to pay the bounties of those who joined the military, as an advance prior to the receipt of state funds.
    In July of 1862, the Derby town meeting voted to give a $100 bounty to men who signed up for service.
    In Seymour a special town meeting was held and the following measures were passed. One hundred dollars was to be given to each volunteer soldier; the sum of five thousand dollars was appropriated to cover this expense. The selectmen were to pay out the money to the volunteers. A tax of three mills was assessed to pay the costs of the measure; As the war progressed, Derby increased its bounty to $150 and eventually to $200 for service.
    In Seymour, the bounty reached $200 for each volunteer, also. By September 15,1864, the expense of filling the town quota was so high that they laid a special tax of 13 mills to cover the costs. The town was eventually obliged to pay $300 per person to get men to join the service.
    The federal government authorized drafting measures on March 3, 1863, but the local towns preferred to fill their quotas with volunteers, even if cash bonuses were required to get them. The national act provided that persons who did not want to be drafted could be exempted by payment of a $300 fee. This money was used to hire substitutes. The record of substitutes and draftees., especially in the last days of the war, was especially poor - with a very high percentage of desertions from these groups.
    A letter from Frederick Candee of Southbury to his sister, Mary Candee Tomlinson of Oxford, as given in the Litchfield-Hoyt History of Oxford, reflects this problem:
    "I must say that our Army has got too many Cowards or men that enlisted for money and are afraid to get into the field of battle. We have got twenty or thirty thousand of those nine months Troops and they are not so good as so many cornstalks.
    "They don't know anything and have not time to learn. You may think that I am hard on these nine months troops, but we have a chance to know what they are. We have got two Green Regiments in the brigade with us and we have to do all the Picket duty. They went out on Picket duty once or twice and they saw a Rebel behind every stump and tree and kept the whole Camp in an uproar . . ."