On May 16, 1864, Confederate troops attacked Union positions at Drewry’s Bluff, Virginia. During the battle some 400 Union soldiers, including a general, were captured. James Childs Hitchcock (1841-1864), serving in the 27th Mass. Regiment, also became a prisoner of war. His journal entry written on the day of the battle records his shock at finding himself in Libby Prison in Richmond. A few months later Hitchcock was transferred to Andersonville Prison in Georgia where he died from unknown causes on September 18, 1864. Andersonville Prison was the most gruesome of American detention camps. When news of its condition leaked out to the media after its capture by the Union Army, the revulsion toward the Confederates intensified the thirst for revenge among many Northerners.
Hitchcock, James Childs. Excerpt from James Childs Hitchcock’s Civil War Military Journal. May 16, 1864. Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association, American Centuries. https://americancenturies.org/collection/l00-038/. Accessed on October 16, 2024.
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