Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1880-04-07
ANDERSONvILLE,
"A STORY OF SOUTHERN MILITARY
PRISONS"

len, BlaoLshear, Charleston and Florence
No book since sUncle Toms Cabin'' has
had the unparalleled success that has at.
tended the publication in the form of a CO.
piously illustrated volume of series of ar
tieles that ran thru the Toledo BLADE last
year under the title of Andersonville: a
Story of Southern Military Prisons" Such
was the interest aroused by the subject, and
the fascinating manner in which it was
treated that the mere announcement that
the sketches were to be reproduced in book
form was sufficient to bring in orders fu-
more than 10000 copies before one was
printed, and though the volume has been
upon the market now less than four months.
the sales have nearly reached 10000, with
every proSpec; that that figure will be dor-
bled or trebled before the year is out. Ger
tainly no book ever sold itself to the extent
that this one has, because the efforts TO in
troduco Z anywhere have been of the slight
est, and in much the greater part of the
country none whatever have been made.
There is adecp fascination in the subject
Of Andersonvine, for that Golgotha. in
which lie the whitening bones of Is, 900 gal
liant young men, represents to them very
nuch of the dearest and costliest sacrifice
Of the war for the preservation of our ma
tional unity. 1t is a type, too, of its class.
Its more than hundred hecatombs OF dead
represent several times that number of their
brethren, for whom the prison gates of Belle
Isle, Danville, Salisbury, Florence, Column
bia and Cahawba opened only in eternity
There are few families in the North who
have not at least one dear relative or friend
among the &c coo whose sad fortune il was
To end their service for the Union by lying
down and dying for ii in a Southern prison
pen. The manner of their death, the hor-
rors that clustered thlckly around every
moment Of their existence, the loyal, un-
faltering steadfastness with which they en-
dured all that fate brought them has never
been adequately told. Ii was not with
them as with their comrades in the field,
whose every act was performed il tie pres
ence Of those whose duty it was to observe
such matters and report them 70 the world
Hidden from the view of tn -ir friends IN
the North by ,he ;n,peaetratIe veil which
the military operations of the Rebels drew
around the so-called Confederacy, the pee
pie knew next to nothing of their career or
their suiferings. Thousands died there less
needed even than the hundreds who per-
,shed on the battlefield. Grant did not
lose as many men, killed outright, in the
terrible campaign from the Wilderness TO
the James River-i3 days of desperate
fghting-as died in July and August at An
dersonville. Nearly twice as many died in
;hat prison - fell from the day that Grant
crossed the Rapidan, till he settled down
into the trenches before Petersburg. More
than four times as many Union dead lie un-
der the solemn, soughing pines about that
forlorn little Village in Southern Georgia
than mark the course of Sherman from
Chattanooga TO Atlanta. The Nation stands
aghls- at the expenditure OF life which at
tended the two bloody campaigns of 1864,
which virtually crushed the COnfederecy,
but no one remembers that more Union sol
ders died in the rear Of the Rebel lines
than were killed in front of them. The
great military events that stamped out the
Rebellion drew attention away from the sad
drama which Starvation and Disease played
in the gloomy pens in the far recesscs OF
sombre Southern forests.
The author begins with an account of the
raid made into the enemy's country by the
cavalry command in which he was serving
as an enlisted man. They meet the Rebel
cavalry, and after a sharp fight, worst 1t
badly, sending it flying from the field. For
while the Union cavalry live off the fat
ness of the land, but at length they are
trapped into narrow valley, and after a
de perate resista'ce, G.e all captured, and
sent TO Richmond. Two months of hard
ship and exposure on Bell Isle, and IN the
tobacco factories end by their being sent to
Andersonville-the author arriving in the
first squad that enters the pen. Then en-
sues six months of terrible suffering, in
which four out of five of those around him
die. This is ended by the falt Of Atlanta,
Immediately upon which the Rebels, fearful
of the safety of so great a mass of prison.
ers in such proximity TO the National lines
as the fall of that stronghold has brought
about, hurry the bulk Of them off to other
and more remote places of confinement.
The author is first taken to Savannah ;
after a short stay there, TO Millen; thence
to Savannah again thence to Blackshear,
where he is paroled and sent back to Savan-
nah again, ostensibly to be exchanged, but
really to get bin and his companions safely
past Sherman's aGy Gydncing lines and t-ile
them to Florence, s. c., where they are
kept until the Confederacy began going to
pieces In March, 1864
Into this warp and woof of daily history
are woven numberless bits of fascinating
description of thrilling incidents, and even
laughable episodes-for there WAS fun even
in that dreary experience. Among the
most thrilling recital to be found anywhere
is that of the story of the fights with and
the capture and execution of the "Raiders.'
q bard of murderous desperadoes who in.
tested the prison, and six Of whom were
hanged IN ferrorem. as a punishment fol
their multifarious offenses. This is the only
suII and accurate &C count Of this noted epi
.ode that has ever been written. Many yer
sions have been given of this, but they hav'
all been written by men who were misn
formed as to the real facts in the case. Th'
author, being one of the very few OF thos'
now living who were actively identihed VIII
the affair from first to last, has exceptiona
knowledge of that of which he speaks
Letters from more than 5000 surviving
prisoners testify in the strongest terms u
the wonderful accuracy of the book Sucf
a testimonial-unheckt by single dissent