of incalculable value. How far the blending of the two corps of engineers into one would be beneficial, I am not prepared to say, but I cannot think the addition of a brigadier general necessary.

Section 4th. I see no reason for the increased rank given to a few officers of the corps of ordnance, and believe the transfer of the majority of the officers to other corps, and the performance of their duties by detail, would prove injurious to the service. There would not be the same amount of experience, and the officers detailed would not feel as great an interest in their duties.

Section 5th. I do not think the wants of the service require as many brigadier generals as are here named. The duties of Adjutant General and Inspectors General have been performed heretofore by colonels, and I believe would be equally as well by them as by brigadier generals.

Sections 5th and 6th. The remaining portion of this section and of section 6th have for their object the destruction of the present staff department of the army, viz: the Adjutant General, Quartermaster General, and Subsistence departments of the army, and causing the duties they now perform to be performed by officers temporarily taken from other branches of the service. Upon these, the administrative departments, every military man must admit, depends the very vitality of an army. Without their perfect administration, all its courage and discipline are of no avail. They call for all the knowledge and experience of their officers, and demand their entire devotion to their duties. Their duties are varied and manifold, and long acquaintance and familiarity with them are requisite in an officer. The system proposed would, it appears to me, consider their duties. as light, and a perfect knowledge of them as but a secondary part of the knowledge of a regimental officer, and, presenting no inducement but a slight increase of pay to recompense him for the heavy responsibilities and arduous labors, would expect that officer to abandon the only path to promotion and distinction, and take upon himself the thankless and arduous duties of a staff officer.

The system now proposed retrogrades to one long since tried and proved defective.

The present staff departments were organized, because of that very deficiency, and have been modified and increased as the wants of the service required. They have been fully tried by the Florida and Mexican wars, and found to work well, and they are now well tested by the scattered condition of our army over our large and uninhabited country. Our troops are everywhere well supplied, and not a single case can be found in which, from not being supplied, they have suffered as the British troops are suffering in the Crimea, and that from the want of such organized departments.

The organization proposed is defective in not giving enough officers for the duties they are to perform. They require as many officers as they now have, and none can be spared, in my opinion; and yet these sections give twenty-three, instead of sixty-four. Here, I would respectfully state, there appears an inconsistency between the excepted paragraph of section 2d and the requirements of sections 4th and 5th: the former gives seventy-six additional captains for general staff duties;

the latter, if none but captains were employed for staff appointments, require but thirty-seven.

The tenor by which the staff appointments are to be held I deem objectionable. If the appointments are desirable, they will be sought by officers; if disagreeable, they will be avoided. In either case, influence will be used, and at each change of administration a change in the staff of the army is likely to occur. These changes, particularly in the disbursing department, will not merely deprive them of the requisite experience, but render less secure the funds in their hands.

The patronage of the administration would be greatly increased under the proposed system; and not only the position and appointment of a disbursing officer, but his character, also, would be at the mercy of the President, for his removal from his position would always carry with it an imputation on his honesty.

The general tendency of the plan proposed would be to render less efficient the administrative branches of the army, to destroy esprit du corps, and introduce politics in the army; dissatisfaction would prevail, and demoralizing influences increase.

Sections 3d, 4th, 5th, and 6th, appear to me to be based upon too high an estimate of the powers and motives of men, and to violate a principle as applicable to military as to civil life, viz: that of divisibility of labor. Believing, as I do, the best workmen are made by application to one pursuit, I should deem the present a safer system than that proposed by those sections.

The proviso to section 6th, in the transfer of the supply and accountability for clothing to the Subsistence department, I deem objectionable, particularly with the diminished number of officers authorized by this bill. Those duties and responsibilities are amply sufficient for any one officer, and those duties will never be satisfactorily performed until they are separated from all others.

Section 7. I would prefer the principle of seniority in promotions should be adhered to in each corps to the rank of colonel. With the power to retire inefficient officers, it would always work well. Promotion in a corps by selection has many objections.

