Prison Camps During The Civil War

Life at a prison camp during the American Civil War was not an easy one. It is estimated that nearly 56,000 men died in various camps throughout the country (Hall). That casualty rate is much greater than that of any battle. This high mortality rate was not on purpose but mostly caused by carelessness, ignorance, and lack of supplies. James Robertson, a history professor at Virginia Tech, stated “Intent and malice were never intended.” In the Civil War, two out of every three soldier deaths was caused by disease not wounds. That is an outstanding number which was made even greater by the fact that the prison camps, both North and South, were bubbling cauldrons that harbored many gross diseases. The United States was heavily unprepared for
All of these exceeded their capacity and left men with already meager provisions to be extremely crowded in their shelters. The North kept most of their prisoners of war in coastal fortifications, jails that already existed, and barracks surronded by very high fence. Early on in the war, both sides realized that some less than formal, makeshift facilities would be needed to hold the overwhelming number of prisoners coming in. Once Union prison camp in Maryland which was called Point Lookout housed their men in tent cities That were walled in by high fences. The South on the other hand was lacking even the proper materials to build structures like this and were housing their prisoners in over-crowded
Camp Sumter was in the South and was built around 1864 when some Confederate officials decided to move a large number of prisoners from in and around Richmond to a place with greater security and more abundant food. The prison pen was surrounded by a blockade of pine logs the varied from between fifteen to seventeen feet tall. Sentry boxes were called “pigeon roosts” by the prisoners and were located at ninety foot intervals along the top of the blockade. There were two entrances which were both located on the west side of the camp. Just inside, about nineteen feet from the pine logs walls, there was a line marked by a mere post and rail fence which was called the “deadline.” Every soldier had the order to shoot any prisoner who foolishly decided to cross or even so much as reach across that line. Just the size of Camp Sumter it made one of the largest “cities in the Confederacy. At its peak Camp Sumter housed close to thirty-three thousand men. The original area was intended for the use of no more than ten thousand men. All of those men were cramped into living on 26.5 acres (Hall). Many of the shelters being used were called “shebangs.” These were very primitive structures created from whatever anyone could find. The only source of water for most of the prison came from a branch of Saltwater Creek that was called Stockade Branch and ran through the prison yard. This