The Wandering Adventurers: March25 and 26

March 25

We drove east through a Mennonite community with nice and tidy looking farmland, beautiful drive. Our first stop was a sobering one at the Andersonville National Historic site. The impenetrable stockade at Andersonville was probably the most infamous prisoner of war camp during the Civil War. It was open from Feb. 1864 until May 1865 when the war was essentially over. During that time more than 45,000 Union soldiers were confined here in deplorable conditions. 13,000 died from disease, dysentery, and lack of nutrition. There simply was not food available to feed prisoners. Even the Confederate soldiers didn’t have enough to eat. The doctors didn’t know about bacteria at that time. If you went into the hospital area, you probably did not live through the experience. The sanitary conditions were described to us on our tour. It’s amazing that more did not die. The stream for their drinking water was blocked with sewage. Legend says that after much prayer, lightning struck the ground and a spring shot up with fresh water. Whether lightning struck or not a spring with fresh water did appear and saved thousands of lives. The ranger led tour was very interesting but very sobering also. A quote from a prisoner’s diary said”…it takes 7 of its occupants to make a shadow.“ The bodies were laid out in the cemetery shoulder to shoulder to save space. In July and August of 1865, Clara Barton came here with a detachment of laborers and former prisoners to identify and mark each of the graves to the best of their knowledge. A former prisoner, Atwater, was in charge of the record keeping and made his private list so he could do his best to notify the families. Between his list and the Confederate records all but 450 were identified. Today the wooden markers have been replaced with granite markers. The cemetery is an active military cemetery.

Andersonville Prisoner of War Camp
Reconstruction of the shelters used by 45,000 Union Soldiers

Andersonville National Cemetery -
13,000 Grave Sites of Union soldiers.

Our next stop was much more up beat. We drove out to Plains to see Jimmy Carter’s boyhood farm. We were in for a treat. We were met by a ranger who gave us the lay of the land. As we walked around the property there were buttons to push and Jimmy Carter’s voice told us stories and gave us information about his growing up here. He was a young boy during the depression. The family had plenty of food but not much extra. There were always chores for him and his sisters and brother but lots of play in the mix. They had a tennis court on the swept red dirt where he would play against his father. They also had a small country store on the road where local people could buy things on credit. His mother encouraged the children to read, even bringing their books to the breakfast table. His best boyhood friends were the African American children that lived on the farm. We heard so many great stories. The ranger said he comes out to the farm often. The other day he rode his bike out here followed by his Secret Service agents! I guess it’s not an unusual occurrence. He is riding one of those 3 wheeled bikes now that he is 87. He went into the big town of Plains, 700 people, for school. He went onto college and then the Naval Academy and a Navy career. When his father died in 1953, he left the Navy and they came back to Plains to run the family business. He began his political career right here. We stood around eating freshly boiled peanuts talking with the ranger before we headed for town.

The other buildings we visited were the school he and Rosalynn had both attended and the small railroad depot that became his campaign headquarters. Between the house, the museum and the campaign headquarters we really got an idea of how his upbringing, school experiences, small town, church and neighbors helped to make him the decent man he is. I think he is one of the only Presidents with high morals who has also lived by those morals. He has probably received more acclaim for things he has accomplished since his Presidency than he has for his years in office. He has a long list of accomplishments in his years of service. He and Rosalynn are still living in the home they built in Plains in 1961. He has a wood working shop where he has made a lot of their furniture. The garage was made into his office when he returned from his years in the White House. It is a ranch style unpretentious home that sits on lovely grounds and can’t be seen from the road giving them privacy. We went to Dylan’s restaurant for lunch, the only one we saw in town. We walked up to the counter and they filled our plates with a fried chicken lunch. Dylan, a 7 year old little boy, told us that Jimmy Carter comes here for lunch on Sundays but he was out of town. Too bad, it would have been great to have him walk in! We left with a greater understanding of our 39^th President.