now depend on events in front of Washington and in Kentucky.  The gunboat Eastport and four transports loaded with prisoners of war destined for Vicksburg have been lying before Memphis for two days, but are now steaming up to resume their voyage.  Our fort progresses well, but our guns are not yet mounted.  The engineers are now shaping the banquette to receive platforms.  I expect Captain Prime from Corinth in two or three days.

I am, with great respect, yours,

W. T. SHERMAN, Major-General commanding.

HEADQUARTERS FIFTH DIVISION MEMPHIS, TENNESSEE, September 21, 1862

Editor Bulletin.

SIR:  Your comments on the recent orders of Generals Halleck and McClellan afford the occasion appropriate for me to make public the fact that there is a law of Congress, as old as our Government itself, but reenacted on the 10th of April, 1806, and in force ever since.  That law reads: 

“All officers and soldiers are to behave themselves orderly in quarters and on the march; and whoever shall commit any waste or spoil, either in walks of trees, parks, warrens, fish-ponds, houses and gardens, cornfields, inclosures or meadows, or shall maliciously destroy any property whatever belonging to the inhabitants of the United States, unless by order of the commander-in-chief of the armies of said United States, shall (besides such penalties as they are liable to by law) be punished according to the nature and degree of the offense, by the judgment of a general or regimental court-martial.”

Such is the law of Congress; and the orders of the commander-in-chief are, that officers or soldiers convicted of straggling and pillaging shall be punished with death.  These orders have not come to me officially, but I have seen them in newspapers, and am satisfied that they express the determination of the commander-in-chief.  Straggling and pillaging have ever been great military crimes; and every officer and soldier in my command knows what stress I have laid upon them, and that, so far as in my power lies, I will punish them to the full extent of the law and orders.

The law is one thing, the execution of the law another.  God himself has commanded:  “Thou shalt not kill,” “thou shalt not steal,” “thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s goods,” etc.  Will any one say these things are not done now as well as before these laws were announced at Sinai.  I admit the law to be that “no officer or soldier of the United States shall commit waste or destruction of cornfields, orchards, potato-patches, or any kind of pillage on the property of friend or foe near Memphis,” and that I stand prepared to execute the law as far as possible.