l inquiry
satisfying myself of the truth, and perhaps cannot give an
intelligent explanation better than by quoting the report itself,
for its tone shows the sort of annoyance I felt, and it exhibits
some of the conditions of an army command involving administrative
duties that were far from pleasant.

I said: "The document is in the handwriting of B. F. Smith, Esq., U.
S. District Attorney, residing here, though signed only by John
Slack, Jr., and William Kelly; the former an acting deputy U. S.
marshal, the latter the jailer at the county jail. Its composition
is so peculiar that it is difficult to tell what part of the
statement is Slack's or Kelly's and what is Colonel Smith's, and
therefore I do not know whom to hold responsible for the
misstatements contained in it.

"Mr. Slack is a respectable young man, who I believe would do his
duty as far as he understands it, but who has not energy enough to
keep him from being the tool of others. Mr. Kelly, the jailer, is
sufficiently described when I state the fact that he has attempted
to add to his profits as turnkey by selling bad whisky to soldiers
put in his calaboose, at the rate of five dollars per pint bottle.
Mr. Smith, the District Attorney, has lost no opportunity of being
annoying to the military officers here, since the controversy about
the negro man captured from his son, Major Isaac Smith of the rebel
army. This reference to the parties concerned is necessary to enable
the commanding general to understand the _animus_ of their
complaints.

"The facts are substantially as follows: Henry H. Hopkins is a
notorious Secessionist living near Coal River, and a man of
considerable property. Some time before his arrest he sent the negro
man mentioned in the complaint _South_, in charge of some Logan
County 'bushwhackers.' On his way and in McDowell County the man
managed to escape and returned into Hopkins's neighborhood, near
Boone C. H., where he took his wife and three children alleged to
have been the property of a woman named Smoot, and brought them to
this post. Upon his representation that he had escaped from armed
rebels in McDowell County, and without further knowledge of the
facts, the Post Quartermaster set him at work. About the 19th of
February Hopkins came to town with Mrs. Smoot, and without notice to
the quartermaster or any color of authority by any civil process,
procured the aid of Kelly, the jailer, seized the negro and took him
to Wright's