I therefore ask you to take the matter into your most favorable consideration.

With much respect, your obedient servant,

C. J. McRAE.

P. S.-Since writing the foregoing Colonel Dunn has informed me that he is going to Richmond, and he will more fully explain to you the condition of the road. I commend him and his road to your most favorable attention.

C. J . M.

[Inclosure.]

OFFICE MOBILE AND GREAT NORTHERN RAILROAD, CO.,

Mobile, October 3, 1861.

Honorable C. J. McRAE:

DEAR SIR: By the greatest exertion this company has been able to progress very far toward the completion of its road. The grading and bridging are all done, more than half the track laid, and the balance of rails on hand mostly in this city. On the unfinished part of the road the cross-ties, with the exception of some three or four miles, are all laid ready for the iron. In this condition the work the available means of the company are almost exhausted. We have been already largely aided by the banks here, and most, if not all, of our stockholders have paid up to the extent of their ability, and we must now look to other sources for the means to enable us to go on. With the aid of $15,000 and an extension for a few months on the duties due on the rails, about $10,000, I feel confident we can have the road in operation by from 10th to 15th of November. I assure you that this work has been urged and pressed forward under all the embarrassments of the times with no reference to the individual interest of the stockholders, but from a conviction of its great and pressing importance to our city in a military point of view at this juncture. May I not, under the circumstances, ask the exercise of your influence with the Government to obtain an advance of $15,000 and an extension of a few months upon the duties, to be paid by transportation for the Government or other earnings of the road at the earliest practicable day, the Government to be secured for both sums by good personal security?

With great respect, your obedient servant,

WM. D. DUNN,

President.

[6.]

NEW ORLEANS, October 3, 1861.

Major General LEONIDAS POLK, C. S. Army,

Commanding Department, Numbers 2.:

GENERAL: Lieutenant Colonel T. McGinnis, of the Third Battalion, Polish Brigade, will report to you in order to submit to your consideration a plan we now have in view for the purpose of carrying out the war in a portion of Kentucky. It is not only feasible, but certain, if properly managed. I will accompany him on this campaign in case we should obtain authority from the Confederate States to raise the troops. If this plan meets with approval I would respectfully [ask] your indorsement of it, and your recommendation to the President of Colonel McGinnis and myself to carry it out. Colonel McGinnis is a Kentuckian by bation. His position as surveying engineer of the State has made him acquainted not only with a large circle of citizens