The Life of Jefferson Davis

In general hospitals or on sick leave at home 75,978

Absent on furlough or as prisoners of war 66,290

Absent without leave 15,483

Grand aggregate 970,710

The aggregate available force present for duty May 1st, 1864, was distributed in the different commands as follows:

Department of Washington 42,124

Army of the Potomac 120,386

Department of Virginia and North Carolina 59,139

Department of the South 18,165

Department of the Gulf 61,866

Department of Arkansas 23,666

Department of the Tennessee 74,174

Department of the Missouri 15,770

Department of the North-west 5,295

Department of Kansas 4,798

Head-quarters Military Division of the Mississippi 476

Department of the Cumberland 119,948

Department of the Ohio 35,416

Northern Department 9,540

Department of West Virginia 30,782

Department of the East 2,828

Department of the Susquehanna 2,970

Middle Department 5,627

Ninth Army Corps 20,780

Department of New Mexico 3,454

Department of the Pacific 5,141

Total 662,345

And again:

Official reports show that on the 1st of March, 1865, the aggregate military force of all arms, officers and men, was nine hundred and sixty-five thousand five hundred and ninety-one, to-wit:

Available forces present for duty 602,598

On detached service in the different military departments 132,538

In field hospitals and unfit for duty 35,628

In general hospitals or on sick leave 143,419

Absent on furlough or as prisoners of war 31,695

Absent without leave 19,683

Grand aggregate 965,591

This force was augmented on the 1st of May, 1865, by enlistments, to the number of one million five hundred and sixteen, of all arms, officers and men (1,000,516).

And again he says:

The aggregate quotas charged against the several States under all calls made by the President of the United States, from the 15th day of April, 1861, to the 14th day of April, 1865, at which time drafting and recruiting ceased, was 2,759,049

The aggregate number of men credited on the several calls, and put into service of the United States, in the army, navy, and marine corps, during the above period, was 2,656,553

Leaving a deficiency on all calls, when the war closed, of 102,596

This statement does not include the regular army, nor the negro troops raised in the Southern States, which were not raised by calls on the States. It may be safely asserted that the “available force present for duty,” of the Federal armies at the beginning or close of the last year of the war, exceeded the entire force called into the service of the Confederacy during the four years. The aggregate of Federal forces raised during the war numbered more than one-third of the free population of the Confederate States, including men, women, and children.[79 - It has been contended that the odds against the South in numbers and resources were compensated by the advantages of her defensive position, and by the strong incentives of a war for her homes and liberties. An ingenious argument in demonstration of the assumed defective administration of the Confederacy has been deduced from various historical examples of successful resistance against overwhelming odds. The most plausible citation has been the success of Frederick the Great, in his defense of Prussia against the coalition of Russia, Austria, and France. This illustration has no value, as it does not at all meet the case.Waiving all consideration of the peculiar strategic difficulties of the South, Frederick first had the advantage of his English alliance. Frederick never fought odds greater than two to one, while the South fought three, four, sometimes five to one – but never equal numbers. Again, Prussia was inaccessible except by overland marches – not penetrated, like the South, in every direction by navigable rivers, and nearly surrounded by the sea. Frederick, too, was absolute in Prussia, and had the lives and property of all his subjects at his control. Mr. Davis, on the other hand, never could consolidate the resources of the South as he desired, being constantly hampered by demagogism in Congress, which could at all times be coerced by the press hostile to the administration, or influenced by the slightest display of popular displeasure. Pretending to place the whole means of the country at the disposal of the President, Congress yet invariably rendered its measures inoperative by emasculating clauses providing exemptions and immunities of every description. President Davis was too sincere a republican, and had too much regard for the restraints of the Constitution to violently usurp ungranted powers.It is to be remembered, too, that the South received no foreign aid, while Frederick was at last saved by the accession of Peter to the Russian throne, which event dissolved the coalition against Prussia.]

But this disparity of numbers, apparently sufficient of itself to decide the issue against the South, was by no means the greatest advantage of the North. When it is asserted that the naval superiority of the North decided the contest in its favor, we are not limited to the consideration merely of that absolute command of the water, which prevented the South from importing munitions of war, except at enormous expense and hazard, which made the defense of the sea-coast and contiguous territory impossible, and which so disorganized the Confederate finances. The Confederacy encountered strategic difficulties, by reason of the naval superiority of the North, which, at an early period of the war, counter-balanced the advantages of its defensive position.

In the beginning the enemy had easy, speedy, and secure access to the Southern coast, and wherever there was a harbor or inlet, was to be found a base of operations for a Federal army. Thus, at the outset, the Confederacy presented on every side an exposed frontier. In every quarter, the Federal armies had bases of operations at right angles, each to the other, and thus, wherever the Confederate army established a defensive line, it was assailable by a second Federal army advancing from a second base. The advantage of rapid concentration of forces, usually belonging to an interior line, was obviated by the easy and rapid conveyance of large masses by water.

Probably the most serious strategic disadvantage of the South was its territorial configuration, through the intersection of its soil in nearly every quarter by navigable rivers, either emptying into the ocean, of which the North, at all times, had undisputed control, or opening upon the Federal frontier. In all the Atlantic States of the Confederacy navigable streams penetrate far into the interior, and empty into the sea. The Mississippi, aptly termed an “inland sea,” flowing through the Confederacy, was, both in its upper waters and at its mouth, held by the North. The Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers, with their mouths upon the Federal frontiers, navigable in winter for transports and gunboats, in the first twelve months of the war, brought the Federal armies to the centre of the South-west. In the Trans-Mississippi region, the Arkansas and Red Rivers gave the enemy convenient and secure bases of operations along their margins. Each one of these streams having inevitably, sooner or later, become subject to the control of the Federal navy, afforded bases of operations against the interior of the South, while it was likewise threatened from the Northern frontier.

