Chapter XCVIII. making Appropriations for the support of the Army for the year ending the thirtieth of June, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-four
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Chap. XCVIII.— An Act making Appropriations for the support of the Army for the year ending the thirtieth of June, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-four. March 3, 1853. *Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled*, That the following sums be and the same are hereby appropriated, out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, for the support of the army for the year ending the thirtieth of June, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-four: 215 For pay of the army, one million eight hundred and fourteen thousandPay of army. seven hundred and fifty-nine dollars: *Provided*, That the salary of the military storekeepers of the Ordnance Department in Oregon, California,Salary of certain military storekeepers. and New Mexico, shall hereafter be one thousand two hundred and fifty dollars per annum.
For the remounting of the four companies of Light Artillery, authorizedRemounting Light Artillery.1847, ch. 61.Proviso. by the act of March third, eighteen hundred and forty-seven, eighteen thousand five hundred dollars: *Provided*, That the same be expended at the discretion and by direction of the President of the United States. For the defence of San Francisco, California, five hundred thousandDefence of San Francisco. dollars. For continuing the defences at the following forts, viz.: *Florida*.—Fort Jefferson, at Gardon Keys, or Tortugas Islands, oneDefences in Florida. hundred thousand dollars;
Fort Taylor, Key West, seventy-five thousand dollars. *Georgia*.—Fort Pulaski, including barracks and quarters, twentyGeorgia. thousand dollars. *South Carolina*.—Fort Sumpter, Charleston Harbor, one hundredSouth Carolina. and ten thousand dollars. *Maryland*.—Fort Carrol, Sollers’ Point, Baltimore Harbor, fifty thousandMaryland. dollars. *Delaware*.—Fort Delaware, Pea Patch Island, Delaware River, oneDelaware. hundred and fifty thousand dollars. *Maine*.—Fort Knox, Penobscot River, fifty-five thousand dollars.Maine. *Massachusetts*.—Fort Warren, Boston Harbor, forty-five thousandMassachusetts. dollars;
Fort Winthrop, Governor’s Island, Boston, twenty-nine thousand five hundred and seventy-three dollars; For commutation of officers’ subsistence, six hundred and fifteen thousandCommutation for officers. eight hundred and forty-seven dollars; For commutation of forage for officers’ horses, one hundred and four thousand nine hundred and twenty-eight dollars; For payments in lieu of clothing for officers’ servants, thirty-six thousand three hundred and twenty dollars; For expenses of recruiting, forty-three thousand two hundred dollars;Recruiting.
For three months’ extra pay for non-commissioned officers, musicians,Reënlistment and privates, on reënlistment, ten thousand dollars; For subsistence in kind, one million and twenty-eight thousand fourSubsistence. hundred and ninety-seven dollars; For clothing for the army, camp and garrison, equipage, and horseClothing, &c. equipments, three hundred and fifty-two thousand one hundred and forty-three dollars and fifty-six cents; For the regular supplies of the Quarter-master’s Department, consistingQuarter-master’s department. of fuel, forage in kind for the horses, mules, and oxen of the Quarter-master’s Department, at the several military posts and stations, and with the armies in the field; for the horses of the first and second regiments of Dragoons, the companies of Light Artillery, the regiment of Mounted Riflemen, and such companies of Infantry as may be mounted, and also for the authorized number of officers’ horses when serving in the field and at the outposts; of straw for soldiers’ bedding, and of stationery, including company and other blank-books for the army, certificates for discharged soldiers, blank-forms for the Pay and Quarter-master’s Departments, and for the printing of division and department orders, army regulations, and reports, one million and fifty thousand dollars;
For the incidental expenses of the Quarter-master’s Department, consisting of postage on letters and packets received and sent by officers of the army on public service; expenses of courts-martial and courts of inquiry, including the additional compensation to judge advocates,216 recorders, members, and witnesses, while on that service, under the act 1802, ch. 9.of March sixteenth, eighteen hundred and two; extra pay to soldiers employed, under the direction of the Quarter-master’s Department, in the erection of barracks, quarters, storehouses, and hospitals; the construction of roads and other constant labor, for periods of not less than ten 1819, ch. 45.days, under the act of March second, eighteen hundred and nineteen; expenses of expresses to and from the frontier posts and armies in the field; of escorts to paymasters, other disbursing officers, and trains, when military escorts cannot be furnished; expenses of the interment