Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 17.djvu/107

 Annual Reunion of the Association of A. N, V, 99

deficiencies, we created almost out of the ground, foundries and rolling- mills, smelting works, chemical works, a powder-mill far superior to any in the United States, and a chain of arsenals, armories, and labo- ratories equal in their capacity to the best of those in the United States, and stretching link by link from Virginia to Alabama/'

THE NUMBERS ON EACH SIDE.

But how was the vast disparity in numbers to be neutralized? Let the battle-fields of the war, the silent soldiers' graves and the living soldiers* memories in wordless eloquence give the immortal answer. It is not a pleasant thing to own defeat, even under the most adverse conditions, and failure almost invariably excuses itself on the plea of the superior numbers of its adversary. Even to this day the respec- tive numbers engaged in many of our great battles are matters of controversy.

But the prowess of the Confederate armies and the consummate skill of their commanders need no stronger attestation than the simple statement that during the entire war, from first to last, less than eight hundred thousand men of all arms were enlisted in the Confederate service ; and we have the authority of the biographers of President Lincoln, who will not be accused of unfairness to themselves, for the statement that during the same period the number of men put into service in the United States army, navy and marines was 2,690,401, besides some 70,000 emergency men. You know, my friends, about what emergency men are worth ; so leaving them out of the count altogether, and deducting also the 150,000 veteran volunteers who are claimed as having re-enlisted in 1863 and 1864, and reinforcing these by 40,000 more for good measure, making an aggregate de- duction of 190,000, and there still remain two and a half millions of men. Upon these facts we may safely commit to the care of the future the fame of those who wore the gray.

Yet, in the face of these figures. Lieutenant- Colonel Dodge, of the United States army, by a recent paper in one of our great magazines, has fairly earned the title of a modern " military Columbus" when he tells us that in fifty important battles, which he names, " at the point of fighting contact, the Confederates outnumbered the Federals by an average of about two per cent." Let us lament the unkind fate of the Federal leaders who have fallen into the hands of this un- merciful iconoclast of their reputations. For, in claiming that with the 2,500,000 of men in their armies, they suffered themselves to be outnumbered on the battle-field by their 800,000 antagonists ; he