Section 8th speaks for itself.

Section 9th settles the question of brevet rank, and in conformity with my views.

Section 10th. With present prices the pay of officers is by no means equal to what it was at the time it was fixed by law. It appears to me but just it should be increased.

Sections 12th, 13th, 14th, and 15th, in relation to retiring officers, are well fitted to carry out the object, and I believe the service would be greatly benefited by their passage.

Regretting the short time allowed to place my views upon paper, compels me to present them in this imperfect form.

I am, very respectfully, your most obedient servant,

Hon. C. J. FAULKNER,

GEO. GIBSON,

Commissary General of Subsistence.

Chairman Committee on Military Affairs.

WASHINGTON, D. C., January 22, 1855.

SIR: In compliance with the wishes of your committee, as conveyed to me by the honorable Secretary of War, for an expression of my views with regard to bill No. 615, for the increase of the army, &c., I have the honor to state, after a careful examination of the bill, I can discover little in its provisions to recommend it to favorable consideration-except the addition of four regiments, the retired list, the attempt to define more clearly the rules which should regulate brevet rank, and probably the increase of pay.

If a reorganization is called for, proper care does not seem to have been exercised in avoiding the infliction of unnecessary hardships on individuals, or in adopting the measures most beneficial for the service.

Section No. 1. The addition of four regiments is not more than is required for the service.

Section No. 2. No good and sufficient reason can be discovered for this addition of one hundred and fifty-two supernumerary officers to the regiments, as provided, for the ostensible purpose of performing duties now discharged by less than one hundred. The cost of this plan will not fall short of fifty thousand dollars per annum; and will not benefit the service, but, on the contrary, will seriously embarrass operations by substituting inexperienced for experienced staff officers. In 1821 a somewhat similar plan was tried, and afterwards proved a failure.

Section No. 3. This is faulty, as it abolishes the corps of topographical engineers as one of minor importance to the military engineers, whilst in fact its duties-the improvement of the internal, commercial, and peaceful resources of the land-will be held in active requisition long after those of the other branch have been brought nearly to a conclusion by the completion of our system of fortifications, the repairs of which will demand a smaller degree of talent.

Section No. 4 provides for the discharge of a number of officers of ordnance. They were selected from the graduates of the Military Academy on account of their supposed fitness for the peculiar duties of the department; and having, by length of service and assiduity, acquired knowledge and skill, it will be difficult, if not impossible, to supply their places by temporary detail of officers. The latter practice, whilst it may suit the views of individuals, cannot fail to be detrimental to the public interest. The increase in the number of field-officers will add very considerably to the cost, without the slightest corresponding benefit. I would propose the following as a substitute for the section under consideration, viz: The ordnance corps shall remain as now constituted, provided that no appointment thereto shall be made until it is reduced to one colonel, one lieutenant colonel, four majors, ten captains, and the number of store-keepers and enlisted men authorized by law; after which, vacancies in the grade of captain may be filled by transfer or promotion from among the captains or first lieutenants of the artillery, infantry, or dragoons, who may have graduated at the Military Academy above No. 21. This will leave an incentive at the academy for industry and desire of high standing.

Section No. 5. Not knowing the duties that are to be exacted from the new brigadier generals, or the causes inducing a change in the departments of the Quartermaster General and the Commissary Genral of Subsistence, I refrain from remark, other than an expression of surprise at the proposal to transfer the duties of the Clothing Bureau from the former to the latter.

Section No. 6 refers to matters that will engage the attention of officers of those departments to which they appertain, and who will be able to review them with a better knowledge than I possess.

Section No. 7. Whilst there is a perfect propriety in the selection for general officers, I see no reason for the departure from the longestablished rule of promotion to the grade of colonel, in the ordnance department. After a service of more than thirty years in one department, it is to be supposed that an officer would be more useful by continuance therein than by a removal to a new sphere of duties. With regard to vacancies, I have to refer to my remarks on the composition of the corps, under section No. 4, and reiterate the opinion. that vacancies in the department should be filled from officers of all the regiments, who may have graduated at the Military Academy above No. 21.

