REPORT

OF

THE INSPECTOR-GENERAL.

WAR DEPARTMENT, INSPECTOR-GENERAL'S OFFICE,

Washington, D. C., October 11, 1875. SIR: I have the honor to report that the services performed by the officers of the Inspector-General's Department during the past year have been as follows:

Under the act of Congress approved April 20, 1874, frequent and scrutinizing inspections of the accounts of disbursing-officers of the Army have been made, and the necessity and economy of the expenditures, as well as their conformity with the laws appropriating the money, have been made subjects of critical investigation.

Inclosed herewith are the reports of the inspections made under the law above cited.

My own duties at the War Department have chiefly been confined to the supervision and direction of the affairs of the inspection branch of the service.

Inspectors-General Sacket, Schriver, Davis, and Hardie have been busily occupied during the year in making inspections and special investigations under the orders of the Secretary of War. They have inspected the Division of the Atlantic and the Departments of the Missouri, Texas, and Arizona, and their reports show that they have carefully and searchingly examined the personnel and matériel of the Army at all the remote and widely dispersed posts, stations, and depots within the limits of their inspections.

Besides these, other minor inspections and investigations have, from time to time, been made by these officers, thus occupying all their time and involving voluminous reports, which have been made without the expenditure of a dollar for clerical assistance.

The inspectors-general report, as they have done in previous inspections, that the commanders of the departments rendered great assistance to them in the execution of their duties by directing that the most ample facilities should be afforded them to investigate every branch of the service at all the posts and stations within their respective commands. The inspectors' reports also show that the officers generally gladly availed themselves of the opportunity afforded by the inspectors' visits to ask instruction relative to the correct interpretation of doubtful points of law, regulations, and orders, and upon other mooted questions regarding the proper performance of military duties; and it seems to me reasonable to presume that the extended and diversified experience of these officers, both in the staff and line of the Army, eminently qualify them to give suitable answers to questions of this character, as well as

sound advice and instruction to young and inexperienced officers. This, besides promoting social harmony, has doubtless tended to produce uniformity in the manner of performing military duty in different departments and localities, and will unquestionably fortify and encourage zealous and competent officers in their action, and thus greatly conduce to the discipline and efficiency of the Army.

The three assistant inspectors-general, Lieut. Cols. R. Jones and A. Baird and Maj. E. H. Ludington, have been attached to the headquarters of the Military Divisions of the Pacific, Missouri, and Atlantic, respectively, and have been engaged in the performance of the duties connected with their offices under the orders of the generals commanding the divisions. They have also, under the orders of the Secretary of War, inspected the accounts of some of the officers disbursing money within the divisions and not subject to the orders of the divisioncommanders.

The following-named officers are now serving as acting assistant inspectors-general: Lieut. Col. E. S. Otis, Twenty-second Infantry; Lieut. Col. C. Grover, Third Cavalry; Maj. A. W. Evans, Third Cavalry, and Capt. G. B. Russell, Ninth Infantry, and attached, respectively, to the headquarters of the Departments of Dakota, the Platte, Arizona, and the Gulf.

EMPLOYMENT OF SOLDIERS AS SERVANTS.

The inspections made during the past year have shown the necessity for some legislation upon a matter alluded to in my last annual report, and which seems to me of such manifest importance to the best interests of the service, that I venture again to invite your attention to the subject by quoting from that report:

The employment of servants for officers stationed at remote military posts in the Indian and mining districts of our country is worthy of attention, and seems to demand early legislation. Section 14 of the act of July 15, 1870, makes it "unlawful for any officer to use any enlisted man as a servant in any case whatever." Before this enactment the Army Regulations permitted an officer, when serving with his company, to take a soldier as waiter, (with his consent,) and the soldier thus employed was so reported and mustered, with a view to having his pay and allowances charged to the officer employing him.

Soldiers thus serving were required to be equipped in every respect according to the rules of the service, and to attend reviews, inspections, drills, &c., and many soldiers preferred this service to doing guard and other military duty.

Since the prohibitory enactment, frequent emergencies have occurred where it has been absolutely impossible for officers to hire civilian servants at any price, and they have been driven to the alternative of performing servant's work themselves and neglecting their appropriate duties, or violating the law by using the voluntary labor of soldiers. Even when officers, in their efforts to avoid this, have engaged servants in the Eastern States and transferred them, at an expense they could illy afford, to their remote stations, in most cases they soon found themselves destitute, as the servants would leave for positions more remunerative than the officers could offer. Moreover, it often occurs that fear prevents civilian servants from accompanying officers ordered to posts or going upon expeditions in the vicinity of hostile Indians.

Besides, many have declined going to places where they were debarred the usual pleasures of civilized life, so that it is seldom that a civilian servant can be induced to remain any great length of time at any of our frontier stations.

It would be a violation of the law if a commissioned officer employed and paid an enlisted man who, with his own consent in the intervals of military duty, performed servant's work for him. The officer must therefore, when he cannot procure the services of a civilian, either feed, groom, and attend to his own horse, cook his own meals, wash his own linen, black his own boots, and perform all other necessary servant's work, which would leave him but little time to attend to the care of his men and other military duties, or he must take upon himself the consequences of violating the law. If deemed necessary, further arguments might be adduced to prove the expediency and, indeed, necessity, for legislation which will, under certain circumstances and proper regulations, authorize the employment of soldiers as servants by officers, as is now allowed in almost every other army where the necessity is not so urgent as in ours.

