military operations issued
by the President or Secretary of War will be issued through the
General of the Army.

JOHN A. RAWLINS, Secretary of War.

By command of General SHERMAN:

E. D. TOWNSEND, Assistant Adjutant-General.

Thus we were thrown back on the old method in having a double--if
not a treble-headed machine. Each head of a bureau in daily
consultation with the Secretary of War, and the general to command
without an adjutant, quartermaster, commissary, or any staff except
his own aides, often reading in the newspapers of military events
and orders before he could be consulted or informed. This was the
very reverse of what General Grant, after four years' experience in
Washington as general-in-chief, seemed to want, different from what
he had explained to me in Chicago, and totally different from the
demand he had made on Secretary of War Stanton in his complete
letter of January 29, 1866. I went to him to know the cause: He
said he had been informed by members of Congress that his action,
as defined by his order of March 5th, was regarded as a violation
of laws making provision for the bureaus of the War Department;
that he had repealed his own orders, but not mine, and that he had
no doubt that General Rawlins and I could draw the line of
separation satisfactorily to us both. General Rawlins was very
conscientious, but a very sick man when appointed Secretary of War.
Several times he made orders through the adjutant-general to
individuals of the army without notifying me, but always when his
attention was called to it he apologized, and repeatedly said to me
that he understood from his experience on General Grant's staff how
almost insulting it was for orders to go to individuals of a
regiment, brigade, division, or an army of any kind without the
commanding officer being consulted or even advised. This habit is
more common at Washington than any place on earth, unless it be in
London, where nearly the same condition of facts exists. Members
of Congress daily appeal to the Secretary of War for the discharge
of some soldier on the application of a mother, or some young
officer has to be dry-nursed, withdrawn from his company on the
plains to be stationed near home. The Secretary of War, sometimes
moved by private reasons, or more likely to oblige the member of
Congress, grants the order, of which the commanding general knows
nothing till he reads it in the newspapers. Also, an Indian tribe,