Regional author Benton McAdams has been fascinated with the Civil War ever since his childhood.

He has dedicated five years of his life to composing “Rebels at Rock Island: The Story of a Civil War Prison,” which was just released last year.

“I was inspired to write about the Civil War prison because it was one of the six major prisons in the North that the Civil War was not written about,” said McAdams, who has served as the technology manager at NIU-Rockford for three years. “I wanted to outline the history of the prison during the Civil War, which started in 1863. Today, nothing is left of the prison except the cemetery.”

“Rebels at Rock Island” addresses the prison’s political and economic ties to the local community, including controversies between the camp commander and local citizens, as well as the local Copperhead newspaper editor.

Its main character, Ashley Wilkes, of “Gone With the Wind” fame, helped cast Rock Island’s reputation as the “Andersonville of the North.” McAdams shows that this Illinois prison was more humane than some accounts have suggested.

The book discusses the tragic history of the Civil War prison where many men died because of freezing weather, incompetent guards and inadequate facilities. Malnutrition and smallpox killed most of the men, in part because William Hoffman, who was in charge of the Union prison during war, focused on financial concerns more than human needs.

The Rock Island conditions were no worse than other Northern prisons such as Camp Douglas, nor was the prison’s mission to be unjustly cruel. McAdams establishes that the Union officers in charge of the camp sought to maintain humane conditions in the face of severe supply shortages, disease and a war that raged on longer and with greater hardships than anyone had anticipated.

Sara Atkinson, marketing assistant for NIU Press, said “I met McAdams in June of this year at Barnes and Noble in Rockford where he was leading a discussion about his book. At this time, he did not know who I was and I thought he was an interesting public speaker who used good anecdotes and told good stories.” Atkinson is responsible for promoting books through advertising and coordinating author appearances at bookstores and other locations. She said “Rebels at Rock Island” was the first book-length story written about the prison and that McAdams has appeared on several radio stations promoting the book.

The book was also adopted by the national History Book Club.

Martin Johnson, acquiring editor for NIU Press, was the editor who brought the book to the press because he thought it was wonderful. Johnson thinks that McAdams has a great sense of humor and it shows in his book through his characters.

“I thought that this was a great story that fits with the university and larger community, and it was well-researched in archives in the region, Washington, D.C., and Rock Island,” Johnson said.

McAdams will speak at 9:15 a.m. Saturday at the Chicago Historical Society’s Civil War Symposium. The title of his lecture is “Dead Dogs, Dollars and Drunkards: The Three Colonels of the Rock Island Barracks.”