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 Duke University Libraries 
 
 (Communication 
 Conf Pam #420 
 
 IIIIIIM 
 
MESSAGK OF THE IMIESIDENT. 
 
 Richmond, Va., Jan, 25, 1864. 
 To the House of Representatives : 
 
 In response to your resolution of the I Ith ult., I herewith trans- 
 mit a communication from the Secretary of War, showing, as far as 
 the records of the Department enable him to do, the number of men 
 liable to conscription who have been removed from the Commissary 
 and Quartermaster's Departments, to give place to disabled soldiers, 
 as directed by law. 
 
 JEFFERSON DAVIS. 
 
 CoNFEDERA rr, States of America, ) 
 
 War DepartmeTit, ^ 
 
 Richmond, Va., Jan. 23, 18G4. ) 
 
 To tht i*resiwitt of ihi. Confederate. States : 
 
 Sir : I have received the following resolution of the House of Rep- 
 resentatives, referred by your Excellency to this Department: 
 
 Renslved, That the President be requested to inform this House 
 what number of men liable to conscription have been removed from 
 the Quartermaster ;ini Commissary Departments, and their places 
 filled by disabled soldiers, in pursuance of an order issued by the Ad- 
 jutant (jrene)al, to carry inLe effect a law on this subject, passed by 
 the Congress of the C )nfederate States." 
 
 The reports of the Adjutant General, Quartermaster General, Com- 
 missary (xeneral, and Superintendent of Conscription, herewith trans- 
 mitted, convey all the information in the possession of this Depart- 
 ment, and set forth the reasons which render it impossible to respond 
 more satisfactorily to the resolution of the House. 
 
 Verj respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 JAMES A. SEDDON, 
 
 Secretary of War. 
 
C. S. War Department, i 
 
 . Adjvtant and Inspector GineraVs Office, \ 
 
 Richmond, Ya., Jan. 22, I8G4. S 
 
 lion. Jawles a. Seddon, 
 
 Secretary of War, Richmond, Va. : 
 
 Sir : The information desired bv the resolution of the Houpe of 
 Representatives, in relation to the number of able-bodied soldiers em- 
 ployed in the Quartermaster and Commissary Departments, who have 
 been sent to the field, under the operation of the act of Congress, ap- 
 proved April 22, 1S63, cannot be furnished as fully as the resolution 
 contemplates. But it will appear from the general orders in which 
 the act is published to the army, (a copy of which is now furnished,) 
 that the Department has endeavored to enforce the provisions of the 
 law. It may be confidently asserted, that, except in special cases, 
 and under the immediate sanction of the Secretary of War, no em- 
 ployee reported by post quartermasters or commissaries has been re- 
 tained in either of the departments specified, unless disability for field 
 service was clearly, shown, in the manner prescribed in the general 
 orders. It has been the invariable rule of this office, when such dis- 
 ability was not shown, to order the employee, if a soldier, to the field, 
 and if a conscript, to direct the Bureau of Conscription to conscribe 
 and assign him to a company in the army. These orders were made 
 ^y endorsement upon the reports, which were referred either to the 
 "ificer reporting, or to the Bureau of Conscription, as the facts indi- 
 cated to be proper. 
 
 It would have been impossible, without greatly increased clerical 
 assistance in this office, to register the names of employees in those de- 
 partments ; and, as the law did not require a report of their number 
 to be made to Congress, this was not considered necessary for its en- 
 forcement. 
 
 No similar reports were required of commanding general?, because 
 it was considered they would permit no able-bodied soldier in the field 
 to remain, in violation of the law and orders, as an employee in either 
 of the departments. 
 
 I am, sir, very respectfully, 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 S. COOPER, 
 Adjutant and Inspector General. 
 
Quartermaster General's Office, } 
 Richmond^ January 14, 1863. S 
 
 Hon. James A. 8eduon, Secretary of War^ Richmond^ Va. 
 
 Sir : I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of the resolutioji 
 of the House of Representatives, of the 12th of December, 1863, 
 requesting the " President to inform the House what number of men 
 liable to conscription, have been removed from the Quartermaster 
 and Commissary's Departments, and their places filled by disabiei} 
 soldiers, in pursuance of an order issued by the Adjutant General, 
 to carry into effect a law on this subject, passed by the Congress of 
 the Confedornte States." The order alluded to in the rusolution, is 
 supposed to be general order No. 105, dated July, 1863 ; and the law 
 that of April 2Uth, 1863, respecting clerks in the Quartermaster 
 and Commissary's Departments. 
 
 The resolution, so far as regards quartermasters, cannot be aii- 
 swered by this office, because : 
 
 lat. The said order rciiuires reporis to be made through this office 
 only, by officers at posts. Officers in the field, who constitute at least 
 three-fourths of the whole, are required to report to their command- 
 ing general, who, it is supposed, transmits such reports directly to the 
 Adjutant and Inspector General's Department. 
 
 2nd. With regard to officers at posts, it can be said, that of the 
 twelve hundred and forty (1240) quartermasters and assistant quar- 
 termasters, in the service, only three hundred and ninty-five (395) 
 are serving at posts. Of these one hundred and twenty-one have 
 rendered reports, under said orders ; these reports have all been sent 
 promptly to the Adjutant and Inspector General's Department, for his 
 actions and orders. As to the military status of these clerks, I am 
 not advised ; the action taken by that officer, if any, has not been 
 communicated to this office, but is presumed to have been sent directly 
 to the proper enrolling officer, for execution. 
 
