mercury as having been passed by the rebel Congress, condemn
to death, if captured, aU white officers acting with colored troops,
thus condemning to death every officer of my command. This
declaration would seem to be only a formal announcement of
what has for some time been the practice in the Western
departments." In November of the same year General HaUeck then
General-in-Chief, U. S. A., writes to Edwin M. Stanton,
Secretary of War, as foUows:
"On the 22d of July, 1862, General Dix and General Hill
(C. S. A.), entered into a cartel for the exchange of prisoners
during the existing war, defining the meaning of a parole, the
rights and obligations of prisoners, and how they should be
released from these obligations. Special agreements of this
kind (duly authorized as in this case), explaining the general laws
of war, furnish the rules of conduct for the contracting parties.
. . . Finding that the rebel authorities were . . . extorting
by threats and iU-treatment unauthorized paroles from our
men, and they refusing to exchange colored prisoners or their
officers, and it being stated that the former were being sold into
slavery and the latter sentenced to imprisonment and death, the
rebel authorities were notified (of these violations) and aU
exchanges ceased. In further violation of good faith and engage
ments solemnly entered into, the rebel commissioner then
declared as exchanged all his own paroled men and ordered them
to their regiments then in the field.
"Rebel prisoners held by the United States have been uni
formly treated with kindness. They have been furnished with
clothing and the same quality and amount of food as our own
soldiers, while our men, when captured, have been stripped of
blankets, clothes, and shoes even in the winter season. They
have been confined in loathsome prisons, half fed on damaged
provisions, or actuaUy starved to death, hundreds ending their
existence loaded with irons. In fine, the treatment of our prison
ers by the rebel authorities has been more barbarous than that

304 PRISONERS OF WAR
which Christian captives suffered from the pirates of Algiers;
and the horrors of 'BeUe Isle' and 'Libby Prison' exceed even
those of the 'British Hulks' or the 'Black Hole of Calcutta.'
This atrocious conduct is applauded by the people and com
mended by the Richmond Press 'as a means of reducing the
Yankee ranks.'"
In this connection the foUowing is illuminating. Gov
ernor Bonham, of South Carolina, writes on August 23, 1864,
to Sedden, Secretary of War, C. S. A. :
" I have your reply recommending that captured free negroes
be not brought to trial, and have suspended further action. I
may add that in the cases of slaves of this State so offending,
which have occurred before similar courts, the offending have
been executed."
It should also be noted that the rebels did not hesitate
to force captured negro soldiers to work on their entrench
ments, under fire, an act forbidden by the rules of civUized
warfare. Finding this to be the case, in some hundred
instances, General Butler advised General Grant who
replied October 12, 1864, approving of the employment of
rebel prisoners in the same way, and sent to Butler a number
for that purpose. This had the effect expected. October
19th, General Lee withdrew the colored soldiers from labor
in the trenches.
I do not wish to-night to lead you through a "chamber
of horrors," but this brief resume would be incomplete with
out some notice of the notorious "stockade" prisons of the
South; but I shaU be brief, and my authorities wiU be chiefly
from rebel sources. "Out of their own mouths shall ye
condemn them. "
The best known of these prisons were AndersonviUe
and MiUen, Georgia; Columbia (Camp Sorghum) and
Florence, South CaroHna; Salisbury, North Carolina;
Tuscaloosa, Alabama; BeUe Island in the James River,
Virginia; and Camp Ford, Texas. The conditions were
much the same in all. There were no barracks in most

PRISONERS OF WAR 305
cases, even for the sick and wounded. Often the prisoners
were not aUowed to build cabins, even where, as at Ander
sonviUe, timber was plentiful. They erected small huts of
boughs, put a piece of a shelter tent on sticks, or dug holes
in the ground. They were densely crowded. In 1864,
AndersonviUe contained in its sixteen acres 35,000 men, by
their official report, which aUowed a space of three feet by
two to each man. Very few cooking utensils were provided,
and the food was furnished usuaUy in a raw condition. Fuel
was so scarce that the prisoners dug up the earth for roots,
and what cooking they did was to warm the coarse meal on a
stone or a piece of a tin can. The amount given was very
smaU and inadequate, as the result showed, to maintain
Hfe. No blankets or clothing were supplied. Often no
sinks were provided. The water was often impure. The
sickness and mortality were appalfing. Prisoners were
frequently shot without cause by the rebel officers and
guard, in a spirit of malice or as a vindictive display of
power, and often the act was accompanied by the lan
guage of hatred and sometimes, strange as it may seem, of
levity. Let us caU the witnesses. H. C. TrumbuU, Chaplain,
10th Conn. Vols., writes November 17, 1863, to Colonel
Hoffman, Commissary of Prisoners, Washington:
"At BeUe Isle a large proportion of our privates are without
tents, barracks, or any shelter, herded like cattle on the cold,
wet sand, lacking blankets, clothing, and sufficient food. Men
are dying at the rate of ten a day. Of 14 brought in one evening
9 died before morning. The day's ration was a piece of coarse
bread 5 by 2 J^ by 3 inches. A Confederate official said to me:
' It is a hard thing to say to you, but your men on BeUe Isle are
dying of starvation.' Another Confederate officer said to me,
' The Island is a perfect slaughter pen for your men. ' "
G. Wm. Semple, Surgeon, C. S. A., previously quoted in
another connection, reports about BeUe Isle, March 6, 1864:
"An area sufficient for 3000 has now from 6000 to 10,000
men in it. The whole surface of the camp is saturated with

