GENERAL ORDERS,
HDQRS. TRANS-MISSISSIPPI DEPARTMENT,

Numbers 45.
Shreveport, La., September 16, 1863.

The lieutenant-general commanding regrets to learn that citizens within the department, demoralized by speculation and the love of gain, persistently refuse to receive Confederate money in the sales of supplies and in the payment of debts. Such a course depreciates our currency, and is, by the authorities at Richmond, declared treasonable in its tendency. Any person persisting in this course can be declared an alien enemy, his property sequestered, and himself sent without our lines. Before proceeding to this extremity, the district commander, in each clearly established case, will direct the purchasing agents to impress the property of persons so offering whenever supplies are to be obtained in their vicinity. The prices allowed will be those determined upon the State commissioners, and published in orders.

By command of Lieutenant General E. K. Smith:

S. S. ANDERSON,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

HDQRS. DEPARTMENT OF THE INDIAN TERRITORY,
Camp on Middle Boggy, C. N., September 17, 1863.

Brigadier General W. R. BOGGS, Chief of Staff:

GENERAL: I have the honor to inclose herewith duplicate of communication addressed from these headquarters to Major Snead, assistant adjutant-general District of Arkansas;* also copy of instructions given Brigadier-General Cabell for his government.+ I respectfully forward these for the purpose of explanation and information as regards late movements in the Indian Territory. This evening a courier arrived at my headquarters, bringing sundry communications from Brigadier-General Cabell's brigade, but not a line from General C. to myself. The information reaches me, unofficially, that General Cabell has gone with his brigade to Little Rock, under orders, it is reported, from district headquarters. Being deprived of this force at this important juncture, leaves me, I fear, no other alternative than the adoption of a purely defensive policy. I have heard nothing from General Bankhead for several days past. When last heard from he had reached Waldron, at or near which place he had pushed forward, in view of my orders directing him to from a junction with General Cabell. On reaching that point, General C. was found to have returned some 50 or 60 miles to the southward, in the direction indicated in the inclosed copy of letter to Major Snead, assistant adjutant-general, &c. On learning that General Bankhead had gone in the direction of Waldron, I immediately dispatched a courier, directing him to reassume a position on the road leading from Fort Smith to this point. I am not a little uneasy as to General Bankhead's position since failing to unite his forces with those of General Cabell, and being in a position, when last heard from in which, by a flank movement of the enemy on the road last referred to, he may be forced to retire on the same route as that adopted by General Cabell, in which event my front will be entirely uncovered, and I shall have no other force than Cooper's brigade to oppose to any movement of the enemy in that direction. I, however, have confidence in General Bankhead's sagacity and skill, though my opportunities of forming a judgment in this respect have been limited. Cooper's brigade (being my entire remaining force) has been ordered

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*See p. 1012.

+See p. 1015.

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