Andersonville (90 page)

 XLIX 

F
lory was carried back to the camps and put in jail—not for the slaying of the prisoner, but for deserting his post. There had been so many other crimes of similar nature that the stockade did not buzz for long about this topic, though the victim was well known. The stockade buzzed night and day about the matter of exchange. With official stoppage of exchange long before, the weaker people had given up hope, the very strongest had felt their hopes watered, thinned to vanishing. No one was in possession of all the facts, many were in possession of no facts at all. Yet they hated ruthlessly and with catholicity of hate. Alike they hated General Benjamin Butler, General Ulysses Grant and Colonel Robert Ould, the Confederate agent for exchange.

A tale which had survived more than two years of war centered around Howell Cobb, who was quoted as refusing to exchange prisoners on a man-for-man basis, when General Wool suggested it. Accordingly Cobb became despicable. . . . President Davis was said to have written to General Lee in discussing difficulties in the application of the cartel:
Scarcely had that cartel been signed when the military authorities of the United States commenced to practise changing the character of the war from such as becomes civilized nations into a campaign of indiscriminate robbery and murder.

So we’re robbers and murderers, are we?

God damn right. That’s why they treat us so. They got us shoved into this one big shit-house, just to keep reminding us that we
are
robbers and murderers!

Charlie, what would you do to that son of a bitch Davis, if you could get your hands on him?

I wish you boys would quit your cursing.
Thou Shalt Not Curse.

It don’t say that in the Bible.

It says not to take the name of the Lord thy God in vain!

Well, Estes, I never did cuss, fore I joined up. Tried not to, out of respect for my mother. Guess I never did cuss much till I came to Andersonville. But, by God, this stink-pot— And when I think of boys I know at home, like Harley Tatham and that slob of a Jewett— Never did join up, wouldn’t be drafted, hired substitutes— And now they’re walking around, big as life, walking down Prospect Street, maybe taking girls for a buggy ride, going on pic-nics to Strawberry Point— Here I sit in this— Know what I’d do to Jeff Davis if I could catch him?

Hang him to a sour apple tree?

By God, yes. By his balls!

For my part, I’d like to hang that God damn Stanton from the same limb.

Why, Shroder?

Why? Cause way back two three years ago he cut loose with that General Order to arrest all disloyal male citizens within our lines!

That wasn’t the fault of Stanton—

Hell it wasn’t—

I
do
wish you boys would cease your blasphemy—

Listen, Estes, the word
hell
ain’t blasphemous—

Well, I do wish—

It was the fault of that damn old Dutch Steinwehr. He arrested some citizens up in Virginia and told them they was going to be put to death. No wonder the Rebs got mad.

Cracky, I remember that! The Rebs said we had violated all the rules of warfare; said we were on a campaign of robbery and murder against unarmed citizens and peaceful tillers of the soil. Or something like that—

If you truly want to know who’s at fault: tis all on account of the niggers. Never should have put them in uniform in the first place!

Wirz is real hard on niggers. Up there at the graveyard. Georgie Hudson went out on wood-detail tother day, and they went nigh the cemetery. Wirz was having two of the niggers whipped. Georgie said they fair to beat the Jesus out of them; said you could hear them yelling halfway back to the stockade—

God damn Wirz to hell. He’s as bad as General Steinwehr.

Two rotten apples off the same Dutch limb!

Wirz ain’t really German: he’s a damn Switzer—

I
do
wish you boys—

This was a reflection of general opinion. The exchange of Negro troops had been a problem insurmountable. The Confederates declared that many of the colored soldiers were former slaves (as indeed they were), and armed by the Yankees. Thus the Yankees were, in effect, inciting an insurrection against the civil populace of the South. White officers commanding those black troops were held to be beyond the protection of any military law, and should be punished according to State laws. . . .

That damn Ben Butler. It all started with him—

How do you mean?

You know what happened when he was commanding over in New Orleans: he hung a citizen, said he had been pulling down a National flag—

The hell with the National flag! I’d like to pull the damn thing down myself.

That’s treason!

If this be treason, make the most of it.

Yes.
Give me liberty or give me death.

Likely you’ll get death.

You’ll get liberty when you die.

Yep. Exchanged.

Yep.
Paroled!

Get shot by that little snot up there on the fence.

You can take all the Stantons and Jeff Davises you want, and hang them on a sour apple tree. Hang them any way you choose; but just give
me
Grant!

That drunken worthless poop! Enoch, wouldn’t I just like to get my hands on him! At least before they rot off. . . .

What’s Grant got to do with it?