306 PRISONERS OF WAR
putrid animal matter. The bread is corn-meal, unsifted or
bolted, and greatly increases disease. "
On May 5, 1864, Gen. Howell Cobb, C. S. A., writes
of AndersonviUe, to Adjutant-General Cooper, Richmond:
"The prison is already too much crowded; the effect of
increasing the number within the present area must be a
terrible increase of sickness and death during the summer."
There were then 12,000 imprisoned. During the summer it
was increased to 35,000!
On June 6, 1864, the same officer reports on the subject
of prisoners to James A. Sedden, Secretary of War, Rich
mond, asking orders. The communication was endorsed by
Sedden, June 13th, and a part of the endorsement reads:
"As to the white officers serving with negro troops, we
ought never to be inconvenienced with such prisoners. "
May 6, 1864, E. J. Eldridge, Chief Surgeon, C. S. A.,
writes of Andersonville: "Their shelters consist of such as
they can make of boughs of trees, poles, etc., covered with
dirt. . . . Few would attempt to escape . . . and would
be readfiy caught by the dogs, always at hand for that
purpose." In May, 1864, Isaiah H. White, Chief Surgeon, C. S. A.,
whose name appears frequently in the records of Anderson-
vfile, writes:
"The total number of cases treated here to date is 4588,
of which 1026 (about 25%) have died. The month of April
exhibits a ratio of 316 cases and 57 deaths to each 1000. "
In August, he adds :
"The prisoners are without barracks or tents, 30,000 men
being densely crowded together. They are exposed to the
sun by day and the dew at night, and entirely unprotected
during rains. The hospital (smaU tents) is utterly inadequate
(in number and size) to accommodate the large number of
sick." This being a monthly estimate means that 68% of the
entire population would die in twelve months.
That conditions became not better, but worse, as time
went by, is shown by the report of Walter Bowie, Captain

PRISONERS OF WAR 307
and Inspector, C. S. A., to Brigadier-General Chilton, Rich
mond, May 10, 1864. Confirming the above he writes:
"The number of deaths during the week ending May 8th
was 131, or 18 per day ... a considerable increase . . .
which wiU continue unless a decided improvement is made."
May 25, 1864, Major Turner writes from AndersonviUe
to General Winder:
"Buildings . . . or tents should be furnished. Without
this they wiU die by hundreds and be a dead loss to us in
the way of exchange."
The expression, "We now have them where, with the
severity of the climate and harsh treatment, nature wiU do
its work faster than the buUet, " is found more than once,
in varying phrase, in the mouths of Confederate officials,
and Winder's (the son of the General) remark to Ambrose
Spencer, a Confederate gentleman from Americus, Ga.,
"that he would make of AndersonvUle a pen that would kfil
more d — d Yankees than could be kUled at the front," is
typical of a large class.
In refreshing contrast to the spirit of caUous calculating
cruelty, that forms the staple of these records, are the occa
sional gleams of pity and humanity that appear among them.
Of such is the foUowing. On June 23, 1864, a rebel private,
James E. Anderson, on guard at AndersonvUle wrote to
Jefferson Davis:
"I am a private in the ranks at this place. ... I would in
form you of things I know you are ignorant of . ... I have no
cause to love the Yankees. . . . Twelve feet inside the waUs is
a dead Une. . . . We have many thoughtless boys who think
the killing of a Yankee will make them great men. . . . Every
day or two there are prisoners shot. When the officer of the
guard comes there is a dead or badly wounded man invariably
with their own lines. The sentry is told he did exactly right
and is a good sentry. Last Sabbath two were shot in their
tents at one shot. Let a good man come and mix with the
prisoners, and he will find things revolting to humanity." [En
dorsed] "Referred by the President to the Secretary of War.
Referred by him to General Winder."

308 PRISONERS OF WAR
Meantime the increased number of prisoners more than
kept pace with the inroads of disease, and conditions grew
steadUy worse. June 26, 1864, Surgeon White reports 25,000
prisoners, 3,000 sick, only five surgeons, and begs for ten
additional doctors. In August, 1864, Captain H. Wirz,
commanding prison, reports deaths during July, 1742;
prisoners on hand, 31,678. In September, he reports deaths
in August, 2993.
But most conclusive, because of the high rank of the
writers, are the foUowing. August 5, 1864, Colonel D. T.
Chandler, Inspector-General, C. S. A., reports to Colonel
R. H. ChHton, Inspector-General, C. S. A., Richmond, from
AndersonviUe: "The acreage gives somewhat less than six square feet to
each prisoner (that is, 2 feet by 3). Many (bodies) are carted
out daUy. . . whom the medical officers have never seen. . . .
The dead are hauled out daily by wagon loads and buried without
coffins, their hands in many instances being first mutilated with
an axe in the removal of any finger rings they may have. It is
impossible to state the number of sick, many dying whom the
medical officers neither see nor hear of until the remains are
brought out for burial. . . . Raw rations have been issued to a
large proportion, who are entirely unprovided with proper uten-
sfis and have so limited a supply of fuel that they dig with their
hands in the filthy marsh for roots. No soap or clothing has
ever been issued. I am confident that by slight exertions green
corn and other antiscorbutics could reacfily be obtained. My
duty requires me respectfully to recommend a change in the
officer in command (over Captain Wirz), Brigadier-General J. H.
Winder, and the substitution of some one who unites energy and
good judgment with some feelings of humanity and considera
tion for the welfare and comfort (so far as consistent with safe
keeping) of the vast number of unfortunates placed under his
control. Some one who at least wiU not advocate deliberately
and in cold blood the propriety of leaving them in their present
condition until their number has been sufficiently reduced by
death to make the present arrangements suffice for their accommo
dation, and who wiU not consider it a matter of self-laudation
and boasting, that he has never been inside the stockade, the

