Wilmington journal., 1870-09-30
Horrors of Aysaersonvule.


A great deal of the bitter Zee ling at the
North towards the South and the atrocious
/ legislation thrust upon us are due to the
belief that Federal soldiers were brutally
treated in the South. Three years ago,
the ''Land We Love" proved, from official
mortuary statistics, that the mortality was
propOrtionally greater among Confederate
than among Federal prisoners. We imagine
that the extract below, from Mr.. Stephens
book, will forever set that matter at rest.
If Wirz deserved to be hanged for his
treatment of Federal prisoners, surely the
Federal jailors deserved to be burned
| We mean burned in this world. But the
strangest part of the whole thing is, that
those who howled SO piteously about the
treatment of Yankee prisoners, took up the
chief criminal and made him President Of
the United States
Mr.. Stephens says of the Federal pris-
| oners:
Large numbers of them were taken to
| South western Georgia in 1864. because
it was a section most remote and secure
! from the invading Federal Armies, and
! because, too, it was country of all others,
| then within the Confederate limits, not
i thus threatened with an invasion, most
| abundant with food, and-a all resources at
command for the health and comfort of
prisoners. They were put in one stock
| ade for the want of men to guard more
than one. The section of country, more
over, was not regarded as more unhealthy
or more subject to malariou3 influences
than any IN the central part of the State.
! The Official Order for the erection of the
stCckade euioined that it should be in "a
healthy locality, plenty of pure water,
running stream, and, if possible, shade
| trees, aud in the Immediate neighborhood
Of grist aud saw mills" The very selec-
tion of the locality, SO fer from being,
yon suppose, made with cruel designs
| against the prisoners, was governed by
the most humane considerations.
Your question might, with much more
point, be retorted by asking, why were
Southern prisoners taken in the dead of
winter with their thin clothing to Camp
| Douglass, Rock Island, and Johnson's
ISland-icy regions of the North-where
1t is q notorious fact that many of them
actually froze to death ?
AS far as mortuary returns afford evi-
dence of the general treatment of prison
ers on both sides, the figures show nothing
to the disadvantage of the Confederates,
notwithstanding their limited supplies Of
all kinds, and notwithstanding all that
has been said of the horrible sacrifice of
life at AudersonYile.
1t now appears that q larger number of
Confederates died in Northern, than Of
Federals in Southern prisons or stockades
L l. u
War, on the 10Th of July. 1866, exhibits
the TACT that, of the Federal prisoners i'll
Confederate hands during the war, only
%, SIG died; while of the Confederate
prisoners in Federal hands 26, 436 died.
This report does not set forth the exact
number of prisoners held by each side rc-
speotively. These facts were given more
in detail in a subsequent report by Sur
geon General Barnes, of the United States
A h14
according to a statement. editorially, in
the National Letelhgencer-very high au
thority-it appears, from the Surgeon
Generals report, that the whole number
of Federal prisoners captured by the Con
federates and held in Southern prisons,
from first to last, during the war, was, in
round numbers, 27O, 900 while the whole
number of Confederates captured and held
in prisons by the Federals was. in
like round numbers, only 100000. From
these two reports it appears that, with
50, 600 more prisoners in Southern stock
ades, or other modes of confinement,
the deaths were nearly 1000 less Ac-
cording to these figures, the per centaena of.
Federal deaths in Southern prisons was
ANGER nine i! while the per centuna of Con-
federate deaths in Northern prisons was
ouer toCeEue! These mortality statistics are
of no small weight in determining on which
side there was the most neglect, cruelty,
and inhumanity
But the great question in this matter is.
upOn aUh0na does this tremendous responsible
ity rest of all this sacrifice of human life,
with all its indescribable miseries and suf-
ferings The facts, beyond question or
doubt, show that it rests entirely upon the
authorities at Washington tits now we'll
understood to have been a part OF their
settled policy in conducting the war, not to
exchange prisoners. The grounds upon
which this extraordinary course was adopt
ed were that it was humanity to the men
in the field, on their side, TO let their cap
tured comrades perish In prison rather
han to let an equal number of Confeder-
ate soldiers be released on exchange to
meet them in battle Upon the Federal
authorities, and upon them only, with this
policy as their excuse, rests the whole of
this responsibility. To avert the indigna-
tion which the open avOwal of this policy
by them, at the time, would ha We excited
throughout the North, and throughout the
civilized world. the false cry of cruelty to-
wards prisoners was raised against the
Confederates. This was but pretext to
cover their own violation of the usages of
war in this respect among civilized ma
tiOns.
Other montrous violations of like usages
were not attempted to be palliated by
them, or even covered by II pretext.-
These were, as you must admit, open,
avowed and notorious. 1 refer not only to
the general sacking of private houses-the
pillaging of money, plate, jewels and 9th
Ell light articles of value. with the destruc-
ton of books, works of art, paintings,
pictures, private manuscript and family
relics. but allude, besides these things,
especially to the hostile acts directly
against property of all kinds, as well as
outrages upon non -combatants- to the lay
ing waste of whole sections of country;
the attempted annihilation of all the ne
cessaries of life, to the wanton killing, in
many instances, of farm stock and domes-
tic animals. the burning of mills, factories
/ and barns, with their contents of grain
and forage, not sparing orchards Or grow
ing crops, or the implements of husband
ry; the mutilation of county and municip-
al records of great value; the extraordi-
,,,o1o IN CFir corv;lo