DEPOT QUARTERMASTER. 283. The office of a depot quartermaster will consist of not less than three nor more than five divisions. (a) At offices at which transportation accounts are not settled, and with which the office of a general superintendent, Army transport service, is not connected, there will be three divisions, subdivided into branches as follows: 1. Adminstrative division Mail and record branch. Personnel and miscellaneous branch. 2. Finance and accounting division- Accounting branch. 3. Supplies division (including transportation)— Supplies branch Purchasing branch. Transportation branch. (b) At offices at which transportation accounts are not settled, and at which the office of a general superintendent, Army transport service, is located, there will be four divisions, subdivided into branches as follows: 1. Administrative division Mail and record branch. Personnel and miscellaneous branch. 2. Finance and accounting division- Accounting branch. 3. Supplies division Supplies branch. Purchasing branch. 4. Transportation division-- Land transportation branch. Water transportation branch. (c) At offices at which transportation accounts are settled, and with which the office of a general superintendent, Army transport service, is not connected, there will be four divisions, subdivided into branches as follows: 1. Administrative division- Mail and record branch. Personnel and miscellaneous branch. 2. Finance and accounting division— Accounting branch. 3. Supplies division Supplies branch. Purchasing branch. 4. Transportation division- Transportation branch. Settlement of transportation accounts branch. (d) At offices at which transportation accounts are settled, and at which the office of a general superintendent, Army transport service is located, there will be four divisions, subdivided into branches as follows 1. Administrative division Mail and record branch. Personnel and miscellaneous branch. 2. Finance and accounting division Finance branch. Accounting branch. 3. Supplies division Supplies branch. Purchasing branch. 4. Transportation division Land transportation branch. Water transportation branch. Settlement of transportation accounts branch. QUARTERMASTER AT A POST OR STATION. 284. The office of a quartermaster at a post garrisoned by not less than a regiment will consist of four divisions, subdivided into branches as follows: 1. Administrative division Mail and record branch. Personnel and miscellaneous branch. 2. Finance and accounting division. 3. Supplies division Subsistence supplies branch. Clothing and equipage branch. Miscellaneous branch. 4. Transportation and construction and repair division Transportation branch. Construction and repair branch. To posts garrisoned by a greater or less number of troops than a regiment, the above organization is applicable with such modifications as may be found necessary. The office organization of a quartermaster at an independent station will be as prescribed in this paragraph. CONSTRUCTING QUARTERMASTER. 285. The office of a constructing quartermaster will consist of such divisions and branches as may, in the opinion of the quartermaster, be necessary for the proper administration of the office. GENERAL SUPERINTENDENT ARMY TRANSPORT SERVICE. 286. The office of a general superintendent, Army transport service, will be organized as follows: (a) When established and maintained as a separate and distinct office, it will consist of four divisions, subdivided into branches as follows: 1. Administrative division Mail and record branch. Personnel and miscellaneous branch. 2. Finance and accounting division- Accounting branch. 3. Supplies division Supplies branch. Purchasing branch. 4. Transportation division Land transportation branch. Water transportation branch. (b) The organization of the office of a general superintendent, Army transport service, when established and maintained as a part of the office of the depot quartermaster, will be as prescribed in paragraph 283 (b) and (d). TRANSPORT QUARTERMASTER. 287. The office of a transport quartermaster will consist of such divisions and branches as may, in the opinion of the quartermaster, be necessary for the proper administration of the office. DESIGNATION OF OFFICES. 288. The designations of offices of the Quartermaster Corps are as follows: 289. The following abbreviations will be used in signing official letters: CORRESPONDENCE, REPORTS, AND OTHER RECORDS. GENERAL PROVISIONS. 290. The staff of a post commander will consist of such staff officers as are on duty at the post, and such line officers as may be required for staff duties. Their official designations will be as follows: Adjutant, quartermaster, surgeon, engineer officer, ordnance officer, and signal officer. The official address of the senior medical officer at a post will be The Surgeon, and in like manner the official addresses of the other staff officers of a post will be, respectively: The Adjutant, The Quartermaster, The Engineer Officer, The Ordnance Officer, and The Signal Officer, Fort (A. R. 206, 1913.) 