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Title: The numerical strength of the Confederate army - an examination of the argument of the Hon. Charles Francis - Adams and others
Author: McKim, Randolph H. (Randolph Harrison), 1842-1920
Language: English
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* * * * *
THE NUMERICAL STRENGTH
OF THE CONFEDERATE ARMY
[Illustration: {Logo with letter "N"}]
THE NUMERICAL
STRENGTH OF THE
CONFEDERATE ARMY
AN EXAMINATION OF THE ARGUMENT
OF THE HON. CHARLES FRANCIS
ADAMS AND OTHERS
BY
RANDOLPH H. McKIM, D.D., LL.D., D.C.L.
_Late 1st Lieut, and A. D. C. 3d Brigade Army of Northern
Virginia. Author of "A Soldier's Recollections."_
_Exigui numero sed bello vivida virtus--Virgil_
It will be difficult to get the world to understand
the odds against which we fought.
--GENERAL ROBERT E. LEE
[Illustration: {Logo}]
NEW YORK
THE NEALE PUBLISHING COMPANY
1912
Copyright, 1912, by
THE NEALE PUBLISHING COMPANY
PREFACE
The distinguished soldier and critic whose name appears on the title
page argues, as do various other Northern critics, that the usual
Southern estimate of the strength of the Confederate army is too small
by half. This conclusion is supported, they contend, both by the census
of 1860, according to which there were at the very beginning of the war
between the States nearly a million men in the Southern States of
military age, and by the number of regiments of the several armies, as
shown by the muster rolls of the Confederate army, captured on Lee's
retreat from Richmond, and now stored among the archives in Washington.
This second line of argument has been developed, among others, by two
well-known military critics, Colonel Wm. F. Fox, in his monumental work
entitled "_Regimental Losses in the Civil War_" (who concludes that the
Southern Armies contained the equivalent of 764 regiments, of ten
companies each), and by Thomas L. Livermore, Colonel of the 18th New
Hampshire Volunteers, in his laborious and painstaking monograph,
"Numbers and Losses in the Civil War in America," published in 1901.
Both these authors have had the advantage of studying the Muster Rolls
of the Confederate army just alluded to, but General Marcus J. Wright,
of the Adjutant General's Office, War Department, Washington, writes me
that he knows of no Southern man who has ever examined these Rolls,
although General T. W. Castleman of Louisiana has recently received
permission to copy the Louisiana Rolls. Colonel Walter H. Taylor, of
General Lee's staff was also permitted to examine some of the official
returns of Lee's Army.
Although the author of the following pages has not had the opportunity
of studying those precious Muster Rolls, he hopes that he has been able
to show that the thesis maintained by the distinguished critics just
mentioned rests on no sufficient foundation and ought to be rejected by
careful thinkers.
The main points of my counter argument are these: 1. The lack of arms
limiting the enrolment of soldiers the first year of the war. 2. The
loss of one-fourth of our territory by the end of the first year. 3. The
loss of control of the Trans-Mississippi in 1863-4. 4. The enormous
number exempted from enrolment for every sort of State duty, and for
railroads and new manufacturing establishments made necessary by the
blockade of our ports. 5. The opposition of some of the State
governments to the execution of the Conscript law. 6. The comparative
failure of the Conscript law. 7. The disloyalty of a part of our
population. 8. The necessity of creating not only an army of fighters,
but also an industrial army, and an army of civil servants out of the
male population liable for military duty.
The character of the evidence available precludes a precise estimate of
the actual strength of the Confederate army. As Colonel Walter H.
Taylor, Lee's Adjutant General, says in a letter addressed to the
author, "I regret to have to say that I know of no reliable data in
support of any precise number, and have always realized that it must
ever be largely a matter of conjecture on our side."
R. H. MCK.
THE NUMERICAL STRENGTH OF THE CONFEDERATE ARMY
Charles Francis Adams holds a warm place in the hearts of the survivors
of the Army of Northern Virginia, and, indeed, of all the Confederate
Armies, not only because of his splendid tribute to General Robert E.
Lee and to the army he commanded, but also because of his generous
recognition of the high motives of the Southern people in the course
they pursued in 1861.
It is therefore in the friendliest spirit that I undertake to question
the accuracy of his conclusion as to the numerical strength of the
Southern forces engaged during the four years of the War between the
States. In his recent volume, "Studies Military and Diplomatic," p. 286,
he states "that the actual enrollment of the Confederate Army during the
entire four years of the conflict exceeded 1,100,000, rather than fell
short of that number."
General Adams is of the opinion that it is a mistake to suppose that the
Confederate States were crushed by overwhelming resources and numbers.
He calls attention to the statement usually given by Southern writers,
that the South had on her muster rolls, from first to last, about
600,000 men, and refers to this as a "legend" (p. 287), "opposed to all
reasonable assumption and unsupported by documentary evidence"; "based
on assertion only" (p. 286).
His argument is chiefly _a priori_, and proceeds substantially thus: The
census of 1860 shows there were upward of 5,000,000 white people in the
States which subsequently seceded. This represents an arms-bearing
population of 1,000,000 men between eighteen and forty-five years of
age. To this he adds thirty per cent, for those males between sixteen
and eighteen years, and between forty-five and sixty years of age--added
by law, so he states, to the military population--making 300,000
more.[1] Now, further add twelve per cent.--or 150,000--for youths
reaching, between May, 1861, and May, 1865, the age of sixteen years,
and we have a total aggregate Confederate arms-bearing population of
1,450,000.[2] From this total General Adams deducts twenty per cent, for
exempts of all classes. "There were then remaining a minimum of
1,160,000 effectives, to which we must add men from the Border States
117,000; giving a total Confederate strength of 1,277,000." He says
also: "The whole male arms-bearing population was thus put in arms."
Now I wish on the very threshold to acknowledge freely that this
conclusion is not, in the opinion of General Adams, discreditable to the
South, but the reverse. He holds that the Southern estimate of a total
strength of only 600,000 with the Confederate colors, is discreditable
to the spirit and the patriotism of our people. In his opinion a just
appreciation of the virtue and self-sacrifice exhibited by the men of
the South should lead us to accept the much higher estimate which he
gives, not reluctantly, but freely and cheerfully. He thinks that we who
contest it place the Southern people on a lower level of devotion than
the Boers of South Africa.
THE COMPARISON BETWEEN THE BOERS AND THE CONFEDERATES
He says, at p. 239 of his "Military Studies": "How was it under very
similar circumstances with the South Africans? On Confederate showing,
they are a braver, a more patriotic, and self-sacrificing race!" He
goes on to show that the Boers had in actual service more than 1 in 4 of
their population; while, if it be true that there were only 600,000
Southern soldiers in the Confederacy, there was only 1 out of 12 at the
front. This, he thinks, would be discreditable to Confederate manhood;
he cannot believe that the Southerners of that period were a race of
such "mean-spirited, stay-at-home skulkers."
In answer to this I shall undertake to show in the following pages that
Mr. Adams' figures are very wide of the mark, so that the proportion of
fighting men in the Confederate army was enormously greater than he
admits in this passage, not less than 1 in 6 of the population. But the
fact is that the conditions in the cases of the Boers and the
Confederates were about as dissimilar as they well could be. In the one
case there was a small, compact population, for the most part half
civilized, and occupying a territory less than a quarter of that
included in the Confederacy. They had no highly differentiated
civilization to support. In the Confederacy there were eleven States,
each of which was organized as a distinct government and each of which
required a large number of men to fill its offices and to maintain its
civilization. Large numbers of men were also needed, as I shall show,
for purposes of manufacture, and to supply the army with food and
munitions of war. To compare a small community of 323,000 (Boers) with a
nation of 5,000,000 whites, besides 3,000,000 blacks; a perfectly
homogeneous people with one containing divers elements; a semi-civilized
people with one whose civilization was highly differentiated; a people
accustomed to live on the veldt in the saddle, with one dwelling largely
in towns and cities and engaged in diversified occupations--is to make a
comparison illusory in a high degree.
