Summary:
Confederate Colonel of Volunteers William Gilham writes from Staunton to
Assistant Adjutant George Deas in July, 1861, to announce his assumption of
command of troops at Staunton. Gilham reports on the orders given to the troops,
and urges that ammunition be sent quickly.
Lieut. Col. GEORGE DEAS, Assistant Adjutant-Gen.:
STAUNTON, VA.,
July 20, 1861.
COL.:
I have the honor to report that in obedience to orders received from the commanding general on yesterday I at once assumed command of the troops here. The Arkansas regiment, Col. Rust, left for Monterey soon after my arrival. This morning I dispatched my own regiment, the Twenty-first, and Col. Burks', the Forty-second, for the same point, and this afternoon the battalion of provisional troops, mounted. Capt. Marye's guns and harness are here. As soon after the arrival of the men and horses as possible the battery will join Gen. Jackson. I shall join my command at Buffalo Gap to-night. Our forces are all, or nearly all, at Monterey, I learn, and I am informed that there is some disorganization among them. I wish respectfully to call the attention of the commanding general to the facts that the quartermaster's and commissary supplies are inadequate to the demand, and that there is a great deficiency in ammunition. I consider it absolutely necessary that the requisitions for ammunition for the troops in this region should be filled at once.
I am, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant,
WILLIAM GILHAM,
Col. of Volunteers.
Bibliographic Information : Letter Reproduced from The War of The Rebellion: Official Records of the Union and Confederate Armies, Series 1, Volume 51, Serial No. 108, Pages 184, Broadfoot Publishing Company, Wilmington, NC, 1997.
