Camp Morton was a military installation in Indianapolis, Indiana that served dual purposes during the American Civil War. Originally established as a training ground for Union forces beginning in April 1861, the site was converted into a prisoner-of-war camp following major Union victories at Fort Donelson and the Battle of Shiloh. The camp was named after Indiana governor Oliver Morton and occupied a 36-acre tract of land bordered by present-day Central Avenue and Nineteenth, Twenty-second, and Talbott Streets.
The first Confederate prisoners arrived at Camp Morton on February 22, 1862, following the fall of Fort Donelson. The camp was among the largest of the Union's eight prison camps established specifically for Confederate noncommissioned officers and privates. The facility continued to receive and hold Confederate prisoners throughout the remainder of the war, operating as a major holding facility for enlisted Confederate soldiers.
Camp Morton's role as a prisoner-of-war facility concluded on June 12, 1865, when its last prisoners were paroled. Following the war's end, the property resumed its pre-war function as the fairgrounds for the Indiana State Fair. In 1891, the property was sold and developed into a residential neighborhood called Morton Place, which became part of the Herron-Morton Place Historic District. The transformation of Camp Morton from military installation to civilian use reflects the broader postwar reintegration of military sites into civilian infrastructure.
The American Civil War (1861–1865) was the deadliest conflict in American history, killing an estimated 620,000 to 750,000 soldiers and an unknown number of civilians. The Confederate States of America, formed by eleven seceding Southern states, faced the Union in four years of warfare across 23 states and territories. Major engagements included First and Second Bull Run, Antietam (the bloodiest single day in American history, September 17, 1862), Chancellorsville, Gettysburg (July 1–3, 1863), Vicksburg (surrendered July 4, 1863), and Sherman's March through Georgia and the Carolinas (1864–1865). President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, transforming the war's stated purpose to include the abolition of slavery and enabling the enlistment of approximately 180,000 Black men in the United States Colored Troops. Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House on April 9, 1865. The war resolved the question of secession and ended American slavery, though Reconstruction would face sustained resistance in its attempt to secure civil rights for formerly enslaved people.
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