military service." Book records comprise, besides records of or relating to prisons (see below), a record of political prisoners detained throughout the North, 1862-64; an index of secret service payments by the War Department disbursing clerk, 1861-70; a record of secret service fund receipts and disbursements; ledgers apparently of the Trader's Bank, Nashville (3 vols.); and Judge Advocate Turner's letter book. The collection includes also prison registers, commitment and release records, prisoners' statements, and records of visitors (19 vols. in all), of or pertaining to Old Capitol, Carroll, Forrest Hall, and other prisons. Much of Turner's correspondence is printed in Official Records .. Armies, ser. 2, vols. 2-8, and ser. 3, vols. 2, 3, and 5, passim. OFFICE OF THE PROVOST MARSHAL On Sept. 12, 1862, Secretary of War Stanton appointed Lafayette C. Baker "special provost-marshal for the War Department . . to exercise the powers and do and perform the functions pertaining to that office during the pleasure of the President." Previously Baker had been employed in "detective" or "secret" services for the Commanding General of the Army, Winfield Scott, and for Secretary of State Seward. Baker, who in his memoirs styled himself "Chief, National Detective Police," considered that his "bureau" had a continuous life despite the transfer of his activities from one department of Government to another. Work for the War Department involved him in cases of disloyalty, treason, vandalism, and conspiracy and in espionage on behalf of the Government. He was prominent in the apprehension of John Wilkes Booth and the other "conspirators" in the Lincoln assassination, and he had a hand in the imprisonment of Jefferson Davis and the trial of Henry Wirz. For the Treasury Department he investigated its First Division (Engraving and Printing Bureau). On June 29, 1863, Baker was appointed Colonel of the First Regiment, District of Columbia Cavalry. According to his own account the "importance of the bureau, and its rapidly accumulating business, rendered a military force, exclusively under my control, a necessity." Baker was "relieved from duty as Provost Marshal of the War Department" on Nov. 7, 1863, but he continued his activities as a special agent. After the draft call of Dec. 19, 1864, he investigated, at the request of Provost Marshal General Fry, frauds in the recruiting service, not only in the draft and volunteer recruitment for the Army, but also in the recruiting service of the Regular Army and in Navy recruitment. Baker's office should not be confused with the Provost Marshal General's Bureau, created in 1863. His official connection with the War Department ended when he was honorably mustered out on Jan. 15, 1866. He died 2 years later. He was and remains a controversial figure. Record Group 94. --After the Civil War the Bureau of Military Justice was given "the duty of systematically arranging and indexing, for purposes of ready reference, the important state papers belonging to the offices of the late Colonel L. C. Turner, judge advocate, and Brigadier General L. C. Baker, provost marshal." From this assignment resulted the collection now known as the Turner-Baker papers, which is described under the Office of the Judge Advocate, above. Much of Baker's correspondence is printed in his History of the United States Secret Service (Philadelphia, 1867), and in Official Records Armies, ser. 1, vols. 19, 21, 25, 29, 41, and 4648; ser. 2, vols. 1, 2, 4, 6, and 8; and ser. 3, vols. 2-5, passim. CAVALRY BUREAU AGO General Order 236, July 28, 1863, announced the establishment in the War Department of the Cavalry Bureau, to have charge of the organization and equipment of the Army's cavalry forces and to provide for their mounts and remounts. Reports of inspection, assigned to promote the efficiency of the cavalry service, were to be forwarded from the field to the head of the Cavalry Bureau at the end of each month and were to cover the following points: "what service the troops inspected have done since last inspected; how many miles their horses have traveled within the month; what character of service has been required of them, and under what circumstances it has been rendered; what appears to have been the care taken of them, as regards treatment, shoeing, &c., &c.; what has been the quantity and character of the rations of forage issued to them; if there have been any deficiency of forage, and who is responsible therefor, &c., &c.; and . . . any other information. . . which it may be advisable should come to the notice of the Bureau. Veterinary surgeons of cavalry were selected by the Chief of the Cavalry Bureau but appointed by the Secretary of War; the appointment records were kept in the Adjutant General's Office. Early in Aug. 1863 it was decided that the Quartermaster General should continue to furnish the army with horses "until the chief of cavalry should notify him that the Cavalry Bureau was able and ready to take this duty upon itself." It was decided also to construct a cavalry depot "capable of accommodating from ten to twelve thousand horses, sick and well, at Giesboro Point, on the Potomac near Washington. A similar depot at St. Louis and temporary accommodations for horses at either Louisville, Ky., or Columbus, Ohio, were planned. More than 16, 000 unserviceable horses were on hand near Washington in 1863; it was believed that most of these, with proper care and treatment, could again become fit for service. The cavalry depots would, it was hoped, minimize future losses of horses such as those sustained after the battle of Gettysburg. AGO General Order 119, Mar. 24, 