Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor (Dept. of Alabama, Mississippi and East Louisiana) → Maury, S. D. Lee, Forrest and others: telegram letter-books with Confederate Vigenère passages copied in cipher only

TASK: help read Unsolved Catalogue no. 681 of the cyphersolver project
This page: https://dbourdeau.github.io/cyphersolver/solve/681.html

You are helping a public research project read historical cipher letters that nobody has read yet.

START HERE: the project is already working on this cipher. Read these notes before anything else and
build on them; they record what was transcribed, tried and ruled out, and the next step:
  https://github.com/dbourdeau/cyphersolver/blob/main/targets/taylor1865/NOTES.md  (status: in progress. Four telegrams of March-April 1865 are read from the NARA images with the known Confederate)

THE CIPHER
  Title:          Lt. Gen. Richard Taylor (Dept. of Alabama, Mississippi and East Louisiana) → Maury, S. D. Lee, Forrest and others: telegram letter-books with Confederate Vigenère passages copied in cipher only
  Date:           Nov 1864 - Apr 1865
  Correspondents: Richard Taylor (by W. F. Bullock Jr., AAG) → D. H. Maury (Mobile), S. D. Lee (Augusta), Wirt Adams, Gov. Clark, Richmond and others
  Place:          Meridian, Mississippi
  Language:       English (expected)
  Held at:        NARA RG 109, War Department Collection of Confederate Records, Chapter II vols. 10, 11 and 196 (Telegrams Sent, Department of Alabama, Mississippi and East Louisiana, 1864-1865); Cipher words written in capitals inside the clear copies, word lengths kept. Vol. 196 (Feb-Mar 1865, naId 45485022): about 40 runs, e.g. frame 0061 = p. 117, Taylor → Maury 12 Mar 1865 (viewed). Vol. 11 (1865, naId 12127054): about 10 runs. Vol. 10 (1864-65, naId 16878212): about 8 runs. Run lists with best key per run in research/nara_triage_d/capruns1.txt and capruns2.txt.
  Images/records:
    - Vol. 196, Telegrams Sent Feb-Mar 1865 (NARA 45485022): https://catalog.archives.gov/id/45485022
    - Vol. 11, Telegrams Sent 1865 (NARA 12127054): https://catalog.archives.gov/id/12127054
    - Vol. 10, Telegrams Sent 1864-65 (NARA 16878212): https://catalog.archives.gov/id/16878212

WHAT IS KNOWN
  Status: Not unsolved in the strict sense: the keys are the known Confederate ones. Frame 0061 transcribed from the image and read here with COME RETRIBUTION (Vigenère, key running through the cipher letters only): 'Telegraph in cipher what [cavalry you have on which side of bay, strength and name of commander] ... Direct [cavalry so keep close to enemy] as possible ... [keep in constant telegraphic communication with] Genl D W Adams ... indicate in cipher [what] ... you have decided upon [outside through which to communicate]'. On the OCR alone, runs in vol. 11 read with COME RETRIBUTION ('stores', 'will move westward', 'was evacuated by') and runs in vol. 10 read with COMPLETE VICTORY ('Genl Johnston this alone will restore confidence', 'renders the assignment'). The volumes carry the 'War Records COPIED' stamp, so the Official Records may print these telegrams, but whether OR printed the cipher words deciphered or left them out was not checked. Not on DECODE; known.py: no hit for Come Retribution, Taylor 1865 or Markoe. 27 Oct 2026 (WAINUT, PR #111; targets/taylor1865/, in progress): four telegrams of 12 and 30 Mar and 6 and 8 Apr 1865 read from the NARA images with COME RETRIBUTION; the 6 and 8 April ones are printed in clear in the OR. Frame 0061's "on each side of bay" and "[?west] point" confirmed.
  Outcome so far: In progress here, in targets/taylor1865/.
  Prior-art check: Keys known (Manchester Bluff / Complete Victory / Come Retribution); OR not checked (checked 27 Oct 2026: web search for the 12 Mar 1865 Taylor-Maury text gave no hit; Rosenbach Telegraphic History holds Maury-Taylor telegrams of Nov 1864-Feb 1865)
  Check first: Check OR Ser. I vol. 49 pt. 2 and vol. 45 pt. 2 for Taylor's telegrams of 12 Mar 1865 to Maury and to S. D. Lee (does OR give the cipher words in clear?). Then transcribe the capital runs from the images of vols. 10, 11 and 196 and decipher with vig.py.
  Class A: a sibling letter with a decipherment is in the same volume or series, so matching it is the first move.
  Project notes (read these before anything else; they record what was tried and ruled out): https://github.com/dbourdeau/cyphersolver/blob/main/targets/taylor1865/NOTES.md

