"Boss" Tweed : the story of a grim generation / by Denis Tilden Lynch.

CHAPTER XX

THE draft began on Saturday morning, July 11, in the
Enrolment Office at the corner of Forty-sixth Street and Third
Avenue. This was the only office in the city ready on that
day. Crowds surrounded the building all day. There was a
squad of veterans present in charge of a corporal. These
were members of the Invalid Corps-all wounded men. Of
the eight hundred troops available for service in the city, five
hundred of them were members of this regiment of disabled
soldiers. A dozen policemen under command of a sergeant
were also on duty. But there were no disorders. When the
lottery wheel, from which the names were drawn, ceased turning at six o'clock, the curious departed in peace.
On Sunday there was much secret activity throughout the
city. Men met in halls, in the backrooms of saloons, in homesanywhere that chance dictated or fancy suggested. Most of
these were clerks and workingmen. There were others, welldressed, who mingled with them and talked to them. These
men did not stay long in any one group.
On Monday morning thousands of men did not report at
their offices, stores, shops and factories. They were elsewhere. Some were at points a mile north of the Enrolment
Office. Others took up positions a mile south of the place where
the draft went on so peaceably on Saturday. These men took
up their positions on Second and Third Avenues. Their orders
were to stop the horse cars running on these two thoroughfares
at nine o'clock and to direct the drivers to stop work when
they returned to the car barns. The instructions were carried
out effectively fully a half-hour before the appointed time.
The men giving these orders were armed with cudgels and iron
bars. Some of them had revolvers concealed. But they did
not have to resort to force.
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