dent aforesaid," has the honor to report that it is believed the communication of the information called for would not, at this time, comport with the public interest.

Respectfully submitted.

GIDEON WELLES.

The PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF FLORIDA,
Fort Pickens, August 16, 1861.

Lieutenant Colonel E. D. TOWNSEND,

Assistant Adjutant-General U. S. Army, Washington, D. C.:

COLONEL: * * * I have nothing especial to report. I have this morning exactly one hundred on the sick-report, the volunteers about seventy. None of the cases are serious. I have lost in all but six since I have been here, only three of which were from disease incurred here. The volunteers have had no deaths. The men are, however, all more or less prostrated and enervated by hard work in a hot climate.

I am, colonel, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

HARVEY BROWN,

Colonel, Commanding.

QUARTERMASTER-GENERAL'S OFFICE,

Washington, D. C., February 27, 1865.

Bvt. Brigadier General E. D. TOWNSEND,

Assistant Adjutant-General, War Department:

MY DEAR GENERAL: The Navy Department has no copy of the instructions to D. D. Porter and other naval officers under which they co-operated with the expedition of April, 1861, to re-enforce Fort Pickens.

The President has none, and they have applied to me. My copies, I think, I placed in Hartsuff's hands. He was adjutant of the expedition.

Please forward the inclosed note to him, and if you have copies let me have for the Navy Department a copy of the President's order to Porter and to other naval officers. Also of the order to Colonel Brown, which required all naval officers to aid him.

General Scott knew of the expedition and its orders; and you were acting confidentially with him and may have had custody of those orders, which were kept secret even from the Secretaries of War and Navy, I believe.

Yours, truly,

M. C. MEIGS,

Quartermaster-General, Brevet Major-General.

QUARTERMASTER-GENERAL'S OFFICE,

Washington City, March 15, 1865.

Brigadier General E. D. TOWNSEND,

Assistant Adjutant-General, Washington, D. C.:

DEAR TOWNSEND: The Navy Department has lately inquired after the orders under which the Fort Pickens expedition was organized and carried out.

The instruction to Colonel Brown and to Captain D. D. Porter were