Camp Randall

Camp Randall is an historic U.S. Army site in Madison, Wisconsin, named after Wisconsin governor Alexander Randall, who served from 1858 to 1861. It was a training facility of the Union army during the Civil War, where more than 70,000 recruits were trained. The army also established a hospital and prisoner-of-war camp here.

Camp Randall
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Camp Randall arch designed by Lew F. Porter
Location	Camp Randall Memorial Park, Madison, Wisconsin
Coordinates	43°4′11″N 89°24′34″W
Area	5 acres (2.0 ha)
Built	1865
NRHP reference No.	71000036[1]
Added to NRHP	June 7, 1971

In 1893 the site was purchased by the state for use by the University of Wisconsin - Madison. Part was set aside as a park to memorialize the army camp. Another portion was used for Camp Randall Stadium, built in 1917 as an outdoor football stadium for the university.

History

The camp was a training facility of the Union Army during the Civil War, with more than 70,000 recruits receiving training there. The 6th Regiment, Wisconsin Infantry, was organized here in 1861. Later, a hospital and a stockade for Confederate prisoners of war were located at the camp.[2] The 140 prisoners of war who died at Camp Randall are buried at Confederate Rest.[3]

The site was purchased by the state of Wisconsin in 1893 and deeded to the University of Wisconsin. Of the original 53½ acres, a segment was set aside as Camp Randall Park. This now features a memorial arch, two Civil War cannons, and a stockade building.

Camp Randall Park is also the location of Camp Randall Stadium, opened in 1917 as the outdoor football stadium of the University of Wisconsin.

Camp Randall was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.

Camp Randall during the Civil War. Sketch made from top of University Building, May 20, 1864, by W. F. Brown, Company B, 40th Wisconsin Volunteer Infantry Regiment

Gallery

• 
  Memorial arch (1912)
• 
  Civil War cannon
• 
  Civil War cannon, plaque, and flagpole
• 
  Prisoner of war stockade under protective roof

References

1. "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. July 9, 2010.
2. "Camp Randall". Dictionary of Wisconsin History. Wisconsin Historical Society. Retrieved 2009-10-24.
3. Abigail Becker (11 April 2018). "Madison City Council votes to remove Confederate marker rather than add an interpretive sign". The Capital Times. Retrieved 9 October 2018. Most of the 140 prisoners who died at Camp Randall and are buried at Confederate Rest [...] were buried in a mass grave at the cemetery and later given their own headstones in Confederate Rest

Further reading

• Cooke, Chauncey H. "Documents: Letters of a Badger Boy in Blue: Life at Old Camp Randall". Wisconsin Magazine of History, vol. 4, no. 2 (December 1920): 208-217.
• Forbes, S. D. Camp Randall and Environs. Madison Wis.: 1890.
• Mattern, Carolyn J. Soldiers When They Go: The Story of Camp Randall, 1861-1865. Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1968.
• Thompson, Tommy R. "'Dying Like Rotten Sheepe': Camp Randall as a Prisoner of War Facility during the Civil War". Wisconsin Magazine of History, vol. 92, no. 1 (Autumn 2008): 2-13.

External links

• Historic images of Camp Randall
• Camp Randall Memorial Arch - images and history
• History of the Camp Randall Arch
• Camp Randall Civil War Prison
• Camp Randall Prison Camp
• Confederate Prisoners at Camp Randall as Seen in Newspaper Articles, Wisconsin Historical Society
• Camp Randall to welcome home its Civil War soldiers, Wisconsin State Journal
• "100 years later, Camp Randall Civil War memorial stands tall", Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
• "Confederate captives in Madison: Camp Randall’s history as Civil War prisoner-of-war camp", The Badger Herald