University of South Carolina Scholar Commons Archaeology and Anthropology, South Carolina Faculty & Staff ubP lications Institute of 7-1998 The lorF ence Stockade Project Jonathan Leader University of South Carolina - Columbia, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/sciaa_staffpub Part of the Anthropology Commons Publication Info Published in Legacy, Volume 3, Issue 2, 1998, pages 14-16. http://www.cas.sc.edu/sciaa/ © 1998 by The outhS Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Anthropology This Article is brought to you by the Archaeology and Anthropology, South Carolina Institute of at Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty & Staff ubP lications by an authorized administrator of Scholar Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Florence Stockade Project location was removed from the rapidly expanding front and major southern By Jonathan M. Leader population centers. It was also served by one of the few remaining railroad The Office of the State Archaeologist is realities of management and life in the lines. From a political and military assisting the Florence Historical War's prisoner-of-war camps. It is a standpoint it seemed to be an ideal Society and the City of Florence, South sad fact that these institutions have choice. Unfortunately, the transfer of Carolina in assessing and delineating been neglected in serious research. ill prisoners to the camp, the over­ the portion of the Civil War-era The decision to erect a stockade at crowded conditions, the general Florence Stockade located on city Florence was based upon several breakdown in supply lines, the lack of property. Originally scheduled for factors. Sherman's advance through supplies in the immediate area, and development as a ball park and picnic Georgia made it necessary for a new the lack of competent management area, the site may eventually have location to be found to receive made the Florence Stockade a night­ interpretive displays, mare for the prisoners a small museum, kept there. and reconstruction The Florence of a portion of the Stockade operated from stockade palisade September 12, 1864 to wall and main gate. no later than February The archaeology at 22, 1865. It was the site has focused formally recorded as on identifying the disbanded in a Confed­ gross architectural erate dispatch of March features of the moat, 10, 1865. During its earthen berm, operation, between palisade wall, 15,000 and 18,000 "deadline," main Union soldiers passed ga te, prison hospital, through the prison. and guard house. Better than 2,300 Funded, supported, prisoners died there, and initiated by the the victims of disease, Florence Historical malnutrition, exposure, Society, this work and, to a lesser extent, has been immeasur­ random acts of brutal­ Preliminary map of the east end of the Florence Stockade. (Ervin Engineering Company, Florencel ably enhanced by the ity. The dead were actions of local and University prisoners from earlier camps, as these buried in two locations. The first volunteers, the City of Florence staff, were being over-run. Second, newly burial ground was outside the the Florence Historical Commission, captured Union soldiers from the Stockade and dates to the building and the Friends of the Florence Stockade, campaign needed to be removed from earliest occupation of the camp. The and the Columbia office of the SCIAA forward areas to secure confinement in second cemetery was located on the Underwater Archaeology Division. the rear. Several Confederate dis­ nearby Jarrott plantation and became The Florence Stockade (38FL2) patches note that having captured necessary when the number of dead holds an important place in South soldiers in their areas invited attacks. averaged between 20 and 30 a day. In Carolina's history. Numerous articles, Third, the outbreak of yellow fever in both instances, slit trenches were used books, and monographs cover the Charleston and its environs was for the hasty entombing of the State's involvement in the politics, blamed on the prisoners and the deceased. economy, military actions, and social military and civil authorities wanted The dead from the smaller life during the Civil War. Far fewer them sent elsewhere. cemetery were eventually exhumed documents exist to chronicle the Florence was elsewhere. The and re-interred on the Jarrott planta- 14 Legacy, Vol. 3, No.2, july 1998 Her deception was uncovered after her transfer to the Florence Stockade, FLORENCE ST'OCKADK where she worked as a nurse in the N01'th. hospital until she succumbed to 'W " 1 " ,.\y~ ~)~~. ~ '"'~ - . • " ' < " . ~.. ~" , -". 1;1, \~~f 2 disease on January 25, 1865. Thought \Hl:\\' to be the first women interred in a ~1(' 11'(' I, .,It;'./ national cemetery, she is buried in 1\ 'i· 1I .'