From Fortress Monroe

FORTRESS MONROE, April 23. – A small boat arrived today from Norfolk containing several refugees. They report the Merrimac at the Gosport Yard, having iron plates put over her port holes. She is expected out again in a few days. She was aground the last day out as was generally supposed.

Nothing was said in Norfolk about the bursting of a gun, and it is doubtless incorrect.

Captain Buchanan is thought to be alive. He was wounded by a rifle shot in the thigh.

The steamers Jamestown and Beaufort went up the James river on Friday and the Yorktown on Sunday to obtain coal. They took in tow a number of schooners loaded with iron to be rolled into plates at [Tredegar] works, Richmond.

Four gunboats have been constructed at Norfolk, and four more are being constructed. Some of them are to be plated.

The engagement between Burnside’s droops and a Georgia regiment took place Saturday. The Union troops numbered 500. The rebels were the 3d Georgia [regiment], Col. Wright. The fight was on the canal above Elizabeth City. – The rebels lost 15 killed and 35 wounded. It is said they run on being attacked. They were poorly equipped and lacked muskets and ammunition.

A refugee who visited Richmond last week states there are few troops there or at Norfolk, having mostly gone to Yorktown. 14,000 are said to have passed through Richmond in one day for Yorktown.

One of the refugees was a sailor on the steamer Fingal. He left Savannah on 1st of March and reports great consternation there. The Fingal and other vessels were in the harbor.

– Published in The Burlington Weekly Hawk-Eye, Burlington, Iowa, Saturday, April 26, 1862, p. 3