Prison Camps In African American Civil War

On the 12th day of April 1861, a shot was fired in South Carolina that would start a war between the states. This war would last just a little over four years yet nearly 620,000 people would die as a result and of this an estimated 56,000 would die in prison camps. During this military engagement, both sides took prisoners and built prisoner of war (P.O.W.) camps. In all there were over 150 prison camps built, these camps would come to hold more prisoners than they were ever meant to hold. During the first few months of the war, the two sides had a prisoner exchange set up. This exchange lasted until the union wanted to exchange African-American prisoners for confederates. The Unions’ main camps were Camp Douglas, Johnsons Island, Elmira Prison,

Of the 18,000, confederate soldiers who would walk through the gates of the camp more than 3100 men would die within the walls of Camp Douglas. Camp Douglas was built on the shores of Lake Michigan in 1861 as a training camp for Union soldiers. In 1862, the camp got its first prisoners from the capture of Fort Donaldson in Tennessee. The prisoners that would call Camp Douglas their home would face harsh conditions during the winter months. During the winter months, many times the prisoners would be deprived of blankets and packed into barracks, which were overcrowded and lacked a heat source. The Confederate troops that were brought here were often times treated harshly by the African-American prison guards that were employed by the

Belle Island was opened in 1863 and held 3,000 tents however; there were no wooden structures on the base. The prisoners on the island were allowed to swim in the river for recreation even though many tried to escape. The men on Belle Island were exposed to harsh seasonal conditions due to the lack of permanent structures in the camp. At one point during it 2 years of operation, the camp housed almost 10,000 union soldiers. The true number of deaths on Belle Island is not known the confederacy said the death count of the camp was in the low hundreds, where as the union said it was upwards of 15,000 deaths. The men held at Belle Island faced disease and malnutrition during the later years of the war as the provisions for those is the Confederacy were