Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1862-12-25
Another Letter from Lieut.. General
f Scott. 0 ~

0OOtts
To Ms Editors ofthe National Hrte,sqercer.
An official report Of mine made to Presi-
dent Lincoln, March 80, 1861, on our South
ern forts, was published on the 2lst OF Oc
tober last To this ex President Buchanan
replied al great length, in the same month,
A short rejoinder from me followed early IN
November, and here is another paper from
Mr.. Buchanan, dated the lIth Of the same
month, aad on the same subject. a priei
notice OF this paper shall terminate my part
/ in this controversy. aaf
Mr.. Buchanan has intimated that have
been actuatod by feeling Of personal i'll
will toward him. This isuDjust. had no
private resentment to crafty. On the von-
trary, | have we'll remembered the many
Official eourtesios received fro II him as well
as from Me-. Floyd, both as Governor Of
| Virginia and Secretary Of War; but TO vim
dicate Justice and the truth OF history Is a
paramount obligation.
had said thai, with view of the medi..
tated rebellion, Secretary Floyd had ordered
| $4,000 extras stands OF mu.kets and rifles
from Northern repositories to Southern
Arsenals. To this Mr.. Buchanan now ro-
plies in substance That the transfers
were made under an order dated nearly
year before Mr. Lincoln's election to the
Presidency. True; but il Mr.. Buchanan
has persuaded himself that the revolt hadnot
been long before planned, dependent on the
election of any northern man, it is not like
ly that he viii ever make q second convert
to that opinion. 2. He only gives l05, 900
as the number Of arms transferred, omittiDg
tho 10000 rifles. 3. He says that the mus
ksts (l0o,0O0) were condemned, and that
purchasers could not be found for many Of
Al hnro "a off
cial statement, made to me eighteen months
ago tiust received from my papers at
w ashington,) showing 95,O0D Uf those arms
wsro percussion" with 10000 ''percussi, n
rife mot one of the ll5,000. was ever
''conlemncd," but all precisely like niost Of
, the swall arms issued to our troops, frog
ular and volunteer in 1851. A. Mr. Buol.-
auan ntimates that those ARMS were trans
: ferred to equaliEe, in some degree. the
deposit among the different States, as il
J. these had any State pride in allowing storage
r to the property of the United States with
? in thoir particular limits If 80, why nst
establish storage places in the great States
of Ohio, Indiana aud Illinois, within which
{ the United States has had no deposit oil
J, arms and no arsenal2 8. Mr.. Buchanan
. supposss me to brand the transferred arm.
with the epithet stolen. In my rejondel
y TO him | nowhere use that term, because
o knew the transaction, though very quietly
a conducted, was officially recorded, and the
freight paid for by the United States
whose property the arms continued to b
= in their new repositories.
Mr.. Buchanan mixes up--perhaps ough
n rather to say seems to confound-quite
" different class of arms with the foregoing
=, viz, the quotas Of arms distributed amonI
" H.. ,,nln, kka
u priations toward arming the whole body O
st the militia of the Union. Thus he says
,r "The Southern States received in 1860 les
instead of more than the quotas Of arms I
[, which they are entitled by law" This i
IL strange contrasted with information give
3, TO me last year, with from telegram jus
81 received from Washington and high OF
a ficer-not of the Ordnance Bureau
these words and figures . Va
oi "Rhode Island, Delaware and Texas ha
not drawn at the end of sightcen.sixi
v, (l860) their annual quota of arms for thi
:; year. and Massachusetts,, Tennessee ON
;, Kentucky only In part; Virginia, Sout
d. Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mi
n sissippi and Kansss were by the order
% the Secretary Of War, supplied with the
a. quota tor eighteen sixty.ons (l86l) in az
vance, and Pennsylvania aud Maryland
'" part. Ett e of
sy This adpance of arms to eight Souther
States is q sufficient commentary by itse
al on the transfer, about the same time, Of Il
lis, 900 muskets and rifles.
70 In respect to the heavy cannon ordore
ny from Pittsburg to the Gulf Of Mexico, nj
,r, Buchanan has shown me that was in err
an in saying that their shipmsnt was counts
80 manded in March instead Of January, 1856
u' This was the only immaterial part of II
th statement, for was correct in the deciar
ton that gave information to Mr.. Seer
nd tary Holt that the shipment had comme
ced, and that he ordered the guns to be i
landed, and stopped the robbery.
WINPIELD SCOTT
NEw YoRK, Dec 2, 1862. sl
"s sover and ubove the previous and usual deposits