November 24th.—Clear and frosty. Ice half an inch thick this morning. All quiet below.
Col. St. John, Niter and Mining Bureau, required 13,000 men to furnish ammunition, etc.
Col. Northrop, Commissary-General, reports only 15 days’ bread rations in Richmond for 100,000 men, and that we must rely upon supplies hereafter from the Carolinas and Virginia alone. The difficulty is want of adequate transportation, of course. The speculators and railroad companies being in partnership, very naturally exclude the government from the track. The only remedy, the only salvation, in my opinion, is for the government to take exclusive control of the railroads, abate speculation, and change most of the quartermasters and commissaries.
Hon. J. B. Clarke proposed a resolution of inquiry in the House of Representatives, which was adopted, calling for the number and name of employees in the departments, and the State they were appointed from. Virginia has more than half of them.
Gen. Cooper, the Adjutant-General, Northern by birth, turned out twenty of his eighty clerks yesterday, to replace them with ladies.
It is said and believed that Sherman’s cavalry has reached Milledgeville, and destroyed the public buildings, etc.
We have nothing from Wheeler since the 18th inst.
November 25th.—Bright and frosty.
A report from the Bureau of Conscription shows after all that only some 3000 men have been sent to the army during the last two months, under General Order 77, revoking details, etc. I don’t wonder, for there has been the natural confusion consequent upon a conflict of authority between Gen. Kemper and the Bureau of Conscription. About as many details have been made by the one authority as have been enrolled by the other.
November 26th.—Clear and frosty.