291. In order to reduce the possibility of confidential communications falling into the hands of persons other than those for whom they are intended, the sender will inclose them in an inner and an outer cover the inner cover to be a sealed envelope or wrapper addressed in the usual way, but marked plainly “Confidential" in such manner that the notation may be most readily seen when the outer cover is removed. The package thus prepared will then be inclosed in another sealed envelope or wrapper addressed in the ordinary manner, with no notation to indicate the confidential rature of the contents. The foregoing applies not only to confidential communications intrusted to the mails or to telegraph companies, but also to such communications intrusted to messengers passing between different offices of the same headquarters, including the bureaus and offices of the War Department. Government telegraph operators will be held responsible that all telegrams are carefully guarded. No received telegram will ever leave an office except in a sealed envelope, properly addressed. All files will be carefully guarded and access thereto will be denied to all parties except those authorized by law to see the same. (A. R. 778, 1913.) 292. 1. Hereafter the word "confidential" will not be placed on any communication from the War Department, except where the subject matter is intended for the sole information of the person to whom addressed. If some military necessity should exist therefor the contents of such a communication may be made known to others, but the person to whom the communication is addressed must assume all responsibility for taking such action. 2. When the contents of any publication, document, communication, map, drawing, or blue print are intended for the information of a certain class or classes of individuals and not for the public at large it will not be marked "confidential," but a statement, printed or written, indicating to whom the contents may be disclosed. will be furnished. Persons receiving such a publication, document, communication, map, drawing, or blue print will exercise due care that its contents are not imparted to any unauthorized person. 3. Mimeographs, bulletins, printed circulars, or blue prints, marked "Confidential," which have been issued in the past by the different bureaus of the War Department for distribution to certain officers, are for the use of officers and enlisted men and civilian employees of the United States when necessary in connection with their work. (Cir. 78, W. D., 1909.) 293. Official communications will be signed or authenticated with the pen and not by facsimiles, and if written by order, it will be stated by whose order. Signatures will be plainly and legibly written. By virtue of the commission and assignment to duty, the adjutant general or adjutant of any command transacts the business or correspondence of that command over his own signature; but when orders or instructions of any kind are given, the authority by which he gives the order must be stated. In the absence of a commanding general, his chief of staff, or, if there be none, his adjutant general, in signing the communications to be forwarded to higher authority will add to his signature the words, "In the absence of ... commander." (A. R. 779, 1913.) the 294. An officer will not be designated in orders nor addressed in official communications by any other title than that of his actual rank. (A. R. 780, 1913.) 295. Private correspondence from persons in the military service which they may desire to have for warded through the dispatch agents of the United States will be addressed, under cover, to the War Depart ment. (A. R. 781, 1913.) 296. Except as otherwise specially authorized or required by Army Regulations, all official communications from officers and enlisted men of the Army outside of the War Department intended for the Secretary of War or for any bureau or office of the War Department will be in writing and addressed to The Adjutant General of the Army, who will submit all business coming to him from the Army which requires action in the War Department or by the President, and which does not come within the jurisdiction of chiefs of bureaus, to the Chief of Staff, to be acted upon by him in conformity to the rules duly prescribed for that purpose by the President or the Secretary of War. Correspondence of the War Department with the Army will be through or by The Adjutant General of the Army. (A. R. 782, 1913.) 297. Unless otherwise expressly authorized by statute, an application for the official opinion of the Judge Advocate General or of an officer of any executive department of the Government other than the War Department will be addressed to The Adjutant General of the Army. Abstract questions will not be presented. (A. R. 788, 1913.) 298. Official communications that are sent to the office of The Adjutant General of the Army should be addressed to him and not through him to some other destination. While The Adjutant General can be relied upon to make proper disposition, subject to the direction of the Secretary of War, of any papers coming to his office, there is no objection to a request being included in any communication sent to his office that the paper be acted upon or disposed of in a specific way, but any such request should be embodied in the communication which should be addressed directly to The Adjutant General. Correspondents should not undertake, by addressing papers through The Adjutant General, to prescribe the disposition that shall be made of those papers after they reach him. That disposition must be left open for action by the Chief of Staff or the Secretary of War, or both. (Cir. 8, W. D., 1909.) 