Image: Captain Henry Wirz obelisk (cropped)

Description: Captain Henry Wirz obelisk, Andersonville, Sumter County, Georgia. The text panels along the four sides of the monument read as follows: North Side When time shall have softened passion and prejudice, when reason shall have stripped the mask from misrepresentations, then justice, holding evenly her scales, will require much of past censures and praise to change places. Jefferson Davis, Dec. 1888 South Side Discharging his duty with such humanity as the harsh circumstances of the times, and the policy of the foe permitted Capt. Wirz became at last the victim of a misdirected popular clamor. He was arrested in the time of peace, while under the protection of parole, tried by a military commission of a service to which he did not belong, and condemned to ignominious death on charges of excessive cruelty to Federal prisoners. He indignantly spurned a pardon proffered on condition that he would incriminate President Davis and thus exonerate himself from charges of which both were innocent. East Side In memory of Captain Henry Wirz, C.S.A. born Zurich, Switzerland, 1822, sentenced to death and executed at Washington D.C. November 10, 1865. To rescue his name from the stigma attached to it by embittered prejudice this shaft is erected by the Georgia division, United Daughters of the Confederacy. West Side It is hard on our men held in southern prisons not to exchange them, but it is humanity to those left in the ranks to fight our battles. At this particular time to release all rebel prisoners would insure Sherman’s defeat and would compromise our safety here. Ulysses S. Grant, Aug. 18, 1864. (NPS)
Title: Captain Henry Wirz obelisk (cropped)
Credit: Own work
Author: Michael Rivera
Usage Terms: Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0
License: CC BY-SA 4.0
License Link: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0
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