influence and one who could and do more harm by his acquiescence and aid (unarmed though he was) than if he were in the brush with his revolvers belted around him. "Desperate diseases require desperate remedies," and the disease is getting desperate when the number of guerrillas is rapidly increasing in a country, and a large proportion of the citizens are ready and willing to harbor and aid them. The killing of a few such men will do more good than anything else for a country like the Perche and Blackfoot Hills, for it will deter others. Where guerrillas cannot be fed without being reported they cannot remain. We were in sight of the bushwhackers several times, and I did my best to come up with them, chasing them for two days, but found it impossible to come up with them, as the citizens would almost invariably put me upon the wrong trail.

There is but one Union family in the Blackfoot Hills, and this is the family of a Federal soldier (named Schwabe, I think). This family told me the guerrillas were harbored in the neighborhood; that they had seen them several times within a few days riding about, accompanies by three or four young women. After scouting about for a day or two I concluded to divide my squad, and did so, sending Lieutenant Self with ten men and one of the guides up the east side of Perche Creek to meet me at a given at the expiration of two days. With the other ten men and one guide I started up the west side of Perche, but after going some distance, hearing of some bushwhackers (through negroes), I divided my men again, taking four men again, taking four men with me and sending the remainder to scout the Franklin Hills. About this time, receiving information from a most reliable citizen that a sister of Bill Hines was staying at a house in the neighborhood, and that I would probably find Hines and his brother (both notorious bushwhackers) about there, I started in search of them. On arriving at the house mentioned the family denied to ms had been there, but finally admitted it, and I knowing that the Hines; had been at the house a number of times to visit her, I burned the house and ordered the owner (Mrs. ---) to either leave the State or go to a military post to live. Here I got on the trail of two men, whom from description I thought to be Lewis Hoard and Younger Grubbs (bushwhackers), and followed it to Brick Chapel Meting-House, but not being able to find Hoard and Grubbs, and losing all trace of them, I started on my return to Perche Creek. In the vicinity of the Brick Chapel resided who had a son in the brush (I have forgotten the name, as I have lost my memoranda). They had harbored and fed him for months. My informations here were negroes, but I questioned them closely, and was perfectly satisfied of the truth of their statements. I had a conversation with the lady of the house, and she expressed herself in the most disloyal; manner. I burned the house, as it was harboring place for guerrillas. Lieutenant Self found no guerrillas, nor did he destroyed any property on his route, but reported to me that he saw a squad of the Ninth Missouri State Militia (a lieutenant and seventeen men), who were reporting themselves to the citizens as a portion of the "Thirty-ninth Missouri, from Glasgow, under command of Lieutenant Johnson. " The other squad of my command burned the residence of Bas. Maxwell, and ordered him to leave that part of the country. Maxwell is notoriously one of the worst men in the country. Doctor Holman, surgeon of the Thirty-ninth Regiment Missouri Volunteers, sometime ago gave me his name and a statement of his deeds and doings, all proving him a dangerous man. The squad who burned his house, however, did it on information received at the time in the neighborhood. with the three squads we scouted the country thoroughly, but it raining and the roads