The discipline of General Earls Army — excellent Orders from the General Commanding.
The disaster (if it may be called so,) of Cedar creek will eventually prove a blessing to the Army of the Valley. No more victories are to be thrown away by demoralized plunderers, and the organization of the army itself is to be so changed that the troops will be more compact and wieldy. Already several skeleton regiments and brigades have been consolidated, which cannot fail to prove an excellent step. The apple brandy question also receives some attention in the following orders, which are furnished us by our correspondent with General Early's army:Headquarters Valley District,
October 25, 1864.
General Orders, No. 44.
- I. Officers commanding divisions, brigades, regiments, battalions and companies, will at once take steps to improve the discipline of their commands, and for this purpose the following rules will be rigidly observed:
1st. No officer or soldier will be allowed to absent himself from his camp without written permission approved by his division commander, or in the artillery by the chief of artillery; and no such permission will be granted for a greater length of time than six hours. All permissions to be absent for a greater length of time must be approved at these headquarters.
2d. Patrols will be organized in each camp to arrest all stragglers; and whenever men are found absent from their camps on permits not approved as above provided, they will be arrested, the permits taken away and sent to the proper division commander, or the headquarters of the artillery, and the officers granting such permits will be arrested and tried on charges for disobedience of orders.
3d. There will be four roll calls each day in camp, to wit: At 6 A. M., Noon, 5 P. M. and 9 P. M., which roll calls must be attended by all company officers, and superintended by the commandants of regiments or a field officer from each regiment; and no company officer or soldier, absent without proper authority from either of said roll calls, will be allowed to draw rations for the next draw day, and all provision returns must be made to conform to this provision, and the absentees will be otherwise punished.
On marches, the rolls of companies will be called on the formation of the command, at the close of the march, and repeatedly during the march when the column halts to rest, and the names of absentees noted, and the same rule will be observed in regard to absentees as to drawing rations an punishments.
4th. All plunder or property of any kind, gotten by officers or soldiers on the battle-field or from the enemy, will be taken from them and turned over to the quartermaster of the army.
All property of every kind captured in battle, or from the enemy, legitimately belongs to the Government. No officer or soldier has the right to appropriate to himself, or his particular command, any kind of property so captured, because he happens to find it first, and for him to do so is a great wrong to his comrades.
The man who continues to fight the enemy is the captor, and not he who stops to gather booty. In future all such appropriation is forbidden, and all persons making it will be brought to trial.
5th. The names of all officers and men who stop to plunder, or who throw away their arms or otherwise misbehave before the enemy, will be punished by publication in the papers of the State to which they belong, and they will be tried under the fifty-second article of war. - II. Division commanders will cause to be made out lists of all officers and men who stopped to plunder, threw away their arms, or otherwise misbehaved in the recent battle on Cedar creek, in order that their names may be published in the newspapers of their States; and charges will be preferred in the most flagrant cases, especially against officers guilty of such misconduct. The lost arms will be charged in every case to the men who have thrown them away.
- III.
All horses and mules captured, and all other property — whether sutlers' goods or public property — taken from the battle-field and not appropriated, will be turned over to the chief quartermaster and commissary of this army; and where it has been appropriated, each article will be valued under the direction of the chief quartermaster or commissary, and charged to the officers or men to whose use it has been appropriated.
This will apply to all camp and garrison equipage, wearing apparel of every description — including boots, shoes, and all other commissary and sutlers' goods of every description; but horses and mules will be taken from the persons having them in possession, whether appropriated or not.
Special Orders, No. 45. All spirituous liquors brought to the camp or the vicinity of this army, for the purposes of sale or barter, will be seized and turned over to the medical department without compensation to the owner; and all distilleries in the neighborhood will be closed.--Division commanders will see to the execution of this order.
