for which they were elected, while their opponents were men of tried loyalty, above the conscript age, and known to be well qualified for the respective officers for which they ran. They result of said election was that every Secession candidate was defeated by a majority of 5 to 1, while men just released from prison, where they had been incarcerated on a charge of disloyalty, were triumphantly elected.

A law passed at the last Legislature of our State makes an appropriation for the families and relatives dependent on soldiers in the army; it intrusts the county courts of the several counties with the distribution of the money for said families. At the last session of the county court of Medina County, some $1,300 were distributed, but while families really dependent on their relatives in the army of the Confederate States, and of known loyalty (as Mrs. Tomerlin, a widow, who has three sons in the army; Mr. Oltman, who has four sons; Mr. Nayelin, who has three sons in the service; and the families of Paul Haller and Frank Soudre, entirely dependent on them for their support, all of them loyal citizens and Secessionists from the beginning of the war), were overlooked, and did not receive any share of said money, the families of deserters and traitors (for instance, that of Joseph Meyer, Joseph Mann, Lar Ahr, Keinsinger, and others), and other families in no way dependent for their support on relatives in the army (like that of Mr. Brictea, one of the country commissioners, of Heickman, and Joseph Finger), received a share of said money. It is true the law provides a remedy against the injustice done by the county court by appealing to the district court of the county, but in the county, but in district judge, even supposing he had the will, has not the power to do justice to the parties and to punish the county court, since no jury could be found to give a verdict against them. We wish also to state here that three members of the county court, to wit, B. Keiffer, H. Richay, and J. Wipf, were arrested and tried as traitors; that Keiffer has been in Mexico in order to evade the conscript law, and been active in inducing other conscripts to escape to Mexico, and that the other commissions are men of very doubtful loyalty; that the proceedings of the county court were carried on clandestinely; no notices given to the parties interested, nor was any record kept; that V. Volmer, the assessor and collector of Medina County, paid said $1,300 entirely in paper currency, although he had collected a large portion of the taxes in specie; that said Volmer was also a conscript at the time of his election, and is in no way qualified for the office. We therefore apply to the military authorities, since the civil authorities cannot nor will not protect us, to see justice done in the premises, and to prevent the county officers of Medina County from any further injuring loyal citizens and their families and rewarding treason and disloyalty.

FRANK RIECHERGER,

CHAS. DE MONTEL.

THOS. P. WYCALE.

G. S. HAAS.

HEADQUARTERS TRANS-MISSISSIPPI DEPARTMENT, Shreveport, La., May 21, 1863,.

Major General RICHARD TAYLOR,

Commanding District of Western Louisiana, Natchitoches, La.:

GENERAL: Lieutenant-General Smith directs that so soon as General Banks develops his line of retreat, information should be sent by trusty