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the total number of volumes, books and pages in the entire publi cation:

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Total number of pages..

138,579 1.006

Total number of maps and sketches in the Atlas.

The total cost of the publication has been as follows:

For salaries ....

Printing and binding

Miscellaneous.

Total..

$1, 265, 895. 68 1, 479, 447. 49 113, 171.50

2,858, 514. 67

the is in hand. They are reserved to contain such additional matter as it may be decided to pubVolumes LIV and LV (serial Nos. 112 and 113) have not been published, and no material for shin future, but they will not be issued unless sufficient matter to justify their publication shall be

secured

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The foregoing statement of cost, however, does not include the pay of the army officers detailed from time to time for duty in connection with the work.

It is believed that with this, the final, volume of the publication a brief review of the work will be appropriate and not without interest. The initiative of the project of collecting for publication the official records of the civil war appears to have been taken by Congress in a joint resolution approved May 19, 1864 (13 Stat. L., 406), which directed the Secretary of War to-

Furnish the Superintendent of Public Printing with copies of all such correspondence, by telegraph or otherwise, reports of commanding officers, and documents of every description in relation to the existing rebellion, to be found in the archives of his Department since the first day of December, eighteen hundred and sixty, to the present time, and during the continuance of said rebellion, which may be, in his opinion, proper to be published, [which] said correspondence, reports, and documents shall be arranged in their proper chronological order.

In accordance with this resolution the work of preparing the records of the war for convenient use was begun by Col. E. D. Townsend, Assistant Adjutant-General. United States Army (then in charge of the Adjutant-General's Office and subsequently Adjutant-General), who reported October 31, 1864, that a large part of the official reports of the operations of the armies of the United States had been copied, and that the work was progressing.

Especial attention does not appear to have been given to the subject of the Confederate records until Maj. Gen. H. W. Halleck's visit to Richmond shortly after its capture, when, on May 11, 1865, he wrote Secretary Stanton of his efforts to secure and preserve the archives of the Confederacy, and reported that over ninety large boxes had been shipped to Washington. Shortly thereafter (July 21, 1865) a division was organized in the Adjutant-General's Office "for the collection, safe-keeping and publication of the rebel archives that have come into the possession of the Government," and Dr. Francis Lieber was placed in charge of the work. In his annual report of November following, the Secretary of War reported that eight volumes of the war records, with maps and indexes, had been sent to the printer, but it appears that none of this matter was actually printed, no funds therefor having been appropriated.

On July 27, 1866, the joint resolution of May 19, 1864, was repealed and another enacted that provided for the appointment by the Secretary of War of "a competent person to arrange and prepare for publication the official documents relating to the rebellion and the operations of the army of the United States, who shall prepare a plan for said publication and estimates of the cost thereof, to be submitted to Congress at its next session" (14 Stat. L., 369). Hon. Peter H. Watson, formerly Assistant Secretary of War, was appointed to

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any service under the appointment, which expired July 27, 1868, by

imitation.

The designation of the military records, Union and Confederate, as The Official Records of the War of the Rebellion" first appeared in the act approved June 23, 1874 (18 Stat. L., 222), which appropriated the sum of $15,000, to enable the Secretary of War to begin the publication of those records.

Under this act the preliminary work was resumed by General Townsend. To W. T. Barnard, the private secretary of the Secretary of War, was assigned the duty of examining the telegrams sent and received by the Secretary of War and General Halleck, and the examination of papers in the Adjutant-General's Office was conducted by Joseph W. Kirkley, A. P. Tasker, S. R. Davis and N. W. King, clerks in that office, outside of office hours, in addition to their regular duties, and for a long time without additional compensation. Progress under this arrangement was so discouragingly slow that Secretary Belknap asked and obtained, by the act of March 3, 1875 (18 Stat. L.,

, a further appropriation of $50,000, which became immediately available. This act provided extra compensation for employés who should perform extra services in connection with the war records.

A reorganization of personnel and methods was then attempted, but the work nevertheless retained a somewhat desultory and disjointed character, being still considered a species of piecework, to be performed in addition to other duties and without interference with them. The chief clerk of the War Department, H. T. Crosby, was designated to compile the records and have general superintendence of the whole work. To W. T. Barnard, who had previously been charged with the preparation of telegraphic correspondence of the Department, was assigned the selection of material from the Confederate records and Union telegrams and the superintendence of copying and printing. A number of experienced clerks in the War Department was designated to select matter from the files, and to collate and arrange it for the Public Printer. The small printing force previously employed was slightly increased, and an additional number of copyists was appointed. The energies of this force were especially directed to bringing forward the preparation of the Confederate records, so that they might be ready for publication simultaneously with the Union records. A further appropriation of $40,000 was made by the act of July 31, 1876 (19 Stat. L., 119). On the 25th of the same month Mr. Barnard was directed, in addition to his other duties," to assume charge of the compilation of the records of the War of the Rebellion, and was placed in direct control of the force of printers, copyists and other employés connected with the work. Orders were also given for the detail from various bureaus of "such clerical force as may be absolutely required for the selection and arrangement for publication of the records of

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the clerks so employed." Mr. Barnard retained charge of the work less than a year, being relieved therefrom, at his own request, May 26, 1877, when Thomas J. Saunders, a clerk who was then engaged upon the work, was designated to "perform all the duties of superintendent," without additional compensation.

By the act of March 3, 1877 (19 Stat. L., 360), another appropriation of $20,000 was made. Up to December 1, 1877. $125,000 had been appropriated for the work, which had been carried on spasmodically, without system, under different "superintendents," and with divided responsibility, so that it is not surprising that the work was still in an inchoate and unsatisfactory condition. At that time forty-seven volumes (thirty-seven relating to Union and ten to Confederate operations) had been compiled and put in type, and thirty copies of each had been printed. No attempt had been made to collate the matter so that the records relating to particular actions and events should be assembled in consecutive order. This first compilation was not regarded by those most familiar with the records, or by prominent actors in the events, as satisfactory--the Union reports respecting any battle being in one volume, the Confederate reports in another, the Union correspondence, in letter form, in a third, that in telegraphic form in a fourth, the Confederate correspondence, in letter and telegraphic form, in two more; so that in order to find all matter pertaining to any event it was necessary to consult at least six separate volumes.

Perceiving that the work required the undivided attention of a single head, Secretary McCrary, December 14, 1877, detailed Capt. Robert N. Scott, Third United States Artillery (subsequently major and lieutenant-colonel, same regiment), to take charge of the work. The Publication Office, War Records," afterward known as the "War Records Office," received its first definite organization under his charge.

The statute of 1874, which directed that the publication be begun, also directed that the Secretary of War have prepared for the Public Printer copies of "all reports, letters, telegrams and general orders, not heretofore copied or printed." A literal interpretation of the language would have warranted the printing of a great quantity of matter of no historical interest. Secretary McCrary, therefore, approved a proposition submitted by Captain Scott January 26, 1878, to omit from the publication

(1) Applications for appointment, arms, contracts, discharge, special exchange, muster in, &c.

(2) Charges of disloyalty, &c., preferred by private individuals or anonymously against officers, agents, &c.

(3) Claims of all descriptions.

(4) Tenders of troops or personal service by individuals.

(5) Offers for contracts or of inventions.

(6) Ordinary routine business of the bureaus and departments.

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