The statistics of the great armies of Austria, Sardinia, and France during
the Italian war, when half a million of men met in conflict at Magenta and
Solferino, show, according to Boudin, that but six thousand four hundred
and ten men lost their lives--of the French, three thousand five hundred
and five; of the Sardinians, one thousand and forty-five; of the
Austrians, one thousand eight hundred and sixty. It is shown by the
records of the British army, that, out of the aggregate number of four
hundred and thirty-eight thousand British soldiers who were engaged in the
twenty-two great battles of the British empire from 1801 to 1854, but
fourteen thousand men were killed, or died of their wounds, or three per
cent. These battles embrace those of Egypt, Spain, France, Waterloo, and
the Crimea.
Contrast these blood-stained records with this one instance of rebel
cruelty at Andersonville. Of the number of the Federal soldiers who have
been held in captivity during the rebellion by the rebels, more than
thirty thousand of them are now dead. We know from official records that
twenty-three thousand are buried at Andersonville and Salisbury alone.