Andersonville Prison

Andersonville prison opened on Feb.

24, 1864. It was the ideal prison.

It's located in Sumpter County,

Georgia. The prison was originally

called Camp Sumpter. At first it was

16.5 acres then expanded to 26

acres. It was 1010' long and 780'

wide, constructed of pine logs with

thickness of a foot. A small creek

ran through the middle, it was the

only source of water.

The prison caused many things like:

misery, suffering, and death. It was

only open for 14 months; from Feb.

1864 till May 1865. During that

time,13,700 died in confinement.

They died of various reasons like:

tainted food, starvation, dirty

water, filth, and diseases such as

scurvy, gangrene.

The prison was designed to hold only

10,000 union soldiers. In June,

1864, it held 20,000 men and in Aug.

'64 it held a whopping 33,000! A

total of 49,485 men were detained.

In 1822 Henry Wirz was born. He

earned a medical degree. He was a

captain. He worked at other prisons

before taking command of

Andersonville in April, 1865. He

became a major at the end of the

war. He was took into custody by the

Union in Nov. . On Nov. 10 1865 he

was hanged in the Old Prison in

Wash. DC for various war crimes,

such as: murders of Union soldiers.

It is now a national cemetery and it

became a national historic site in

1970.

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