Quartermaster's Department, running through the Chesapeake and Albemarle Canal, are each armed with one 6-pounder howitzer, and have likewise each a detail of one sergeant and ten men belonging to this command.

A detailed report of the effective force of the brigade and a similar report of the ordnance and ordnance stores appertaining to the command will be transmitted at the earliest practicable moment, orders having been issued to the assistant adjutant-general of the brigade, now at Point of Rocks, to have them prepared immediately.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

CHARLES K. GRAHAM,

Brigadier-General, Commanding.

SPECIAL ORDERS,
HEADQUARTERS U. S. FORCES, Numbers 10.
Fort Fisher, N. C., January 21, 1865.

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II. Bvt. Brigadier General H. L. Abbot, chief of artillery, will immediately take from Fort Fisher the 12-pounder guns now in that work and place them in the line of defenses toward Wilmington in such position as he may deem best, making a detail from the artillerists of his command to man them. General Abbot will make requisition on these headquarters for the necessary fatigue parties.

By order of Major General A. H. Terry:

A. TERRY,
Captain and Assistant Adjutant-General.

HEADQUARTERS U. S. FORCES,

Fort Fisher, January 21, 1865.

General R. DELAFIELD,

Chief Engineer:

I was at Fort Caswell yesterday, and think that some information in reference to it may be of interest to the Department. The first change in the work made by the rebels appears to be an attempt to make wooden bombproofs for the guns on the south and southwest faces, the crossed shading indicating the supposed original parapet. The exterior timbers of the casemate were covered by railroad iron. Subsequently these casemates were covered with earth, the parapet being raised ten or twelve feet in height, and probably thickened, so as to give eight to twelve feet of earth in front of the railroad iron. At a still later day, apparently, suspecting the power of resistance of these embrasures, the guns were all removed to the covered way, which had also been raised some eight or ten feet and heavily traversed. These traversed, rising some eight to ten feet above the raised parapet of the covered way, are perfectly bombproofed, the entrance to some being from the ditch. On leaving the work the

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