. ~~~~~ " /I/tlll section d, row 13, surrounded by the (/1(" '';;;' '.' ii il·1 1 now unknown soldiers with whom she 1 ,I/(I';! I} 2 fJ "if served and suffered. , 11\1 1'1";' 1.7( ; t J~ ./ , " ; 1" The Confederate guards at the \\'@ .it!'}; !ill .I)) 1'1 ! Florence Stockade have been identified Ilid! :1;:11 '2 by local historians as units raised in 1,,<\1; ~ /";~. ,.' I; !l " '. Georgia and South Carolina, They I '!'I((.I'I); 1 li m South. included, at different times, elements of the 5th Georgia Infantry, 32nd Georgia Infantry, 55th Georgia Infantry, 2nd South Carolina Artillery, Idealized stockade structure drawn from memories of a survivor ca . 1890. (From "Dancing Along the Decdline, " by Ezro Hoyt Ripple, Presidio Press, Novato, CA, 1996) Waccamaw Light Artillery, 1st South Carolina Cavalry, Captain Holman's tion, This became the nucleus of the Genealogical Society, and the Friends Company of Reserve Cavalry, 3rd, 4th, present Florence National Cemetery of the Florence Stockade. 5th, 6th, and the 7th Battalion South located on Cemetery Road. Nonethe­ The most famous prisoner held at Carolina Reserves. The conscripted less, there are persistent statements in the Florence Stockade was probably guards apparently shared a common earlier accounts, and by some local Mrs. Florena Budwin. Mrs. Budwin connection with the union prisoners. historians, that not all of the dead were enlisted as a soldier under an assumed The letters, diaries, and military either reloca ted or re-in terred. This is name in order to accompany her dispatches make it very clear that they an area for continued concern and husband, a Captain from Pennsylva­ did not wish to be there either. Life at research, nia. Unfortunately, Captain Budwin the Stockade was not pleasant. The Union prisoners held in the was killed and Mrs, Budwin was Stockade were from several different captured and sent to Andersonville, See STOCKADE, Page 16 units, as well as other prisoner-of-war camps. The most familiar of these other camps is undoubtedly the infamous Andersonville prison in Georgia, The roster for the Florence National Cemetery lists Civil War dead from units raised in 18 states, the District of Columbia, and the regular army. Clearly not all of the listed burials were from soldiers imprisoned at the Stockade. The difficult task of determining precisely who was at the Stockade, and the identity of the unknown, has been undertaken by the Florence Historical Society, the Pee Dee Rifles Camp #1419 of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, the Old Darlington District Chapter of the SC Delineating wes t wall from gate. (photo by Jonathon Leader) Legacy, Vol. 3, No.2, July 1998 15 STOCKADE, From Page 1 5 The Florence Stockade was sufficient to discourage tunneling. rectangular in shape, spanned a creek, This activity had been a problem at and extended onto the rising land to other camps, such as Andersonville, '. either side. Its dimensions were and the Florence Stockade building roughly 1,400 feet by 725 feet, on an plan was modified to benefit from the east-west axis, with an off-center gate experience. The Confederate guards in the west wall. The stream provided mounted the embankment and had a the only drinKing water available to clear viewof the interior of the camp. prisoners and removed filth from the Additional control was provided by "sinks." The creek also passed cannons situated on elevated plat­ through the Confederate encampment forms at the four corners and aimed where it was used first. It is important . into the interior of the stockade. The to remember that the Civil War saw "deadline" at the camp was a combi­ ! .. the birth bf the Sanitary Commission. nation of a plank placed on posts and a The shape and placement of simple plowed furrow, both of which Confederate prisoner-of-war camps were set back 12 feet from the wall. was based on a common plan devised Any prisoner who crossed this line and directed under the supervision of could be shot without warning. General John H. Winder. The walls of One unique fea ture of the Stockade the Florence Stockade were made from was a sutler's store located, in one rough tree trunks, set securely into the account, in the southeastern corner of ground, and covered with an earth the stockade. It apparently had a embankment on the outer side. The "window" that opened through the height of the wall was approXimately wall into the camp for prisoner use. 16 feet. The roughly 5-foot-deep The union POW's are reported to have trench along the outside of the wall, bartered their buttons, personal items, which resulted from the manufacture small coins, and scrip for the items of the embankment, was believed available. After the Civil War, the area was allowed to revert to nature. Eventu­ ally the portion of the camp on what is now city property was plowed down, while the eastern portion on the opposite side of the creek was preserved by a private land­ owner.