Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: January 30, 1864

The Senate has passed a new Conscription Act, putting all residents between the ages of eighteen and fifty-live in the military service for the war. Those over forty-five to be detailed by the President as commissary quartermasters, Nitre Bureau agents, provost guards, clerks, etc. This would make up the enormous number of 1,500,000 men! The express companies are to have no detail of men fit for the field, but the President may exempt a certain class for agricultural purposes, which, of course, can be revoked whenever a farmer refuses to sell at schedule prices, or engages in speculation or extortion. Thus the President becomes almost absolute, and the Confederacy a military nation. The House will pass it with some modifications. Already the Examiner denounces it, for it allows only one owner or editor to a paper, and just sufficient printers,— no assistant editors, no reporters, no clerks, etc. This will save us, and hasten a peace.

Mr. G. A. Myers, the little old lawyer, always potential with the successive Secretaries of War, proposes, in a long letter, that the Department allows 30 to 40 foreigners (Jews) to leave the Confederate States, via Maryland, every week!

Mr. Goodman, President of the Mississippi Railroad, proposes to send cotton to the Yankees in exchange for implements, etc., to repair the road, and Lieut.-Gen. (Bishop) Polk favors the scheme.

Commissary-General Northrop likewise sent in a proposal from an agent of his in Mississippi, to barter cotton with the Yankees for subsistence, and he indorses an approval on it. I trust we shall be independent this summer.

To-day it is cool and cloudy, but Custis has had no use for fire in his school-room of nights for a week—and that in January. The warm weather saved us a dollar per day in coal. Custis's scholars are paying him $95 the first month.

I shall hope for better times now. We shall have men enough, if the Secretary and conscription officers do not strain the meshes of the seine too much, and the currency will be reduced. The speculators and extortioners, in great measure, will be circumvented, for the new conscription will take them from their occupations, and they will not find transportation for their wares.

The 2000 barrels of corn destroyed by the enemy on the Peninsula, a few days ago, belonged to a relative of Col Ruffin, Assistant Commissary-General! He would not impress that—and lo! it is gone! Many here are glad of it.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 2, p. 138-9

George L. Stearns to Governor John A. Andrew, after July 18, 1863

To His Excellency John A. Andrew.

Dear Sir: — Last week a deputation from my Philadelphia committee visited Washington to confer with the Government in relation to colored troops. Most prominent in the conference was the question of “pay and bounty the same as white troops.”

To-day they send to Washington a memorial setting forth their reasons for asking that colored troops be placed in every way on the same footing as white. You will see by reference that the conscription law makes no difference in pay, and the committee think that should control the earlier legislation.

*          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *

My heart bleeds for our gallant officers and soldiers of the 54th. All did their duty nobly. I am told that three companies of the 54th saved the Maine regiment engaged in the battle.

I have the honor to be

Very respectfully,

George L. Stearns.

SOURCE: Preston Stearns, The Life and Public Services of George Luther Stearns, p. 305-6

Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes to Sardis Birchard, March 9, 1863

Camp Reynolds, March 9, 1863.

Dear Uncle: — Yours of last Sunday came to hand yesterday. Wife and boys still here — very happy. They fish and row skiff and ride horseback. They can all row. Webb and Birch rowed a large load of soldiers across the river and back — a large roaring river, almost like the Ohio in a fair fresh. They will go home in a week or two probably. We shall remain here two or three weeks and then probably go to Charleston.

The new conscript act strikes me as the best thing yet, if it is only used. I would only call enough men to recruit up weakened regiments, and compel the return of the shirks and deserters. Make our commanders give more time to drill and discipline; make the armies regulars — effectives; stand on the defensive except when we can attack in superior numbers; send no more regiments or gunboats to be gobbled up one at a time. Mass our forces and we shall surely conquer.

Sincerely,

R. B. Hayes.

S. BlRCHARD.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 393-4

Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes to Sardis Birchard, March 4, 1863

Camp Reynolds, Virginia, March 4, 1863.

Dear Uncle: — Getting on finely. The boys busy and very happy. Webb, I fancy, is a good deal such a boy is [as] Lorenzo was. He is to be seen driving some soldier's team or riding whenever there is a chance. Lucy will probably leave in a fortnight or so, probably about the time we go to Charleston.

The new conscription law strikes me as a capital measure. I hope it will be judiciously and firmly administered.

I have an offer for my Hamilton property one thousand dollars cash, one thousand dollars in six months, and the balance of fifteen hundred in three equal annual payments. Before the war I would have taken it quickly enough, but I am not sure now but the real estate is best. It pays taxes and about one hundred dollars a year rent. What could I do with the money?

Sincerely,

R. B. Hayes.

S. BIRCHARD.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 393

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: July 21, 1863

We have intelligence to-day, derived from a New York paper of the 18th inst., that the “insurrection” in New York had subsided, under the menacing attitude of the military authority, and that Lincoln had ordered the conscription law to be enforced. This gives promise of a long war.

Mr. Mallory sent a note to the Secretary of War to-day (which of course the Secretary did not see, and will never hear of) by a young man named Juan Boyle, asking permission for B. to pass into Maryland as an agent of the Navy Department. Judge Campbell indorsed on the back of it (to Brig.-Gen. Winder) that permission was “allowed” by “order.” But what is this “agent” to procure in the United States which could not be had by our steamers plying regularly between Wilmington and Europe?

