After the arrival of General Green's division there will be required a daily issue of 2,000 bushels of corn; thus 60,000 bushels of corn will be required for the month of January, while the supply within 15 miles of Camp Wharton will not amount to half that quantity. The camp is at present supplied from the west side of the Bernard by the regimental transportation; the roads are becoming bad and the teams will soon be much reduced by this work, and should the bad weather continue it will be impossible to keep the command supplied, and it will have to move where forage is. My opinion is that this force cannot be supplied for more than fifteen days to come except by the use of the steam-boats on the Brazos River, but I am officially informed that the supply of corn in the vicinity of Columbia is about exhausted. I request that these facts be brought before the commanding general at an early day, and that I may be authorized to prepare depots of forage at the most convenient points possible, to which this command may be removed when absolutely necessary, and that I be informed of the views of the commanding general as to the location of the troops when the present supply of forage is exhausted.

With great respect, your obedient servant,

H. P. BEE,

Brigadier-General, Commanding.

CAMP BRAGG, ARK., January 3, 1864.

Colonel JOHN H. WINSTON, JOHN C. C. THORNTON,

Missouri:

GENTLEMEN: Your dispatch of November 22, 1863,* has been carefully read and considered. I am glad to believe that the Southern people of Missouri are, as you state, consistent in their loyalty to the Confederacy, and anxious for an opportunity to take up arms in its support. I cannot doubt the fact, for I cannot believe that men who have been free can be made to submit, without a struggle, to that abject slavery which the North is attempting to impose upon the South, nor that they can be so cowardly as to surrender without a blow their liberties, their property, and their honor. Let no man delude himself with the belief that he can by a pusillanimous submission escape that ruin which will involve every Southern man in Missouri, if our State should unhappily be detached from the Confederacy. In that event the Missourians of Southern birth and blood will form a distinct and superior class, and will be shut out by their conquerors from all political privileges, and be oppressed and impoverished by their greedy masters. The fate of the Irish and the Poles will be theirs. What fate can be more wretched than that?

But there ought to be no doubt as to the permanent incorporation of Missouri into the Confederacy. There would be none if those Missourians who still remain at home would but emulate the example of those gallant men who have fought so gloriously for the independence of Missouri, and who have made her name honored throughout the Confederacy. If they, instead of waiting until the Confederate States can send into the State an army able to maintain itself there, would, manfully braving every danger and bidding farewell to ease and selfish indulgence, come to this army and place themselves by the side of their brave kindred and neighbors here,

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* Not found.

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52 R R - VOL XXXIV, PT II