(regular) Infantry, now on the march, arrives to relieve it. When last heard from this company was one day's march beyond Fort Churchill. The company of Nevada infantry at Fort Churchill will be mustered out as soon as the company of cavalry ordered there from northern Nevada arrives. The company of Nevada infantry at Fort Independence, Owen's River Valley, will be mustered out of service as soon as relieved by the company of California volunteer cavalry, now en route. As in the case of companies at Summit Lake, this post lies beyond the Sierra Nevada, which is now covered with snow. The relieving company has been obliged to march to the south through Walker's Pass, instead of direct across the mountain. It has, however, arrived by this time, and the company of Nevada infantry will soon be on the march to Fort Churchill to be mustered out, which will be toward the end of the month. The battalion of Native California Cavalry was serving in southern Arizona and will not be able to reach its place of muster-out for sometime, as it has to make a march of over 500 miles, much of it over a desert.

In addition to these corps, a detachment at Fort Churchill belonging to the Nevada cavalry serving in Utah, and detachments at the Presidio belonging to the Second California Volunteers Infantry, and Native California Volunteer Cavalry in Arizona have been mustered out. As I do not consider that they can be "dispensed with" I have not given orderes for the muster-out of the Second California Volunteer Cavalry, for there is no regular cavalry in the department that could be sent to relieve it, and it is stationed in California and Nevada at points that require protection, and some of it engaged in active hostilities against the Indians. Nor have I given oreders for the muster-out of the volunteers regiments and companies serving in Arizona; for the reason that they are now occupied in a vigorons campaign against the Apaches for which large and expensive preparations have been made, and to carry on which the two battalions of the Fourteenth, even when they reach that far-off country, will be wholly inadequate. The First Battalion, recently arrived, will proceed there as soon as practicable; moving two companies at a time, which, on account of the scarcity of water on the desert, is the largest number that can march with comfort. There remains in the District of Humboldt, at Hoopa Valley and at the Indian reservation at Round Valley, two companies of the Second and one company of the Fourth California Volunteer Infantry. A long and expensive Indian was was waged in that section, which required from two to three regiments. A large number of the hostile, Indians were made prisoners and sent to the Round Valley Reservation, and others have been located on the Hoopa Valley Reservations; I do not think it prudent at this time to withdraw the volunteer companies from those reservations.

I have nothing but two small skeleton companies of the Ninth, no over one-third of the force, and if they should be sent I should be without a single company of infantry for any service; the two small skeleton companies referred to being the infantry reserve for the whole department. The force in Nevada is represented by the district commander and by his subordinates as inadequate to the service required of it. In northern Nevada a very active companies has been carried on all last summer, and the Indians have been driven off the main routes and overland-mail road. We have lost one of our best officers, Lieutenant-Colonel McDermit, the district commander, and several men. In a recent engagement on the route from Nevada to Idaho an entire