it depends on if the prisoners were rich or not
they ate nasty food
In the 1940's the food they ate was very poor unless you were wealthy. The most common food ate for poor families was bread because it kept longer than most food.
Yes they did. They ate the same types of food.
They ate the same food as a poor person but at higher standards.
Yes, medieval people ate lobster. They also ate crab and crayfish, and did not distinguish among them as we do today. Lobster was regarded as food for very poor people among the early English colonists to North America, and fed it to prisoners. It may be that the English of the Middle Ages regarded the food in much the same way.
It is hard to say where the worst conditions of the Civil War existed. The most senseless existed in the northern prisoner of war camps where the Union held Southern prisoners. No reason exists why so many starved to death. The worst for the Northern Prisoners of war existed in Andersonville, Georgia. There the Union Prisoners also starved. However, unlike the Confederate solders in the Union Prisons, the Union Prisoners in Andersonville were given the same rations as Confederate solders in the field. The difference beinging that the solders in the field helped themselves to farmer's corn and other produce as they marched along. The worst place for civilians came during the siege of Vicksburg, Mississippi. The union artillery burned all the buildings. The people dug out caves. One solder reported, "First we ate all the cows; then we ate all the mules; then we ate all the horses; then we ate all the dogs; then we ate all the cats; and when we could find absolutely nothing else to eat, we surrendered. Both the army and the people of Vicksburg had gone a number of days without eating. When a few starved to death, they surrendered.
When they couldn't harvest any food or hunt animals, they were hungry enough to eat anything. So they brought some of the prisoners from the prisons and cooked them for food.
They didn't earn money and the grew the food they ate or the church community provided food. It was considered Godly to be poor.
they went to the bathroom in a can
Babies that could not be nursed by the biological mother frequently were given to a wet nurse until they could be weaned. Babies that had to be put on cow's milk tended to get something called "Summer Complaint" and frequently died. It was probably a form of food poisoning from lack of refrigeration.
they ate anything and everything. The richer ate better than the poor.
The rich Romans did. The poor Romans who could not afford to throw parties ate their food from a sitting position.