your subordinates who may have been in command of capturing parties may have recognized the propriety of giving no quarter to armed negroes and their officers. In this way we may be relieved from a disagreeable dilemma. If they are taken, however, you will turn them over to the State authorities to be tried for crimes against the State, and you will afford such facilities in obtaining witnesses as the interests of the public service will permit. I am told that negroes found in a state of insurrection may be tried by a court of the parish in which the crime is committed, composed of two justices of the peace and a certain number of slave-holders. Governor Moore has called on me and stated that if the report is true that any armed negroes have been captured he will send the attorney-general to conduct the prosecution as soon as you notify him of the capture.

I have the honor to be, general, your obedient servant,

E. KIRBY SMITH,

Lieutenant-General, Commanding.

[Inclosure Numbers 2.]

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT TRANS-MISSISSIPPI,
Shreveport, La., June 13, 1863.

Major General R. TAYLOR,

Commanding District of Louisiana:

GENERAL: In answer to the communication of Brigadier-General Hebert, of the 6th instant, asking what disposition should be made of negro slaves taken in arms, I am directed by Lieutenant-General Smith to say no quarter should be shown them. It taken prisoners, however, they should be turned over to the execute authorities of the States in which they may be captured, in obedience to the proclamation of the President of the Confederate States, sections 3 and 4, published to the Army in General Orders, Numbers 111, Adjutant and Inspector General's Office, series of 1862. Should negroes thus taken be executed by the military authorities capturing them it would certainly provoke retaliation. By turning them over to the civil authorities to be tried by the laws of the State no exception can be taken.

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

S. S. ANDERSON,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

OFFICE COMMISSARY-GENERAL OF PRISONERS,

Washington, D. C., June 17, 1863.

Lieutenant Colonel W. H. LUDLOW,

Agent for Exchange of Prisoners, Fort Monroe, Va.:

COLONEL: In reply to your letter of the 14th instant I am directed by the General-in-Chief to say that section 8 of Mr. Ould's declaration of exchange should be confined to civilians delivered at City Point or otherwise specially declared exchanged or released, and delivered at other points across the lines. I use his own words:

Section 8 of your declaration is not quite so comprehensive as this. Will it not be necessary to give another notice?

Besides the prisoners now at Fort Delaware, some 2,500 left Camp Morton for that fort on the 11th instant, and they will be ready for exchange as soon as the rolls are prepared. The prisoners from Altin should have been at Baltimore on Sunday last, and I did not know until yesterday after I telegraphed to you that they had not arrived.