DEPOT PRISONERS OF WAR,

OFFICE OF SUPERINTENDENT OF PRISON,

Near Sandusky, Ohio, July 24, 1864.

Captain JUNIUS R. SANFORD,

Acting Assistant Adjutant-General:

CAPTAIN: I have the honor to submit the following report of the condition of prison this Sunday morning and of improvements needed. Number of prisoners last Sunday, 2,406; number of prisoners to-day, 2,404; decrease, 2; sick report last Sunday, 47; sick report to-day, 52; increase, 5; actual increase of sick, 3; 2 men taken to the hospital and reported sick were wounded by a sentinel last night. No deaths during this week. The policing has been somewhat neglected during the latter part of the week; it will be remedied immediately. Owing to the scarcity of time, the sinks are very offensive, and the drains are also becoming foul from the same cause. The present arrangement of prisoners' messes makes it almost impossible to keep their quarters in even a passable condition. With one stove and one kettle to cook with, they are compelled to cook about two hours for breakfast; another hour is consumed in eating and clearing up the tables; then they must begin to cook for dinner. They have no place to store their rations; their pork is hung everywhere, greasing everything near it; sometimes it is in the mess-room, then on a shelf in the kitchen, again on the floor. A kitchen and store-room with a mess-room to each block would be a great improvement both as to cleanliness and convenience. When eating and sleeping is done in the same room to the extent that it is done in this prison a great of the time the rooms are very dirty. With the ditching that is now being done more teams are necessary for thorough policing. The one team we have inside is employed all the time carrying away the dirt from the ditches. Another pump should be put up in the prison. The two now up are run to their utmost capacity. When one breaks, as is often the case, the prisoners have to be out to the bay to get water. The wells inside are a failure; the water is unfit for use. The large drain on the west side of the prison will have to be sided up with plank or stone for about half its length to prevent constant caving.

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

E. A. SCOVILL,

Major 128th Ohio Volunteers, Superintendent of Prison.

[Indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS U. S. FORCES,
Johnson's Island, Ohio, July 26, 1864.

Approved and respectfully forwarded to Colonel William Hoffman, Commissary-General of Prisoners.

The report handed in Sunday morning was returned as insufficient, and this comes in its place tod-day, through dated on Sunday. Major Scovill has been in poor health for some time, but with his approbation Captain Wells, an efficient officer, who has been on duty here for nearly three years, was detailed to assist on the 8th instant, and ordered no devote his whole time to the prison. That order, I believe, has been obeyed. The prison inclosure was extended on an average of ninety-five feet to the northwest on the 12th, and six new sicks previously made thus brought into use along that line. The offensive sinks are on the side toward the bay and not well constructed. I should have submitted a plan with profiles and estimates two weeks, since, showing