ADJUTANT AND INSPECTOR GENERAL'S OFFICE,

Richmond, February 28, 1863.

General R. E. LEE, Commanding, &c., Fredericksburg, Va.

GENERAL: I have received your letter of the 24th instant and it seems only necessary to say that I concur in your views respecting the Sixty-fifth and Eighty-ninth Articles of War.

I am, general, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

S. COOPER,

Adjutant and Inspector General.

CHATTANOOGA, February 28, 1863.

General S. COOPER, Adjutant and Inspector General.

SIR: I respectfully submit the accompanying papers* to the War Department to show the fact that Major-General Rosecrans declines to correspond with General Bragg and upon what grounds.

To Major-General Rosecrans' letters to myself I replied+ that the correspondence which he desired me to undertake was one of General Bragg's functions which I could not assume.

Most respectfully, &c.,

J. E. JOHNSTON,

General.

INSPECTOR-GENERAL'S OFFICE, ARMY OF TENNESSEE,

Tullahoma, Tenn., February 28, 1863.

ASSISTANT ADJUTANT-GENERAL, Army of Mississippi.

SIR: I have the honor in obedience to instructions from the commanding general to forward to your headquarters under guard George U. Thatcher, who purports to be a citizen of Missouri and who has twice been arrested within the lines of our army under suspicious circumstances, with the request that Thatcher be sent across the Mississippi River. The circumstances of Thatcher's arrest are as follows: When the Army of Mississippi entered Kentucky Thatcher was found within our lines. Not being able satisfactorily to account for himself General Bragg had him arrested and ordered to the rear, directing him to remain at Chattanooga, Tenn., until the return of the army. Instead of doing this Thatcher preceded the army in its advance through Kentucky, arriving at Louisville simultaneously with General Buell U. S. Army. Shortly after this an article appeared in a Louisville paper giving the organization of the Army of Mississippi (at that time so-called). Authorship of this article was attributed to the prisoner. On the return of the army Thatcher is again found within the lines with military goods for sale; also a negro which he claims as his property. Negro boy is identified by a citizen of Rutherford County and Thatcher is arrested as a spy but is released at the solicitations of Honorable Phelps, Member of Congress from Missouri, with the distinct understanding that he is to proceed immediately across the Mississippi River. Violating this Thatcher is rearrested and is now sent to Lieutenant-General Pemberton with the request that he be immediately sent across the Mississippi River as too dangerous a man to be allowed to remain within our lines.

---------------

*See Rosecrans to Johnston, January 18 and 19, pp. 188, 191.

+See Johnston to Rosecrans, February 12, p. 266.

---------------