Beef Goes to Union Soldiers Held at Belle Isle
OUR PRISONERS IN THE SOUTH.; Diagram Showing the Outline and Surroundings of the Deadly Camp at Andersonville, in which Thirty Thousand Union Soldiers are Confined. Condition of Those Confined at Andersonville, Ga. FEARFUL HARDSHIPS AND SUFFERINGS. A Sworn Statement by Exchanged Prisoners.
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September 5, 1864
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OUR PRISONERS IN THE SOUTH.
The Sanitary Commission Bulletin for the present week, contains the following exceedingly interesting statement regarding the condition and treatment of our prisoners confined at Andersonville, Ga. It will be observed that it is verified under oath by three of our soldiers who were exchanged Aug. 16, and were appointed by their comrades as a deputation to wait upon President LINCOLN, and make representations regarding their condition and sufferings. Originally six Commissioners were appointed by the prisoners, but two of them were returned with the twelve who failed to secure an exchange at Port Royal, and of the four who came through, one, E.W. BOATS, the Chairman, is confined to his bed in this city unable to accompany the Commissioners to Washington. A strange delay in forwarding the papers granting these men a furlough has prevented them from going to Washington as promptly as they desired, but their story, some parts of which are too revolting for publication, has, by this time been laid before the President. The statement in the Bulletin is as follows:
"I am a private in the Eighty-second New-York Regiment of Volunteers, Co. G. was captured with about 800 Federal troops, in front of Petersburgh, on the 23d of June, 1864. We were kept at Petersburgh two days, at Richmond, on Belle Isle, three days, then conveyed by rail to Lynchburgh. Marched 75 miles to Danville, thence by rail to Andersonville, Ga. At Petersburgh we were treated fairly, being under the guard of old soldiers of an Alabama regiment, at Richmond we came under the authority of the notorious and inhuman Major TURNER, and the equally notorious Home Guard. Our ration was a pint of beans, 4 oz. of bread and 3 oz. of meat a day. Another batch of prisoners joining us, we left Richmond 1,600 strong. All blankets, haversacks, canteens, money, valuables of every kind, extra clothing, and in some cases, the last shirt and drawers had been previously taken from us. At Lynchburgh we were placed under the Home Guard, officered by Major and Capt. MOFFETT. The march to Danville was a weary and painful one of five days, under a torrid sun, mamy of us falling helpless by the way, and soon filling the empty wagons of our train. On the first day we received a little neat, but the sum of our rations for the five days was thirteen crackers. During the six days by rail to Andersonville, meat was given us twice, and the daily ration was four crackers.
On entering the Stockade Prison, we found it crowded with 28,000 of our fellow-soldiers. By crowded, I mean that it was difficult to move in any direction without jostling and being jostled. This prison is an open space, sloping on both sides, originally seventeen acres, now twenty-five acres, in the shape of a parallelogram, without trees or shelter of any kind. The soil is sand over a bottom of clay. The fence is made of upright trunks of trees, about twenty feet high, near the top of which are small platforms, where the Guards are stationed. Twenty feet inside and parallel to the fence is a light railing, forming the "dead line," beyond which the projection of a foot or finger is sure to bring the deadly bullet of the sentinel. Through the grounds, at nearly right angles with the longer sides, runs or rather creeps a stream through an artificial channel, varying from five to six feet in width, the water about ankle deep, and near the middle of the inclosure, spreading out into a swamp of about six acres, filled with refuse wood, stumps, and debris of the camp. Before entering this inclosure the stream, or more properly sewer, passes through the camp of the Guards, receiving from this source, and others farther up, a large amount of the vilest material, even the contents of the sink. The water is of a dark color, and an ordinary glass would collect a thick sediment. This was our only drinking and cooking water. It was our custom to filter it as best we could, through our remnants of haversacks, shirts and blouses. Wells had been dug, but the water either proved so productive of diarrhoea, or so limited in quantity that they were of no general use. The cook-house was situated on the stream just outside the stockade, and its refuse of decaying offal was thrown into the water, a greasy coating covering much of the surface. To these was added the daily large amount of base matter from the camp itself. There was a system of policing, but the means were so limited, and so large a number of the men was rendered irresolute and depressed by imprisonment, that the work was very imperfectly done. One side of the swamp was naturally used as a sink, the men usually going out some distance into the water. Under the Summer sun this place early became corruption too vile for description, the men breeding disgusting life, so that the surface of the water moved as with a gentle breeze.
The new-comers, on reaching this, would exclaim, "Is this hell?" yet they soon would become callous, and enter unmoved the horrible rottenness. The rebel authorities never removed any fifth. There was seldom any visitation by the officers in charge. Two surgeons were at one time sent by President DAVIS to inspect the camp, but a walk through a small section gave them all the information they desired, and we never saw them again.
