The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 66, July 1962 - April, 1963 Page: 14
641 p. : ill., maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Southwestern Historical Quarterly
ilarly.co Mrs. Allen and other ladies sometimes paid friendly visits
upon the Federal officers. On one occasion she introduced them
to Mollie Moore, a Texas poetess.51 The same New York colo-
nel said that Border, variously described as an Englishman,
a monarchist, and "a drunken lieutenant-colonel,"''62 treated "a
few with surly civility, but the great majority with brutal cru-
elty."" The commanders who followed Anderson and Border
did not provoke much comment in Federal accounts of the prison.
From October, 1864, or earlier, until the end of the war, "con-
trol of all privileges granted to prisoners" at Ford seems to have
been exercised by one of them, namely, Captain Joseph M.
McCulloch, Company C, 77th Illinois. Described as "well suited
for the position" the captain evidently enjoyed the confidence of
both the prisoners and the prison commanders.4
A few members of the various guards who served at Camp Ford
proved to be overly zealous in their roles, and their irresponsible
actions provide one of the most unfortunate aspects of the history
of the prison. In the four definitely authenticated instances of the
killing of a prisoner by a sentry the circumstances seem to sub-
stantiate the charge that prisoners were murdered without reason,6
although limited evidence makes it difficult to judge.
The first incident occurred on November 11, 1863, while the
stockade was being erected by Negroes. The camp was under
Confederate command at the time, though it appears that all
the guards were militia. One of them was Frank Smith, who, ac-
cording to Federal accounts, "had sworn that he would shoot a
Yankee before he went back to Tyler." The shooting took place
when two men of the 26th Indiana, carrying a log for their house,
soNott, Sketches in Prison Camps, 172, oo; Bosson, Forty-second Massachusetts,
431; Duganne, Twenty Months in the Department of the Gulf, 409; Bering and
Montgomery, Forty-eighth Ohio, 155-157.
51Duganne, Twenty Months in the Department of the Gulf, 410-411.
g2Bosson, Forty-second Massachusetts, 431; Bringhurst and Swigart, Forty-sixth
Indiana, 127.
5sNott, Sketches in Prison Camps, 2oo.
"4Bering and Montgomery, Forty-eighth Ohio, 251; Illinois Adjutant General,
Report ... for the Years x86z-i866, IV, 654. See also Captain J. M. McCulloch to
Colonel Charles C. Dwight, February 8, 1865, Oficial Records, Series II, Vol. VIII,
196.
seBringhurst and Swigart, Forty-sixth Indiana, 128; Stanyan, Eighth New Hamp-
shire, 504, 510.
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 66, July 1962 - April, 1963, periodical, 1963; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101196/m1/26/?rotate=90: accessed April 19, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.