Tuscaloosa’s Prisoner of War Camp

Henry Wirz, second commander of the
Tuscaloosa Prison Camp. 

   Early during the war, one local Alabama historian wrote, Tuscaloosa became a camp for Federal prisoners. Federal soldiers captured at the battle of First Manassas were sent to Tuscaloosa. The thinking is that Tuscaloosa was so far south, no prisoners would try to escape. At first, warehouses and hotels near the river were used to house the prisoners. Later, a larger camp was constructed elsewhere.[1] Maybe there is some truth in this assessment.

   On October 25, 1861, Secretary of War Judah P. Benjamin wrote to Alabama governor A.B. Moore about a facility to house prisoners: “I am told,” Benjamin wrote, “you have at Tuscaloosa not only legislative buildings, but an insane asylum and a military institute, all unoccupied. We are greatly embarrassed by our prisoners as all our accommodations here are required for our sick and wounded. It would be a great public service if you can find a place for some, if not all, of our prisoners. We have over 2,000 here.”[2] Added to this, in November 1861, a group of Union operatives destroyed several bridges through East Tennessee. Those who were caught and “identified as having been engaged in bridge-burning” were tried by a “drum-head court-martial” and, if found guilty, were “executed on the spot by hanging.” Those without proof of involvement but suspected, were arrested and sent to Tuscaloosa, imprisoned “at the depot selected by the Government for prisoners of war.”[3] By November 28, some twenty-two prisoners from Carter County had been arrested, sent to Nashville, and were expected to be sent to Tuscaloosa (it is not clear if all twenty-two were to be sent, or just “5 or 6 known to have been in arms.”)[4]

      An abandoned paper mill that was totally unsuited for the job as a prison was selected. When the prisoners began to arrive, some locals were used as guards.[5] Prisoners, at least those captured in the east, were transported via rail from Petersburg, Wilmington, and Montgomery, then steamboat via the Alabama, Tombigbee, and Black Warrior rivers.[6]

   Were all 2,000 prisoners that Benjamin referenced, plus an untold number from the bridge burners, sent to Tuscaloosa? Probably not, but just how many were sent is unclear. There were enough for new Alabama governor John G. Shorter to write to Benjamin on December 19 that he had “Better send no more prisoners to Tuscaloosa . . . Accommodations exhausted.” Also, the state asylum was not available to be used as a prison.[7]

   In December 1861, Capt. E. A. Powell organized a company of prison guards. Powell stepped aside and the company became known after their new captain, C.D. Freeman (Freeman’s Company of the Alabama Prison Guards. They served at the prison in Tuscaloosa until the fall of 1862 when they were transferred to the prison in Salisbury.[8]

   On March 5, 1862, Braxton Bragg ordered that the Federal prisoners in Memphis were to be forwarded to Tuscaloosa.[9] After the skirmish on the Elk River near Bethel, Tennessee, on May 9, 1862, the prisoners were sent “over the mountain by the turnpike road to Tuscaloosa”[10] As early as December 1861, Capt. Elias Griswold was reported as in command of the prison at Tuscaloosa. Griswold apparently held this command through April 11, 1862, when he was promoted to major and ordered to Richmond, Virginia, to be provost marshal.[11] On learning that Griswold was heading to Richmond, local citizens asked that his assistant, Henry Wirz, be placed in command.[12]

   Some of the Federal prisoners from the battle of Shiloh in April 1862 were sent to the prison at Tuscaloosa.    

The Confederate prison in Tuscaloosa was closed by the fall of 1862 and the prisoners were paroled or sent elsewhere.[13] Tuscaloosa was later reopened in the spring of 1864, housing Federal soldiers captured during the Overland Campaign and Brice’s Cross Roads.[14] Just when the prison finally closed and if it was still using the old paper mill is unclear.

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[1] Hubbs, Tuscaloosa, 40.

[2] Sanders, While in the Hands of the Enemy, 49.

[3] Official Records, Series 1, Vol. 7, 701.

[4] Official Records, Series 1, Vol. 7, 701.

[5] Hesseltine, Civil War Prisons, 64.

[6] Colton, Travels in the Confederate States, 60.

[7] Sanders, While in the Hands of the Enemy, 49.

[8] CSR, Roll 0502, M331, RG109.

[9] Official Records, Series 1, Vol. 10, part 2, 298.

[10] Official Records, Series 1, Vol. 10, part 1, 887.

[11] CSR, M331, RG109.

[12] CSR, M331, RG109.

[13] Sanders, While in the Hands of the Enemy, 122.

[14] Sanders, While in the Hands of the Enemy, 219; Radley, Rebel Watch Dog, 170,