The National tribune., 1909-12-23
DIR. "pEMAGARA" KERR,
DIV Il IIfJI'-NVtNHsts v
OF Andersonvillc Malodorous Fame,
Catches What's Coming to Him.

Editor National Tribune: For several
years the writer has either asked to be
excused from reciting his experience
while a prisoner of war or has given
only a mild outline of the severe eX-
posure and suffering during the year
and more confined at that horrible
place The dedication of the monu-
ment to Capt. Wirz was thought to be
only to appease the heartaches of
surviving member of his family, and
the incident would soon pass into OBJ
livion For the sake of obliterating
from the memory of mankind the
atrocities mercilessly heaped upon us
there / was willing not only to forgive,
but, as nearly as possible, to forget the
multiplicity of crimes imposed upon
the helpless inmates of that cesspool
of misery and crime.
But when one reads such an out
burst of rank dissmulation and dis
loyalty as that published over the name
Of the "unreconstructed" w. j. w.
Kerr, who claims to have been doctor
at Andersonville, and we have been in
formed that an effort is being made to
inject the same kind of falsehood into
the school books of the South, it seems
essential and quite necessary for the
good of the common country, and par
ticularly the South, that from the
mouths of the living the whole truth
should be told and the testimony re-
published thru the land approving of
the verdict of the court-martial con-
victing the jailkeeper at Andersonville.
If DIR. Kerr is a member of the L. S.
Marine Hospital Service and is guilty
of writing the letter published in The
National Tribune, he is as dishonor-
able as he is disloyal or he would re-
sign at once. The matter should be
placed into the hands of the Depart
ment of Justice, and, if necessary, from
his own testimony he should have the
same kind of trial as was given his
acknowledged partner in sin.
DR.. Kerr says he was Ito take charge
of the hospital, hospital building and
the dispensary." / was in the hospital
about five months; was paroled from
the hospital March 25, 1865 | never
saw Il hospital building" except the
dispensary. We had tents over us,
nothing but the ground under us. In
the midst of an abundance of pine
boughs, men sick unto death were COM
PEELED to lie on the sand, alive with
vermin and often besmeared with their
own or next patients cxcrement.
Dir. Kerr claims that there were &c.
0O0 prisoners there when he assumed
charge. The records at Andersonville
only claim 33,006 as the largest num-
ber in prison any one day and date.
DIR. Kerr says: Thank God, / have
seen one true history of the Anderson
Vile Prison written, and that by a
Federal officer, who was a prisoner of
war in the prison in 1864 and knew
both Capt. WirZ and myself we'll" Be
it known that there were no officers in
the stockade at AndersOnville, and if
Capt J. NJ. Page has written a history
of AnderSonville it must be hearsay
account, for the officers had a separate
stockadc, remote from the real bull
PEN" and knew nothing or very little
of what was going on there.
If DIR. Kerr is anxious to make him
self notorious he has made the initial
mistake in doing so while so many of
the survivors of Andersonville still
live. We have shown his errors in
some general statements, and we are
of the opinion that the said history by
Capt. Page is more in the Doctors i'm
agination than the facts will bear out
If Capt. Page was Union soldier and
prisoner of war at Andersonville and
speaks the truth, he cannot possibly
say anything that would vindicate eth
er the actions of Wirz or Dr. Kerr, in
what he says. or of their inhuman
treatment of helpless, sick human be-
ings.
Our next National Commander, Com
rade John McElroy, will doubtless have
something to say regarding these mat
ters after his installation. and he is
able and can do it justice, for he was
an inmate there himself. NJ. Emery,
Chicago, Ill.