To prevent communication between the enemy, now closely invested in Vicksburg, and their friends and adherents without, the following rules must be observed on the north front:
A continuous chain of sentinels must extend from the Mississippi River to the main Jackson road, along our front trenches. These sentinels will act as sharpshooters or pickets, and must be posted daily, and be instructed that no human being must pass into or out of Vicksburg, unless on strictly military duty, or as prisoners.
These sentinels must connect, one with another, the whole line; but division commanders may prescribe the posts, so that the length of line for each sentinel will depend on its nature.
All the ground, no matter how seemingly impracticable, must be watched.
The reserves and reliefs will be by brigades or divisions, according to the nature of the ground; but the post of his reserve must be known to each sentinel, and be within call.
I. General Steele will be held responsible for the front, from the Mississippi to the valley now occupied by General Thayer, to be known as "Abbott's Valley."
II. General Tuttle, from Abbott's Valley to the Graveyard road, at the point near the head of our "sap," to be known as "Washington Knoll?
III. General Blair, from Washington Knoll to where he connects with General McPherson's troops, at or near the point now occupied by General Ransom's advanced rifle-pits, to be known as "Ransom's Hill."
IV. The battalion of regulars, commanded by Captain Smith, will keep guards along all the roads leading to the front, and will arrest all soldiers absent from their regiments without proper authority, and turn back all officers not provided with written orders or passes from the commanders of their brigades or divisions.
Soldiers or citizens (not regular sutlers within the proper limits of their regiments) found peddling will be put under guard, and set to work on roads or trenches, and their wares turned into the hospital or distributed among the soldiers on duty.
Horses, mules, or any species of property found in possession of stragglers or absentees from duty, will be turned in to the corps quartermaster, a memorandum receipt taken, and sent to the corps inspector-general.
V. Colonel Eldridge, One hundred and twenty-seventh Illinois, will guard the Yazoo City road, at Chickasaw Creek, and also the bridges across the bayou, and will enforce at those points the same general orders as above prescribed.
VI. Colonel Judy, of the One hundred and fourteenth Illinois, will guard the road at the picket station near Templeton's, with vedettes on the by-roads leading therefrom north and east, and enforce similar general orders.
VII. In every regiment, troop, or company there must be at least three roll-calls daily—at reveille, retreat, and tattoo, and any commander who cannot account for every man in his command, at all times, will be liable for neglect of duty. He cannot shift his responsibility to an orderly sergeant.
The inspector-general of the corps may, and will, frequently visit camps, call for the rolls, and see that captains and colonels can account for every man.
VIII. Surgeons in charge of corps and division hospitals will notify regimental commanders of the admission and discharge of men at their hospitals, and furnish lists of men so admitted or discharged to the proper military commander.
Corps and division inspector-generals may, and will, frequently visit such hospitals, and satisfy themselves that no officers or soldiers are in hospital, except such as are admitted for treatment or regularly detailed as nurses.
IX. All commanders of divisions, brigades, regiments, and detached companies will be held responsible that their camps are not encumbered with surplus wagons, tents, horses, mules, tools, sutlers' trash, or anything that will prevent their raising camp at a moment's notice and taking up the march against an enemy to our front, flank, or rear.
X. The magnificent task assigned to this army should inspire every officer and soldier to sacrifice everything of comfort, ease, or pleasure to the one sole object, "success," now apparently within our grasp. A little more hard work, great vigilance, and a short struggle, and Vicksburg is ours.
By order of Maj. Gen. W. T. Sherman:
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