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 384-5

Diary of Gideon Welles: Tuesday, July 14, 1863

We have accounts of mobs, riots, and disturbances in New York and other places in consequence of the Conscription Act. Our information is very meagre; two or three mails are due; the telegraph is interrupted. There have been powerful rains which have caused great damage to the railroads and interrupted all land communication between this and Baltimore.

There are, I think, indubitable evidences of concert in these riotous movements, beyond the accidental and impulsive outbreak of a mob, or mobs. Lee's march into Pennsylvania, the appearance of several Rebel steamers off the coast, the mission of A. H. Stephens to Washington, seem to be parts of one movement, have one origin, are all concerted schemes between the Rebel leaders and Northern sympathizing friends, — the whole put in operation when the Government is enforcing the conscription. This conjunction is not all accidental, but parts of a great plan. In the midst of all this and as a climax comes word that Lee's army has succeeded in recrossing the Potomac. If there had been an understanding between the mob conspirators, the Rebels, and our own officers, the combination of incidents could not have been more advantageous to the Rebels.

The Cabinet-meeting was not full to-day. Two or three of us were there, when Stanton came in with some haste and asked to see the President alone. The two were absent about three minutes in the library. When they returned, the President's countenance indicated trouble and distress; Stanton was disturbed, disconcerted. Usher asked Stanton if he had bad news. He said, “No.” Something was said of the report that Lee had crossed the river. Stanton said abruptly and curtly he knew nothing of Lee's crossing. “I do,” said the President emphatically, with a look of painful rebuke to Stanton. “If he has not got all of his men across, he soon will.”

The President said he did not believe we could take up anything in Cabinet to-day. Probably none of us were in a right frame of mind for deliberation; he was not. He wanted to see General Halleck at once. Stanton left abruptly. I retired slowly. The President hurried and overtook me. We walked together across the lawn to the Departments and stopped and conversed a few moments at the gate. He said, with a voice and countenance which I shall never forget, that he had dreaded yet expected this; that there has seemed to him for a full week a determination that Lee, though we had him in our hands, should escape with his force and plunder. “And that, my God, is the last of this Army of the Potomac! There is bad faith somewhere. Meade has been pressed and urged, but only one of his generals was for an immediate attack, was ready to pounce on Lee; the rest held back. What does it mean, Mr. Welles? Great God! what does it mean?” I asked what orders had gone from him, while our troops had been quiet with a defeated and broken army in front, almost destitute of ammunition, and an impassable river to prevent their escape. He could not say that anything positive had been done, but both Stanton and Halleck professed to agree with him and he thought Stanton did. Halleck was all the time wanting to hear from Meade. “Why,” said I, “he is within four hours of Meade. Is it not strange that he has not been up there to advise and encourage him?” I stated I had observed the inertness, if not incapacity, of the General-in-Chief, and had hoped that he, who had better and more correct views, would issue peremptory orders. The President immediately softened his tone and said: “Halleck knows better than I what to do. He is a military man, has had a military education. I brought him here to give me military advice. His views and mine are widely different. It is better that I, who am not a military man, should defer to him, rather than he to me.” I told the President I did not profess to be a military man, but there were some things on which I could form perhaps as correct an opinion as General Halleck, and I believed that he, the President, could more correctly, certainly more energetically, direct military movements than Halleck, who, it appeared to me, could originate nothing, and was, as now, all the time waiting to hear from Meade, or whoever was in command.

I can see that the shadows which have crossed my mind have clouded the President's also. On only one or two occasions have I ever seen the President so troubled, so dejected and discouraged.

Two hours later I went to the War Department. The President lay upon a sofa in Stanton's room, completely absorbed, overwhelmed with the news. He was, however, though subdued and sad, calm and resolute. Stanton had asked me to come over and read Dana's¹ report of the materials found at Vicksburg. The amount is very great, and the force was large. Thirty-one thousand two hundred prisoners have been paroled. Had Meade attacked and captured the army above us, as I verily believe he might have done, the Rebellion would have been ended. He was disposed to attack, I am told, but yielded to his generals, who were opposed. If the war were over, those generals would drop into subordinate positions.

_______________

¹ Charles A. Dana, Assistant Secretary of War.

SOURCE: Gideon Welles, Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson, Vol. 1: 1861 – March 30, 1864, p. 369-71

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: March 4, 1863

The enemy bombarded Fort McAlister again yesterday, several gun-boats opening fire on it. It lasted all day; during winch one of the iron-clads retired, perhaps injured. We had only two men wounded and one gun (8 in. columbiad) dismounted. The fort was but little injured.

Recent Northern papers assert that their gun-boats have all passed through the canal opposite Vicksburg. This is not true yet.

Lincoln is now Dictator, his Congress having given him power to call out all the male population between the ages of twenty and thirty-five years, and authority to declare martial law whenever he pleases. The Herald shouts for Lincoln — of course. We must fight and pray, and hope for revolution and civil war in the North, which may occur any day.

