Paintings of Prison Life at Point Lookout by a Captive Confederate

John Jacob Omenhausser was born in 1832 in Philadelphia to a German immigrant family. When the Civil War began he was living in Richmond, Virginia. He enlisted in a Virginia regiment within two weeks of the attack on Fort Sumter. By the summer he was in the 46th Virginia Infantry. He was twice captured by the Union army, the second time at Petersburg on June 15, 1864. Omenhausser was confined at Point Lookout until the end of the war. One of the sketchbooks can be found here. The New-York Historical Society has digitalized its collection of Omenhausser’s sketchbook here, which is where I drew these illustrations from for this article. I did not reproduce all of the watercolors. Scholars believe that over two hundred sketches by the artist exist.

While many of the watercolors illustrated everyday life at the camp, some contained humorous dialogues. Omenhausser wanted to appeal to fellow prisoners’ desire for relief from the grimness of prison life.

One unique aspect of the paintings is the depiction of United States Colored Troops (USCT) serving as guards. In viewing these we can see not only the expected antipathy of a confined soldier towards his guards, but also the racial prejudices of a Confederate towards armed Black men. The Confederate government described former enslaved men in the USCT as slaves in a state of insurrection. The fact that they were now free men was not recognized by the Confederacy.

A set of the sketches was found in the papers of Brig. General James Barnes. Barnes eventually came to command the camp. Here is the hand-lettered cover of General Barnes’s set of sketches.

The first sketch we will look at is of the entrance to the camp, staffed by USCT.

Next is a scene of an amputee leaving the camp’s hospital.

The prison’s post office is depicted. Men would often communicate with relatives and friends living in areas under Union control served by the Post Office. They sometimes received money from these sources. Connection to family and friends in the North could play a role in the survival of a prisoner.

This next illustration shows the Prisoners’ Cookhouse with prisoners leaving with food to eat at their tents or elsewhere in the camp. Notice one USCT in the rear-left of the illustration walking on an elevated walkway guarding the stockade perimeter. You an also see another guard rushing towards a prisoner on the ground.

The Prison Schoolhouse is shown below. Many Union prisons had schools in which Confederates who may have been teachers in civilian life taught illiterate fellow soldiers to read and write. In some camps more advanced subjects, including foreign languages were taught as well. Once again you can see a USCT walking guard duty on the stockade wall and another guard on the prison’s street. Unlike some of the other illustrations showing conflict between the guards and prisoners, here the Confederates appear relaxed. A water pump appears in the foreground. Many Confederates later said that clean fresh water was not always available at the camp.

At most prisons, some Confederates became merchants in the camps’ internal economies. This sketch depicts a ring merchant and a spoon merchant. The ring merchant asks for “five crackers a piece” for a spoon. The rings sell for “only fifty cents a piece.” In addition to cash, whether Union Greenbacks or Confederate Greybacks, crackers and tobacco were recognized as forms of currency in many camps.

Rings were often made by prisoners with craft experience. They might be made from bones found in the cookhouse’s garbage or from gutta-percha, a hardened plastic.

Prisoners could earn Greenbacks by selling to the Union soldiers and officers guarding the camp. Here a merchant prisoner sells fans likely made by other prisoners to a Union officer. The prisoner is wearing what appears to be a Union uniform. Confederates often arrived at Camp Lookout with only the clothes they were wearing when they were captured, which were often in poor condition from constant use in campaigning. If they were lucky, they might receive surplus or cast-off Union uniforms. These were sometimes altered by the jailers so that an escaping prisoner could not disguise himself as a Union soldier. Money earned could go for necessities like food and clothing, or for treats like candy or alcohol.

Next is a prisoner selling Molasses Candy. The purchaser says “Mr. aint Molasses candy the sweetest thing in the world.” The prisoner merchant says “Here’s your good Molasses candy two dollars a stick in Confeds, or five cents in Greenbacks.” The word “Confeds” refers to Confederate paper money. Here, a Union Greenback is worth 40 times what a Confederate Greyback is worth.

The next sketch shows “The Coffee Ground Collector.” The standing Confederate in Union clothes asks to fry some meat on the fire in exchange for his coffee grounds.

