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28.

Bureau Refugees, Freedmen and Abandoned Lands,
OFFICE CHIEF MEDICAL OFFICER, STATE OF VIRGINIA,
Richmond, Va., July 23d 1866.

Circular.

To Superintendents of Bureau, State Va.

The number of accounts of Private Physicians not under contract with the Bureau, which have been sent to me approved by Officers in charge of Districts in the state, and which I have been obliged to return disapproved, makes it proper in order to save trouble, that I should state distinctly, that it is useless forwarding such accounts. The Asst. Comr. State Va. declines recognizing and they will be invariably returned disapproved. 

The disposition which has been recently 
exhibited by many Physicians in the state, who receive pay for attendance on all Freedmen able to pay, but if they attend one not able to pay, endeavor to receive pay from the Bureau, makes it necessary that Officers of the Bureau shall understand distinctly that such bills will not be paid. Every medical practitioner expects, to do a certain amount of business where there is no certainty of reward concerning white persons. Why humanity does not extend the same duty to Freedmen, I cannot see. In order to have it perfectly understood, that the Bureau was not proposed to guarantee all accounts, of Physicians for attendance on Freedmen,

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