Our cavalry, under Gen. Jones, has done some brilliant skirmishing recently in the vicinity of Winchester; and as soon as the March winds dry the earth a little, I suppose Hooker will recommence the “On to Richmond.” We shall be weaker the next campaign, but our men are brave.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 267

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: March 3, 1863

We like our new quarters — and the three Samaritan widows, without children. They lend us many articles indispensable for our comfort. It is probable they will leave us soon in the sole occupancy of the house. There is ground enough for a good many vegetables — and meat is likely to be scarce enough. Bacon is now $1.37½ cts. per pound, and flour $30 per barrel. The shadow of the gaunt form of famine is upon us! But the pestilence of small-pox is abating.

We have now fine March weather; but the floods of late have damaged the railroad bridges between this and Fredericksburg. The Secretary of War requested the editors, yesterday, to say nothing of this. We have no news from the West or from the Southeast — but we shall soon have enough.

The United States Congress has passed the Conscription Act. We shall see the effect of it in the North; I predict civil war there; and that will be our “aid and comfort.”

Gen. Toombs has resigned; and it is said Pryor has been made a major-general. Thus we go up and down. The President has issued a proclamation for prayer, fasting, etc., on the twenty-seventh of this month. There will certainly be fasting — and prayer also. And God has helped us, or we should have been destroyed ere this.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 266-7

Diary of John Beauchamp Jones: February 25, 1863

On the 18th inst. the enemy's battery on the opposite side of the Mississippi River opened on Vicksburg. The damage was not great; but the front of the town is considered untenable.

The Conscription bill has passed the United States Senate, which will empower the President to call for 3,000,000 men. “Will they come, when he does call for them?” That is to be seen. It may be aimed at France; and a war with the Emperor might rouse the Northern people again. Some of them, however, have had enough of war.

To-day I heard of my paper addressed to the President on the subject of an appeal to the people to send food to the army. He referred it to the Commissary-General, Col. Northrop, who sent it to the War Department, with an indorsement that as he had no acquaintance with that means of maintaining an army (the patriotic contributions of the people), he could not recommend the adoption of the plan. Red tape is mightier than patriotism still. There may be a change, however, for Gen. Lee approves the plan.

SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 264

Major-General John A. Dix to the Citizens of New York, August 17, 1863

Head-quarters, Department of the East, New York City,

August 17, 1863.

To the Citizens of New York:

The draft of men in this city to replenish the ranks of the army, in order to complete more speedily the suppression of the insurrection in the South, having, in consequence of forcible resistance to the execution of the law, been placed under my direction, as commanding officer of the forces of the United States in this Military Department, I have thought it not out of place to present to you some suggestions for your consideration as friends of the Union and of the good order of society.

The law under which the draft is to be made is for enrolling and calling out the National forces. It is founded on the principle that every citizen, who enjoys the protection of the Government and looks to it for the security of his property and his life, may be called on in seasons of great public danger to take up arms for the common defence. No political society can be held together unless this principle is acknowledged as one to which the Government may have recourse when its existence is in peril. There is no civilized country in which it is not recognized.

The law authorizing the draft has been persistently called a conscription law by those who desire to make it odious and defeat its execution. It is in no just sense a conscription like that which was put in force in the sixth year of the French Republic, and abandoned on the restoration of the Bourbons, on account of its oppressive exactions. It is a simple law for enrolling and calling into the service the arms-bearing population of certain ages, and differs in no essential principle from the law authorizing the Militia to be called out, excepting that in the latter case complete organizations are brought into the field. The object of the very provisions of the law which are most beneficial to individuals has been most grossly perverted. If a drafted man finds it inconvenient to serve, he is allowed to furnish a substitute, or to purchase his exemption from service by paying the smallest sum of money for which substitutes are ordinarily obtained. Both these provisions have the same purpose — to provide for cases of hardship; and if either were stricken out, these cases would be proportionably increased in number.

The draft about to be made is for one-fifth part of all persons between twenty and thirty-five years of age, and of the unmarried between thirty-five and forty-five. The entire class between eighteen and thirty-five was long since drafted in the seceded States; and the draft has recently been extended to embrace nearly the whole arms-bearing population. Compared with the burden they are sustaining ours is as nothing. The contest on our part is to defend our nationality, to uphold the institutions under the protection of which we have lived and prospered, and to preserve untarnished the proud memories of our history — brief, it is true, but full of high achievements in science, in art, and in arms. Shall we, in such a cause, shrink from labors and sacrifices which our misguided brethren in the seceded States are sustaining in the cause of treason and social disorganization? For the honor of New York let us take care that the history of this rebellion, more vast than any which has ever convulsed a nation, shall contain nothing to make our children blush for the patriotism of their fathers.

Whatever objection there may be to the law authorizing the draft, whatever defects it may have, it is the law of the land, and resistance to it is revolt against the constituted authorities of the country. If one law can be set at defiance, any other may be, and the foundations of all government may be broken up. Those who, in the history of political societies, have been the first to set themselves up against the law have been the surest victims of the disorder which they have created. The poor have a far deeper interest in maintaining the inviolability of the law than the rich. Property, through the means it can command, is power. But the only security for those who have little more than life and the labor of their own hands to protect lies in the supremacy of the law. On them, and on those who are dependent on them, social disorder falls with fatal effect.

