Death at Point Lookout

During the Civil War, Point Lookout became an isolated prisoner of war camp chosen by Union forces in 1863, where over 50,000 Confederate soldiers were confined in tents and crude buildings. Crowded conditions, insufficient food, contaminated water, and exposure to harsh weather led to disease, and dysentery, tuberculosis, and smallpox spread quickly among men, many from rural areas who had no previous exposure to these illnesses. Ill-equipped hospital stewards could not contain the contagion, and in just three years over 4500 people were buried there. The dead were placed in five separate cemeteries: one for smallpox victims, one for Union soldiers, one for African-American soldiers, and two for Confederate prisoners of war. Bodies of Confederate prisoners were collected by horse-drawn wagons and carried to open trenches, where they were laid side by side and covered with dirt, and the remains were later removed elsewhere for proper burial. None of these graveyards exist today.

Maryland · United States