OPERATIONS IN KENTUCKY AND TENNESSEE. [CHAP.XII.
Below you have a telegram of the burning of bridges at Chattanooga (this has been done by the population-no enemy's troops are in that part of Tennessee), viz:
One railroad bridge five miles from Chattanooga, on Georgia road, burned, and also another between Chattanooga and Cleveland. Telegraph lines, both routes, torn down. Thus railroad and telegraph cut off beyond Chattanooga. Can still telegraph to Richmond via New Orleans.
W. W. MACKALL, Assistant Adjutant-General.
BOWLING GREEN, November 9, [1861.]
Major-General POLK, Columbus:
The necessity for General Pillow's force at Clarksville is greater now than when ordered. The general hopes that no delay beyond that caused by the battle of the 7th instant will be made. You have reported no imperious necessity for suspension of the order, and your decisive victory has doubled your forces. Seventy-six cars and eight locomotives will be at Paris for the troops Monday night.
W. W. MACKALL, Assistant Adjutant-General.
WAR DEPARTMENT, C. S. A., Richmond, November 10, 1861.
General A. SIDNEY JOHNSTON, Bowling Green, Ky.:
SIR: I now renew my reply* to your favor of 22nd ultimo on some points not before answered.
1st. I concur entirely in your view about the arrangement of the commissariat at Nashville, and I have ordered Captain T. K. Jackson's promotion to major in the Commissary Department, and specie has been ordered up from Savannah to be sent to him, so that he may obtain Kentucky bank notes for his purchases.
2nd. The President and Cabinet consider that the act of Congress prohibiting the exportation of certain commodities from the Confederacy except through seaports is not applicable to such portions of Kentucky as are held by our armies under military rule. At the same time the policy of the Government would be violated by introducing articles not required for the consumption of the people. We therefore suggest, as the best plan, that you announce that you will issue licenses to loyal Kentuckians within your lines for the introduction of such Southern products as sugar, molasses, rice, &c. (but not cotton or naval stores), as shall suffice for the consumption of the inhabitants, taking care not to allow any to cross your lines into the section of the country occupied by the enemy.
3rd. Whatever may be our rights, if we consider Kentucky to be in a state of war against us, it is not considered politic to exercise them as regards any taxation of the inhabitants. On the contrary, we think it would be advisable to issue a proclamation declaring that your army will protect the people against the collection of a tax to which they have not consented, and which has been imposed on them by a body of men assuming to be their legislators, but who were compelled by
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*See November 3, p. 502.
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