The constitutionality of the law authorizing the draft has been disputed. Near the close of the year 1814, when the country was engaged in war with Great Britain, a similar law was recommended to Congress by the Government, to draft men to fill the ranks of the army, which was gallantly battling, as our armies are now, for the nation's honor and life. Madison, one of the great expounders of the Constitution, which he took a prominent part in framing, was President. Monroe, his successor, then acting both as Secretary of State and Secretary of War, addressed to the House of Representatives a lucid argument in support of the right of Congress to pass such a law. Alexander J. Dallas was Secretary of the Treasury; William Jones, Secretary of the Navy; Return J. Meigs, Postmaster-general; and Richard Rush, Attorney-general. The measure could not well have received a higher party sanction. All laws passed with the established legislative forms are valid until declared otherwise by judicial tribunals of competent jurisdiction. What would become of a people in critical emergencies if no law could be carried into effect until it had passed the ordeal of the courts? or if State or municipal authorities could arrest its execution by calling in question its conformity to the provisions of the Constitution? The President has promptly consented to have it tested by judicial interpretation; but while the car of victory is moving on, and treason is flying before it, God forbid that the State of New York or its constituted authorities should attempt to stay its progress until the judicial process can be consummated.

The accuracy of the enrolment in the city districts having been impeached, a revision was immediately ordered by the President, on a representation from the Governor of the State. But as the men are needed for immediate service, and as the correction of the returns requires time, the quota was ordered to be reduced in all the districts — in some more than half the whole amount — leaving the account for future adjustment. The reduction in the quota exceeds in proportion the alleged excess of the enrolment; so that no personal injustice can possible occur.

Under these circumstances no good citizen will array himself, either by word or deed, against the draft. Submission to the law in seasons of tranquillity is always the highest of political duties. But when the existence of the Government is in peril he who resists its authority commits a crime of the deepest turpitude. He is the voluntary instrument of those who are seeking to overthrow it, and becomes himself a public enemy. Moreover, resistance to the Government by those who are living under its protection, and arc indebted to it for the daily tenure of their property and their lives, has not even the palliation under which those who lead the insurrection at the South seek to shelter themselves—that they are acting under color of authority derived from Legislatures or conventions of the people in their respective States. With us resistance to the constituted authorities is both treason and lawless violence; and if there are any who thus combine to re-enact the scenes of cruelty and devastation by which this city has recently been dishonored, and to defeat by force of arms the execution of the paramount law of Congress, they will be treated as enemies of the country and mankind.

Returning among you from a distance, fellow-citizens, after more than two years of military service in the cause of the Union, to uphold which this city has, in all emergencies, stood forth with a manly patriotism worthy of her high position—having no feeling but to see her good name preserved without blemish, no wish but that she may continue, as she has ever been, the most Orderly of the great commercial towns of the age — I have ventured to address to you these suggestions, to exhort you to the maintenance of order, to obedience to the laws, and to the quiet pursuit of your accustomed avocations, while the draft is in progress.

Should these suggestions be disregarded by any among you, and renewed attempts be made to disturb the public peace, to break down the barriers which have been set up for the security of property and life, and to defeat the execution of a law which it is my duty to enforce, I warn all such persons that ample preparation has been made to vindicate the authority of the Government, and that the first exhibitions of disorder or violence will be met by the most prompt and vigorous measures for their repression.

John A. Dix, Major-general.

SOURCE: Morgan Dix, Memoirs of John Adams Dix, Volume 2, p. 88-91

Governor Horatio Seymour to Major-General John A. Dix, August 15, 1863

Executive Department, Albany, August 15,1863.

To Major-general John A. Dix, U.S.A.,

Commanding Department of the East:

Sir, — I have received the final answer of the President to my suggestions with regard to the draft in this State. I regret that he did not see fit to comply with my requests, as I am confident that a generous reliance upon the patriotism of the people to fill the thinned ranks of our armies by voluntary enlistments would hereafter, as it has heretofore, prove more effectual than any conscription. As I have fully expressed my views on this subject in my correspondence with the President, of which I send you a copy, it is not necessary to refer again to those topics.

I had hoped the same opportunity would be afforded New York that has been given to other States, of showing to the world that no compulsory process was needful to send from this State its full quota of men to re-enforce our armies. As you state in your letter that it is your duty to enforce the act of Congress, and as you apprehend its provisions may excite popular resistance, it is proposed you should know the position which will be held by the State authorities. Of course, under no circumstances can they perform duties expressly confided to others, nor can they undertake to relieve others from their proper responsibilities. But there can be no violations of good order, no riotous proceedings, no disturbances of the public peace, which are not infractions of the laws of the State, and those laws will be enforced under all circumstances. I shall take care that all the executive officers of this State perform their duties vigorously and thoroughly, and if need be the military power will be called into requisition.

As you are an officer of the general Government, and not of the State, it does not become me to make suggestions to you with regard to your action under a law of Congress. You will, of course, be governed by your instructions and your own views of duty; and it would be unbecoming in me to obtrude my opinions upon one who is charged with high responsibilities, and who is in no degree subject to my direction, or responsible to me for anything which he may do in accordance with his own judgment and in pursuance of his convictions of propriety.

Yours truly, etc.,

Horatio Seymour.

SOURCE: Morgan Dix, Memoirs of John Adams Dix, Volume 2, p. 82

Major-General John A. Dix to Governor Horatio Seymour, August 8, 1863

Head-quarters, Department of the East, New York City, August 8,1863.

