The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1866-09-06
CYuelties to Prisoners.


The trial of Major GEE afforded an ad-
diticnal opportunity for displaying before
northern people the alleged horrors of
southern prisons. The Radicals have made
the most Of this opportunity. We may
infer that the testimony utterly failed to fix
upon Major GEE any offence affording even
apretext for subjecting him to punishment.
Therefore the court only found him guilty
OF "wcakness" in holding the position
"when unable to carry out the dictates OF
humanity THE Confederate Government
not furnishing him with means to feed and
clothe the Federal prisoners under his au-
thority. OF course the dead Confederate
Government is represented as awfnlly de-
linoucn, for no. furnishing food and cloth
inn il did no. haze to prisoners achich it
sought in cr1y manner that Humanity and
in,,7nity could suggest to return to their
homes, utee they ,rould haze been rel fed
and happy. But the Federal Government,
instigatcd by Mr.. STANTON, rejected every
proposition, and absolutely condemned
their own soldiers to remain in southern
prisons under all the discomforts and suf-
fcrings unavoidable in country greatly
deficient in the means of subsistence,
which were constantly diminished by the
burning and destruction, in every conceiv-
able way, committed by the Federal armies
penetrating the country at all points.
But if Major GEE is censurable for weak
ness in holding an office because the Go
vcrnmcnt was short of commissary stores,
the censure would apply to every officer
and soldier who sustained it. The scarcity
was general, and pinched the army as well
as the prisons.
Evcn-handed justice would bring to trial
some Of the keepers of northern prisons,
who could not be acquitted, under the cen
sure of weakness" for holding their
Offices when the Government failed topro-
vide them with the means to feed and
clothe the Confederate prisoners. There
was no such excuse for them. The Fede-
raj Government had plenty and TO spare.
Never was government so bountitully sup
piled with all that could promote COM
fort-all that could furnish philanthropy
and bcncyolence with the means for their
divine muistrations. Yet what tales OF
horror could be untoldcd of the treatment
Confederate prisoners received in many OF
the northern prisons. Open the chapter
= ~ :. a. ,,G
Fort Dclawarc-paint their scenes in the
sunlight of truth, and the world would
stand paralyzed with horror. There is
nothing that the southern man would more
gladly welcome than full and fair expo
siiion of the history of the prisons both
North and South. He would be perfectly
willing to trust the character of the South
10 The test.
Poor WERz was hung-or rather MUIR
dcrcd-altcr a most UNANIMOUSLY unjust
and er yQrte trial by an unlawful tribunal.
Major GEE has been acquitted i'll Judg-
mcnt which casts odium upon the South.
But whenever the facts are brought to the
test it will be found that there are men
who kept prisons in the North far more
deserving of hanging than WEIR; and that
for the suffering of Federal prisoners in
southern prisons the Federal Government ,raS
atone 10 blame.
We trust if there are to be any more
prosecutions for crueltics TO prison.
crs that there is fairness and justice
enough in the nation to demand that there
he thorough investigation of the prison
management North and South during the
war. The war is ended, and there has
been too much of that deliberate and
heartless purpose to aggravate sectional
anmosites by these trials. They have
been unjust, as they were designed to be,
and il is time for them to end. If there is
peace, there must be justice. If there is
Justice, these trials must either end or
there must be a trial of all delinquents /;
and whenever all, without distinction, are
brought to justice, it will be seen who
have been cruel and who have been rogues,
appropriating to their own benefit the sub
sistence and clothing of prisoners, and
growing rich upon this cruel and brutal
spoliation.