the work with the greatest possible dispatch; so commencing and carrying on the survey that the road may be put under construction from Nicholasville toward Danville at the earliest possible moment.

The necessary means of transportation, camp and garrison equipage,

will be obtained by requisition on the quartermaster's department, the subsistence by provision returns on the subsistence department, approved by the commanding officer of the post whence they are drawn.

Inclosed are some blank reports of persons employed and hired in the quartermaster's department, on which you will enroll for payment by that department, in triplicate, the several parties, specifying the occupation, period of service, rate of compensation, entry into service, amount of pay, time and amount due, &c., under the proper heads. These reports will be made to me at the expiration of every mouth.

You will also report to me weekly the progress you are making in the work.

I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

J. H. SIMPSON,

Major and Chief Engineer, Department of the Ohio.

B.

SPECIAL ORDERS, HDQRS. DEPARTMENT OF THE OHIO,

No. 199. Cincinnati, Ohio, May 25, 1863.

Officers of the Corps of Engineers and their assistants in this department will, besides superintending the construction of the military defenses with which they are charged, be assiduous in collecting and recording, by map or otherwise, all the information they may obtain of the country in which the troops are operating, or are likely to operate, in respect to its resources of subsisting man or beast, the character of the roads, whether turnpike or ordinary dirt roads, whether good or bad, their connections by cross-roads, the fords and bridges and their approaches, the towns, and the distances intermediate. These last should be tabulated, and a note made of the roads connecting the towns, whether they are turnpike or common dirt roads. All this information should be put in a succinct, available form, and sent from time to time to Major J. H. Simpson, chief of engineers in the department, for use at headquarters.

By order of Major-General Burnside:

W. P. ANDERSON,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

WAR DEPARTMENT, Washington, August 12, 1863.

Major-General HURLBUT, Memphis, Tenn.:

I have directed the Ordnance Department to forward to you six 12-pounder Napoleon guns for [A. J. S.] Molinard's battery. You are authorized to raise 40 recruits for that battery by enlistment for three years or during the war, and, if unable to raise them, I will endeavor to send them to you. I have also directed 20,000 Springfield rifled muskets, with accouterments complete, to be forwarded immediately for your corps, in exchange for the arms they now have. The ordnance and arms will go to Memphis, unless you direct them to be shipped to some other point, of which you will inform me.

EDWIN M. STANTON,

Secretary of War.