not have been prudent to start with less than eight or ten days provisions, and unless we were quite sure of succeeding when we got there it would be unsafe with that.

Question. Was not a movement on Chattanooga with ten days' subsistence as practicable as Bragg's movement across the Tennessee with ten days' and only three wagons to a brigade?

I think that Bragg's movement was a very extraordinary one certainly, and that the other movement would have been a very extraordinary one. As far as I understand the movement, I think that Bragg's was more feasible than the movement on Chattanooga with him very much through whose country he was to march and I suppose he had an accurate knowledge, for I suppose that he obtained all such information possible of all our forces and our strength.

Question. State what reasons you have, general, for saying that Bragg knew he could avoid the enemy.

I suppose that Bragg knew the position of our forces and that he knew he could avoid us. Bragg having his troops concentrated and ready to move could by keeping his own counsel start just when he pleased. He knew that we could not or would not attempt to intercept him without concentrating our forces, and I think it was not possible for us to have concentrated our forces so as to intercept him.

Question. Was there not time between the knowledge of the fact of his crossing the Tennessee and his arrival at Sparta to have concentrated our forces?

I think it is possible that our forces might have been concentrated at Sparta before General Bragg reached there. I am not sure of that, but think it is possible; still I to not think that would necessarily have intercepted General Bragg.

Question. How could he have avoided our army concentrated at Sparta?

He might have kept still farther to the east and have avoided it, or he might have attempted to come west and avoid it.

Question. Had he turned to the east would it not have thrown him upon a line of country in which he would have found great difficulties to subsist his army, and had he turned west would it not have brought it to the front of Nashville instead of to its rear?

I do not know the nature of the country into which he would have been thrown by going farther east. He might have obtained supplies by the road from Chattanooga to Knoxville had he gone far enough, and if he had turned to the west I suppose he would have been tempted to go to Murfreesborough ahead of us. He might have got to Nashville by that route.

Question. Is it not now well known that all the rebel troops that could be spared were in demand at Richmond for the struggle with McClellan during that summer and that very few troops could be spared at the Southwest?

Question objected to by General Buell.

General BUELL. Mr. President, if it gives the witness the privilege of speaking from report it cannot be known as a matter of notoriety. If the witness is expected to speak from his own knowledge, very well. I will give a reason why the question cannot be answered. I can cite an example where the rebel troops were at a point where they were not absolutely necessary. For example, the expedition of Breckinridge's division against Baton Rouge. That was not an expedition of such vital importance that those troops could not have been spared for other points where the presence of an additional force was of vital consequence.

General SCHOEPF. As I understand, General Buell objects to the question so that he may answer it himself.