In confirmation of the preceding statement, I add the following passage
from a letter addressed to me by my friend, Colonel Archer Anderson, of
Richmond, Va.:
"My argument was that the comparison of the Confederates with the Boers
was not fair, the Boers being at a primitive stage of civilization--a
pastoral and agricultural people with no arts, no culture, and no wants
beyond a bare subsistence. Such a people can call out a large proportion
of its population, and in their case there was the particular advantage
that through their relations to the great mining region operated by
foreigners, they had accumulated a vast treasure and a great stock of
European munitions of war, and for a long period were able to draw what
they further needed from Europe through their railway communication
with the Portuguese port on Delagoa Bay. You have shown that the
Confederates on the other hand were highly civilized, with national,
State, and municipal institutions to maintain, and, being cut off from
supplies from the outside world, obliged to extemporize varied
manufactures of powder, cannon, small arms, clothing, shoes, hats, and
every sort of material needed by their railway systems and their people
at home as well as the armies in the field. The maintenance of civil
government, and such a task of production over and above the yield of
agriculture, required the abstraction of a vast number of men from
military service."
It is instructive, in considering this argument to recall what a great
historian tells us of the Helvetii, in their contest with Cæsar. He
says,
"The whole population of the assembled tribes amounted to 368,000 souls,
including women and children: the number that bore arms was 92,000."
(Merivale, History of the Romans, vol. I, pp. 242-3.)
Here is a real historical parallel between two peoples at a not
dissimilar stage of civilization. Their numbers were very nearly the
same: in one case 323,000, in the other 368,000; and their fighting
strength was about in the same proportion,--one in four of the
population; 89,000 in one case, 92,000 in the other.
It may be added that if Mr. Adams is right in estimating the Southern
armies at nearly 1,300,000 men, then we face the remarkable fact that a
white population of a little more than 5,000,000 people sent to the
front almost as many men as a population of over 22,000,000. For Colonel
Livermore tells us there were 2,234,000 individuals in the United States
army; but of these, 186,017 were negroes, 494,000 foreigners, and 86,000
from the Southern states; so that the North only sent into the field
1,467,083.
Judged then by the numerical standard, the patriotism and devotion of
the Southern people, according to this showing, was to that of the North
as four to one. And this takes no account of the many thousands who
served the South as mechanics, laborers, etc.
FUNDAMENTAL ERROR IN THE ARGUMENT OF NORTHERN WRITERS
It seems to be overlooked by General Adams, Colonel Livermore, and other
persons, in their estimates of the population available for military
purposes, that the Confederate States' Government had not only to
organize an army, but also to establish extensive manufacturing plants
for the equipment of the army; for clothing, for harness, for saddles,
for guns, powder, and ordnance; even for mining the ore which had to be
worked up into iron for the Tredegar works and other similar plants
within the limits of the Confederacy.
Again, a large contingent of men had to be retained as railway servants
and government clerks, and for purposes of agriculture, for it must be
remembered that not one in ten of the soldiers in the Confederate army
was an owner of slaves, and therefore a very large proportion of the
agriculture of the country had to be carried on by white men. It is also
overlooked that the complicated machinery of civilized government had to
be maintained in eleven States with the necessary officers and clerks
pertaining to their administration. (This is one of the particulars in
which the case of the Boer Republic differs so radically from that of
the Southern Confederacy that the comparison between the two is quite
illusory.) If, as General Adams insists, "the whole male arms-bearing
was thus put in arms," one cannot but wonder who did all these things
just enumerated?
When these things are taken into consideration, and the figures I shall
present are carefully examined, it will be seen that to have put
600,000 men into the armies of the South--men serving with the
colors--instead of being discreditable to the patriotism of the Southern
people was in reality a great achievement.
One of the most accomplished English military critics of our time,
Colonel G. F. R. Henderson, author of the Life of Stonewall Jackson,
writes on this aspect of the subject as follows:
"Not only had the South to provide from her seven millions of white
population an army larger than that of Imperial France, but from a
nation of agriculturists she had to provide another army of craftsmen
and mechanics to enable the soldiers to keep the field. For guns and gun
carriages, powder and ammunition, clothing and harness, gunboats and
torpedoes, locomotives and railway plant, she was now dependent on the
hands of her own people and the resources of her own soil. The
organization of these resources scattered over a vast extent of
territory, was not to be accomplished in the course of a few months, nor
was the supply of skilled labor sufficient to fill the ranks of her
industrial army." (Life of Stonewall Jackson, II, 253.)
Upon this striking passage one or two remarks may be appropriate. The
distinguished critic tells us most truly that the South, by reason of
her isolated situation, had to provide two armies,--an army of fighters
and an army of workers. He might have said she had to provide three
armies; for besides the industrial army and the army of soldiers, she
had to provide an army of civil servants to man the offices necessary to
carry on not only the Confederate States government, but also the
government of eleven separate States, with their highly differentiated
organizations.
Our author calls attention to the fact that the fighting army of the
South was larger than that of Imperial France. Let me add that, even if
the Southern army numbered no more than 650,000 men, it was nearly
double the army of Imperial Rome in the reign of Augustus. Radiating
from the golden milestone in the forum to every point of the compass,
that vast empire extended from the Pillars of Hercules to the banks of
the Euphrates, and from the coasts of Britain to the borders of the
great African desert. It comprehended among its subjects at least an
hundred divers races, numbering about 85,000,000 people; and yet the
historian tells us that the entire armies of the empire, exclusive of
some battalions maintained in Rome itself, did not exceed 340,000
men,[3] there being at the time among the _citizens_, exclusive of the
_subjects_, 5,984,072 males of military age.
I have quoted Colonel Henderson's admiring comment on the size of the
army the South was able to put in the field. In doing so I have not
forgotten that he estimates that army at 900,000. But his judgment upon
that point loses much of its weight when we observe that in two distinct
passages in his Life of Stonewall Jackson he gives seven millions as the
white population of the South, instead of five millions, as it actually
was. This error may serve to show how easy it is for a foreign critic to
be mistaken upon a question of statistics. Apart from the influence upon
his judgment of his error as to the size of the white population, it is
evident, from the passage quoted above, that Henderson included in the
estimate of 900,000 many thousands of men detailed for the various
industries he enumerates.[4]
I submit then that these preliminary considerations quite do away with
the presumption that an army of only six hundred thousand men serving
with the colors, would have been unworthy of the devotion or the
patriotism of the Southern people, or inadequate to what might have
been expected of a nation of five millions of whites.
In other words, we enter upon our argument without any reasonable
presumption against the conclusion which it is our purpose to defend.
Whoever will fairly consider that the South had to provide out of her
indigenous male population of military age, a fighting army, an
industrial army, and an army of civil servants, will not be surprised if
it shall appear from the evidence available that she was not able to
muster in battle array more than six hundred thousand men.
AFFIRMATIVE EVIDENCE IN SUPPORT OF OUR CONCLUSION
We arrive at the result indicated above by several independent lines of
evidence.
I.--Our figures are supported by the statements of a number of men who
were in position to know what was the total effective strength of the
Southern armies. Among them were General Cooper, adjutant-general of the
Confederate armies, writing in 1869 (see "Southern Historical Society
Papers," Vol. vii, p. 287); Dr. A. T. Bledsoe, Assistant Secretary of
War; General John Preston, chief of the Conscription Bureau;
Vice-President Alexander H. Stephens ("War Between the States," 1870,
Vol. ii, p. 630); General Jubal A. Early ("Southern Historical Papers,"
Vol. ii, p. 20); Dr. Joseph Jones (official report, June, 1890,
"Southern Historical Society Papers," xix, 14), and General Marcus J.
Wright--who now, however, puts the numbers at 700,000 ("Southern
Historical Society Papers," xix, 254). I ask what better authorities on
this subject could be named than the adjutant-general of the army, the
Assistant Secretary of War, and the chief of the Conscription Bureau of
the Confederate States?
In August, 1869, Dr. Joseph Jones sent to General Cooper a carefully
prepared paper on this subject, asking his opinion as to the accuracy of
the data contained therein. General Cooper replied that after having
"closely examined" the paper he had "come to the conclusion, from his
general recollection," that "it must be regarded as nearly critically
correct." Is it credible that the adjutant-general of the army should
have given as his opinion that this number--600,000,--was "_nearly
critically correct_," if in fact there had been upon the rolls of the
Confederate armies twice that number,--1,277,000 men,--as General Adams
would have us believe?
II.--By adding together the Confederate prisoners in the hands of the
United States at the close of the war, 98,000;[5] the soldiers who
surrendered in 1865, 174,223; those who were killed or died of wounds,
74,508; died in prison, 26,439; died of disease, 59,277; died from other
causes, 40,000; discharged, 57,411; deserters, 83,372; we get a total of
613,230.
These figures as to the killed and died of wounds, and of disease, are
taken from Fox's monumental work on regimental losses. He "conjectures"
that nearly 20,000 must be added to the 74,508 given above, making
94,000; but gives no grounds for this.
