When convenient, please send a fair, legible copy by a clerk of your communication to this Bureau.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

J. F. GILMER,

Colonel and Chief of Engineer Bureau.

SUBSISTENCE DEPARTMENT, C. S. A.,

Richmond, November 3, 1862.

His Excellency ZEBULON B. VANCE,

Governor of North Carolina, Raleigh:

SIR: By order of Colonel L. B. Northrop, Commissary-General of Subsistence, who has written to you fully in regard to purchase of certain articles to be made for the Subsistence Department of the Confederate States, I send Mr. Jacob Parker to see you in the hope you have accepted the position which Colonel Northrop has felt warranted in calling upon your to undertake, not less from a desire to avail of your advantage of position than from a conviction of your patriotism and energy. Mr. Parker wishes to know what price to pay for hogs, and I refer to you and Major Smith, especially yourself, as the best source of information on that head. He also represents that speculators are ready to dog his steps as soon as he moved and asks how he is to get rid of them. I reply that whatever plan you may recommend will have the respectful consideration of this Bureau. If approved, as it is presumed it will be, the most strenuous efforts be used to get for it the active sanction of the War Department.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

FRANK G. RUFFIN,

Major and Commissary of Subsistence.

NAVY DEPARTMENT, C. S. A.,

Richmond, November 4, 1862.

His Excellency ZEBULON B. VANCE,

Governor of North Carolina:

SIR: Commander Cooke, sent by me to North Carolina to obtain iron for plating the gunboats being built in and for the defense of the State, has returned without having accomplished this object. He reports that you have the control of a quantity of railroad iron, and I therefore address myself to you upon the subject.

To enable the boats to resist the guns of the enemy their armor must be at least 4 inches thick, placed at an angle of at least 36 deg. This armor, from the limited power of our mills, we are compelled to roll into plates 2 by 7 inches and 10 feet long, and to put them on the vessels in two courses.

If you will let the Department have the rails, and facilitate its transportation to Richmond, they will be immediately rolled into plates for the vessels in question and for such other defenses as we may build in the waters of your State.

Commander Cooke will remove the iron if you consent to its transfer, and will arrange the compensation according to his instructions.

Please telegraph your reply.

I am, respectfully, your obedient servant,

S. R. MALLORY,

Secretary of the Navy.