Before resigning to avoid court-martial for his criminal treatment 0f sick prisoners, the chief surgeon at Elmira was overheard boasting that he had killed more Rebels than any Union soldier.
__________________ "I want to bury myself in a den of books. I want to saturate myself with the elements of which they are made and breathe their atmosphere until I am of it."
--Lew Wallace, 1885
Book Description
During the Civil War, James Madison Page was a prisoner in different places in the South. Seven months of that time was spent at Andersonville. While there he became well acquainted with Major Wirz, or Captain Wirz, as he then ranked.
Page takes the stand that Captain Wirz was unjustly held responsible for the hardship and mortality of Andersonville. It was his belief that the Federal authorities must share the blame for these things with the Confederate, since they well knew the inability of the Confederates to meet the reasonable wants of their prisoners of war, as they lacked a supply for their own needs, and since the Federal authorities failed to exercise a humane policy in the exchange of those captured in battle.
The writer, "with malice toward none and charity for all", denies conscious prejudice, and makes the sincere endeavor to put himself in the other fellow's place and make such a statement of the matter in hand as will satisfy all lovers of truth and justice.--This text refers to the Paperback edition.
__________________ "I want to bury myself in a den of books. I want to saturate myself with the elements of which they are made and breathe their atmosphere until I am of it."
--Lew Wallace, 1885
I haven't read it or much about Andersonville (I find these POW stories much too grim to be enjoyable), but I did just read Mckinley Kantor's Andersonville (a novel). In that book, Wirz is portraid as a tortured soul, but certainly not a nice guy (except to his family). The real bad Guy was John Winder in this book. Supposedly, and I have read this elsewhere in non-fiction, some of the locals after a while, distressed at the prisoners' conditions, collected a few wagon loads of vegatables and other food and some clothing and intened to deliver them to the prisoners, but were denied by the Confederate officers (Winder, Wirz, ...?).
__________________ -
"It was a very peculiar time." - Franklin D. Cossitt
Ancestors in USA Army: 6th IA Inf, 11th IL Cav, 1st AL Cav; 122nd NY Inf; 6th MI Cav; 35th MA Inf; 100th IL Inf; 1st CO Inf/Cav; 22nd IN Inf
I remember seeing some place that the south lost 31,000 men to Northern POW camps while the north lost 30,000 to the southern POW camps. Actually The History channel had a really good documentary about the POW camp in Illinois, don't remember the camp but it was referd to as "40 Acres Of Hell". However you cut it both sides should be held accountable for the amount of POWs that they "accidently" killed.
-Jesse
I remember seeing some place that the south lost 31,000 men to Northern POW camps while the north lost 30,000 to the southern POW camps. Actually The History channel had a really good documentary about the POW camp in Illinois, don't remember the camp but it was referd to as "40 Acres Of Hell". However you cut it both sides should be held accountable for the amount of POWs that they "accidently" killed.
-Jesse
The name of the most imfamous northern prison was Camp Douglas. The brutality and neglect there rivaled Andersonville. Neither side treated prisoners well. Trouble is the federals could feed and house confederate prisoners well....if they wanted to. They didn't...to their shame.
Calicoboy
__________________ My dear mother:- I have come safely through two more terrible engagements with the enemy, that at South Mountain and the great battle of yesterday (Antietam). Our splendid regiment is almost destroyed. We have had nearly 400 men killed and wounded in the battles. Seven of our officers were shot and three killed in yesterday's battle and nearly 150 men killed and wounded. All from less than 300 engaged. The men have stood like iron....Maj. Rufus Dawes, 6th Wisconsin Volunteers
The name of the most imfamous northern prison was Camp Douglas. The brutality and neglect there rivaled Andersonville. Neither side treated prisoners well. Trouble is the federals could feed and house confederate prisoners well....if they wanted to. They didn't...to their shame.
A quadruple yup on that one cheesehead. A testament to the frailty of the beast among us. There were, and are, some who ought to be shunned in its most extreme sense; i.e., piano wire, suspension, etc. It was not a nice time, but we still see them among us.
__________________ I never knew a man who wished to be himself a slave. Consider if you know any good thing that no man desires for himself. A. Lincoln
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