HEADQUARTERS SECOND CORPS, January 5, 1865-12 m.

General S. WILLIAMS,
Assistant Adjutant-General, Army of the Potomac:

I desire to improve the picket-line of the corps on the left and rear in the vicinity of the Squirrel Level and Vaughan roads, by throwing it forward to the edge of the open field of Cummings.

A. A. HUMPHREYS,

Major-General, Commanding.

HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF THE POTOMAC, January 5, 1865-12.15 p. m.

Major-General HUMPHREYS,
Commanding Second Corps:

The major-general commanding has no objection to the change you propose in your telegram of 12 m.

S. F. BARSTOW,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

HEADQUARTERS SECOND CORPS, January 5, 1865-12.45 p. m.

General S. WILLIAMS,
Assistant Adjutant-General, Army of the Potomac:

The two deserters reported as having come into our lines this morning turn out to be a young man who belongs to the Third Virginia cavalry, Wickham's brigade, now in the Shenandoah Valley, he having been detached to get horses some three mjonths ago about his home, seven miles west of Reams' Station. He has brought his wife in with him; both young persons. They are more properly refugees, and should have been detained upon the picket-line; but these exceptional cases do appear to be beyond the discretion of the picket officers. Shall they be sent forward?

A. A. HUMPHREYS,

Major-General, Commanding.

HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF THE POTOMAC, January 5, 1865.

COMMANDING OFFICER SECOND CORPS:

The commanding general says you can send the two persons alluded to in your dispatch of 12.45 p. m. to the provost-marshal-general.

S. WILLIAMS,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

HEADQUARTERS FIRST DIVISION, SECOND ARMY CORPS, January 5, 1865.

Major SEPTIMUS CARNCROSS,

Assistant Adjutant-General, Second Army Corps:

I have the honor to report that, in changing the camps of the different regiments of my command, in order to bring them in line with their proper brigades, the following changes were made in commanders of the garrisons of forts: Colonel D. F. Burke, Eighty-eighth New York