SPECIAL ORDERS,
ADJT. AND INSP. GENERAL'S OFFICE, Numbers 257.
Richmond, October 29, 1863.

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III. Colonel Walter H. Stevens, Engineers, will assume command of artillery defenses of Richmond, in addition to his duties of chief engineer of fortifications of Department of Richmond.

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By command of the Secretary of War:

JNO. WITHERS,
Assistant Adjutant-General.

SPECIAL ORDERS,
HDQRS. ARTILLERY CORPS, A. N. VA., No.-.
October 29, 1863.

Major James Reilly, having reported for duty with Major Haskell's battalion artillery, under commission dated September 25, 1863, is hereby assigned to that battalion. He will report accordingly, and be obeyed and respected as a field officer of the battalion.

W. N. PENDLETON,

Brigadier-General, and Chief of Artillery.

DUBLIN, October 29, 1863.

Colonel J. GORGAS, Chief of Ordnance, Richmond:

COLONEL: I have the honor to inclose a requisition* for ordnance and ordnance stores. The army is now on the move to East Tennessee, and the limited supply of these stores has already been exhausted, and was not sufficient to satisfy the wants of the army before the march was begun, and as they are daily calling for more, I earnestly beg that the requisition may be filled entiere, that no lack of ordnance stores can be urged as cause of failure of the campaign.

Respectfully, colonel, your obedient servant,

T. M. BOWYER,

Major, Chief Ord. Officer, Dept. W. Va. and E. Tenn.

HDQRS. ARMY OF NORTHERN VA., October 30, 1863.

Honorable JAMES A. SEDDON, Secretary of War, Richmond:

SIR: Your telegram, directing a respite in the cases of Privates Newton and Scroggin, Forty-first Virginia Infantry, is received, and the order has been issued accordingly. At the same time I beg leave to express my serious apprehension of the consequences of a relapse into that lenient policy which our past experience has shown to be so ruinous to the army, and in the end so much more cruel to the men. Early in the war, it was found that stringent measures alone would keep the army together. After a few executions a number of men were pardoend, and the consequence was a recurrence of desertion to a most alarming extent. A return to a sterner discipline was found to be absolutely necessary, and by the executions that have taken place since the proclamation of the President, and by them only, has a stop been put to a spirit that was rapidly growing, that siezed eagerly upon the slightest hope of escape from the consequences of crime, and that seriously threatened the existence of the army.

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*Not found.

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