German POWs in America: A True Story of Hope and Friendship

Guests Behind the Barbed Wire narrates the true story of Camp Aliceville in Pickens County, Alabama, where as many as 6,000 German prisoners of war were housed during World War II.  It is the story not only of those prisoners but also of the 1,000 raw recruit soldiers sent from all over America to guard them and of the townspeople who related to the POWs through civilian jobs and labor assignments.

The story of Camp Aliceville has classic elements escape and death, loneliness and fear, disillusionment and despair, but also humor, hope, and romance as well as the amazing creativity that flourished in confinement.  It goes beyond the war to the reconciliation and reunion that has taken place in Aliceville since that time.

An additional source of information about Camp Aliceville is the Aliceville Museum located in Aliceville, Alabama.  It houses the largest collection of World War II Prisoner of War memorabilia in the country, along with an impressive collection of memorabilia from American servicemen and their experiences.  The museum is open weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon and from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m.  For more information, visit the museum's website as www.CityOfAliceville.com/POWOverview.htm.

Ruth Cook also maintains a frequently updated blog where readers share additional information about Camp Aliceville and other topics of historical interest.  You are welcome to visit and to comment at www.genevapow.com.

A Civil War Trail of Tears

A Review by Sue DeVille for Civil War Book Review, Fall 1999

Drawing from scant historical documentation and oral histories passed down by survivors, NORTH ACROSS THE RIVER examines how the working class fared in the Civil War by providing an account of a mass civilian deportation.

Ruth Beaumont Cook begins this work with detailed histories of Roswell and Sweetwater, two small Georgia towns whose common denominator was their water-driven cotton mills.  With the approach of General William T. Sherman's forces, mill owners fled, leaving behind mill bosses to operate the mills with only a home guard for defense, thus setting the stage for the tragedy that followed.

As Sherman's army ravaged the Georgia countryside, millworkers, mostly women and children, continued to work.  After Union soldiers marched swiftly into the area and arrested the workers, Sherman ordered their deportation because their labor would benefit the Confederacy if they remained.  Workers were told to pack what they could and vacate their homes.

The book follows the plight of two millworker families, Walter and Lizzie Russell Stewart and their four children in Sweetwater and four the Kendley siblings in nearby Roswell.  Over 400 people, mostly women and children, were shipped to a women's prison in Louisville.  Cook gives a stark picture of the pitiful conditions that the families endured. Local women helped to relieve the squalor through donations, but overall the workers suffered greatly.  Though some women found work, many continued their sorrowful journey by taking advantage of the Union's offer of further deportation to Indiana.

Cook demonstrates how a local incident can offer a chilling face to human cruelty.  Utilizing a masterful blend of solid fact and reasonable supposition to weave a credible story that gives the reader a vivid picture of the millworkers' ordeal, the author portrays ordinary citizens who handled the sorrows of war.

Well-written and meticulously researched, this is a book for people who enjoy stepping off the beaten path of Civil War history and discovering the more unusual happenings of that era.