Franklin Repository

A statement carefully prepared by one who had access to official documents, and who was a prisoner himself, has been made out, showing the number of deaths among Union prisoners at Andersonville, Georgia, from February, 1864, to February 1865. The grand total is twelve thousand, eight hundred and eighty four! The highest number of deaths in a single day was one hundred and twenty-seven, the date being August 23, 1864, at which time thirty-two thousand one hundred and ninety-three prisoners were confined there, being the highest number ever imprisoned at that point. The statement was prepared by Charles Lang, hospital steward of the 101st Pa. Regiment, who was captured at Plymouth, N.C. Governor Curtin, who has been eagerly seeking for a list of the Pennsylvania soldiers who died at Andersonville, has received the full roll of Pennsylvania victims from this considerate soldier, and it will be found on an inside page of our double-sheet to-day. The list will also be published in pamphlet form by Surgeon-General Phillips. We understand that the bodies of the victims cannot be removed until October, and before that time Governor Curtin will probably announce the best and most convenient way of securing such removals. The Governor is engaged at this time in an effort to procure full lists of Pennsylvania soldiers who died in other rebel prisons, and it is hoped that a list more or less complete will soon be ready for publication. A statement of those who died at Salisbury, N.C. will probably soon be made public.

Nothing has made so deep an impression on the heart of the loyal people as the treatment of Union soldiers who fell into the fiendish hands of the Southern military authorities. The evidence that a deliberate system of starvation was practised accumulates every day. Henry S. Foote, late a rebel Senator from Mississippi, is the most recent witness. In a letter in reference to his efforts to get the Confederate Congress to investigate these cruelties, he says:

"Touching the Congressional report referred to I have this to say: A month or two anterior to the date of said report I learned, from a government officer of respectability, that the prisoners of war then confined in and about Richmond were suffering severely for want of provisions. He told me further, that it was manifest to him that a systematic scheme was on foot for subjecting these unfortunate men to starvation; that the Commissary General, Mr. Northrop (a most wicked and heartless wretch), had addressed a communication to Mr. Seddon, the Secretary of War, proposing to withhold meat altogether from military prisoners then in custody, and to give them nothing but bread and vegetables, and that Mr. Seddon had endorsed the document containing this recommendation affirmatively. I learned further that by calling upon Major Ould, the commissioner for exchange of prisoners, I would be able to obtain further information on this subject. I went to Mr. Ould immediately, and obtained the desired information. Being utterly unwilling to countenance such barbarity for a moment, regarding indeed the honor of the whole South as concerned in the affair, I proceeded without delay to the hall of the House of Representatives, called the attention of that strangely constituted body to the subject, and insisted upon an immediate committee of investigation. I grieve to say that this was at first refused, and I was most acrimoniously censured by several members for introducing the subject in the House at all. But I resolved to have an investigation, and to put a stop to such Vandalic atrocities if I could, or at least to rescue my own character from menaced infamy by withdrawing from all further connection with the Confederate cause at once. I introduced a second resolution, next morning, and finally succeeded in getting the committee raised. You will find, in addition to the report made by the committee, a considerable mass of testimony of various kinds reported with it, and among other documentary proofs, the official communications of the Commissary General, above referred to, and the endorsement of Mr. Seddon thereon, in which he substantially says that, in his judgement, the time had arrived for retaliation upon the prisoners of war of the enemy."

The history of the civilized world cannot furnish a more atrocious record than that made up for themselves by the leaders of the rebellion, and among our greatest reasons for thankfulness at the close of the war and the death of slavery, is the fact that such horrible outrages on humanity can never more be perpetrated. The oligarchic system which tended to sanction such indescribable cruelties has been ground to powder, not a vestige of it is left, and the entire world has cause to sing to a paen of rejoicing at its destruction.

"Petroleum V. Nasby," whose writings amused Mr. Lincoln so much, says in his last letter that "these is the dark days of the Dimocrasy."--He adds:

"We hev no way uv keeping our voters together. Opposin the war won't do no good, fer before the next eleckshun the heft of our voters will hev diskivered that the war is over. The feer of drafts may do suthin in sum parts uv Pennsylvany and Suthren Illinoy, fer some time yit; but that can't be dePendid on."

