Finn's Point Cemetery

For four years, from 1861 to 1865, the North and South fought to the death during this nation's only Civil War.

Today, the remains of Union and Confederate soldiers lie nearly side by side at Finns Point National Cemetery. It's one of the few national cemeteries where troops from both sides are interred together.

The cemetery is in a remote corner of Finns Point, just a stone's throw from Fort Mott in Pennsville. While the cemetery is in Salem County, the Delaware state line is only a few yards away. Finns Point was founded during the 1600s as a Finnish settlement.

Finns Point is a quiet, peaceful and unique burial ground. It is unique because it contains the remains of Union and Confederate soldiers as well as the remains of 13 German World War II prisoners of war from Fort Dix. The Confederate dead

The Confederate dead were prisoners of war confined to the Civil War prison at Fort Delaware, on Pea Patch Island in Delaware City.

Fort Mott is an 1896 fortification erected in anticipation of the Spanish-American War. Fort Mott, Fort Delaware and Fort DuPont, which is just south of Delaware City, were built as part of the federal government's plan to defend the Delaware River.

"Fort Delaware, owned by the government from about 1837, was first fortified in 1814 when the British were coming, and they put up an earthwork battery out there," said R. Hugh Simmons, a member of the Fort Delaware Society and editor of the Fort Delaware Notes.

"Fortunately," he points out, "the British did not come or they would have had Philadelphia again."

In the early years of the Civil War, some Confederate soldiers were confined to Fort Delaware, and there were some burials there. Simmons says there were few prisoners during the first two years of the war in comparison to the last two.

Simmons says the first mention of Confederate prisoners found in Fort Delaware Society records is from August 1861.

But it was not until May 1863, when the federal government decided Fort Delaware would become a major POW camp, that burial space was needed for the dozens of soldiers who were dying daily.

The fort was on the Delaware River, which meant it could be reached from the Atlantic Ocean. Through the nearby Delaware and Chesapeake Canal, a short cut could be taken there from Baltimore and Fort McHenry. Upstream was the railroad center in Philadelphia.

Simmons explained that the prison was built to house 10,000 POWs, and the barracks were divided to hold about 2,000 officers and civilians in one compound and about 8,000 privates and enlisted men in the other.

"So you had 3,800 (Confederate) prisoners suddenly appear on the doorsteps," he says. "These guys were sick as dogs. They were badly treated en route, and the Union officers have testified to that. When they arrived here, they started dropping like flies." Burial at Finns Point

With little space on the island, Soldiers Burial Ground at Finns Point was pressed into service.

There are 2,436 Confederates buried in seven parallel pits at Finns Point that run east to west, Simmons explains. They were buried in wooden coffins stacked three deep. Names plates were put on each coffin and covered in leather for future identification. But no records were kept, and it was impossible to identify anyone after the war.

In 1875, the year the ground was designated a national cemetery, the Corps of Engineers exhumed the remains of 135 Union soldiers and 187 Confederates on Pea Patch Island and reburied them at Finns Point.

Two major monuments have been erected to the fallen soldiers. The Confederate monument was erected in 1910. The obelisk-type monument is 85 feet tall and has eight brass plates, two on all four sides, which contain the names of the dead. The Union monument was constructed in 1879 and bears the names of the 135 exhumed from the island.

According to records, the prison camp on Pea Patch Island was not as bad as the one in Andersonville, Ga., where thousands of Union troops were badly mistreated and died.

During Andersonville's existence, from February 1864 to May 1865, more than 45,000 Union solders were confined and almost 13,000 died from disease, poor sanitation, malnutrition, overcrowding or exposure. Frigid barracks

"Out there (Fort Delaware), they at least had a wooden barracks," Simmons explained. "In some sense, it was not like Andersonville because they had the barracks. In another sense, it was every bit as bad because the wooden barracks were freezing cold in the winter."

Simmons says the amount of firewood and coal prisoners had for heat was limited, as was their food supply. The prisoners were allowed to write to people in the North, mainly women's church groups, to ask for aid and food.

"They were allowed to receive care packages that sometimes contained food, money and clothing," he points out.

For Simmons, there is a personal connection to being involved with the society and the cemetery. Four of his ancestors were Confederate soldiers, from Louisiana and Mississippi.

"There are seven men from my great-grandfather's regiment buried here (at Finns Point)," he explains.

Simmons is looking for ways to get New Jersey residents interested in what the cemetery is all about.

"In my mind, the three forts and the cemetery go together," he says. "It is all part of one area that was used by the government for the defense of the United States, from 1814 to 1950."

Thomas A. Bergbauer is a retired Courier-Post copy editor and can be reached at (856) 346-0371, tbergbauer@verizon.net, or through Communities, Courier-Post, P.O. Box 5300, Cherry Hill, N.J. 08034.

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