interruptedly, I reached Dalton on the morning of the 12th, and proceeded at once to report to General Johnston. Through his kind attention I was enabled immediately to enter upon the work of inspection, and examined that day the batteries grouped in reserve. The day following was devoted to a general review of the artillery serving with the two army corps. Special inspections were continued on subsequent days until every battery had been carefully examined as to its material, management, and condition. The performance of the artillery was also repeatedly witnessed in drills and reviews.

In addition to these personal observations, I sought from the commanding general and officers likely to know such information as they could give, and especially called for and received from the artillery commanders detailed statements of the service seem by the several batteries, of the defects, in their judgement, needing remedy and wants requiring supply, with an expression in every case of what they deemed their own condition. An acquaintance tolerably accurate with the entire condition of the artillery of that army was thus in a few day s obtained, so that defects could be pointed out and remedies applied as far as means existed.

General Johnston and the corps commanders evinced great concert that the artillery might be rendered as efficient as possible at an early day. Its condition they deemed unsatisfactory on account of defective armament, insufficient strength in animals, and want alike of adequate chiefs and of suitable organization. The armament I found less strong than is desirable; with other particulars it will be seen in the tabular report (A). The 6-pounders, of which there were fifteen, are, in the present state of fire-arms, nearly useless, if not indeed worse, employing and exposing as they de a number of men and animals, whole they can scarcely ever accomplish anything against the more powerful guns or event he long-range muskets of the enemy. The 12-pounded howitzers, of which there were twenty-seven, are scarcely more valuable; a few batteries of these for special service in that broken and wooded country may be remedied; perhaps by 10th April nearly all the 6-pounders will be substituted by the more efficient 12-pounder Napoleon, and within a few weeks, the Chief of Ordnance assures me, several rifle batteries will be furnished in place of so many howitzers.

The animals were, for the most partly, certainly thin; some had died from hard usage and disease not uncommon in our artillery service, and others were worn down below the standard for use. This I regard not as peculiar or as matter for blame, but as chiefly unavoidable and incident to the nature of the case. Extreme care will not always keep artillery horses in good condition, necessarily subject as they are at times to excessive draft, injurious exposure, and long fasting. The end of the fall campaign general leaves them seriously reduced; the vicissitudes of winter and the difficulties in the way of supplies of forage sufficient in quantity and suitable in quality scarcely allow of their being adequately by spring. In the mean time diseases will more or less prevail, and the animals are therefore often found still below a satisfactory standard in numbers and in flesh a new campaign is about to open.

This state of things did not strike me as existing to a greater extent in the Army of Tennessee than in other commands at all simi-