To-day the excitement was quite as great as ever, for bodies
of the enemy are still in the vicinity. They are like frightened quails when
the hawks are after them, skurrying about the country in battalions and
regiments. Fitzhugh Lee defeated one of their parties, and reports that the
entire calvary force of Hooker, in anticipation of certain victory, had been
detached in the rear of Lee's army. This force comprises twenty-eight
regiments, or 15,000 mounted men! Now that Hooker is defeated— our operator at Guiney's
station dispatches to-day that it is reported there, and believed, that Hooker
and his staff are prisoners — it may be reasonably doubted whether one-half of this
wild cavalry will escape. It was the mad pranks of a desperate commander.
Hooker cast all upon the hazard of the die — and lost.
Among the mad pranks of the enemy, they sent a message over
the wires to-day from Louisa County, I believe, to this purport: “For Heaven's
sake, come and take us. We are broken down, and will surrender.”
They captured an engine sent out yesterday to repair the
road. The white men escaped, leaving two free negroes. The Yankees made the
negroes put on a full head of steam, and run the locomotive into the river.
One of the enemy was taken sleeping at one of our city batteries
near the river.
My friend, Dr. Powell, on the Brooke Turnpike, sent his
little son, mounted on his finest horse, on an errand to a neighbor. The lad fell
in with, as he called them, “some Yankee Dutchmen,” who presented their pistols
and made him dismount. They took his horse and allowed him to return.
At the hour we were dining yesterday, the enemy were within
two and a half miles of us on the Brooke road, and might have thrown shell into
this part of the city.
Col. D. J. Godwin writes a long letter to the Secretary of War,
from King and Queen Counties, concerning the great number of suspicious persons
continually passing our lines into those of the enemy, with passports from this
city; and the great injury done by the information they give. Unquestionably
they have not only given information, but have furnished guides to the many
regiments of cavalry now skurrying through the country. But the Baltimore Plug
Uglies, under the protection of Gen. Winder, are the masters, now Mr. Secretary
Seddon has yielded again.
A letter was received from Gen. J. E. Johnston to-day. He is
too unwell to take the field, and suggests, if it be desirable to be in regular
communication with Gen. Bragg, that the President send out a confidential officer.
He says the army is suffering for meat, and if it retires into East Tennessee,
supplies must be obtained from its flanks instead of from its rear, which would
be dangerous. The letter was dated a week ago, and gives no indications of a battle.
The general says he is exchanging sugar for bacon; but condemns the practice of
allowing our people to sell cotton to the enemy for supplies. In my opinion
none but government cotton should be exchanged for subsistence. He says the
people are subjugated by trade. He suggests that our men when paroled, and not
exchanged, may do duty otherwise than in arms — as is practiced by the enemy.
H. D. Bird, general superintendent of the railroad, writes
from Petersburg that the movements of cars with ammunition, etc. are thrown
into confusion by the neglect of telegraph agents in giving timely notice. This
is an unfortunate time for confusion. I sent the letter to the Secretary,
and know that it was not “filed” on the way to him.
A communication came in to-day from the Committee of Safety
at Mobile, Ala., charging that J. S. Clark, Win. G. Ford, and Hurt, have been
shipping cotton to New Orleans, after pretending to clear it for Nassau. It
says Mr. Clarke was an intimate crony of Gen. Butler's speculating brother. It
also intimates that the people believe the government here winks at these
violations of the act of Congress of April, 1862.
Very curiously, a letter came from the Assistant Secretary's
room to-day for “file,” which was written April 22d, 1861, by R. H. Smith to
Judge Campbell — a private letter — warning him not to come to Mobile, as
nothing was thought of but secession, and it was believed Judge C. had used his
influence with Mr. Seward to prevent secession. The writer deprecates civil
war. And quite as curiously, the Examiner to-day contains what purports
to be Admiral Buchanan's correspondence with the Lincoln government, two
letters, the first in April, 1861, tendering his resignation, and the last on
May 4th, begging, if it had not been done already, that the government would
not accept his resignation.
SOURCE: John Beauchamp Jones, A Rebel War Clerk's
Diary at the Confederate States Capital, Volume 1, p. 308-10
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