SPECIAL ORDERS,
HDQRS. CAVALRY IN MISSISSIPPI,
Numbers -.
New Albany, Miss., October 2, 1863.

I. Brigadier General S. W. Ferguson, with the following portion of his command, will move at once to the vicinity of Cherry Creek and there await further orders from the major-general commanding: Second Alabama Regiment Cavalry, Fifty-sixth Alabama Regiment Cavalry, Barteau's Tennessee Regiment Cavalry, and Sanders' battalion and Owens' battery.

II. Colonel Richardson's command will move at once to the post at New Albany, and he will assume command of all the cavalry not under the immediate command of Brigadier General S. W. Ferguson.

By command of Major General S. D. Lee:

H. N. MARTIN,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

PONTOTOC, October 2, 1863.

Memoranda for Major General S. D. Lee, commander cavalry.

To select about 2,500 of the best troops of Chalmers', Ferguson's, and Ross' brigades, with Owens' battery, for the expeditions into Middle Tennessee, for which you were desired at Oxford on the 29th ultimo, to prepare to break the railroads in rear of Rosecrans' army. It is important to move as soon as possible, and by the route least likely to be observed by the enemy, to the points on the railroads where most injury can be done to them with least exposure of our troops. The bridges over the branches of Duck River and of the Elk are suggested. As the fords of the Tennessee are in and above the Muscle Shoals, it would be well to move toward Tuscumbia first, and in crossing the river and moving forward to ascertain as many routes as possible by which to return.

Fayetteville would be a point in the route to the parts of the railroad between Elk and Duck Rivers. Shelbyville is the disloyal town of Middle Tennessee.

General Bragg is informed of your intended movement, and has been requested to put Brigadier-General Roddey under your command.

Should circumstances now unforeseen make the enterprise too hazardous, abandon it. Your own judgment must decide if risks od or do not counterbalance the important results to be hoped for from success. Brigadier-General Chalmers' move to the Memphis and Charleston Railroad should precede yours by a day if practicable. Brigadier-General Jackson was instructed three or four months ago to issue the cavalry arms for which I had applied to the Ordnance Department, so as to convert the best instructed regiments into cavalry first. Let those instructions be executed. Brigadier-General Jackson is under the misapprehension that you have countermanded them.

J. E. JOHNSTON,

General.

HEADQUARTERS CAVALRY IN MISSISSIPPI, New Albany, October 2, 1863.

Brigadier General P. D. RODDEY, Commanding Cavalry Brigade:

GENERAL: I will move from the vicinity of Pontotoc about the 6th or 7th instant for Tuscumbia or vicinity, to cross the Tennessee