of invoking your consideration of my suggestion to send General Fitzhugh Lee, or some such dashing officer, to the Valley in the place of General Jones.

I am, respectfully, your obedient servant,

A. R. BOTELER,

[Inclosure.]

RICHMOND, February 6, 1863.

Honorable A. R. BOTELER:

DEAR SIR: I have just learned that the brute Milroy has made another requistion upon the people of Winchester for 2,000 pounds more of bacon, and also that another foraging party has visited Front Royal. Will not the administration send some commanding officer to the Valley that will some degree, at least, chastise the insolent invader?

Very respectfully,

M. R. KAUFMAN,

[25.] Of the House of Delegates.

HEADQUARTERS ARMY OF NORTHERN VIRGINIA,
February 7, 1863.

Lieutenant General T. J. JACKSON,

Commanding Second Corps:

GENERAL: I received last night the letters of Colonels Cruntchfield and Brown and copy of Captain John Garnett's, forwarded by you on the 5th instant. I greatly lament the condition to which our horses are reduced and the suffering to which they are exposed. I had heard previously of the failure to get corn at Llyod's, and the cause. Steps were immediately taken to remedy it as far as possible, and I hope since the date of the letters transmited the evil has been at least mitigated. It seems evident, however, that to supply our men and animals the most earnest and active exertions must be made by every officer. I have felt less solcitude on account of your corps, as I have been confident that everything would be done by yourself and staff officers to supply its wants. I had hoped that the plan proposed some days since to send to the vicinity of forage all the animals not required for the support of troops and the batteries necessarily retained in position would have relieved the difficulty. If this will not accomplish it, it will be better to send the horses wherever they can be foraged than to let them die, for if they cannot transport the cannon they are of no use with them. I have understood that forage could be had in King William, and King and Queen, Essex, &c. Is it so? If it is, I suggest that you estabish them in vicinity of Hanover Court-House, where corn is being hauled from that region, and which could be applied to their necessities. It could also be delivered there from Richmond by the Central Railroad without embarrassment to the supply of provisious by the Fredericksburg Railroad. But unless some long forage can be collected in that region I do not know how it can be supplied. Colonel Corley tells me that one-half of the hay brought by the General Railroad from Augusta and Albemarle, the ony places from which it can be obtained, is turned over to Major Harman. He had been promised 90,000 pounds par day by railroad; but he has never received more than 30,000 per day, and that not regularly. This first amount, which the superintendent of the railroad states is all that it can transport and keep up with its business, is but half forage for all our animals. Th second, if regulrly delivered, would be but one-sixth. So you see the large deficit