The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1867-08-23
Gen. Grant Responsible for the Deaths
ut AcdarsopYille.

A long document appears in the New
York Tribune, purporting to be the Official
report Of Major General Butler ITO the
Committee of Congress on the Conduct of
the War" 1t is without signature or date,
but is evidently genuine, and of recent pro-
ductlon. 1t would seem to have been pre-
pared for the special use of the committee
on the treatment of Union prisoners by the
rebels, for the Committee ON the Conduct
Of the War completed their labors long ugo.
The object Of the document is TO show that
General Grant was responsible for prevent
| ing exchanges, and go, for the sacrifice Of
| thousands OF our men. For the most part,
the statements agree with those previously
| and repeatedly made. In 1863, after ex-
changes had ceased, we held 26, coo rebels,
and treated them well, Butler says, while
the rebels held $1,000 OF our men, who
| were dying Of cold and starvation. Butler
and Secretary Stanton wanted to trea. rebel
officers in oar hand in the same cruel way,
but General Grant objected to any such re-
taliation. In December, 1868, Butler was
appointed commissioner of exchange, al
though it Was known tha.t the Confederates
would hold no intercourse with him. II
April, 1864, General Grant ordered Gen
cral Butler to decline all further negotia-
tions, but to receive all the sick and wc1n-
ded that the rebels would give up. In
August the rebels offered to exchange man
for man. To this offer General Grant re-
piled in a telegram to General Butler
ut is hard on our men held in Southern
prisons not 20 exchange them, but it is HUI
manity to those left in the ranks to fight
our battles. Every man released On parole
Or otherwise becomes an actlTe soldier
against us at once, either directly or indi-
rectly. Ii we commence system of ex-
change which liberates a!l prisoners taken,
we will have to fight untl the wheie is ex-
terminated. If We hold those caught, they
amount to no moro than dead men. At
prisoners North would insure Sherman S
defeat, and would compromise our safety
here"
Afterwards the rebels offered to give Up
our sick and wounded without exchange,
but it was three months before transporta-
ton was furnished, and this was the period
of greatest mortality at Andersonville and
the otheI prison pens. The cist and aim Of
General Buffers documents arc embodied
in this bitterly sarcastic concluding para
graph, hurled ierccly at General Grant.
''The great importance Of the question !;
the fearful responsibility for tie many
thousands of lives which, by the refusal to
exchange, were sacrificed by the most cruel
forms OF death-from cold, starvation, and
pestilence Of the prison-pens of Raleigh aud
Andersonvil!e-b more than all the
British soldiers killed in the wars of Napo-
Icon r;.e anxiety of fathers, brothers, sis
ters, mothers, wives to know the egiscncy
which caused this terrible, and, perhaps,
as it NAV have seemed tO them useless and
unnecessary destruction Of those dear to
them, by horrible deaths, each and al! have
compelled mo to this exposition, SO that it
may be seen that these lives were spent as
a part of the system Of attack upon the re-
bellion, devised by the wisdom of the gen.
eral- lin chief of the armies, to destroy it by
depletion, depending upon our superior
numbers to win the victory at last. The
loyal mourners will doubtless derive solace
from this fact, and appreciate all the more
highly the genius which conceived the plan
and the success won at so great cost. y
Springfield, Massachusetts,, Republican.