His Excellency Horatio Seymour, Governor of the State of New York:

Sir, — I had the honor to receive on the evening of the 5th instant your letter of the 3d, in reply to mine of the 30th ultimo, informing me that you had made a communication to the President of the United States in relation to the draft in this State, and expressing your belief that his answer would relieve you and me from the painful questions growing out of an armed enforcement of the Conscription Act, etc.

Your Excellency promises to write me again on the subject when you shall have received the President's answer. It will afford me great pleasure to hear from you, and to receive an affirmative answer to the inquiry contained in my letter. But I owe it to my position as commander of this Military Department to anticipate his reply by some suggestions arising out of your answer to me.

You are, no doubt, aware that the draft has been nearly completed in the nine Western Districts, and that it has also been completed in several districts and is in successful progress in others in the central part of the State, under the orders of the Provost-marshal General. It is my duty now, as commanding officer of the troops in the service of the United States in the Department, if called on by the enrolling officers, to aid them in resisting forcible opposition to the execution of the law; and it was from an earnest desire to avoid the necessity of employing for the purpose any of my forces which have been placed here to garrison the forts and protect the public property, that I wished to see the draft enforced by the military power of the State in case of armed and organized resistance to it. But, holding such resistance to the paramount law of Congress to be disorganizing and revolutionary — leading, unless effectually suppressed, to the overthrow of the Government itself, to the success of the insurgents in the seceded States, and to universal anarchy — I designed, if your co-operation could not be relied on, to ask the general Government for a force which should be adequate to insure the execution of the law, and to meet any emergency growing out of it.

The act under which the draft is in progress was, as your Excellency is aware, passed to meet the difficulty of keeping up the army, through the system of volunteering, to the standard of force deemed necessary to suppress the insurrection. The service of every man capable of bearing arms is, in all countries — those specially in which power is responsible to the people—due to the Government when its existence is in peril. This service is the price of the protection which he receives, and of the safeguards with which the law surrounds him in the enjoyment of his property and life. The act authorizing the draft is entitled “An act for enrolling and calling out the national forces.” I regret that your Excellency should have characterized it as “the conscription act” — a phrase borrowed from a foreign system of enrolment, with odious features from which ours is wholly free, and originally applied to the law in question by those who desired to bring it into reproach and defeat its execution. I impute to your Excellency no such purpose. On the contrary, I assume it to have been altogether inadvertent. But I regret it, because there is danger that, in thus designating it and deprecating “an armed enforcement” of it, you may be understood to regard it as an obnoxious law, which ought not to be carried into execution, thus throwing the influence of your high position against the Government in a conflict for its existence.

The call which has been made for service is for one-fifth part of the arms-bearing population between twenty and thirty-five years of age, and of the unmarried between thirty-five and forty-five.

The insurgent authorities at Richmond have not only called into service heretofore the entire class between eighteen and thirty-five, but are now extending the enrolment to classes more advanced in age. The burden which the loyal States are called on to sustain is not, in proportion to population, one-tenth part as onerous as that which has been assumed by the seceded States. Shall not we, if necessary, be ready to do as much for the preservation of our political institutions as they are doing to overthrow and destroy them — as much for the cause of stable government as they for the cause of treason and for the disorganization of society on this continent? I say the disorganization of society, for no man of reflection can doubt where secession would end if a Southern Confederacy should be successfully established.

I cannot doubt that the people of this patriotic State, which you justly say has done so much for the country during the existing war, will respond to the call now made upon them. The alacrity and enthusiasm with which they have repeatedly rushed to arms for the support of the Government and the defence of the National flag from insult and degradation have exalted the character and given new vigor to the moral power of the State, and will inspire our descendants with magnanimous resolution for generations to come. This example of fidelity to all that is honorable and elevated in public duty must not be tarnished. The recent riots in this city, coupled as they were with the most atrocious and revolting crimes, have cast a shadow over it for the moment. But the promptitude with which the majesty of the law was vindicated, and the fearlessness with which a high judicial functionary is pronouncing judgment upon the guilty, have done and are doing much to efface what, under a different course of action, might have been an indelible stain upon the reputation of the city. It remains only for the people to vindicate themselves from reproach in the eyes of the country and the world by a cheerful acquiescence in the law. That it has defects is generally conceded. That it will involve cases of personal hardship is not disputed. War, when waged for self-defence, for the maintenance of great principles, and for the national life, is not exempt from the suffering inseparable from all conflicts which are decided by the shock of armies; and it is by our firmness and our patriotism in meeting all the calls of the country upon us that we achieve the victory, and prove ourselves worthy of it and the cause in which we toil and suffer.

Whatever defects the act authorizing the enrolment and draft may have, it is the law of the land, framed in good faith by the representatives of the people; and it must be presumed to be consistent with the provisions of the Constitution until pronounced to be in conflict with them by competent judicial tribunals. Those, therefore, who array themselves against it arc obnoxious to far severer censure than the ambitious and misguided men who are striving to subvert our Government, for the latter are acting by color of sanction under Legislatures and conventions of the people in the States they represent. Among us resistance to the law by those who claim and enjoy the protection of the Government has no semblance of justification, and becomes the very blackest of political crimes, not only because it is revolt against the constituted authorities of the country, but because it would be practically striking a blow for treason, and arousing to renewed efforts and new crimes those who are staggering to their fall under the resistless power of our recent victories.

