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

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[96] counting seven stars on its new escutcheon, when it assisted Mr. Davis in this work. It entrusted him with the supreme management of military operations, with authority to muster into the service of the central government the volunteers of the several States. On the 6th of March, 1861, the number of these volunteers was fixed at one hundred thousand, and their term of enlistment for one year, and, at the same time, orders were issued directing the formation of a general staff for the provisional army, and the organization of a regular army.

The provisional army was to be reorganized as soon as the adopted Constitution should be put in force, and it was decided that all the State troops of which it was composed should then be re-enlisted in the service of the Confederacy for a period fixed by Congress. Contrary to what had hitherto been the practice in the United States, where the Federal compact vested the right of maintaining troops in time of peace exclusively in the central authority, there were seen, among the particular contingents of the several States, what were called regular troops, intended to be kept in service after the end of the war and the recognition of their independence. But in the mean time, the Confederate government took them into its service and pay, and provided them with staff officers and administrative departments, either by appointing new officers or by confirming the appointments already made by the governors of the States. In both cases these officers held their commissions from the President, and retained them during the entire war.

We shall not now enter into details as to the recruiting and organization of the Confederate army. In this matter the men of the South, true to American customs and traditions, took for their model the levies of other periods, especially those of the Mexican war, under the Union flag; and their organization was precisely the same as that of the armies of the North, of which we shall speak more at length hereafter. The habits, the modes of thought and of action were so similar throughout every section of the republic that, in spite of their desire to be considered a separate nation, the people of the South could not disclaim the traditions they held in common with their brethren of the North, to preserve a distinct character. When they sought to enact laws