In regard to the discontent among the soldiers, Colonel Swanson of the Fifty-ninth and Sixty-first Alabama[326] regiments (consolidated) stated that there was a general disposition on the part of the poorer classes, substitutes, and foreigners to accept terms and stop the war. They had nothing anyway, so there was nothing to fight for, they said. There was no general matured plan, and no leader, Colonel Swanson thought.[327] Major Cunningham of the Fifty-seventh Alabama Regiment[328] reported that there had been considerable manifestation of revolutionary spirit on account of the tax-in-kind law and the impressment system, and that there was much reckless talk, even among good men, of protecting their families from the injustice of the government, even if they had to lay down their arms and go home.[329] General Clanton said that the society had existed in Hilliard's Legion and Gracie's brigade, and that few men, he was sure, joined it for treasonable purposes.[330] Before the appointed time--Christmas Day--sixty or seventy members of the order mutinied and the whole design was exposed. Seventy members were arrested and sent to Mobile for trial by court-martial.[331] There is no record of the action of the court. The purged regiments were then ordered to the front and obeyed without a single desertion. Bolling Hall's battalion, which was sent to the Western army for having in it such a society, made a splendid record at Chickamauga and in other battles, and came out of the Chickamauga fight with eighty-two bullet-holes in its colors.[332] During the summer and fall of 1863 and in 1864 the Confederate officials in north Alabama often reported that they had found certain traces of secret organizations which were hostile to the Confederate government. The Provost-Marshal's Department in 1863 obtained information of the existence of a secret society between the lines in Alabama and Tennessee, the object of which was to encourage desertion. Confederate soldiers at home on furlough joined the organization and made known its object to the Confederate authorities. The members were pledged not to assist the Confederacy in any way, to encourage desertion of the north Alabama soldiers, and to work for a revolution in the state government. Stringent oaths were taken by the members, a code of signals, and passwords was used, and a well-organized society was formed. The bulk of the membership consisted of tories and deserters, with a few discontented Confederates. Their society gave information to the Federals in north Alabama and Tennessee and had agents far within the Confederate lines, organizing discontent. General Clanton early in 1864 endeavored to break up the organization in north Alabama and made a number of arrests, but failed to crush the order.