vernor of this State, rendering such aid as I could in the
organization of our State militia, and am still engaged in that
capacity. A letter addressed to me at Springfield, Illinois, will reach
me.

I am very respectfully, Your obt. svt., U. S. GRANT.

This letter failed to elicit an answer from the Adjutant-General of the
Army. I presume it was hardly read by him, and certainly it could not
have been submitted to higher authority. Subsequent to the war General
Badeau having heard of this letter applied to the War Department for a
copy of it. The letter could not be found and no one recollected ever
having seen it. I took no copy when it was written. Long after the
application of General Badeau, General Townsend, who had become
Adjutant-General of the Army, while packing up papers preparatory to the
removal of his office, found this letter in some out-of-the-way place.
It had not been destroyed, but it had not been regularly filed away.

I felt some hesitation in suggesting rank as high as the colonelcy of a
regiment, feeling somewhat doubtful whether I would be equal to the
position. But I had seen nearly every colonel who had been mustered in
from the State of Illinois, and some from Indiana, and felt that if they
could command a regiment properly, and with credit, I could also.

Having but little to do after the muster of the last of the regiments
authorized by the State legislature, I asked and obtained of the
governor leave of absence for a week to visit my parents in Covington,
Kentucky, immediately opposite Cincinnati. General McClellan had been
made a major-general and had his headquarters at Cincinnati. In reality
I wanted to see him. I had known him slightly at West Point, where we
served one year together, and in the Mexican war. I was in hopes that
when he saw me he would offer me a position on his staff. I called on
two successive days at his office but failed to see him on either
occasion, and returned to Springfield.

CHAPTER XVIII.

APPOINTED COLONEL OF THE 21ST ILLINOIS--PERSONNEL OF THE REGIMENT
--GENERAL LOGAN--MARCH TO MISSOURI--MOVEMENT AGAINST HARRIS AT FLORIDA,
MO.--GENERAL POPE IN COMMAND--STATIONED AT MEXICO, MO.

While I was absent from the State capital on this occasion the
President's second call for troops was issued. This time it was for
300,000 men, for three years or the war. This brought into the United
States service all the regiments then in the State service