General Hospital #21
Information about General Hospital #21 in Richmond, VA during the Civil War.
General Hospital #21 functioned as both a prison and a hospital during the Civil War
General Hospital #21 was also called Gwalthmey Factory Hospital, Gwathmey Factory Hospital, Gwathney Factory Hospital, Maryland Hospital, and C. S. M. Prison Hospital. It was probably the former tobacco factory of R. A. Mayo Company, later Gwathmey Tobacco Company, which was a large six-storied, brick building.
The hospital opened before June 1862 with a capacity over 700 and 65 employees. It was used for a smallpox epidemic in December 1862, before these sufferers were moved to Howard’s Grove Hospital. It had 600/700 Union wounded prisoners in May and June 1864. A straw vote for President by these men on November 9,1864 was Lincoln 154, McClellan 300. Dr. George William Semple was the surgeon-in-charge.
The hospital was used for a short time by Federal occupation forces.
General Hospital #21 was located on the northwest corner of 25th and Cary Streets, west of General Hospital #24.
From Confederate Military Hospitals in Richmond by Robert W. Waitt, Jr., Official Publication #22 Richmond Civil War Centennial committee, Richmond, Virginia 1964.
- Images of General Hospital #21
- Statistics of General Hospital #21, 9/1862 to 9/1864 - notes that GH#21 became the Military Prison Hospital in November, 1863 (RG 109, Ch. 6, Vol. 151, p. 27)
- Statistics of C. S. Military Prison Hospital, 9/1862 to 10/1863- hospital closed after October, 1863 and changed to General Hospital #21(RG 109, Ch. 6, Vol. 151, p. 59)
- Records of General Hospital #21 in the National Archives