those required by the troops of its department. I have written more particularly in a communication addressed to you, and which you will probably receive shortly after this is handed to you.

Respectfully, &c.,

GEO. S. DODGE,

Colonel and Chief Quartermaster.

NOTE. - The above dispatch was addressed to "Telegraph Operator," and instead of being delivered at Fort Monroe, was brought to the telegraph office, War Department.

Respectfully, &c.,

THOS. T. ECKERT,

Major and Assistant Adjutant-General U. S. Military Telegraph.

CHIEF QUARTERMASTER'S OFFICE, Fort Fisher, N. C., February 11, 1865.

Bvt. Major General M. C. MEIGS,

Quartermaster-General U. S. Army, Washington, D. C.:

GENERAL: I have the honor to inclose herewith a copy of an order received from General Schofield,* in which he desires that 400,000 rations of forage and 20,000 pairs of shoes be forwarded to Beaufort Harbor, for the use of General Sherman's army. As the general suggests, these stores should be shipped only in such light-draft vessels as will be competent to enter the Cape Fear River or Beaufort Harbor, as may [be] deemed advisable. The bar at Beaufort will admit vessels drawing fourteen feet of water, while that at the mouth of the Cape Fear River will allow no vessel of heavier than eleven feet to come over it. It would be advisable, therefore, to limit the draft of the vessels in which the above-menioned supplies will be sent to eleven feet, so as to prevent any detention at the bar of Cape Fear. In addition to such supplies of forage and shoes as General Schofield has directed, would it not be as well to send a vessel having an assorted cargo of whatever clothing, &c., may probably be needed in the army of General Sherman. Please cause these supplies to be forwarded in season to reach Beaufort by the 25th of the present month, and direct that they remain there, subject to the order of General Schofield or myself. I respectfully request that these articles be invoiced in blank for the present, until the arrival of the proper officer to receipt for them. I have this day telegraphed you, via Fortress Monroe, to the same effect as above, and forward this communication as explanatory of my action.

I have the honor to be, general, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

G. S. DODGE,

Colonel and Chief Quartermaster.

SIGNAL STATION, February 11, 1865-8. 05 p. m.

Major-General SCHOFIELD:

Colonel Dodge has gone to see you. If no troops are landed to-night in the steamers the mules can be landed by the steamer Howard.

LAMB,

Captain and Assistant Quarteramster.

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*See 10th, p. 384.

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