save the stockade. One hundred and three died yesterday. The rain has rendered things desperate here. Send me some company officers to help the new stockade.

JNO H. WINDER,

Brigadier-General.

OFFICE COMMISSARY-GENERAL OF PRISONERS,

Washington, D. C., August 12, 1864.

Lieutenant Colonel S. EASTMAN,

Commanding Depot Prisoners of War, Elmira, N. Y.:

COLONEL: Your letter of the 7th instant is received. On the 9th instant I requested the Quartermaster-General to order the tents estimated for to be forwarded without delay. It is not expected that there will be mess-rooms sufficient for all the prisoners to take their meals at once, and unless additional [room] is absolutely necessary no more will be erected. Please report fully on this subject. The old citizen clothing which you mentioned may be issued to prisoners if it is not of a color to disguise them as Union citizens. Only gray, or some shade of gray mixed, can be allowed. A prisoner cannot be allowed to purchase tools and leather for repairing shoes.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

W. HOFFMAN,

Colonel Third Infantry and Commissary-General of Prisoners.

HEADQUARTERS U. S. FORCES,
Camp Chase, near Columbus, Ohio, August 12, 1864.

Colonel W. HOFFMAN,

Commissary-General of Prisoners, Washington City, D. C.:

COLONEL: Agreeably to your instructions in your letter of the 27th ultimo I have the honor to report that the gate at which the prisoners escaped on the 4th of July last is the large gate for the passage of carts and wagons when necessary. This gate when no opened is so secured as to be as strong as any other part of the prison, and no guards are permanently posted at it. My instructions to the provost-marshal have always been to see that this gate is always amply guarded whenever necessary to use it. On the morning in question it seems that only two guards were stationed at the gate when the cart went in. No attempt of the king having ever been mae, they were supposed to be sufficient. They were armed only with their muskets. No order is on file in this office directing guards to be armed with revolvers. When I took command of this post there were 400 revolvers turned over to me, said to have been furnished by the Commissary-General of Prisoners for the purpose of arming escorts of prisoners transferred from this post to other points. There were with them no holsters. Since the reception of your letter I have produced holsters and armed the whole guard with them. More of the prisoners would have been hurt if they had not been surrounded and recaptured so soon as to prevent the necessity of firing further upon them. There are 78 guards on rebel prisons, 26 on each relief, 24 on parapet, and 1 at each gate (that is, at the small gate), 1 officer of the guard, 2 sergeants, and 3 corporals. In addition to these, ground guards are placed on at nightfall and taken off in the morning, whenever the darkeners of the night or any other