[Senate Doc. 512, vol. 246, page 471]

Fort Mitchell, September 29, 1832. 

Sir,

In addition to the information sought for in our last, by Maj. Parsons and myself, I would also respectfully suggest, that we think it necessary that we should be instructed in the following particulars, viz.

In the form forwarded as the plan for the making out of the census rolls, there is no place left for the registering of slaves owned by Indians, nor any allusion in any part of our instructions made to them. We should like to be informed whether it is the intention of the Government that they shall be numbered, in common, with the inmates of the family, male and female, according to their sex, and then carried out into the aggregate or whole number, as if the same were so many Indians - or altogether pretermitted - or regularly entered in a separate column, kept for the purpose, as slaves, and afterwards carried out into the aggregate, so as, in this manner, to show as well the kind and nature of the inmates composing the family, as the actual number.

I have the honor to be,
Very respectfully, sir,
Your obedient servant,
Thos. J. Abbott

Hon. Lewis Cass,
Secretary of War