The Missouri in the Civil War Message Board

Re: Missouri Prisons in St. Louis Area
In Response To: Missouri Prisons ()

Joanna,

Please forgive the delay in my reply. Busy time.

The three St. Louis area military prisons for men during the war were:
--Gratiot Street Prison (formerly the McDowell Medical College);
--Myrtle Street Prison (formerly Lynch's Slave Market--a Yankee form of joke on the Rebs);
--Alton Military Prison (formerly a State of Illinois penitentiary in downtown Alton, IL condemned due to lack of sanitation facilities and flooding).

Gratiot and Myrtle facilites were only blocks away from each other in the downtown area.

Women were kept in a private residence for a time not far from Myrtle Street Prison and were kept in Gratiot Street Prison much of the war. I recall from reading that some females were kept at Alton Prison late in the war. Several of the females had children with them.

To my knowledge, NO POWs were kept in Jefferson Barracks (except for medical treatment), Benton Barracks, or the St. Louis Arsenal (except for one day).

The sick and wounded were kept in a large number of facilites all over St. Louis. Some were even treated in Jefferson Barracks, which was a vast convalescence hospital mostly for the Yanks during the war.

Most of the POWs who died were re-interred in Jefferson Barracks National Cemetery. The exceptions include those whose families took the remains away for private burials, a few who died in hospitals, and many of those who died of smallpox in the island in the Mississippi River.

I hope this helps.

Bruce Nichols

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