But suppose we had not done so. His recapture on land by the Confederate forces, treating them as representatives of a Government, would make the salve, as an article of property, the property of the Government that captured him, and would by no reason revert the title in the former owner.

To use an illustration which has occurred to my mind: Suppose on land we capture from the rebels a horse belonging to A; that horse, disposed of by our Government, is taken into its own service and is afterward recaptured by the Confederate forces; would there be any doubt that the property in the animal would have been diverted from the original owner, A, by the first capture and come to the United States, and then been taken from the United States and given to the Confederate Government by the recapture?

Further, to permit this would be a violation of the laws of some of these very Confederate States.

Virginia has emancipated her slaves by provisions which no one can doubt must be held according to any usage to be operative within the lines of the U. S. Army. Many slaves are thus made free who are now in our army, and we cannot, of course, suffer them to be enslaved by the fact of capture by the rebels. I understand this right to thus dispose of black soldiers in arms to be made a sine qua non by the Confederates, and therefore I take leave the suggest that I may be instructed to settle with the Confederate commissioner, upon further conference with him, all points of difference except this, and to declare exchanged numbers equal on either side heretofore delivered and paroled, so that this point may be left standing out sharply alone, and in regard to it, to insist that the cartel applies, as it does apply, to these colored prisoners of war, and that no further exchange can go on by the delivery of prisoners captured until this point is yielded, with the purpose, but not with the threat, of exact retaliation in exact kind and measure upon treatment received by ours.

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

BENJ. F. BUTLER,

Major-General and Commissioner for Exchange.

HDQRS. DEPT. OF VIRGINIA AND NORTH CAROLINA, OFFICE COMMISSIONER FOR EXCHANGE,
Fort Monroe, Va., April 9, 1864.

Honorable ROBERT OULD, Agent for Exchange, Richmond, Va.:

SIR: Referring to your complaint that several men who had been declared exchanged by an agreement of May 8, 1863, are now in confinement at Alton, Ill., for breaches of their paroles, from which they had been released by said declaration of exchange, the Secretary of War directs me to request that you will forward the names of any men held at the Alton prison or elsewhere under the circumstances stated.

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

BENJ. F. BUTLER,

Major-General and Commissioner for Exchange.