Camp Oglethorpe: Macon’s Unknown Civil War Prisoner of War Camp, 1862-1864

Abstract

Located along the Ocmulgee River, Macon, Georgia, is known for its International Cherry Blossom Festival, the Ocmulgee National Monument, Mercer University, among other historic and cultural sites. Yet, as Stephen Hoy and William Smith argue in Camp Oglethorpe: Macon’s Unknown Civil War Prisoner of War Camp, 1862-1864, Macon is not known for having been the site of a prisoner of war (POW) camp during the American Civil War. Both long-time residents of Macon, Hoy and Smith recognized that they were living within minutes of an important site that had long since faded from public memory. Taking advantage of their location and the hundreds of accounts written by Union POWs, the authors resolved to bring Camp Oglethorpe out of the shadow of Andersonville and other more infamous Civil War prisons to present this clearly-written and well-researched study of Macon’s “unknown prisoner of war camp.”