PRISONERS OF WAR 309
horrors of which it is difficult to describe, which is a disgrace to
civilization, and the condition of which, by a little energy, and
even with the limited means at his command, he might have
considerably improved. "
This report is approved in aU particulars under date of
November 22, 1864, by W. Carvel HaU, Major, C. S. A.,
who accompanied Chandler. It is endorsed: "The con
dition of this prison is a reproach to us as a nation. —
R. H. ChUton, Inspector-General." And: "The suffer
ings of the prisoners seem almost incredible. The frightful
percentage of mortality appears a consequence of the criminal
indifference of the authorities. . . . These reports show a
condition which caUs loudly for the interposition of the
Department. — J. A. CampbeU, Assistant Secretary of War,
Ks. o. A.
During the trial of Wirz in Washington at the close of
the war, Colonel Chandler appeared before the Board of
Officers constituting the court and corroborated the above
with many additional details. He was an officer who had
been educated at West Point and his testimony, given in a
frank, straightforward way, made a deep impression on the
Court. He swore that he wrote the report quoted above,
and that the statements embodied in it were true of his
own knowledge.
The other witnesses of equal importance, and the last
I shaU summon are Drs. Joseph Jones and J. C. Bates, of
the Medical Department, C. S. A. Of Dr. Jones, Jefferson
Davis writing to Bedford's Magazine in January, 1870,
says he was "eminent in his profession and of great learning
and probity." In August, 1864, Dr. Jones was sent to
AndersonviUe to investigate and report to Surgeon-General
Moore. He did so. At the Wirz trial he was a witness,
and under oath corroborated his report, which was in evi
dence. From this report I quote briefly:
"I visited two thousand sick within the stockade lying under
some long sheds. ... At this time only one medical officer was in
attendance, whereas at least twenty should have been employed.

310 PRISONERS OF WAR
. . . The sick lay upon bare boards or upon such ragged blankets
as they possessed without . . . any bedding or even straw. The
haggard distressed countenances of those miserable, complain
ing, dejected, living skeletons, crying for medical aid and food
. . . and the ghastly corpses, with their glazed eyeballs staring
up into vacant space, with the flies swarming down their open
and grinning mouths and aU over their ragged clothes, infested
with numerous lice, as they lay amongst the sick and dying,
formed a picture of helpless, hopeless, misery which it would be
impossible to portray by words or by the brush. Millions of
flies swarmed over everything and covered the faces of the
sleeping patients and crawled down their open mouths and
deposited their maggots in the gangrenous wounds of the
living. . . . Where hospital gangrene was prevailing it was
impossible for any wound to escape contagion under these
circumstances. "
Surgeon Bates, C. S. A., who was on duty for a number of
months at AndersonvUle, gave the Court his professional
opinion as follows:
"I feel myself safe in saving that seventy-five per cent, of
those who died might have been saved, had those unfortunate
men been properly cared for as to food, clothing, bedding, etc. "
General Winder, whose removal as Superintendent of
Mifitary Prisons was thus recommended by Colonel
Chandler, was an especial friend and protege of Jefferson
Davis. He was never given command of troops in the
field, but in the above capacity made himself notorious by his
brutal treatment of prisoners. No words of mine can more
fittingly describe his character than his own language em
ployed in his celebrated Order No. 13, issued when General
KUpatrick's (U. S. A.) command moved in the direction of
AndersonvUle. I give it without further comment:
"Order No. 13
"Headquarters, Confederate States Military Prison,
"Andersonville, July 27, 1864.
" The officer on duty and in charge of the battery of Florida

PRISONERS OF WAR 3H
artiUery at the time will, upon receiving notice that the enemy
has approached within seven rmles of this Post, open fire upon
the stockade, i. e., the prison containing 25,000 to 35,000 defence
less men, with grape-shot, without reference to the situation
beyond these lines of defence. It is better that the last Federal
be exterminated than be permitted to burn and piUage the prop
erty of loyal citizens, as they wiU do if aUowed to make their
escape from the prison.

"By order of,

"W. S. Winder,
"Asst.Adj.-Gen.

'John H. Winder,
' ' Brigadier-General.

Before leaving AndersonvUle, it may be weU to aUude to
the fate of its jaUer, Captain Wirz, who was perhaps the
most notorious for personal brutafity among the many of his
class who commanded Southern prisons. I am led to speak
of it because many of our younger generation are ignorant
of the facts, and because the women of Georgia recently
erected a statue to him as a martyr. Confirming my belief
above expressed, so weU informed a man as President
Roosevelt said to me at the White House in the winter of
1908: "Did the United States execute any of the rebels
after the war?" My reply was that we hung one, but not
for treason. Wirz was tried upon the charge of murder, and
was convicted of having killed with his own hand, at various
times in the AndersonviUe prison, and in cold blood, twelve
unarmed and inoffensive Union soldiers, and for these crimes
was sentenced and hung. Every opportunity for defence
was given him, his lawyer and witnesses being paid by the
United States.
In treating of these matters a conscientious writer must
often hesitate between the inadequacy of a general phrase
to convey the real facts and the apprehension that the fuU
and perhaps loathsome detaU wUl expose him to the charge
of bias, exaggeration, or denunciation. To Ulustrate I
give one instance. It has been previously said that in these

312 PRISONERS OF WAR
prisons "the water was often impure." What may this
mean? Let Dr. R. H. Whitfield, surgeon, C. S. A., in charge
of the prison at Cahaba, Ala., teU us. On March 31, 1864,
he reports to his superior, Surgeon P. B. Scott, C. S. A.,
Medical Director:
"When you know the sanitary conditions you cannot be
surprised at the large number of cases reported. The prisoners
sleep on the earth or on boards, without straw or bedding of any
kind. The wood (less than half the regulations aUow) is green
pine or decayed oak. The water for drinking, cooking, and
bathing comes along an open street gutter for 200 yards. In its
course, it has been subjected to the washing of the persons of
soldiers, citizens, and negroes, and has received the contents of
buckets, tubs, and spittoons from offices and hospital; the refuse
of hogs, dogs, cows, and horses, and filth of aU kinds from the
streets and other sources."
Of the prison at Florence, S. C, Colonel W. D. Pickett,
Inspector-General, C. S. A., reports to General Hardee,
October 12, 1864:
"The condition of these prisoners has not been misrepre
sented. They are emaciated and sickly and filthy in the ex
treme. Three-fourths are without blankets, and almost without
clothing. They have only the temporary shelters they have
erected." Of Columbia, Lieutenant-Colonel Iverson, C. S. A.,
reports, January 26, 1865, to Colonel H. Forno, Inspector
Military Prisons, C. S. A.: "The rations are, in my
judgment, totaUy insufficient for the sustenance of the
prisoners. "
And Colonel Forno reporting to General Winder, C. S. A.,
says: " The subsistence department is entirely deficient, and
the ration issued daily amounts almost to starvation. "
Of SaHsbury, Governor Vance of North Carohna, writes
to the Secretary of War, C. S. A., February 1, 1865: "Ac
counts reach me of the most distressing character in re
gard to the suffering and destitution of Federal prisoners

