to fill up the regiments already authorized here, but unsuccessfully, Brevet Major-General Burbridge preferring to retain in Kentucky all men recruited there.

My present wish and policy are-and I understand they are those of the chief of the Colored Bureau and of the Adjutant-General-to fill the Fortieth Infantry and the Ninth Artillery to the maximum and then fill to the maximum all the regiments serving in East and Middle Tennessee and Northern Georgia and Alabama.

I should be very much gratified if there could be obtained from Kentucky, say, 1,500 recruits for the incomplete regiments above alluded to. It would be excellent policy, I think. I am convinced that Major-General Thomas has in his letter done me, unintentionally, injustice, for I believe that the course he recommends is substantially the one I am endeavoring to carry out. I suppose that Major-General Thomas may have been led into the error of supposing that I was forming new regiments from the fact that the names of several enlisted men and others in the Department of the Cumberland who have passed the examining board here have been given by me to Adjutant-General Thomas, who has ordered the men to duty with regiments in Kentucky. By beyond so furnishing these names I have nothing and have had nothing to do with the organization of regiments of U. S. colored troops in Kentucky.

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

R. D. MUSSEY,

Colonel 100th U. S. Colored Infty., Comr. U. S. Colored Troops.

WAR DEPT., PROVOST-MARSHAL-GENERAL'S OFFICE,

Washington, D. C., August 23, 1864.

Major F. N. CLARKE,

Actg. Asst. Provost-Marshal-General, Boston, Mass.:

Honorable J. D. Baldwin writes me from Worcester that towns in his district enlist their own citizens, provide bounties for them, and send them to camp or rendezvous to be mustered in and credited. That after reaching rendezvous they are beset by recruiting agents for other places, especially Boston. These agents, offering higher local bounties, succeed in getting the men credited to other towns than those where they belong and which enlisted and presented them. You are it if it is in operation. You will not give credits thus fraudulently obtained.

JAMES B. FRY,

Provost-Marshal-General.

EXECUTIVE MANSION,

Jefferson City, Mo., August 28, 1864.

Honorable EDWIN M. STANTON,

Secretary of War, Washington City, D. C.:

SIR: Volunteering for the U. S. service is progressing very well in this State at present-so much so that I have strong hopes of filling up the eleven new regiments of twelve-months" men called for by General Rosecrans by the 8th of next month. I believe that the entire quota of Missouri under the last call of the President can be filled by volunteers by the middle of October next.