III.--Again the official report of General S. Cooper, Adjutant General,
dated March 1, 1862 (127 W. R. 963), states the aggregate of the
Confederate armies, including armed and organized militia, officers
and men, as 340,250
General Preston, Superintendent of Conscription,
C. S. A., reports from February,
1862, to February, 1865 (W. R.,
series iv, Vol. iii, p. 1101):
Conscriptions (exclusive of Arkansas and
Texas) 81,993
Enlistments east of the Mississippi River. 76,206
-------
498,449
Estimated conscriptions and enlistments
west of the river and elsewhere 120,000
-------
Total 618,449
IV.--Now compare with these reports the following statement from the
_New York Tribune_ of June 26, 1867:
"Among the documents which fell into our hands at the downfall of the
Confederacy are the returns, very nearly complete, of the Confederate
armies from their organization in the summer of 1861 down to the spring
of 1865. These returns have been carefully analyzed, and I am enabled to
furnish the returns in every department and for almost every month from
these official sources. We judge in all 600,000 different men were in
the Confederate ranks during the war."
This was accompanied by a detailed tabular statement.
Is not this good secondary evidence as to the numbers of men in the
Confederate Army, especially when we remember the statement of General
Cooper, late adjutant-general of the Confederate armies? He says:
"The files of this office which could best afford this information [as
to numbers] were carefully boxed up and taken on our retreat from
Richmond to Charlotte, North Carolina, where they were, unfortunately,
captured and, as I learn, are now in Washington." These files, be it
remembered, have never been examined by any Southern writer.
Observe also that the "American Encyclopædia" (1875), of which Mr.
Charles A. Dana, late Assistant Secretary of War, U. S., was editor,
quotes General Cooper's statement as to numbers, without comment, thus
tacitly admitting the truth of that statement. Can it be justly said, in
the light of these facts, that the estimate usually given by Southern
writers is based on assertion only?[6]
V.--There is a fifth line upon which we are led to a very similar
conclusion.
In the work of Lieutenant Colonel Wm. F. Fox, "Regimental Losses in the
Civil War," we find the strength of the Confederate armies furnished by
the seceded States and by the border States as well, reckoned as
follows: 529 regiments and 85 battalions of infantry; 127 regiments and
47 battalions of cavalry; 8 regiments and 1 battalion of partisan
rangers; 5 regiments and 6 battalions of heavy artillery, and 261
batteries of light artillery--in all equivalent to 764 regiments of 10
companies. In making this statement Colonel Fox assures his readers that
"no statistics are given that are not warranted by the official
records."
As to the size of the regiments we got some light from the following
reports: The Confederate adjutant-general reports in March, 1862, an
average strength of 823 men in 369 regiments and 89 battalions (127 W.
R. 963). Beauregard's Corps (32 regiments) is reported Aug. 31, 1861, as
numbering 1037 men to the regiment (5 W. R. 824). Longstreet's Virginia
troops, June 23, 1862, averaged 754 men to the regiment. (14 W. R. 614,
615.) But more important is the legislation of the Congress. The
Confederate Act of March 6, 1861, prescribed for infantry companies the
number of 104, and for cavalry 72, which gives, for an infantry regiment
(10 companies) 1040 men, and for a cavalry regiment 720 men--provided
the ranks were full, which was by no means the rule but rather the
exception. Observe now that in November, 1861, the War Department
prescribed that no infantry company should be accepted with less than 64
men and no cavalry company with less than 60 and no artillery company
with less than 70. On this basis infantry regiments might number only
640 men and cavalry regiments only 600.
This marked change in the standard of the size of companies and
regiments prescribed by the War Department in November, 1861, as
compared with the Act of March, 1861, lowering the requisite number of
men in an infantry regiment from 1040 to 640, and in a cavalry regiment
from 720 to 600, is suggestive of the fact that it was not found easy to
raise regiments of the size originally prescribed.
Now in calculating the strength of the Confederate army from the number
of regiments, we shall probably approximate closely a correct result by
taking the mean between the larger and smaller number just referred to.
But the mean between 1040 and 640 is 840, and that between 720 and 600
is 660.
Applying this standard to Colonel Fox's statement of the troops in the
entire Confederate army, we get the following result:
Men
529 regiments of infantry, 840 each 444,360
85 battalions infantry, 400 each 34,000
127 regiments cavalry, 600 each 76,200
47 battalions cavalry, 400 each 18,800
261 batteries light artillery, 70 each 16,270
5 regiments heavy artillery, 800 each 4,000
6 battalions heavy artillery, 400 each 2,400
8 regiments partisan rangers, 700 each 5,600
1 battalion partisan rangers 350
-------
601,980
The size of infantry and cavalry battalions and of regiments and
battalions of heavy artillery in this calculation, as well as of the
regiments of partisan rangers, is in each case suggested by that
accomplished and experienced officer, Colonel Walter H. Taylor,
adjutant-general on the staff of General Robert E. Lee. His figures may
be rather high--certainly they are not too low. Of course such a
calculation is necessarily only approximate, but the basis on which it
is made appears reasonably reliable. To one who, like myself, had
personal observation of the armies in Virginia from the first battle of
Manassas to Appomattox, the standard of strength in regiments and
battalions in the field above adopted, seems in conformity with the
facts.
THE ARGUMENT OF GENERAL ADAMS
Turn we now to examine the estimate made by General Adams and quoted at
the beginning of this paper.
But first let me say that I quite agree with him when he says that if
the South had as many as 600,000 men in arms she ought to have been
unconquerable, and probably would have been so, but for the United
States Navy.
That opinion was expressed by a distinguished Southern writer, Dr.
Bledsoe, Assistant Secretary of War, in an article written about forty
years ago. He said: "The decisive circumstance which robbed the South of
the defensive advantage of its wide territory was the superiority of its
enemy upon the water." All the water front of the Confederate States was
"an exposed frontier," both ocean coasts and navigable rivers. The best
authorities in the South have maintained the same view with practically
unanimity; hence, in differing from Mr. Adams I am not influenced by a
desire to account for our defeat by the overwhelming force of numbers
opposed to us, but by the desire to establish the truth of history.
WEAK POINTS IN GENERAL ADAMS' ARGUMENT
Now in making the calculation previously alluded to, it appears to me
that our gallant and generous friend has overlooked some important
considerations bearing on the problem discussed.
1.--During the first year of the war the Confederate Government could
not have availed itself of even half a million of men for its armies,
inasmuch as it was utterly unable to arm and equip them. The supply of
arms and of artillery was utterly inadequate for even half that
number.[7] As the war progressed the muskets, the sabers, the cannon,
used in the Confederate army, if examined, would have been found to have
been in larger part captured on the field of battle. Pompey the Great is
reported to have said, "I have only to stamp with my foot to raise
legions from the soil of Italy." Had Jefferson Davis been able by a
stamp of his foot to summon a million men to the Confederate colors in
the spring of 1861, what advantage would it have been? He could not have
armed them, even if he could have fed and clothed and transported them.
As General Adams himself has said: "The strength of an army is measured
and limited not by the census number of men available, but by the means
at hand of arming, equipping, clothing, feeding, and transporting those
men."
2.--General Adams appears to have overlooked the fact that by May, 1862,
the Northern armies were in permanent occupation of middle and west
Tennessee, nearly the whole of Louisiana, part of Florida, the coasts of
North and South Carolina, southeastern Virginia, much of northern
Virginia, and practically the whole of that part of Virginia known as
Western Virginia. The population thus excluded from the support of the
Confederacy may be estimated conservatively at 1,200,000, leaving
3,800,000 to bear the burden of the war. Hence the estimate of the
arms-bearing population in 1862, when the real tug began, would be not
1,000,000, but 760,000. Of this number, one-fifth, as General Adams
admits, would be regularly exempt, i.e., 152,000; and many thousands
more were detailed for various branches of industry. Doubtless during
the first year thousands entered the Confederate army from this
territory--a fair proportion of the 340,000 on the muster rolls in
March, 1862; but the conscript law could not operate--never did
operate--in this fourth of the Southern territory.
3.--The seceded States (including West Va.) furnished the Northern
armies, according to the returns of the War Department, 86,000 men. I do
not remember any mention of this by Mr. Adams, though he alludes to the
statement that 316,000 men were furnished by Southern States to the
Union armies, including the Border States, which did not secede. (The
records of the War Department show a total of white soldiers from all
Southern States, including Kentucky, Missouri, Maryland, West Virginia,
Delaware and District of Columbia, of 295,481.)
