Army’s 1861 Regulations
ARTICLE XXXV Section 747
“Exchanges of prisoners and release of officers on parole depend on the orders of the General commanding-in-chief, under the instructions of government.”
Throughout the Civil War, some soldiers became prisoners. In such cases representatives from either the United States Army or Confederate Army held prisoner exchanges. Article XXXV Section 747 of the 1861 Army Regulations required exchanges to be conducted under the authorization of the Federal government, preventing individual regiments from negotiating prisoner exchanges on their own.
Prisoner exchanges became more complicated after the Union Army began enlisting African American Regiments, including the Massachusetts 54th and 55th Volunteer Infantry. Under an official statute passed by the Confederate Congress, African American soldiers and who were captured by the Confederacy were turned over to the states for trial and usually returned to slavery, while white officers of black regiments were subject to execution.Moreover, Jefferson Davis, the President of the Confederacy approved of the execution of black soldiers as an “example to discourage the arming of slaves.”1 Nevertheless, the Confederacy’s treatment of the African-American troops it captured varied. Some were executed in the field, but others were sent to prison camps. Many of the 54th’s enlisted men taken during the assault on Battery Wagner were imprisoned in Charleston.
This entry in John Ritchie’s diary documented a prisoner exchange in which 50 rebel officers were traded for an equal number of United States soldiers. Both sides also exploited prisoners for strategic and diplomatic means. In 1864, the Confederate Army placed 50 Union officers inside a Charleston house that was directly in the line of Union artillery fire to prevent the Union forces from shelling the city. The United States retaliated by placing 600 Confederate prisoners on the stockade at Morris Island, subjecting the prisoners to Confederate fire for 45 days.
Being a prisoner on either side exposed soldiers to wretched conditions. As the war dragged on, prisoner exchanges became less common.
Ethan Toro, September 20, 2013
End Note
1. James McPherson, Battle Cry of Freedom (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 566.
Emancipation Project 