299. Communications, whether from a subordinate to a superior, or vice versa, will pass through intermediate commanders. This rule will not be interpreted as including matters in relation to which intermediate commanders can have no knowledge and over which they are not expected to exercise control. Chiefs of War Department bureaus are intermediate commanders between higher authority and the officers and enlisted men of their respective corps or departments, who are serving under the exclusive control of themselves and their subordinates. Verbal communications will be governed by the same rules as to channels as written communications. When necessity requires communications to be sent through other than the prescribed channel, the necessity therefor will be stated. Communications from superiors to subordinates will be answered through the same channel as received. (A. R. 783, 1913.) 300. Correspondence between an officer of a staff corps or department and the chief of the War Department bureau in which he is serving, which does not involve questions of administrative responsibility within the supervision of commanding officers outside that staff corps or department, nor relate to individual interests or status of a military nature requiring the action of authority outside that staff corps or department, and which is concerned exclusively with the business of that staff corps or department, will pass directly. All business emanating from the bureaus of the War Department requiring the action of higher authority will be submitted to the Chief of Staff for his consideration, either orally in person or in writing through The Adjutant General of the Army. In all cases the action of higher authority thereon will be communicated in writing by The Adjutant General of the Army to those concerned. Matters, however, of a purely civil nature will be submitted by chiefs of bureaus directly to the Secretary of War unless otherwise required by their subject matter. (A. R. 784, 1913.) 301. In order to facilitate public business pertaining to the Quartermaster Corps it is directed that all official communications relating to money or property accountability between officers of this corps, and all receipts, invoices, etc., sent by them, be addressed to the proper office rather than to the officer by name. 302. A commander or chief of bureau may communicate with those under his command or direction through a staff or other suitable officer. With all others he will himself make the communication. (A. R. 787, 1913.) 303. All correspondence and reports relating to the Coast Artillery Corps personnel or material will pass through coast defense command headquarters. (A. R. 305, 1913.) 304. Unimportant and trivial communications need not be forwarded to The Adjutant General of the Army simply because addressed to him. Department, brigade, and district commanders should decide whether a communication is of sufficient importance to be forwarded. (A. R. 789, 1913.) 305. Except as provided in paragraph 783, A. R. 1913 (par. 299), all communications, reports, and estimates from officers serving at a military post, and communications of every nature addressed to them relating to affairs of the post, will pass through the post commander. (A. R. 785, 1913.) 306. Officers who forward communications will indorse thereon their approval or disapproval, with remarks. No communication will be forwarded to the War Department by a department commander or other superior officer for the action of the Secretary of War without some recommendation or expression of opinion. (A. R. 786, 1913.) 307. In official correspondence between officers or between officers and officials of other branches of the public service, and especially in matters involving questions of jurisdiction, conflict of authority, or dispute, officers of the Army are reminded that their correspondence should be courteous in tone and free from any expression partaking of a personal nature or calculated to give offense. Whenever questions of such character shall arise between officers and officials of other branches of the public service, and it is found that they can not be reconciled by an interchange of courteous correspondence, the officer of the Army, as the representative of the interests of the War Department in the matter involved, will make a full presentation of the case to the Secretary of War through the proper military channels, in order that the same may be properly considered. (A. R. 790, 1913.) 308. In view of the leniency heretofore shown to officers who have failed to make prompt reply to official communications without satisfactory excuse for the delay, and in view of the fact that frequent complaints are still received of negligence in this respect, resulting in needless delay in the transaction of public business, it is deemed advisable at this time to caution all concerned that hereafter disciplinary measures will be resorted to in all cases of such neglect. When, in order to make proper reply, it is necessary to examine papers not at hand or to consult with other persons at a distance, or when for other sufficient reason full and prompt reply is impossible, acknowledgment of the receipt of the communication will be made at once, with a statement giving the cause of the anticipated delay. The commanding officer of every Army post and station will take such steps as he may deem expedient to insure prompt reply by officers of his command to official communications sent them which require reply. (Cir. 25, W. D., 1906.) 