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| Package from Andersonville National Historic Site: Envelope, Traveling Clara Barton, and NPS Andersonville Brochure. |
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| Stamp on Traveling Clara Barton from Andersonville National Historic Site |
Got Stamp #3 today on Traveling Clara Barton! This one is from
Andersonville National Historic Site in Georgia.
Another
place which used my sticker. The folks over there sent me the standard issue
NPS brochure of the site with my stamped paper. So that was nice because I got
to read more about Andersonville. Those brochures are really informative. :)
One
step closer to getting the Clara Barton Civil War 150th AnniversaryJunior Ranger Badge. Three down, three to go! :)
Andersonville
National Historic Site
Andersonville
National Historic Site is composed of three sites: Camp Sumter (the prison
site), Andersonville National Cemetery, and the National Prisoner of War
Museum.
For those of you keeping track of the Junior Ranger badges, it is possible to obtain three (3) Junior Ranger badges here: Andersonville NHS Junior Ranger, Clara Barton Civil War 150th Anniversary Junior Ranger and Civil War Historian Junior Ranger.
Camp
Sumter and Andersonville National Cemetery
Andersonville,
or Camp Sumter as it was officially known, was one of the largest Confederate
military prisons that were established during the time of the Civil War. This
prison was built in 1864 after officials decided to move their Richmond,
Virginia prisoners to a place where there would be more supplies and security.
This prison existed for 14 months and held more than 45,000 Union soldiers.
There were many casualties (over 13,000) that resulted from numerous conditions
such as disease and malnutrition.
The
first prisoners were brought here in February, 1864. It is approximated that
400 soldiers were brought to Andersonville each day. By the end of June, there
were approximately 26,000 men imprisoned in a space originally intended for
10,000. In August, the population swelled to 32,000.
As
Confederate resources dwindled, all available resources were concentrated on
its army. This action crippled the prison; Confederate government was unable to
provide adequate supplies or care to their Union prisoners. The mortality rate
skyrocketed to about 100 prisoners a day.
On
September 2, 1864, as Union troops closed in on Andersonville, the Confederates
decided to move most of their prisoners to other camps in South Carolina and Georgia;
however, the prison continued to operate on a smaller scale with the remaining
prisoners.
Andersonville
prison ceased to exist in May 1865. Many of the prisoners returned to their
pre-war lives. In July and August of 1865, Clara Barton, laborers and soldiers,
and Dorence Atwater (a former prisoner himself), came to the cemetery at
Andersonville to identify and mark the graves of the dead Union soldiers. While
he was in the prisoner, Atwater was in charge of recording the names of the
soldiers that died. He had made a copy of the death record at the end of the
war, which combined with Confederate records, they were able to mark all but
460 graves.
Andersonville
National Historic Site and the National Prisoner of War Museum
Andersonville
National Historic Site, and within it the National Prisoner of War Museum, is
the only NPS site to serve as a memorial to ALL American prisoners of war,
regardless of the conflict/engagement. Congress established this park to
provide “an understanding of the overall prisoner of war story of the Civil
War, to interpret the role of prisoner of war camps in history, to commemorate the
sacrifice of Americans who lost their lives in such camps, and to preserve the
monuments located within the site.” It was in 1998 when the National Prisoner
of War Museum opened at Andersonville, and was dedicated to this purpose.
The
Clara Barton Connection
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| Depiction of Clara Barton raising the flag over Andersonville National Cemetery. Photo Courtesy of nps.gov |
At
the time of the Civil War, there was no system in place to document missing or
dead soldiers. When the war ended, Clara Barton took it upon herself to fill
this need. She began to receive numerous letters from soldiers’ family members
asking what happened to their loved ones who did not return home from the war. Responding
to these letters required a great deal of research which was difficult with the
limited information available to Barton.
In
June, 1865, Dorence Atwater contacted Barton and requested copies of her lists
of missing soldiers. He had kept a copy of the death records at Andersonville.
This would aid Clara Barton immensely in her quest to reply to the whereabouts
of these missing soldiers. She contacted Edwin Stanton, the Secretary of War,
and requested to join in the expedition to Andersonville so that she could help
identify the graves at the site.
On
July 25, 1865, Clara Barton arrived at Andersonville. At the time of her
arrival, the difficult task of identifying and burying the dead was ahead of
her. Atwater and Barton looked through the letters she had received and began
to search the death and hospital records for the missing soldiers. This would
continue for two months. During this time, laborers that had accompanied Barton
began to build the gravemarkers. Barton was able to write many letters to
inform families that their loved ones had died at Andersonville. At the end of
this mission, she would identify and mark the graves of almost 13,000 soldiers.
Barton also led the initiative to establish Andersonville National Cemetery. On
August 17, 1865, it was Clara Barton herself who raised the flag over the newly
dedicated cemetery site; a symbol which honored the soldiers who died in
service to a grateful nation.
President
Lincoln authorized Barton to gather information about the missing soldiers to
inform their relatives, which began her Missing Soldiers Office in Washington
in 1865. She hired many clerks, including Dorence Atwater, which would help her
respond to more than 60,000 letters. Two years later, in 1867 when the Office
closed, Barton’s agency had identified more than 20,000 missing soldiers—13,000
of which had died in Andersonville Prison.
Source: nps.gov
Explore
on, Junior Rangers! :)
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