The brave and gallant conduct of Lieutenants Dane and Dana can hardly be overestimated. Never have I seen signal officers subjected to as hot a fire as were they, and in no case were they found absent from their post of duty. I respectfully recommend that they each receive battle-flags, with appropriate inscriptions thereon, as a partial reward for their gallant conduct at Sabine Pass on the 8th of September, 1863.

I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

WM. B. ROE,

Captain, and Chief of Signal Corps, Department of the Gulf.

Major G. B. DRAKE,

Assistant Adjutant-General, Department of the Gulf.

Numbers 3. Reports of Major General William B. Franklin, U. S. Army, commanding Expedition.

HEADQUARTERS NINETEENTH ARMY CORPS,
On board the Steamship Suffolk, September 11, 1863.

GENERAL: I have the honor to report that, in obedience to your orders of the - instant, [31st ultimo,]* I embarked the troops of my command at the points indicated.

On Friday, [September 4,] at 5 p. m., Brigadier-General Weitzel started from New Orleans with about 1,000 infantry, one battery of 30-pounder Parrott guns, and one of 20-pounder, of First Indiana Artillery, in the steamers Belvidere, Banks, Landis, and Saint Charles. The remainder of the force, with few exceptions, embarked during Friday night, and arrived at the mouth of the river during all of Saturday.

General Weitzel's instructions were to proceed as far as off Berwick Bay, in company with the gunboat Arizona, when he was to be joined by Lieutenant-Commander Crocker, U. S. Navy, with the gunboats Clifton and Sachem; thence they were to proceed in company to Sabine pass, off which they expected to arrive during Sunday night. On Monday morning, at daylight, they were to enter the mouth of Sabine River. The gunboats were to engage and silence the rebel battery, and General Weitzel's troops were to co-operate, and were to hold a position on shore until the arrival of the other troops. Unfortunately the gunboat Granite City, which had been dispatched to the Pass several days before the carry Captain Crocker's pilot, who was well acquainted with the channel of the Pass, and who was to place a light to enable him to run in at daylight, did not arrive at the Pass until Monday afternoon; also, on Sunday night there were no blockaders off the Pass. The consequence was, that Captain Crocker missed Sabine Pass on Sunday night; imagined that he had run past it; ran back, and at daylight on Monday morning was off Calcasieu Pass, the next opening to the eastward, instead of being ready to run into Sabine Pass.

On Monday morning, about 11 o'clock, I arrived off Sabine Pass at the head of the fleet of transports, crossed the bar, and was about to run in, when, seeing nothing to indicate the presence of our people, I recrossed the bar. It was not until late in the afternoon that I ascer-

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*See inclosure to Banks' report of September 5, p. 287.

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