WASHINGTON, D. C., April 3, 1864.

Major-General POPE, Milwaukee, Wis.:

GENERAL: Your letter of March 30 is just received.* You probably are not fully aware of the difficulty of ascertaining and counteracting the baneful influence upon military operations exercised by speculators, through members of Congress and the civil departments of the Government. More especially is this the case in regard to Indian affairs, when dishonest men are continually intriguing to use the military for their individual purposes. As soon as I explained to the Secretary of War the real condition of affairs in your department, he authorized me to suspend his order in regard to sending the Sixth Minnesota Regiment to the Army of the Potomac. Your alacrity in sending troops to other departments whenever you could spare them has been most praiseworthy.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

H. W. HALLECK,

General-in-Chief.

HDQRS. DIST. OF MINN., DEPT. OF THE NORTHWEST, Saint Paul, Minn., April 3, 1864.

Brigadier General A. SULLY, Saint Louis:

GENERAL: Your official communication of 28th ultimo reached me last evening.+ With reference to the propositions of the Yanktonais and other Missouri bands that no steamers should ascend the river for the present, until a general pacification, I mentioned them as coming from what I knew to be reliable sources, more for the information of Major-General Pope than with any intention of interfering with or retarding your preparations for ascending the Missouri or dispatching steamers with your supplies. I have additional intelligence from my chief of scouts at the head of the Coteau as late as 24th ultimo. He had conferred with 6 young men from the upper country, and knowing some of them personally, he deems their statements to be worthy of credence, especially as they are corroborative of information received from other quarters. They state that there are three camps of Sissetons near the place where I first encountered the Indians at Big Mound on the Coteau, about 60 miles from the Missouri, numbering, respectively, sixty, seventy, and ninety lodges.

The Indians are almost unanimous in favor of peace, and are expected to accede to the conditions I imposed last fall. Some of the chiefs will probably proceed to Fort Abercrombie to give a formal assent, and then go with their bands to Devil's Lake. The Yanktonais were expected soon to encamp somewhere near the locality of the present camps. The Teton bands are assembling on the west or south bank of the Missouri, preparatory to crossing into the Yanktonais country, as they state there are neither buffalo nor water nor grass where they usually roam. They have sent a message to the Yanktonais that they are coming to join them, and if the latter desire to shake hands with the Americans they will do so likewise, otherwise they will with them continue the war. This concentration of warriors on this side of the Missouri, if true, will make the establishment of a post at Devil's Lake still more hazardous and difficult. The buffalo are on the move southward, and the

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*See Part II, p. 792.

+See Part II, p. 766.

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3 R R-VOL XXXIV, PT III