AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF JOHN F. LACE Y 409 



asked to be relieved from staff duty with Colonel Salo- 

 mon, who succeeded Rice, as I presumed he would prefer 

 a German from his own regiment, the Ninth Wisconsin. 



I went back to Company C and commenced duty again 

 when one evening Major J. B. Wheeler, U. S. A., Steele's 

 chief of engineers, rode up and called for me and said 

 General Steele wished to see me. I went to department 

 headquarters and Steele told me that he wanted me to 

 serve on his staff until Rice should recover. I accepted 

 his tender of position and at once entered on duty as an 

 assistant to Lieutenant-Colonel W. B. Green. 



In a few days after I received my commission from 

 President Lincoln and my direct connection with the 

 Thirty-third Iowa ceased. I found that my work with 

 Steele was not very active, as Colonel Green could read- 

 ily do most of the work in the adjutant-general's office 

 and Major B. B. Foster had also been assigned to the 

 same work. General J. R. West was ordered on a cav- 

 alry expedition after General Shelby in northeastern 

 Arkansas and I volunteered as his assistant adjutant- 

 general for the expedition. We spent a couple of weeks 

 hunting Shelby but did not find him and I then returned 

 to my duty at department headquarters. Refugees, de- 

 serters, and escaped prisoners were coming in daily and 

 I organized a system to utilize all the information that 

 could be gathered from all these and other sources in 

 regard to the rebel army. 



All such persons and all scouts were sent to me and I 

 collected all the information that I could get from every 

 source. I arranged these scraps of information system- 

 atically and soon had a complete roster of the Rebel army 

 in Arkansas and Louisiana, with a pretty accurate ac- 

 count of the strength of every regiment, brigade, and 

 division. Discrepancies in statements arose as to the 

 strength of various regiments and I sifted the evidence 



