ARMY, UNITED STATES. 



35 



1 



nel $80, major $70, captain $60, 

 li.Mit, nant $50, pecond lieutenant $45 per 

 ! I,,- financial Mimnmry of tho pay de- 



.liibits 

 ie on hand at the beginning 



<l year $120,107,999 32 



i in. tn Treasury and other 



wiring the year 163,420,228 97 



Total $283,533,228 29 



nt (! for as follows: 



Ar- 

 mv and Military 



ay $10,431,00442 



Msbunementa to vol- 

 unteers 248,948,313 36 



1 requisitions 



in Treasury 10,750,000 00 



In hands of paymas- 

 ters, June 30 13,408,910 51 



$283,533,228 29 



The total disbursements of each class during 

 the fiscal year are as follows : 



To troops on muster out $205,272,324 00 



, service 30,250,010 00 



':iims 7,602,736 00 



nent of Treasury certificates. 16,189,247 00 



TIH 



i 



Total $259,374,317 00 



The estimaU'd appropriations of the pay de- 

 partment amount to $17,728,560 for pay of the 

 Army for the next fiscal year. 



'y in tho first session of the last Con- 

 hill was introduced to pay a hounty to 

 luntecrs of 1861 and 18C2 equal to tho 

 t bounty paid to the volunteers of 1863 

 d 1^ ( '> 1-, equalizing the bounty according to 

 e time of service ; to pay three-months men 

 a bounty of $100, deducting from said bounty 

 nny sum heretofore paid ; and to pay $33.33 to 

 the one-year men, to complete the payment of 

 the $100 promised them. As the sum required 

 for this equalization of bounties would, at a 

 moderate computation, considerably exceed 

 $200, 000, 000,* which, in the then embarrassed 

 financial condition of the country, could be ill- 

 spared from the national Treasury, the project 

 -! renuously opposed, and failed to become 

 a law in the shape in which it was originally 

 proposed. Its friends succeeded, however, in 

 engrafting it, in a very modified form, upon the 

 ivil Appropriation Bill, in which connection 

 t was passed by Congress on the last day of 

 "e session. The sections of tho bill relating 

 bounties enact that every soldier who en- 

 ited after the lOth'of April, 1801, for a period 

 ot less than three years, and who, after having 

 ! his time of enlistment, has been hqn or- 

 al >ly discharged, and who has received, or is 

 d to receive, from the United States, un- 

 der existing laws, a bounty of one hundred dol- 

 ii'l no more ; and every such soldier honor- 

 ably discharged on account of wounds, and tho 

 widow, minor children, or parents of such 

 who died in service, or from disease or 

 ounds contracted in the service in the line of 

 uty, shall ho paid an additional bounty of one 

 andred dollars. Tho soldiers v r ho enlisted 



for two years, and who are entitled to a Gov- 

 ernment bounty of fifty dollars, under exist- 

 ing laws, are to get, under the like conditions, 

 an additional bounty of fifty dollars. Al- 

 though doubts were entertained whether, in 

 consequence of defective wording of these 

 sections, the legislation respecting the equaliza- 

 tion of bounties was not inoperative, a board 

 of officers was appointed by tho War Depart- 

 ment to prepare rules and regulations for tho 

 payment of the authorized bounties. But up 

 to October 20, 1866, no payments of the extra 

 bounty had been made. The Paymaster-Gen- 

 eral says that the muster and pay rolls, " al- 

 ready much worn and defaced, would be re- 

 duced to illegible shreds before a tithe of the 

 cases arising under this law could be disposed 

 of, if taken up separately." It is therefore 

 proposed to classify the claims filed, by regi- 

 ments and battalions. This plan, though im- 

 posing delay at the outset, will prove hi the end 

 the quickest and Desk The payment, however, 

 will not begin till the six months' limitation 

 has passed. The disbursements will amount to 

 nearly $80,000,000, about a third of the sum 

 contemplated by the original bill, and will be 

 divided among upward of a million persons. 

 To the same board the subject of bounties to 

 colored soldiers was also referred, with a view 

 to provide additional checks against the de- 

 mands of fraudulent assignees, to secure the 

 bounty to the rightful claimants, and to protect 

 the Treasury against frauds. 



The grand^ aggregate of individuals on the 

 pension-rolls of the United States was, on June 

 30, 1866, 126,722, of whom 123,577 were army 

 invalids or their widows or other representa- 

 tives. Nearly ninety per cent, of this number, 

 comprising all classes of pensioners, have arisen 

 out of the late war. The remainder now on 

 the rolls, but rapidly dropping away, are from 

 the War of 1812, the Mexican War, and the 

 various Indian wars. But one Revolutionary 

 pensioner now remains. Samuel Downing, of 

 Edinburgh, Saratoga County, N. Y., who was 

 a native of, and enlisted from New Hampshire, 

 and is now over a hundred years old. There 

 are, however, still on the pension-rolls 931 wid- 

 ows of revolutionary soldiers, of whom only 

 two were married previous to the termination 

 of the War of Independence. The aggregate 

 of annual pension money due for the fiscal year 

 ending June 30, 1866, was $11,674,474.13. 

 The Commissioner of Pensions says: "In 

 view of the large number of applications which 

 continues to be received, on account of casual- 

 ties in the late war, it is manifest that the ag- 

 gregate annual amount of pensions will con- 

 tinue to swell for some years to come." He 

 also says that the $11,674,474.31 requisite to 

 pay the 126,722 now on the rolls will, for the 

 fiscal year, ending June 30, 1867, be increased 

 to a sum exceeding $33,000,000. This is owing 

 partly to the law of last session increasing the 

 rate of pension. The estimated amount requi- 

 site to pay pensions the next fiscal year is more 



