To Benjamin F. Butler1Jump to section
Major General Butler War Department,
Bermuda Hundred, Va. Washington, D.C., Sept. 13. 1864.
The Ames guns I am under promise to pay, or rather to advise paying, a very high price for, provided they bear the test, and they are not yet tested, though I believe in process of being tested. I could not be justified to pay the extraordinary price without the testing. I shall be happy to let you have some of them so soon as I can. How comes on your canal.2Jump to section A LINCOLN
Annotation
[1] ALS, DNA WR RG 107, Presidential Telegrams, I, 167. See Lincoln's order of August 21, 1864. Butler telegraphed on September 13, 1864: ``I am informed that Mr Ames of Falls Village Conn has some wrought iron rifle guns of great strength & penetration which have commended themselves to your notes [notice] & that you have ordered some to be made. We need one (1) or two (2) guns of great power & penetration to use against the enemys iron clad on the James. Please permit me to order one (1) or two (2) to be rifled & forwarded here. . . .'' (DLC-RTL).
[2] Lincoln probably refers to the Dutch Gap Canal being built on the James River. No reply to the question has been found.