ARSENAL PRISON

 

In Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell called the Rock Island Prison camp “The Andersonville of the North.” Rock Island ’s death rate was far below that of Andersonville with deaths per year. That first winter of 1863-64, there was a shortage of blankets. The temperature that winter is said to have fallen to 33 degrees below zero for two days and then plummeted to 40 below.

Along with one of the worst winters on record in 1863-64 in Rock Island , small pox, influenza, other diseases, and war wounds, the death toll at Rock Island amounted to 1,964 of the 12,000 prisoners during the camp’s existence. . Prisoners were buried next to the prison.  In the spring of 1864, the bodies of dead prisoners were moved . A total of 171 guards died while on duty at the prison. They were moved from their original burial site to the National Cemetery in 1867

As with any prison camp, accommodations were not very good. There were eighty-four 20 by 100 feet barracks, cheaply and simply built. The wooden frame barracks held 120 men in triple deck bunks with straw bedding and a blanket for each. Each barrack had two stoves for heat, a kitchen for cooking, and dining area were located on each barrack’s end. Nearby coalfields provided the coal that was burned for heat. The camp, rectangular shaped, was on the middle north side of the island with the barracks in 14 rows running East-West. 50 feet from the ends and sides of the barrack rows ran a stockade 12 foot tall constructed of rough boards. About 8 feet above the ground ran a board walk along the outside of the 12 foot fence. A sentinel house stood every 100 feet along the fence. 25 feet from the barracks and 25 feet from the stockade fence was the “death line.” Any prisoner crossing that line would be shot.

Negligence did occur in sick care at the prison. Surgeon A. M. Clark, upon his arrival in February of 1864, found 38 smallpox patients in the same area as other prisoners. Smallpox, contracted by some of the prisoners prior to their arrival at Rock Island , spread through the camp taking its toll in both guards and prisoners. Clark also found the medical staff, either too young or too old, and inexperienced with wielding authority, bewildered by their situation. Clark immediately corrected the problems by having a temporary isolation ward or, “pesthouses,” built on the southern shore of the island, away from the prison. Surgeon Clark ordered a hospital to be built ,and sewers installed.  These measures improved health conditions tremendously and ended the smallpox epidemic.

  After the war, the prison was completely destroyed.  What remains is approximately 1,950 Confederate soldiers interred under row upon row of pointed grave markers to tell the story of these valiant men who fought for the Confederacy.  It is said, the reason the markers were created with points was to keep "Yankees" from sitting on them.