Benjamnin F. Butler, Butler's Book: Autobiography and Personal Reminiscences of Major-General Benjamin Butler

I returned to Massachusetts and saw Governor Andrew once more. He said that he had appointed Colonel Jones, who had led the Sixth Regiment through Baltimore, to raise a regiment to be denominated the Twenty-Sixth Massachusetts, and that Colonel Jones already had the regiment partly raised, and that he would assign that regiment to me, and I could encamp it where I chose. He further said that I could then go on with my recruiting, and that he would turn over a skeleton regiment for me to recruit.

A skeleton regiment meant one there was nobody in but the principal officers. I knew some of the men who proposed to be officers of that regiment, and in any view of the matter I should just as lief not have them. However, all I said was:--

“I will accept Colonel Jones' regiment, and we will go to work. I will confer further with you, with your leave, as to the second regiment. I suppose you will take my nomination of its officers.”

To this he made no reply, and we again parted amicably.

I procured the Agricultural Fair Grounds, within a couple of miles of my house at Lowell, as a place of encampment, and named it Camp Chase, and in a few days I got a large number of recruits. I was fully content with Colonel Jones, of whom I had a very high appreciation. He was well known as a leading Democrat, and still remains in that position as lieutenant-governor of the State of New York. Meanwhile, except for those recruits who came to me because of their respect for my position, and because of their confidence in me and my officers, recruiting had substantially ceased in the State. It was difficult to get many soldiers.

Massachusetts was very far behind in her quota, and she always remained so until she imported Germans in large numbers to fill up her ranks, and, in the latter part of the war, sent down to Virginia and paid money to have negroes whom I had enlisted in the service of the United States and duly mustered, credited to the quota of the several towns of Massachusetts. When this last performance came to my knowledge, some of the agents who were doing it went into the guard-house, and those who were not put there ran away home, and that fraud was stopped. And with all that under the performances of her administrative officers, Massachusetts had the disgrace