The guards usually numbered about 64 -- eight at each end, and 24 on a side. On the outside, within 300 yards, were fortifications, on high ground, overlooking and perfectly commanding us, mounting 24 12-pound Napoleon Parrotts. We were never permitted to go outside, except at times, in small squads, to gather our fire-wood. During the building of the cook-house, a few, who were carpenters, were ordered out to assist.
Our only shelter from the sun and rain and night dews, was what we could make by stretching over us our coats or scraps of blankets, which a few had, but generally there was no attempt by day or night to protect themselves.
The rations consisted of eight ounces of corn bread, (the cob being ground with the kernel,) and generally sour, two ounces of condemned pork, offensive in appearance and smell. Occasionally, about twice a week, two table-spoonfuls of rice, and in place of the pork the same amount (two table spoonfuls) of molasses was given us about twice a month.* This ration was brought into camp about 4 o'clock P.M., and thrown from the wagons to the ground, the men being arranged in divisions of 270, subdivided into squads of nineties and thirties. It was the custom to consume the whole ration at once, rather than save any for the next day. The distribution being often unequal, some would lose the rations altogether. We were allowed no dish or cooking utensil of any kind. On opening the camp in the winter, the first 2,000 prisoners were allowed skillets, one to 50 men, but these were soon taken away. To the best of my knowledge, information and belief, our ration was in quality a starving one, it being either too foul to be touched or too raw to be digested.
The cook-house went into operation about May 10, prior to which we cooked our own rations. It did not prove at all adequate to the work, (30,000 is a large town,) so that a large proportion were still obliged to prepare their own food. In addition to the utter inability of many to do this, through debility and sickness, we never had a supply of wood. I have often seen men with a little bag of meal in hand, gathered from several rations, starving to death for want of wood, and in desperation would mix the raw material with water and try to eat it.
The clothing of the men was miserable in the extreme. Very few had shoes of any kind, not 2,000 had coats and pants, and those were late comers. More than one-half were indecently exposed, and many were naked.
The usual punishment was to place the men in the stocks, outside, near the Captain's quarters. If a man was missing at roll-call, the squad of 90 to which he belonged was deprived of the ration. The "dead line" bullet, already referred to, spared no offender. One poor fellow, just from SHERMAN's army, his name was ROBERTS, was trying to wash his face near the "dead-line" railing, when he slipped on the clayey bottom, and fell with his head just outside the fatal border. We shouted to him, but it was too late -- "another guard would have a furlough," the men said. It was a common belief among our men, arising from statements made by the guard, that Gen. WINDER, to command, issued an order that any one of the guard who should shoot a Yankee outside of the "deadline"should have a month's furlough, but there probably was no truth in this. About two a day were thus shot, some being cases of suicide, brought on by mental depression or physical misery, the poor fellows throwing themselves, or madly rushing outside the "line."
The mental condition of a large portion of the men was melancholy, beginning in despondency and tending to a kind of stolid and idiotic indifference. Many spent much time in arousing and encouraging their fellows, but hundreds were lying about motionless, or stalking vacantly to and fro. quite beyond any help which could be given them within their prison walls. These cases were frequent among those who had been imprisoned but a short time. There were those were captured at the first Bull Run, July, 1861, and had known Belle Isle from the first, yet had preserved their physical and mental health to a wonderful degree. Many were wise and resolute enough to keep themselves occupied -- some in outting bone and wood ornaments. making their knives out of from hoops -- others in
Our regular Army Ration is:
3/4 lb. Pork or 1 1/4 lbs. Fresh Beef.
18 ozs. Hard Bread, or ozs. Soft Bread or Flour.
1-10 lb. Coffee.
1-6 lb. Sugar.
1-10 lb. Rice, or
[???]-10 lb. Beans or Hominy.
Vegetable -- Fresh or Dessicated. Molasses. Irregularly. Vinegar.
manufacturing ink from the rust from these same hoops, and with rude pens sketching or imitating bank notes or any sample that would involve long and patient execution.
Letters from home very seldom reached us, and few had any means of writing. In the early Summer, a large batch of letters-five thousand we were told -- arrived, having been accumulating somewhere for many months. These were brought into camp by an officer, under orders to collect ten cents on each -- of course most were returned, and we heard no more of them. One of my companions saw among them three from his parents, but he was unable to pay the charge. According to the rules of transmission of letters over the lines, these letters must have already paid ten cents each to the rebel Government.
As far as we saw Gen. WINDER and Capt. WIRTZ, the former was kind and considerate in his manners, the latter harsh, though not without kindly feelings.
It is a melancholy and mortifying fact, that some of our trials come from our own men. At Belle Isle and Andersonville there was among us a gang of desperate men, ready to prey upon their fellows. Not only thefts and robberies, but even murders were committed. Affairs became so serious at Camp Sumter that an appeal was made to Gen. WINDER, who authorized an arrest and trial by a criminal court. Eighty-six were arrested, and six were hung, beside others who were severely punished. These proceedings effected a marked change for the better.
