WAR DEPARTMENT,

Washington City, April 26, 1864.

His Excellency JOHN A. ANDREW,

Governor of Massachusetts, Boston, Mass.:

The Secretary of War considers it inexpedient to authorize the consolidation of the heavy artillery companies referred to in your dispatch of yesterday. These companies will come on at once, and will be replaced as rapidly as possible by the militia that General Dix has called on you for.

By order of the Secretary of War:

ED. R. S. CANBY,

Brigadier-General and Assistant Adjutant-General.

CIRCULAR
WAR DEPT., PROV. March GENERAL'S OFFICE, Numbers 15.
Washington, April 27, 1864.

VETERAN RESERVE CORPS - RECRUITING SERVICE.

1. The recruiting in the various States for the Veteran reserve Corps will be under the charge of the acting assistant provost- marshals-general as general superintendents.

2. All soldiers honorably discharged for disability, of good character and not liable to draft, whether discharged from the Regular Army, Marine Corps, or volunteers of this war, or nay time previous, may be enlisted in the Veteran Reserve Corps, notwithstanding that the disability under which they may have been discharged has disappeared and that they are over forty-five years of age, provided they are able to do duty in the First Battalion of the Veteran Reserve Corps.

3. Men desiring to re-enlist in this corps will present themselves to the Board of Enrollment for the district in which they reside for examination by the surgeon thereof, who shall make a personal examination of them and report the result to the Board of Enrollment (according to the form furnished).

4. The Board shall then consider each case, and if the applicant is found to fulfill the conditions specified below the Board shall give him a certificate (according to the form furnished) to that effect, viz:

First. That he is unfit for service in the field.

Second. That he is fit for duty in the First Battalion, Veteran Reserve Corps, according to rules laid down in General Orders, Numbers 212, War Department, 1863.

Third. That he is meritorious and deserving.

Fourth. That he was honorably discharged from the service on account of disability.

Those fulfilling the above conditions will be enlisted by the provost-marshal. The enlistments will be signed by the provost- marshal as recruiting officer and by the surgeon o the Board of Enrollment as examining surgeon. The oath will be administered by the provost-marshal.

5. The term of enlistment in the Veteran Reserve Corps shall be for three years. Enlistments will be made in duplicate upon the printed forms furnished for the purpose from this Bureau.

6. The provost-marshals will make all reports and returns of the recruiting service of this corps and forward them in the same [manner] as they are required to do for other troops.