[17] A gate in the south fence of the camp provided access to the 10-acre property (4.0 ha) donated by Senator Douglas to the Old University of Chicago, which had opened in 1857 at its site on Cottage Grove Avenue and 35th Street.

[15] The Union Army sent three tons of corn meal and large quantities of blankets, clothing, shoes and eating utensils to the camp on March 1, 1862.

[54] In the summer of 1862, Henry Whitney Bellows, president of the U.S. Sanitary Commission,[55] wrote the following to Colonel Hoffman after visiting the camp: Sir, the amount of standing water, unpoliced grounds, of foul sinks, of unventilated and crowded barracks, of general disorder, of soil reeking miasmatic accretions, of rotten bones and emptying of camp kettles, is enough to drive a sanitarian to despair.

I do not believe that any amount of drainage would purge that soil loaded with accumulated filth or those barracks fetid with two stories of vermin and animal exhalations.

[56]Hoffman already had requested improvements in the camp, but he kept the report secret because he did not want to take a position contrary to that taken by any superior, such as Quartermaster General Meigs.

[70] All the parolees left the camp by the end of that month except for Colonel Daniel Cameron and his 65th Illinois Volunteer Infantry Regiment, who were held until April 19, 1863, and put to work as guards.

[85] A few prisoners were wounded or killed by guards who saw them step over the "dead line" near the boundaries of the camp or commit minor offenses, but such incidents occurred infrequently.

[46][91] The first of the new Confederate prisoners, 558 militant guerrilla raiders who had been under the command of Brigadier General John Hunt Morgan, arrived at the camp on August 20, 1863.

[95] Colonel DeLand tried to impose discipline on the disorderly camp but was frustrated by its poor condition and corrupt guards, including especially those from his own regiment.

[82] During this period, in retaliation for treatment of Union prisoners by Confederates, an undisclosed official in the high command ordered the cook stoves, which also provided heat, replaced by 40-US-gallon (150 L) boilers.

[101] After criticism from Dr. Clark and Colonel Hoffman, who reviewed reports on the camps, in mid-October 1863 DeLand provided the prisoners with cooking utensils, one hundred barrels of lime, twenty-four white-wash brushes, and a quantity of lumber for repairs and washing of buildings.

[104] Prisoners who tried to escape were placed in White Oak Dungeon, an 18-square-foot (1.7 m2) space under the guard room, which had only one small window and was permeated with an intolerable stench.

[46] President Lincoln's brother-in-law, Ninian Wirt Edwards, a Union Army captain, contracted with vendors to supply meat and other rations to military camps.

[103] On one occasion, DeLand lined up the prisoners from the 8th Kentucky Cavalry Regiment when a tunnel was found under their barracks and ordered guards to shoot "if any sat down.

[119] On December 17, 1863, the prison camp officials closed the barber shop and newsstand, and stopped sales of stamps, envelopes and writing paper, likely also in retaliation for the major escape attempt.

[141] Construction of a very advanced additional 180-bed hospital, including a mess room, kitchen, hot water, adjoining laundry and flush toilets, was completed on April 10, 1864.

[158] The topsoil at the camp had become so eroded that guards had to wear goggles as protection against blowing sand and dust, and prisoners had to almost close their eyes to move around.

[172] Attorney and historian George Levy maintains the "conspiracy" began as a con aimed at Confederate agents that evolved into a hoax exploited by Colonel Sweet for his own advantage.

[172] Levy wrote that believing in the Camp Douglas conspiracy was a matter of faith: Confederate agents thought they had created a workable plot, and Colonel Sweet made their dream come true.

[177] One of the agents, Captain Thomas Hines, believed that he could raise a force of about 5,000 Confederate sympathizers in Chicago to free the prisoners from Camp Douglas.

[180] As Sweet made no effort to prevent the 196th Pennsylvania Infantry from leaving the camp 11 days earlier, Levy thinks that his report to superiors was self-serving.

[181] On November 6, 1864, Brigadier General John Cook in Springfield, Illinois authorized Colonel Sweet to arrest two Confederate agents at Chicago.

Sweet sent a message by hand delivery, not by telegraph, to Cook that said that Colonel Marmaduke of the Rebel army and other officers were in town plotting to release the prisoners.

[182] Without a warrant, Sweet's men searched the home of Charles Walsh, leader of the "Sons of Liberty," who were sympathetic with the South, and discovered a cache of guns and ammunition.

Sweet stated that 106 men were arrested, including Walsh and Judge Buckner Stith Morris of the Circuit Court of Illinois, treasurer of the Sons.

[190] Sweet's main informer and agent, John T. Shanks, a Confederate prisoner who was a former Morgan's Raider and a convicted criminal, testified against the defendants.

[208] The camp officials contracted with an unscrupulous undertaker, C. H. Jordan, who sold some of the bodies of Confederate prisoners to medical schools and had the rest buried in shallow graves without coffins.

[211] Many dead prisoners' bodies initially were buried in unmarked paupers' graves in Chicago's City Cemetery (located on the site of today's Lincoln Park).

[230] In 2015, David L. Keller wrote that "the total number of deaths at Camp Douglas is somewhere between the 4,243 names contained on the monument at the Confederate Mound at Oak Woods Cemetery and the 7,000 reported by some historians."

[237] In 2012 archaeological work at the site was conducted and since 2013 has continued on a bi-annual basis with help from college students from DePaul University (under the direction of Dr. Michael Gregory) as well as other local volunteers and children from the neighborhood.