The records of numerous agencies examined by the Survey of Federal Archives in the late 1930's are described in its published inventories of the field records of the Department of the Interior. Many agency records that agents took with them on leaving office have found their way into historical societies and libraries. Consequently the guides to depositories in the area in which a researcher is interested should be examined. See also Hamer, ed., Guide to Archives and Manuscripts; and Grant Fore- OFFICE OF THE COMMISSIONER OF PUBLIC BUILDINGS From 1816 the administering of Federal public buildings and grounds in the capital city had been in the charge of a Commissioner of Public Buildings, whose post had been authorized by an act of Apr. 29, 1816 (3 Stat. 324). The Commissioner had operated under the "supervisory and appellate powers" of the President until, by sec. 9 of the act of Mar. 3, 1849, establishing the Interior Department, he had been put under the supervision of the Secretary of the Interior. In matters regarding the Capitol and its police, however, the Commissioner had continued to be directed by the presiding officers of the two Houses of Congress. By an act of Aug. 4, 1854 (10 Stat. 573), he was required to submit annual reports and estimates to the Secretary of the Interior, under whose direction appropriations for repairs and improvements of public buildings, grounds, and streets were allocated. At the beginning of the Civil War the Commissioner of Public Buildings had varied responsibilities. He had charge of the repair and maintenance of the Capitol and the White House and their grounds, superintendence of the Capitol Police, the repair of certain streets and roads, the enclosing and improving of public squares and reservations and the placing of statues in them, construction of the Patent Office Building, and the repair and operation of the "Long Bridge" over the Potomac and the bridge over the Anacostia. These duties required the Commissioner to make frequent inspection trips about the city. Arrangements for the medical treatment of transient paupers, for which an annual appropriation was made by Congress, were also under the care of the Commissioner. When the Washington Infirmary was destroyed by fire in 1861, these patients were cared for in Douglas Hospital, and after the end of Feb. 1864 in the new Providence Hospital. The Capitol during the war housed not only Congress, but also the Supreme Court, the Library of Congress, the Commissioner of Public Buildings, the Architect of the Capitol, and the U. S. Court of Claims. For a while also the Army quartered soldiers in the Capitol, operated a bakery in the basement, and--in the emergency following the second battle of Manassas--had a hospital in the building. Because of military considerations, the Army took over control of the "Long Bridge" in 1861 and was given formal jurisdiction over it in 1863. Besides the staff of his own Office, which included a clerk, a messenger, and a laborer, the Commissioner supervised a number of other employees. These included the Capitol Police and their captain; watchmen, gatekeepers, and gardners at the Capitol and the White House; laborers and watchmen at the public grounds and reservations and the public stables; furnace keepers at the Capitol; "draw keepers" on the bridges; and lamplighters. Commissioner French in Sept. 1861 appointed a general superintendent to oversee work in progress. The post of inspector of meters is listed for the first time in the Official Register for 1865. The Office of Commissioner of Public Buildings was abolished by an act of Mar. 2, 1867 (14 Stat. 466), and its functions were transferred to the Office of the Chief of Engineers (War Department), in which an Office of Public Buildings and Grounds was formed. Successive Commissioners during the war period: John B. Blake, June 5, 1855. Record Group 42. --During the Civil War the Commissioner of Public Buildings carried on correspondence with many people. His letter books contain copies of communications to the Secretary of the Interior transmitting accounts, reports, and estimates; replying to instructions; giving information on employees and the condition of the city lot account; and making recommendations for repairs and improvements to the White House, the public grounds, and streets. The Commissioner corresponded direct with Congress concerning Capitol repairs and improvements and the management of the Capitol Police. To the police captain he sent instructions for the administration of his men. He wrote to other Government officials and (infrequently) to the President and to Mrs. Lincoln concerning the upkeep of the White House. Appointments to positions under the Commissioner's control, dismissals, acceptances of resignations, and other communications are also recorded in the letter books, as are copies of letters to business firms about materials or furnishings for the White House, to contractors about work on the White House, and to the Washington and Georgetown Railroad Co. and the Washington Gas-Light Co. about their facilities. The Commissioner often had to communicate with the mayor of Washington, the chief of the Metropolitan Police, and other local officials; and to write to private citizens about