communications below. Three gun-boats and two transports are at Montgomery, the former aground; one gun-boat at Deloach's Bluff above Cotile. The will be attacked at dawn to-morrow. The river is falling fast and very low.

Some subsistence must be sent this army from above or we will have to eat our boots. The failure to remove the Falls City is most unfortunate.

Your obedient servant,

R. TAYLOR,

Major-General.

Colonel S. S. ANDERSON.

HEADQUARTERS DISTRICT OF WEST LOUISIANA, Monett's Ferry, April 25, 1864.

COLONEL: On the 16th instant I was informed by the general commanding that Walker's division, then moving from Shreveport, would not be taken from my command, but that the expedition in which it was engaged would occupy but a few days, when it would be returned to me. The division was subsequently halted beyond Minded, and I was apprised that it would march thence to Campti if the road was safe. Acting upon these assurances I have, with the small force at my disposal, driven the enemy from Natchitoches, and am this morning 40 miles below that place in a country entirely devastated and without supplies, and I received a communication from department headquarters that Walker's division has been ordered to Arkansas by the general commanding. My plans for following and driving the enemy were to a great extent based upon the assurance that Walkler's division would be at my disposal. I would call the attention of department headquarters to the fact that last year when I had thrown my small force across Berwick Bay and into the La Fourche country for the purpose of relieving Port Hudson, and had given orders for the same division, then on the Ouachita, to join me in the La Fourche district, the general commanding the department, without communicating with me, ordered the division in a contrary direction.

On the 16th instant I ordered the removal of the wreck of the Falls City in order that the supplies needed by my little army might be brought down the river, and was assured by the chief engineer of the Trans-Mississippi Department that the obstruction would be removed in two days. To-day I received a communication from the engineer's office, dated on the 23rd instant, informing me that up to that time the removal had not been effected, and I am thus deprived of supplies which I had every reason to rely upon. I am confident that any experienced steam-boat captain on the river would have accomplished in a day or two what has baffled the skill of the engineer department, whit all the scientific knowledge and appurtenances of the Bureau. While engaged in the most active operations against the enemy, using all the limited means placed at my disposition to prevent the conquest of the Trans-Mississippi Department, Brigadier-General Liddell, an officer of my command whose operations were highly important to the success of my plans, was ordered directly from department headquarters to send two siege guns and a portion of his force to the Ouachita River. Thus repeated instances have occurred of orders being given directly by department headquarters