Today in History:

217 Series I Volume XXXIV-IV Serial 64 - Red River Campaign Part IV

Page 217 Chapter XLVI. CORRESPONDENCE,ETC.-UNION.

BOONVILLE, June 4, 1864.

Major-General ROSECRANS,

Commanding Department of the Missouri:

GENERAL: Cooper County is infested with about 50 or 75 bushwhackers. N. Leonard, a Union man, was robbed and wounded in the hand. This morning the stage was turned back from Georgetown. Reports continue to come in of robberies having been committed all over the county. The people of Cooper County are anxious for troops to be sent or organized here. General, our Enrolled Militia can be made reliable in very short time.

Respectfully,

D. W. WEAR,

Colonel Fifty-second Regiment Enrolled Missouri Militia.

BOONVILLE, MO., June 4, 1864.

Major-General ROSECRANS,

Commanding Department of the Missouri:

A messenger just in from Pilot Grove states from 100 to 200 bushwhackers there. They killed Mr. Mays; wounded 2 other Union men. They report themselves from Kansas. I have called out the citizens, and will arm them and make the best defense possible.

D. W. WEAR,

Colonel Fifty-second Regiment Enrolled Missouri Militia.


HEADQUARTERS SAINT LOUIS DISTRICT, Saint Louis, Mo., June 4, 1864.

Major O. D. GREENE,
Assistant Adjutant-General, Dept. of the Missouri:

MAJOR: I respectfully request instructions as to the execution of General Orders, No. 44, Department of the Missouri, current series.

Is it intended that the commanding officer of a regiment, where a portion of the regiment is detached at different stations in the district and not under his command, will make the monthly inspections of arms, &c., of the entire regiment? There is no regiment in my district stationed at one post. They are all divided and stationed at different stations, frequently remote from each other. For instance, the First Infantry, Missouri State Militia-two companies are on duty at Saint Louis, two at Benton Barracks, two at Bloomfield, and the remaining four in the District of Rolla.

It will require 7 officers, as there are seven regiments and parts of regiments in my district, to be in the field nearly or quite all of the time to make these inspections, and in the majority of cases would require the officers to go into other districts to complete their inspections. It appears to me that it is wholly unnecessary to send each commanding officer of a regiment to every post at which troops of his regiment are stationed, to make monthly inspections of arms, &c. The inspections could be quite as rigidly and completely made by the district inspector, and not add very materially to the duties of his office. My attention was called to this subject by a portion of the indorsement on Lieutenant-Colonel Herder's inspection report


Page 217 Chapter XLVI. CORRESPONDENCE,ETC.-UNION.