Volume II Part 48 (2/2)

”I could not of a right accept your proposition further than to exchange those prisoners captured within the last three days, and who have not yet been delivered to the commanding General of prisoners.

Among those lost by the armies operating against Richmond were a number of colored troops. Before further negotiations are had upon the subject, I would ask if you propose delivering these men the same as white soldiers.”

On the next day General Lee said, in rejoinder:

”In my proposition of the 1st inst., to exchange the prisoners of war belonging to the armies operating in Virginia, I intended to include all captured soldiers of the United States, of whatever nation and color, under my control. Deserters from our service and negroes belonging to our citizens are not considered subjects of exchange, and were not included in my proposition. If there are any such among those stated by you to have been captured around Richmond, they can not be returned.”

On October 20th General Grant finally answered, saying;

”I shall always regret the necessity of retaliating for wrong done our soldiers, but regard it my duty to protect all persons received into the army of the United States, regardless of color or nationality; when acknowledged soldiers of the Government are captured, they must be treated as prisoners of war, or such treatment as they receive inflicted upon an equal number of prisoners held by us.”

This was ”putting the matter offensively, for the purpose of preventing an exchange,” as recommended by General Grant for the adoption of General Butler.

But let us return to the progress of negotiations. In a dispatch from General Grant to General Butler, dated City Point, August 18, 1864, the former says:

”On the subject of exchange, however, I differ from General Hitchc.o.c.k. It is hard on our men held in Southern prisons not to exchange them, but it is humanity to those left in the ranks to fight our battles. Every man released on parole, or otherwise, becomes an active soldier against us at once, either directly or indirectly. If we commence a system of exchange, which liberates all prisoners taken, we will have to fight on until the whole South is exterminated. If we hold those caught, they amount to no more than dead men. At this particular time to release all rebel prisoners North would insure Sherman's defeat, and would compromise our safety here.”

We now proposed to the Government of the United States to exchange the prisoners respectively held, officer for officer and man for man.

We had previously declined this proposal, and insisted on the terms of the cartel, which required the delivery of the excess on either side on parole. At the same time we sent a statement of the mortality prevailing among the prisoners at Andersonville.

As no answer had been received relative to this proposal, a communication was sent, on August 22, 1864, to Major-General E. A.

Hitchc.o.c.k, United States commissioner of exchange, containing the same proposal which had been before delivered to the a.s.sistant commissioner, and a request was made for its acceptance.

No answer was received to either of these letters, and on August 31st the a.s.sistant commissioner stated that he had no communication on the subject from the United States Government, and that he was not authorized to make an answer.

This offer, which would have released every soldier of the United States confined in our prisons, was not even noticed. Indeed, the United States Government had, at that time, a large excess of prisoners, and the effect of the proposal, if carried out, would have been to release all the prisoners belonging to it, while a large number of ours would have remained in prison awaiting the chances of the capture of their equivalents.

Thus, having ascertained that exchanges could not be made, either on the basis of the cartel, or officer for officer and man for man, we offered to the United States Government their sick and wounded without requiring any equivalents. On these terms, we agreed to deliver from ten to fifteen thousand at the mouth of the Savannah River; and we further added that, if the number for which transportation might be sent could not be readily made up from sick and wounded, the difference should be supplied with well men.

Although the offer was made in the summer, the transportation did not arrive until November. And as the sick and wounded were at points distant from Georgia, and could not be brought to Savannah within a reasonable time, five thousand well men were subst.i.tuted. In return, some three thousand sick and wounded were delivered to us at the same place. The original rolls showed that some thirty-five hundred had started from Northern prisons, and that death had reduced the number during the pa.s.sage to about three thousand.

On two occasions we were specially asked to send the very sick and desperately wounded prisoners, and a particular request was made for men who were so seriously sick that it was doubtful whether they would survive a removal a few miles down James River. Accordingly, some of the worst cases, contrary to the judgment of our surgeons, but in compliance with the piteous appeals of the sick prisoners, were sent away, and after being delivered they were taken to Annapolis, Maryland, and there photographed as specimen prisoners.

The photographs at Annapolis were terrible indeed, but the misery they portrayed was surpa.s.sed by some of those we received in exchange at Savannah. Why was there this delay between the summer and November in sending vessels for the transportation of sick and wounded, for whom no equivalents were asked? Were Federal prisoners left to suffer, and afterward photographed ”to aid in firing the popular heart of the North”?

In the summer of 1864, in consequence of certain information communicated to our commissioner, Mr. Ould, by the Surgeon-General of the Confederate States, as to the deficiency of medicines. Mr. Ould offered to make purchases of medicines from the United States authorities, to be used exclusively for the relief of the Union prisoners. He offered to pay gold, cotton, or tobacco for them, and even two or three prices if required. At the same time he gave a.s.surances that the medicines would be used exclusively for the treatment of Union prisoners; and moreover agreed, on behalf of the Confederate States, if it were insisted on, that such medicines might be brought into the Confederate lines by the United States surgeons, and dispensed by them. Incredible as it may appear, it is, nevertheless, strictly true that no reply was ever received to this offer.

One final effort was now made to obtain an exchange. This consisted in my sending a delegation from the prisoners at Andersonville to plead their cause before the authorities at Was.h.i.+ngton. It was of no avail. President Lincoln refused to see them. They were made to understand that the interests of the Government of the United States required that they should return to prison and remain there. They carried back the sad tidings that their Government held out no hope of their release.

”We have a letter from the wife of the chairman of that delegation (now dead) in which she says that her husband always said that he was more contemptuously treated by Secretary of War Stanton than he ever was at Andersonville.” [114]

Another prisoner, Henry M. Brennan, writes:

”I was at Andersonville when the delegation of prisoners spoken of by Jefferson Davis left there to plead our cause with the authorities at Was.h.i.+ngton; and n.o.body can tell, unless it be a s.h.i.+pwrecked and famished mariner, who sees a vessel approaching and then pa.s.sing on without rendering the required aid, what fond hopes were raised, and how hope sickened into despair, waiting for the answer that never came. In my opinion, and that of a good many others, a good part of the responsibility for the horrors of Andersonville rests with General U. S. Grant, who refused to make a fair exchange of prisoners.”

The following extracts are from the official report of Major-General Butler to ”the Committee on the Conduct of the War,” which was appointed by a joint resolution of Congress, during the war:

”Mr. Ould left on the 31st of March, 1864, with the understanding that I would get authority and information from my Government, by which all disputed points could be adjusted, and would then confer with him further, either meeting him at City Point or elsewhere for that purpose. In the mean time exchanges of sick and wounded, and special exchanges, should go on.

”General Grant visited Fortress Monroe on April 1st, being the first time I had ever met him. To him the state of the negotiations as to exchange[115] was verbally communicated; and most emphatic directions were received from the Lieutenant-General not to take any step by which another able-bodied man should be exchanged, until further orders from him.”

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