1864, appointed a board to inspect the mounted troops and as a further measure a cavalry officer was especially assigned (AGO S. O. 133, Mar. 31, 1864) to proceed from point to point to "examine into the use of government horses, which are suitable for cavalry purposes, by persons not authorized by regulations and orders so to use them," reporting the results of each examination to the Bureau Chief. By AGO General Order 162, Apr. 14, 1864, the Cavalry Bureau was put under the command of the Chief of the Army Staff. Thereafter the organization, equipment, and inspection of cavalry were to be carried out by a specially assigned cavalry officer, and the purchase and inspection of horses and their subsistence and transportation by a specially assigned officer of the Quartermaster's Department. The Bureau was abolished by AGO General Order 83, Oct. 4, 1866. The successive chiefs of the Cavalry Bureau were Maj. Gen. George Stoneman, Brig. Gen. James H. Wilson, and Lt. Col. James A. Ekin. Wartime annual reports of the Chief of Cavalry, appended to those of the Secretary of War; Theo. F. Rodenbough and William L. Haskin, eds., The Army of the United States (New York, 1896). ... Record Group 92. --Some of the Cavalry Bureau's records were transferred to the Quartermaster General's Office and intermingled with the records of that Office. These records include fair copies of letters sent and abstracts of letters received, 1863-66 (2 vols.); compiled reports of "persons and articles employed and hired" at Washington in Oct. - Nov. 1863 and at Giesboro Point in 1864 (1 vol.); an invoice book kept at Giesboro Point, July 1864-Aug. 1866; and morning reports of Bureau employees. Other records, which may belong to the First Division of the Quartermaster General's Office, include a volume entitled "General Halleck Book No. 1," containing transcriptions of the Bureau's correspondence with Halleck as Chief of Staff, 1864; an "Officer's Book," of transcriptions of Bureau correspondence, 1864-67; a "Quartermaster's Book," of copies of Bureau correspondence with assistant quartermasters in the field, Apr. -June 1864; and a letter book of Col. James A. Ekin, containing copies of letters received concerning Cavalry Bureau property accounts, 1864–67. Record Group 98. --The Cavalry Bureau's records in this record group include a small amount of loose papers (letters received) and the following "book" records: copies of letters sent, 1863-66 (2 vols.); copies of endorsements and memoranda sent, 1863-66 (3 vols.); a "telegram book," 1864-65; several registers and indexes of letters received, 1863-66; and some letter books of the special inspectors of cavalry in the Departments of the Ohio and of Arkansas. There are also volumes of general and special orders, inspection records, strength and muster records, and workmen's accounts; and a register of applications for appointment of veterinary surgeons. PROVOST MARSHAL GENERAL'S BUREAU AGO General Order 140, Sept. 24, 1862, announced the newly created post of Provost Marshal General of the War Department; and a similar order of Oct. 1, 1862, announced the appointment of Simeon Draper of New York to the position and enjoined that he be "respected accordingly." With headquarters at Washington, the Provost Marshal General had immediate supervision, control, and management of a corps of special provost marshals. These arrangements were superseded by an act of Congress, Mar. 3, 1863 (12 Stat. 731), which created the Provost Marshal General's Bureau and provided for a provost marshal and a board on enrollment in each congressional district. Pursuant to the act, AGO General Order 67, Mar. 17, 1863, detailed Col. James B. Fry "Provost Marshal General of the United States"; and AGO General Order 111, May 1, 1863, put under his "special charge and direction" all enlistments of volunteers. The more important duties of the Bureau were the arrest of deserters, the enrollment of men for the draft, and the enlistment of volunteers. Through the Bureau the Federal Government took direct control of much business previously handled by the States. The provost marshals of the several congressional districts, aided by a commissioner and a surgeon in each, became in effect recruiting officers; and they were made responsible to acting provost marshals general appointed in the several loyal States. "This system," Provost Marshal General Fry stated in his final report, "... met the wants of the service; recruits were rapidly obtained by voluntary enlistment or draft, and such strict regard was paid to their physical fitness, before accepting them, as to greatly reduce the enormous loss on account of discharges for physical disability, which had prevailed during the first two years of the war." Under the direction of the Bureau all men liable to conscription were enrolled; a more economical method of recruiting was devised and put in operation; desertion was deterred; and the quotas of men furnished by various parts of the country were equalized. The Bureau compiled detailed records on the physical condition of more than a million of the men examined during its existence and compiled statistics (from the official muster rolls and monthly returns) of all casualties in the entire military forces of the Nation during the war. The Provost Marshal General believed that the "extension of the Bureau over the country brought together the Government and the people by closer ties, nurtured that mutual confidence and reliance through which the civil war was conducted to a successful termination, and developed a consciousness of national strength." Recruiting for the Regular Army remained a function of