Fifteen Months in Dixie; Or, My Personal Experience in Rebel PrisonsDay, W. W. (William Worthy)
History
Fifteen Months in Dixie; Or, My Personal Experience in Rebel Prisons
Day, W. W. (William Worthy)
United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Prisoners and prisons
Ans. For the purpose of prosecuting investigations ordered by the
Surgeon General.
Ques. You went there in obedience to a letter of instructions?
Ans. In obedience to orders which I received.
Ques. Did you reduce the results of your investigations to the shape
of a report?
Ans. I was engaged at that work when General Johnston surrendered his
army.
(_A document being handed to witness._)
Ques. Have you examined this extract from your report and compared it
with the original?
Ans. Yes sir, I have.
Ques. Is it accurate?
Ans. So far as my examination extended, it is accurate.
The document just examined by witness was offered in evidence, and is
as follows:
_Observations upon the diseases of the Federal prisoners, confined
in Camp Sumter, Andersonville, in Sumter county, Georgia, instituted
with a view to illustrate chiefly the origin and causes of hospital
gangrene, the relations of continued and malarial fevers, and the
pathology of camp diarrhea and dysentery, by Joseph Jones Surgeon P.
A. C. S. Professor of Medical Chemistry in the Medical College of
Georgia, at Augusta, Georgia._
Hearing of the unusual mortality among the Federal prisoners
confined at Andersonville, Georgia, in the month of August, 1864,
during a visit to Richmond, Va., I expressed to the Surgeon General,
S. P. Moore, Confederate States of America, a desire to visit Camp
Sumter, with the design of instituting a series of inquiries upon
the nature and causes of the prevailing diseases. Small pox had
appeared among the prisoners, and I believed that this would prove
an admirable field for the establishment of its characteristic
lesions. The condition of Peyer’s glands in this disease was
considered as worthy of minute investigation. It was believed that a
large body of men from the northern portion of the United States,
suddenly transported to a warm Southern climate, and confined upon a
small portion of land, would furnish an excellent field for the
investigation of the relations of typhus, typhoid and malarial
fevers.”
Then follows a letter of introduction to the Surgeon in charge at
Andersonville, and a letter to Gen. Winder asking permission to visit
the Inner Prison, and an order of Winder granting permission. The
report then proceeds.
“_Description of the Confederate States Military Prison Hospital at
Andersonville, Number of prisoners, physical condition, food,
clothing, habits, moral condition, diseases._
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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