GENERAL ORDERS, 
No. 127. 
WAR DEPARTMENT, 
Adjutant General’s Office, 
Washington, March 29, 1864. 
1.. Medical Directors of Departments will establish a General Hospital, 
at some convenient point within their respective Departments, for the 
reception and treatment of sick and wounded officers, hut no expendi- 
tures for the construction of new hospitals for this purpose will he 
incurred without special authority. They will detail a Surgeon-in- 
Charge, who will make requisitions upon the Medical Purveyor for 
medicines, hospital stores, furniture, &c., according to the standard 
Supply Table of the Medical Department, and will hire the nurses, 
cooks, and laundresses required. Hospital Stewards assigned to Officers’ 
General Hospitals will be paid on the regular muster and pay rolls. 
11.. 0n the recommendation of the Medical Director of the Depart- 
ment, a commissioned medical officer will be detailed to act permanently 
as Treasurer for each Officers’ General Hospital, w-ho shall not be re- 
moved without sufficient cause. The Treasurer shall have the custody 
of the funds of the Hospital, and shall perforin such duties in relation to 
collecting, disbursing, and accounting for the same, and such other 
duties as may be prescribed by the Surgeon General. 
111.. 0n the last day of each calendar month, and immediately on 
leaving the Hospital, by return to duty, furlough, or otherwise, each 
officer shall pay to the Treasurer the sum of one dollar for each and 
every day he has been in the Hospital, and for which he has not already 
paid as herein provided. When an officer has employed a special 
attendant, he shall pay thirty cents a day additional for each day such 
attendant wras subsisted in the Hospital. Company officers of volun- 
teers, w'hile in such Officers’ General Hospital, shall be considered as 
“on detached service without troops,” for the purpose of drawing their 
pay and settling their indebtedness to the Hospital, and may be paid 
on separate pay accounts, instead of on the muster and pay rolls. . . 
IV..When an officer is not provided with money, and is unable to 
obtain it, he will give a certificate of indebtedness, in triplicate, to the 
Treasurer of the Hospital, in such form as shall be prescribed by the 
Surgeon General, for the amount due from him to the Hospital. The 
Treasurer shall immediately forward, for stoppage, two copies of the 2 
certificate to the Chief Paymaster of the Pay District in which the 
Hospital may be located, retaining the remaining copy for his own 
reference and security. When an officer is discharged from the Hospital 
to return to a regiment serving beyond the limits of the Pay District in 
which such Hospital is located, the Treasurer shall forward the certifi- 
cates of indebtedness which the officer may have given to the proper 
Chief Paymaster, if known to him; otherwise, to the Paymaster General, 
for such reference. 
V. Chief Paymaster of the Pay District will immediately cause 
the certificates of indebtedness to be placed in the hands of the Pay- 
master of the Hospital, (or of the regiment, should the officer have left 
the Hospital,) with instructions to stop the amounts on the first pay- 
ment of the officers by whom the certificates were given. The Pay- 
master will take the receipt of each officer for the full amount of his 
pay account, and transmit the deducted sums to the Treasurer of the 
Hospital to which they are due, who will endorse receipt therefor upon 
the duplicate certificates in the Paymaster’s hands, or furnish duplicate 
abstracts of receipts signed by him, and embracing in one receipt the 
names of all the officers on whose accounts the sums have been re- 
mitted. The Paymaster will also forward monthly an abstract of certifi- 
cates thus paid to the Surgeon General. 
VI. . Officers of the Subsistence Department will make separate ab- 
stracts of the sales to each Officers’ General Hospital during each 
calendar month, and will report the same to the Commissary General 
of Subsistence in the manner provided by regulations in relation to 
sales to officers. Payment for stores thus purchased of the Subsistence 
Department shall be made by the Treasurer monthly, and in cash, 
when practicable; but when the Treasurer has not money on hand 
sufficient to liquidate the entire indebtedness of the Hospital to the 
Subsistence Department, he shall give to the Commissary accountable 
for the stores sold a certificate of indebtedness, in duplicate, for the 
amount remaining unpaid, which certificate shall be a valid claim 
against the Hospital, and be paid from the first moneys received there- 
after by the Treasurer, and until paid shall be considered as a sufficient 
cash voucher to the Commissary for the amount stated therein. When 
the Treasurer pays this certificate of indebtedness, he shall take the 
receipt of the Commissary for the amount thus paid him, and shall 
report his action in this matter to the Commissary General of Subsist- 3 
ence, stating the date and amount of each certificate thus canceled, 
the name of the Commissary receiving the money therefor, &e. 
VII. Medical Directors of Armies in the field, when necessary, will 
establish temporary Hospitals in the rear of such armies, to be governed 
by the following regulations: 
Medical Directors of Armies and of Departments and Medical In- 
spectors will frequently inspect Officers’ General Hospitals, and in 
addition to the usual course of hospital inspection, they will investigate 
the manner in which the Treasurer performs his duties, and promptly 
report any neglect on his part to the Surgeon General. 
VIII. No officer whose certificate of indebtedness to a Hospital re- 
mains unpaid by him shall receive pay without deducting therefrom the 
amount of this indebtedness and leaving it in the hands of the Pay- 
master, who shall give him duplicate receipts therefor, one of which 
the officer shall immediately forward to the Treasurer of the Hospital 
for which the stoppage is made. A violation of this paragraph will 
subject the officer so offending to court martial for disobedience of 
orders. 
IX. When an officer dies in Hospital, the Treasurer shall immedi- 
ately ascertain the amount of his indebtedness to the Hospital, and 
prepare an account thereof in triplicate, which shall he certified to be 
correct by both the Treasurer and the Surgeon-in-Charge. One copy 
of this account shall be retained by the Treasurer, and the remaining 
two copies be forwarded to the Second Auditor of the Treasury, in order 
that, upon the final settlement of the officer’s accounts, the amount of 
his indebtedness may be deducted from any pay due him, and remitted 
to the Treasurer of the Hospital. 
By order of the Secretary of War: 
E. D. TOWNSEND, 
Assistant Adjutant General. 
Official : 
Assistant Adjutant General.