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During the Civil War, Fort Delaware went from protector to prison; a prisoner-of-war camp was established to house captured Confederates, convicted federal soldiers, and local political prisoners as well as privateers. [26]
11 lut 2012 · More than 40,000 Confederate POWs, plus hundreds of civilian detainees, and hundreds of Union army prisoners under sentence of military courts-martial were held prisoner at Fort Delaware during the American Civil War.
Copy of original photograph of Confederate prisoners of war at Fort Delaware; group of 15 officers posed in fort, all are identified.
During the course of the war 33,000 Confederates, political prisoners, and Federal convicts were imprisoned at the fort. Over 2,400 died while in prison. The fort is located on Pea Patch Island in the Delaware River; visitors travel to the island aboard the Delafort, a ferryboat.
The fort was among the most state-of-the-art in the nation when it was completed and housed prisoners of war during the Civil War due to its relative isolation. Within the walls of Fort Delaware, visitors can also see Battery Torbert.
12 lip 2012 · During its three years of service as a Civil War prison, Fort Delaware — located on Pea Patch Island in the Delaware River, a half-mile from Delaware City — housed more than 32,000 prisoners of war. Some were prominent civilians and high-ranking Confederate officers.
The brick-and-granite fort, the largest in existence in the United States when completed in 1859, originally was designed as a harbor defense — to keep hostile invaders from sailing upstream to the ports of New Castle, Wilmington and Philadelphia — not to hold prisoners of war.
