Just read a book about Andersonville Prison Camp

[Taverner]

Wow...just wow

What is it about that time in history? It seems as if it would be better to die on the battlefield than slowly perish in some prison camp...

And it wasn't just Andersonville - the Union's POW camps were just as bad - and a few years later during the Boer War, the UK was just as bad with the Afrikaans (this is where Hitler got the idea of a concentration camp btw)

[frogmarch]

1. What was the title of the book?

I'd like to read it. Lately I've become very interested in the Civil War.

I didn't know the Union's POW camps were bad too.

That is really something about UK's treatment of the Afrikaans during the Boer War serving as an inspiration for Hitler and his concentration camps!

[Taverner]

2. Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor

It's a novel, so the writer takes some liberties, but most Civil War historians, including Shelby Foote, argue that the book got the conditions right.

[Hubert Flottz]

5. I've read some great novels based on historical fact...

Here are more links:

Allan Eckert:

http://www.wvbookco.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=wvbookco&Category_Code=00e_eckertallan

Denise Giardina:

http://www.wvbookco.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=wvbookco&Category_Code=00g_giardinadenise

James Alexander Thom:

http://www.wvbookco.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=wvbookco&Category_Code=00t_thomjames

All three of these authors make history entertaining. I've read all their books and loved them all.

[sinkingfeeling]

10. I read that book at the age of 11. Had to have a dictionary with me to look up some of the

'sexual' words in there.

[Blue_In_AK]

12. That was an excellent book.

I read it many years ago and was profoundly moved.

[Hubert Flottz]

3. Yes several...

Very sad and so were the Civil War era prisons in the North. I just finished reading a book about two brothers who fought for the Union and one of the brothers died in Andersonville. It's a new book written/compiled by former WV congressman Ken Hechler, based on letters written home by his grandfather George Hechler, who's younger brother John was captured during the battle of Chickamauga and taken to Andersonville.

Check out, 'Soldier of the Union' by Ken Hechler, Pictorial Histories Publishing Co., Inc. Charleston WV.

I've met and talked with Ken Hechler who is in his 90s now and he was a pleasure to talk with. He also wrote the book, 'The Bridge At Remagen' which was later used to make the movie with the same name.

A list of Mr. Hechler's books may be found at this link...

http://www.wvbookco.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Store_Code=wvbookco&Category_Code=00h_hechlerken

[Taverner]

4. And it wasn't just the US either...

I pointed out how the Second Boer War's use of Concentration Camps inspired Hitler.

In New Zealand, during the Taranaki Wars the UK pretty much tried genocide against the Maori.

Cruelty was the law of the planet, it seems....

[11 Bravo]

6. My Great Aunt's father was captured and sent to Andersonville.

He survived and was eventually re-patriated, but "Auntie" maintained an abiding hatred for the Confederacy until the day she died.

[Manifestor_of_Light]

7. I saw the play "The Andersonville Trial" many years ago on TV.

It was on PBS or NET or whatever public TV was called.

It was quite good. William Shatner was the prosecutor, I think.
It also had Jack Cassidy (David and Shaun's father).


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Andersonville_Trial

[canoeist52]

9. "The Andersonville Trial" was pretty eye opening.

I saw it in the 70's as a teenager too. Brought to the forefront the cruelty, stupidity and wastefulness of war.

[LiberalEsto]

8. My husband's great-grandfather was in Libby prison

and later transferred to Salisbury before being released in a prisoner exchange.

[thecrow]

11. One of my father's relatives was in Andersonville.

He wrote letters home from there that survive today.
They had a scarcity of paper so he would write all around the edges of the paper too.
He was released and then was on the Sultana when it exploded.

Story of the Sultana: http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~genepool/sultana.htm

[hack89]

13. US Grant actually played a large (but indirect role) in this tragedy

the practice in the Civil War was to parole prisoners of war instead of holding them indefinitely - prisoners would be exchanged for an equal number of prisoners from the other side. There was no restriction on them returning to combat.

When he become commander of the Union armies, Grant stopped the practice on the practical basis that with his huge numerical manpower advantage, he didn't need to get Union soldiers back while the Confederacy depended on those paroled soldiers as the war ground on.

The tragic result was that the population of prison camps exploded as neither side was prepared to handle so many men. The Confederate camps were worse simply because they had fewer resources - by that stage of the war there was barely enough supplies for the armies.

[cayanne]

14. The Commandant of Andersonville

Captain Henry Wirz—the commandant of the Confederate prison at Andersonville, Georgia—was arrested in May 1865, the only Confederate soldier charged with war crimes during the Civil War. His trial, by a military tribunal, took place between August 23 and October 18, 1865. Captain Wirz was found guilty on all counts and was sentenced to death. He was hanged on November 10, 1865, at the Old Capitol Prison in Washington, D.C.

http://www.loc.gov/rr/frd/Military_Law/Wirz_trial.html

[deaniac21]

15. They took the prisoners but didn't have the resources to take

care of them. The army encampments during the winters were rampant with disease too.

[RamboLiberal]

16. Hellhole of the Northern prisons was Camp Douglas in Chicago

Most people associate the name Andersonville with being the most horrible of all Civil War prison camps. Actually, it was just the worst in a whole line of bad – north and south alike. As a rule, prisons were more lethal than the shells of war. The North’s equivalent to Andersonville was Camp Douglas Prison, also referred to as “80 Acres of Hell”. It was located near the shores of Lake Michigan in Chicago, and was known as the northern prison camp with the highest mortality rate of all the Union Civil War Prisons, an estimated 6,000 Confederate prisoners died there from disease, starvation, and the bitter cold winters. (An additional 1,500 were reported as “unaccounted” for).

http://www.northernsunprint.com/page/content.detail/id/501835.html?nav=5000

[Taverner]

19. They were ALL hell holes

If I were captured back then, I'd take a bullet to my head instead of going to a POW camp

[lonestarlib]

17. My 3rd great grandfather died in a hell hole in Illinois, as did his

brother and several of his cousins. The bodies of 2 of his cousins were never found or at least identified. Most of the dead were dumped into mass graves. Until Dubya, I thought our nation had actually made progress in the humane treatment of POWs. I guess not.

[Taverner]

18. Life really was cheap back then

It's hard for us (well me, at least) to imagine letting a human being starve and die right in front of you.

Too bad it keeps cycling back (Abu Gharaib)

[raccoon]

20. If you liked Kantor's book, you might also like "Andersonville" by John McElroy, a first-hand

account, and "Andersonville Diary" by John Random.

Kantor's character Willie Mann was modeled after John McElroy.

You may be able to find both of these (as well as other similar works) as etexts on the Internet.

I wrote a term paper in high school about Civil War prisons; I still remember a lot of that stuff.