HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE EAST,
New York City, August 18, 1863.

His Excellency HORATIO SEYMOUR,

Governor of the State of New York:

SIR: I dir not receive until last evening your letter of the 15th instant.* Immediately on my arrival in this city on the 18th ultimo I called upon you with General Canby, and in a subsequent interview with you at my headquarters I expressed the wish that the draft in this State should be executed without the employment of the troops in the service of the United States. In a letter addressed to you on the 30th ultimo I renewed more formally the expression of this wish, and stated that if the military power of the State could be relied on to enforce the draft in case of forcible resistance to it, I need not call on the Secretary of War for troops for the purpose. In the same spirit, when some of the provost-marshals in the interior applied to me for aid against threatened violence, I referred them to you in order that they might be protected by your authority. It was my earnest wish that the Federal arm should neither be seen nor felt in the execution of the law for enrolling and calling out the national forces, but that it might be carried out under aegis of the State which has so often been interposed between the General Government and its enemies. Not having received an answer from you, I applied to the secretary of War on the 14th instant for a force adequate to the object. The call was promptly responded to and I shall be ready to meet all opposition to the draft. I trust, however, that your determination, of which your letter advises me, to "call into requisition the military power, if need be, to put down violations of good order, riotous proceedings, and disturbances of the public peace, as infractions of the laws of this State," will render it unnecessary to use the troops under my command for the purpose, and that their only service here may be to protect the public property and the officers of the United States in the discharge of their duties, and to give those who intend to uphold the Government, as well as those who are seeking to subvert it, the assurance that is authority will always be firmly and effectually maintained.

I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

JOHN A. DIX,

Major-General.

ADJUTANT-GENERAL'S OFFICE,

Albany, August 18, 1863.

I certify that the quotas under call for volunteers in this State of July 1, 1862, and August 4, 1862, mentioned in my certificate in regard to Erie County under date of August 14, 1863, were respectively ordered and assigned by Major-General Morgan, then Governor of the State, on report of Adjutant-General Hillhouse, and that the quota assigned to Erie County was sufficient to make up, with the other districts and towns, the whole quota of the State; that prior to said July 1, 1862, no quota to Erie county or other districts in this State was assigned; that under the two calls for troops by the President, of April 15, 1861, for 75,000, and July 22, 1861, for 500,000 troops, the quota of this State was 113,280 men; that the number of troops required by said calls were furnished by the State; that of such

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*Not found.

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