SALISBURY — Historians Ed and Sue Curtis of Salisbury each received an award Saturday at the annual program of the N.C. Society of Historians, established in 1941.

The event was held in Mooresville, and President Elizabeth Bray Sherrill presented awards to those sharing the history of people, places and events in North Carolina.

Ed and Sue Curtis each received an award connected to their longtime interest in the military prison that was located by the Confederate government in Salisbury from December 1861 to February 1865 and its prison commandants, guards and prisoners from 32 states and the District of Columbia.

Sue Curtis received a Paul Green Multimedia Award for the 17th Annual Salisbury Confederate Prison Symposium, hosted by the Robert F. Hoke Chapter, United Daughters of the Confederacy, April 4-6, 2014.

The Symposium featured a banquet, seven lectures, two memorial services and a tour of the prison site.

An independent panel of judges used descriptions of the symposium from newspapers and publications; the symposium’s program booklet, “Looking Into the Salisbury Confederate Prison,” with images, map, poetry, speakers credentials and historical information; and the tablemat filled with significant dates, prison commandants, states of guards and prisoners, causes of death, physicians and interesting connections to other individuals.

A review of the symposium from the Salisbury Confederate Prison Association’s newsletter was submitted that described the lectures about sailors captured off the Outer Banks in 1861; newspaper reporters who worked in the prison prior to escaping; court-martialed Confederate soldiers serving out their sentences; the use of the railroad to the prison; the life of one of the ten prison commandants; and a review of the prison and its importance.

Ed Curtis received a Joe M. McLaurin Newsletter Award as editor of the Salisbury Confederate Prison Association Inc. publication, “The Prison Exchange.”

Copies of the quarterly newsletter for the 2013-2014 SCPA year were reviewed by judges. Material published in the newsletters included information from historical documents, publications, letters, diaries, etc., which were read and condensed to the available space; two biographies on Union prisoners and biographies on a Confederate guard and a physician; the 8th annual list of books that reference the prison or those who were there; an 1863 calendar; a list of Confederate and Union military prisons; and The Salisbury Confederate Prison 1861-1865 pamphlet.

Ed Curtis included announcements about the upcoming February 2015 Sesquicentennial Prison Display at the Rowan Public Library; a review about the SCPA table at the 2013 October Tour for Historic Salisbury; talks and tours given by members, donations made to the Hefner VA Medical Center and historical groups; wreaths placed; help provided in obtaining a cemetery marker in Wisconsin; and the placing of a SCPA paver in a historic Greensboro cemetery.

The newsletter is mailed to over 200 members in 28 states, District of Columbia, Canada, Singapore, and South Korea in addition to a number of museums and libraries.