from commanders under military necessity can be at once carried into effect.
4th. Labor—The greater part of the labor connected with the engineer operations has been performed by fatigue parties, by engineer troops, by a limited number of details for mechanical service, and by negroes hired and impressed; but from all these sources the supply has been inadequate. A better and more permanent organization of negro labor is demanded for military and civil engineer service, to the extent of about (29,000) twenty-nine thousand men (7,000 being for the Trans-Mississippi Department), not including those needed as teamsters and cooks for the workshops and other local service.
It has been made the duty of the bureau, by General Order No. 86, 1864, to organize all the slave labor called under act approved 17th February, 1864, for service with our armies, and officers have been appointed to attend to the same.
But up to this time the number of slaves impressed by conscript officers and delivered for organization is small, and I fear unless the impressments are made more rapidly than heretofore, that this labor, so essential, will not be available in time. The organization will be made as rapidly as the negroes are received.
There will be required a number of men, chiefly from the reserve forces, as directors, superintendents, managers and overseers, a part of whom will be considered as engaged in the engineer service.
In addition to the foregoing, the details of about (1,700) seventeen hundred able-bodied men (400 being for the Trans-Mississippi Department) is required. A large proportion of these necessary details has already been made by local commanders, and the men are constantly and fully employed.
It is hoped that the foregoing statement furnishes approximately, at least, the information desired.
I have the honor to be,
With great respect,
Your obedient servant,
J. F. Gilmer,
Surgeon-Generals Office,
Richmond, Virginia, February 9th, 1865.
Sir—In reply to the circular of the 7th instant, from your office, I have the honor to submit the following report:
By recent instructions, the superintendent of Conscription has (on the authority of the War Department) directed that all disabled men detailed from the Army of Northern Virginia, should be returned for such duty as they may be able to perform in the field.
Objections cannot reasonably be made to this, provided the men not found equal to any duty in the field be returned to the same hospital from which they have been taken. But by Circular No. 35,