4.--It must be remembered that while the unanimity with which the
Southern people supported the war has perhaps never been surpassed in so
large a revolution, yet there was a large element of disloyalty,
especially in the mountainous regions of the South. For instance, in the
Valley of Virginia there were large numbers of Quakers and Dunkards, all
opposed to war. There were also in that region the numerous descendants
of the Hessian prisoners, who were not in sympathy with us. The number
of Union men in the South who did not take up arms has been estimated at
80,000.
5.--It must also be remembered, as Dr. Bledsoe said in his article in
the _Southern Review_, that "there was also a large element of baser
metal,--men who begrudged the sacrifice for liberty and shirked danger."
6.--General Adams says that the Confederate States passed the most
drastic conscript law on record--which may be true; but he is mistaken
in supposing that this law was successfully executed. Thus, General Cobb
writes, December, 1864, from Macon, Georgia, to the Secretary of War:
"I say to you that you will never get the men into the service who ought
to be there, through the conscript camp. It would require the whole army
to enforce the conscript law if the same state of things exist
throughout the Confederacy which I know to be the case in Georgia and
Alabama, and I may add Tennessee." (W. R., series iv, vol. iii, p. 964.)
Again, H. W. Walters, writing from Oxford, Mississippi, to the
Department, December, 1864, says: "I regard the conscript department in
Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi as almost worthless." Yet again
General T. H. Holmes reports to Adjutant-General Cooper as to North
Carolina, April 29, 1864: "After a full and complete conference with
Colonel Mallett, commandant of conscription, ... I am pained to report
that there is much disaffection in many of the counties, which,
emboldened by the absence of troops, are being organized in some places
to resist enrolling officers." And General Kemper reports, December 4,
1864, that in his belief there were 40,000 men in Virginia out of the
army between the ages of eighteen and forty-five. (W. R., series iv,
vol. iii, p. 855.)
In support of his thesis that the whole military population was enrolled
in the Confederate armies Colonel Livermore quotes a letter of General
Lee, urging the necessity of "getting out our entire arms-bearing
population in Virginia and North Carolina." But this letter, written
October 4, 1864, six months before the surrender, is strong evidence
that _up to that time_ the stringent conscript laws had failed to get
out even in Virginia and North Carolina, "the entire arms-bearing
population." (Livermore, "Numbers and Losses," p. 17.)
Colonel Livermore quotes another letter of General Lee, dated September
26, 1864, in confirmation of his opinion that the conscription laws were
thoroughly enforced, in which General Lee speaks of the "imperious
necessity of getting all our men subject to military duty in the field,"
and adds, "_I get no additions._" (Id. p. 17.) Is that statement
consistent with the rigid and successful enforcement of the conscript
law? Is it not rather the most conclusive evidence that it was not
successfully enforced? Or is my Bœotian wit so dull that I cannot see
the point? If so, I pray to be enlightened![8]
The statement is often made that the Confederate Conscription embraced
all white males between 16 and 60 years of age. This is an error. The
first Act, April 16, 1862, embraced men between 18 and 35 years; the
second, of Sept. 27, 1862, men between 18 and 45 years; the third and
last, of February 17, 1864, men between 17 and 50. Both General Adams
and Colonel Livermore acknowledge this. Yet the latter rests his
argument on the supposition that the Conscription gathered in all males
between 16 and 60 years.
In further illustration of this subject, I may point out that one of the
difficulties confronting the conscript officers was the opposition of
the governors of some of the States, notably the Governor of
Mississippi, the Governor of North Carolina, and the Governor of
Georgia. Thus the doctrine of States' Rights, which was the bedrock of
the Southern Confederacy, became a barrier to the effectiveness of the
Confederate government! South Carolina passed an exemption law which
nullified to a certain extent the conscript laws of the Confederacy, and
Governor Vance of North Carolina proposed "to try title with the
Confederate Government in resisting the claims of the conscript officers
to such citizens of North Carolina as he made claim to for the proper
administration of the State."
"The laws of North Carolina," General Preston complains (W. R., iv, iii,
p. 867), "have created large numbers of officers, and the Governor of
that State has not only claimed exemption for those officers, but for
all persons employed in any form by the State of North Carolina, such as
workers in factories, salt-makers, etc."
"This bureau has no power to enforce the Confederate law in opposition
to the ... claims of the State."
Governor Brown of Georgia forbade the enrollment of "large bodies of the
citizens of Georgia." The number is supposed to have reached eight
thousand men liable to Confederate service. General Preston complains in
like strain of the action of the Governor of Mississippi.
EXEMPTS AND DETAILS
There is an important report by General Preston in February, 1865 (W.
R., iv, iii, pp. 1099-1011). In this he gives the number of exempts
allowed by the Conscript Bureau in seven States, and parts of two
States, east of the Mississippi as 66,586.
He then gives the agricultural details, details for public necessity,
and for government service, contractors and artisans, a total of
21,414--the whole aggregating 87,990 men.
In another report, already referred to, November, 1864, he gives the
number of State officers exempted on the certificates of governors in
nine States as 18,843. This, with the preceding, makes a grand total of
106,833.
These are exemptions under the Confederate States' law in seven States,
and in parts of two States. They do not include the States west of the
Mississippi. But in addition to these there were many thousand
exemptions under purely State laws. We have no complete record of these
last; but in the State of Georgia alone we have a record of 11,031 such
exemptions.
7.--We must also consider the large numbers of men employed on the
railroads, in the government departments, in State offices, and in the
various branches of manufacture necessary for the support of the army
and of the people; and in directing the agricultural labor of the
slaves. Factories were started for making swords, bayonets, muskets,
percussion caps, powder, cartridges, cartridge boxes, belts, and other
equipment; for clothing, for caps and shoes, for harness and saddles,
for artillery-caissons and carriages; for guns, cannon and powder.
I have already referred to the statement of General Kemper that in
December, 1864, "the returns of the bureau, obviously imperfect and
partial, show 28,035 men in the State of Virginia between eighteen and
forty-five, exempt and _detailed_ for all causes." The South having an
agricultural population, it was necessary, as just said, when war came,
to organize manufactories of every kind of equipment for the army.
After all, the most important question to determine is the number of men
actually serving with the colors in the armies of the Confederate
States. And even if we admit an enrollment in the Confederate army of
700,000, and reduce our estimates of exemptions and details for special
work from 125,000 to 100,000, there remain apparently for _service in
the field_ only about 600,000 men; and that, I suppose, is what General
Cooper and other Southern authorities had in mind.
We know approximately the respective numbers in the great battles of the
war, and I submit that these numbers are far more consistent with the
maximum of 600,000 serving with the colors than with the maximum of
1,200,000.[9] If, indeed, the Confederacy had been able to muster in
arms a million two hundred thousand men, it is greatly to the discredit
of their able generals that never in any one battle were they able to
confront the enemy with more than 80,000 men.
* * * * *
But our gallant and generous friend taxes us, as we have seen, with
casting discredit upon the patriotism of the South by our claim that we
had no more than six or seven hundred thousand men in the field. Is he
justified in this opinion? Let us see how the matter stands.
THE MILITARY POPULATION OF THE CONFEDERACY
In the month of May, 1862, as we have shown above, at least one-fourth
of the Southern territory had been wrenched from the control of the
Confederate Government. In the territory remaining there was in round
numbers a population of about 3,800,000 souls. The military population
then should have been 760,000.
To this must be added, by the extension of the military age down to
seventeen, and up to fifty, ten per cent.--that is, in all, six
additional years, 76,000.
[In this calculation I adopt Mr. Adams' ratio of three-tenths by a
supposed extension down to sixteen and up to sixty,--which gives in the
light of the census returns about one-tenth for the _actual_ extension
provided by the law of February 17, 1864, viz. down to seventeen and up
to fifty years.]
Then we must make a further addition (again adopting Mr. Adams' ratio),
for youths reaching military age in four years, of twelve per cent. of
the military population, or 91,200 men. This, with the age-extension
addition--76,000--makes a total of 167,200, which, added to the original
estimated population of 760,000, makes a grand total of 927,200.
To this number Mr. Adams would add the men furnished by the Border
States to the Confederate army, viz. (as is alleged), 117,000, a grand
available total of 1,044,200.
