| Camp Wharton |
| December 27, 1863 |
| |
| Col. James Duff |
| |
| Colonel, |
| I am instructed by
Major-General Magruder to acknowledge the receipt of your
communications of December 26, &c., 4.30 and 8.30 p.m. The
orders directing you to move your command, excepting two companies
of State troops, east of the Colorado, should the enemy land at Tres
Palacios, or any point on Matagorda Bay between that place and
Matagorda, are, of course, under the present circumstances, not to
be carried out. Your forces will be held sufficiently near the enemy
to be thrown by you to any part to prevent his advance beyond
Lavaca. The tardiness in destroying the railroad may have induced
him to advance for the purpose of getting possession of the track. |
| You are directed to allow nothing whatever to
prevent you from destroying at once the whole of the track to
Victoria, burning the ties, and utterly destroying the iron,
coaches, flats, &c. Should Judge Wheeler interpose any obstacle
or resort to any device to prevent the immediate destruction of
everything connected with the road, you are directed to arrest him,
and take entire control yourself Nothing will be allowed to prevent
you from carrying out these orders. |
| ***** |
| Should the portable part of
the engines not have been removed, and should it be impossible to
remove them at once from any cause whatever, you will utterly
destroy everything. |
| Edmund P. Turner |
| Assistant Adjutant-General |
|