Soldiers, of the Army of the united States, execute confederate Captain Henry Wirz, former Commandant of the Andersonville, Georgia prisoner of war camp.  The rope used to hang Wirz is too short; as a consequence Wirz dies slowly by strangulation, instead of instantaneously from a broken neck.

       NOTE: There are several facts not yet lost to history that would suggest that Wirz was a victim of victor’s “justice”:

• The compulsory Union declared medicine to be contraband—the first time in history this had been done;
• Although food was in short supply, the compulsory Union prisoners of war received no less food than did their Confederate guards.
• The death rate of Confederate guards at Andersonville was higher than that of the compulsory Union prisoners of war.
• The highest death rate of any prisoner of war camp during the War of Federal Aggression was not at Andersonville, or even in the Confederacy, but at Elmira, New York, where half of the 10,000 Confederate prisoners slept, year round, either in the open, or in tents.  Food, donated by local churches, and clothing and supplies, sent from the Confederacy, was withheld.  The Commandant of Elmira, routinely refused inspectors from the Sanitary Commission to visit the camp.

       Question: Among the crimes that Wirz was charged with was murder of 13 unnamed prisoners of war.  There were thousands at Andersonville; could no one come forward to name just one victim?

        [restored 4/23/2022]