[Second indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF WASHINGTON, TWENTY-SECOND ARMY CORPS,
May 18, 1865.

Respectfully referred to Lieutenant Colonel B. S. Alexander, engineer, for his remarks.

He will please cause the Aqueduct Bridge to be examined carefully and report as to its safety.

By command of Major-General Augur:

A. R. SEWALL,

Lieutenant and Acting Assistant Adjutant-General.

[Third indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS CHIEF ENGINEER OF DEFENSES,
Washington, May 20, 1865.

Respectfully returned.

I have caused the Aqueduct Bridge over the Potomac to be examined. I have no doubt of its strength to carry over a drove of elephants. But there ought, nevertheless, to be a pontoon bridge laid from the foot of Washington street, Georgetown, to Analostan Island, is any considerable portion of the army is to return to the south side of the river after the proposed review, otherwise there must be great delay in marching by file through so narrow a bridge. The troops would pass from this island over the causeway to the mainland and under the aqueduct arch of the canal, without interference with the other column over the Aqueduct Bridge.

B. S. ALEXANDER,

Lieutenant-General and Aide-de-Camp.

SPECIAL ORDERS,
WAR DEPT., ADJT. GENERAL'S OFFICE, Numbers 238.
Washington, May 18, 1865.

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52. The following officers are hereby assigned to duty as assistant commissioners of the Bureau of Refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands for the States sent opposite their respective names. They will report to Major-General Howard, U. S. Volunteers, commissioner of the Bureau of refugees, Freedmen, and Abandoned Lands in this city: Byt. Major General R. Saxton, U. S. Volunteers, for the states of South Carolina and Georgia; Brigadier General J. W. Sprague, U. S. Volunteers, for the States of Missouri and Arkansas; Brigadier General Clinton B. Fisk, U. S. Volunteers, for the states of Kentucky and Tennessee; Major E. Whittlesey, judge-advocate, for the State of Mississippi; Major T. W. Osborn, First New York Artillery, for the State of Alabama; Captain O. Brown, assistant quartermaster of volunteers, for the State of Virginia; Captain Horace James, assistant quartermaster of volunteers, for the State of North Carolina; Captain Thomas W. Conway, superintendent of freedmen, Department of the Gulf, for the State of Louisiana.

* * *

By order of the Secretary of War:

E. D. TOWNSEND,
Assistant Adjutant-General.