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5 Gentlemen of the White Apron Approximately 410,000 soldiers were taken prisoner in the Civil War, and roughly 56,000 died in prison.1 The ordeal of Civil War captives is a subject that received considerable treatment immediately following the war, and renewed scholarly interest in the last twenty years. Scores of titles have been published about Civil War prisons, yet only tantalizing fragments illustrate the influence of Freemasonry inside prison walls. Notwithstanding its paucity, the evidence that does exist shows that the Masonic tenets of brotherly love and relief found a perfect field of expression in Civil War prisons, where food, shelter, and compassion were in short supply. Although ignored by scholars, there is considerable evidence that Freemasons in prison went to great lengths to care for their own, and that this fraternal concern transcended Union or Confederate affiliation. The vignettes presented here make plain that apart from being a mere social phenomenon, Freemasonry was a lifeline to prisoners of war—nearly all of whom were confined in unwholesome and unsanitary conditions, and the fraternity provided not only actual necessities that sustained life—food, blankets, clothing, and medicine—but also psychological support that sustained men under the bleakest of conditions. I Immediately Commenced My Free-Masonry Just as in actual combat, many Freemasons resorted to appealing for aid when captured, sometimes to assure their personal safety—and some- Gentlemen of the White Apron / 99 times to avoid capture entirely. Lt. Col. Homer Sprague, 13th Connecticut Volunteers, was taken prisoner by Ramseur’s brigade in the 3rd Battle of Winchester on 19 September 1864. Following a long march with his fellow captives, Sprague’s strength failed him and he collapsed in a roadside ditch. A rebel officer took pity on him and he was allowed to ride in an ambulance. Into the ambulance I climbed with some difficulty, and immediately commenced my free-masonry on the driver. He responded to the signs. . . . He gave me some nice milk and some fine wheat bread. “As a Mason,” said he, “I’ll feed you; share the last crumb with you; but as a Confederate soldier, I’ll fight you till the last drop of blood and the last ditch.”2 While the chances of a modern soldier meeting any success by “commencing his Freemasonry” is undoubtedly slim, in nineteenth-century America, the fraternity, and its reputation for solidarity between brethren was well known. During the Petersburg campaign, John Floyd, a captain in the 18th South Carolina Infantry, described a successful sortie against a federal position that illustrates the reputation of Masonry among frontline troops. Floyd had ordered his troops to approach the Union position stealthily to within 30 yards, then to yell with all their might before falling “flat on their faces.” The federals fired en masse at the commotion, but the shots passed harmlessly over the rebels. “I then ordered my men forward at the run, and before the enemy could reload their guns we were on them. They commenced begging for quarter and inquiring for Masons and Oddfellows. We captured all of them.”3 Floyd doesn’t comment on whether the men he captured were actually affiliated with either fraternity, and his affiliation with the Craft is not known. It is possible that these men were Masons and Odd Fellows, but it is equally possible that they were not affiliated with either group but were aware that the qualities of fraternal mercy were not strained. A federal officer caught napping hazarded his luck on Masonic mercy 100 / Chapter 5 near Tuscumbia Landing, Alabama. On 12 April 1864, Confederate troops from the 27th and 35th Alabama regiments captured the entire complement of Company G, 9th Ohio Cavalry, known as the “White Horse Company ,” in a midnight raid on a farmstead where the federals were camped. As dawn threatened to expose the rebel column, consisting not only of federal prisoners but also their horses, baggage, and a herd of cattle, the jubilant rebels hurried to cross the Tennessee River to return to rebel lines. Midstream the raiders realized that they had not captured the federal officers who had been sleeping apart from their men. The rebel commander, Col. Samuel S. Ives, decided to go back for them. With several hand-picked men, including Lt. Albert Goodloe, of the 35th Alabama, Ives returned, and “lantern in hand, rushed into the room where they were, finding them still asleep, notwithstanding what had just transpired” in the farmyard. According to Goodloe, the colonel “aroused...

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