the sale of public lots or to warn against illegal occupancy of public grounds. An alphabetical index facilitates finding letters to particular persons. Letters received, which are filed numerically and indexed in registers, are largely from the same correspondents and on the same subjects. The correspondence is one of the principal sources for the history of the capital during the war. Besides the subjects already mentioned, it contains papers concerning President Lincoln's funeral, the arrangements for which were made by the Commissioner. Two other files supply more information on people seeking jobs in the Federal District during the war. A box of applications and recommendations for employment contains letters and recommendations from Congressmen, the Secretary of the Interior, and citizens of Washington, Georgetown, the State of Virginia, and other States; and individual applications for employment in positions under the Commissioner's jurisdiction. Filed numerically, these letters give biographical data and information on the party affiliation of the applicants. A few resignations are also in this file. Easier to consult is an alphabetical file of oaths of allegiance taken by persons who were actually employed. Some financial records give not only information about expenditures but also the names of employees under the Commissioner and those of business firms with which he dealt. The ledger lists periodically the names of employees to whom salary payments were made. In the ledger are also recorded expenditures made for other purposes, including services of various kinds; repairs and improvements of the Capitol, the White House, and the bridges; construction of the Patent Office Building; purchases of tools, supplies, furnishings, fuel, and books; and payments to hospitals for the care of paupers. Though largely duplicatory, other information about the capital city during the war can sometimes be gleaned from requisitions for funds, receipted accounts for services and supplies, canceled checks, check stubs, certificates of deposit, a statement of expenditures on the "Long Bridge" for 1836-68, invoices for furnishings and books bought for the White House, and bills and other documents concerning President Lincoln's funeral. Records concerning the Commissioner of Public Buildings are in the records of the Senate and the House of Representatives (Record Groups 46 and 233), both of which bodies had committees on public buildings and grounds and committees on the District of Columbia. Information on the Commissioner's expenditures is in General Accounting Office records (Record Group 217), and correspondence on his maintenance and construction operations is in the records of the Office of the Secretary of the Interior (see above). Records in Other Custody. -- The papers of Commissioner Benjamin B. French, in the Library of Congress, contain many letters written by French to his family during the war. Although these relate largely to personal affairs, they make many references to the conduct of the Office of the Commissioner and to wartime events in Washington. Some other pertinent records are among those of the Architect of the Capitol, still in his custody. PENSION OFFICE The appointment of a Commissioner of Pensions under the Secretary of War had been authorized by an act of Mar. 2, 1833 (4 Stat. 688). The Commissioner had become responsible in 1840 for administering Navy as well as Army pensions and had functioned under the joint direction of the Secretaries of War and the Navy until 1849, when their "supervisory and appellate powers" over the acts of the Commissioner had been transferred to the Secretary of the Interior. When the Civil War began, the Washington staff of the Pension Office included a chief clerk, 61 clerks, 3 messengers, 3 laborers, and a watchman; its field agents were 49 pension agents stationed throughout the States and Territories. The number of clerks was doubled within the next 2 years, and later during the war some temporary clerks and copyists were added. The clerks examined claims for different kinds of pensions, recorded or copied documents, and handled mail and filing. The pension agents, appointed by the Secretary of the Interior, served as area disbursing agents to pay pensions. Their compensation and allowances for expenses were regulated by acts of July 17, 1862, and June 30, 1864 (12 Stat. 629; 13 Stat. 325). Physicians were appointed throughout the country to examine applicants for pensions and to make biennial examinations of pensioners, and an act of July 4, 1864 (13 Stat. 387), permitted claimants to make declarations before notaries public, justices of the peace, or other duly authorized officers if the claimants lived more than 25 miles from courts of record. Federal pension agents in the Confederate States were suspended from office in 1861, but as parts of the South came under the control of the Federal Government an attempt was made to find the former agents in order to settle their accounts. (The payment of pensions to persons in the Confederate States who had fought against the United States or had encouraged the Southern cause was suspended in 1861, and by an act of Feb. 4, 1862--12 Stat. 337--the names of such persons were stricken from the pension