viz, Lieutenant Daniel Davis, under sentence of military court; Captain Frank Battle, under special instructions from Commissary-General of Prisoners, and William McBlair, temporarily confined for an attempt to elude a guard.

I will thank you for a list of the prisoners held in the South to be affected by this proposition and a statement of your action in the matter.

Our authorities are of the opinion that you are under a misapprehension with regard to the number of prisoners of war held by them in close confinement.

I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

JNO E. MULFORD,

Major and Assistant Agent for Exchange.

NEW YORK, September 8, 1864.

Honorable EDWIN M. STANTON, Secretary of War:

I hope you desire the salvation of the Union, but I am persuaded the exchange of prisoners is more nearly connected with this question than is generally supposed. Thousand of those whose friends die in prison from systematic persecution of rebels who are at heart loyal will work and vote against the President, because they think sympathy with a few negroes, also captured, is the cause of a refusal to relieve their friends, when even partial exchange could be made. Humanity, good policy, aye, the very future of our nation and the hope of free government for the wide world are involved. I want to make speeches and do a little campaigning for our good President, Abraham Lincoln, but for Heaven's sake do let exchanges be made as fast and far as possible. We lose by delay, for the rebels will kill of so many of our prisoners in their hands soon that there will be none to exchange. This is one only thing I do not know how to explain or argue. The rebels, of course, will not be honorable. Strange if they would, when their whole position is founded on fraud, deceit, violated oaths, and is from stem to stern infamous. If Lincoln is defeated and the country broken up and ruined forever, I believe this will be the chief cause. This is what I would not say, write, or publish to the enemies of our cause, and only urge it privately. Will you consider it, and if you agree with me talk to the President about it? I hope you will take s, and not throw it aside.

Yours, with high consideration,

H. BREWSTER.

[Indorsement.]

SEPTEMBER 10, 1864.

If the writer of this letter understood the whole case he would rest satisfied to leave this question in the hands of the Government.

E. A. HITCHCOCK,

Major-General of Volunteers.

CONFEDERATE STATES OF AMERICA, WAR DEPARTMENT,

Richmond, Va., September 8, 1864.

Mrs. ANNA J. SANDERS, Abingdon, Va.:

MADAM: The President referred, your letter of the 23 th ultimo, relative to the exchange of your son, Major Reid Sanders, to this Department for attention and reply. You are informed that attempts have