[Inclosure.]

NAVY DEPARTMENT, C. S. A.,

Richmond, February 12, 1864.

Captain E. M. JEFFERSON, Richmond, Va.:

SIR: In reply to your statement that you are about to organize upon your account, at Mobile, an enterprise in boats against the enemy in the waters of Mississippi and Louisiana, for the command of which you desire an appointment in the Navy, to secure to you and your party the treatment due prisoners of war if captured, you are informed that Admiral Buchanan is instructed to report the means with which you propose to operate and the character of your enterprise, and you are requested to confer with him, presenting this letter. Such an expedition is desirable and the admiral will extend to it all the aid in his power.

Upon his report of your readiness to undertake what you propose, the appointment will be transmitted to him for you.

I am, respectfully, your obedient servant,

S. R. MALLORY,

Secretary of the Navy.

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE GULF,
Mobile, Ala, April 9, 1864.

Lieutenant Colonel T. M. JACK,

Assistant Adjutant-General, Demopolis, Ala.:

COLONEL: Please say to the lieutenant-general commanding that I have received his telegram inquiring whether I can receive and hold here 1,000 Federal prisoners.

It is my duty os far as practicable to hold Mobile in readiness for attack. The presence here of prisoners, whether military or civil, will interfere with this. Mobile, on account of the great number of disloyal people in and about it, its propinquity to the enemy, the great number of ordnance, quartermasters', and subsistence stores accumulated in it, is peculiarly unfitted for a place of imprison meant or detention of any persons whose allegiance to our cause is questionable.

I respectfully suggest Greenville, Ala., as the place within my command be suited for such uses, and will make every practicable arrangement to insure the proper custody there of any enemies of the Confederacy whom it may be desirable in the opinion of the lieutenant-general commanding to hold.

Very respectfully, colonel, your obedient servant,

DABNEY H. MAURY,

Major-General, Commanding.

P. S.-Since writing the above I have received the lieutenant-general's second dispatch of yesterday relative to the prisoners, and have ordered two large cotton warehouses to be prepared for them.

D. H. M.

HEADQUARTERS MISSISSIPPI STATE TROOPS,
Aberdeen, April 9, 1864.

Lieutenant-General POLK,

Commanding Department, &c.:

GENERAL: I am here with about 550 prisoners, captured by Major-General Forrest's forces at Union City and elsewhere, and was di-