Every one of those killed in this action from these two colored regiments under a fire before which the veterans of twenty battles recoiled _died defrauded by the Government of nearly one half his petty pay_.
Mr.Fessenden, who defeated in the Senate the bill for the fulfillment of the contract with these soldiers, is now Secretary of the Treasury.
Was the economy of saving six dollars per man worth to the Treasury the ignominy of the repudiation?
Mr.Stevens, of Pennsylvania, on his triumphal return to his constituents, used to them this language: "He had no doubt whatever as to the final result of the present contest between liberty and slavery.
The only doubt he had was whether the nation had yet been satisfactorily chastised for their cruel oppression of a harmless and long-suffering race." Inasmuch as it was Mr.Stevens himself who induced the House of Representatives, most unexpectedly to all, to defeat the Senate bill for the fulfillment of the national contract with these soldiers, I should think he had excellent reasons for the doubt.
Very respectfully, T.W.HIGGINSON, Colonel 1st S.C.Vols (now 33d U.S.) July 10, 1864.
To the Editor of the _New York Tribune_: No one can possibly be so weary of reading of the wrongs done by Government toward the colored soldiers as am I of writing about them.
This is my only excuse for intruding on your columns again.
By an order of the War Department, dated August 1, 1864, it is at length ruled that colored soldiers shall be paid the full pay of soldiers from date of enlistment, provided they were free on April 19, 1861,--not otherwise; and this distinction is to be noted on the pay-rolls.

In other words, if one half of a company escaped from slavery on April 18, 1861, they are to be paid thirteen dollars per month and allowed three dollars and a half per month for clothing.

If the other half were delayed two days, they receive seven dollars per month and are allowed three dollars per month for precisely the same articles of clothing.
If one of the former class is made first sergeant, Us pay is put up to twenty-one dollars per month; but if he escaped two days later, his pay is still estimated at seven dollars.
It had not occurred to me that anything could make the payrolls of these regiments more complicated than at present, or the men more rationally discontented.

I had not the ingenuity to imagine such an order.

Yet it is no doubt in accordance with the spirit, if not with the letter, of the final bill which was adopted by Congress under the lead of Mr.
Thaddeus Stevens.
The ground taken by Mr.Stevens apparently was that the country might honorably save a few dollars by docking the promised pay of those colored soldiers whom the war had made free.