But we hev wun resource fer a Ishoo--ther will alluz be a Dimocrisy, so long ez ther's a Nigger. Ther is a uncompromisin dislike to the Nigger in the mind uv a ginooine Dimocrat."

Mr. Nasby then lays down a few plain rules for the guidance of the faithful in this matter, one of which is as follows:

"Alluz assert that the nigger will never beable to take care uv himself, but will alluz be a public burden. He may, possibly, give us the lie by going to work. In sich a emergency the dooty ov every Dimecrat is plane. He must not be allowed to work. Associations must be orgenizd, pledged to neether give him employment, to work with him, to work fer any one who will give him work, or patronize eny one who duz. (I wood sejest that sich uv us as hez been foretoonit enuff 2 git credit, pay a trifle on account, so ez to make our patronage wuth suthin.) This course rigidly and percistently follered, wood drive the best uv em to steelin, and the balance to the poor houses, provin wot we hev alluz claimd, that they air a idle and vishus race."

Ef ther aint no niggers, Sentrel Committis must furnish em. A half dozen will do fer a ordinary county, ef theyr hustled along with energy. Ef they won't steel, the Sentrel Committis must do it theirselves. Show yer niggers in a township in the mornin, and the same nite rob the clothes lines and hen roosts. Ever willin 2 sacrifice myself fer the cause, I volunteer to do this latter duty in six populous cuntis."

An honest, intelligent conviction, no matter how different from what we ourselves entertain, should always command our respect. If we cannot concur in the belief of others, we should at least dissent in a respectful manner, admitting all the time the possibility of the error being on our side.

It is best always to keep in mind the imperfection of human knowledge, and while tenacious of our opinions to preserve an unbiased judgment. It has often happened that an idea emerging from dark obscurity has exploded beneath the fortifications of error, and blown them and their defenders out of existence. There is no security against the occurrence of such a thing, and it is simply wise and prudent to be prepared at all times to make our escape. But it is not every belief that is intelligent and honest. Notwithstanding the fact that we are living in the latter half of the nineteenth century, ignorance and prejudice still exercise a powerful influence on men's minds and hearts. They did not die with the last century, but still linger on, and if not quite so formidable as they were, they are yet as far removed from reason and fight as obstinately as ever. Towards belief grounded in these unfortunate characteristics of human nature, reason can be tolerant, but never respectful. Men may believe, if they choose, in the transmigration of souls, and no one should object to their recognizing in their favorite horses and dogs the souls of their departed grandparents, but they must not complain if intelligent men do not manifest much respect for their insane notions. Men can believe just what they please, or at least they ought to be allowed to do so, but at the same time there is no law to enforce a respect for opinions against which reason rebels.

These remarks have been suggested by the violent and unreasonable hatred toward the negro that is constantly finding expression in the democratic journals, and more especially in by a communication which appeared in last week's issue of the Spirit. Not that the communication expresses any more violent or unreasonable hatred and abuse than has characterized more than one-half of the editorials of our neighbors within the past year, but because the writer boldly anticipates what we are forced to believe would be to the Spirit a desirable solution of the difficulty in which, according to its theory, the negro has involved us. In the article in question it is proposed to "turn upon the black-skinned and coffee colored objects of the negro-lovers commiseration and wipe them out." Just when or how this is to be done the writer does not specify, but assures us that it is a condition precedent to the return of peace and harmony. He places a low estimate on the negro's capacity and avows the belief that the GREAT CREATOR fixed a low limit for his intelligence beyond which it will forever be utterly impossible for it to expand.

Now we are decidedly of the opinion that the author of this brief but philosophic article has a perfect right to believe what he has written, and we will do all we can to protect him in the enjoyment of this inestimable privilege; but if we see in his views a heartless indifference to the welfare of the human race, a stupidity that would disgrace the degraded people of whom he writes, and a bigotry that could only take root in a weak intellect, we must be permitted to withhold our respect from his sentiments, and instead thereof, to bestow our pity upon the author, who, in our judgment is lamentably deficient in a certain article that is generally supposed to contribute somewhat to man's superiority over the brute creation. We speak of him because, by rushing into print, he has made it convenient for us to do so, and not that we attribute any special importance to him or his communication. We take him to be one of a large class of persons to all of whom our remarks will apply with equal force. Many of them are doubtless as ignorant and bigoted as he, though we confess that we have rarely met with such.

