Andersonvilles of the North

The Myths and Realities of Northern Treatment of Civil War Confederate Prisoners

By: James M. Gillispie

Narrated by: Randall R. Berner

Length: 10 hrs and 19 mins

Publisher's summary

Andersonvilles of the North, by James M. Gillispie, represents the first broad study to argue that the image of Union prison officials as negligent and cruel to Confederate prisoners is severely flawed. This study is not an attempt to "whitewash" Union prison policies or make light of Confederate prisoner mortality. But once the careful listener disregards unreliable postwar polemics, and focuses exclusively on the more reliable wartime records and documents from both Northern and Southern sources, then a much different, less negative, picture of Northern prison life emerges. While life in Northern prisons was difficult and potentially deadly, no evidence exists of a conspiracy to neglect or mistreat Southern captives. Confederate prisoners' suffering and death were due to a number of factors, but it would seem that Yankee apathy and malice were rarely among them. In fact, likely the most significant single factor in Confederate (and all) prisoner mortality during the Civil War was the halting of the prisoner exchange cartel in the late spring of 1863. Though Northern officials have long been condemned for coldly calculating that doing so aided their war effort, the evidence convincingly suggests that the South's staunch refusal to exchange black Union prisoners was actually the key sticking point in negotiations to resume exchanges from mid-1863 to 1865.

History/Military Book Club Selection. The book is published by University of North Texas Press.

©2008 James Gillispie (P)2017 Redwood Audiobooks

Critic reviews

" Andersonvilles of the North is an outstanding work of Civil War history." (Steven E. Woodworth, author of Jefferson Davis and His Generals)

"Will become a major work in the field of Civil War prisons for years to come." ( Journal of Illinois History)

"An important addition to our understanding of the prisoner-of-war issue." ( North Carolina Historical Review)

Fantastic, balanced accounting of northern prisons

No book on this topic will satisfy everyone and over 100+ years of a certain viewpoint being dominant about the poor treatment of Confederate prisoners (which the author investigates) being challenged is bound to ruffle feathers. Gillespie relies on wartime sources from both sides and cross-references them as opposed to postwar memoirs. As a listener you can choose to accept or deny his explanations to whatever degree you want, but they are supported with facts.

Union Good , Confederate Bad

I’ve read a lot of civil war books, but this was probably the worse one I’ve read so far. I’ll give you the gist of the book. Union prison camps were good despite all the confederate deaths because they get an A for effort and nice dispatches. There was no retaliation by union prisons on their captives despite the inflammatory news of the confederate prison known as Andersonville . His dismissal apologies for union failures is annoying as it follows every negative aspect of confederate prisoners treatment. There are a lot of statistics & numbers demonstrating how the Union prison mortality & illness rates were comparable or near the same as those reported in Confederate prion camps in an effort to show there was no bias by the Union. What he should have brought out, and honestly counter to the whole premise of his book is; despite the limited resources available to the South, they were miraculously able to maintain almost the same care of their prisoners as the North. I didn’t enjoy this book. You might ?
P.S.

If you are the author of this book , I intentionally left my errors in my review so that that when you read my review you will think I’m an ignorant snot and then promptly ignore everything I said thus restoring your ego to where you prefer it!