The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-07-03
MORE FIGURES OF OUR CIVIL
WAR OF FORTY YEARS AGO
Relative Strength of the Northern and Southern
Armies 1.-Two Sons of Wimngton-->The
Evil of Divorce

The old lie lives as to the relative
strength of the Southern and Northern
armies during the four years of terri
BILE war, and on the part of the South
of desolation, destruction and exhaus-
ton. North Carolina alone, a small
State of less than 100000 people, ne
groes included, had to send 1875, 900
men to the war, losing by death over
41.000 soldiers. according to the
Northern Records of the Rebellion, .
lit ought to have said truthfuliy,
Records of the Second War of indie
pendence"-or over 10000, according
to the Handbook of the Confed-
eracy,' book of the Southern Con-
federate Veterans. But the North is
quite capable of deceiving. If the
truth is known to the world it will
come to pass that Europe will have a
much poorer opinion of the fighting
qualities of the North than it has held.
So the game that has xbeen playing
through the last thirty-five years or
more, is to exaggerate. the numbers
of the Confederacy and to lessen the
actual force of the great, dominant
North. 1t will not begin to do, they
think, to admit that the South had less
than a million of men, or that the
North had more than a million and a
half or so. But this is one of the in
stances when lying will not answer.
There are actual war statistics. and
the numbers are approximately known
whatever the denying or classifying of
Northern writers and literary journals
or magazines or newspapers. A dozen
lies will not make a furth or overturn
one genuine fact.
General Grant stated not long after
the war that the North had nearly or
quite 100000 men in it's armies.
What do the published Records of
the U. s. Government say about it?
That is the point and not what do
ignorant writers or lying publications
and so-called school histories tell.
Recently an instructive and we'll
based publication has been made by
Mr.. c. G.. Lee, of Washington, who is,
says the able Baltimore Sun, "a recog-
nized authority on civil war statistics. -
He sets forth figures that will startle
the dreams and liars "up North as
to the real fsEts and figures of the
respective armies, showing that the
South was tremendously outnumbered.
These figures will surprise no we'll
educated, intelligent Southron of fifty
years of age. The facts given are old
to them, I I'm sure. I'~have known
them, or the most Of them, approx
mately since 1870, or earlier. Mr.. Lee
gets his figpres from the War Re-
cords I h I've often referred to. The
Sun says:
"Mr. Lfe's figures show that the
total enlistments in the Northern army
were 2,77S,304, as against 100000 in
the Confederate army. The foreigners
and negroes in the Northern army
aggregated 6S0,917, or S0,917 more
than the total strength of the Confed-
crate. army. There were 316, 424 men
of Southern birth in the Northern
army. Mr.. Lees figures are as fol-
lows:
Northern Army.
Whites from the North. 49,. PIP, 1893
Whites from the South. $500. 316. 424
Negroes ................. 1S6,017
Indians ............... $3.50
-----------
Total =, IT'S, 304
Southern army ............ 600 600
-----
North'S numerical superb
ority 2,l1S,504
Mr.. Waddv Thompson-Gs he a
son of the once distinguished Southern
politician of that name. who was in
the U. S. Congress, was Minister to
Mexico. and wrote a book about that
country?) has Just published q volume
on ''The History of the United States"
IL is published i'm Boston. General II.
v. Boynton. a Federal officer who
fought the South, is the reviewer in
the New York Saturday Review Mr..
Thompson falls into one error that is
or Northern inspiration, that the
South had quite one million OF men
I'm the war. General Boynton. true
90 the North, accepts this with decided
Endorsement as TO it's correctness.
while himself perpetrating an mex
cusable blunder unworthy of a review
er. or "a soldier. He writes:
but I'm contrasting these conditions
with the resources and the prosperity
of the North, the volume repeats one
OF the myths of war time discussions
at the South. namely. that the
North secured through its abundant
wealth. many foreigners to serve as
soldiers This statement, Though it has
been given wide currency, cannot be
verified"
AS TO Mr.. Thompson's figures. Gen
eral Samuel Cooper. Northern man
by nativity, who was Adjutant Gener-
al of the Confederate States army
gave IL out that the total number OF
troops was not more than GOO 900, and
that there was no day i'm the four
wears when the Confederates could
and Valuable matter relating to the
have had i'm the field more than ZOO