North Or South, A Masonic Obligation Is Binding

North Or South,
A Masonic Obligation Is Binding
Angelo G. Coppola, Sr., 32°
1940 Waterside Drive
North Little Rock, Arkansas 72116
I was in a local bookstore recently when I came across a book entitled, John Randsom’s Andersonville Diary. Since I have taught American Civil War history, I was instantly fascinated by the book’s subtitle, Life Inside the Civil War’s Most Infamous Prison.
Most historians will agree that more American lives were lost in the Civil War than in all other wars combined since that time. However, what they fail to reveal is that the prison camps on either side killed nearly 10 times as many as died on the battlefield.
Andersonville was a Southern POW camp located in Georgia, and, like all such camps then, it was cramped, dirty, and inhumane. The food was rancid, unfit for hogs much less humans; living quarters were cramped tents with many forced to sleep outside even in the dead of winter; clothing was scarce as was firewood to burn for heat. Sanitation of any kind did not exist. It was a daily task to take out and wrap in canvas 20 to 30 dead soldiers.
John Randsom was a 20-year-old Brigade Quartermaster in the Ninth Michigan Calvary. He, along with many other Union soldiers, was captured and sent to Andersonville. It had been the practice to swap prisoners between the North and the South at various intervals. However, when Lincoln turned the Union Army over to a highly aggressive General by the name of Ulysses S. Grant, strategies changed. Grant no longer sanctioned the swaps, believing they merely put Southern soldiers back into the mix to fight his troops. The North had sufficient resources of material and men to keep fighting without a return of prisoners.
When John Randsom arrived at Andersonville in late November 1863, he decided to keep a diary. It would be a long time before he was able to escape from Andersonville, so he determined to endure the inhumane treatment with as much human dignity as possible under the circumstances. On January 20, 1864, he wrote the following in his diary.
“Sergt. Robertson, I learned today, instead of being a sergeant is a lieutenant. His whole company being captured, he preferred to go with them and share their trials than to go with the officers. The men are very much attached to him and no wonder, as he is a fine fellow…. He is also a Mason, and I am going to write down wherein the fact of his being a Mason he brought good into the camp today. The boys feeling rather more hungry than usual were rather despondent, when the sergeant gets up and says, ‘Boys, I’ll go and get something to eat,’ went out of the tent and in twenty minutes came back with three or four pounds of bacon and two loaves of corn bread. We were surprised and asked how he performed the miracle. Told us then that he was a Mason, as also was the lieutenant in charge, from whom the food came. We decided then and there that the first opportunity that presented itself we would join the Masons.”
How many Brethren remember the lesson of charity taught in the Entered Apprentice Degree? It is as true today as it was on January 20, 1864.

Angelo G. Coppola, Sr.
is a graduate of the University of Arkansas with a doctorate in public school administration. He has served as a teacher, principal, superintendent of school, Arkansas State Department of Education employee, and presently is the Deputy Director for the Arkansas Teacher Retirement System. A retired Naval Officer and a member of the Executive Board for the Quapaw Council Boy Scouts of America, Dr. Coppola is also a Past Master and presently the Secretary of Albert Pike Lodge No. 714 in Little Rock, Arkansas. He is a member of the York Rite and began serving as the Grand Chaplain for the Grand Lodge of Arkansas in February 2001.