Clouds and
sunshine-cool.
No war news except
what appears in the papers.
There was a rumor
yesterday that several of the companies of the Departmental Battalion were
captured on Monday, but it was not confirmed by later accounts.
Our battery of 49
guns was unmasked, and opened on the enemy, who had been firing over the heads
of our young men (clerks). This was replied to by as many guns from the enemy.
Thus both fires were over the heads of the infantry in the low ground between,
and none were hurt, although the shell sometimes burst just over them.
A pontoon train
passed down the river to-day, on this side, one captured from the United
States, and brought from Gordonsville. If Grant crosses, Lee will cross, still
holding the “inside track.”
Received a letter
from Custis. He is at Gen. Custis Lee's headquarters on ordnance duty. A pretty
position, if a shell were to explode among the ammunition! He says he has
plenty of bread and meat, and so we need not send any more. But he considers it
a horrible life, and would rather be without his rations than his daily
reading, etc. So I sent him reading enough for a week-all the newspapers I had;
a pamphlet on the Bible Society in the South; Report of the Judiciary Committee
on the Suspension of the habeas corpus; and, finally, the last
number of the Surgical Magazine, in which he will find every
variety of gunshot wounds, operations, etc. etc. I had
nothing else to send him.
