On August 1, 1863 after weeks of personal distress over Southern misfortunes at Vicksburg and Gettysburg, President of the Confederacy Jefferson Davis—humbled by Southern defeat--called on the citizenry of the South to exert a greater effort toward victory, noting “no alternative is left you but victory, or subjugation, slavery and utter ruin of yourselves, your families and your country.”
Davis further declared that all soldiers absent without leave or those who had not reported for service would be granted pardons and amnesty, if they reported for duty within twenty days.
Clearly, Davis now understood the disparity between the size of the North’s and South’s population and believed that every citizen of the South had to do his/her duty, if the South was to prevail in the American Civil War.