PRISONERS OF WAR 3I3
at SaHsbury;" and to General Bradley T. Johnson, C. S. A.,
he writes: "If the half be true, it is disgraceful to our
humanity." General Johnson replies, February 12, 1865: "It is dis
graceful to our country. A large per cent. Hve in holes
in the ground. I have pressed upon our authorities (at
Richmond) the terrible suffering and mortafity among
them." Of all the prisons of this type we get the same sad pic
tures, all drawn from Confederate sources and presenting a
thousand gruesome details of privation, suffering, and death,
which I shall not distress you by repeating.
Such a discussion cannot be left, however, without an at
tempt to answer two questions: First, was the action of the
South defiberate, intentional, preconceived? And if so, who
was responsible? After aU these years we can surely weigh
the question judiciaUy and with fairness. Second, were there
mitigating circumstances to be urged on behalf of the South
which would render less vivid this panoramic picture of
cruelty? In answer to this it should be freely admitted that
something can be urged for the defence ; that few professional
surgeons could be spared from the rebel armies ; that surgical
implements and medical suppHes were very scarce; that
blankets and clothing were scarce; that aU suppHes of
manufactured articles, tools, cooking utensils, etc., were
drained for their armies ; that fewer crops were planted and
raikoad communications between the interior and the battle
lines were cut off; that many of their army officers protested
indignantly, but uselessly, against the cruelty they saw
practised, and that many Southern citizens joined in those
protests. But on the other hand, what of the pine forests surround
ing these prisons which our men were not allowed to cut for
fuel or for shelter ? What of the abundant corn fields of Geor
gia, untouched by war, through which Sherman marched whUe
our men at AndersonviUe, a few miles away, were starving? Is
nothing to be said of those vast supplies from which at SaHs
bury alone, April 12, 1865, Sherman's commissary took 100,000

314 PRISONERS OF WAR
bushels of corn, 50,000 bushels of wheat, 27,000 pounds
of rice, 20,000 pounds of sugar, and 60,000 pounds of ba
con, and of those in the neighborhood of AndersonvUle,
about which General J. H. Wilson states, "My command
found suppHes in great abundance." What of the sutlers
who kept for sale near these prisons, corn-meal, bacon,
beef, sweet potatoes, beans, onions, pumpkins, salt and
soda, for which, at enormous cost, the prisoner's remain
ing clothing or other things of value, was exchanged untU
he was naked, destitute, and helpless? What of the Con
federate Inspector-General's report that "necessary food
could be obtained with slight effort"? What of the using
for their own troops of the food, the blankets and the clothing
sent by our Government, under solemn stipulation to be
used for its captured soldiers, and so accepted by the Con
federate Government? What of the report of Surgeon Wm.
A. Carrington, C. S. A., March 23, 1864, to the Surgeon-
General, C. S. A., regarding hospitals in Richmond? It ends
with these words:
" Large, weU-ventilated, and completely organized hospitals
near the city have been empty during the whole of this time.
They were offered (for the use of prisoners) and refused by the
(rebel) authorities. They contained 750 beds."
On this point General John H. Stibbs, one of the two
surviving members of the Court which tried Wirz, says,
May 30, 19 10:
"Could these horrors have been averted? I reply yes —
scarcely having patience to answer the question. This prison
was located in one of the richest sections of Georgia. Supplies
were abundant, the prison was surrounded with a forest, and
yet some of our men froze to death for lack of fuel which they
would gladly have gathered had they been permitted to do so.
Among those confined in that stockade were men possessed of all
the training and ability necessary to construct anything, from a
log cabin to a war ship; and they would have considered it a
privilege to have done aU the work necessary to enlarge the
stockade, build barracks, and provide a supply of pure water,

PRISONERS OF WAR 315
had they been provided with tools and materials and given the
opportunity. "
In such a situation the opinion of an eminent and
impartial spectator is of pecufiar value. Such we find in
Goldwin Smith's Reminiscences of the American Civil War,
written at the time. He was an Engfishman of the highest
standing, public and private, literary and social. He was
known and respected in two continents. He approached
the subject, like most Engfishmen of his day, prepossessed
in favor of the South. Upon the point I have raised he says:
" It seemed to me at the North, generaUy, there was a remark
able absence of truculence. Prisoners of war were well-treated.
I visited the prison camp at Chicago and saw that the inmates
were weU-fed and suffering no hardship beyond that of con
finement. I visited the prisoners' hospital, Baltimore, and
satisfied myself that the treatment was good. My visit was
unannounced. I record this as an answer to the charges of
cruelty rife at the time in England. It was the more notable as
the treatment of Federal prisoners in some of the Confederate
prisons was known to be most inhuman. In the Andersonville
prison camp it was devilish and such as no want of resources on
the part of the captor could excuse. No laws of war can warrant
the retention of prisoners whom a captor cannot feed. I saw at
Annapolis, the first batch of prisoners exchanged from Anderson
viUe; they were living skeletons."
The question is often asked, What was General Lee's
attitude toward prisoners of war? The answer is simple.
The prisoners, taken by the troops under his immediate
command, were treated with consideration and humanity
whUe in his charge. But when they passed into the hands
of the Richmond authorities he ceased to concern himself
about them. There is no evidence discoverable that he ever
interested himself in the general question of the treatment of
prisoners in the South, and at a time when his influence with
the Confederate authorities was paramount, and when his
views would have compelled appropriate action, and when
the sufferings of the Federal prisoners were at their maximum,

