Civil War: Andersonville POW Camp & Captain Henry Wirz Trial Documents - Download

Civil War: Andersonville POW Camp & Captain Henry Wirz Trial Documents

4,973 pages of documents, histories, and photographs related to Andersonville Prison, a Confederate prisoner-of-war camp operating during the final fourteen months of the American Civil War and its commander Captain Henry Wirz, who was tried and executed after the war for war crimes.

Only a few Civil War figures are as controversial as Henry Wirz. To some people, he is a martyr or a scapegoat for a failed Confederacy. To others he is the vilest criminal of the Civil War. Captain Henry Wirz's conviction and subsequent execution is still debated to the present day.

During the Civil War, it has been estimated that 194,000 Union soldiers and 214,000 Confederate soldiers became prisoners of war, more than in any other conflict in the history of the country. Approximately 30,000 Union soldiers died in Confederate prisons while the death rate was almost as bad in the North with approximately 26,000 Confederate soldiers dying in Union prisoner of war camps. Since both sides predicted a short war, neither prepared for large numbers of POWs during the four years of conflict. As prisoners were taken, commanders usually worked out exchanges among themselves. Soon an exchange system was accepted by both governments but failed to work due to a variety of disagreements that arose. The number of prisoners of war increased and prison facilities on both sides became severely overcrowded. Mismanagement, lack of adequate planning, retaliation and many other factors led to suffering by prisoners on each side. By the end of the war, camps such as Andersonville suffered from a lack of supplies and experienced extremely high mortality rates, as well as death and desertion by many of its guards. During the 14 months of its existence, Andersonville accounted for 43 percent of all Union deaths during the Civil War.

Captain Henry Wirz was still at his post when U.S. Cavalry Captain Henry E. Noyes arrived at Andersonville in early May 1865 with orders for his arrest. Noyes took Wirz to Washington in late May. General Lew Wallace presided over a military commission which tried Wirz for: (1) conspiring with Jefferson Davis, Howell Cobb, John H., Richard B., and W.S. Winder, Isaiah H. White, R. Randolph Stevenson, and others to "Impair and injure the health and to destroy the lives.., of large numbers of federal prisoners.., at Andersonville" and (2) "murder, in violation of the laws and customs of war." Lasting two and a half months, during the course of the trial nearly 150 former prisoners, civilians, and confederate officers, officials, and guards testified about conditions at the prison.

One of the great paradoxes of the Wirz Trial is that both the prosecution and the defense sought to prove that Captain Wirz was following orders; the prosecutors hoped to convict higher ranking Confederate officials and Wirz hoped to absolve himself by passing responsibility up the chain of command. As in nearly every military tribunal, the "following orders" defense did not work. Wirz could blame the poor logistics and overcrowding on his superiors, but he could not escape his own orders and actions. He was convicted of conspiracy and murder. The sentence was carried out on November 10, 1865, in the courtyard of old Capitol Prison.

Material in this collection includes:

Trial of Henry Wirz - Report from the Department of War

This 900-page report, Published at the request of Congress, covers procedural documents and  a transcript of the trial of Captain Wirz. In the words of the compiler, "It is arranged in narrative form for the sake of compactness and as being more easily read, the exact language of each witness being given as nearly as practicable. In cases where the meaning of a witness is doubtful or his answer evasive, and also where the testimony is of great importance, the questions and answers have been given."

 
Photographs taken by AJ Riddle

Photographer AJ Riddle visited Andersonville in August 1864 and took the only known photographs of the prison during its operation.

 
Thomas O'Dea's drawing of the Andersonville Prison

21 drawings of Anderson Prison made by former prisoner Thomas O'Dea.

 
Wirz Compiled Confederate Service Record.

The Compiled Confederate service record for Captain Henry Wirz.

 
Prisoner Photographs Associated with Andersonville

These photographs are often linked to Andersonville, even though some are not of Andersonville prisoners. Many of the famous photographs were actually of recently released prisoners from Richmond in early 1864. After the prisoner exchange cartel broke down, large numbers of Union soldiers captured in late 1863 were crammed into warehouses around Richmond and on Belle Isle.

 
Photographs of the Execution of Henry Wirz

Photographs taken on November 10, 1865 by Alexander Gardner of the execution of Captain Henry Wirz, at the Old Capitol Prison in Washington D.C.

 
Report on the Treatment of Prisoners of War by the Rebel Authorities During the War of the Rebellion (1869)

This document is the report of a House of Representatives committee which interviewed former prisoners of war and civilians imprisoned by the Confederate States of America during the Civil War. Very much a political document, the report still contains much material of interest. Beginning on page 787 of the report are transcripts and written statements of Union POWs, telling their own experiences.

 
Contributions Relating to the Causation and Prevention of Disease, and to Camp Diseases; Together with a Report of the Diseases, Etc., Among the Prisoners at Andersonville, GA (1867)

This report by the non-governmental U.S. Sanitary Commission is devoted to a series of medical issues pertaining to the Civil War. A third of the book is devoted to Andersonville, written by Confederate surgeon Joseph Jones, M.D. Portions of his essay are derived from the report he attempted to suppress at the end of the war.
 

A List of the Union Soldiers Buried at Andersonville (1866) 

Published in 1866, this report provides a list of the dead at Andersonville, taken from Dorence Atwater's secret copy of the official Confederate records. Dorence, a prisoner held at Andersonville for eleven months, spent much of his time held at the prison as a paroled prisoner, working in the hospital office as a clerk. It was in this capacity that he made a secret copy of the death register. He and Clara Barton accompanied the Army expedition to Andersonville in the summer of 1865.


Life and Death in Rebel Prisons (1865)

Published as the war ended, this prisoner memoir is important because it is among the very first book to tell the Andersonville experience to a national audience. The book also contains descriptive information on other Confederate military prisons, written by men held at each of the locations.

 
Andersonville National Historic Site Historic Resource Study (1970)

A 330-page comprehensive history of the Andersonville Prison.

 
National Park Service Fact Sheets

25 fact sheets produced by the NPS covering topics such as African Americans at Andersonville,  American Indians at Andersonville, Clara Barton, Father Whelan, Hispanic prisoners in the Civil War,  and myths about the prison.

 
The Trial of Henry Wirz  - A Mock Trial Lesson Plan Examining the Laws of War (2012)

A study activity produced by the Andersonville National Historic Site.

 
A History of Camp Douglas Illinois, Union Prison, 1861-1865

A comprehensive history of Camp Douglas by the National Park Service. Camp Douglas, in Chicago, Illinois, sometimes described as "The North's Andersonville," was one of the largest Union Army prisoner-of-war camps for Confederate soldiers taken prisoner during the American Civil War

 
Military Law Review Vol. 68 Article - Hell And The Devil Andersonville And The Trial Of Captain Henry Wirz, C.S.A., 1865 (1968)

 
Books

Andersonville A Story of Rebel Military Prisons, Fifteen Months A Guest Of The So-Called Southern Confederacy A Private Soldier's Experience In Richmond, Andersonville, Savannah, Millen, Blackshear, And Florence by John Mcelroy. (1879)

Andersonville The Story of a Civil War Prison Camp (1972)

The Horrors of Andersonville Rebel Prison - Trial of Henry Wirz, The Andersonville Jailer - Jefferson Davis' Defense of Andersonville Prison Fully Refuted (1891)

Escape of a Confederate Officer from Prison. What He Saw at Andersonville. How He Was Sentenced to Death and Saved by the Interposition of President Abraham Lincoln (1892)

Washington, D.C. Reading the death warrant to Wirz on the scaffold