Remembering, Reconciliation, and Forgetting

Of the sixteen foremost Civil War Prisoner of War camps, seven were in the South (Confederate-run) and nine in the North (Union-run). The average death rate in Northern prisons was 12%, but Elmira in Central New York State had the highest death toll at 24%. The dead prisoners were buried in cemeteries next to the camps. This chapter focuses only on Northern POW cemeteries, especially the Elmira Prisoner of War Camp cemetery. The Northern POW camp cemeteries and their monuments, including those at Elmira, reveal the changing meanings and messages of the monuments regarding reconciliation, the causes of the Civil War, the “Lost Cause,” slavery, and racism. This chapter provides a discussion and comparison of Northern POW cemeteries, their monuments, and these changing narratives. These monuments often reflect an exclusionary memory. Selective amnesia about the causes of the war, the brutality of slavery, and the fact that Confederates were fighting against the United States are evident in many of the monuments erected in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, especially those in POW cemeteries. .