Officers serving at comfortable stations within the settlements where servants can we hired at moderate wages are not affected by this law; but it is those who are doing duty in remote localities, performing the rough work of campaigning in the hostile Indian districts, that suffer from it, and complaints of their inability to secure civilian servants are very general.

A repeal of the law before cited would doubtless meet the exigencies of the service at this time, by placing the subject where it formerly was, when no evil was known to result from the working of the system.

LAUNDRESSES.

The law of the 16th March, 1802, in regard to laundresses (which is still in force) says: "Women may be allowed to accompany troops as laundresses, in number not exceeding four to a company ;" and the Army Regulations authorize one laundress to every nineteen, or fraction of nineteen, enlisted men.

Under the existing organization our Army is allowed upward of 1,316 laundresses, who are amply compensated for all the work they perform by the enlisted men. Besides, each one draws a daily ration, at an aggregate cost to the Government of over $100,000 per annum. Moreover, quarters and fuel are furnished them, and a large amount of transportation whenever the troops are moved.

It has often been said (and I think with a great deal of truth) that the baggage of four laundresses, with their children, generally amounts to more than that of all the enlisted men of the company; so that I think I am within the scope of reason in estimating the annual expense to the Government of the 1,316 Army laundresses at about $200,000. There is no doubt but that they are a great incumbrance to troops when changing station; and as they and their children cannot be transported with troops serving in the field, they must suffer by being left behind at posts without their husbands, when they would not generally be entitled to quarters, fuel, or rations.

In view of the limited appropriations made by Congress for barracks and quarters during the past three years, it has been found impracticable to furnish comfortable or even habitable quarters for laundresses at many posts, and they and their children have suffered in consequence. In consideration of the facts above stated, it is believed that a material reduction, if not the entire abolition, of laundresses would be a measure of economy, expediency, and humanity.

As it would certainly be a virtual breach of faith to at once discharge those laundresses whose husbands enlisted upon the condition that their wives were to accompany them and receive the allowances of laundresses, I would respectfully recommend that no more married men be allowed to enlist in time of peace, and that, at the expiration of the terms of service of those soldiers whose wives are authorized laundresses, they only be re-enlisted in exceptional cases, such as meritorious non-commissioned officers or especially deserving private soldiers. In this manner a reduction of one-half or the whole number of laundresses could be made without injustice to any one.

In the opinion of many experienced line-officers, all the laundresses might with great advantage to the service be dispensed with, and their places supplied by each soldier doing his own washing, or by colored or white men being enlisted and adequately compensated for this especial service, or by details from the troops, which has occasionally been done in our Army, and is the universal practice in almost every European service except the English. Our soldiers are regularly detailed to cook for the companies, and in the field they wash their own clothes; so do miners, surveyors, and explorers, and they do not look upon it as any great hardship.

HISTORICAL POST-RECORD.

It is a singular fact that, aside from the few official items contained in the archives of the War Department, the only information we have of the early history of our old military posts is derived from personal reminiscences or vague tradition.

An officer assigned to the command of a military post finds on his arrival no record showing when, why, or by whom it was established, who have been its commanders, or any other reliable facts in its history. This serious omission ought, in my judgment, to be corrected at once, by requiring a historical-record book to be kept at every military post, under the exclusive charge of its commander, whose duty it should be to enter therein every event of importance occurring within the scope of his command; this book to be turned over by each commander to his successor, and not to be removed from the post unless it is abandoned, and then to be forwarded to the Adjutant-General for file in the War Department. Such a book, properly kept, would afford easily accessible and reliable information regarding the special services of troops and their results. It would also exhibit a catalogue of errors, if any had been committed, which might serve to prevent their recurrence; these, with numerous other items of record, would be important for subsequent reference.

The military significance and value of such a record will be apparent to every experienced officer, and it would not be devoid of interest to those civilians who appreciate the importance of the rapid settlement and development of the resources of the West. A faithful delineation of the stirring events at those frontier posts whose garrisons have furnished the vanguards which confronted and drove back the hordes of hostile savages that opposed the advance of the tidal wave of emigration, enabling it to sweep across the continent with a momentum as irresistible as that of the Gulf Stream, must in the future possess great historic import. Who, for example, would not read with intense interest a properly authenticated narrative of the scenes that transpired in the early history of old Fort Dearborn, which once occupied the ground where the great city of Chicago now stands? And many would be equally interested in an accurate history of Forts Mackinac, Howard, Crawford, Snelling, and other posts that have figured conspicuously in the early settlement of the West. But up to this time no such record has been kept.

TRANSPORTATION.

In an Army like ours, dispersed in small detachments to garrison military posts scattered at wide intervals throughout extensive districts of unpopulated territory, affording but few military supplies, it becomes necessary to transport everything needful from remote furnishing depots to the places of consumption.

This, in sections like Arizona, New Mexico, Montana, Oregon, and other places where there are no railroad or water communications, involves the use of an immense amount of wagon-transportation, which, in passing over arid plains and rough natural roads, is rapidly consumed.

The teamsters, hostlers, herders, &c., for this means of transportation, for the most part, are soldiers detailed from the line, often without any knowledge of the work, and against their wishes; but as the appropriations are inadequate to the employment of citizens, these details are unavoidable.