order of the Surgeon-General. The condition of affairs there requires the immediate attention of the authority controlling the camp, and I urgently request your attention to the report and ask that its recommendations may be carried out. Deeming your authority ample in the case, I have not asked the interposition of the commanding general of the department. As the responsibility connected with the management of the medical department at that place rests upon me, I beg that you will communicate your decision upon the matters and recommendations contained in this report at your earliest convenience.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

C. McDOUGALL,

Surgeon, U. S. Army, Medical Director, Department of the East.

[Indorsement.]

OFFICE COMMISSARY-GENERAL OF PRISONERS,

Washington, November 22, 1864.

Respectfully referred to Colonel B. G. Tracy, commanding Depot Prisoners of War, Elmira, N. Y., immediate report as to what has been done, what is in course of completion, and what is about being commenced to remedy the evils mentioned in within report. Full report required. Particular attention is called to the prevalence of scurvy and to the instructions from this office of August 1, 1864, in relation to the purchase of antiscorbutics. These papers to be returned with report.

By order Brigadier General H. W. Wessells, Inspector and Commissary-General of Prisoners:

W. T. HARTZ,

Captain and Assistant Adjutant-General.

[Inclosure.]

MEDICAL DIRECTOR'S OFFICE DEPT. OF THE EAST,

No. 125 Bleecker Street, New York, November 14, 1864.

Surg. C. McDOUGALL, U. S. Army, Medical Director:

SIR: I have the honor to report that in accordance with your instructions I made a special inspection of the prisoner's camp at Elmira, N. Y., on the 12th instant. No better time could have been selected for this examination, with particular reference to its condition in unpleasant weather, as a severe storm of snow and rain was prevailing. The inspection was based upon the following indorsement of the Surgeon-General upon the report of Surgeon Sanger, U. S. Volunteers, in charge, of November 1, transmitted to you on the 10th, viz:

SURGEON-GENERAL'S, November 10, 1864.

Respectfully returned to Medical Inspector McDougall, New York City, who will cause a special inspection and report to be made to him of the condition of affairs at the prison camp at Elmira, N. Y., and to take such measures as may be necessary to corrected the evils complained of and add to the comfort and well-being of the sick in hospital at that place. The medical director will ask for the interposition of the authority of the commanding general Department of the East to carry out these instructions, if, in his opinion, necessary to secure prompt action.

By order of the Surgeon-General:

C. H. CRANE,

Surgeon, U. S. Army.

The statement made to the Surgeon-General by Surgeon in his report of November 1 were not exaggerated, although an undue warmth of language may have been exhibited, from the difficulties he had to encounter from the delays attending the filling of his requisitions and the little attention paid to his remonstrances. In the latter