Orders of General Robert E. Lee to the Army of Northern Virginia, June 21, 1863

    Source citation
    Reprinted in Frank Moore, ed., The Rebellion Record: A Diary of American Events, with Documents, Narratives, Illustrative Incidents, Poetry, Etc. (New York: D. Van Nostrand, 1864), VII: 319. 
    Recipient (to)
    Army of Northern Virginia
    Type
    Military record
    Date Certainty
    Exact
    Transcriber
    John Osborne
    Transcription date
    The following text is presented here in complete form, as it originally appeared in print. Spelling and typographical errors have been preserved as in the original.
    HEADQUARTERS ARMY NORTHERN VIRGINIA,
    June 21,1863. 
     
    While in the enemy's country the following regulations for procuring supplies will be strictly observed, and any violation of them promptly and rigorously punished:
     
    1. No private property shall be injured or destroyed by any person belonging to or connected with the army, or taken, except by the officers hereinafter designated.
    2. The chiefs of the commissary, quartermaster, ordnance, and medical departments of the army will make requisitions upon the local authorities or inhabitants for the necessary supplies for their respective departments, designating the places and times of delivery. All persons complying with such requisitions shall be paid the market price for the articles furnished, if they so desire; and the officer making such payments shall take duplicate receipts for tho same, specifying the name of the person paid, and the quantity, kind, and price of the property; one of which receipts shall be at once forwarded to the chief of the department to which such officer is attached.
    3. Should the authorities or inhabitants neglect or refuse to comply to such requisitions, the supplies required will be taken from the nearest inhabitants so refusing, by the order and under the directions of the respective chiefs of the departments named.
    4. When any command is detached from the main body the chiefs of the several departments of such command will procure supplies for the same, and such other stores as they may be ordered to provide, in the manner and subject to the provisions herein proscribed, reporting their action to the heads of their respective departments, to which they will forward duplicates of all vouchers given or received.
    5. All persons who shall decline to receive payment.for property furnished on requisitions, and all from whom it shall be necessary to take stores or supplies, shall be furnished by the officer receiving or taking the same with a receipt specifying the kind and quantity of the property received or taken, as the case may be, the name of the person from whom it was received or taken, the command for the use of which it was intended, and the market price. A duplicate of said receipt shall be at once forwarded to the chief of the department to which the officer by whom it is executed is attached.
    6. If any person shall remove or conceal porperty necessary for the use of the army, or attempt to do so, the officers hereinbefore mentioned will cause such property and all other property belonging to such person that may be required by the army, to be seized, and the officer seizing the same will forthwith report to the chief of this department the kind, quantity, and market price of the property so seized, and the name of the owner. 
     
    By command of
    General R. E. Lee.
     
    R. H. Chilton, A. A. and A.G. 
    How to Cite This Page: "Orders of General Robert E. Lee to the Army of Northern Virginia, June 21, 1863 ," House Divided: The Civil War Research Engine at Dickinson College, https://hd.housedivided.dickinson.edu/node/40015.