Some few weeks before being released, I was ordered to act as clerk in the hospital. This consists simply of a few scattered trees and fly tents, and is in charge of Dr. WHITE, an excellent and considerate man, with very limited means, but doing all in his power for his patients. He has twentv-five as: sistants, besides those detailed to examine for admittance to the hospital. This examination was made in a small stockade attached to the main one, to the inside door of which the sick came or were brought by their comrades, the number to be removed being limited. Lately, in consideration of the rapidlv increasing sickness, it was extended to 150 daily. That this was too smalt an allowance in shown by the fact that the deaths within our stockade were from thirty to forty a day. I have seen 150 bodies waiting passage to the "dead house," to be buried with those died in hospital. The average of deaths during the earlier months was thirty a day; at the time I left the average was over 130, and one day the record showed 146.
The proportion of deaths from starvation, not including those consequent on the diseases originating in the character and limited quantity of food, such as diarrhoe, dysentery, and scurvy, I cannot state, but to the best of my knowledge, information and belief, there were scores every month. We could at any time point out many for whom such a fate was inevitable, as they lay or feebly walked, mere skeletons, whose emaciation exceeded the examples given in Leslie's Illustrated, for June 18, 1864. For example, in some cases the inner edges of the two bones of the arms, between the elbow and the wrist, with the intermediate blood vessels, were plainly visible when held toward the light. The ration in quantity was perhaps barely sufficient to sustain life, and the cases of starvation were generally those whose stomachs could not retain what had become entirely indigestible.
For a man to find on waking that his comrade by his side was dead, was an occurrence too common to be noted. I have seen death in almost all the forms of the hospital and battle-field, but the daily scenes in Camp Sumter exceeds in the extremity of misery all my previous experience.
The work of burial is performed by our own men under guard and orders, twenty-five bodies being placed in a single pit, without head-boards, and the sad duty performed with indecent haste. Sometimes our men were rewarded for this work with a few sticks of fire-wood, and I have known them to quarrel over a dead body for the job.
Dr. WHITE is able to give the patients a diet but little better than the prison rations -- a little flour porridge, arrow-root, whisky and wild or hog tomatoes. In the way of medicine, I saw nothing but camphor, whisky, and a decoction of some kind of bark, white oak, I think. He often expressed his regret that he had not more medicines. The limitation of military orders under which the surgeon in charge was placed. is shown by the following occurrence: A supposed private wounded in the thigh, was under treatment in the hospital, when it was discovered that he was a Major of a colored regiment. The As-sletant-Surgeon, under whose immediate charge he was, proceeded at once not only to remove him, but to kick him out, and he was returned to the stockade to shift for himself as well as ho could. Dr. WHITE could not or did not attempt to restore him.
After entering on my duties at the hospital I was occasionally favored with double rations and some wild tomatoes. A few of our men succeeded, in spite of the closest examination of our clothes, in secreting some greenbacks, and with these were able to buy useful articles at exorbitant prices, a teacup of flour at $1; eggs $3 to $6 a dozen; salt $4 a pound? molasses $30 a gallon; nigger beans, a small inferior article, (diet of the slaves and pigs, but highly relished by us.) fifty cents a pint. These figures, multiplied by ten, will give very nearly the prices in Confederate currency. Though the country abounded in pine and oak, sticks were sold to us at various prices, according to size.
Our men, especially the mechanics, were tempted with the offer of liberty and large wages to take the oath of allegiance to the Confederacy, but it was very rare that their patriotism, even under such a fiery trial, ever gave way. I carry this message from one of my companions to his mother: "My treatment here is killing me, mother, but I die cheerfully for my country."
Some attempts were made to escape, but wholly in vain, for if the prison walls and guards were passed and the protecting woods reached, the bloodhounds were sure to find us out.
Tunneling was once attempted on a large scale, but an the afternoon preceding the night fixed on for escape, an officer rode in and announced to us that the plot was discovered, and from our huge pen we could see the hill above us the regiments just arriving to strengthen the guard. We had been betrayed. It was our belief that spies were kept in the camp, which could very easily be done.
The number in camp when I left was nearly35,000, and daily increasing. The number in hospital was about 5,000. I was exchanged at Port Royal Ferry Aug. 16. PRESCOTT TRACY.
Eighty-second Regiment N.Y.V.
City and County of New-York, ss. -- H.C. HIGGISBON and S. NOIROT, being duly sworn, say: That the above statement of PRESCOTT TRACY, their fellow-prisoner, agrees with their own knowledge and experienced H.C. HIGGINSON,
Co. K, Nineteenth Illinois Vols.
SILVESTER NOIROT,
Co. B, Fifth New-Jersey Vols.
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/1864/09/05/archives/our-prisoners-in-the-south-diagram-showing-the-outline-and.html
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