are not entitled to them nor receive them, such as sly recruiting officers, C. S. Army, bushwhackers and guerrillas, men who have violated oath, &c. N. B.-I have written to the commanding officer of the Fifth Missouri Cavalry inquiring concerning R. Craig. F. A. DICK, Lieutenant-Colonel and Provost-Marshal-General. [Third indorsement.] HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE MISSOURI, Respectfully referred to Col. C. Bussey, commanding post, Helena, Ark., who will please ascertain concerning the private mentioned and reply by first flag of truce. By order of Major-General Curtis: H. Z. CURTIS, Assistant Adjutant-General. [Fourth indorsement.] HEADQUARTERS DISTRICT OF EASTERN ARKANSAS, I have sent a communication explaining this to General Holmes, commanding the Confederate forces at Little Rock. Respectfully returned to the Department of the Missouri. W. A. GORMAN, Brigadier-General, Commanding. OFFICE COMMISSARY-GENERAL OF PRISONERS, Col. W. W. Duffield, Washington, D. C., December 8, 1862. Ninth Michigan Volunteers, Detroit, Mich. COLONEL: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 29th ultimo in relation to Lieutenant-Colonel Parkhurst, of your regiment, and in reply thereto to inform you that this officer was exchanged on the 10th ultimo for Lieut. Col. Emory F. Best, Twentythird Georgia Regiment. Please communicate this fact to LieutenantColonel Parkhurst in order that he may join his regiment without delay. I am, colonel, very respectfully, your obedient servant, W. HOFFMAN, Colonel Third Infantry, Commissary-General of Prisoners. OFFICE COMMISSARY-GENERAL OF PRISONERS, Col. G. DE KORPONAY, Commanding Camp Banks, Alexandria, Va. COLONEL: Send all exchanged [troops] at your camp to join their regiments with as little delay as practicable. Prepare as full rolls as possible, each regiment by itself, and furnish cooked rations for the journey. The men who belong to regiments serving in the West will be sent under an officer to join a command belonging to the same regiments from Camp Parole at the Annapolis Junction on Thursday next, the 11th instant, by the 3 p. m. train. The officer will return from Baltimore unless he belongs to one of the regiments. The Quartermaster's Department will furnish the necessary transportation. By order of the General-in-Chief: Very respectfully, your obedient servant, W. HOFFMAN, Colonel Third Infantry, Commissary-General of Prisoners. OFFICE COMMISSARY-GENERAL OF PRISONERS, Lieut. Col. GEORGE SANGSTER, Commanding Camp Parole, Annapolis, Md. COLONEL: The exchanged troops at your camp belonging to regiments serving in and west of Virginia will leave to join their regiments by the evening train on Thursday next, the 11th instant. Send as full rolls with the detachment as possible, each regiment by itself, and furnish cooked rations for the journey. The exchanged men of these regiments at Camp Banks will be ordered to join this command at the Annapolis Junction and the commanding officer must be prepared to take charge of them. Direct him to distribute his command as follows, viz: At Wheeling, for General Wright's department, First, Second, Fourth, Tenth Infantry, Eighth Cavalry and Second Artillery Regiments [West] Virginia Volunteers; and for General Cox's command, Thirty-fourth, Thirty-seventh, Forty-second and Forty-seventh Ohio Infantry. At Camp Wallace, for General Wright's department, the Twenty-third, Thirtieth and Eighty-third Regiments Ohio Infantry. At Nashville, for General Rosecrans' army, Twenty-first and Twentyfourth Regiments Ohio Infantry and Third and Fourth Regiments Ohio Cavalry; Tenth, Sixteenth, Twenty-second, Twenty-fourth, Twenty-seventh and Fifty-first Illinois Infantry; First, Second, Third, Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Regiments Tennessee Infantry and Second Regiment Tennessee Cavalry; Thirty-seventh Regiment Indiana Infantry, Eleventh Kentucky Infantry and First and Fourth Regiments Kentucky Cavalry. At Benton Barracks, for General Grant's army, First Regiment Ohio Cavalry; Eleventh, Twelfth, Fifteenth, Twenty-eighth, Twenty-ninth, Thirtieth, Thirty-first and Fifty-eighth Illinois Infantry and Twelfth Illinois Cavalry; Seventh Regiment Tennessee Infantry; Third, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, Twelfth, Fourteenth, Fifteenth, Sixteenth Regiments Iowa Infantry and Second Iowa Cavalry, and Eighteenth Regiment Missouri Infantry. The Quartermaster's Department will furnish the necessary transportation. Notify the quartermaster at Baltimore in season so that there may be no delay there. Report immediately the regiments and the number of officers and enlisted men in each that will move under this order. The sick in hospital will not go. By order of the General-in-Chief: W. HOFFMAN, Colonel Third Infantry, Commissary-General of Prisoners. OFFICE PROVOST-MARSHAL-GENERAL, Col. W. HOFFMAN, Commissary-General of Prisoners. COLONEL: I have received your letter of the 4th. I was very much disappointed that the shipment of prisoners from Saint Louis to Alton spoken of by you was attended by