164 REPORTS OF EXAMINING SURGEONS. 



Tlie large sums of money thus offered proved to be a premium to desertion. Facts 

 show this indubitably to have been the case. The Provost-Marshal-General says : 

 " In general, those States which gave the highest local bounties were marked by the 

 largest proportion of deserters.'" This officer gave it as his conclusion that, in the 

 event of another war, the enrollment-law (with some slight changes which he recom- 

 mands) would produce all the men needed, without bounties, either local or general.- 

 The frauds practiced by those known as bounty-jumpers, or men who deserted in order 

 to re-enlist and thereby obtain a second bounty, are almost incredible in their extent. 

 One man, who served out a sentence of four years' imprisonment in the Albany Peni- 

 tentiiyy for desertion, confessed to have "jumped the bounty" tlnrUj-hvo times P 



An enrollment-law, if enacted at the outbreak of a war, would, for obvious reasons, 

 be much easier of enforcement tlian after a system of volunteering induced by bounties 

 had been established. In the late war, it was not until the supply of men became 

 manifestly inadequate, and the cause of the Government began in the minds of many 

 to appear of doubtful issue, that Congress determined to re-enforce the depleted armies 

 by compulsory drafting. It cannot be a matter of surprise that, under such circum- 

 stances, a measure, always in itself odious, should have inspired attempts at resistance. 

 That it- was, after all, so generally complied with is doubtless due to the law-abiding 

 disposition of the greater poiiion of the American people. 



An important and desirable provision in any future law for enrolling tlie national 

 forces would be one requiring a re-examination, within a specified time, of certain 

 classes of drafted men who might have been exempted as unfit for military service. 

 Men found to be undei- the required height, or to be deficient in development of chest or 

 body, if at an age of uncompleted growth, are likely, in a majority of instances, to be 

 able to discharge their debt to the state, if a year, or perhaps two years, were 

 allowed to elapse before their re-examination.'' The same rule would appl}' to men 

 debilitated from recent illness, or who were the subjects of disease of which a cure 

 might reasonably be anticipated within a year. • 



' Final rq>orl of the I'rovost-Manshal-General, p. 96. 



s 1 bid., p. 87. 



'/6id., p. 103. lu one remarkable instance, the device of a bounty-jurai)er recoiled upou himself with a fatal 

 result. The man's n.ime was John Freeborn. He had received a large bounty upou enlisting, and, while at Norfolk, 

 Va., planned a scheme for desertion. He directed his mistress, a Gi^rman woman named Linder, to procure a trunk 

 capable of containing him; in this receptacle, which, as her baggage, it was thought, would excite no suspicion, she 

 was to convey him to Chicago. A capacious trunk was accordingly procured. It measured about 2.") inches in depth, 

 10 inches in width, and 32 inches in length. Immediately beneatii one of the straps, a small orifice was drilled, into 

 which a pipe stem was iuserted. This was the only iirovisiou uiado for a supply of air. The soldier was proviiled with 

 a canteen of water, a piece of tobacco, and a towel in which to eject his tobaceu-juic . These preparations being made, 

 the trunk, under the woman's care, was carried to the Baltimore steamer. When opposite Fortress Monroe, a precon- 

 certed signal on her part was duly answered by the imprisoned man, showing that, so far, he was doing well. Upon 

 arriving at Baltimore, a hackney-carriage was summoued, and the woman soon had her extraordinary baggage depos- 

 ited in a room at the nearest hotel. Locking the door, she gave the well-known tap, to which, this time, there was no 

 response. Hastily unfastening the cover of the trunk, the result of their nefarious project was before her: the man 

 was dead — asphyxiated. The woman, overwhelmed with terror at the catastrophe, closed up the fatal trunk and had 

 it speedily conveyed to the railroad-depot. Upon arriving there, she desired the carman to get it checked for Chicago, 

 and, not daring to wait his return, she escaped Into the street, ami wandered, pur|)0seless, through the city during the 

 entire night. The next moruing, hearing that the contents of the trunk had been discovered, she surrendered herself to 

 the police. She was, of course, not charged with the man's death, which was clearly the result of his own act, but she 

 was tried by court-m;utial for aiding a soldier to desert. Ou the 6th of January, 1865, she was sentenced to pay u fine 

 rf five hundred dollars and to bo imprisoned for two years at hard labor. 



< See avtc, p. 21, and note to page 37. 



