Sir: In obedience to your request I have the honor to submit my advice as to the course you should take upon the memorandum or basis of agreement made on the 18th inst. by and between
General J. E. Johnston, of the
Confederate States Army, and
Major-General W. T. Sherman, of the United States Army, provided that paper shall receive the approval of the
Government of the
United States.
The principal army of the
Confederacy was recently lost in
Virginia.
Considerable bodies of troops not attached to that army have either disbanded or marched toward their homes, accompanied by many of their officers.
Five days ago the effective force, in infantry and artillery, of
General Johnston's army was but fourteen thousand seven hundred and seventy men, and it continues to diminish.
That officer thinks it wholly impossible for him to make any head against the overwhelming forces of the enemy.
Our ports are closed, and the sources of foreign supply lost to us. The enemy occupy all or the greater part of
Missouri,
Kentucky,
Tennessee,
Virginia, and
North Carolina, and move almost at will through the other States to the east of the
Mississippi.
They have recently taken
Selma,
Montgomery,
Columbus,
Macon, and other important towns, depriving us of large depots of supplies and of munitions of war. Of the small force still at command, many are unarmed, and the Ordnance Department can not furnish five thousand stand of small arms.
I do not think it would be possible to assemble, equip, and maintain an army of thirty thousand men at any point east of the
Mississippi River.