This envenomed hate which this class of men delight in exhibiting toward the negro, instead of evidencing their superiority over the objects of their malevolence, rather establishes the opposite. It is not the way superiors generally treat inferiors. If the negro were guilty of any crime or enormity it would be otherwise. If he were even responsible for his present low condition, contempt and scorn might then with some justice be visited upon him, but since he is not, and as his degradation is a misfortune which he could not avert, no matter whether arising from oppression or a law of his nature, it becomes his superiors to manifest pity rather than scorn, benevolence rather than hate. Genuine superiority will invariably manifest itself after this fashion. It is far from creditable to us as a people that this hostility is so widespread; for it rests entirely in ignorance and prejudice. It cannot be defended by a single argument that would commend itself to the respect or judgment of an impartial mind. The negro has not intruded himself upon us voluntarily, but was brought here against his will, by overpowering force and through cunning deceit. He was here when the Republic was founded, fought for its establishment and afterwards in its defence. Though deprived of his rights he has never plotted its overthrow, but has always been true to its flag. He has borne oppression without resistance, and has permitted us to make him a hewer of wood and drawer of water for our convenience and gain. True he is ignorant, lamentably so. But who will undertake to say that in this respect he enjoys a monopoly? If he has any right to such a monopoly, like all others he ever had, it has been disregarded and violated. But MODERN DEMOCRACY doesn't see things in this light and we can understand why. Public plunder once afforded sufficient cohesive power to preserve unity among those professing the faith, but of late years that article has become scarce with them, and where they once appealed to cupidity they are now compelled to appeal to ignorance and prejudice. Every man who has enough of the latter to hate the negro race, as a race, votes the democratic ticket and always will do so. The men who two years ago amused themselves by hanging innocent negros to lamp posts in the streets of New York all vote the regular ticket and so do all their friends. Policy makes it the business of democracy to encourage and intensify this ill feeling. It admitted into its creed that uncharitable and unchristian doctrine that denied the black man any rights the white man was bound to respect, and notwithstanding the fact that it once professed to believe that all government derives its just form from the consent of the governed, it became the special champion of human slavery. It defended its existence and struggled for its expansion. Its zeal in behalf of its strange ally made it overleap all bounds, and has made it responsible to-day for much of the intolerance that disgraces us as a people. It taught its followers to believe that the great DECLARATION of human right in asserting that all men were created equal, referred only to white men, and we doubt not that a vast majority of them to-day believe that the utterance of that voice from Heaven, commanding "Peace on earth, good will toward men," should be restricted in its reference by the same narrow rule. We would infer from the communication in the Spirit, and that journal's editorials, that such at least was their belief, whether it had ever been officially promulgated as an article of democratic faith or not. It is, indeed, humiliating to know that there is a great party in American politics built upon the theory that God did not "make out of one blood all the nations of the earth," and that the great principle of cohesion in that party is an uncharitable and unchristian hate that springs alone from the accident of color. Our common school system may be very good, but we have abundant evidence before us that it has not yet entirely fulfilled its mission. Reason has the vantage ground, but we still need more school houses.

This seems to have been the condition of the Democratic party for the last five years. On the breaking out of the rebellion the southern wing formally renounced all allegiance to the United States Government and took, as they thought, a final leave of us. The Northern wing equally hostile to the government, but laboring under the slight disadvantage of being a minority among a patriotic people, contented themselves with mentally absolving themselves from their allegiance and with embarrassing, as far as they were able, every measure of the government for the suppression of the rebellion and the preservation of the country. During the whole war the two wings were in the closest sympathy. A rebel victory was a signal for copperhead rejoicing and a rebel defeat was a source of sorrow deep and lasting. On the principle that "No good can come out of Nazareth" so no one single measure of the government was permitted to pass unassailed.

The President of the United States was denounced as a tyrant, and was ridiculed as an imbecile, a buffoon, an ignorant boor, and with a choice selection of all the terms that Billingsgate could supply. All the eminent men in the country, no matter what might have been their political antecedents, even though but lately High Priests of the Democratic faith, who dared to take their stand in favor of liberty and the perpetuity of the Union, were constantly and unsparingly vilified and abused.