31 6 PRISONERS OF WAR
we faU to find any protest from his pen, or the record of any
effort on his part to ameHorate their condition. That he
was aware of it appears from his correspondence, but he
seems to have regarded it as outside his province. In his
correspondence with General Grant he stands for negro
slavery and distinctly approves the Confederate pohcy of
refusing to exchange our negro soldiers, saying in substance
that in agreeing to an exchange cartel he had omitted to say
that it could not include former slaves, who would not be
regarded by him as soldiers; and he approved the suspension
of exchanges, with aU its horrible consequences to both
sides, rather than to yield on this issue. How far he felt
himself bound in this regard by the action of the Confederate
Congress and Davis's proclamation, and whether these were
, in accord or conflict with his own convictions, we can only
surmise. So far as we can learn from his official record, he
acquiesced and approved. The fact that he was the one
conspicuous mUitary figure in the capture of John Brown at
Harper's Ferry, and in his subsequent execution, throws a
side Hght upon his view of slavery, and in a measure is
corroborative of the opinion above expressed.
To the much-mooted question, What were the total
losses by death among prisoners North and South? it must
be answered that no even approximate estimate has been or
ever can be truthfuUy made. The necessary data is lacking.
The records of the Northern prisons were regularly kept,
have been preserved, and are accessible. But in the South
no regular systematic records were kept in most instances,
and such reports as were made covered irregular and widely
separated periods. Even of these, few have been preserved.
AndersonviUe, Ga., forms, apparently, the one exception
to this. The records of this, the most notorious of the stock
ade or open-air prisons, were kept during 1864 (the year of
greatest congestion of numbers and maximum deaths),
by a Federal prisoner detaUed for that purpose, and were
recovered from the rebel archives at Richmond. Yet whUe
they present continuity and system, they faU far short of
accuracy. Surgeon White, C. S. A., in charge, and the

PRISONERS OF WAR 317
inspector-generals who, from time to time, visited and
reported upon the condition of the prisoners, aU repeat the
statement that of the hundred and odd bodies, amounting in
August, 1864, to an average of 130 a day, which were carried
out each morning for burial in a common trench, "hundreds
had never been seen by any surgeon or recorded in any way. "
An attempt has been made by counting graves, and again by
deducting the number released from the number supposed
to have been received, to estabhsh a balance representing the
dead; but in the absence of any approximately refiable
record of those received, and in view of the method employed,
viz., the hasty interment of hundreds of bodies, piled one
upon another in a common trench, it is clearly apparent
that such efforts and calculations, made after a long lapse of
time, are utterly futile for the purpose of affording any
refiable basis of calculation. When we join to this the fact
that, after efiminating the smaUer places, there were thirty-
four principal prisons in the South, located all the way from
Richmond, Va., to the southern confines of Texas, that these
were abandoned and broken up and their inhabitants sent
elsewhere as our troops swept over one part of the South after
another during the last months of the war, that the rebel
authorities were seeking their own safety and had no interest
in the preservation of records which would be self -condemna
tory, it needs no argument to estabHsh the fact that the
number of deaths of Union soldiers in Southern prisons can
never be known, and that any estimate based upon the
fragmentary data accessible must be many thousands
below the reahty.
The careful historian, analyzing the records of those times,
is forced to the conclusion that a wide difference existed
between the f eefing of the South toward the Northern soldier,
and that of the North toward the Southern one. To this
difference was due in large measure the marked contrast
in the treatment of prisoners by the two contending parties,
the facts of which are now established beyond controversy.
As no reasonable man would claim that the Southern
portion of our people were inherently vindictive and cruel,

31 8 PRISONERS OF WAR
it foUows that some especial and powerful influences had
been and were, at the beginning of the war, at work,
to engender among them the characteristics aUuded to,
which were so constantly and generaUy displayed toward
those of our men who were placed helpless in their hands,
during the four years that foUowed. To ascertain what these
influences were, to lay bare the cause behind the fact, is
manifestly germane to this whole subject, and necessary to a
complete understanding of it. In what follows, therefore,
I have tried to outfine briefly the source and character of
these influences which poisoned the otherwise generous
natures of a whole people; the methods adopted by the
Southern leaders to carry out their purposes; and something
of the effect produced by these efforts.
It is difficult at all times to analyze thought in others and
to define motive, and it is unsafe to generalize decidedly or
dogmaticaUy as to the impulse that has moved great masses
of men toward a common object, but referring to the North
ern soldier, it is entirely safe to say that in a vast majority
of cases he enlisted to help "save the Union" or "to put down
the rebeUion, " as he phrased it, *'. e., to re-estabHsh the
national supremacy, to recover its forts and dockyards, and
to make its flag once more respected. His impulse was
impersonal, a sentiment, if you please, and even during the
period before described in this paper, when the events of
three years of bloody and indecisive war had excited an
tagonisms to the highest possible pitch, his feehng never de
generated into a personal animosity toward his Southern foe.
His enemy, the "Johnny Reb," continued to be the brave
soldier, the gaUant antagonist, to the end of the chapter.
WhUe he attacked the defenders of Secession with a crusader's
zeal, it was the Cause they advocated which he sought to
destroy, and no racial hatred, no personal antipathy, added
its bitterness to the blows he dealt.
On the other hand, the Union soldier was regarded by the
South as an invader, as one come to free the slaves, as a
destroyer of homes and property, and as a ravisher of women.
The leaders and makers of public opinion in the South, the

