[Inclosure.]

MEDICAL DIRECTOR'S OFFICE, HILTON HEAD, S. C.,

September 19, 1862.

Major W. P. PRENTICE,

Assistant Adjutant-General, Department of the South:

MAJOR: In obedience to instructions received from the major-general commanding, I have the honor to submit the following report in regard to the origin and existence of yellow fever at this place:

The steamer Delaware, with General Terry and staff on board, left Hilton Head on the 26th of July for Saint Augustine, Key West, and Fort Jefferson, Tortugas. She returned here on the 26th of August, bringing a detachment of soldiers belonging to the Seventh New Hampshire Volunteers, who had been left sick at Fort Jefferson, Tortugas, when the regiment left the post in June last. They were all men who had been invalids for a long time and broken down in constitution.

The steamer left Key West on the 14th of August, arriving here, as before stated, on the 26th, and was ordered to the quarantine at Saint Helena Sound, about 20 miles from this place. Asst. Surg. [W. F.] Cornick, U. S. Army, under orders from this place, and a passenger on board the Delaware, having been on duty at Key West for some time past an much exposed to yellow fever, was taken sick almost immediately after leaving Key West with what he supposed to be a mild case of yellow fever, but had entirely recovered from it before his arrival here, and no other case of sickness then existed on board the steamer. The vessel remained at quarantine twelve days, and as it was then reported to me by Surgeon J. D. Dalton, U. S. Volunteers (who was a passenger), that there was no sickness on board, she was allowed to come to Hilton Head. Three days subsequent to the landing of the passengers yellow fever developed itself among the detachment of the Seventh New Hampshire Volunteers, and during the detachment. The disease has not spread beyond, it, and during the last three days there have been no new cases. As the remainder of the detachment has been sent to New York in the steamer Delaware I am greatly in hopes that no more cases will occur. The other chartered vessels, with Government stores on board, which have arrived here from Key West have also been sent to New York. I am satisfied that the only method of keeping yellow fever away from here is to stop any and all communication with any infected post.

In this instance twenty-eight days elapsed between the time that the steamer Delaware left Key West (the only infected post then visited) and its development after their arrival and debarkation here.

I remain, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

C. H. CRANE,

Medical Director, Department of the South.

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE SOUTH,
Hilton Head, S. C., September 20, 1862.

The Honorable the SECRETARY OF WAR,

Washington, D. C.:

SIR: I have the honor to report to the Department my arrival at these headquarters on the afternoon of Monday, the 15th instant.

On assuming command I immediately commenced an inspection of