In conclusion, I renew the expression of my anxiety to be assured by your Excellency at the earliest day practicable that the military power of the State will, in case of need, be employed to enforce the draft. I desire to receive the assurance because, under a mixed system of government like ours, it is best that resistance to the law should be put down by the authority of the State in which it occurs. I desire it also because I shall otherwise deem it my duty to call on the general Government for a force which shall not only be adequate to insure the execution of the law, but which shall enable me to carry out such decisive measures as shall leave their impress upon the mind of the country for years to come.

I have the honor to be, very respectfully, yours,

John A. Dix, Major-general.

SOURCE: Morgan Dix, Memoirs of John Adams Dix, Volume 2, p. 78-81

Major General George G. Meade to Margaretta Sergeant Meade, June 23, 1863

Camp At Aldie, Va., June 23, 1863.

Yesterday General Pleasanton drove the enemy's cavalry across what is called the Loudoun Valley, or the valley formed by the South Mountain and Bull Run Mountains. He did not find any infantry in Loudoun Valley, and reports Lee's army about Winchester, in the Valley of the Shenandoah, and that A. P. Hill, whom we left at Fredericksburg, is coming up the valley to join Lee. When Hill joins Lee, he will have a large army, numerically much superior to ours, and he will then, I presume, develop his plans.

I have seen a paper now and then, and have been greatly amused at the evident fears of the good people of the North, and the utter want of proper spirit in the measures proposed to be taken. I did think at first that the rebels crossing the line would result in benefit to our cause, by arousing the people to a sense of the necessity of raising men to fill their armies to defend the frontier, and that the Government would take advantage of the excitement to insist on the execution of the enrollment bill; but when I see the President calling out six months' men, and see the troops at Harrisburg refusing to be mustered in for fear they may be kept six months in service, I give up in despair. I hope it will turn out better, and we have been disappointed so many times when we had reason to look for success, it may be, now that we are preparing for a reverse, we may suddenly find ourselves in luck.

This is a beautiful country where I am now encamped. It is right on the Bull Run Mountains, which, though not very high, yet are sufficiently so to give effect to the scenery and purify the air. Charles F. Mercer lived in Aldie; President Monroe's estate was here, and the mansion of the old Berkeley family, showing that in old times it was the abode of the aristocracy. It is a great contrast to the arid region around Fredericksburg that we left.

SOURCE: George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Vol. 1, p. 386-7

Major General George G. Meade to Margaretta Sergeant Meade, April 18, 1863

April 18, 1863.

To-day is fine and beautiful, and if we only have a continuance of such weather, we shall soon be on the move. I suppose the sooner we get off the better. General Hooker seems to be very sanguine of success, but is remarkably reticent of his information and plans; I really know nothing of what he intends to do, or when or where he proposes doing anything. This secrecy I presume is advantageous, so far as it prevents the enemy's becoming aware of our plans. At the same time it may be carried too far, and important plans may be frustrated by subordinates, from their ignorance of how much depended on their share of the work. This was the case at Fredericksburg. Franklin was not properly advised, that is to say, not fully advised, as to Burnside's plan. I am sure if he had been so advised, his movements would have been different.

I suppose you have seen Jeff Davis's proclamation on the subject of food. It undoubtedly is a confession of weakness, but we should be very careful how we allow ourselves to be led astray by it. Not a single exertion on our part should be relaxed, not a man less called out than before. We might as well make up our minds to the fact that our only hope of peace is in the complete overpowering of the military force of the South, and to do this we must have immense armies to outnumber them everywhere. I fear, however, that this plain dictate of common sense will never have its proper influence. Already I hear a talk of not enforcing the conscription law. Certainly no such efforts are being made to put the machinery of the law into motion as would indicate an early calling out of the drafted men. In the course of the next month and the one ensuing, all the two-year and nine-month men go out of service. Of the latter class there were called out three hundred thousand. How many are in service I don't know. I do know, however, that this army loses in the next twenty days nearly twenty-five thousand men, and that I see no indication of their being replaced. Over eight thousand go out of my corps alone. These facts have been well-known at Washington for some time past, and pressed upon the attention of the authorities, and perhaps arrangements unknown to me have been made to meet the difficulty.

SOURCE: George Meade, The Life and Letters of George Gordon Meade, Vol. 1, p. 366-7

Major General William T. Sherman to Schuyler Colfax, August 12, 1864

HEADQUARTERS MILITARY DIVISION OF THE MISSISSIPPI.

IN THE FIELD, ATLANTA, Aug. 12, 1864.

SCHUYLER COLFAX, Esq.,

South Bend, Ind.

My Dear Sir:

John Sherman has sent me your letter of Aug. 2d, in which you intimate a wish that certain nine regiments of Indiana troops should be ordered where they can be furloughed so as to vote in the fall elections.

Of course it is impossible. I have not now troops enough to do what the case admits of without extra hazard, and to send away a single man would be an act of injustice to the remainder. I think you need not be concerned about the soldiers’ vote. They will vote, — it may not be in the coming election, — but you may rest assured the day will come when the soldiers will vote, and the only doubt is if they will permit the stay-at-homes to vote at all.

