Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1897-09-07
}. 2O3 ALEXANDRIA. VA, TUESDAY EVENING" SEPTI

no 0OI 0IuDTaC6 tu0 case VI tuo dumis-
sion of foreign State, or foreign terri
tory, by legislation into the Union,
such aa act of admission would have
no binding force whatever on the peo-
pie OF Massachusetts"
If these resolutions do not avow the
right of 81 secession, or of notification.
and threaten that Massachusetts would
exercise that right in Case of the annex
alton of Texas, confess that am un-
able to interpret their meaning.
will not ask space here to pursue
the subject further, but hold myself
prepared to maintain that from 1890 to
1860 Massachusetts has an almost un-
broken record in favor of secession and
publication.
8. DIR. Wayland quotes the conclu
sion of sentence in my book (page
35S), in which 1 say:
e The official reports of the
federal Secretary of War, E. M. Stan
ton, and the federal Surgeon General,
Barnes, show that nearly per cent.
more Confe1erates died in northern
prisons than of Federals in southern
PRISONS
My distinguished critic parades
against me q letter from the present
surgeon general, in which he says that
he sis not aw are OF" any such reports,
and refers to the medical and surgical
history of the war;" published in 1888,
and gives "the death.rate among the
Confederate prisoners in northern pris-
ons," and that among the Union pris-
oners at Andersonville."
Now, I instituted no comparison be-
tween the mortality at Andersonvllle
and that in all of the northern prisons
indeed, l went into no details but
simply stated the deduction from Off
cal figures given by Secretary Stanton
and Surge on. General Barnes.
These figures were first col'ated ty
the National Inteligencer, Washington,
aud have within the past thirty years
been frt quently published, and never
successfully controverted. I regret that
Surge on General George Sternburg is
ignorant of their exisie ace. and b s mis-
led DR.. Wayland into deny their au
thority.
In Lis report for July 10, 1866, Secre-
tary Stanton states that OF the Federal
prisoners in Confederate hands, only
%, SIC died, while of the Confederate
prisoners in Federal bands 26, ,436 died
In subsequent report Surgeon General
Barnes states that, in round numbers,
the Federalds held in prison 22O, 900
Confederates, and the Confederates
held 27O, 900 Federals.
Now, comparing the figures of these
two reports, it is perfectly clear that
more than II per cent of Confederates
in Federal prisons died, while less than
8 per cent. of Federals died in Confed-
crate prisons; and I was entirely accu
rate, therefore, in the statement made
in my book.
If the accuracy of these figures could
be successfully impe ached, that would
not impeach my statement as to what
they show.
But they have stood the severest tests
and cannot be successfully impeached.
In the great debate in the House OF
Representatives R in January, 1876, be.
tween the Hon. James G. Blaine, OF
Maine, and the Hon. B. 81. Hill, OF
Georgia, Mr.. Hill quoted these figures,
asked Mr.. Blaine to verify them, and
used them with tremendous force and
triumphant effect.
In bis reply to Mr.. Hill, with ample
time for preparation, all of the authorl
ties at hand, and all of the officials OF
the departments at his call, MIR. Blaine
did not dare to deny the accuracy OF
these official figures. but admitted them
and adroitly attempted to break their
f,rce by insisting that "during the lat
ter part of the war rebel prisoners came
into our hands very much exhausted,
ill-clad, ill fed, diseased, go that they
died in our prisons of disease that they
brought with them"
This admission, of course, tore up by
the roots his whole argument for if the
Confederates could provide no better
for their own soldiers, they could not
be expected to do better for their prls-
oners; aud it is also very serious re-
Election on Gen. Grant and his great ar
mics of superbly equipped soldiers that
vastly inferior numbers of these emacl-
ated skeletons could withstand so long
his mighty combinations.
respectfully submit that have fully
met the poiols raised, and that, instead
of the author of "Jones's School His
tory of the United States" it is my able
and disting guished critic, D.. 81. L. Way.
aud, who ''s ould make an effort, with
mind discharged of bias, once more to
consider the facts upon which he pro-
poses to comment"
J. WILLIAM JONES,
Miller School, Va.