The Democratic press of the North re-echoed every slander that came to us from abroad, every stupid tale that the ignorance and malice of foreign hate could devise was repeated here. If we might believe the Democratic papers we were a nation of liars and cowards. Our brave soldiers never gained a victory and the reports of our generals to that effect were false. On the other hand rebel victories were magnified, and the reports of rebel generals were taken against those of our own, as the measure of our losses. Grant was a butcher and a liar--Lee a gentleman and soldier. Butler was a beast--Forest an embodiment of chivalry. So the comparisons ran.

Resistance to the draft was persistently taught, and in heavy Democratic districts brought forth the expected fruit, treason and bloodshed. The financial policy and resources of the United States were depreciated and every effort made to make the nation bankrupt. And finally, in 1864, at Chicago, in a solemn conclave of the whole Democratic party, the war was declared to be a failure, and the government as far as that party was concerned delivered into the hands of its enemies, for such would have been the result of an abandonment of the war at that time. Happily the people by an immense majority, indignantly refused to endorse this declaration at the polls, and the war went on to a successful issue.

This triumph of the nation has however had no effect in abating the animosity of the Democratic party toward it. It is still as bitterly hostile and as active in the interests of treason as during the war. Nothing that the government does or attempts to do is right. When after a long and tedious trial the assassins of our late President are convicted and punished, the sworn evidence of the government witnesses is discredited, and the statements of rebels and rebel sympathizers received and paraded to the effect that the prisoners are innocent. When the treason of the southern wing of the Democratic party compels the government to retain an army of 50,000 to 80,000 men, one half of whom will probably be negroes, it is attempted to excite the prejudices of the people against the negroes by denouncing them as servile brutal mercenaries-- worse than Sepoys--although there is no instance on record of their murdering a garrison in cold blood as the Sepoys under Forest did at Fort Pillow--or of their putting to death by slow starvation 60,000 Union soldiers, as was done by the great Sepoy, Jeff. Davis, now occupying a cell in Fortress Monroe. The government is further gravely warned that "the national debt may become a wedge of disunion instead of a bond of Union, unless it be so wisely managed as to forbid the raising of sectional complaints." In other words, if the payment of the rebel debt is not assumed by the United States that the Democratic party will assist the rebel leaders when they again get into power, to repudiate our own debt. And to this end every effort is made by the Democratic party--every press denounces the exceptions in the President's amnesty proclamation, and especially the $20,000 property prohibition, by which rich and truculent rebels who originated the rebellion are disfranchised and kept beyond the power to do further injury. In short, in every possible way in which malevolence to the constituted authorities of the United States government can be shown, the occasion is seized by the Democratic party to do so.

The history of our times when fully recorded will present the singular spectacle of a great party living among us, yet not of us. Whose every act in a time of great public danger was against the government which protected them. Who appeared to have lost every sentiment of love and respect for their country and flag and every honorable feeling as American citizens. A party who had so completely abjured all patriotic feeling to the land which gave them birth. Who had departed so far from their original principles that their name was a libel on them--and who had finally arrived at that point that like Salathiel, the Wandering Jew, they might be said to be without a country and a name.

During the war, one of the most difficult things to learn, says the Philadelphia Ledger, was the precise extent of enlistments, and the number of the military force we had in the field. Secretary Stanton has just furnished a report which lets a little light into the popular darkness on this subject. There were enlisted for the army from November 1, 1863, to November 1, 1864, 402,698 white and colored troops. Colored volunteers enlisted in rebel States from January 1, 1864, to October 14 of the same year, 22, 143. In the same period the recruits for the regular army were 13,871. Veterans and re-enlisted before the expiration of their service, between November 1, 1863, and November 1, 1864, 136,507. Drafted and substitutes, 75,006. For the naval service and marine corps, from February to November, 1864, 24,683: making a total of 675,452. The report says:

"In estimating the number of troops called into the service, it has been the care of the Department to take into account the whole number of men mustered, without regard to the fact that the same persons may have been previously discharged after having been accepted and credited on preceding calls.

A large part (near two hundred thousand) of the men accepted in the years 1861 and 1862, were soon found to be unfit for service, and were discharged. This accounts, partially, for the large excess carried forward from the calls of 1862 and deducted from those of 1863."

The colored troops enlisted up to October 30, 1864 numbered 101,950. This branch of the service, up to that time, lost by battle, discharges, desertions, and diseases, 33,132 men. Up to November 7, 1864, Gen. Thomas had organized along the Mississippi river a force of 56,320 colored troops.