In this detail, you can see the stove the Coffee Ground Collector uses as well as the coffee mill. Also note that the prisoner at the left has no shoes. While their captors often supplied the Confederates with clothes, they were less likely to supply shoes.

In the next sketch, a lemonade vendor is selling his refreshments for five cents (presumably in Greenbacks) a drink. If you read the caption in the detail that follows, you can get a sense of the cold capitalist calculations of the seller.

In the next scene, the tobacco merchant trades one “chew” of tobacco for a “cracker” or piece of bread or hardtack. Union camp officers sometimes complained that hungry Confederates would trade away their bread or meat for tobacco, candy, or treats like lemonade, or would lose their food as bets while gambling.

The next sketch is entitled “A Lady Visitor Come to See the Sights at the Camp.” Outside visitors might come to the camp to inspect conditions, offer medical relief, or, in this case, as a form of “Dark Tourism.” Prisoners found this tourism galling and humiliating. In this sketch the artist satirizes such a visit by showing a prisoner killing lice in his clothing while the scandalized tourist looks on aghast.

The Beer Stand was very popular when alcohol was available.

The captions tell us a lot about life in the camps. The soldier on the left complains that he is “out at the elbows, out at the knees” meaning his shirt and pants are in tatters. He has no shoes or socks, but “plenty of Greybacks,” which are nearly worthless by 1864. He also complains that he has “not a friend in the Pen [prison] or at the north.” Many prisoners with friends or families in the North relied on their contacts for deliveries of food to supplement their diets or for United States money which they could use to buy food and clothes from sutlers.

The merchant on the right is functioning as a bar tender offering a “cake and cup of beer for five cents.” The two men with money to spend tell us that the drink is “corn beer” and that it is “sharp.”

The Apple Stand depicts a merchant selling apples, onions, and potatoes. While the title caption spells “Apple” correctly, the sign on the stand does not. The artist was likely poking fun at the poor literacy of some of his fellow captives. In the detail below, the soldiers on the left tries to trade his comb for fruit. The merchant disdainfully tells him to keep his “louse trap.”

Here Coffee Vendors walk through camp calling out “Have your good hot Coffee.” The vendor on the right says the coffee is “Only one cracker a cup.”

The next sketch tries to draw some humor out of a grim situation. Here, the barber may lack skill, but he also has bad equipment.

The sign to the right shows the price of a shave as two crackers, a haircut as three, and a shampoo as three. Once again, crackers are currency.

In the next sketch, titled “Washing Machines,” the “machines” are two prisoners. The man on the right yells out that they will wash two pieces of clothing for five cents.

Next is a Liver Hash vendor. For five cents, a man got hash and a piece of bread.

One of the few advantage of Point Lookout’s location was the abundance of crabs.

The Reb Who Never Saw a Crab is a watercolor that pokes fun at a naïve prisoner who is convinced to “smell” a crab and pays for his nosiness.

This vendor sells slap jacks, fritters and pies, and bread pudding.

The Biscuit Bakery sells biscuits and molasses for five cents.

The man eating at the Apple Dumpling vendor’s station says he has not had the dumplings since the war began.

Here a mini-casino where the dealer calls for bets in a game of faro. Note the boats in the background.

Here the Watermelon vendor mocks a man who wants to pickle the rinds.

Here a prisoner shows off the steam engine he built.

In this scene on the beach men are fishing, washing, bathing, and crabbing.

In this scene, a prisoner is challenged by a guard from the USCT.

The dice game chuck a luck was popular.

Here, a prisoner who is in rags asks Captain Barnes for a new pair of pants.

Here prisoners are playing 21.

In this scene a USCT soldier warns a prisoner to get back from the stockade wall. The racial politics fills the scene.

Here a Black sentinel complains that he paid a prisoner for tobacco and the man absconded with his money.

Here one guard has shot another.

Here a guard is ordering freezing prisoners to assemble on a cold night in January.

Here a guard criticizes a praying prisoner for making too much noise.

Point Lookout held 50,000 men during the Civil War of whom 4,000 died. While the death rate was considerably lower than at prisons like Andersonville and Elmira, the inadequate barracks forced many men to live in tents year round, causing much suffering from cold and wind.

 

 

 

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