were such as to absorb the supplies sent to our men, which were pledged on Confederate honor to be delivered. Hence the above order of the War Department. Any private supplies can be sent.

Yours, ever and truly,

J. G. FOSTER.

HDQRS. MILITARY DIVISION OF WEST MISSISSIPPI,
OFFICE OF AGENT OF EXCHANGE,

New Orleans, September 16, 1864.

Rear-Admiral D. G. FARRAGUT,

Commanding West Gulf Blockading Squadron:

ADMIRAL: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 14th instant, relating to the exchange of Admiral Buchanan.

If you will do me the honor to refer to my communication addressed to you under date of September 6, you will find an explicit statement of the terms of the agreement made between Colonel Watts, C. S. commissioner at Mobile, and myself. In that communication I quote all that part of the agreement which relates to the mode of exchange of the naval prisoners.

I also state in that communication that "I have received from Colonel Watts and forwarded to the assistant agent of exchange for the Trans-Mississippi Department, C. S. Army, an order directing him to deliver our prisoners in accordance with this agreement. " This was rendered necessary by the fact that Colonel Watts who, as a general agent of exchange for the Confederate States, claimed the authority to make the agreement, yet had not the immediate control of the prisoners whom he agreed to exchange, they being in the Trans-Mississippi Department. As I stated, I forwarded the order of Colonel Watts to Major Szymanski, the assistant agent west of the Mississippi, and two or three days after so doing met him by appointment at the mouth of Red River, when he stated that he did not recognize the authority of Colonel Watts to direct him to deliver prisoners captured in the Trans-Mississippi Department, but that he had already addressed Judge Ould, the general agent at Richmond, asking authority to make the exchange in question, and with Judge Ould's consent would deliver the prisoners as provided in the agreement with Colonel Watts. At the same time he declared his purpose to insist upon the delivery of Admiral Buchanan, and I fear that purpose will be adhered to, especially if the other naval prisoners in our hands do not furnish a full equivalent for the naval prisoners held by them.

The scale of equivalents referred to in our agreement is that established by the general cartel made by Generals Dix and Hill in July, 1862, by the provisions of which an admiral will be exchanged for four captains, six commanders, ten lieutenants, or sixty common seamen.

I have no list of the naval prisoners in Texas, nor could Major Szymanski give me a definite statement of the number, though in his opinion they are in excess of those captured in Mobile Bay.

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

CHAS. C. DWIGHT,

Colonel and Agent of Exchange, Mil. Div. of West Mississippi.

Lieutenant Colonel T. E. Usphaw, Thirteenth Virginia Cavalry, asking the release of William Allison, Ninety-fourth Pennsylvania, on the ground of kindness to our soldiers.