Atrocities of the American Civil War?

Answer 1

Prisoner of war camps, particularly Andersonville. Also the Confederate assault on Ft. Pillow, where many black Union soldiers were massacred.

Answer 2

Andersonville Prison for sure. I'd also include Sherman's "March to the Sea". He burned to the ground everything in his path while advancing on Atlanta.

Answer 3

Andersonville Prison was an atrocity. Because of the scarce resources of the Confederacy, Andersonville prison was frequently short of food, and even when this was sufficient in quantity, it was of a poor quality and poorly prepared on account of the lack of cooking utensils. The water supply, deemed ample when the prison was planned, became polluted under the congested conditions. During the summer of 1864, the prisoners suffered greatly from hunger, exposure, and disease, and in seven months about a third of them died from dysentery and were buried in mass graves, the usual procedure there. During the war almost 45,000 prisoners were received at the Andersonville prison, and of these 12,913 died (40 percent of all the Union prisoners that died throughout the South). After the war, Henry Wirz, the superintendent, was tried by a court-martial featuring chief JAG prosecutor Norton Parker Chipman on charges of conspiracy and murder. On November 10, 1865 he was hanged. Wirz was the only prominent Confederate to have his trial heard and concluded (even the prosecution for Jefferson Davis dropped their case). The revelation of the sufferings of the prisoners was one of the factors that shaped public opinion regarding the South in the Northern states, after the close of the Civil War. The prisoners' burial ground at Andersonville has been made a national cemetery and contains 13,714 graves, of which 921 are marked "unknown".

Elmira Prison, in New York, where 12,123 Confederate soldiers were incarcerated; of these, 2,963 died during their stay from a combination of malnutrition, prolonged exposure to brutal winter weather, and disease directly attributable to the dismal sanitary conditions on Foster's Pond and lack of medical care. The prison's "doctor", an Elmira resident, bragged openly that he "..had killed more Rebels than any soldier at the front!"

The Fort Pillow Massacre, where Confederates under Nathan Bedford Forrest massacred black soldiers.

The Lawrence Massacre, where Confederate guerillas sacked and burned Lawrence, Kansas. Between 150-200 people were killed.

The Baxter Springs Massacre, fought on October 6, 1863, near the modern-day town of Baxter Springs, Kansas.
In late 1863, the guerrilla band of Quantrill's Raiders travelled south from Kansas along the Texas Road to winter in Texas. Numbering about 400, this group captured and killed two Union teamsters who had come from small Federal Army post called Fort Blair.
Quantrill decided to attack Fort Blair and divided his force into two columns, one under him and the other commanded by a subordinate, David Poole. Poole and his men proceeded down the Texas Road, where they encountered Union soldiers, most of whom were African Americans. They chased and attacked the Union troops, killing some of them before they reached the earth and log fort.
Poole's column then attacked Fort Blair, but the garrison fought them off with the aid of a howitzer. Quantrill's column moved on the post from another direction and happened to encounter a Union detachment escorting Maj. Gen. James G. Blunt as he was in the process of moving his command headquarters from Fort Scott to Fort Smith.
Most of this detachment, including the military band, Maj. Henry Z. Curtis (son of Maj. Gen. Samuel R. Curtis), and Johnny Fry (first official westbound rider of the Pony Express) was killed, but Blunt and a few mounted men escaped and returned to Fort Scott. Blunt was removed from command for failing to protect his column, but he was soon restored. Touted as a massacre by some, Baxter Springs was another of the events that characterized the vicious Kansas-Missouri border warfare.

Answer 4

I happened a lot more than folks know,if you have watched the p b s mini series it tells about an officer named Sullivan balou that was killed at first bull run. but it didnt tell what the southerners did to him , they dug him up and cut his head off , and burned the rest of his body, there were a lot os southern women using (yankee) skulls for holding face powder.

Answer 5

Andersonville prison.

Answer 6

I was going to say Andersonville, too.

Answer 7

the fact that doctors kept running out of anesthesia so they amputated people's arms and legs off while they were awake to feel the excrutiating pain.

Answer 8

Confederate and union hospitals and medical treatment, particularly amputations.