![]() The prisoners’ families and relief agencies sent boxes Those prisoners who still had money or goods to trade could sometimes entice guards to purchase food at greatly inflated prices at the city markets. “I try to keep each bite in my mouth as long as I can,” wrote one famished soldier. By Novemberġ863, meat had been eliminated and prisoners were receiving little more than nine ounces of corn bread and water. At first, prisoners received a daily ration of a quarter-pound of beef, half a pound of bread, and four ounces of rice or beans. Of America.” This thievery was but a foretaste of what was to come. Upon arrival at Libby Prison, Union officers were generally relieved of their valuables, leading one newcomer to declare that for “making a clean thing of the robbing business, commend me to the Confederate States Turner was the prison’s designated “Negro whipper” and rarely missed the opportunity to employ physical punishment. His second in command, Richard Turner, unrelated to his boss, was a 23-year-old former plantation overseer whom one writer described as “possessed of a vindictive, depraved, and fiendish nature.” Richard Of him, one prisoner would write that his “utter depravity seems to have gained a full and complete expression in every lineament of his countenance.” Thomas Pratt Turner, a 21-year-old lieutenant, commanded the prison. Quarters for black prisoners and a cooking area. ![]() The basement included a room for commissary supplies and straw, which became known as “Rat Hell” dungeons used to punish prisoners a workshop living The prisoners occupied the six rooms on the two upper floors, while the first floor housed officesįor prison officials, a kitchen, and a hospital. Each floor had three equally sized rooms. Separated by thick walls that extended from the basement to the attic. Accessible by rail and water, the prison stood three stories high in front and four stories high in its rear, and measured 135 feet wide and 90 feet deep. The first captives had arrived in March 1862, and by August the prison population numbered 1,350 prisoners, and wouldĮventually climb to 4,000. This strategic decision had a substantial impact on the Union officers confined in Libby Prison. Last weeks of the war, in large part because of Confederate threats to execute the commanders of captured black soldiers, and to send the blacks into slavery. Robert Ould, the Confederate exchange commissioner, “and receive some of the best material I ever saw.” A year later, the Union suspended prisoner exchanges, and did not resume them until the “We get rid of a set of miserable wretches,” crowedĬol. Since captured Confederates were often treated better by their Union captors than they were by their own army, this arrangement clearly favored the South. A month later, 3,021 Union and 3,000 Confederate prisoners rejoined their respective armies. In July 1862 both sides agreed to parole future captives within 10 days at designated spots on the James River and near Vicksburg,Īnd forbade parolees from taking up arms again until they had been officially exchanged. Of tens of thousands of captured soldiers challenged Union and Confederate leaders alike. As expectations for a quick end to the fighting dissolved in the second year of the war, the management The bold escape plan stemmed in part from the breakdown of prisoner exchanges between Union and Confederate forces. Of those escaping, 48 were captured, two drowned and 59 successfully reached Union lines. 9, 1864, 109 Union officers squeezed through a narrow tunnel and fled a Confederate prison notorious for its wretched and overcrowded living conditions, starvation rations and the casual cruelty The Civil War’s most celebrated prison break.ĭuring the night of Feb. A dozen rebel soldiers quickly knocked him to the ground and bound him for return to Richmond, ending the short-lived escape of one of the masterminds of It into the air, Rose ran toward the approaching Yankees. After wrestling a musket from one of his captors and firing Assuming they were a federal vanguard, he rose to greet them, only to find himself recaptured. Of his comrades, he noticed three soldiers to his rear. After five days of torturous travel on foot, he was about to make good his escape from Richmond’s infamous Libby Prison. Thomas Rose could see the Union troops approaching from the east.
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