I hope you will be elected; but I do think the conscript-law is the only one that is wanted for the next few years, and if the President uses it freely he can checkmate the Copperheads, who are not in favor of being governed by Jeff Davis, but are afraid to go to the war. Their motives are transparent. Jeff Davis despises them more than you do, and if he prevails in this war he will deal with Copperheads with infinitely more severity than he will with men who fight for their country and for principle.

I am, etc.,

W. T. SHERMAN,

Major- General.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman Letters: Correspondence Between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 238-9

From Virginia

HARRISONBURG, Va., April 29.

Three thousand rebels, under Edward Johnson, formerly of the Federal army, are posted a few miles from Stanton, but in a position easily accessible to escape in case of Gen. Milroy’s approach.

The most reliable news from Gordonsville, is that there are only four brigades there, not numbering 15,000.  Gen. Longstreet, with his command, has gone to Yorktown.  Should Johnson retire there he will probably reinforce Jackson on the Blue Ridge.

The Richmond Examiner, of the 22d, says, in effect that the destiny of the Confederacy is trembling on the result at Yorktown.  If successful, it will give us six months for carrying out the conscription act, arming and equipping a large army, and launching a fleet of Merrimacs; but if unsuccessful, Virginia is lost.

– Published in The Davenport Daily Gazette, Davenport, Iowa, Friday Morning, May 2, 1862, p. 1

Major General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, April 23, 1863

CAMP BEFORE VICKSBURG, April 23, 1863.

Dear Brother:

I have noticed in the Conscript Act the clauses which empowered the President to consolidate the ten companies of a regiment into five, when the aggregate was below one-half the maximum standard, and to reduce the officers accordingly. Had I dreamed that this was going to be made universal, I should have written you and begged you for the love of our ruined country to implore Lincoln to spare us this last and fatal blow. Two years of costly war have enabled the North to realize the fact that by organized and disciplined armies alone can she hope to restore the old and found a new empire. We had succeeded in making the skeletons of armies, eliminating out of the crude materials that first came forth the worthless material, and had just begun to have some good young colonels, captains, sergeants and corporals. And Congress had passed the Conscript Bill, which would have enabled the President to fill up these skeleton regiments full of privates who soon, from their fellows, and with experienced officers, would make an army capable of marching and being handled and directed. But to my amazement comes this order. . . . This is a far worse defeat than Manassas. Mr. Wade, in his report to condemn McClellan, gave a positive assurance to the army that henceforth, instead of fighting with diminishing ranks, we should feel assured that the gaps made by the bullet, by disease, desertion, &c., would be promptly filled, whereas only such parts of the Conscript Law as tend to weaken us are enforced, viz.: 5 per cent for furlough and 50 per cent of officers and non-commissioned officers discharged to consolidate regiments. Even Blair is amazed at this. He protests the order cannot be executed, and we should appeal to Mr. Lincoln, whom he still insists has no desire to destroy the army. But the order is positive and I don't see how we can hesitate. Grant started to-day down to Carthage, and I have written to him, which may stave it off for a few days, but I tremble at the loss of so many young and good officers, who have been hard at work for two years, and now that they begin to see how to take care of soldiers, must be turned out. . . .

If not too late, do, for mercy’s sake, exhaust your influence to stop this consolidation of regiments. Fill all the regiments with conscripts, and if the army is then too large disband the regiments that prefer to serve north of the Potomac and the Ohio. Keep the war South at all hazards. If this Consolidation Law is literally enforced, and no new draft is made, this campaign is over. And the outside world will have a perfect right to say our Government is afraid of its own people. . . .

Affectionately yours,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman letters: correspondence between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 199-200

Major General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, April 3, 1863

CAMP BEFORE VICKSBURG, April 3, '63.

My Dear Brother:

I received your long letter from Mansfield, for which I am much obliged. You certainly have achieved an envious name in the Senate, and I confess I am astonished at your industry and acquirements. I readily understand how, in a revolution of the magnitude that now involves us all, older men should devolve on you and the younger school of men the legislation and experiments necessary to meet a state of facts so different from the common run of events. The Finance Bill and Conscription Acts of the late Congress in my judgment may keep the management of the affairs of the nation in the hands of the Constitutional Government. Anything short of them, the war would have drifted out of the control of President and Congress. Now if Mr. Lincoln will assume the same position that Davis did at the outset, he can unite the fighting North against the fighting South, and numerical force systematized will settle the war. I know the impatience of the people, but this is one of the lessons of war. People must learn that war is a question of physical force and courage. A million of men engaged in peaceful pursuits will be vanquished by a few thousand determined armed men. The justice of the cause has nothing to do with it. It is a question of force. Again we are the assailants, and have to overcome not only an equal number of determined men, however wrongfully engaged, but the natural obstacles of a most difficult country. . . .

They [i.e. newspaper correspondents] are unknown to me, appear in disguise of sutlers' clerks, cotton thieves and that class of vultures that hang around every army. I never saw or heard of Knox till he had published his falsehoods; and when I did send for him, and he admitted how false he had been, he enunciated the sentiment that his trade was to collect news — he must furnish reading matter for sale, true, if possible; otherwise, false. . . .

