The United States government had already determined upon an expedition to the Indian country and, yielding to the importunities of Senator Lane, who represented General Hunter as in full accord with himself in the matter, had decided to use the Kansas Indians in the making up of the attacking force. It was well that the Indians had manifested a readiness to fight and that the Delawares, particularly, had overcome their previous aversion. The first official record of the fact that the decision to use the Kansas Indians had been reached appears to be a communication[546] from Assistant Adjutant-general E. D. Townsend to Surgeon-general C. A. Finley, under date of December 31, 1861, notifying him that medical supplies would soon be needed for a force of about twenty-seven thousand men, about four thousand of whom were to be Indians, which was to be concentrated at an early day near Fort Leavenworth. On the third of January, Lane wrote[547] to Hunter, informing him, as if at first hand and semi-officially, of the new plan. It is not to be wondered at that General Hunter took offence at the officiousness and presumption Lane displayed. In point of fact, it was a clear case of executive interference. Now that it had, to all appearances, gained a long-desired object, the Indian Office lost no time in lending the War Department its hearty coöperation. Commissioner Dole was especially enthusiastic and, under instructions from Secretary Smith, prepared to go out to Kansas himself to help organize the Indians for army service. He also sent particulars[548] of the new movement to Superintendent Branch and a circular letter[549] to the agents of the central superintendency, detailing the advantages that would accrue to individual Indians should they enlist. Dole wrote these letters on the sixth of January and was then expecting to be in Leavenworth City for the making of final arrangements eight or ten days "hence." He did not manage to get away, however, quite so soon; but the agents went to work immediately and, even before Dole arrived in Kansas, Agent Farnsworth, who had always been rather too eager for Indian enlistment, was able to report[550] the initial steps taken. By the twenty-first of January,[551] Dole was well on his way west. He reached Kansas in due season and there learned[552] for the first time, that Opoeth-le-yo-ho-la had been completely overwhelmed, that the refugees were on the Verdigris, and that General Hunter was subsisting them. This was doleful news, indeed, and made the project of a southern expedition seem more and more expedient.