tried, and believing man as a brigadier to undertake in North Carolina the organization of the colored troops, selecting officers therefor as did General Ullmann for Louisiana. I have information leading me to the belief that with the proper man to lead the movement good troops can be raised in North Carolina in numbers from 2,500 to 5,000 now within General Foster's lines. But it needs a man always for the should of any movement-even to trundle a wheelbarrow-and the right man is the main point. My own undertaking to raise a colored regiment in Massachusetts was begun upon talking with you about North Carolina and the difficulty of attracting negroes to join white troops, while it would be comparatively easy to gain large numbers to join an army in part already composed of black troops. I suggest that if you could send some colored troops down there the result would shortly be a general attraction of the blacks to our Army unless the business of dealing with those people should be badly managed; and, if you are prepared to have it done, I believe the work is already ripe. When our regiment gets there it will be the nest egg of a brigade. The officers of the Forty-fourth and Forty-fifth Massachusetts, now there, will render Foster is now looking with a king eye on black troops. In truth, I believe within four months the idea of thus organizing colored men will be most popular throughout the North. Meanwhile, I am desirous of doing what I can to bring it before the public mind by doing the thing which what I can to bring it before the public mind by doing the thing which men are discussing. There is little chance of opposition after a thing is accomplished and seems to be good.

I wish to assure you, though I can"t think it necessary, that I am influenced by no merely State policy-that is, in a local sense-in raising colored regiments here. The truth is that unless we do it in Massachusetts it cannot be expected elsewhere, while if we do it others will ultimately and indeed soon follow. Thus, then, Massachusetts can help by deed and example the ripening of Northern public sentiment and at the same time can help the Department to some black troops thoroughly organized for other to rally around. If nobody else will take black men I will, with your consent; and if the United States Government is not prepared to organize a brigade in North Carolina I would gladly take those black men who may choose to come here, receive our State bounty, and be mustered in. But I prefer to see the work going on in the South itself, if the Department will order the work to be done and direct its organization. Brigadier General Frank Barlow, of New York, would be very good officer to detail for such a purpose in North Carolina, or if the President would permit me to name an officer I could find a colonel by selecting one of several whom I known, to whom a vacant brigadiership might be assigned, better fitted for such an enterprise-haing regard to the proper combination of intellectual and moral qualities with military experience-than any brigadier with whom I am personally familia now in the service.

I have the honor to be, faithfully, your obedient servant,

JOHN A. ANDREW,

Governor of Massachusetts.

P. S.-However, our Fifty-fourth is being raised and officered for active not for fatigue duty,a nd unless active operations of a brilliant sort are contemplated in North Carolina, in which they, as a portion of the troops in that command, could be allowed to engaged, then I pray you to send the Fifty-fourth to South Carolina, where, under General Hunter, negro troops will be appreciated and allowed a place in onward and Honorable movements of active war.