untoward circumstances, and I am 'not surprised at the dissatisfaction expressed by you. I wish to explain the matter. I took charge of the provost-marshal's office on the 5th of November. At that time the Gratiot Street Prison held about 800 prisoners. Its maximum number should not have exceeded 500. I found that the Myrtle Street Prison, capable of containing comfortably 100 prisoners, had been taken possession of by my predecessor but for want of some necessary repairs was not occupied. I had it made ready and removed 150 prisoners there from Gratiot Street, which by that time had over 1,000 prisoners. In a few days thereafter the number in Gratiot Street again ran up to about 1,100. About the middle of November sickness in Gratiot Street Prison began increasing at an alarming rate. The number sick about that time was over 100, and within a week it ran up to 235 so that a large number of sick and dying men were lying on the floors. Every morning men would be found dead on the floor in the common rooms who had received no attention because from the crowded condition of the rooms it was impossible with the ordinary hospital attendance. With this condition of things it was impossible to observe the ordinary police and sanitary regulations. The men could not be even taken out of doors, for the prison has no yard. Of the 150 well men removed to Myrtle Street 35 were taken sick within four days, the consequences of the infection at Gratiot Street and with all this prisoners were coming in daily from the country at the rate of from 30 to 100 a day. Fearing that the worst consequences would result from keeping these men longer in Gratiot Street and ascertaining that there was abundant room in Alton for a large number I decided to remove several hundred of those whose cases would not probably be disposed of at an early day. Upon looking over the lists in this office it was reported to me that there were about 400 of that class and I notified Colonel Hoffman to expect about that number. But the actual number sent was 276, and the difference between that and the estimated number arose thus: Upon the lists were a large number who were found too sick to go. Some had died, some been discharged and two pages of names were duplicated. Had the books of this office been in proper condition such inaccuracy would not have existed, but for that I am not in fault for half my time has been occupied in overhauling the confused state of things found by me in this office. The day before the prisoners were to go the guard was provided and transportation engaged. It was found impossible to get a special boat and it was necessary to use the Alton packet. But the crowded and confused state of things at the prison, the unavoidable result of its overcrowded condition and the intermingling of the sick and the well created great delay in getting the prisoners out, and as a corrected list had to be made out to send with them the boat did not get off until nearly dark. This list ready to go with the prisoners unfortunately was left behind in the prison. Notwithstanding the hour was so late, the prisoners being out and ready, it would have been worse to turn them back than to go forward. Since then, last Saturday I sent 237 additional prisoners from Gratiot Street Prison to Alton and the number now at Gratiot Street is about 570. On to-day the quartermaster has begun making most important and necessary repairs and improvements in the Gratiot Street Prison, and when completed it will be comfortable and can be kept clean. To send off the last body of prisoners arrangements were made to start the boat by 11 a. m. It did not start until 1, and was so impeded by the ice that it did not arrive at Alton until dark. But for the ice the boat could have arrived before 4 o'clock. In no case will any effort be wanting to have things so arranged that prisoners sent from here to Alton will hereafter arrive in the day, and invariably will full rolls be sent. But the prisoners that were sent by me were men who had been captured as guerrillas in Missouri and the only rolls of them ever sent to this office contain merely their names and by whom captured, with the remark that they were to be imprisoned. Having at an early day made myself familiar with your instructions I have carefully followed them and not deviated from them in a single instance that I know of. You said that prisoners might be sent to Alton; if impracticable to keep them here until their cases were disposed of. The foregoing facts show that the case provided for by you existed, and I wrote to Colonel Hildebrand that these prisoners' cases had not been disposed of by me so that he might keep them distinct from others. I have confined my releases from the Alton Prison strictly to those authorized to be released by me in your letter of 29th of October. Beyond that I have not given an order relating to a prisoner at Alton. I was told to-day that General Grant had lately ordered prisoners there to be released, and perhaps you may have supposed that releases made if any were upon orders from