 The order of the War Department, in question, and the law of 
 April 20th, 1863, on which it is based, appears to have been regularly 
 executed, so fur as the reports have been received from officers ; ad 
 urgent appeals from many of them, for the detention of efficient and 
 experienced clerks have been denied, when the parties were liable to 
 military duty. 
 
 officers at posts, who have not yet rendered the reports required, 
 have been again called on to do so, and proper efforts are being made 
 to secure them from all. It may be remarked, as one cause of delay, 
 that a number of these officers are in the trans-Mississippi depart- 
 ment, with whom, communication is slow and difficult. 
 I have the honor to be, 
 
 Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 A. R. LAWTON, 
 Quartermaster General, C. S. A, 
 
Richmond, Va., Dec. 15, 1863. 
 Hon. James A. Seddon, Secretary of War : 
 
 Sir : The following resolution, adopted by Congress and referred 
 by you on the 14th inst., was duly received : 
 
 " Resolved, That the President be requested to inform this House 
 what number of men, liable to conscription, have been removed from 
 the Quartermaster and Commissary Departments, and tlieir places 
 filled by disabled soldiers, in pursuance of an order issued by the Ad- 
 jutant (jeneral to carry into effect a law on this subject, passed by the 
 Congress of the Confederate States." 
 
 I would respectfully reply that as soon as the order of the Adju- 
 tant General was received, it was distributed to ihe commissarie.>- 
 throughout the Confederacy, and although often petitioned by these 
 officers in different parts of the country to allow them to retain certain 
 of these clerks who had rendered invaluable service in their offices, an 
 invariable answer in the negative has been returned, and the commis- 
 saries instructed to employ disabled soldiers and non-conscripts for 
 the duty. 
 
 So far as this bureau proper is concerned, no clerks have been ap- 
 pointed in it since the passage of the first act of conscription, except- 
 ing those men who had been discharged from the service of the Con- 
 federate States army, or who were detailed on account of physical disa- 
 bility from such service. I'revious to the passage of that act, verbal 
 application had, from time to time, been made to the Secretary of War 
 for additional force in the bureau. I entered the office on 1st April, 
 1861, with one one clerk ; on the 2Gth April, an additional clerk was 
 allow'ed. By act of Congress, two more were allowed in August, 1861. 
 These continued to transact the current work of the office until Novem- 
 ber, when, in consequence of the great increase of business, verbal ap- 
 plication was made for several others ; only one was allowed until 
 March, 1862, when authority was given me to employ two others. On 
 the 9th October, 1862, application was again made to the Secretary of 
 War, by letter, for twelve additional clerks, which was approved by 
 him. 
 
 The accounts of the office continued to accumulate. On the 20th 
 January, 1863, another increase of ten clerks was applied for and 
 granted. The conscription act had been passed, and the construction 
 put upon it was that, after the 16th April, 1862, no clerk could be ap- 
 pointed who was subject to conscription at the time of the pas- 
 sage of the act. The appointments, being restricted, were made from 
 that class of citizens who had been in and Avere, at the time of ap- 
 pr>i .Luient, dichargedfrom the service of the Confederate States army. 
 
 hi consequence of this limitation the parties appointed lost so much 
 \-aiQ from sickness and wounds, that the business of the office, which 
 haii been continually on the increase, was necessarily thrown behind 
 Land. Besides the loss of time from sickness, interrogatories from 
 < "ongress had to be answered, which consumed the time of most of the 
 tierks for several weeks. To overcome these difficulties I was under the 
 
necessity recommending to you a further increase of clerical force on 
 the 17th October, 1863. When the latter application was recommend- 
 ed it was a known fact that but few efficient wounded men and non-con- 
 scripts could be obtained on account of the low rate of compensation al- 
 lowed the employees of the Government, andthe impossibility of obtain 
 ing requisite board and lodging by them; and several of the most efficient 
 that had been appointed have, during the present year, resigned their 
 positions and returned to the army, or sought more lucrative employ- 
 ment elswhere. Ag^iin, the clerks had been enrolled for local de- 
 fence, and thej number of raids made by the enemy in the vicinity of 
 Richmond had caused a suspension of business in the department for 
 a week at a time. It Avas, therefore, desirable that as m my men as 
 possible should be untrammelled for the local defence of the country. 
 To meet these necessities and, at the same time, to aid the refugee 
 and destitute portions of the female population of the country in part, 
 and to give employment to many intelligent ladies of this class, the 
 suggestion had been made, and by you approved and recommended, to 
 test the qualifications of the ladies in the examination of the accounts 
 of this bureau. The experiment has been tried, and is likely to prove 
 successful, though the question is not yet beyond doubt. 
 
 With regard to the number of men liable to conscription, who have 
 been removed from this department, this information can best be ob- 
 tained from the bureau of conscription, the officers of which were au- 
 thorized b}'' the Adjutant General's orders to conscribe all who were 
 efficient for field service, 
 
 I have been thus explicit to show that, so far as it lay in the power 
 of this bureau, the object desired has been sedulously aimed at. 
 Very respectfullv, your obedient servant, 
 
 L, B. NORTHOP, 
 Commissary General. 
 
 Official copy : 
 
 L. B. Northrop, Commissary General. 
 
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