Editing Union army (section)

===Adjutant General's Department===
{{main|United States Army Adjutant General's Corps}}
[[File:Gen. Lewellyn F. Haskell - NARA - 528379 Restored.jpg|thumb|right|[[Llewellyn F. Haskell]] (1842–1929), [[United States Army]] officer and a Union [[General officer|general]] during the [[American Civil War]]]]

The responsibilities and functions of the Adjutant General's Department (AGD) were many and varied during the course of the Civil War, but principle among them was handling military correspondence between the President, Secretary of War and General-in-Chief, and the rest of the army. Other functions included administering recruitment, overseeing the appointment of [[chaplain]]s, maintaining personnel records, and issuing instruction books and other [[Form (document)|forms]]. During the war, some of the department's responsibilities and functions were spun off to new offices while new ones were added. The recruitment of new white volunteers and draftees, and the suppression and punishment of [[absenteeism]] and [[desertion]], was given to the newly formed Provost Marshal General's Bureau in May 1863, while the position of [[Commissioner for the Exchange of Prisoners]] was created to take over this function from the AGD. The [[Bureau of Colored Troops]] was created within the AGD specifically to oversee the creation of the [[United States Colored Troops]], and in the final year of the war the AGD was given the responsibility for collecting and editing documents which would constitute ''The War of the Rebellion: A Compilation of the Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies''.<ref name="Newell90">Newell & Shrader, p. 85-90</ref>

At the start of the Civil War, the AGD numbered just fourteen regular officers: the [[United States Army Adjutant General's Corps|Adjutant General]] (AG) with the rank of colonel, a lieutenant-colonel, four brevet majors, and eight brevet captains. In August 1861 the AG was raised to major-general and the strength of the AGD increased to twenty officers, and a year later it was reorganized to constitute the AG, two colonels, four lieutenant-colonels, and thirteen majors. The small number of civilian clerical staff supporting the officers was also increased as the war progressed, including the addition of up to ten noncommissioned officers by 1862. However to meet the need for assistant adjutant generals authorized for each corps, division and brigade, appointments were made from among the volunteer forces, and by 1865 there were an additional 85 majors and 256 captains serving in these capacities. At the regimental level, one of the unit's lieutenants would be selected to serve as its adjutant.<ref name="Newell90"/>

In spite of the rapid increase of the army at the start presenting numerous challenges and being perpetually understaffed throughout the war, the AGD appears to have handled its responsibilities competently and with little disruption. The AGD also had fewer conflicts with field commanders compared to some of the other departments, partly because its authority was well-established and issued few controversial orders itself, and it was less affected by matters of procurement and emerging technologies.<ref name="Newell90"/>

;Leadership
Colonel [[Lorenzo Thomas]] was named Adjutant General of the army on March 7, 1861, one day after Col. [[Samuel Cooper (general)|Samuel Cooper]] resigned the join the Confederacy.  While Thomas served as the AG throughout the entirety of the war, he eventually ran afoul of Secretary Stanton, who reassigned him to the job of recruiting soldiers for black regiments in the [[Western Theater of the American Civil War|western theater]].  From March 1863 on then, the assistant adjutant general Colonel [[Edward D. Townsend]] essentially was the acting AG in Washington.<ref name="Newell90"/>