The Court then at 10 a.m. adjourned to meet at Washington, Ark., on Monday, the 8th instant, at 12 m., or as soon thereafter as practicable.

OSCAR M. WATKINS,

Major, Assistant Adjutant-General and Judge-Advocate.

HEADQUARTERS TRANS-MISSISSIPPI DEPARTMENT,
Shreveport, La., May 19, 1865.

I certify the above to be the original of the proceedings of a Court of Inquiry ordered from department headquarters in case of Major-General Price.

C. S. WEST,

Major and Assistant Adjutant-General.

Major-General Price asks the indulgence of the Court and their patient consideration of the following:

The investigations up to the time of their summary interruption by the general commanding the department had developed enough of the history of the campaign into Missouri for his individual vindication and to relieve him from that feeling of delicacy which impelled him to forbear presenting anything to the Court that would put him in the attitude of seeking delay in this investigation, but it must be apparent to the Court that the range given by the order calling them places him continually at a disadvantage. Although the Special Orders, No. 58, Paragraph XVI, recites that a court of inquiry is called at the instance of Major-General Price, that order mentions no imputation, charge, or transactions into which it is made your duty to inquire, unless it be considered that a campaign of nearly ninety days, in which over forty battles and skirmishes were fought, and nearly 1,500 miles traversed by the army under his command, is a transaction of such a character as the commanding general may be authorized to order a court of inquiry into at the instance of an officer who may desire it.

He desires here to remark that courts of inquiry in the army are instituted for the vindication of officers who have a right to demand them, and in all instances in demanding them the custom of the service and all analogies of the law would indicate that the applicant should himself indicate what transaction, charge, or imputation he desires investigated. And further, it is proper to remark that courts of inquiry, except when ordered by the President, are exclusively for the vindication of the personal honor of officers who ask them, and courts-martial are instituted solely for their prosecution and punishment, which are tribunals to be called into being at any and all times at the discretion of the commanding general. While it is the right of every officer to demand a court of inquiry into any charge, imputation, or transaction against him, it is still in the discretion, and is conceived to be in the line of duty, of the commanding officer of the department to determine if in his opinion the charge, transaction, or imputation is of such a character as will in the letter and spirit of the Articles of War warrant and authorize him in calling the court, and to grant or refuse it. If there is not such a state of facts brought officially to the knowledge of the commanding general as will bring the applicant within the-Article of War, the good of service and other high considerations would impel him to deny what an over-sensitive jealousy of his reputation might induce an officer to demand. The granting of a