Twas in all the papers up North. Didn’t you see me talking to them fresh fish that came in yesterday? One of them was from the Thirty-first, same as me. He had it on good authority: Colonel Ould—that’s the Rebel agent—agreed to a man-for-man exchange a while back, and Grant positively refused. He wept a few crocodile tears; he said it was soooo hard on our men down here in Andersonville, not to exchange them; but it wouldn’t be fair to the rest of the dear boys who were left in the ranks still to fight. Just imagine that!

It’s God’s own truth—or the Devil’s. Grant pointed out that every Johnny held by the North would become an active soldier against us, the moment he got exchanged.

And us?

We’re worthless, we’re dirt.

That drunken skunk!

You know he
was
drunk at Shiloh. That’s why the Rebs ran all over us.

Grant said that if they exchanged the Rebs held by the North, it would probably defeat Bill Sherman.

Bill Sherman! He couldn’t get us into a scrape that old Pap Thomas couldn’t get us out of. . . .

As I just said, Joel, we’re not worth blowing up. Not worth the powder and shot to do it! Just look at you and me and the rest: sick, rotten, starved, hungry, bowels running loose, teeth falling out— Oh, wouldn’t we just make soldiers once again!

Hell, I couldn’t carry a musket fifty foot, let alone my knapsack and forty rounds.

Certain we’re worthless. We’re poison! Just let us set here in our own filth until we’re mildewed—

I’m mildewed already, by God.

If
you boys will only stop—

They felt the deadly justice of their universal opinion.

It was to an encampment such as this that Henry Wirz had returned at the end of August. Wirz came thinner, more probed, more scraped and drained. The right arm burned and leaked as it had never burned and leaked before. The surgeon Greenaway was no miracle man.

Wirz accepted records kept by Lieutenant Davis and the clerks, and tried to make sense out of them in his regular report.

Consolidated Return for Confederate States Military Prison, Camp Sumter, Andersonville, Georgia, for the Month of August, 1864.

The same complaint has been made again against the carelessness and insufficiency of the guard of the thirty prisoners. . . . Perhaps twenty-five more escaped during the month, but were taken up by the dogs before the daily return was made out, and for that reason they are not on the list of escaped nor recaptured.

That only four were recaptured is owing to the fact that neither the guard nor the officers of the guard reported a man escaped. The roll-call in the morning showed the man missing, but he was too far gone to be tracked. As we have no general court-martial here, all such offenses go unpunished, or nearly so.

The worthlessness of the guard forces is on the increase day by day.

H. Wirz,

Captain Commanding Prison.

In Augusta, however, and during the journey south, Wirz had felt that his load might be lightened soon. It was this belief, expressed incautiously to subordinates, which caused the rumors to gush. For several days Henry Wirz had received no orders, no directive of any kind to support this opinion. Nothing in the world could have pleased him more than the withdrawal of the vast plaguing mass. After the fall of Atlanta he was hopelessly certain that a removal could not be accomplished. Yankee columns would go fanning out from the city and slice the railroads, surely. . . . But less than forty-eight hours after the Atlanta news came, Wirz was summoned to Winder’s headquarters.

The old general lay on a sagging sofa which had been requisitioned for his purposes from somewhere or other. He lay there frequently nowadays. He did not lift his head from the cushion when Wirz came in and saluted with his left hand. He did not return the salute or invite the superintendent to sit down.

Captain—

Ja, mein
General?

Shut the door!

Wirz closed the door and returned to stand beside the sofa, while Winder rambled hoarsely. The general seemed to be excruciatingly tired; he had been traveling; probably now he dwelt in dread of capture by Sherman’s cavalry.

We’ve got to get these God damn prisoners out of here.

Where, sir, do you take them?

Savannah, Charleston—maybe even up to Florence. I had another stockade built at Millen. Designation: Camp Lawton. Not ready for them yet, no facilities—

Wirz wondered drearily what facilities had ever been provided at Andersonville.

Can’t bother with the sick; take the well ones. God damn sick can die here as easily as anywhere else. We’ll fill up detachments with only those able to walk. Get them out of here as fast as cars are available to carry them out. Use open cars, flat cars—any type—just so they’ve got wheels on them. Trouble is, half the God damn bastards will go leaping off the cars and running wild all over the countryside. They’ll try to join Sherman; and that’s just what we don’t want. That’s where you come in, Captain Wirz. I want you to impress upon these prisoners that they are to be
exchanged
immediately. A good share of them have their time expired anyway, and won’t try to join Sherman if they think they’re going to be exchanged and sent to the North.