WASHINGTON, April 16, 1865. (Received 11.40 a. m.)

Major-General MEADE:

General ord has been directed to respect your passes for persons to visit Richmond.

J. A. RAWLINS,

Brigadier-General and Chief of Staff.

[APRIL 16, 1865.-For Meade to Townsend, transmitting flags captured form the enemy by the Second Army Corps, and recommending medals of honor to captors, see Part I, p. 606.]

FORT WARREN, April 16, 1865.

Lieutenant General U. S. GRANT,

Commanding U. S. Army:

GENERAL: You will appreciate, I am sure, the sentiment which prompts me to drop you these lines. Of all the misfortunes which could befall the Southern people, or any Southern man, by far the greatest, in my judgment, would be the prevalence of he idea the at hey could entertain any other than feelings of unqualified abhorrence and indignation for the assassination of the President of the United States, and the attempt to assassinate the Secretary of State. no language can adequately express the shock produced upon myself, in common with all the other general officers confined here with me, by the occurrence of this appalling crime, and but he seeming tendency in the public mind to connect the South and Southern men with it.

Need we say that we are not assassins, nor the allies of assassins, be they from the north or from the South, and that coming as we do from most of the States of the South we would be ashamed of our own people, were we not assured that hey will reprobate this crime. Under the circumstances I could not refrain from some expression of my feelings. I thus utter them to a soldier who will comprehend them. The following officers, Major General Ed. Johnson, of Virginia, and Kershaw, of South Carolina; Brigadier-Generals Barton, Corse, Hunton, and Jones, of Virginia; De Bose, Sumns, and H. R. Jackson, of Georgia; Fraxer, of Alabama; Smith and Gordon, of Tennessee; Cabell, of Arkansas, and Marmaduke, of Missour, and Commodore Tucker, of Virginia, all heartily concur with me in what I have said.

Respectfully, general,

R. S. EWELL,

Lieutenant-General, C. S. Army.

[Indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS FORT WARREN, Boston Harbor, April 16, 1865.

Respectfully referred to Brigadier General William Hoffman, commissary-general of prisoners.

The general officers confined at this post as prisoners of we have, form the moment of the reception of the news, expressed their regret for the loss of President Lincoln, and their utmost horror of the act and detestation of his murderers.

JOHN W. M. APPLETON,
Major First Battalion Heavy Artillery, Commanding Post.

(Forwarded by General Hoffman to General Grant.)