this office. I have not given a solitary pass or permit to visit the Alton Prison, it being forbidden in your letter of October 29. You state: It is reported to me that great inconvenience is experienced by the daily calls for the release of prisoners made from your office. The releases which I have ordered have been strictly within your instructions. I nowhere find in them directions as to the time when I shall make the orders. The releases that I have ordered were of prisoners who were there when I became provost-marshal. As I have reached their cases and ascertained that the charges against them were unfounded I have sent up the orders for the release, for I have consid ered that after it is determined that a man should be discharged he ought at once to be released; and as it is an expense to the Government to subsist him the sooner that stops the better. I think there must be some misapprehension as to the inconvenience from this cause, for it will less interfere with the prison routine to release the men gradually than in large bodies. Upon the closing sentence of your letter I remark I regret that you have the impression that I have not confined myself within the orders of the War Department and your instructions relating to the Alton Prison. At all times it will give me great satisfaction to have you point out any misconstruction of mine of the orders and regulations made, and I assure you that any mistake that I may make will not be intentional and when pointed out will not occur again. In a late letter I stated that "a large number of my prisoners are men captured in Missouri in bands, and a part of them sworn into the Confederate service by recruiting officers from the rebels who had reached the northern part of the State," and I asked if these men are to be sent forward to be exchanged. My impression is that a large number of irregular prisoners, such as men captured in small bodies without organization, and also disloyal citizens who would have joined the Confederate Army if they could have reached it, have been sent forward 4 R R-SERIES JI, VOL V from Johnson's Island and Alton to Cairo to be exchanged. If such prisoners are to be sent forward I believe that amongst those in my custody will be found a large number who will gladly go South. I ask an early reply to this inquiry that I may send such men off at once and in that way relieve our overcrowded prisons. Inclosed are copies of two letters* sent to Colonel Hildebrand. I have the honor to be, most respectfully, your obedient servant, Lieut. Col. and Provost-Marshal-General, Dept. of the Missouri. [Inclosure.] OFFICE PROVOST-MARSHAL-GENERAL, Saint Louis, Mo., November 29, 1862. Col. J. HILDEBRAND, Commanding Alton Military Prison. COLONEL: The necessity for removing a considerable number of the prisoners from Gratiot Street Prison was pressing for the reason stated in my letter of the 27th. A large list of prisoners was made out in this office by the clerk who has always had charge of that kind of work from the rolls sent to this office by General Merrill. In the pressure of business time was not taken to call off the prisoners by the list to ascertain if they agreed with it. In making up the list from different rolls done by different clerks it happened that two pages of it were duplicated. Upon calling upon the prisoners to go it was found that a few of them had been released, a considerable number were dead and a large number too sick to be moved. For these reasons the number actually sent, 276, fell short of the number I expected to send. Had the records of my office been in proper condition those discharged would have been so entered and could due time have been taken beforehand to ascertain the state of health of the men the sick would not have been entered upon the list. All such irregularities are being corrected as rapidly as possible but order cannot be brought out of confusion instantaneously. What made the matter appear worse the officer in command of the guard left at the prison the rolls of the prisoners actually sent. This will be sent to you at once. I am, colonel, very respectfully, your obedient servant, Lieut. Col. and Provost-Marshal-General, Dept. of the Missouri. Col. WILLIAM D. WHIPPLE, FORT DELAWARE, December 8, 1862. Assistant Adjutant-General, Eighth Army Corps. SIR: Will you please instruct me as soon as convenient whether the paroled prisoners, numbering about 550 enlisted men of the U. S. service now at this post, are to be forwarded by me without further orders in the case than is embraced in General Orders, No. 191, from AdjutantGeneral's Office, Washington, to any other post or camp for return to their regiments. Provision first of general order referred to covers the case of all the paroled prisoners at this post; that is they are captured and paroled in Virginia and Maryland previous to November 1, 1862, and were delivered at Aiken's Landing prior to November 11, 1862, but in the after enumeration no mention is made of this post or * For Dick to Hildebrand, November 27, see Vol. IV, this Series, p. 762. |