Record Data
Source citation
Reprinted in Frank Moore, ed., The Rebellion Record: A Diary of American Events, with Documents, Narratives, Illustrative Incidents, Poetry, Etc. (New York: G.P.Putnam, 1861), III: 403-404.
Type
Executive record
Date Certainty
Exact
Transcriber
John Osborne
Transcription date
Transcription
The following text is presented here in complete form, as it originally appeared in print. Spelling and typographical errors have been preserved as in the original.
Executive Head-Quarters, Nashville, Tenn., Nov. 19, 1861.
To the Officers in command of the Militia, of the State of Tennessee in the Second, Third and Fourth Divisions:
The danger of invasion upon the part of the Federal forces is imminent. This invasion threatens the quiet and security of your homes, and involves the security of your sacred rights of person and property. The warning example of Maryland, Missouri and Kentucky bids you, if you would preserve your firesides, your homes, and the sanctity of your wives and daughters, to meet the despotic invader and his minions at the threshold of your State and drive him back. Let the soil of Tennessee be preserved from his unhallowed touch, and let him know that in defence of our liberties and our altars every Tennesseean is ready to yield up his life. General A. S. Johnston, commanding the forces of the Confederate States in this department, in view of this threatened danger, has called upon me to send to the field such force as can be armed by the State.
In obedience to which requisition, and to repel the invader, thirty thousand of the militia of this State are hereby called to the field.
Officers in command of the militia of the Second, Third and Fourth divisions, will hold their commands in readiness to receive marching orders by the 25th instant, unless in the mean time a sufficient number of volunteers shall have tendered their services to fill this requisition.
Special orders to the commanders of the military, apportioning this requisition among the different brigades of said divisions, will be immediately forwarded, accompanied with such instructions and directions as may be necessary for the movement of troops to the place of rendezvous.
In the mean time, captains will direct their companies to parade on some given day, with whatever arms they may have, and they will take all other proper and legal steps to possess the arms within the bounds of their respective districts, and immediately report to the commanding officer of their regiments the number of arms and accoutrements, as well as the strength of their companies.
Isham G. Harris.