But this estimate of 117,000 men furnished the Confederate army by the
Border States (Maryland, West Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri) cannot be
relied upon as even approximately accurate. For example, it includes
20,000 men alleged to have been furnished by the State of Maryland. But
a careful examination of all the Maryland organizations, including
several companies in Virginia regiments, gives a total of only 4,580
from the State of Maryland; and this number must be largely reduced by
names duplicated through re-enlistments. Applying the ratio adopted by
the War Department of the United States, we must deduct at least 920
men, which leaves a total of only about 3,500. Even this I believe to be
too large. This item alone reduces the estimate of 117,000 to about
100,000. I will discuss this subject at length a little further on in
this paper, and will only say here that there is good reason to believe
100,000 an excessive estimate of the number actually furnished to the
Confederate colors by the Border States. Let us place the figure at
75,000 as a compromise. Then we should have:
Grand total of men available in the
Southern States 927,200
Furnished by the Border States 75,000
---------
Total 1,002,200
NECESSARY DEDUCTIONS
Let us turn now to the deductions that have to be made from this number.
1.--On the ground of disloyalty we have no facts on which to base an
estimate, hence the number must be left indeterminate, but it was
certainly considerable. The chief of the Bureau of Education estimates
the Appalachian mountaineers in the Southern States at present at
3,000,000. They must therefore have been very numerous in 1861, and it
is conceded that most of them were loyal to the Union. Some Southern
writers estimate 80,000 as the number of Union men who refused and
evaded service in the Confederate army. If there were only one million
of these mountaineers, they would represent 160,000 men of military age
and fitness.
2.--We must also deduct a large number for men _exempted_ for various
causes, besides the accepted exemption of twenty per cent. for physical
and mental disability. Of this we have no complete statistics, but there
are preserved in the War Department Records several documents which
enable us to arrive at an approximate estimate.
Under the head of "Public Necessity" we find _exemptions_ for railroad
companies, telegraph companies, navigation companies, cotton and wool
factories, paper mills, iron manufactories, foundries, printing
establishments, fire department, police department, gas-works, salt
manufactories, shoemakers, tanners, blacksmiths, millers, millwrights,
ferrymen, wheelwrights, wagon-makers, express companies, equity, justice
and necessity, indigent circumstances, and miscellaneous. (_Id._ p.
873.)
Thus General Preston, writing November 23, 1864 (W. R., ser. iv. vol.
iii, p. 850), says: "The governors of the States do not confine their
certificates of exemption to officers, as that term seems to be used in
the law, but extend them to all persons in the service of the State, or
in any mode employed by State authority; and that authority is
interposed to prevent the conscript officers from enrolling and
assigning such persons to the Confederate service."
He gives a table (p. 851) of _State officers_ exempted on certificates
of the governors, and it appears that in Virginia, North Carolina, South
Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee and Florida there
were 18,843 such exempts.
The _civil officers_ exempted in the State of Georgia were 5,478, and
militia officers 2,751. (See W. R., iv., vol. iii, p. 869.) In the same
State the exempts for agricultural and necessary purposes reached the
number of 4,156, making the total exemptions in that one State, 12,385.
(_Id._ iv. iii. p. 873.)
General Preston also reports the number of State officers exempted in
North Carolina, November, 1864, at 14,675 (_Idem_, p. 851).
There is a report in the same publication, p. 96, which gives the number
of persons exempted by occupation, in Virginia, at 13,063. Thus in
these three States we have records of exemptions amounting to 40,123. I
am unable to give the number of exemptions in the remaining eight
seceded States; but if they were at all in proportion to what we find
them in Virginia, Georgia, and North Carolina, then we must reckon the
exemptions in the whole Confederacy as nearly 120,000, since the
military population of those three States was only a little more than a
third of the whole. These, be it observed, were not men detailed from
the army, but exempted from enrollment.
3.--Estimate of men _detailed_ for special work in the various branches
of manufacture necessary for the support of the Army and people. Here we
have a difficult problem, but some light is thrown upon it by the
following report of men detailed in the State of Georgia (_Idem._ iv.
iii. p. 874):
For agricultural purposes 957
For public necessities 1,264
For government purposes 629
For contractors 141
For artisans, mechanics, etc. 508
-----
Total 3,499
And in Virginia we find this item:
Men detailed in departments 4,494
-----
Total in these two States 7,993
From these figures of details in these States we may conservatively
estimate the number of men detailed for various branches of work in the
eleven States of the Confederacy as about 40,000.[10]
4.--The seceded States exclusive of West Va., according to the report
of the War Department, furnished the United States armies with 55,000
men. These must also be deducted from the aggregate above stated.
5.--Then we must deduct, as General Adams acknowledges, from the
aggregate number of men of military age as above (viz., 927,200, less
80,000 disloyal and 55,000 in U. S. army, leaving 792,200) twenty per
cent. for those exempt on account of physical or mental disability, or
158,440. This is the usual percentage, though in the French and British
armies it has been as high as thirty-three per cent.
6.--Natural death rate in two and a half years before being enrolled in
army 11,055 (compare Livermore, p. 22).[11]
But it will be said, and justly, that although after May, 1862, at least
one-fourth of the territory of the seceded States was not in control of
the Confederate government, and therefore not available as a recruiting
ground for its armies, nevertheless many thousands of men had enlisted
in the Confederate armies previous to May, 1862. Now, it appears from
General Cooper's official report that the aggregate number of men and
officers enrolled in March, 1862, was 340,250. And so our question is,
How large a proportion of this number is to be credited to that part of
the Confederacy which by May, 1862, was occupied by the Federal armies?
If we assume that the part of the country thus occupied furnished as
large a proportion as the rest of the Confederacy (a large assumption),
then, as the population of the occupied part is estimated to have been
about one-fourth of the whole, we may suppose that it furnished the
Confederate army one-fourth of the total 340,000; that is to say, 85,000
men. This is probably a very large assumption, but it may be accepted
for the purposes of our calculation.
To sum up this part of the argument: Let it be granted that there was an
available military population, first and last, in that part of the
Confederacy not occupied by the Federal armies, of 927,200,
To which may be added volunteers first
year of war from territory occupied
by Federal forces after May, 1862 85,000
And also men from Border States 75,000
---------
Aggregate 1,087,200
---------
Deductions from this as follows:
Natural death rate in 2-1/2 years, before
being enrolled in army, 2-1/2% 11,055
Southern men in U. S. army 55,000
Disloyal, estimated 80,000
Exempt for physical and mental disability:
20% of the whole (after deducting
the two previous items) viz.
792,200 158,440
---------
304,495
Leaving available aggregate 782,705[12]
---------
Aggregate 1,087,200
Now let us remember that out of this available aggregate (exaggerated
though I believe the number to be), there had to be created for the
service of the Confederate State three armies,--an army of soldiers, an
army of civil servants and an army of industrial and agricultural
workers. If we put the strength of the fighting army at 620,000, there
will remain for the other two armies 162,000 men,--and we have seen
grounds for believing that there were 40,000 soldiers detailed for
special work, and 120,000 exempt as State officers, workmen in various
occupations, agricultural and necessary purposes, mechanics, railway
servants, etc. And it may be asked with confidence whether for all these
manifold purposes one hundred and sixty-two thousand men can be
considered an excessive or unreasonable number. To support the army in
the field, to equip the civil governments of eleven great States, and to
supply the life blood of civilization in a country of such vast extent
as the Southern Confederacy, necessarily absorbed the energies of a
great number of men.
GENERAL ADAMS CLAIMS SOUTHERN SUPPORT FOR HIS CONCLUSION
But General Adams supports his opinion by figures taken from a recent
work, "The South in the Building of the Nation." He is thus able to show
on the authority of Southern writers themselves, an aggregate estimate
of 944,000 enlistments in the Confederate armies--to which he adds
117,000, as the number claimed to have been furnished the Confederate
army from the four Border States, making a grand total of 1,061,000
men.
Now, even if the numbers furnished by these _Southern writers_ could be
accepted as approximately accurate, the result would be quite different
from what General Adams figures. For let me call attention to a
memorandum issued by the War Department, U. S. A., May 15, 1905, in
which I find this statement: "It is estimated from the best data now
obtainable that the re-enlistments in the army during the Civil War
numbered 543,393" (p. 4), which is about twenty per cent. of the whole.
This number, the military secretary says, must be deducted from the
total number of enlistments (2,778,304) to get the actual number of men
who were enrolled.
Now, if we apply this same principle and proportion to the alleged
enlistment of 944,000 men in the Southern army, we should deduct for
re-enlistment 188,800; leaving as the actual number of enlisted men, all
told, with the colors and not with the colors, 756,200. And further,
though we have no accurate figures concerning the number of men detailed
for duties of various kinds,--as clerks, skilled mechanics, gunsmiths,
teamsters, cooks, etc.; also details in the medical, quartermaster,
commissary, and other supply departments; and as apothecaries,
physicians, teachers, nurses, agriculturists, railroad employees,
etc.,--we know they numbered many thousands, so that this
number--756,200--must be greatly reduced.
