The Point Lookout Peninsula in Maryland juts south into the Potomac where the river meets the Chesapeake Bay. During the Civil War, the Federal Government quickly converted a resort on the point into a military hospital. After the July 1863 Battle of Gettysburg, the Union established a prisoner-of-war camp at the site. By the end of the war, more than 50,000 Confederate prisoners had passed through Point Lookout’s gates, making it the largest prisoner of war facility in the north. The soldiers who died at the prison camp are now buried at Point Lookout Confederate Cemetery located north of the historic prison. Two memorials stand commemorating the Confederate soldiers buried in a mass grave at the cemetery.