the Adjutant General during the war. A Joint Resolution of Congress of Feb. 24, 1864 (13 Stat. 402), directed the Provost Marshal General to enlist men desiring to enter the naval service of the United States, but an act of June 3, 1864 (13 Stat. 119), repealed this resolution. Thereafter the Bureau was required merely to credit on the quotas assigned for draft the enlistments reported by the Navy Department. Because recruitment for the Army and the Navy was conducted according to entirely different rules and the War and Navy Departments had divided responsibility for credits allowed on the draft for naval enlistments, some fraud and abuse in filling quotas occurred, especially during the last year of the war. The Bureau was at first composed of seven branches responsible for (1) general and miscellaneous business; (2) enrollment and draft; (3) deserters--their arrest, return, descriptive lists, etc.; (4) medical affairs and statistics; (5) the Invalid (later Veteran Reserve) Corps; (6) disbursements and accounts under the enrollment act; and (7) disbursements and accounts under an appropriation for collecting, organizing, and drilling volunteers. These branches eventually became known by the names given in the separate entries below. The acting assistant provost marshals general in the States and the provost marshals' districts and boards of enrollment are also separately discussed below. At the end of the war, as quickly as "the exigencies of the service" allowed, the Provost Marshal General reduced his force. By Nov. 1865 the surgeons and commissioners of boards of enrollment in all the districts had been discharged, the districts had been consolidated, and only 33 provost marshals remained in service. In accordance with an act of July 28, 1866 (14 Stat. 387), AGO General Order 66, Aug. 20, 1866 (effective Aug. 28), discontinued the "Bureau and Office of the Provost Marshal General of the United States" and transferred to the Adjutant General's Office "all business relating in any way to the Provost Marshal General's Bureau, or the raising of troops, with all the accounts and claims connected therewith, or whatever character or date, or whensoever incurred." This business the Adistant General divided between newly established Enrollment and Dis bursing Branches, the work and records of which are described in this Guide under the Office of the Adjutant General. The Bureau's Medical Branch, however, was transferred to the Office of the Surgeon General to assure compliance with the act of July 28, 1866, with regard to publishing the Bureau's medical statistics. Col. (later Brig. Gen.) James B. Fry was Provost Marshal General from Mar. 17, 1863, until the office was discontinued in 1866. The "Final Report Made to the Secretary of War, by the Provost Marshal General . . ." Mar. 17, 1866, is printed as a part of H. Ex. Doc. 1, 39 Cong., 1 sess., Serials 1251 and 1252; it covers the entire history of the Bureau. Record Group 110.--"The records will be voluminous, " Provost Marshal General Fry anticipated on Apr. 2, 1863, "and I don't think there is room enough at my disposal in the War Department." The extant records in this record group approximate 1, 600 feet. Since the functions of the Provost Marshal General stemmed from those that before and during the first year of the war were responsibilities of the Adjutant General, many records series begin in the Adjutant General's Office, continue for the period 1863-66 in the Provost Marshal General's Bureau, and are again continued in the Adjutant General's Office. The records of the Bureau that can be identified as belonging to its several branches are described under those branches, below. Fair copies of letters sent are in a main series of several volumes for each year, well indexed; and the principal file of letters received, 1863-66 (ca. 30 ft.), on matters of concern to the Bureau as a whole (as distinguished from letters filed in the several branches) is alphabetically arranged by name of correspondent and thereunder chronologically. The letters received are abstracted in many registers arranged by year and thereunder alphabetically by name of correspondent; there are several volumes for each year. Other records apparently not belonging to branches include "roughs" of letters sent, applications for membership on boards of enrollment, papers pertaining to fraud cases, and historical reports submitted by provost marshals. Associated with these records are correspondence and accounts concerning "scouts, guides, spies, and detectives." Enrollment Branch Organized about June 1, 1863, the Enrollment Branch superintended the operations of local boards of enrollment. The Adjutant General's Office had kept accounts, with States only, on volunteers called for and recruited, but the Enrollment Branch opened accounts with each enrollment district of the loyal States. On July 1, 1864, the system of accounts was changed by requiring mustering officers to report enlistments and musters, monthly and quarterly, to the acting assistant provost marshal general of the State to which recruits were to be credited. The Branch also received and kept the enrollment sheets of the loyal States, consisting of the original enrollment (May-June 1863) with corrections and revisions (1863-65). A board to examine and correct the quotas of the States and districts under the call for volunteers of Dec. 19, 1864, was appointed by the President on Feb. 6, 1865, to consist of Attorney General James Speed, Brig. Gen. Richard Delafield, and Col. C. W. Foster. Its report was published in AGO General Order 22, Feb. 17, 1865, and its "calculations of the quota of each and |