309. Copies of any records or papers in the War Department, in any of its bureaus, or in an office of any of the supply departments; or at the headquarters of an army, field army, division, brigade, or regiment; or of a territorial division, territorial department, or post, if authenticated by the impressed stamp of the bureau, office, or headquarters having custody of the originals (e. g., "The Adjutant General's Office, Official Copy"), may be admitted in evidence equally with the originals thereof before any military court, commission, or board, or in any administrative matter under the War Department. (G. O. 16, W. D., 1912.) 310. There are included in the number of printed circulars of the Quartermaster General's Office mailed from time to time to each department and other quartermasters sufficient to provide each clerk (civilian and enlisted) on duty in the respective offices with one copy of each of such circulars. These circulars when received should be distributed to clerks as above, and each clerk will be held responsible for the circulars furnished him. Clerks must familiarize themselves with the contents of the circulars and file same in proper numerical order in a suitable binder. Lack of knowledge on the part of clerks and other employees to whom circulars are furnished, or who have access to files of circulars, of the requirements of these circulars will be noted by the quartermaster against the efficiency rating of the employee concerned. When a clerk (civilian or enlisted) is transferred elsewhere for duty, he should take with him his file of circulars. When a clerk (civilian or enlisted) is separated from the service, the quartermaster in charge of the office in which the clerk is on duty at the time of his separation from the service will take possession of the file or files of circulars in the hands of said clerk. 311. All orders and circulars from the War Department, or from the headquarters of an army, field army, division, brigade, or territorial department in which the regiment may be serving, will be filed in book form, and general orders and circulars indexed as soon as received. (A. R. 259, 1913.) 312. Amendments to Army Regulations and other regulations and manuals of the War Department will be published in the future as "Changes" and will be furnished to those individuals and offices that have received copies of those publications. Copies of these changes will be securely inserted in the publication amended and will not be kept as a separate file by any office or individual. (G. O. 11, W. D., 1912.) 313. The use of colored inks, except as carmine or red ink is used in annotation, ruling, or compliance with specific instructions issued by the War Department on blank forms or otherwise, is prohibited in the records and correspondence of the Army. (A. R. 822, 1913.) 314. The preparation of muster rolls, pay rolls, inventories of effects, and certificates of disability for discharge on a typewriting machine is authorized, provided a black-record ribbon of standard quality is used, but carbon copies of such papers will not be forwarded to the War Department. Under no circumstances will discharge certificates and final statements be prepared on a typewriting machine. (Cir. 41, W. D., 1910.) 315. Sections 128 and 129 of the Federal Penal Code of March 4, 1909, prescribe penalties for the willful and unlawful concealment, removal, mutilation, obliteration, falsification, or destruction of any record, proceeding, map, book, document, paper, or other thing filed or deposited in any public office. (A. R. 823, 1913.) 316. Manuals issued by the staff departments and approved by the Secretary of War, when not in conflict with any of the provisions of these regulations or of orders or bulletins of the War Department, will have equal force therewith. (A. R. 1570, 1913.) 317. List of official publications of the War Department available for issue and sale to officers of the Army, organizations of the Army, Organized Militia and educational institutions; also list of private publications. (Bull. 12, W. D., 1916, as amended by G. O. 21, W. D., 1916.) CORRESPONDENCE. 318. Record of correspondence will be kept as prescribed in G. O. 92, W. D., 1909, by the office of the quartermaster at each permanent military post whose garrison exceeds two companies, except that in the Philippine Department the system will be extended only to the offices of the quartermaster of such of the larger posts as may be designated for the purpose by the department commander. (G. O. 3, W. D., 1912.) The correspondence book furnished by The Adjutant General of the Army prescribed in G. O. 109, W. D., 1906, will be kept in the office of the quartermaster of each permanent military post whose garrison is two companies or less. 319. A flat-filing system known as the War Department correspondence file has been adopted for use by the War Department in lieu of the system prescribed in G. O. 92, W. D., 1909, and will be installed throughout the service as funds become available. When a post or station has been designated to install the system, complete instruction for its installation, with "a subjective decimal classification with relative index for arranging and filing," will be furnished. LETTERS AND INDORSEMENTS. 320. An official letter should refer to one subject only. Letters of transmittal will be used only when necessary, and when used must refer only to the matter transmitted; none are required with rolls, returns, estimates, requisitions, or periodical reports. (A. R. 775, 1913.) |