of noncommissioned officers and soldiers; authorized office furniture; hire of laborers in the Quarter-master’s Department, including hire of interpreters, spies, and guides for the army; compensation of clerk to officers of the Quarter-master’s Department; compensation of forage and wagon-masters, 1838, ch. 162.authorized by the act of July, eighteen hundred and thirty-eight; for the apprehension of deserters, and the expenses incident to their pursuit; the various expenditures required for the first and second regiments of Dragoons, the companies of Light Artillery, the regiment of Mounted Riflemen, and such companies of Infantry as may be mounted, including the purchase of travelling forges, blacksmith’s and shoeing tools, horse and mule shoes, iron, hire of veterinary surgeons, and medicines for horses and mules, three hundred thousand dollars;
For constructing, repairing, and enlarging barracks, quarters, hospitals, storehouses, stables, wharves, and ways, at the several posts and army depots; for temporary cantonments, and the authorized furniture for barrack-rooms of non-commissioned officers and soldiers; gun-houses for the protection of cannon, including the necessary tools and materials for the objects enumerated, and for rent of quarters and offices for officers, and barracks and hospitals for troops, where there are no public buildings for their accommodation; for storehouses for the safe keeping of military stores, and of grounds for summer cantonments and encampments, three hundred thousand dollars;
Barracks, &c.For erecting barracks and quarters at the Republican Fork of the Kansas River, sixty-five thousand dollars; For erecting barracks and quarters for a military post on Minnesota River, forty thousand dollars; Mileage of officers.For mileage or allowance made to officers for the transportation of themselves and baggage, when travelling on duty without troops, one hundred and twenty thousand dollars; Transportation, &c.For transportation of the army, including the baggage of the troops, when moving either by land or water; of clothing, camp and garrison equipage, and horse equipments, from the depot at Philadelphia to the several posts and army depots; of subsistence from the places of purchase, and from the places of delivery, under contract, to such places as the circumstances of the service may require it to be sent; of ordnance, ordnance stores, and small-arms, from the foundries and armories to the arsenals, fortifications, frontier posts, and army depots; freights, tolls, and ferriages; for the purchase and hire of horses, mules, oxen, wagons, carts, drays, ships, and other sea-going vessels and boats, for the transportation of supplies, and for garrison purposes; for dray age and cartage at the several posts; hire of teamsters; transportation of funds for the pay and other disbursing departments; the expense of sailing public transports on the various rivers, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Atlantic and Pacific; and for procuring water at such posts as from their situation require that it be brought from a distance, one million five hundred thousand dollars;
Horses.For the purchase of horses required for the first and second regiments of Dragoons, the companies of Light Artillery, the regiment of Mounted Riflemen, and such companies of Infantry as may be mounted, one hundred and eighty thousand dollars; 217 For the Medical and Hospital Departments, fifty-two thousand dollars;Medical and hospital departments. For cannon, gun-carriages, and projectiles for sea-coast defence, two hundred thousand dollars; For ordnance, ordnance stores, and supplies, one hundred thousandOrdnance. dollars;
For the current expenses of the ordnance service, one hundred thousand dollars; For the manufacture of arms at the national armories, two hundredArms. and fifty thousand dollars; To make good damages at Harper’s Ferry, caused by the flood ofArmories. nineteenth and twentieth of April, eighteen hundred and fifty-two, twenty thousand dollars; For repairs and improvements and new machinery at Harper’s Ferry, forty-three thousand five hundred dollars; For repairs and improvements and new machinery at Springfield Armory,Superintendence of armories. forty-six thousand and ninety-four dollars: *Provided*, That, from and after the first day of July next, the act of Congress approved August twenty-third, eighteen hundred and forty-two, be so modified that the President may, if in his opinion the public interest demands it, place over any of the armories a superintendent who does not belong to the army; and in order to enable him to decide to his satisfaction, he is hereby authorized to cause the necessary and proper inquiries to be instituted, through the medium of a commission of civilians and military men, with a view of ascertaining which of the two systems is the more economical, efficient, and safe for the management of the public armories, that formerly existing under the superintendence of civil officers, or that now existing under the superintendence of officers of the ordnance department;
