Lieutenant-Colonel Rutherford B. Hayes to Colonel Eliakim P. Scammon, June 5, 1862

Flat Top Mountain, June 5, 1862.

Sir: — Colonel Little wishes to procure the release of James McKenzie, of Mercer County, Virginia, now a prisoner of war at Columbus. McKenzie was taken by Lieutenant Bottsford, Company C, Twenty-third Regiment, at the time of the fight at Clark's house, May 1. Colonel Little says he knows McKenzie was always a Union man, and believes his assertion that he joined the militia under compulsion, that he intended to desert to our forces, and at Clark's availed himself of the first opportunity to do so. I therefore recommend that steps be taken to procure the release of McKenzie.

Respectfully,

R. B. Hayes, 

Lieutenant-colonel 23D Regiment O. V. I.,

Commanding.

Colonel E. P. Scammon,

Commanding First Brigade.

SOURCE: Charles Richard Williams, editor, Diary and Letters of Rutherford Birchard Hayes, Volume 2, p. 287