therefore, believing the claims of our Government in matters of exchange to be just, we yet are profoundly impressed with the conviction that the circumstances of the classes of soldiers are so widely different that the Government can honorably consent to an exchange, waiting for a time to establish the principle justly claimed to be applicable in the case.

Let 35,000 suffering, starving, and dying enlisted men aid this appeal to the Chief Magistrate of the Republic for prompt and decisive action in their behalf; 35,000 heroes will be made happy. For the 1,800 commissioned officers, now prisoners, we urge nothing. Although desirous of returning to our duty, we can bear imprisonment with more fortitude if the enlisted men, whose sufferings we know to being tolerable were restored to liberty and life.

J. B. DORR,

Colonel Eighth Iowa Cavalry.

T. J. HARRISON,

Colonel Eighth Indiana Cavalry.

GEORGE STONEMAN,

Major - General, U. S. Volunteers.

[Indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE SOUTH,
OFFICE PROVOST - MARSHAL - GENERAL,

Hilton Head, S. C., August 19, 1864.

Respectfully forwarded.

This letter was received from Private Prescott Tracy, a private of Eighty - second New York Volunteers, who concealed it in his stock, and by direction of General Stoneman delivered it to me. Private Tracy was exchanged on 18th instant at Port Royal Ferry. A statement with other important documents from Private Tracy accompanies this document.

JAMES F. HALL,

Lieutenant Colonel and Provost - Marshal - General, Dept. of the South.

[Inclosure Numbers 2.]

Minute of a meeting of the sergeants commanding detachments of prisoners at Andersonville, Ga.

At a meeting of the sergeant in charge of the various detachments of prisoners confined at Andersonville, Ga., held for the purpose of taking some action to properly represent the present condition of the prisoners to our Government at Washington, and there by secure, if possible, a speedy redress of the wrongs

complained of the following committee was appointed, who, after due consultation, reported the following preamble and resolutions, which were unanimously adopted:

Committee. - William W. Johnson, chairman: H. C. Higginson, J. S. Banks, E. W. Webb.

Preamble. - Apparently one of the sad effects of the progress of this terrible war has been to deaden our sympathies and make us more selfish than we were when the tocsin of battle strife first sounded in the land. Perhaps this state of public feeling was to have been anticipated. The frequency with which you hear of captures in battles, and the accounts which you have seen of their treatment, has robbed the spectacle of its novelty and, by a law of our nature, has taken off the edge of sensibilities and made them less the object of interest. No