PRISONERS OF WAR 319
Confederate Congress, President Davis, and the public
press, used every influence of spoken and printed argument
to force and impress this conviction indelibly upon the minds
of their people, and so, in their own apt phrase, to "fire the
Southern heart."
To escape the responsibfiity of their own initiative in be
ginning hostilities, and seizing the properties of the United
States, the Confederate leaders planted and sedulously
cultivated in the minds of the Southern people the belief,
growing to a conviction, that the North meant conquest and
subjugation. This accounts in a great degree for the brutal
ity of expression toward our officers and men so constantly
found in these records and for the approval with which the
South as a whole acquiesced in the treatment of prisoners
that I have described.
My personal experience leads me to say gladly that this
perverted view of the Union soldier was held in far less degree
by the Confederate soldier at the front than by the pohti-
cian, the editor, and the civifian, male and female, in the rear.
To show that this picture is not overdrawn, a few iUus-
trations, selected at random from a mass of material, wiU
suffice. Typical of this purpose is the speech of Roger A. Pryor in
Richmond, April 10, 1861. He said:
"Gentlemen, I thank you especiaUy that you have at last
annihilated this accursed Union, reeking with corruption and
insolent with excess of tyranny. Not only is it gone, but gone
forever. For my part if Abraham Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin
to-morrow were to abdicate their offices and were to give me a
sheet of blank paper to write the conditions of re-annexation to
the defunct Union, I would scornfully spurn the overture. Do
not distrust Virginia. As sure as to-morrow's sun wiU rise, just
so sure wiU Virginia be a member of this Southern Confederation.
And I will tell you, gentlemen, what wiU put her there in less than
an hour by Shrewsbury clock, strike a blow. The very moment
that blood is shed Old Virginia wiU make common cause with
her sisters of the South. "
And this, — Hon. Jeremiah Clemens, U. S. Senator from

320 PRISONERS OF WAR
Alabama, when the State seceded, said to the convention
at HuntsviUe, Ala., March 13, 1864:
"I wiU teU you how your State was got out of the Union.
In 1 861, when the seat of the Confederate Government was in
Montgomery, I met in the office of General Walker, then Con
federate Secretary of War, Jefferson Davis with Memminger and
Benjamin, of his cabinet, Gilchrist, a member of our State Legis
lature, and a number of other prominent gentlemen. They were
discussing the propriety of immediately opening fire on Fort
Sumter, to which General Walker was opposed. Mr. GUchrist
said to him: 'Sir, unless you sprinkle blood in the face ofthe
people of Alabama, they wiU be back in the old Union in less than
ten days.' The next day, the 12th of April (though Major
Anderson had agreed to surrender on the 15th) Beauregard was
ordered to open his batteries on Sumter, and Alabama was
saved to the Confederacy. "
Lying before me as I write is a copy of the Richmond
Dispatch of Friday, March 31, 1865. I obtained it in Rich
mond whUe a prisoner and brought it away with me, its
only interest to me at that time being the account of a recent
battle near Petersburg. The Dispatch and the Examiner
were the two leading daihes of that city. Coming from the
seat of government, they were widely circulated and read
throughout the South, and their editorials carried aU the
weight of official inspiration. From the editorial columns
on the front page of the Dispatch I quote:
" Thg r>bjac±-r>f t.hf» Vanlraes in_maffMg-f-hfeJf^w4-TTf-^iffar'Tf^y
are now engaged in carrying on against us, could not be mistaken.
It is no longer a restoration of the UnionThat they seekT That
was frc^rrrtKe" first jfmere pretensepused* to "Cover designs which,
at one time, it might not have been quite so prudent to expose
as they believe it to be now. Theuniyersal belieLamQj^£h£rri__
is, that thex are on the point of completing our subjugation, and
thatfit is, therefore, no longer required by pl^rIehce~taTnake a
mystery of the fate they design for us. That fate is simply the
utmost degree of degradation which their ingenuity, prompted by
their malice, can devise. They wiU not be content with merely
beating us into surrender. We must suffer aU the horrors of

PRISONERS OF WAR 32 1
conquest ever heretofore put in practice against a defeated foe,
with the addition of new ones, devised for the especial gratifica
tion of their hatred. That hatred is a passion universal among
the whole Yankee nation. There are so few bosoms not agitated
by it that they scarcely serve for an exception to the general
rule. It began long before this war, and any one who attributes
the unheard-of enormities which have marked its progress to the
disposition on the part of aU armies to commit excesses will
be very much mistaken. It arises from the long, deep-rooted
hatred, to which we have alluded, and which is now presented
with an opportunity of gratif ying itself. Our cities are wantonly
burnt, and our population insulted and murdered, upon principle.
It is the result of cold-blooded calculation, not of mfiitary pas
sions, stimulated by resistance. These soldiers are turned loose
upon a population which they hate, and they are told to do their
worst, for they wiU rather be applauded than punished for any
crime they may perpetrate.
" Such being the treatment our people receive whUe we have
large armies stiU in the field, what are we to expect when resis
tance shaU have ceased altogether? The Yankees themselves
teU us a part of what we are to look for, but they do not teU us
aU. We must look for it in their acts. In Charleston, they
have not only set the negroes free, but, as far as they have been
able, have compelled the whites to associate with them. They
do this because they know that the whites consider such associa
tion as degrading to them; and they are determined to make them
drink the cup to the dregs. There are probably among us
Southern people who are tired of the war, and who hope that,
by submission, they may obtain a little mercy at the hands of
their masters. Never were people more woefuUy deceived. The
Yankee wiU have no mercy upon them. He is only forbearing
when he finds his proposed victim in a condition and disposition
to resist. Let him but once be at his mercy — completely in his
power — incapable of further resistance — and he might as weU
hope for mercy from a tiger, or compassion from a wolf, or
forbearance from any other cruel and cowardly wUd beast of
the forest. The Yankee wiU not only strip his victim of every
thing he has in the world, down to the very clothes upon his back,
but he wiU take every other means to make him feel his situation.
Is it not better to continue to resist even unto death than to
accept such a peace as this?

