Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 3.djvu/55

The same day Governor Letcher made public the following call for volunteers:

Executive Department, Richmond, April 20, 1861.

In obedience to a resolution of the convention, the injunction of secrecy having been removed, the following section of an ordinance passed by the convention is published for the information of the public:

"Be it ordained, That the governor of this commonwealth be and is hereby authorized and required to call into the service of the State as many volunteers as may be necessary to repel invasion and protect the citizens of the State in the present emergency, which volunteers we will receive in companies and organize into regiments, brigades and divisions, according to the force required; the governor shall appoint and commission the general, field and staff officers of said volunteers, and proceed to have them organized and instructed. And that he shall immediately invite all efficient and worthy Virginians and residents of Virginia in the army and navy of the United States to retire therefrom, and to enter the service of Virginia, assigning to them such rank as will not reverse the relative rank held by them in the United States service, and will at least be equivalent thereto."

By order of the Governor.

George W. Munford, Secretary of the Commonwealth.

Immediately after the passage of the ordinance of secession, most of the members of the convention and of the general assembly of Virginia from the Trans-Alleghany section left Richmond, and they presently called a meeting of the citizens of that region who were opposed to secession to assemble at Clarksburg. That meeting issued a call to the Trans-Alleghany counties to send delegates to a convention to meet at Wheeling on the 13th of May, which convened with so-called representatives from 26 of the 140 counties of Virginia, and issued a call for an election, on June 4th, of delegates to a convention "of the State of Virginia," to meet in Wheeling on June 11th. It also advised its supporters to vote at the coming May election against the ordinance of secession, and at the same time to elect members to the United States Congress from the three Trans-Alleghany districts of Virginia.

On April 21st the governor of Virginia, in pursuance of his call of the 20th, issued the following proclamation:

By virtue of authority vested in the executive by the convention, I, John Letcher, governor of the commonwealth of Virginia, do hereby order that each volunteer company, equipped and armed, whether infantry, artillery or riflemen, in the counties lying west of the city of Richmond, between Richmond and the Blue ridge, and in the valley of Virginia from the county of Rockbridge to the Tennessee line, establish forthwith on the lines of speedy communica-