Comte de Paris, History of the Civil War in America. Vol. 1.
Henry Coppee , LL.D., Ed.

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[273] men at the utmost—one colonel, a lieutenant-colonel, and a major. This number would have been excessive in a standing army, but at a time when it was necessary to organize everything it offered great advantages; for there were many chances that among these three officers one would be found capable of assuming the management of affairs in the regiment, whatever his rank; his superiority over his two colleagues very soon placed the direction of affairs in his hands. Most of these officers applied themselves with zeal to the novel task they had accepted. Very often, after a day of drill and manoeuvres, when the soldier was resting without care, the colonel would call all his officers together in his tent. There, by the light of an unsteady lamp, he would lecture them upon certain manoeuvres, at first in the capacity of teacher, then freely discuss with them sundry points in tactics; and when the latter had retired, he would still continue to study, with his lieutenant-colonel and major, the French regulations (infantry tactics), translated by Scott, in order to expound them on the following day.

One of the most important duties in the organization of the army, and the most difficult to have well performed, was the management of regimental accounts. In the absence of an administrative staff the keeping of these accounts devolved entirely upon the colonel and captains of companies. For those who had not been engaged in mercantile affairs it was a labyrinth from which they could not extricate themselves without close application; and one should have inspected some of the American regiments in person in order to form an idea of the worriments entailed upon thousands of officers by the necessity of keeping four official account-books in order—the descriptive-book, the morningreturn-book, the account-book, and the order-book.

In all the details we have given concerning the formation and organization of volunteer regiments we have said nothing of the measures taken to fill the gaps occasioned by sickness and the bullets of the enemy. The fact is that such measures had not been deemed necessary at the outset of a war which it was thought would only last ninety days. It was soon found that when a regiment had once set out to join the army, nobody any longer applied to the recruiting depots; the good places had been taken;