Andersonville Prison Camp Victims

Andersonville Prison Camp Victims. Once upon a time in Norwich.... , Once upon a time in Norwich... , nine victims of the Civil War were reinterred in this circle. Their stones are marked Andersonville. France's Devil's Island and the infamous Bataan Death March were parallel in horrors to Andersonville where they died during the Civil War., Andersonville, Georgia was a prison camp; the cruelest prison camp in all American history. During the winter of 1864, and the following three months of 1865, 13,000 Union soldiers died. Of that number 15 were from Norwich., The prison was but a few acres in which 41,000 men were packed. They were provided no shelter, only a handful of meal mush a day, and a polluted stream was their only water supply. There was absolutely no sanitary facilities whatever. The clothing they wore was salvaged from their dead comrades. The temperature in the winter of 1864-'65 fell to almost zero. The summer heat reached 110°. They tortured the men. They murdered them. They died of exposure and starvation. These crimes on Americans were committed by Americans. An average of 3,000 died each month; 100 a day, Some were shot by guards for no other reason than they wandered too close to the fence., When the war was over, the City of Norwich sent George W. Smith to Andersonville to bring back the bodies of Norwich's men and boys to be reinterred at this site. There were 30 Norwich men prisoners. Fifteen of them died. Only ten bodies could be identified. Nine of them are burled here. George W. Ward is buried in the family lot at the City Cemetery, and his stone is marked Andersonville. The nine buried here together in this circle are memorialized by the Civil War cannon and the American flag that flies day and night in their honor., This plaque to their memory is sponsored by , Harrison C. Noyes.