Today, it’s a peaceful place, a green rolling hill dotted with a few monuments and markers. But knowing what happened here in 1864-5, imagining what those human beings endured, the hellish conditions, will haunt me for a very long time.
45,000 Union soldiers were confined in a 26-acre stockade during the fourteen months this Civil War prison existed. Almost 13,000 died here. Overcrowded, living in filthy and unsanitary conditions, exposed to the elements, they died of starvation and disease, sometime at the rate of 100 a day.
This park is a tribute to them. You can walk or drive (audio tapes available for $2) the original prison site, with its rebuilt stockade wall sections and remnants of escape tunnels, as well as the Civil War Cemetery, their final resting place, within the larger National Cemetery. We found the two films at the Visitor Center to be a moving prelude to the visit.
The park also pays tribute to all POW’s from the American Revolution to the Iraq War, at the National Prisoner of War Museum. A fascinating tribute to the human spirit.
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