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you may leave the city with no fear that your house will be interfered with by any exercise of military right; but will be safe under the laws of the United States.
Trusting that the inexorable logic of events will convict you of wrong toward your country, when all else has failed, I remain, etc.
Mrs. Slocomb acknowledged the favor:--
Permit me to return my sincere thanks for the special permit to leave, which you have so kindly granted to myself and family, as also for the protection promised to my property.
Knowing that we have no claim for any exception in our favor, this generous act calls loudly upon our grateful hearts; and hereafter, while praying earnestly for the cause we love so much, we shall never forget the liberality with which our request has been granted by one whose power here reminds us painfully that our enemies are more magnanimous than our citizens are brave.
Very respectfully, your obedient servant,
I may without offence give other transactions: Soon after landing in the city I proposed to furnish my officers with the houses of the officers of the
Confederate service, for their use as quarters, and I ordered therefore the seizure of those houses.
A staff officer reported to me that he had seized the residence of
General Beauregard, finding his wife and I think a sister alone occupying it. I was not acquainted with the general or his family, but I directed the house to be released, and to prevent intrusion upon the family, I put a sentinel at the door for a short time until matters got settled.
It also happened that when I issued an order to confiscate all the money of the
Confederate officers and of the
Confederacy in the New Orleans banks, among the returns was the sum of five hundred dollars in the
Louisiana Bank left by
General Beauregard as a deposit for the use of his family.
This I allowed to remain at their disposal.
That is, I tried to do, not as I was done by, but as I would be.
Order No. 55, levying assessments upon the subscribers to the “city defence fund,” was to relieve the poor of the city.
I found it necessary as a part of that relief to subscribe in support of the hospitals.
In the case of the
St. Elizabeth Hospital I subscribed five
