OPERATIONS IN TEX., N.MEX.,AND ARIZ. [CHAP.XI.

SAN ANTONIO, TEX., November 11,1861.

General HEBERT, Commanding Department of Texas:

SIR: I have a commission to raise for the Confederate service an infantry company, to rendezvous at or near Victoria, and drill until spring, unless the coast is invaded, and wish to raise a company for the above-mentioned service, but find it hard to get Texans to go into infantry companies. They say they will go mounted, but no other way; that is, a majority say so. I can get a good company among the Federal prisoners that are now at Camp Verde, provided they could get certificates from the mustering officer, or some other officer properly authorized, that the Confederate States would pay what is due them by the old Government. They would nearly all to a man join the Southern Army, and there are about 350 of them. If they can get certificates from the Southern Government for their back pay, you will oblige me much by letting me know, and to authorize the mustering officer, or some one, to give them their certificates after they shall have been mustered into the Confederate service.

Yours, &c.,

S.W. McALLISTER.

[Indorsements.]

Will Major Maclin please give the general commanding such information as he may possess in regard to the writer, and whether what he proposes is advisable?

P.O. HEBERT, Brigadier-General.

CHIEF QUARTERMASTER'S OFFICE, Galveston, Tex., November 16,1861.

Respectfully returned to the general commanding for his consideration. The prisoners now at Camp Verde have from $150 to $300 due each. The Adjutant and Inspector General of the Army was consulted upon the subject of paying the prisoners what was due them by the United States. He replied that no appropriation had been made for such purpose, and that they could not be paid. But he was inclined to the belief that the Government would pay them after the war, provided they enlisted and served faithfully. No one, therefore, can give the pledge demanded by the prisoners. My opinion is that the large sums due the prisoners of war at Camp Verde ought not to be paid; that their services would not justify it. They have been solicited frequently to enter our service, and have declined. They have manifested much bitterness against our cause.

Respectfully, your obedient servant,

SACKFIELD MACLIN, Major, C.S.A., Act.Chief Quartermaster Dep't of Texas.

HDQRS. SECOND REGIMENT TEXAS MOUNTED RIFLES, Fort Brown, Tex., November 11, 1861.

Captain D.C. STITH, Assistant Adjutant-General, C.S.A., San Antonio, Tex.:

CAPTAIN: I have the honor to report that, having received information from my spies of the presence of some escaped prisoners of war near the mouth of the Rio Grande, I dispatched Captain Nolan and Lieutenant Lively, with twenty-three men, to that point, with orders to