It has, indeed, been argued that we cannot make the deduction which the
War Office claims in estimating the number of men in the Union armies,
as stated above, for the reason that the twelve-months' men in the
Confederate armies "were all retained in service for the war" by the Act
of April 16, 1862. Again, it is insisted that "substantially all of the
regiments enrolled in 1861 remained in service to the end of the war."
"It may, then, be assumed that in effect the term of service of all who
entered the Confederate armies continued from the time they entered
until the end of the War, May 4, 1865." (See Livermore, "Numbers and
Losses," p. 52, 53.)
The best way to test the soundness of this conclusion is to look into
the actual record of some of the troops, to see whether or not they did
re-enlist. If they did, then the same opportunity for error in counting
them twice offered itself as in the case of the Union enlistments.
I cite then a few examples of re-enlistment, established beyond doubt.
1. The first Maryland Infantry, spring of 1862.
2. Rodes' Brigade at Yorktown, spring of 1862; the fifth, sixth and
twelfth Alabama and twelfth Mississippi regiments.
"They retained their corporate identity, but not simply continued over.
At any rate, some men in them did not remain." (Colonel J. W. Mallet,
February 16, 1912.)
3. Bonham's South Carolina regiment enlisted for six months. Re-enlisted
1861. (Statement of Colonel Hilary Herbert.)
4. General Dickinson, late Secretary of War, remembers regiments which
were enlisted for three months, and then re-enlisted.
5. The Eighth Alabama, Colonel Hilary Herbert. He says:
"The men stepped out one by one and re-enlisted, all but one man, and he
exercised the liberty which all had, of declining to re-enlist. This was
in January, 1864."
I quote also an order of General Lee's on the subject, February 3, 1864:
"The Commanding General announces with gratification the re-enlistment
of the regiments of this army for the war, and the reiteration of the
war regiments of their determination to continue in the army until
independence is achieved." The fact of re-enlistment then is absolutely
established. In fact practically all of the twelve-months' volunteers
re-enlisted in 1862.
THESE RECENT SOUTHERN ESTIMATES GREATLY EXAGGERATED
But it can be shown, I think beyond contradiction, that the numbers
given by the representatives of the various States which Mr. Adams
quotes from "_The South_," and from other Southern publications, are
enormously exaggerated.
We may test the accuracy of this estimate of theirs briefly as follows:
The total military population of the 11 seceded States in 1861 was
984,475, not taking into account that about one-fourth of our territory
and population became unavailable for recruiting purposes within one
year of the breaking out of the war. If we add one-tenth for the
extension of the military age by Confederate law down to 17 and up to
50, we have 98,447; and, if we add 12 per cent. for youths reaching
military age in four years, we have 118,137, aggregating 1,201,518. But
from this we must deduct, as military writers agree, 20 per cent. for
men exempt for physical and mental disability, viz., 240,303, which
leaves available for military duty in the four years of the war, through
the whole extent of the Southern territory, 961,215. Now, if we accept
the figures of the State historians, we have 935,000 enrolled in the
Confederate Army; and the reports of the United States War Department
state that, exclusive of West Virginia, there were 55,000 soldiers in
the Union Army from these same Southern States, which makes an aggregate
of 990,000 men furnished to both armies, which, it will be observed, is
nearly 30,000 more than the entire military population! Without going
any further, this shows that there has been serious error in the above
estimates of Confederate enrollment.
But there are several other matters to be considered. In the first
place, by the spring of 1862 at least one-fourth of the territory of the
seceded States was under the control of the United States Army; and,
therefore, that much of the territory was not available as a source of
supply for the Confederate Army. This cuts off nearly one-fourth of the
military strength. Calculated on this basis, the writers alluded to make
the aggregate of Southern soldiers more than 200,000 in excess of the
entire military population!
Again, the conscript law, drastic as it was, was very imperfectly
executed, as those in charge of it at the time amply testified. The
opposition of the Governors of Mississippi, Georgia, South Carolina and
North Carolina to the conscript law will be remembered. We must also
remember that thousands of men were employed on the railroads, in the
Government departments and in various branches of manufacture necessary
for the support of the army and the people, and also for agricultural
labor. It must also be remembered that there were thousands of men in
all the Confederate States exempted by State authority.
If these things are considered, it becomes plain that the previously
quoted estimates of the several States of the Confederacy cannot
possibly be accepted as at all near the real facts.
Let us now compare these estimates of the Southern writers quoted with
the military population of some of the States:
The military population of Virginia in
1861, exclusive of West Virginia, is
estimated by Livermore at 116,000
Add one-tenth for extension of military
age down to seventeen and up to fifty 11,600
Add twelve per cent. for youths maturing
to seventeen in four years 13,920
-------
Total 141,520
Deduct exempts for physical and mental
defects, twenty per cent 28,304
-------
Available military population 113,216
But the representative writer in "_The South_" puts the number of men
furnished by Virginia to the Southern armies at 175,000, which is
61,784 more than the available military population! Could there be a
more palpable _reductio ad absurdum_?[13]
Besides, as I have shown, in Virginia and all the States there were
large numbers of men exempt as State officers. This considerably
increases the twenty per cent. which Colonel Fox says are in all
countries exempted from military service.
Take next Florida:
Her military population in 1861 was 15,739
Add one-tenth for extension of military
age down to seventeen and up to fifty 1,573
Add twelve per cent. for youths attaining
seventeen years in four years 1,888
-------
19,200
Deduct exempts, twenty per cent. 3,840
-------
Available military population 15,360
But the writer quoted by Mr. Adams states that Florida furnished 15,000
to the Confederate States army, and the War Office records show that
she furnished the Union army 1,270; making a total of 16,270, which is
900 more than the entire available military population!
Georgia.--Military population in 1861
was 111,005
Add one-tenth for extension of military
age down to seventeen and up to fifty 11,100
Add twelve per cent. for youths attaining
seventeen years in four years 13,320
-------
Total 135,425
Deduct twenty per cent. for exempts 23,085
-------
Available military population 112,340
But the alleged enrollment in the Confederate States army is 120,000,
which is 7,110 more than the available military population, making no
allowance for the failure of the conscript officers to put into the army
every man liable to military duty, and none for the thousands exempt
from service.
North Carolina.--Military population
was 115,369
Add one-tenth for the extension of military
age down to seventeen and up to
fifty 11,500
Add twelve per cent. for youths maturing
to seventeen years in four years 13,800
-------
Total 140,669
Deduct twenty per cent. for exempts 28,133
-------
Leaving available 112,536
Alleged Confederate enrollment 129,000; furnished to the Union army,
3,156; total, 132,156; which is 19,620 more than the available military
population, although in one-fourth of the State the conscript law could
not be executed, and although many thousands were exempted from service
by State law.
South Carolina.--Military population 55,046
Add one-tenth as above 5,504
Add twelve per cent. as above 6,605
-------
Total 67,155
Deduct twenty per cent. 13,231
-------
Leaving available 53,924
The alleged Confederate enrollment was 75,000, which is more than 21,000
in excess of the total number of men available for service, though here
also there were thousands of State exemptions.
Mississippi.--Military population 70,295
Add one-tenth for extension of military
age 7,029
Add twelve per cent. for youths maturing
to military age in four years 8,435
-------
Total 85,759
Deduct twenty per cent. for exempts 17,151
-------
Leaving available 68,608
The alleged Confederate enrollment was 70,000, and furnished to the
United States army 515, which is nearly 2,000 more than the total
military population, taking no account of the large number of exempts
and of the failure to execute the conscript act.
Alabama.--Military population was 99,667
Add one-tenth for the extension of military
age down to seventeen and up to
fifty 11,500
Add twelve per cent. for youths maturing
to seventeen years in four years 11,796
-------
Total 121,959
Deduct twenty per cent. for exempts 24,391
-------
Leaving available 97,568
The alleged Confederate enrollment was 90,000, and furnished to the
Union army, 2,576, making a total of 92,576; which is within 5,000 of
the total available, taking no account of the large number exempted for
State officers and other causes, and taking no account, either, of the
number of men who could not be reached by the conscript officers.