Section No. 8. The Executive already possesses and exercises the power of prescribing the armament of the troops. No legislation

seems necessary.

Section No. 9 is understood to aim at the negation of brevet rank in all cases except when assignment is made by the President on mixed commands. This, in my opinion, will be a wholesome law. The latter clause of the section is, I think, unjust to certain officers, and will prove to be injurious to the service. I would propose the following substitute: "Officers of the pay and medical departments will not command commissioned officers of other corps, or departments; nor will they be commanded except by the commanding commissioned officer of the troops with whom they serve."

Section No. 10 is approved.

Section No. 11 is approved, except the restriction of pay and allowances to officers on furlough. This restriction will be unfavorable to officers serving on distant stations, while those in the Atlantic States will not be much affected. Those having power to grant furloughs should see that the indulgence is not abused. The closing paragraph of this section seems to me to be uncalled for, the pay of the general officers having been considered with that of the others in section No. 11.

Sections Nos. 12, 13, and 14. Nothing is seen to be objected to, in

these sections.

I have the honor to be, with great respect, your obedient,
H. K. CRAIG,
Colonel of Ordnance.

Hon. C. J. FAULKNER,

Chairman Military Committee, Ho. of Reps.

BUREAU OF TOPOGRAPHICAL ENGINEERS,
Washington, January 22, 1855.

SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge your direction to report upon House of Representatives bill No. 615, entitled "A bill for the increase and better organization of the army, and for other purposes.

Your letter directs me to make a full and careful examination of the provisions of the bill, and to give an expression of my views, in writing, relative thereto.

It is also stated, that the report should be ready for the committee by its meeting on Tuesday next.

In order to comply with your direction, each provision of the bill will be taken up in order, and the reflections and opinions which occur to me will be stated as briefly as practicable.

Many parts of the bill refer more to other branches of the army than that to which I belong, and will, without doubt, be reported upon by other officers with better knowledge in reference to those branches than I possess; but I will endeavor as far as in my power, and as well as the time for the answer will admit, to fulfil your directions.

Section 1 increases the army by two regiments of infantry, and two regiments of cavalry, which, with the change, in the 2d section, of the mounted rifles into a regiment of cavalry, will make in the whole five regiments of cavalry, four regiments of artillery, ten regiments of infantry-in all, nineteen regiments.

The increase of the army is so necessary, and so desirable, that objections can, to my mode of thinking, be alleged only against the form or kind of troops. I do not perceive the necessity of the two additional regiments of cavalry, but would prefer, as more efficient and less costly, five regiments of infantry. Five regiments of infantry would cost about the same as the two regiments of infantry and the two regiments of cavalry proposed, and would, to my judgment, be more efficient and of more general utility. The change of the mounted rifles to a regiment of cavalry, (section 2,) would furnish as much of that kind of force as could be well employed. Three regiments of cavalry will give three thousand men, exclusive of non-commissioned and commissioned officers. Infantry can much sooner be made serviceable than cavalry, the latter requiring a drill and discipline of both man and horse.

And in reference to the protection of our frontier, for which it is said cavalry is particularly desirable, there is with me no doubt that such protection would be more effectually rendered by a cordon of posts, in which infantry could be stationed, and by cavalry patroles between each of these. For these last purposes, the three regiments of cavalry would, I think, be adequate, and to prevent marauding parties of Indians, and to protect travellers. Such marauding parties are usually small, and can be best pursued and with more rapidity by small parties.

A passion for riding gives, in our country, to cavalry force much of its popularity. The necessity of drilling the horse, of taking care of him and of his equipment, does not so generally enter into the reasoning.

Five regiments of cavalry will be full in reference to officers, but