Today in History:

82 Series II Volume I- Serial 114 - Prisoners of War

Page 82 PRISONERS OF WAR, ETC.

folk and there effect an exchange for me. I at once wrote to the Adjutant-General expressing my gratitude for the consideration which had been shown me and my anxiety to join the army in the field. I was then in New York, and not doubting that I would receive orders in three or four days I took immediate measures to be prepared for a speedy summons to active service. Day after day I was disappointed, until I gave up all hope, attributing the failure to want of integrity in Colonel Bradford. About two weeks since I received a note from Commodore Barron, a prisoners at Fort Warren, in which he informed me that he had learned through a friend in Richmond that he was to be exchanged for me, and I immediately urged in a letter to the Adjutant-General this exchange might be sanctioned. To-day I have had the extreme mortification to hear that it has not been through a want of integrity on the part of Colonel Bradford that I have not been exchanged, but because he was sometime since exchanged for Major and Brevet Lieutenant-Colonel Chandler, recently promoted to the rank of major and still more recently as announced in the newspapers placed on the retired list.

The slight put upon me as an officer by this proceeding is so palpable that I would show myself unworthy the position I hold in the army if I could hesitate a moment to express my profound humiliation at the wrong which has been done me. I need not enlarge upon it. You can well understand what I ought to feel under the circumstances, and my only object in troubling you is that you may be assured I fully appreciate the indignity.

I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

W. HOFFMAN,

Lieutenant-Colonel Eighth Infantry.

DEPOT QUARTERMASTER'S OFFICE,

Washington, D. C., March 19, 1862.

Honorable E. M. STANTON,

Secretary of War, Washington, D. C.

SIR: I have the honor to lay before you a copy of a letter (marked A) from the Honorable F. P. Blair, chairman of the Military Committee of the House of Representatives, calling upon me for a complete list of officers serving in Texas who were arrested and who left the country on parole, as well as the circumstances attending their arrest. The arrests having been made a different times and at different localities, I cannot furnish all of the information required from personal knowledge.

Moreover, a complete history of the reason of General Twiggs in Texas being a matter of official record a the War Department, as will be seen from his published orders and the detailed report of Colonel Waite, U. S. Army, his successor in command of that department, I deem it a matter of etiquette to refer the Military Committee through you to that report rather than submit for their action the statement of an officer so much the junior of Colonel Waite in years and rank. The accompanying papers from B to F are transmitted as bearing on my individual case, and are respectfully submitted for consideration.

I am, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

EDWARD L. HARTZ,

Captain and Assistant Quartermaster, U. S. Army.


Page 82 PRISONERS OF WAR, ETC.