Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 01.djvu/303

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The above statement needs no comment. The refusal of Mr. Stanton to allow this high-minded, Northern gentleman to distribute supplies among these destitute suffering prisoners, was of a piece with his insolent reply to Hon. A. J. Beresford Hope, who wrote for permission to use a sum of money raised by English gentlemen to alleviate the condition of Confederate prisoners at the North, and received for answer, that the United States Government was rich enough to provide for its prisoners, and needed no foreign help.

Yes! the United States Government was amply able to provide for its captives; but it chose to adopt a system of cold-blooded cruelty, and to seek to avoid the verdict of history by the most persistent slanders against the Confederate authorities.  We give in full the following statement of a medical officer of