rolls.) Pension agencies were reestablished in the South in 1865 to restore pensions to those who could prove their continuous loyalty and to receive applications from new claimants. At the beginning of the war pensions were granted to disabled soldiers under existing laws, but these laws did not provide for widows and orphans of deceased soldiers. Pensioners were required from 1861 onward to take an oath of allegiance in order to receive payments. An act of July 17, 1861 (12 Stat. 607), made special provision for a Navy pension fund to be established from the sale of prizes taken by the Navy. This fund amounted by 1866 to almost $12, 000, 000, and the interest on it was more than sufficient to pay pensions to officers, seamen, and marines. The first and most important Civil War pension act, however, was that of July 14, 1862 (12 Stat. 566). This act made eligible for pensions officers and enlisted men of the Army, Navy, and Marines disabled after Mar. 4, 1861, by wounds inflicted or disease contracted in service and in line of duty. It also provided pensions not only for widows or children of men entitled to pensions who had died after Mar. 4, 1861, but also for their dependent mothers or orphan sisters. The liberal terms of this enactment increased the number of pension claims and proofs of claims submitted, and threw more work on the Pension Office. Another Civil War act--that of July 4, 1864, mentioned above--still further liberalized the pension system. It authorized pensions for volunteers who had served with the armed forces and for men who had volunteered and served in engagements with "rebels" or Indians; it provided pensions for widows or other dependents of deceased volunteers; and it allowed pensions to widows of Negro soldiers without requiring other proof of marriage than that the parties had habitually lived together. Long after the war a series of service pension laws beginning with an act of June 27, 1890 (26 Stat. 182), made increasingly liberal provisions for survivors, their widows, and their dependents. An act of Aug. 5, 1892 (27 Stat. 348), provided for the pensioning of women who had been employed by the Surgeon General of the Army as nurses during the Civil War or whose employment as nurses had been "recognized by the War Department." During the years after the war and well into the twentieth century many private laws were also passed for the relief of individuals whose claims to pensions had been rejected under the general laws. Successive Commissioners of Pensions during the war period: George C. Whiting, Jan. 1857. William H. Glasson, Federal Military Pensions in the United States (New York, 1918); Gustavus A. Weber, The Bureau of Pensions; Its History, Activities, and Organization (Baltimore, 1923); Gustavus A. Weber and Laurence F. Schmeckebier, The Veterans' Administration; Its His- Record Group 15. --Now a part of the records of the Veterans Administration, the Pension Office records important to Civil War research comprise administrative records, pension case files, and financial records. Many of these records, of course, are of the postwar period but are directly related to the war. The types of records are discussed separately below. Administrative Records These are records accumulated by the Office of the Chief Clerk and the Pension Bureau Library. Records relating to pension appeals include registers of appeals and decisions of the Secretary of the Interior on appeals reported to the Secretary by the Commissioner of Pensions. Many such appeals and decisions concern Civil War cases. For Civil War hospitals there are indexes to records of the Adjutant General's Office pertaining to hospitals, a guide to hospitals, a list of general and post hospitals in Washington and Georgetown, D. C., and records relating to the use of the Delaney House in Washington as a field hospital. Some materials regarding National and State homes for soldiers and sailors are of interest, for they supply information about inmates who were veterans of the Civil War. Statistical items include lists and charts showing the numbers of men engaged in different wars and the numbers of pensioners. Other administrative records are a register of boards of examining surgeons, beginning in 1862; a table of U. S. bounties authorized during the Civil War, showing classes of enlistments, character of service, and limits of enlistments for bounties; a photograph of 24 employees of the Pension Office, including Commissioner Barrett; and a framed charcoal sketch of George C. Whiting. Various items relating to the war were presented to the successor Bureau of Pensions. These include a register of patients at a convalescent camp at Vicksburg, Miss., which was kept by Dr. Joseph Speck in 1863; extracts from the diary, 1861-64, of Capt. Joseph Waldo Denny, 25th Massachusetts Volunteers; and a scrapbook of clippings from the Peoria (Ill.) Evening Star of 1917 that printed a diary, 1861-64, kept by Philip Smith of the 8th Missouri Volunteer Infantry. A printed list of officers of the Union Army and Navy imprisoned in Libby Prison, at Richmond, 1863-64, is probably available elsewhere also. A volume of reports of the special committee on volunteering for New York County, 1864, contains a list of all volunteers |