Tennessee.--Military population 159,353
Add one-tenth as before 15,935
Add twelve per cent. as before 19,222
-------
Total 194,510
Deduct twenty per cent. 38,902
-------
Leaving available 155,608
The alleged Confederate enrollment was 115,000, and the State furnished
the Union army 31,092, a total of 146,092, which is within 9,000 of the
total available military population, without taking account of the men
not reached by the conscript officers, and, further, taking no account
of the fact that so large a part of the State was in occupation of the
Federal armies.
As to Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana, it is enough to say that they were
in that Trans-Mississippi Department of which the Confederate
Government lost control in July, 1863. Hence, it is not surprising that
even those inflated estimates of the number of men furnished the
Confederate army fall far short of the estimated military population. In
Arkansas, however, the estimate comes within 5,000 of the total
available,--58,289 out of 63,665.
In the light of the facts just stated we must conclude that the Southern
writers quoted by General Adams have, in their zeal for the honor and
glory of their several States, greatly overestimated the number of men
contributed by the same to the Confederate armies. This would be more
probable _a priori_, than that the leading men in the Confederate army
and Government who were at the sources of information, and who ought to
have been well informed, should have so enormously underestimated the
strength of the armies of the South; but the tests to which we have now
submitted the figures given by these State historians demonstrate their
error beyond the possibility of doubt. They must be cut down by several
hundred thousand. A large element of this error is to be found, as I
have suggested, in the failure to observe the great number of
re-enlistments that undoubtedly took place, especially in 1862, when the
terms of service of nearly all the Confederate regiments expired. This
duplication, in the opinion of the military Secretary of the United
States, reduces the total by twenty per cent.
As a sample of how errors creep into reports of numbers, it is stated
(W. R., ser. iv., vol. iii, p. 96) as to a certain number of conscripts,
"We find some men were reported three times." And again (_Id._ p. 99)
that the "Adjutant-General's report contains an error in which he has
accounted for 14,000 men twice."
Let it be observed, finally, that when we have reached a reasonably
probable conclusion of the men enlisted in the Confederate armies during
the four years of war, we must then proceed to ascertain, if we can, the
probable number of these enlisted men who were _detailed_ for various
duties and occupations ancillary to the support of the government and
the army. And only when this number has been deducted from the total
enlistments will we have ascertained the probable number of men actually
serving with the colors and making up the fighting force of the
Confederacy.
THE CONTRIBUTION OF THE BORDER STATES TO THE ARMIES OF THE CONFEDERACY
It is a difficult problem to determine with any degree of probability
how many men were contributed to the armies of the Confederacy by the
Border States. The factors by which it might be solved do not seem to be
within reach. At least, I have not been able to possess myself of them.
There lies before me a printed "List of Regiments and Battalions in the
Confederate States' Army, 1861-1865." According to this there were
furnished by Missouri 21 battalions and 79 regiments; by Kentucky 16
battalions and 26 regiments; by Maryland 2 infantry regiments and 4
battalions, 4 batteries; also the Maryland Line, of various arms. But,
upon inspection, it appears that this "Maryland Line" was formed of
those regiments and battalions and batteries previously enumerated.
General Charles Francis Adams, following Colonel Livermore, tells us
there were 238 full regiments from the Border States in the Confederate
army, besides 132 lesser organizations. On the other hand, Colonel Fox,
in his well-known work, "Regimental Losses in the Civil War," credits
the Border States with having sent into the Confederate army only 21
regiments and 4 battalions of infantry; 9 regiments and 5 battalions of
cavalry, and 11 batteries of light artillery. As to numbers, he
estimates them at "over 19,000" (p. 552).
These estimates and numbers of Colonel Fox look strange beside the
estimate of 117,000 and 125,000, as given by some Southern writers. We
have already stated that in "The South in the Building of the Nation,"
Maryland is credited with having furnished 20,000 men to the Confederate
army. How wide of the mark this statement is, may be seen by inspecting
the following total of organizations of Maryland men in the Confederacy:
INFANTRY
First Maryland Infantry, number of men 782
Second Maryland Infantry 627
Company B, Twenty-first Virginia, Colonel
L. Clarke 109
One company, Thirteenth Virginia Lanier
Guards, estimated 75
One company, Sixty-first and Sixty-second
Virginia, estimated 65
-----
Total Infantry 1,658
CAVALRY
First Maryland, Colonel Ridgeley Brown 74
Company K, First Virginia; transferred in
August, 1864, to First Maryland 197
Lieutenant Harry Gilmour Battalion,
estimated 250
Colonel Sturgis Davis Battalion, estimated 100
One Maryland Company in Seventh Virginia,
estimated 75
One Maryland Company in Thirty-fifth Virginia,
Colonel Elijah White 103
One Maryland Company in Forty-third Virginia,
Colonel Mosby, estimated 75
-----
Total cavalry 674
ARTILLERY
Colonel Snowden Andrews 204
Second Maryland, Captain Griffin 197
Third Maryland, Colonel Rowan, Captain
Ritter 350
In Western Army, Fourth Maryland,
Chesapeake, Captain Brown, Captain
Chew 137
Captain Brethed, Horse Artillery (a Maryland
battalion, though mustered into service
as Virginian) 75
Baltimore Heavy Artillery, estimated 100
Marylanders at Charleston, South Carolina,
estimated 225
-----
Total artillery 1,288
-----
Grand total 4,580
These figures are compiled from the muster rolls, with the exception of
those "estimated." It is to be observed that a very large proportion of
the men in the Second Maryland Infantry were those who had previously
served in the First Maryland Infantry; so that there is a good deal of
duplication there by reënlistment. On the other hand, there were many
individual Marylanders in various regiments accredited to other States.
We have also the names of 137 Marylanders who were officers in various
other commands.
The estimate above alluded to, of 20,000 Marylanders in the Confederate
service, rests apparently upon no better basis than an oral statement of
General Cooper to General Trimble, in which he said he believed that the
muster rolls would show that about 20,000 men in the Confederate army
had given the State of Maryland as the place of their _nativity_. How
many were _citizens of Maryland_ when they enlisted does not appear.
Obviously many _natives_ of Maryland were doubtless in 1861 _citizens of
other States_, and could not therefore be reckoned among the soldiers
furnished by Maryland to the Confederate armies.
As to the estimates furnished by writers in "_The South_" concerning the
number of men furnished the Confederacy from the Border States, viz.,
Kentucky, 30,000; Missouri, 60,000; West Virginia, 7,000; the same
unintentional exaggeration doubtless exists here as I have shown in
regard to the numbers alleged to have been furnished by the seceded
States. Unfortunately it is not possible to be definite in stating the
numbers furnished by the Border States. When we observe the discrepancy
between Colonel Fox's 19,000, President Tyler's 117,000, and Colonel
Livermore's 143,000, it becomes clear that the whole subject is involved
in uncertainty. I incline to the opinion that 50,000 is nearer the
actual numbers in the Southern army from these Border States than
100,000; but for the sake of argument I leave the number 75,000, as
stated above.[14]
Before concluding this branch of the subject I would call attention to
the following remark made by Mr. Charles Francis Adams in his "Military
Studies," p. 282. He says "that the States named [meaning Kentucky,
Maryland, Missouri, West Virginia] sympathizing, as at the time the
Southern authorities claimed, most deeply with the Confederacy should
have furnished over 316,000 recruits to the Federal army, and only
117,000 to that of the Confederacy is, to say the least, deserving of
remark,--it calls for explanation." Again he says: "It would be not
unnatural to assume that these States furnished an equal number of
recruits to the Confederacy." (_Id._ p. 238.)
This statement is sufficiently amazing. On the contrary, would it not be
most _unnatural_ to assume that these four States, occupied and
controlled from end to end by the Federal armies, should have furnished
as many men to the Confederate army as to the Federal army,
notwithstanding the enormous difficulties of passing through the lines?
Although there was much sentiment favorable to the Confederacy in these
four States, I fear there cannot be any doubt that the preponderance of
sentiment was in favor of the Union; and he must be blind who does not
recognize the fact that the difficulties in the way of a young man
desiring to enlist in the Southern army, while his State was occupied by
the Federal forces, were enormously great.
