CAMP DOUGLAS, Chicago, Ill., September 4, 1864.

Captain E. R. P. SHURLY,

Acting Assistant Adjutant-General:

CAPTAIN: In compliance with Special Orders, Numbers 317, dated Headquarters Post of Chicago, Chicago, Ill, August 22, 1864, I have the honor to submit the following report:

I have made daily a thorough inspection of the camp, barracks, hospitals, and kitchens during the past week, which I find, with few exceptions, generally in good order. The Federal hospital is not well arrangement, for the reason that there is at present no suitable building for a hospital. There is one in process of erection, which, when finished, will doubtless have all the conveniences. The hospital for prisoners of was is not large enough. There are at least 200 prisoners sick in quarters that should be in hospital. Out of twelve deaths among the prisoners during the past week three of them died in quarters. I am informed by the surgeon that supply of medicine is insufficient for the actual wants of the prisoners. The roofs of many of the barracks in the prisoners' square are in bad order. They should be attended to at once. The barracks all need windows, as many of the prisoners are destitute of blankets and the nights are getting cool. Quite a number of the Farmer's boilers used for cooking are unfit for use. They should be replaced by new ones. The guard-house is still in bad order, owing to leakage in water-works.

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

M. BRIGGS,

First Lieutenant, Eighth Regiment Veteran Reserve Corps.

[Indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS CAMP DOUGLAS,
Chicago, Ill., September 4, 1864.

Respectfully forwarded to Colonel William Hoffman, Commissary-General of Prisoners.

More hospital room has been provided and other suggestions noted.

B. J. SWEET,

Colonel Eighth. Regiment Veteran Reserve Corps, Commanding Camp Douglas.

ROXABELL, OHIO, September 4, 1864.

His Excellency President LINCOLN:

DEAR SIR: "Blessed is he that considereth the poor. " My business as an agent for one of our church boards has given me an opportunity of becoming extensively acquainted with the views and feelings of the minister and prominent members of the Presbyterian churches of Southern and Western Ohio. I find everywhere the most intense feeling of dissatisfaction at the policy of the Administration relative to our suffering prisoners at Andersonville, Ga. Those people were and are your warmest political friends. These minister and people labored earnestly to fill your call for volunteers from the beginning of our national war, very many of them urging their own sons to enter the list. Many of those ministers have sons and scores of members now in prison, taken at Chickamauga and Gettysburg. The authenticated accounts of their suffering at Andersonville have brought several gray-haired mothers to their graves and others to the insane asylum. Fathers and mothers who wept, but yet thanked God for such noble sons, when they heard of their falling gloriously on the battle-field, have sickened and fainted under the consuming suspense and burning