322 PRISONERS OF WAR
"Our 'Northern brethren' of the Puritan persuasion are
happily endowed with the felicitous quality of always looking
at the bright side of their own character and actions. For ex
ample, we suppose that between them and the rest of the Chris
tian world there would not be one moment's dispute about the
practical duties of Christianity. They would not deny that
forgiveness of enemies is the peculiar and cardinal virtue of the
Christian religion; that the man who does not show mercy to
others can expect no mercy from God. They will argue that the
rules of civilization, let alone Christianity, do not permit any
barbarities in warfare not essential to the end for which war is
waged. And yet, the community which holds these excellent
principles is not aware of any inconsistency between their faith
and practice when they exult in the deadly hate that they bear
the South as if it were a first-class virtue; when they pant for
our extermination; when they rejoice to read accounts in their
daily papers of the Southern farmhouses and towns that have
been burned to the ground; of the defenceless women and
children that have been turned out-of-doors, and exposed to
destruction, and sometimes worse; of the prospect of starving
to death whole communities of innocent people; of prisoners
dying miserably of cruel treatment, or cold, or famine. Nay,
their very preachers get up in the pulpit, and, Sunday after
Sunday, invoke their hearers to rain fire and brimstone upon the
accursed rebels, and to spare none of the infernal crew. "
Within two weeks after this pubhcation, Grant had
received Lee's surrender, had simultaneously issued 20,000
rations to the nearly starving soldiers of the Confederate
army, and had announced the order which has become his
toric for its magnanimity, granting them their horses and
guaranteeing them peace and protection in their homes.
Shortly before this our troops had entered Richmond,
extinguished the fires lighted by the evacuating rebels
among the hospitals holding their wounded, and the houses
of the inhabitants, had issued rations to women and children,
and had assured protection from want and from insult to all
the defenceless people of the city.
On the 1 8th of July, 1863, Colonel Robert G. Shaw was
killed while leading his men of the 54th Massachusetts in an

PRISONERS OF WAR 323
attack on Fort Wagner, near Charleston, South Carolina.
The 54th was the first "colored" regiment that entered the
United States service and was recruited from among the
citizens of negro lineage residing in the Bay State. Colonel
Shaw's parents, advanced in years, and whom I knew weU,
lived on Staten Island, N. Y. Hearing of their son's death
and wishing to recover his body, they communicated with
the authorities at Washington to learn what disposition had
been made of it after the battle. Our Government forwarded
the inquiry through the official Confederate channels, and
in due time came a refusal from the authorities at Charleston
to attempt to identify or return the body, and this explana
tory message : ' ' We buried him in the ditch with his niggers. ' '
The reply of Colonel Shaw's parents, as published in the
press of that day, was simply that their son's body could not
have a nobler burial than among those of his devoted men,
and an eminent writer has said: "What was intended as a
disgrace will, in the light of history, be regarded as a monu
mental honor. "
Contrast this attitude of the Southern civU authorities
with that of the Southern soldier. On the evening of Sep
tember 1, 1862, General Phifip Kearny, U. S. A., was kUled
in the battle of ChantiHy, Virginia. On the foUowing morn
ing General Lee sent the body under an escort and flag of
truce into the Union Hnes. It was fuUy accoutred with
uniform and sabre, as at the time of Kearny's death, and
was accompanied by the horse he had been riding, also fuUy
accoutred. In his letter to the Union general, General Lee
said in substance, that it gave him pleasure to send at once
and with great respect the body and the horse of General
Kearny, a very gallant soldier, feefing that the possession
of them might be some consolation to General Kearny's
widow with whom he sympathized in her great loss.
I have more than once before this audience opposed the
erection of a statue to General Lee in the Statuary Hall of
the House of Representatives at Washington, on the broad
grounds that he was not a patriot, was not true to his oath
and his country at the crucial moment, and that no other

324 PRISONERS OF WAR
than loyal men should receive national commemoration.
I stiU hold this view and holding it feel an especial pleasure
in recording this tribute to General Lee's gaUantry and
courtesy as a soldier, and his humanity and sympathy as a
man. Probably no man among the miUions, North and
South, was more torn by conflicting emotions, or more un
decided as to his course up to the last moment, than Robert
E. Lee. He wrote his son that he did not believe in a con
stitutional right of secession, and saw nothing on the part
of the North that justified it; and, on the other hand, he told
General Scott, that his lands and his slaves were aU he had to
leave his chUdren, and if his State seceded and he did not
join it, he would lose aU. The latter influence unhappUy
prevaUed. These leaders studiously concealed from the Southern
people the conciHatory attitude of President Lincoln, as
shown by his first inaugural and by bis speeches, and the
real intent, the preservation of the "Union as it was," with
which the North took up arms. Lest this be questioned let
Lincoln speak for himself, — and in speaking for himself he
speaks for the North as a whole.
. In his first inaugural he says to the South:
" In your hands, my dissatisfied feUow countrymen, and not
in mine is the momentous issue of civil war. The Government
wiU not assaU you. You can have no conflict without being
yourselves the aggressors."
Such were his sentiments in 1861. What were they in
1865? In February of that year three Confederate commis
sioners, Alexander H. Stephens of Georgia, Vice-President
of the Confederacy, and R. M. T. Hunter and CampbeU of
Virginia, members of the Confederate Congress, entered the
lines of the ist Division of the 9th Army Corps (upon
whose headquarters staff I was serving) in front of Peters
burg under flag of truce. They were escorted to City Point,
where Mr. Lincoln received them at General Grant's head
quarters. The conference was long and, as it proved, fruit
less, but as it was about to close, Lincoln, unwilling to believe

PRISONERS OF WAR 325
that peace was impossible, drew toward him a sheet of paper
and said, "Stephens, let me write the word 'Union' at the
top of that paper and you may fiU in as you please the terms
of peace that are to foUow."
The foregoing quotations and incidents are not recited
for the purpose of again arousing, at this late day, indignant
comment or denunciation of the acts and thoughts they
reveal. They are introduced here simply for their historical
value and are submitted as incontrovertible evidence of
what has been asserted above in regard to the view of the
Union soldier propagated by the Southern leaders and press,
and the feeling that existed toward him on the part of the
great mass of the Southern people fifty years ago. I
hazard little in asserting that no paraUel can be found for
them upon the Union side of the controversy. The simple
facts are that the Confederate leaders brought on the se
cession movement to perpetuate human slavery, which they
beheved to be threatened by the increasing voting power in
national affairs of the Northern States. The difference of
constitutional interpretation was in no sense a cause, but
was appealed to by them as a partial justification of what, for
the above reason, they had determined to do, as shown by
scores of their letters prior to the war and now pubhc prop
erty. They did not intend war, but prepared for it, and
finding they could not carry their States with them otherwise,
they declared and began it, persuading their people that in so
doing, they only anticipated what the North intended. It is
true, as often asserted by Southern writers, that the bulk
of the Southern army did not knowingly fight to perpetuate
slavery, and supposed they were defending their threatened
liberties, but it is equaUy certain that they were deceived by
their trusted leaders at the outset and throughout the war.
The sowing and cultivating of that feeling by defiberate
misrepresentation of the attitude of the North, of President
Lincoln and of the Union soldier, with the great war it
engendered, constitute a crime against humanity, unequaUed
for its magnitude and the suffering involved, and for this
the Southern leaders must answer at the bar of history.

