[DECEMBER 6, 1865.-For Holt to Stanton, in regard to the alleged complicity of Clement C. Clay in various crimes against the laws and usages of war, &c., see inclosure, Numbers 1, Holt to Stanton, January 18, 1866, p. 855.]

FORT MONROE, December 9, 1865.

General E. D. TOWNSEND, Assistant Adjutant-General:

The Rev. Charles Minnigerode, of Richmond, Va., appears here with an order from the Secretary of War dated December 4, 1865, granting him an interview with Jefferson Davis as a spiritual adviser. Is the order genuine and sufficient for me [to] admit him?

NELSON A. MILES,

Major-General.

HOFFMAN HOUSE, New York, December 10, 1865.

Honorable EDWIN M. STANTON,

Secretary of War, Washington, D. C.;

SIR: The Tallahassee correspondent of the New York Herals, while urging upon President Johnson that the clemency already granted to several prominent Southern leaders be extended also to Mallory, Yulee, and other distinguished rebel gentlemen of Florida, says, in behalf of Mr. Mallory, "that he was very anxious at the beginning of the war to prevent disruption between the people of the South and the Government of the United States, and was bitterly assiled in his own State as having prevented the capture of Fort Pickens when it might have been made at that time. These statements are all false. While in command of West Florida I visited Tallhassee and found in the State archives some of the most treasonable dispatches sent by Mallory to the Florida State convention in January, 1861, while he was still siting in the U. S. Senate in Washington. These dispatches are in direct contradiction with the above misrepresentations. Instead of preventing disruption between the people of the South and the Government of the United States, and especially preventing the capture of Fort Pickens, he was actually urging both the secession of the South and the speedy occupation of the Pensacola forts. I thought it proper to take official copies of some of these dispatches, and beg leave to submit them herewith, as follows:

WASHINGTON, D. C., January 6, 1861.

The PRESIDENT OF THE FLORIDA CONVENTION:

I send for the information of the convention the resolutions* passed by a meeting of Southern Senators of last evening.

S. R. MALLORY.

These documents will throw proper light upon the character of Mallory and Yulle without further comment.+

I have the honor to be, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

A. ASBOTH,

Brevet Major-General of Volunteers.

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* Omitted here; see Series I, Vol. I, p. 443.

+ See Perry to McGehee, Series I, Vol. I, p. 44, for other documents inclosed.

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53 R R-SERIES II, VOL VIII