"For I am tired of Cecesia": History and Archaeology of Confederate Guards and Union Prisoners of War at Camp Lawton

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "“We Go to Gain a Little Patch of Ground. That hath in it no profit but the name”: Revolutionary Research in Archaeologies of Conflict" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Conflict sites, from battlefields to internment camps, exist frozen in time, with assemblages that characterize some of the most direct evidence of human agency. For the Civil War, the historiography of Union Prisoners of War focused on their treatment as an unintentional tragedy, resulting from a collapsing Confederate state that equally affected guards. However, debates around Union POWs and guard access to medicine, clothing, and food continue. Camp Lawton, a Confederate camp for Union POWs in southeast Georgia, was finished in September, and abandoned by November, 1864, in fear of Sherman’s march. This paper compares evidence from POW and Confederate areas and offers initial comparisons of the material culture assemblage, its global nature, and the emerging picture of access to necessities and luxuries by Confederate guards. The perspective of history is clouded by Lost Cause ideologies and the psychological trauma of the POWs themselves. Conflict archaeology can clear these clouds.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• “We Go to Gain a Little Patch of Ground. That hath in it no profit but the name”: Revolutionary Research in Archaeologies of Conflict   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2020

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 702