French or for an independent nation, I am unable to ascertain. They have recently left California in such numbers as to indicate concert of action. At the same time persons in this Territory suspected of sympathy in that direction have gone to Sonora. One of them was asked what it meant, and replied that the Confederacy was played out, and that he would not live under Lincoln. I think it is a movement in aid of the French.

J. N. G.

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF NEW MEXICO,
Santa Fe, N. Mex., October 9, 1864.

Brigadier General LORENZO THOMAS,

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

GENERAL: As you have been informed in communications hitherto sent to your address by myself, the force in this department has been, and is daily becoming, greatly reduced in number by expiration of service. Some few of the California volunteers, a mere handful, re-enlisted as veterans, and efforts are making to get as many more to enlist after they are mustered out as possible. Of the First and Fifth Infantry California Volunteers I hope to be able to raise five or six companies, which I shall organize, including the veterans, and shall designate as the First Veteran Infantry California Volunteers. For this I desire to have the approval of the War Department. Unless I secure the services of the men now as their term of service expires, without waiting to hear from Washington, they will become scattered; many will go to the States, and to California and to the Arizona mines. The exigencies of the service, and the security of our posts and their material, absolutely require that this be done. I beg to request that the War Department will not only approve this, but will direct the Governor of California accordingly, and request that he raise and send to this department the number of companies necessary to complete the regiment. The five companies First Cavalry California Volunteers which were first raised have been mustered out of service. The veterans of those five companies have been assigned to Company B, and Captain Emil Fritz has been retained to command that company. I hope to be able to fill this company by recruiting men discharged from the other four. When this is done the regiment will have but eight companies. I beg, therefore, that you will direct the Governor of California to raise, organize, and send without delay to this department Companies A, C, D, and E, First Cavalry California Volunteers, to complete its organization. These troops are greatly required here and in Arizona and cannot get here too soon. They should come through the desert during the cold weather. I am endeavoring to fill up Colonel Carson's regiment, First Cavalry New Mexico Volunteers, but succeed very slowly.

I beg again to call your attention to the exposed condition of this department. You see that I have but a handful of men all told, and you must know that the New Mexico troops, except against Indians, cannot be relied upon as can troops from Colorado or California to fight against Texas. The whole force under my command is necessarily scattered in small detachments, mostly of one or two companies, over an enormous extent of territory. If I were menaced by a raid of even a few hundred men from Texas, even if it were possible to get the troops collected to oppose such raid, I should have to destroy or abandon the material collected at the distant posts. We are liable to have such a