The operations of the draft are very remarkable. The report is dated November 25, 1864. From July 1, 1864, up to that time, 130,000 names were added to the enrolment list, and 285,398 names stricken off. This enrolment showed the national force, not called out up to November 1, 1864, to consist of 2,784,266 men. In the draft of 1863 the quota drafted for was 194,962, with fifty per cent added. The report says:

Of this number 39,417 failed to report, and 164,887 were exempted from physical and other causes, 52,237 paid commutation, 26,002 furnished substitutes, and 9,848 were held to service.
The total deficiency drafted for was .....50,367
The number reported and examined.....85,861
The number exempted for physical disability..31,446
The number exempted for other causes.....19,648
The number held to personal service.....3,418
The number furnished substitutes........8,903
The number who paid commutation....32,446

On September 19, 1864, another draft was had, and the result, known up to November 1, was as follows:
Number reported and examined..............72,432
Number exempted for physical disability..20,332
Number exempted for other causes.........19,797
Number held to personal service.............19,038
Number furnished substitutes...................13,343

These facts, adds the Ledger, clearly show that, as a means of recruiting the army, the draft was entirely inadequate. Those who were exempted, those who ran away from the draft, and those who paid commutation, swallowed up nearly the entire number drafted. The number held to personal service was but a small proportion of the whole amount. This proves that volunteering, however expensive it may be, is the most popular, surest, and speediest means of raising an army, and of making satisfied and willing soldiers. The average measurement of the chest, at inspection of the recruits was, 33.16 inches. The average height was 5 feet 6.44 inches. Vermont troops showed the greatest number of inches around the chest and the greatest height: but Pennsylvania troop recruits were close upon Vermont--for her men measured an average of 5 feet 7.08 inches, against Vermont's 5 feet 7.62. In the measurement around the chest the men of Pennsylvania were 1.55 inches less than Vermont. The Veteran Reserve Corps shows that nearly every fourth man has been transferred to it on account of disability from honorable wounds. The horses and mules in the army amount to 300,000. During the first eight months of the year 1864, the cavalry of the Army of the Potomac was supplied with two remounts--nearly 40,000 horses.

The expenditures for the Ordnance Department during the year were $38,502,822, and there remained in the arsenals on the 30th of June last 2,037 field cannon and siege guns, 1,304,947 small arms, and 1,831,853 pounds of artillery ammunition. There were in operation during the year 6,500 miles of military telegraph, of which 76 miles are submarine. One million eight hundred thousand telegraph messages were transmitted during the year, at an average cost, charging the whole yearly expense of construction, maintenance, and operation to them, of only thirty cents. There were purchased during the year about 9,500 army wagons, 1,100 ambulances, and harness for 175,000 animals. The special report of animals and means of transportation with the several armies during the year are imperfect, but it is estimated that there were about 300,000 horses and mules in the service of the army, of which the horses were about 170,000, and the mules about 130,000.

The number of men who have died in hospitals, in the vicinity of Washington, from August 1, 1861, to August 1, 1864, is stated at 12,708, of whom 4,910 were natives of the United States.

Over two hundred flags, captured from the rebels in various battles, received during the year, are deposited for safe keeping. Many others are supposed to have been disposed of by persons who captured or had them in possession, in ignorance of their being public property. One hundred and six enlisted men were presented with medals of honor for capturing rebel flags and other acts of bravery.

The statistics of the Surgeon General's Department show that there were in operation on the 30th of June, 1864, 190 hospitals, with a capacity of 120,521 beds. During the year the health of the entire army was better than is usual with troops engaged so constantly on active duty and in arduous campaigns. No destructive epidemics prevailed in any section, and the number of sick and wounded, although large, was comparatively small in the proportion it bore to the whole army. At the close of the year the number of sick and wounded, both with their commands and in general hospitals, was less than sixteen (16) per cent. of the strength of the army. Of this number 9.3 per cent. were sick, and 6.46 per cent. wounded. The deaths from disease during June, 1864, were 2.98 per thousand of mean strength; from wounds, 3.10 per thousand; total deaths, 6.08 per thousand, or six-tenths of one per cent. for the month. During the same month of the previous year the total was 7.3 per thousand of mean strength, or over seven-tenths of one per cent. There were furnished during the year to disabled soldiers 669 legs and 330 arms.