Today in History:

669 Series I Volume III- Serial 3 - Wilson's Creek

Page 669 Chapter X. CORRESPONDENCE, ETC.-CONFEDERATE.

this way, and I [inclur] great risk to my supplies and men by this system of business.

My forces are now in three bodies, 20 miles apart, and my subsistence and ordnance stores divided in the same way, and you will perceive at once that my whole movement must break down. I have relied confidently upon getting the wagons from Memphis, or I would not have attempted to move at all. I send down the Cheney again to get some wagons and harness. I will be forced to fall back, or go forward and risk the loss of my stores, if I do not get transportation. My only reliance is in your having me supplied.

GID. J. PILLOW,

Brigadier-General, Commanding.


HEADQUARTERS FIRST MILITARY DISTRICT, MO. S. G.,
Camp Benton, Mo., August 21, 1861.

Captain O'REIRDON, Commanding Artillery, Present:

SIR: I am rather astonished that you should encourage the idea that the war in which we are engaged is one to revenge private wrongs and reimburse private losses, by giving your sergeant an order for a watch, which he claims because he lost one. If I understand the purpose of the war, it is for the liberty of my State; that she may have the right to regulate her own affairs and control her own citizens and property without the interference of the abolition government of Abraham Lincoln, and not for private aggrandizement, ambition, or revenge. I hope you will impress this upon your men and caution them against violating General Orders, Nos. 17 and 23.

Yours, very respectfully,

M. JEFF. THOMPSON,

Brigadier-General, Commanding.

LITTLE ROCK, August 22, 1861.

Honorable L. P. WALKER:

The Fourteenth Regiment of Arkansas is at Yellville. It is one of the regiments transferred to General Hardee by agreement with Gibson P. Johnson, as a gent of the Department. We understand that General Hardee does not wish to receive it. General Polk has dispatched us, requesting the regiment included in the agreement with Mr. Johnson, but the regiment at Yellville is too distant en route to send him with any convenience. General Hardee has ordered the troops first transferred to him from the northwest of the State to headquarters. This leaves McCulloch's command small, and but a portion of the State most liable to assault not well defended. Will your order to send this regiment to McCulloch? Reply.

H. M. RECTOR,

Governor and President.


HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT Numbers 2,
Fort Pillow, Tenn., August 23, 1861.

[General PILLOW:]

GENERAL: Yours dispatch of the 21st is received. In reply I have to say that I am gratified to find you repudiating what otherwise would


Page 669 Chapter X. CORRESPONDENCE, ETC.-CONFEDERATE.