HDQRS. GEORGIA RESERVES
AND MIL. DIST. OF GEORGIA,
Macon, Ga., January 8,
1865.
Hon. JAMES A. SEDDON,
Secretary of War, Richmond, Va.:
SIR: Your letter of the 30th of December received by
yesterday's mail. I beg to assure you that I have spared no efforts or pains to
prosecute vigorously the recruiting of our Army through the conscript camp. It
is true, as you say, there are many liable to conscription who have not been
reached, and for reasons I have heretofore given I fear never will be reached.
Rest assured, however, that I will not cease my efforts in that regard. In response
to your inquiries, how our Army is to be recruited, I refer with strength and
confidence to the policy of opening the door for volunteers. I have so long and
so urgently pressed this matter that I feel reluctant even to allude to it, and
yet I should not be true to my strong convictions of duty if I permitted any
opportunity to pass without urging and pressing it upon the proper authorities.
It is in my opinion not only the best but the only mode of saving the Army, and
every day it is postponed weakens its strength and diminishes the number that
could be had by it. The freest, broadest, and most unrestricted system of
volunteering is the true policy, and cannot be too soon resorted to. I think
that the proposition to make soldiers of our slaves is the most pernicious idea
that has been suggested since the war began. It is to me a source of deep
mortification and regret to see the name of that good and great man and
soldier, General R. E. Lee, given as authority for such a policy. My first hour
of despondency will be the one in which that policy shall be adopted. You
cannot make soldiers of slaves, nor slaves of soldiers. The moment you resort
to negro soldiers your white soldiers will be lost to you; and one secret of
the favor with which the proposition is received in portions of the Army is the
hope that when negroes go into the Army they will be permitted to retire. It is
simply a proposition to fight the balance of the war with negro troops. You
can't keep white and black troops together, and you can't trust negroes by
themselves. It is difficult to get negroes enough for the purpose indicated in
the President's message, much less enough for an Army. Use all the negroes you
can get, for all the purposes for which you need them, but don't arm them. The day
you make soldiers of them is the beginning of the end of the revolution. If
slaves will make good soldiers our whole theory of slavery is wrong—but they
won't make soldiers. As a class they are wanting in every qualification of a
soldier. Better by far to yield to the demands of England and France and
abolish slavery, and thereby purchase their aid, than to resort to this policy,
which leads as certainly to ruin and subjugation as it is adopted; you want
more soldiers, and hence the proposition to take negroes into the Army. Before
resorting to it, at least try every reasonable mode of getting white soldiers.
I do not entertain a doubt that you can by the volunteering policy get more men
into the service than you can arm. I have more fears about arms than about men.
For heaven's sake try it before you fill with gloom and despondency the hearts
of many of our truest and most devoted men by resorting to the suicidal policy
of arming our slaves.
Having answered the inquiries of your letter, let me
volunteer in a few words a suggestion. Popularize your administration by some
just concessions to the strong convictions of public opinion. Mark you, I do
not say yield to popular clamor, but concede something to the earnest convictions
of an overwhelming, and, I will say, an enlightened public opinion. First,
yield your opposition to volunteering in the form and manner which I have
heretofore urged; second, restore General Johnston to the command of the Army
of Tennessee, and return General Beauregard to South Carolina.
With Lee in Virginia, Johnston here, and Beauregard in South
Carolina you restore confidence and at once revive the hopes of the people. At
present I regret to say that gloom and despondency rule the hour, and bitter
opposition to the Administration, mingled with disaffection and disloyalty, is
manifesting itself. With a dash of the pen the President can revolutionize this
state of things, and I earnestly beseech him to do it.
Sincerely, yours,
HOWELL COBB,
Major-general.
SOURCE: The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of
the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series IV, Volume
3 (Serial No. 129), p. 1009-10
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