The difficulty of space, which defeated Napoleon in his invasion of Russia, and which has baffled the largest armies led by the ablest commanders, had an easy solution for the North. Remarkable illustrations of the extent to which these water facilities aided the North, were afforded by the signal failure attending every overland advance of the Federal armies so long as the Confederates could raise even the semblance of an opposing force. Besides the innumerable Federal failures in the Appalachian region of Virginia, Sherman and Grant, the most successful of Northern commanders, illustrated this military principle in instances already noted. When Sherman finally marched from the Confederate frontier to the ocean, General Grant’s policy of “attrition” had virtually destroyed the military strength of the South, and Sherman simply accomplished an unopposed march through an undefended country. There can be no better illustration of these strategic difficulties of the Confederacy, than that afforded by the train of disasters in the beginning of 1862, each of which was directly and mainly attributable to the naval advantages of the enemy and the geographical configuration.

A candid review of the events of the first two years of the war will demonstrate the inevitable failure of subjugation of the South, but for these advantages of her invaders. Not only are the facilities of transportation possessed by the North to be considered, but the further advantage extended by its fleet in the event of military reverse. The shipping constituted an invulnerable defense and convenient shelter for the fugitive Federals. Upon at least two occasions, the two main Federal armies were rescued from destruction by the gunboats – in the case of Grant at Shiloh, and of McClellan on James River.

Nor was it possible for the South to make adequate provision to meet the naval advantages of the North. The Federal Government retained the whole of the navy. The North was manufacturing and commercial, while the South was purely agricultural in its means; hence the incomparable rapidity with which the Federal Government accumulated shipping of every character. The initial superiority of the North in naval resources prevented the South from obtaining from foreign sources the men and the material for the equipment of vessels of war. Then, again, the disputed question of the capacity of shore batteries to resist vessels of war, had a most inopportune solution for the South, and in cases where great interests were involved. We have already noted one instance where this question had a fatal solution – that of New Orleans. And in this instance, too, the want of time for preparation was a fatal difficulty. But for the unfinished condition of the iron-clads at New Orleans, the possession of the Mississippi by the enemy would have been greatly deferred, though, with the headwaters and mouth of the great river in Federal control, it was hardly more than a question of time, should the North skillfully employ its superior manufacturing resources and preponderant population.

The special weapon of the North, from which no amount of victories ever brought the Confederacy one moment’s relief, was the blockade – a weapon which the injustice of foreign powers placed in the grasp of our adversaries. The blockade ruined the Confederate finances and, by preventing the importation of military material, weakened the Confederate armies to the extent of thousands of men who were detailed for manufacturing and other purposes. It was the blockade, too, which caused the derangement of the internal economy of the South, creating the painful contrast in the effects of the war upon the two sections. The North, with its ports open, the abundant gold of California, and petroleum stimulating speculation, found in the war a mine of wealth. Patriotism and profit went hand in hand. The vast expenditures of Government created a lucrative market; the enormous transportation demanded made the railroads prosperous beyond parallel; and the sources of popular prosperity and exhilaration were inexhaustible. The condition of the South was the exact reverse. With its commerce almost totally suspended; frequently in peril of famine; whole States, one after another, occupied or devastated by the enemy, so that when the Confederate armies expelled the enemy they could not maintain themselves, and were compelled to retreat; deprived of every comfort, and nearly of all the necessaries of life, the history of the war in the South is a record of universal and unrelieved suffering.

It must be apparent that we have here given but a superficial review and imperfect statement of the obstacles with which the South contended. But, assuredly, before even this array of odds, such minor questions as the removal of one officer and the retention of another sink into utter insignificance. As we have before intimated, many of the most important incidents in the conduct of the war must be reserved for the decision of impartial military judgment. What if it should be granted that the appointment of Pemberton and the removal of Johnston were fatal blunders, were they compensated by no acts of judicious selection of other officers for promotion and reward? Is the firm and constant support of Lee, of Sidney Johnston, of Jackson, and of Early to be accounted as nothing? Are we to accept the imputation of error to Mr. Davis alone? We need not pursue the career of General Johnston much farther than its beginning to discover what his countrymen unanimously deplored as an error, what Stonewall Jackson declared a fatal blunder. General Lee confessed his error at Gettysburg. Beauregard, too, has been generally adjudged to have seriously erred at Shiloh. Yet how easy would it be to construct a plausible theory, demonstrating the seriously adverse influence upon the fortunes of the Confederacy, from each one of those errors. And we could extend the parallel much farther. Napoleon estimated the merits of different generals by the comparative number of their faults and virtues. Perhaps that is even a better philosophy which urges us to measure the reputations of men, “not by their exemption from fault, but by the size of the virtues of which they are possessed.” Assuredly, the South can never demur to the application of this test either to herself or her late leader. Judged by such a standard of merit, neither can be apprehensive for the award of posterity. Two generations hence, if not sooner, Jefferson Davis, not less for his wisdom than for his virtues, will be commemorated as the Washington of the South.