CONCLUSION
There are two remarks of General Adams to which, before closing, I
should like to call attention. He states that the foreigners in the
Union army were more than counterbalanced by our drastic conscription
("Military Studies," p. 246). Now it appears from official reports that
there were 494,000 foreigners in the Union army, so that he must have
supposed that the conscription law produced about 500,000 soldiers. It
actually produced, east of the Mississippi, 81,992 men from February,
1862, when the first law was passed, to February, 1865. We cannot
suppose that the additions from the States west of the
Mississippi--Texas, Louisiana, and Arkansas--could have been even
one-fourth as numerous. The military population was about one-third as
large, but by 1863 that territory was overrun by the Federal armies. But
if we put these at 20,000, we have only 101,992, instead of the half
million which Mr. Adams supposes. And if we should add the 76,000 men
which the conscription officers, magnifying their diligence, _guessed_
had been driven into the army by enlistment to avoid conscription we
would then have only 177,993.
Again, General Adams says:
"As respects mere numbers, it is capable of demonstration that at the
close of the struggle the preponderance was on the side of the
Confederacy, and distinctly so. The Union at that time had, it is said,
a million men on its muster rolls.... It might possibly have been able
to put 500,000 men into the fighting line. On the other side ... the
fighting strength of the Confederacy cannot have been less than
two-thirds its normal strength. The South should have been able to
muster, on paper, 900,000 men." (_Idem_, pp. 241-2.)
Compare this statement of what the South _should have been able_ to
muster with the consolidated abstract of the latest returns of the
Confederate army showing what she _was able_ to muster. This is the
record:
Officers and men in _all_ the Confederate armies, February, 1865,
aggregate for duty, 160,000; aggregate present and absent, 358,000 (W.
R., iv. iii. p. 1182).
General Marcus Wright, an expert authority, estimates the strength of
the Confederate army _at the close of the war_ thus:
Present 157,613
Absent 117,387
-------
Total 275,000
And of the Union army thus:
Present 797,807
Absent 202,700
---------
Total 1,000,507
If General Adams is right, one cannot but ask, where were the other
542,000 men, over and above the 358,000 shown by the official report
alluded to have been on the rolls? The 90,000 men in Northern prisons
will not help the situation, for they were not exactly available as part
of the "fighting strength of the Confederacy." Compare also the fact
that there were mustered out of the Union army at the end of the war
1,034,000 men; and there were, in all the Confederacy, surrendered
Confederate soldiers to the number of 174,000 only, and this included
all who were paroled, whether in hospital, or at their homes, as well as
those in arms.
* * * * *
In conclusion I am reminded of the words of General Lee in a letter to
General Jubal A. Early, shortly after the war, "IT WILL BE DIFFICULT TO
GET THE WORLD TO UNDERSTAND THE ODDS AGAINST WHICH WE FOUGHT."
Still I cannot help thinking that the statements of the adjutant-general
of the Confederate armies in his official reports, and the testimony of
General Lee himself in regard to the numbers in his army, will
ultimately be considered by the world more reliable than the _a priori_
estimates of even so careful and honest an investigator as Colonel
Livermore.
When immediately after the surrender at Appomattox General Meade asked
General Lee how many men he had in his army, the latter replied that he
had on his entire front, from Richmond to Petersburg, not more than
29,000 muskets. "Then," said General Meade, "we had five to your one."
On the whole I think we may still claim for the armies of the Southern
Confederacy the encomium penned by Virgil nearly two thousand years ago:
"Exigui numero, sed bello vivida virtus."
POSTWORD
The arguments adduced in the preceding pages are believed by the writer
to be valid and sufficient to refute the conclusion reached by Colonel
Livermore, the Hon. Charles Francis Adams, and others, that there was in
the Confederacy a "minimum of 1,160,000 effectives, to which we must add
117,000 men from the Border States, giving a total Confederate strength
of 1,277,000." I have not attempted to give definite figures as to the
actual enrollment in the Southern armies. My argument is of necessity
largely based on the probabilities of the situation,--it does not
profess to be demonstrative, or final. But "probability is the guide of
life"; and I believe I have blazed a path by which future students of
the subject, having before them the muster rolls of the Confederate army
will be able to reach more definite conclusions in this important
subject--conclusions, however, not seriously at variance with those
stated in these pages.[15]
FOOTNOTES
[1] Gen. Adams says: "Computations based on the census returns tend to
show that at the very lowest estimate the increase of time of military
service would represent an increase of at least 30 per cent. in
effectives." Id. p. 284.
[2] Our critic has made an error here: 12 per cent, of 1,000,000, i.e.,
120,000, so that his aggregate should be 1,420,000.
[3] See Merivale's History of the Romans, III, 416, and IV, 298 and 343,
and V. 386.
[4] In the first edition of Col. Henderson's work, cited above, he
actually stated that the element of foreigners in the Southern armies
was almost as large as in the Northern armies!
[5] Gen. Marcus J. Wright puts this number at only 65,387. But cf.
Mansfield's Life of Grant, p. 338.
[6] See a valuable discussion of our subject in a pamphlet entitled
"Acts of the Republican Party," by Cazenove G. Lee, who wrote under the
_nom de plume_ of "C. Gardner," Winchester, Va., 1906, pp. 59-69.
[7] I acted as adjutant of the Third Brigade A. N. Va., in the
Gettysburg campaign. Even then, in the third year of the war, and in
that best equipped army, the returns showed only 1480 muskets to 1941
men in the brigade. One-fourth of the command was without arms.
[8] "The Government, at the opening of 1864, estimated that the
Conscription would place four hundred thousand men in the field." Lee
did not share this belief. By the end of the year it was, in his
opinion, "diminishing, rather than increasing, the strength of his
army."--Letter of Dec. 31, 1864. See "R. E. Lee, Man and Soldier," p.
591, by Thos. Nelson Page.
[9] Thus, to quote that able and expert authority Gen. Marcus J. Wright:
Battles around Richmond (1862), Lee, 80,835; McClellan, 115,249. At
Antietam, Confederates, 35,255; Federals, 87,164. At Fredericksburg,
Confederates, 78,110; Federals, 110,000. At Chancellorsville,
Confederates, 57,212; Federals, 131,661. At Gettysburg, Confederates,
64,000; Federals, 95,000. At the Wilderness, Confederates, 63,981;
Federals, 141,160.
[10] A consideration of the portentous difference between the number of
men borne on the regimental rolls and the number actually available on
the battlefield, suggests that it may be in large degree accounted for
by the number of men detailed for service in the industrial army.
Thus in the army of Northern Virginia just before Fredericksburg, Nov.
20, 1862:
Aggregate present and absent 153,773
Aggregate present for duty 86,569
Soon after Gettysburg:
1863: Present and absent 109,915
Present for duty 50,184
Before Wilderness campaign:
1864: Present and absent 98,246
Present for duty 62,925
On reaching Petersburg, July 10, 1864:
Present and absent 135,805
Present for duty 68,844
As to exemptions it was customary to exempt farmers who engaged to raise
a certain amount of corn.
Again the practice was extensively pursued of granting furloughs for
recruiting service. Such men continued to be borne on the rolls of their
commands in the field.
[11] Aggregate available military population 792,000, of which 350,000
in the army January, 1862. Above figure is 2-1/2 per cent. of remainder,
viz. 442,000.
[12] Col. Livermore's method of computation, if applied to the true
available number 760,000, with additions and deductions noted above,
yields a very similar result, about 790,000. See his book, p. 23, but
note on p. 21 an error of calculation, where instead of 265,000 he
should give 246,872.
[13] The ten per cent. addition for extension of military age is too
high an estimate in this and the following tables, when we remember that
the conscript law lowering the age to seventeen and raising it to fifty
did not go into operation until February 17, 1864, by which time the
territory of the Confederacy was greatly contracted.
[14]
WAR DEPARTMENT,
WASHINGTON, May 18, 1912.
DEAR DR. MCKIM,
I think your estimate of 50,000 as representing the total number of
troops furnished by the Border States is about correct. It can never be
definitely ascertained.
Very truly yours,
MARCUS J. WRIGHT.
[15] I have not in this Monograph taken account of an argument sometimes
put forward, drawn from the alleged fact that the census of 1890 showed
that there were then living 432,020 Confederate and 980,724 United
States soldiers (or including sailors and marines 1,034,073). But the
Report on Population, 1890, Part II, p. clxxii, states that the figures
first quoted are approximate only, and "have not been subjected to
careful revision and comparison." No positive conclusion, therefore, can
be drawn from them. Their unreliability is shown by the fact that at
that very time the War Department estimated that there were then living
1,341,332 Federal soldiers.
* * * * *
Transcriber's Corrections
Following is a list of significant typographical errors that have been
corrected.
- Page 70, repeated "to" eliminated (alluded to have been).
- Footnote 10, "Fredricksburg" changed to "Fredericksburg" (just before
Fredericksburg).
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