New York State Bureau of Military Statistics Telegrams Received and Sent by the Governor's Office

Organized into three subseries: 1. Copies of Telegrams Received; 2. Original Telegrams Received; 3. Telegrams Sent.

Chronological within subseries.

This series consists of ten volumes of original and duplicate telegrams received and sent by Governor Edwin D. Morgan's office between April 15, 1861 and September 20, 1862.

Subseries 1--Copies of Telegrams Received. The first six volumes contain transcriptions of telegrams received by the Governor's Office between April 15 and December 27, 1861.

Subseries 2--Original Telegrams Received. Volumes seven through nine contain original telegrams received from March 4, 1862 through September 20, 1862.

Subseries 3--Telegrams Sent. Volume ten is a letter press book containing telegrams sent by the Governor's Office between May 6, 1861 and August 16, 1861.

The majority of the telegrams pertain to military matters such as the initial raising and equipping of troops in response to President Lincoln's call for 75,000 volunteers after the attack on Fort Sumter; transportation of troops to the Washington, D.C. area; purchase of arms, uniforms, and accoutrements for New York soldiers; subsequent recruitment of men to satisfy quotas established by the federal government; appointment of officers; and the payment of recruiting bounties. The volumes contain telegrams received from and sent to President Lincoln, Lincoln's first Secretary of War Simon Cameron and his successor Edwin M. Stanton, and General Henry W. Halleck, who was essentially Lincoln's chief of staff.

Scanned images of selected correspondence with Abraham Lincoln are available at the New York State Archives.

A4111Series A4111, Administrative Correspondence Files, contains additional correspondence to and from the Governor's Office.

Volumes 7-10 contain alphabetical name indexes.

Volume list is available at the repository.

It is not exactly clear how the Adjutant-General's Office came into possession of records dealing solely with the Executive Chamber. One explanation may be that these volumes were acquired by the Bureau of Military Statistics. The bureau's first director, Lockwood L. Doty, also was Governor Morgan's private secretary prior to his appointment to the Bureau of Military Statistics. Furthermore, in his first annual report to Governor Seymour, Doty stated that "the public correspondence of the Governor by telegraph and mail, commencing in 1860, relating to preparations for public defense and military affairs... are being arranged in the order of their dates..." These ten volumes very well could be a part of what Doty referred to as "The Executive Record."

There are no restrictions regarding access to or use of the material.