It is absurd to say these correspondents relieve the anxiety of parents, friends, &c. My soldiers write constantly and receive immense numbers of letters. This is right, and if newspapers will report only local matters and discuss matters within their knowledge, parents and families would not be kept half frantic with the accounts of sickness, death, massacres, &c., of their children and relatives. We have hundreds of visitors from every quarter to examine our camps, because correspondents represented us as all dying, when the truth is no army was ever better provided for and supplied. We are camped on narrow slips of levee and ground, because all else is under water. To get on dry ground we must go back to Memphis or Helena. . . .

McPherson is a splendid officer. Grant is honest and does his best. I will do as ordered. I will suggest little, as others talk of my failing to take Vicksburg and I want them to try a hand. . . .

Affectionately,

W. T. SHERMAN.

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman letters: correspondence between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 196-8

Senator John Sherman to Major General William T. Sherman, March 20, 1863

MANSFIELD, OHIO,

March 20, 1863.

Dear Brother:

I am at length at home with sufficient leisure to think, but still somewhat jaded from a very laborious session. When I went into the Senate I anticipated quiet and dignified leisure with ample time to read, reflect and study such grave questions of politics as I chose to turn my attention to. Such thus far has not been my experience. The vast and complicated legislature required by war, demands of Senators an amount of labor in committees never before given. The Senate has become a laborious committee where bills are drawn as well as discussed. It has so happened that although a junior yet I have had to carry the most important financial bills, such as the Bank Loan and Tax Bills, subjects full of difficulty and detail. . . .

The laws passed at the last session will be a monument of evil or of good. They cover such vast sums, delegate and regulate such vast powers, and are so far-reaching in their effects, that generations will be affected well or ill by them. These measures are distinguished as much by what were omitted as by what were adopted. The negro was not legislated upon. The laws of confiscation, emancipation, &c., were left precisely upon the basis of previous laws, the proclamations of the President and ultimate decisions of the courts. The arming and employment of negroes is left upon the old law and mainly to the discretion of the President. There was but little speech-making and that mainly to the matter in hand. The Union or rather Republican members made scarcely a political speech in either house. They felt too constantly the pressure of practical measures demanding action. On the whole, the recent Congress may fairly appeal to their constituents for a favorable judgment upon the general aggregate of their acts. For myself, I do not reproach myself with any glaring fault. I opposed arbitrary arrests, general confiscation, the destruction of State lines and other extreme measures, and thereby have lost the confidence of some of my old friends. On the other hand, I have taken my full share in framing and supporting other great measures that have proved a success, and think I may fairly claim credit for many of the most valuable features of our financial system, which has been wonderfully sustained under enormous expenditure. I can also claim the paternity of the Bank Law yet to be tested by experience, and for the main features of the Conscription Law. This latter law is vital to our success, and although it was adopted with fear and trembling and only after all other expedients failed, yet I am confident it will be enforced with the general acquiescence of the people and that through it we see the road to peace. But after all, Congress cannot help us out of our difficulties. It may by its acts and omissions prolong the war, but there is no solution to it except through the military forces. The people have got beyond the first danger of the war. They no longer underrate the power of the Confederates and no longer expect a short or holiday war. When coming home at Philadelphia, and in the cars, and here among plain people I find a healthy feeling. They want peace. But very few would accept it on any other terms than the preservation of the Union. They know very well that the South will only yield to this after being thoroughly whipped, and this has not been done.

I am very much rejoiced that you did not act upon your hasty impressions about resigning. The history of your Vicksburg expedition is now well understood and you stand well with all classes.

Most of the papers who joined in the clamor against you have corrected their statements. You never lost the confidence of the department and especially of Stanton and Halleck. . . .

Affectionately yours,

JOHN SHERMAN

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman letters: correspondence between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 194-6

Major General William T. Sherman to Senator John Sherman, March 14, 1863

CAMP BEFORE VlCKSBURG, March 14, '63.

Dear Brother:

* * * * * * * * * *

The Conscript Bill is all even I could ask, it is the first real step toward war. And if Mr. Lincoln will now use the power thus conferred, ignore popular clamor and do as near right as he can, we may at last have an army somewhat approximating the vast undertaking which was begun in utter, blind, wilful ignorance of the difficulties and dangers that we were forced to encounter. . . .

I have been much pleased with your course in Congress, and regret that anything I have done or may do has given you trouble or concern. I could easily have been popular, as I believe I am with my own command, by courting the newspaper men; but it does go hard to know that our camps are full of spies revealing our most secret steps, conveying regularly to the enemy our every act, when a thousand dollars won't procure us a word of information from Vicksburg. I know the press has defeated us, and will continue to do it, and as an honest man I cannot flatter them. I know they will ruin me, but they will ruin the country too. . . .

Napoleon himself would have been defeated with a free press. But I will honestly try to be patient, though I know in this, as in other matters, time must bring about its true result, just as the summer ripens the fruits of the season. . . .

My corps is alone here at the neck opposite Vicksburg, fighting off the water of the Mississippi which threatens to drown us. Grant is here on board a boat and Admiral Porter at the mouth of Yazoo.

Affectionately,

W. T. SHERMAN

SOURCE: Rachel Sherman Thorndike, Editor, The Sherman letters: correspondence between General and Senator Sherman from 1837 to 1891, p. 193-4