Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 24.djvu/31

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truths per cent, saw service in the Confederate States army, and they were in all grades from private to brigadier-general. Of the 759 that we know, 234 were killed. This means that thirty per cent, of those who went into the Confederate service from the 1'im < -rsity of North Carolina for those ten years, sealed their faith with their blood. This death rate is very near the average of the per cent, of loss sustained by North Carolina troops as a whole, and represents seventeen and five-tenths per cent, of the total enrollment of the University for the ten years. In other words, the proportional loss sustained on the total enrollment of students for these ten years, was just about twice as threat as that sustained by the Federal army. The rates of losses of that army, moreover, were greater than were those in the Crimean, or in the Franco- Prussian war. If we reduce this proportion to its proper basis of enlisted men, it will be found that the losses in the Federal army from all causes, death in battle, death from wounds, death by disease and in prison, was eight and six- tenths per cent.* Of the 1078 University men who are known to have served in the Confederate army, we know that 312, or 28.94 per cent lost their lives; more complete records of their service would no doubt reduce this per cent, but it is not probable that the most complete returns of the service of our students would reduce it to less than twenty-five per cent or three times as heavy as the losses sustained by the Federal army.

It will give us a clearer conception of the immense energy dis- played by this University, to compare its losses with the losses of some other institutions. The University of Virginia Memorial gives the number of students of that institution who were killed, as 198. Professor Trent estimates that there were perhaps 300 killed in all, and that twenty-five per cent of its students saw service in the C. S. A. The number of students of the Virginia Military Institute repor- ted as killed, was 171. I have found no figures for other Southern institutions. Of northern institutions we find that all contributed more or less of their graduates to the army of the Union. Lafayette College, Pennsylvania, had 226 students who served in that army. Of its regular graduates living, and not beyond the age for military service, twenty-six per cent were in the army. The average of ser-

tle. In his larger work, Regimental Losses, he says that the general Con- federate loss in killed and wounded, was nearly ten per cent, while the Fed- eral loss in killed and wounded, was nearly five per cent.
 * See Col. Fox's article in The Century, on the chance of being hit in bat-