Part 9

The war closed on a spectacle of ruin the greatest yet known in America. While the smoke had cleared away, and the roar of the cannon had ceased, yet there could be heard the wailing of mothers, widows and orphans throughout both North and South, which is the greatest costs of so great and devastating war.

The Southern states lay prostrate; their resources gone; their fields desolate; their cities ruined; the fruits of the toil of generations all swept to destruction.

The total number of Union soldiers engaged were about a million and a half. Of this number, 275,000 were either killed in battle, died of mortal wounds or from disease in camp, and the loss to the Confederates was approximately the same. In both armies about 400,000 were disabled for life, thus making a grand total loss of about a million able-bodied men to the country.

At the close of the war over 60,000 Confederate prisoners were released. The records of the war department shows that 220,000 Confederates were made prisoners in the war. This includes, of course, the surrender of the armies at the close. Of this number 25,000 died of wounds and disease during their captivity. The estimated number of Union captives were about 200,000, of whom 40,000 died in captivity.

THE END

Transcribers' Notes:

Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced quotation marks retained.

Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained.

Page 42: "Thoughfare Gap" should be "Thoroughfare Gap".

Page 46: "Court Marshal" was printed that way.

Page 57: "as they shown through the groves" was printed that way.

Page 58: "in front of its back" probably should be "it".

Page 93: "John Biglow" may be a misprint for "John Bigelow".

End of Project Gutenberg's Battles of the Civil War, by Thomas Elbert Vineyard