Point Lookout

Maryland Historical Society

Point Lookout is a peninsula at the tip of Southern Maryland in St. Mary's County bounded by the Potomac River on the west and the Chesapeake Bay on the east. This strategic location, first marked by a lighthouse in 1830, played one significant role in the War of 1812 and another during the American Civil War when first a hospital and then a camp for Confederate prisoners of war were located there. Point Lookout is now a state park.

During the War of 1812 the U.S. Post Office established a daily courier operation from Point Lookout to Washington, DC, to inform the capital of British naval movements on the Chesapeake Bay. During the summer of 1813, the British occupied the point and used it as a temporary base for raids in Virginia and Maryland. Nevertheless, the couriers continued to carry news to the capital. Forward observer Thomas Swann first spotted the combined British invasion fleet on August 17, 1814, sailing for Washington, and sent a courier to warn the city.

Point Lookout hospital area

Maryland Historical Society

During the Civil War, Point Lookout served as an important prisoner-of-war camp for captured Confederate soldiers as well as a hospital, fort, and contraband settlement where many blacks joined the 38th Regiment of U.S. Colored Troops. In 1862, following General George B. McClellan's unsuccessful campaign to capture Richmond, the federal government erected Hammond Hospital at the tip of Point Lookout. Prevailing medical wisdom of the day recognized the value of fresh air circulating through hospital wards, and Union medical officials wanted to take advantage of the Point's almost constant breezes. At Hammond Hospital, sixteen ward buildings radiated outward like spokes from a central cross-bay. Wounded and sick Union soldiers were sent there for treatment. At least 786 Union veterans who died at the hospital were buried there in several burial areas, most of which were relocated up to three times due to erosion and efforts at consolidation.

The prison camp, called Camp Hoffman, was established after the Battle of Gettysburg (July 1-3, 1863) to incarcerate the sudden influx of captured Confederate soldiers. Camp Hoffman operated from August 1863 to June 1865. Convenient to the war's eastern theater, it became the largest federal prison camp. Designed to accommodate 10,000 prisoners, it held between 12,600 and, in the summer of 1864, nearly 20,000 prisoners at one time. An estimated 52,264 Confederate prisoners were incarcerated there during its twenty-two months of existence, and more than 4,000 died. Although the figure seems high, the overall death rate of approximately 8 percent was less than half that among soldiers in the field.

Point Lookout camp

Maryland Historical Society

In 1864, as part of General Jubal A. Early's surprise offensive, Maryland Confederate General Bradley T. Johnson contemplated a daring cavalry raid on the prison to liberate and arm the captives, who would then march on Washington. This plan was abandoned when Union intelligence uncovered the plan and Early's raid stalled briefly at the Battle of Monocacy.

A federal and a state monument have been erected to memorialize the Confederates who died at the camp. The Maryland monument, erected in 1878, is a white marble obelisk approximately twenty-five feet tall. Funding for it was made possible by holding jousting tournaments and balls at Point Lookout. The federal monument is an 85-foot tall obelisk erected in 1910-11.

Beitzell, Edwin W. Point Lookout Prison Camp for Confederates. Leonardtown, Maryland: St. Mary's County Historical Society, 1991.