Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 06.djvu/34

24 for recruiting all the Confederate armies east of the Mississippi river, after the 16th of April, 1862, up to February, 1865. Let us see how it was on the other side. The Comte seems to be unaware of the fact that, on the third day of March, 1863, an act of the United States Congress was approved, which provides for conscription, though generally designated the "Enrolment Act." On the 17th of March, 1863, the Bureau for Enrolment and Conscription was organized under Brigadier-General James B. Fry as Provost-Marshal General (see his report, page 13), and on the 1st of May, 1863, an order was issued giving it the superintendence of the entire volunteer recruiting system (same page). After the 3d of March there were no more calls on the States except for "emergency men." The Provost-Marshal General, in his report (page 2), says:

Of the 1,356,593 raised before the organization of the Bureau, 1,146,189 were for three years, as shown by a table on page 160 of the report, 18,000 of them being called for for the navy; and if all that number went into that service, there were left 1,128,189 three years' men for the army. On page 57 he says that in the summer of 1863, 956 volunteer regiments, 7 independent battalions, 61 independent companies, and 158 volunteer batteries were in the service. There were then less than 1,000 regiments, including those in the regular army, for the 1,128,189 three years' men to be divided among, which would give over 1,128 men to a regiment. From the beginning to the close of the war, there was not quite 600,000 men put in the Confederate army in any way, which would give less than 1,000 each that the Confederate regiments received from the beginning to the close of the war. Of course it follows, as a necessary consequence, that in June, 1863, the Federal regiments were greatly larger than the Confederate regiments were at that time, unless we had rendered hors de combat a great many more of them than they had of us. Besides the troops put into the field before the passage of the Federal conscript act, it appears from the Provost-Marshal General's report (page 53), that 13,971