ave designated Brigadier-General Charles P. Stone, Colonel
Henry W. Birge, and Lieutenant-Colonel Richard B. Irwin as the
officers to meet the commission appointed by you. They will meet
your officers at the hour designated at a point near where the flag
of truce was received this morning. I will direct that all active
hostilities shall entirely cease on my part until further notice
for the purpose stated."

The division commanders, as well as the commanders of the upper
and lower fleets, were at once notified, and at six o'clock Captain
Walker was sent to find Admiral Farragut, wherever he might be,
and to deliver to him despatches conveying the news of the surrender,
outlining Banks's plans for moving against Taylor in La Fourche,
and urging the Admiral to send all the light-draught gunboats at
once to Berwick Bay.

Banks meant to march Weitzel directly to the nearest landing, which
was within the lines of Port Hudson, as soon as the formal capitulation
should be accomplished, and to send Grover after him as fast as
steamboats could be found. This called for many arrangements; the
occupying force had also to be seen to; and finally, it was necessary
that the starving garrison should be fed. Colonel Irwin was
therefore relieved, at his own request, from duty as one of the
commissioners, and Brigadier-General Dwight was named in his stead.
This drew an objection from Weitzel, who naturally felt that there
were claims of service as well as of rank that might have been
considered before those of the temporary commander of the second
division; however, it was too late to make any further change, and
when Banks offered to name Weitzel, whose protest had been not for
himself but for his brigades, as the officer to receive Gardner's
sword, the offer was declined. Among the officers of the navy,
too, especially those of higher grades, great cause of offense was
felt that, after all their services in the siege, they were left
unrepresented in the honors of the surrender. This feeling was
natural enough; yet before determining how far the complaints based
on it were just, it is necessary to consider how important was
every hour, almost every moment, with reference to the operations
against Taylor, while three and a half hours were required to make
the journey between headquarters and the upper fleet, and four and
a half hours to reach the lower fleet. Moreover, the Admiral had
gone to New Orleans the evening before.