The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1862-08-15
Pope and his Officers Out
laWed.
THREATENED WITH HANGING.
NOT ENTITLED TO EXCHANGE
IF TAKEN PRISONERS.
IF UNARNIED REBELS ARE KILLED
THEY WILL BE HUNG,
The War Growing Sanguinary.

Dispatch of Monday, the 4th, says day of
retribution is at hand for the outrages
which have 80 long characterized the con
duct OF the enemy in their prosecution of
tia war.
Adjutant and Inspector Generals Office,
Richmond, August l. 1862.
GENERAL ORDER NO. 81.
l. That the following orders are publish
Ell for the information and observance of all
concerned.
Whereas, By General Order dated the
22i of July, 1862, issued by the Secretary
of War of the United States, under the
order of the President of the United States,
the military commanders of that govern
ment within the States of Virginia, South
Carolina, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi,
Louisiana, Texas and Arkansas, are direct
ed to seize and use any property, real or
personal, belonging to the inhabitants of
this Confederacy which may be necessary
or convenient for their several command
ers, and no proposition is made for any
compensation to the owners of such private
property seized and appropriated by the
military commanders of the enemy.
3. Whereas, by General Order No.
IL, issued on the 23d of July, 1862, by
Major General Pope, commanding the forces
OF ths enemy in Northern Virginia, it is
ordered that all commanders Of any army
corps, divisions, brigades, and detached
commands, will proceed Immediately to ar
rest all disloyal male citizens within their
limits or within their reach, in the rear of
their respective commands. Such as are
willing to take the oath of allegiance to the
United States, and will furnish sufficient
security for its observance, shall be per-
mitted to remain at their homes, and pursue
in good faith their accustomed avocations.
Those who refuse shall be conducted south,
beyond the extreme pickets of this army.
and be notified that, if found again in the
rear, they will be considered as spies and
subjected to the extreme rigor of military
law. If any person, having taken the oath
as above specified, be found to have violated
it. he shall be shot, and bis property seized
and appropriated to the public USE"
4. Whereas, by an order issued on the
18th of July, 1862, by Brigadier General
"A. Steinweihr, Major William Stedman, a
cavalry officer of his brigade, has been Or
dered to arrest five of the most prominent
citizens of Page county, Virginia, to be held
as hostages, and to suffer death in the event
of any of the soldiers of said Steinweibr's
brigade being shot by" bushwhackers )" by
which term is meant the citizens of the
Confederate States of America who have
taken up arms to defend their homes and
families.
5. 1t results from the above orders that
some of the military authorities of the
United States, not content with the unjust
and aggressive warfare hitherto waged with
savage cruelty against an unoffending peo-
pie, and exasperated by the failure OF their
efforts to s1bjugate them, have now deter~
mined to violate all the rules and usages of
war aud to divert hostilities hitherto waged
against armed forces, into campaign of
robbery and murder against unarmed citi.
zens and peaceful tllers of the soil.
6 Whereas this Government, bound by
the highest obligations of duty to its citi
zens, is thus driven to the necessity OF
adopting such just measures of retribution
as shall seem adequate to repress and pun
ish these barbarities.
Whereas the orders above recited have
only been published and made known to
this government since the signature of
cartel for the exchange of prisoners of war
which cartel, in so far as it provides for an
exchange of prisoners hereafter captured,
would never have been signed or agreed
to by the government if the inten-
ton to change this war into system of in
discriminate murder and robbery had been
made known to it.
Whereas, A just regard to humanity for
bids that the repression of crime which this
Government is thus compelled to enforce
should be unnecessarily extended to retal:a-
ton on those enlisted in the army of the
United States, who may be unwilling in
struments of the savage cruelty of their
commanders, so long as there is hope that
the excuses of the army may be checked or
prevented by retrlbution on the commission
ed officers, who have the power to avoid the
guilty action, by refusing service under a
Government which seeks their aid in the
preparation of such infamous bsrbarities;
9TH. Therefore it is ordered, That Major
General Pope, Brigadier General Stem.