326 PRISONERS OF WAR
EquaUy certain is it that the chief responsibility for their
prison pohcy must finally rest with the pohtical leaders of
the RebelHon, Jefferson Davis, and his associates, and upon
the Confederate Congress, a Congress which approved the
placing of a mine charged with gunpowder under Libby
Prison, as stated in the report of their joint select committee
of the two Houses, March 3, 1865. These political authori
ties unquestionably favored a policy which depleted the
Union forces by the death of their men and the return of
helpless invalids in the exchanges. I say ' unquestionably '
because the Confederate State papers avow it. They found
isolated instances of army officers and civilians wiUing to
be their tools in carrying out this policy, and the general
feeling of the South, already described, sustained them in the
results attained, whUe, perhaps, not chargeable with know
ledge of the full measure of the crimes they perpetrated.
The contrasts that have been thus presented have been
offered, not to arouse sectional feeling and not in a vindic
tive spirit, but in the belief that the truth should be made
a matter of record; that justice should be done to the North
for the way she played her part and, that those to whom these
great wrongs were due should, with equal justice, be placed
face to face with the record they created.
NOTE
Since this address was made, the subject has been somewhat
elaborately treated in the publication entitled The Photographic
History of the Civil War. The seventh volume of this work is
devoted to " Prisoners and Hospitals. " It has been edited by
Professor Holland Thompson of the CoUege of the City of New
York, and much of the material was coUected and many of the
chapters written by him.
I have carefuUy examined his work and gladly testify that it
bears evidence throughout of an earnest effort, quoting his own
words, "to be absolutely just and impartial." That it fails in
my judgment, in some essential points to be so, is due chiefly
to inherent conditions, which I pointed out to him, but of the
force of which he was, and probably still is, unaware. This Note

PRISONERS OF WAR 327
is not the place to refute with detailed evidence the conclusions
and generalizations which I believe to be erroneous, but their
general line may be indicated.
Professor Thompson undertook, with high motives, what was
for him an impossible task. He labored, at the outset, under two
practicaUy insurmountable difficulties. He is less than forty
years of age, and he is a native of North Carolina. His knowl
edge of the war is therefore derived entirely at second-hand,
and his viewpoint, both from inheritance and environment is
the Southern one, the only one in fact which he could hold or
make public without being ostracized by relations and friends
and by the community to which he belonged.
He started, perhaps unconsciously to himself, with certain
pre-conceived theories, and his labors have been in great measure
directed toward finding evidence to sustain them. These theories
were, briefly, that there was no striking dissirmlarity between the
treatment of prisoners in the North and in the South; that such
favorable difference as existed in the North was due to its greater
resources; and that nothing which could be characterized, truly,
as inhumanity or barbarity was shown by the South.
He further tries by the misleading method of percentages to
prove that the ratio of deaths in certain northern prisons exceeded
the ratio in any Southern prison. The fallacy of this argument is
twofold. Percentages to be valuable require equal numbers of
men and equal continuity of death rate, two conditions not met
by his Ulustration. For example, the fact that of two men, in
any prison, one died the first week, thereby producing a death
rate of fifty per cent, per week, is worthless statistically, if
contrasted with the fact that in another prison out of a total of
30,000 prisoners, 15,000 died during a period of from six months
to a year. Again, no records worth naming exist of the great
majority of Southern prisons, even the Andersonville 1864 record
of deaths being admittedly far short of the real mortality, hence
his conclusion is unwarranted for lack of data to substantiate it.
In laboring thus to sustain a theory, apparent in his writing
to any thoughtful reader, he is led into the further error, unwill
ingly no doubt, of omitting or minimizing the incriminating
evidence and enlarging on that which favors his conception.
For instance, on page 80, he mentions the report of Lieutenant-
Colonel Chandler, C. S. A., upon conditions at Andersonville
as clear and dispassionate, but he fails to quote any part of it.

328 PRISONERS OF WAR
Extracts from this famous report of the Confederate Inspec
tor-General are to be found in my address. It is moderate in
tone and merits the characterization of trustworthiness which Pro
fessor Thompson has given to it. But its substance is a descrip
tion of the horrible conditions which this officer saw, and it closes
with a very severe criticism, almost denunciation, of the execu
tive officers in charge, and of the Confederate officials of high
rank who permitted such conditions to exist. It would seem, in
the interest of fairness and partiality, that Professor Thompson
should have quoted the salient features of this report, as it has a
marked bearing upon the mooted question of whether inhumanity
and barbarism were exhibited toward Union prisoners in the
South. Again, the kiUing of Union prisoners after surrender he dis
misses in six lines on page 174, with slight comment, indicating
incredulity, in the face of much confirmatory evidence and official
Confederate documents authorizing and approving the practice
under specified conditions.
The official correspondence of those in charge of Northern
prisons is complete and accessible and their criticisms of defects
and earnest efforts at improvement are made the basis for a
somewhat general condemnation by him of conditions in Northern
prisons; but such records are generally lacking with regard to
Southern prisons, and therefore, with a few notable exceptions,
these are spared criticism.
Many more instances could be adduced, indicating the un
conscious bias I have aUuded to above, which pervades the
work of Professor Thompson, but enough has been said to register
a protest against the acceptance, as history, of many of his con
clusions, while every effort has been made to express this honest
difference of opinion in language which would in no way reflect
upon his entire sincerity of purpose.

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