THE IMMORTAL SIX HUNDRED
Headquarters Department South Carolina,
Georgia, and Florida.
Charleston, S. C, June 13, 1864.
Maj.-Gen. John G. Foster,
Commanding U. S. Forces, Coast of South Carolina.
General:
Five general officers and forty-five field officers of the United States Army, all of them prisoners of war, have been sent to this city for safe keeping. They have been turned over to Brigadier-General Ripley, commanding First Military District of this department, who will see that they are provided with commodious quarters in a part of the city occupied by non-combatants, the majority of whom are women and children. It is proper, however, that I should inform you that it is part of the city which has been for many months exposed day and night to the fire of your guns.
Very respectfully your obedient servant, Sam Jones,
Maj.-Gen. Commanding.
(War Records, Vol. xxxv, Part 2, p. 132.)
In this letter Gen. Sam Jones says most clearly where the Union prisoners of war are quartered in Charleston City: "In that section of the city where the
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