You will make such arrangements as may become necessary for any further protection that may be required. Act with General McKean in this and all other things that will insure the safety of this trade and the quiet of the border. Make this public.

E. B. BROWN,

Brigadier-General.

HEADQUARTERS FOURTH SUB-DISTRICT,
Kansas City, Mo., May 16, 1864.

Captain JAMES H. STEGER,

Assistant Adjutant-General:

SIR: I would respectfully inform the general commanding that the country is full of bushwhackers, and that they have friends all through the country who furnish them with food and give them their papers to travel on. I am satisfied that there are many families that are feeding them that have proved their loyalty, and i would recommend that all such be arrested and sent out of the country. They are not only harboring the thieves, but are lending them their permits to travel on thereby deceiving our scouts. I wish you would inform me what disposition I shall make of them as soon as possible.

Respectfully, your obedient servant,

JAS. H. FORD,

Colonel, Commanding Fourth Sub-District.

[First indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS DISTRICT OF CENTRAL MISSOURI,
Warresnburg, May 18, 1864.

Respectfully returned.

Colonel Ford will report each case separately, together with evidence of the complicity of the parties.

By order of Brigadier-General Brown:

J. H. STEGER,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

[Second indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS FOURTH SUB-DISTRICT,
Kansas City, May 26, 1864.

Respectfully returned to Brigadier General E. B. Brown, commanding District of Central Missouri, with a reference to Second Lieutenant A. L. Gooding's report, in which the names of several obnoxious families are mentioned, and the reason and proofs of their harboring armed rebels and guerrillas, and the difficulty attending the pursuit and apprehension of such in the Fourth Sub-District, when fed and harbored a the several points mentioned.

JAS. H. FORD,

Colonel, Commanding Fourth Sub-District.

[Third indorsement.]

HEADQUARTERS DISTRICT OF CENTRAL MISSOURI,
In the Field, Warrensburg, May 27, 1864.

Respectfully referred to Major-General Rosecrans, commanding Department of Missouri, with the report of Captains, Moses for his

information.