u now, clearly and unequivocally, that such
measure of treatment as you mete out to Federal soldiers will be
measured to you again.

If you give no quarter, you need expect none. If you observe the
rules of civilized warfare, and treat our prisoners in accordance
with the laws of war, your prisoners will be treated, as they
ever have been, with kindness.

If you depart from these principles, you may expect such
retaliation as the laws of war justify.

That you may know what the laws of war are, as understood by my
Government, I beg leave to enclose a copy of General Orders No.
100 from the War Department Adjutant-General's Office,
Washington, April twenty-four, 1863.

I have the honor to be, sir,
Very respectfully yours,
C. C. WASHBURN, _Major-General_.

GENERAL LEE TO GENERAL WASHBURN.

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT ALABAMA, MISSISSIPPI, AND }
EAST LOUISIANA, MERIDIAN, June 28, 1864. }

Major-General C. C. WASHBURN, _Commanding Federal Forces at
Memphis, Tennessee_:

GENERAL: I am in receipt of your letter of the seventeenth inst.,
and have also before me the reply of Major-General Forrest
thereto. Though that reply is full, and approved by me, yet I
deem it proper to communicate with you upon a subject so
seriously affecting our future conduct and that of the troops
under our respective commands.

Your communication is by no means respectful to me, and is by
implication insulting to Major-General Forrest. This, however, is
overlooked in consideration of the important character of its
contents.

You assume as correct an exaggerated statement of the
circumstances attending the capture of Fort Pillow, relying
solely upon the evidence of those who would naturally give a
distorted history of the affair.

No demand for an explanation has ever been made either by
yourself or your government, a course which would certainly
recommend itself to every one desirous of hearing truth; but, on
the contrary, you seem to have been perfectly willing to allow
your soldiers to labor under false impressions upon a subject
involving such terrible consequences. Even the formality of
parades and oaths have been resorted to for the p