It is anticipated that the reproduction of the records of the war of 1812 will be completed not later than the 1st of February next, if no further unexpected difficulties or interruptions are encountered. With regard to the general subject of the reproduction of the records of the various wars by the index-record card system, it may be stated that the great mass of the records of the war of the rebellion, for whose preservation the work was originally undertaken, has been carded and placed beyond the danger of destruction, the records exclusively relating to the personnel of the Revolutionary armies have been transcribed, the reproduction of the records of the Mexican and most of the Indian wars has been completed, and the work on the records of the war of 1812 is well in hand, with the prospect of its completion at an early date. There remains, however, much to be done to make the card-index records complete. Of the rebellion records there is a large mass of miscellaneous papers, mostly pertaining to the office of the late ProvostMarshal-General of the Army, to be arranged, classified, and compared with other records, with a view to the reproduction of such data as are not already embraced in the card-record files. Of the Revolutionary war there are also many miscellaneous papers yet to be examined for the purpose of extracting therefrom and reproducing in the indexrecord card form such evidence of individual military service as they contain, thus adding as much as possible, from present available sources of information, to the now incomplete records of service in that war. There are also many records of Indian wars, discovered in the files of the Treasury Department and transferred to this Department since the work on that class of records was supposed to have been completed, which are yet to be carded. As regards the records of the Revolutionary war, the rolls of which are not complete in any one collection, it is hoped and confidently expected that the files of this Department will be largely augmented by the loan of such records as are now in the custody of the authorities of the several States and of historical societies, following the example of the officials of the States of New Hampshire and Vermont. There will then be one collection of records, and that where it should be, in the custody of the General Government, that will be as nearly complete as any such collection can be made after the long interval that has elapsed since the service was rendered. The original records loaned will of course be returned to their proper custodians after having been reproduced by the index-record card system. One important result of the work of carding the military records is the discovery and collection in one place, where they can be readily referred to, of records relating to all wars in which the country has been engaged, containing evidence of military service which would otherwise have been inaccessible and practically lost. This result alone is one of great value, especially in connection with the adjudication of claims under the recent laws giving a pensionable status to the survivors of certain Indian wars and their descendants, the Department, by the aid of the newly discovered records, being enabled to verify or refute allegations of service the truthfulness of which could not otherwise be officially determined. The full value of the work already accomplished and in contemplation can not be overestimated. The index record card work for the last fiscal year included the preparation of 1,381,203 military cards and 6,159 medical cards, which, added to the number previously reported, make a total of 38,248,326 of the former and 6,959,444 of the latter class, aggregating 45,207,770 index-record cards prepared up to June 30, 1896. TRANSCRIPTS OF MILITARY RECORDS. Attention was invited in the last annual report to the provision of the legislative, executive, and judicial appropriation bill approved March 2, 1895, requiring that "the Secretary of War shall, upon the application of the governor of any State, furnish to such governor a transcript of the military history of any regiment or company of his State, under such regulations as the Secretary of War may prescribe, at the expense of such State." Pursuant to this enactment, regulations in execution thereof were adopted by the Secretary of War in which it is prescribed that applications for transcripts of the records shall be made by the gov ernors of the States in interest and shall designate specifically the records of which transcripts are desired, and that upon the receipt of such an application from the governor of any State he shall be furnished with an estimate of the cost of making the transcripts, the funds to cover the cost to be deposited with the disbursing clerk of the War Department, to be by him covered into the Treasury upon the completion of the work. It is further provided in these regulations that all transcription of records under the law shall be done during office hours and by the regularly authorized employees of the War Department, under the direction of the Chief of the Record and Pension Office. Comparatively few applications have been made under the provisions of law referred to, and in but few cases have the required deposits been made after the estimated cost of the work has been made known. In the few instances in which deposits have been made and the work ordered, the regulations adopted for carrying the law into effect have proved to be well adapted to the purpose for which they were intended. The general effect of the law seems to be to deter the State authorities from pressing their claims upon the War Department for copies of the records of organizations from their respective States, the cost of the labor and material required in the execution of the work being evidently an obstacle in the way of its accomplishment. In one instance, in which the estimated cost was less than $150, a bill was introduced in Congress to defray the expense. This bill, however, did not become a law, although it was passed by the House of Representatives. Such special legislation would of course be in direct conflict with the spirit of the general law, and would be a discrimination in favor of one State as against all other States having similar interests, while if extended to all of the States it would be in effect a complete nullification of the existing law and would involve very great expense to the General Government, which is avoided by the law now in force. CLERICAL FORCE. By reason of the satisfactory progress of the work of transcribing the records of the volunteer armies by the index-record card system, a reduction of 300 was made in the clerical force of this office for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1895, and a further reduction of 50 for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1896. It is believed that a still further reduction of 25 clerks can be made for the next fiscal year without detriment to the public service, making a total reduction of 375 clerks, and representing a permanent saving of $425,000 annually in the appropriations for the clerical force of the office. Very respectfully, The SECRETARY OF WAR. F. C. AINSWORTH, Colonel, U. S. Army, Chief of Office. REPORT OF BOARD OF PUBLICATION OF WAR RECORDS. WAR DEPARTMENT, WAR RECORDS OFFICE, Washington, June 30, 1896. SIR: The Board of Publication of the Official Records of the Rebellion begs to submit the following report of its operations during the fiscal year ended June 30, 1896: Eleven thousand copies each of Vols. XLVI, Parts II and III; XLVII, Parts I, II, and III, and XLVIII, Part I, have been printed and distributed during the year. These volumes cover the final campaigns of the war in Virginia, the Carolinas, and the trans-Mississippi region. Vol. XLVIII, Part II, will be issued in a few weeks. The final part of the Atlas (No. 35) was issued during the year, which completed the work as planned; but it was found necessary to publish three additional plates for insertion in Part XXVII. These were accordingly printed and will be issued during the coming month. An index and table of contents to the Atlas has just been completed and will shortly be issued, which will greatly facilitate reference to the maps accompanying the various reports. Work upon the general index to the first series of the War Records has been continued throughout the year, and it is now up with current issues. This index can not be completed until the last volume of Series I is published. The examination of files and archives and the work of selecting, copying, and comparing material for the remaining volumes of the several series have been continued without interruption. The following notes of work accomplished within the year in the several departments of publication will convey some idea of the variety and amount of labor performed in connection with the preparation and publication of these records: 92,772 books have been received from the printer and 83,227 distributed; 30,968 copies of parts of the Atlas to accompany the Official Records of the Rebellion have been received and 20,189 distributed; 3,900 letters, cards, etc., have been received and 7,200 letters, cards, circulars, etc., have been mailed in response to inquiries; 103,000 labels for addresses have been printed and compared; 7 books have been indexed wholly or in part, and this involved the preparation of 87,000 reference cards; 49,000 folios of manuscript were prepared and verified and 8,250 pages of proofs in galleys and page form were verified, corrected, and prepared for publication. The work remaining to be done consists in completing Series I, of which there will be four more books; a supplement of probably four books, and a general index of book indexes, making a total in the series that is taken up with the active operations of war of 110 books in all. The Atlas, consisting of 178 plates, may be considered as a part of this series. |