Andersonvilles of the North: The Myths and Realities of Northern Treatment of Civil War Confederate Prisoners
By James M. Gillispie
(December 2008 Civil War News)

Illustrated, chapter endnotes, appendix, bibliography, index, 278 pp., 2008. University of North Texas Press, P.O. Box 311336, Denton, TX 76203-1336, $24.95 plus shipping.

Reviewer: Michael Russert
Michael Russert, a member of the North Shore Round Table of Long Island and the Company of Military Historians, has a MALS plus 60 hours in American Studies. He is Coordinator of The New York State Veteran Oral History Program.

Review:
The American Civil War has simultaneously been termed the last Napoleonic war and the first modern war. It was a period when medical science was in its infancy and doctors learned on the job, and, in a somewhat ignored field, the operation of large prison camps and their rules and management was relatively new.

The organization and supervision of these camps was in an experimental stage with few international laws concerning the treatment of prisoners, especially during a civil war, available.

In this context, author Gillispie has written an extremely well-researched book. Andersonvilles of the North is bound to be controversial due to the strong feelings concerning this topic. Gillispie provides a probing in-depth analysis of prison camps in the North.

In the introduction he states his objective “to offer a book that does offer a new perspective on northern prisoner of war policies and how Federal officials treated Confederate captives during the Civil War.”

The author does this by “not relying on eyewitness testimony written after 1865 due to their negative view of Federal prison policies.”

He based his research on the Official Records and war period letters and diaries of Confederate prisoners. He believes wartime records and writings tend to be more dependable and not tainted by postwar politics.

The halt of prisoner exchanges of 1864-1865 is addressed as well as the increase in mortality due to an increase in prison populations during that period.

As a yardstick, Gillispie makes a comparison of each of nine major federal camps with disease and mortality rates at Chimborazo Hospital in Richmond.

His thesis concludes that the mortality rate in Union prison camps, not as high as previously thought, especially when compared to Chimborazo, was due to several factors.

The first cause of high death rates, especially early in the war, was because of the relative inexperience of camp administrators and the newness of large internment centers.

Second, in the years of the greatest rate of mortality, 1864-1865, the health of Confederate prisoners entering the camps was tentative due to poor nutrition and fatigue.

Finally, the number one killer among troops during the Civil War was disease; thus prisoners living in unsanitary conditions suffered a high mortality rate due to microbes.

While some readers many not agree with all of Gillispie’s conclusions, or his method of study, this is a new, innovative approach that is well-documented and thought provoking.

The author uses a vast array of primary accounts and government sources to substantiate his conclusions.

 In their introduction to Writing the Civil War, editors James M. McPherson and William J. Cooper Jr. suggested an omission in Civil War studies was a general study of “the prisoner of war issue.”

James M. Gillispie’s Andersonvilles of the North certainly provides a seminal study of Federal prison camps. It is compelling and essential reading and comes highly recommended.