[2] 89 
Head Quaiiters, Western Department, 
Louisville, Kentucky, July 26, 1823. 
General : You will repair to the Missouri, aud assume the com- 
mand assigned you by my department order of this date. 
Tlie immediate object of this command is to support the detachment 
under Colonel Leavenworth, and to give a timely check to the hostile 
spirit which has recently manifested itself among the Indians of the 
Upper Missouri, and at the same time to arrest or punish the Rica- 
ras or other warriors by whom thirty-three of our citizens have re- 
cently been killed or wounded. 
Six companies of the 1st Infantry, under Colonel Chambers, are 
this day instructed to join you at St. Louis, to act under your or- 
ders; to which will be added, should it be advisable, four compa- 
nies of the 7th Infantry. 
These will be directed to be held in readiness, subject to your orders, 
to join you at such time and place as you may find it necessary to 
direct. 
Should the information which may reach you at or beyond St. 
Louis, in your judgment, suggest the proptiety of your being sup- 
ported by an additional force, you will, in this event, make application 
to the Governor of the State of Missouri for a few companies, or if 
necessary a battalion, of Volunteer Mounted Riflemen: but it is not 
expected that this force will be required, without satisfactory evidence 
should meet you of some new act of hostility on the part of the Indians, 
below the Ricaras villages. 
You w ill order from St. Louis to Fort Atkinson a supply of sub- 
sistence and ordnance stores, which, added to those now at the post, 
shall be sufficient for the regular troops destined for that post, during 
the period of nine months from the 15th of October next, at which 
time the 1st Infantry should reach that post; and, should it become 
necessary to obtain volunteers, you will, in that event, order up addi- 
tional supplies, sufficient for such additional force, during the time for 
which they may be employed, which should be for nine months, un- 
less sooner discharged; and you will order the purchase of whatever 
subsistence may be necessary, (to supply any deficiency which may 
be found in the subsistence department at St. Louis,) to enable you 
to carry these measures into effect. 
In the discharge of these duties, you will exercise a sound discretion, 
governing your movements and measures by the facts and circum- 
stances which may be disclosed to you as you proceed, and by the 
instructions heretofore addressed to you, and in obedience to the 
•' General Regulations of the Army." 
You will keep me advised of your measures, and of the occurrences 
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