For arsenals, forty-one thousand and seventy-one dollars; and that theArsenals may be abolished. Secretary of War be and is hereby authorized to abolish such of the arsenals of the United States as in his judgment may be useless or unnecessary; For arrearages prior to July first, eighteen hundred and fifteen, payableArrearages.1820, ch. 52. through the office of the Third Auditor, under an act approved May first, eighteen hundred and twenty, in addition to an unexpended balance of seven thousand four hundred and twenty-six dollars remaining in the Treasury on the thirtieth of September, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-two, three thousand five hundred dollars;
For arrearages of pay, subsistence, and clothing due to Captain RichardArrearages of Captain McRae’s company. McRae’s company of Virginia volunteers, which served in the war with Great Britain in eighteen hundred and twelve and thirteen, the sum of ten thousand three hundred and thirty-four dollars and thirty-one cents; to be paid out to the officers and soldiers of said company, or their legal representatives, under the order of the Secretary of War, upon the production of such proof as satisfies him as to the identity of said officers and soldiers, and that they have not been paid;
For bridges, and establishing communications between Fort LeavenworthBridges, &c., at the West. and the Republican Fork of the Kansas River, eleven thousand seven hundred and twenty-five dollars; For fuel and quarters tor officers of the army serving on light-houseOfficers on light-house duty. duty, the payment of which is no longer made by the Quarter-master Department, four thousand and fifty-three dollars and eighty-seven cents; For fuel and quarters and for mileage or transportation for officers andEmployees in coast survey. enlisted men of the army serving on the coast survey in cases no longer provided for by the Quarter-master Department, ten thousand dollars: *Provided*, That the annual coast survey report shall be submitted toAnnual report of const survey.
Congress during the month of December in each year, and shall be accompanied by a general chart of the whole coasts of the United States, on as large a scale as convenient and practicable, showing, as near as practicable, the configuration of the coasts, and showing, by lines, the218 probable limits of the gulf stream, and showing, by lines, the probable limit to which the soundings off the coast will extend, and showing, by the use of colors and explanations, the exact portions of our coasts, of which complete charts have been published by the Coast Survey; also, showing such other parts of the coasts of which the triangulation, the topography, and the soundings have been completed, but not published and, also, such parts of the coasts of which the triangulation and topography, or the triangulation only, have been completed.
Sec. 2. Claims of Florida.*And be it further enacted*, That the proper accounting officers of the Treasury Department be and they are hereby authorized to adjust and settle the claims of the State of Florida for the services of her troops 1851, ch. 12.under the act of February twenty-seventh, eighteen hundred and fifty-one, by the provisions stated for the settlement of the claims of the State of Georgia for like services, as prescribed by the act approved thirty-first 1852, ch. 110.of August, eighteen hundred and fifty-two, entitled “An act making appropriations for the support of the army for the year ending thirtieth of Distribution of arms to Iowa.June, eighteen hundred and fifty-three; and that the Secretary of War be authorized to distribute the arms provided for by the act of Congress 1808, ch. 55.of eighteen hundred and eight to the State of Iowa according to her representation in Congress.
Sec. 3. Report as to providing arms by contract.*And be it further enacted*, That the Secretary of War be directed to report to Congress whether, in his opinion, it would not be more economical, proper, and advisable to cause all the arms of the United States to be made by contract. Sec. 4. Reappropriation for Florida claims.*And be it further enacted*, That such portion of the sum of seventy-five thousand dollars, appropriated for the discharge of claims for preventing and suppressing Indian hostilities in Florida, by the act 1861, ch. 12.of twenty-seventh February, eighteen hundred and fifty-one, as shall remain unexpended on the thirtieth of June, eighteen hundred and fifty-three, is hereby reappropriated for that purpose.
Sec. 5. Settlement of accounts of military contributions in Mexico.1852, ch. 110.*And be it further enacted*, That the provisions of the seventh section of the act approved August thirty-first, eighteen hundred and fifty-two, entitled “An act making appropriations for the support of the army for the year ending the thirtieth day of June, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-three,” shall be construed to extend to all persons who were engaged as receivers of military contributions in Mexico or California, during the war with Mexico.
