According to James M. McPherson’s discussion[1] of conscription in the North, “If a man’s name was drawn in this [draft] lottery, one of several things would happen to him next – the least likely of which was induction into the army.” Substitution and the $300 dollar commutation fee were allowed, and more than 20% fled to safer locales (Canada, the West, the woods). Three-fifths of those who appeared before the Enrollment Boards “were exempted for physical or mental disability or because they convinced the inducting officer that they were the sole means of support for a widow, an orphan sibling, a motherless child, or an indigent parent.”
The following paragraph from a Seneca County, New York newspaper in August 1863 gives some idea of this winnowing:
The drafted men of Waterloo reported at Auburn on Wednesday. Out of the 122 drawn not over 40 were accepted by the Board.
A page at the New York State Military Museum gives more details for Waterloo and the rest of the 24th Congressional District. Here is the main section that lists exemptions for Waterloo:
Henry Moran, Waterloo, constitutional syphilis.
Jno. Blake, ” injury of skull.
And Thorp, ” prolapsus ano.
John T Carl, ” inguinal hernia,
Edw Bates, ” over 35 and married.
Isaac Cary, ” ” ” “
J L Coon, ” loss of teeth.
S P Gabriel, ” support widowed mother, only brother in U S service.
Darwin E Slosson, ” disease of lungs.
E A Johnson, ” ” kidneys.
Hugh Fulton, ” loss of thumb.
Thos Godfrey, ” inguinal hernia.
Peter Fenn, ” splay feet.
Jas C Gray, ” varicose veins.
Fred C Brehm, ” ing. hernia.
H Manwaring, ” dislocation elbow.
Matthew Moran, ” varicose veins.
Hugh Burns, ” over 35 and married.
Dan’l Hogan, ” ” “
Patrick Welch, ” ” “
A J Prosser, ” ” “
Dan’l Pound, ” loss of sight.
Wm Redman, ” retraction first phalanx toe.
Wm Horsley, ” disease of lungs.
Jackson Lynch, ” feebleness and disease lungs.
Sprinkled throughout the rest of the page are mentions of Waterloo men left off for club feet, under 20 years of age, pulmonary disease, loss of teeth, and alienage. Back in May President Lincoln ordered that aliens would not be exempted if they had declared an intention to become U.S. citizens, so apparently some men from Waterloo convinced the authorities that had no designs on citizenship.
People lose their teeth even today, but it is true that some men tried to avoid the draft by losing their teeth because infantrymen needed teeth to “bite off the cartridge paper to load muskets”. Springfield’s MassLive reports advertisements for painless tooth extraction by the use of laughing gas. There was a good market for this service until surgeonds caught on and accepted men into the cavalry, which “used pistols and carbines which did not require the use of teeth.”
the 33%
- [1]McPherson, James M. The Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era. New York: Ballantine Books, 1989. Print. page 601.↩