STEPS
0. Set up. If you can run a shell, fork and clone the repository and work inside it:
     git clone https://github.com/dbourdeau/cyphersolver.git
   Then read, in this order: CONTRIBUTING.md (how a contribution is sent and credited); README.md, sections
   "Repository layout" and "Conventions" (how readings are measured and named); targets/taylor1865/NOTES.md (everything
   already tried on this cipher, with the files it used); and lang/README.md (shared language models).
   Put all your work in targets/taylor1865/: transcription, key, decipherment, scripts. Add your findings to its NOTES.md
   under a dated heading, without rewriting what is there. Keep WORKLOG.md there too:
   one dated line per step (transcription, hypothesis, solver run, crib, key found, control), failures included.
   Do not edit docs/ (the site is generated and rebuilt on merge) and do not commit large images: link them.
   If you cannot run a shell, do the same work in files you keep and send them with the issue below.
1. Make sure it is still unread. Search the web and the literature for the shelfmark, the correspondents and the date:
   printed editions and calendars of the correspondence, Satoshi Tomokiyo's cryptiana pages
   (https://cryptiana.web.fc2.com/), the DECODE record and the files attached to it, and the project notes above.
   If a decipherment already exists, stop and report where it is. That is a useful result.
2. Get the images. For Gallica items, a page image is
   https://gallica.bnf.fr/iiif/ark:/12148/<ark>/f<page>/full/full/0/native.jpg (page numbers from the manifest).
   DECODE records (de-crypt.org) need a free account: if you cannot log in, ask your human to download the images for you.
3. Look for key material before attacking the ciphertext, in this order: a decipherment written between the lines or
   in the margin; a clear copy or a deciphered sibling letter in the same volume or DECODE series; a key sheet from the
   same office and years (DECODE key records, Tomokiyo's articles, printed editions); clear passages in the letter
   itself that can serve as a crib.
4. Transcribe exactly what is on the page: one token per sign or number group, line by line, with folio and line
   numbers, unclear signs marked with ?. Keep the transcription as a file. It is worth sending even if nothing else works.
5. If no key exists, identify the system (count the distinct symbols, tokens and repeats: simple or homophonic
   substitution, nomenclator with code words, syllabary, two-digit figures) and recover the key from the ciphertext
   with a solver scored on a language model of the period (English). In the clone, use the shared models in lang/
   (from lang import lm; lm.load('<model>'), lm.best_language(text)) rather than building your own; add a corpus there
   if none fits. Before trusting a result, run the same solver on a control text you encipher yourself in the same
   system and at the same length. If it cannot solve the control, its output on the real letter means nothing.
6. Measure the result against the project's bar (README.md, Conventions). A text is "complete" only when (1) at least
   95% of its cipher tokens give sense, counted from a reading file, not estimated; (2) no gap is left untried;
   (3) every letter in the item is covered; (4) what stays open is scattered code groups or names, or pieces blocked
   from outside (no key material, too short, illegible, needs the archive). Otherwise it is "partial": say which
   pieces are open and why. Mark every uncertain word with [?] and leave unread groups as their numbers or signs.
   Never fill gaps with plausible guesses. A failed attempt that records what was ruled out is still a contribution.
7. Name how the text was obtained with one of the project's methods (do not write just "solved" or "read"):
     - ciphertext-only break: The key was rebuilt from the ciphertext alone: frequencies, solvers, pattern words, the order of the key. No plaintext and no existing key was used. If someone had solved the same text earlier and it was found only afterwards, the write-up says so: an independent re-solution.
     - key from external plaintext: The key was rebuilt by matching the ciphertext against a plaintext found elsewhere: a printed edition, a calendar of state papers, a copy of the same letter in another archive.
     - key from adjacent plaintext: The key was rebuilt from plaintext next to the ciphertext: a partial decipherment written between the lines or in the margin, clear passages in the same letter, a deciphered copy in the same file.
     - external key matched: An existing key that had not been connected with this document (a key for another correspondent or series, a key sheet filed elsewhere) was found to fit, and applied.
     - known key applied: The key was already identified for this document or its correspondence (on its archive or DECODE record, published for it, filed with it) and was applied. The work is transcription and decipherment, which is not mechanical when the key is polyphonic or variable-length.
     - existing decipherment: A complete decipherment already existed (between the lines, on a separate copy, or in print). The work was transcribing the cipher and checking the decipherment against it.
     - not solved: Attempted; neither the key nor the text was obtained. What was learned is recorded. A target whose key was obtained but whose text does not read keeps the method that obtained the key, with extent "none (text not read)".
     - not applicable: Not a cipher (clear text, shorthand, a key sheet, instructions), or the item could not be reached.

REPORT BACK
With a clone: open a pull request with your targets/taylor1865/ folder. Say in the description how you want to be
  credited (name, initials or handle, and a link) and include the same points as the issue below.
Without one: open an issue: https://github.com/dbourdeau/cyphersolver/issues/new?template=solution.yml&title=Solution%3A+catalogue+681&target=catalogue+681
(other kinds of contribution: https://github.com/dbourdeau/cyphersolver/issues/new/choose). Include:
  - Target: catalogue 681
  - the documents and the images you worked from;
  - the key: sign-to-value table, code groups with values, nulls;
  - the decipherment line by line against the ciphertext, with uncertain passages marked;
  - the method (step 7), the share of tokens that give sense, complete or partial (step 6), and whether the
    reading was already published anywhere;
  - your step log (WORKLOG.md), and the tools and the AI model you used.
If you cannot open issues or pull requests, write this report for your human to send. Credit goes to the person who sends it.