ADJUTANT-GENERAL'S OFFICE,

Washington, February 14, 1865.

Brigadier General E. S. BRAGG,

Annapolis, Md.:

Telegram received. Order one regiment to Hart's Island, New York harbor; two regiments to Elmira, N. Y.; and one regiment to Springfield, Ill.-to report to the commanding officers of the draft rendezvous at those places. Report yourself by letter from Baltimore and await further orders there. See that the regiments are properly started as above, and report by telegraph what regiments are assigned to each place, and when they started.

By order of the Secretary of War:

E. D. TOWNSEND,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

SAINT NICHOLAS HOTEL, February 14, 1865.

Honorable WILLIAM H. SEWARD:

DEAR SIR: I have written this by the urgent solicitation of Governor Foote, of Tennessee, with whom I had an interview previous to his departure for Europe. He begs that you permit him to return to the United States within the next three months, whenever he may deem it most advisable, because, he said, there was a solemn compact entered into between the almost entire Congressional delegation from Tennessee, nearly a majority of that from North Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, and a portion from Mississippi and Virginia, that if peace was not restored then that they would, in defiance of Davis and the war faction, stump their respective States for an immediate reunion with the Federal States. He further stated to me that every sagacious or well-informed citizen of the South, at the period of his leaving, believed the rebel States were exhausted in all the indispensable resources of war, and must yield before the expiration of six months, if we in the North prosecuted the war with vigor and courage. Governor Foote spoke of you in the kindest manner, and said while his memory remained he would never forget the kindness which you evinced to himself and family. Foote, to my own knowledge, even down to the commencement of hostilities, was a strong Unionist in Tennessee, and was president of the last Union meeting held in the city of Nashville. His hatred to Jeff. Davis and his administration has ever been, as it is now, unabated and uncompromising. Thus I have written you as I promised him.

Your friend,

W. N. BILBO.

HEADQUARTERS OF THE ARMY,
Washington, February 15, 1865.

Lieutenant-General GRANT,

City Point:

GENERAL: In reply to your telegram in regard to the payment of the troops before Richmond, I would remark that these troops have been paid generally to a later period than those in the West and South. Some are unpaid for seven or eight months. The fault is not in the

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