[CHAP. XLIII.

prayers for your success against this unholy rebellion are with you daily. Their faith in you will not be in vain. Their hopes will not be blasted. Their prayers to Almighty God will be answered. You will yet go to other fields of strife, and, with the invincible bravery and unflinching loyalty to justice and right which have characterized you in the past, you will prove that no enemy can withstand you, and that no defenses, however formidable, can check your onward march.

By order of Major General U. S. Grant:

T. S. BOWERS,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

GENERAL ORDERS,
WAR DEPT. ADJT., GENERAL'S OFFICE,

Numbers 398.
Washington, December 21, 1863.

The following joint resolution by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States is published to the Army:

JOINT RESOLUTION of thanks to Major General Ulysses S. Grant and the officers and soldiers who have fought under his command during this rebellion; and providing that the President of the United States shall cause a medal to be struck, to be presented to Major-General Grant in the name of the people of the United States of America.

Be it resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the thanks of Congress be, and they hereby are, presented to Major General Ulysses S. Grant, and through him to the officers and soldiers who have fought under his command during this rebellion, for their gallantry and good conduct in the battles in which they have been engaged; and that the President of the United States be requested to cause a gold medal to be struck, with suitable emblems, devices, and descriptions, to be presented to Major-General Grant.

SEC. 2. And be it further resolved, That, when the said medal shall have been struck, the President shall cause a copy of this joint resolution to be engrossed on parchment, and shall transmit the same, together with the said medal, to Major General Grant, to be presented to him in the name of the people of the United States of America.

SEC. 3. And be if further resolved, That a sufficient sum of money to carry this resolution into effect is hereby appropriated out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated.

SCHUYLER COLFAX,

Speaker of the House of Representatives.

H. HAMLIN,

Vice-President of the United States, and President of the Senate.

Approved December 17, 1863.

A. LINCOLN.

By order of the Secretary of War:

E. D. TOWNSEND,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

Numbers 5.

Dispatches of Mr. Charles A. Dana, Assistant Secretary of War, October 30-December 12.*

CHATTANOOGA, October 30, 1863-5 p.m.

Nothing important since morning. Rain all day. Hooker has been ordered to change his weak position for a very strong line running diagonally across Lookout Valley, his right covering the Kel-

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*For Mr. Dana's reports, October 21-30, see Part I, p. 68, and for his reports, November 13-December 12, relating to operations in East Tennessee, see Part I, p. 258.

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