peaceful citizens as spies, if found quietly tilling their farms in his rear, even outside of his lines.
And one of his Brigadier-Generals, Steinwehr, has seized innocent and peaceful inhabitants to be held as hostages, to the end that they may be murdered in cold blood if any of his soldiers are killed by some unknown persons, whom he designated as "bushwhackers."
Some of the military authorities of the United States seem to suppose that their end will be better attained by a savage war, in which no quarter is to be given and no age or sex to be spared, than by such hostilities as are alone recognized to be lawful in modern times. We find ourselves driven by our enemies, by steady progress, towards a practice which we abhor, and which we are vainly struggling to avoid.
Under these circumstances this Government has issued the accompanying general order, which I am directed by the President to transmit to you, recognizing Major-General Pope and his commissioned officers to be in a position which they have chosen for themselves—that of robbers and murderers, and not that of public enemies, entitled, if captured, to be treated as prisoners of war.
The President also instructs me to inform you that we renounce our right of retaliation on the innocent, and will continue to treat the private enlisted soldiers of General Pope's army as prisoners of war; but if, after notice to your Government that we confine repressive measures to the punishment of commissioned officers, who are willing participants in these crimes, the savage practices threatened in the orders alluded to, be persisted in, we shall reluctantly be forced to the last resort of accepting the war on the terms chosen by our enemies, until the voice of an outraged humanity shall compel a respect for the recognized usages of war.
While the President considers that the facts referred to would justify a refusal on our part to execute the cartel, by which we have agreed to liberate an excess of prisoners of war in our hands, a sacred regard for plighted faith, which shrinks from the semblance of breaking a promise, precludes a resort to such an extremity. Nor is it his desire to extend to any other forces of the United States the punishment merited by General Pope and such commissioned officers as choose to participate in the execution of his infamous orders.
I have the honor to be, very respectfully your obedient servant,
General Commanding.
Richmond, August 1, 1862.
General Orders, No. 54.
I. The following orders are published for the information and observance of all concerned:
II. Whereas, by a general order, dated the 22d July, 1862, issued
