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WAR DEPARTMENT,
ADJUTANT GENERAL'S OFFICE
Washington, August 15, 1867.

GENERAL ORDERS, No. 76.                   

I..With a view to a more rigid economy in the service of the Quartermaster Department, the officers thereof are notified that in regard to allowances of every description, a strict adherence to the prescribed regulations will be enforced. They will endeavor by every means possible to reduce the expenditures.

II..No barracks or other public buildings will be constructed unless by order of the War Department, except such as are indispensably necessary for the immediate and temporary occupation of troops. In the latter case the buildings must be of the cheapest kind, and in their construction the labor of soldiers shall be employed.

III..The commanders of the several military departments and districts will direct the commanders of the several depots, posts and stations within their respective commands to cause to be immediately discharged all civilians employed in the Quartermaster Department whose services can pessibly be dispensed with, or whose places can be supplied by enlisted men without manifest injury to the public service. Department and district commanders will also direct the commanders of depots, posts, and stations, as above, to report to them the number of civilians employed on the 30th of September next, as clerks, agents, mechanics, laborers, or in any other capacity in the Quartermaster Department. These reports will be made in tabular form, specifying the services performed, the necessity for the employment of civilians, the compensation allowed, and the authority therefor, and will be transmitted to the Quartermaster General by the department and district commanders, with such general remarks on the subject as the good of the service may suggest. Hereafter, when civilians are employed, a copy of the authority under which they are employed will be filed with the copy of the reports of persons and articles hired, forwarded to the Quartermaster General.

IV..Every officer of the army, other than of the Quartermaster Department, who has in his possession, or under his control, any horse, ambulance, spring wagon, or vehicle of any kind, pertaining to the Quartermaster Department, whether used in the performance of his public or private duties, will immediately turn in the same to the said department; and hereafter no such officer will use any ambulance or spring wagon, the property of the Quartermaster Department, whether for the transaction of his official or private business, without an order in writing subsequent to the date hereof, from the War Department, or at stations west of the Mississippi, from the commanders of the military division or department