Sec. 6. Extra pay of mounted riflemen on the Oregon route.1850, ch. 78.*And be it further enacted*, That the provisions of the first section of the act entitled “An act making appropriations for the support of the army for the year ending the thirtieth of June, one thousand eight hundred and fifty-one,” approved September twenty-eight, eighteen hundred and fifty, granting extra pay to the officers and enlisted men of the army serving in Oregon and California, be extended to the officers and men of the two companies of regiment of mounted riflemen that garrisoned the post of Fort Laramie, Oregon route, during the time they occupied said post; and the amount which may be found due them under this act shall be paid out of any moneys in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated.
Sec. 7. Richard B. Lee.*And be it further enacted*, That the Secretary of War cause to be paid out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, to Richard B. Lee, late Commissary of the Pacific division of the army, the sum of eleven hundred and seventy-five dollars, with interest from the ninth of June, eighteen hundred and fifty, being for money lost in being transported from Honolulu to San Francisco, under his charge, and for which he has accounted to the department, and which sum includes the expenses incurred in efforts to recover the same.
Sec. 8. Settlement of claims of Georgia and Alabama.*And be it further enacted*, That for the settlement of the remaining unpaid claims of the States of Georgia and Alabama, for advances made in suppressing Indian hostilities, the Secretary of the219 Treasury pay to the State of Georgia her claims now remaining unpaid for moneys paid by the State in suppressing hostilities of the Cherokee, Creek, and Seminole Indians, in the year eighteen hundred and thirty-five, and since, upon proof that the same was paid by the State; and that the provisions of the act of Congress relative to the settlement of the claims of Georgia for military services, approved March third, eighteen1851, ch. 35. hundred and fifty-one, be extended to the payments to be made under this act.
And that the Secretary of the Treasury pay to the State ofPayment to Alabama. Alabama, under the provisions of the acts of Congress of sixteenth August, eighteen hundred and forty-two, and the twenty-sixth January eighteen hundred and forty-nine, the balance due the said State growing out of the Creek Indian hostilities of eighteen hundred and thirty-six and eighteen hundred and thirty-seven: *Provided*, proof is made that saidProviso. State advanced in good faith the amount claimed.
Sec. 9. *And be it further enacted*, That whenever any lieutenant ofPromotion in the corps of topographical engineers.Proviso. the corps of engineers, corps of topographical engineers, or ordnance corps, shall have served fourteen years continuous service as lieutenant, he shall be promoted to the rank of captain: *Provided*, That the whole number of officers in either of said corps shall not be increased beyond the number now fixed by law: *And provided further*, That no officer shall be promoted before those who rank him in his corps.
Sec. 10. *And be it further enacted*, That the Secretary of War beSurvey of a railroad route to the Pacific. and he is hereby authorized, under the direction of the President of the United States, to employ such portion of the corps of topographical engineers, and such other persons as he may deem necessary, to make such explorations and surveys as he may deem advisable, to ascertain the most practicable and economical route for a railroad from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean, and that the sum of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, or so much thereof as may be necessary, be and the same is hereby appropriated out of any money in the Treasury, not otherwise appropriated, to defray the expense of such explorations and surveys.
Sec. 11. *And be it further enacted*, That the engineers and otherHow organized. persons employed in said explorations and surveys shall be organized in as many distinct corps as there are routes to be surveyed, and their severalReport. reports shall be laid before Congress on or before the first Monday in February, eighteen hundred and fifty-four. Sec. 12. *And be it further enacted*, That in the adjustment of the accountAdjustment of claim of Virginia. of the State of Virginia, under the twelfth section of the act approved thirty-first August, eighteen hundred and fifty-two, the Secretary1852, ch. 110. of War be and he is hereby directed to follow the provisions of the act of second of June, eighteen hundred and forty-eight, providing for1848, ch. 60. refunding to the several States the amounts expended by them in raising regiments of volunteers for the Mexican war.
Sec. 13. *And be it further enacted*, That the lot of land in the townArsenal lot in Newcastle, (Del.) to be reconveyed. of Newcastle, in the State of Delaware, upon which an arsenal has been erected, and the said arsenal, be and the same arc hereby reconveyed and granted to the Trustees of the said town and their successors. Sec. 14. *And be it further enacted*, That for the purpose of enablingWestern Military Asylum. the Commissioners of the Military Asylum to purchase a suitable site with the view of establishing thereat a Western Military Asylum, the sum of ten thousand dollars, in addition to the sum in the hands of the Commissioners, is hereby appropriated out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated.
Approved, March 3, 1853.