only to be repulsed as before. Night was now an Episcopal clergyman of this city, declared that coming on, and a flank movement having been McClellan's "change of base line" to the James made by Jackson on the enemy's right with great River, was but the carrying out of a plan some havoc to their ranks, they withdrew their bat-time resolved upon. "And it was a part of the teries and retreated in the darkness. Thus was plan, sir," asked our clergyman, “that you should brought to a close the memorable fight of Tues- be in Richmond a prisoner?" The General was day, the first of July. It differed from the san- silent. guinary battle of Gaines's Mill in this, that it was fought principally at long-range with artillery, whereas the encounter at the mill was between the infantry hand to hand and under the breastworks of the foe. Every day adds to the amount of arms, ammunition, and stores captured by our forces. Trenches of uncommon size and suspicious looking graves have been opened and found to contain boxes of fine Belgian rifles; large quantities of fixed ammunition and sabres have been dug up in the same manner, and wagons have been discovered concealed in the woods with clothing and commissary stores in good order. On Friday Col. Thomas T. Mumford, of Jackson's cavalry, McClellan's engineer department, embracing plans of all his earthworks executed and projected, and an excellent map of the country from actual survey. The value of this acquisition is incalculable. While the army has thus been winning victories and plunder, it was natural enough that the confederate navy (what there is left of it under Mr. Mallory) should meet with disaster and loss. The steam gunboat Teaser has fallen into the enemy's hands with a balloon on board, and its armament of two guns and ammunition unharmed. During the whole of this tremendous cannonade of Tuesday, Gen. Lee's headquarters were at a small house on the roadside within range. Several of the enemy's case-shot burst in the yard, and upon the day of my visit the fragments of shells could be picked up all around the build-overhauled a wagon containing the drawings of ing. Continuing my ride beyond the battle-field of Tuesday, about a mile and a half, I came to the Malvern Hill mansion, which is occupied as a Federal hospital, and there I saw two hundred and fifty of the wounded Yankees in all conditions of horrible mutilation; many minus a leg or an arm; others with wounds in the head; others again shot in the body; all requiring the utmost care of the surgeons, and yet McClellan had left but three in charge of this and several other hospitals in the neighborhood. One of their wounded men told me that their loss in the fight of Tuesday far exceeded, for the number engaged, that of the Seven Pines; another said that had the first attacking column been three thousand strong, the day would have ended at once in a rout, for the cannoniers of one battery had left their guns, and the infantry supporting it had fled in confusion before the confederates had proceeded two thirds the way across the field; and a third confessed that McClellan had proclaimed it in a general order that all the United States soldiers who should fall into the hands of the rebels would be put to death! The house at Malvern Hill is a quaint old structure of the last century, built of red brick, and stands on a lofty hill a thousand yards from James River, of whose meanderings for several miles it commands a beautiful view. The house was standing in Tarleton's time, and is marked down upon the map accompanying the early English edition of his campaigns. A fine grove of ancient elms embowers the awn in a grateful shade, affording numberless vistas of far-off wheat-fields and little gleaming brooks of water, with the dark blue fringe of the primitive pines on the horizon. It seemed a bitter satire on the wickedness of man, this peaceful, serene, harmonious aspect of nature, and I turned from the joyous and quiet landscape to the mutilated victims around me with something very like a malediction upon Seward and Lincoln and their participants in the crime of bringing on this accursed war. We are not surprised, of course, that the operations of the last ten days are claimed as victories by the Northern press. Gen. McCall, who, you know, is a prisoner in Richmond, conversing with The government has so successfully kept from the public all intelligence of the movements and disposition of our forces during the last four or five days that I am unable to give you any infor mation of affairs. All that we know is, that McClellan is at Berkeley, on James River, where he has established his line of communication with Old Point, and received large reënforcements. The weather is blazing hot-ninety-six degrees of Fahrenheit in the shade-and a week of such fierce suns acting on the "impenetrable morass" which protects his flank will probably reduce his army to one half its actual number. But then it will also decimate our own force. Let us hope for the best. "Patience," says Sancho Panza, "and shuffle the cards.". RICHMOND "EXAMINER" ACCOUNT. RICHMOND, July 4, 1863. The battle of Tuesday was perhaps the fiercest and most sanguinary of the series of bloody conflicts that have signalized each of the last seven days. We have already adverted to the part played in the action by Gen. Jackson and others, but, as yet, have made little mention of the operations upon the occasion of Gen. Magruder and the troops under his command. We now propose to give such particulars as we have obtained on the field after the battle. Early on Tuesday morning the enemy, from the position to which he had been driven the night before, continued his retreat in a southeasterly direction towards his gunboats on James River. At eight o'clock A.M. Magruder recom menced the pursuit, advancing cautiously, but steadily, and shelling the forests and swamps in front as he progressed. This method of advance During the morning the enemy evacuated his position and retreated, still bearing a south-easterly direction, and apparently not attempting to lessen the distance between him and his gunboats. was kept up throughout the morning, and until four o'clock P.M., without coming up with the enemy. But between four and five o'clock our troops reached a large open field, a mile long and three quarters in width, on the farm of Dr. Carter. The enemy were strongly intrenched in a dense The battle-field, surveyed through the cold rain forest on the other side of this field. Their artil- of Wednesday morning, presented scenes too lery, of about fifty pieces, could be plainly seen shocking to be dwelt on without anguish. The bristling on their freshly constructed earthworks. woods and the field before mentioned were, on At ten minutes before five o'clock P.M., Gen. Ma- the western side, covered with our dead, in all gruder ordered his men to charge across the field the degrees of violent mutilation; while in the and drive the enemy from their position. woods on the west side of the field, lay, in about Gallantly they sprang to the encounter, rush-equal numbers, the blue uniformed bodies of the ing into the field at a full run. Instantly from the line of the enemy's breastworks a murderous storm of grape and canister was hurled into their ranks, with the most terrible effect. Officers and men went down by hundreds, but yet, undaunted and unwavering, our line dashed on until two thirds of the distance across the field was accomplished. Here the carnage from the withering fire of the enemy's combined artillery and musketry was dreadful. Our line wavered a moment, and fell back to the cover of the woods. Twice again the effort to carry the position was renewed, but each time with the same results. Night at length rendered a further attempt injudicious, and the fight, until ten o'clock, was kept up by the artillery on both sides. To add to the horrors, if not the dangers, of the battle, the enemy's gunboats, from their . position at Curl's Neck, two and a half miles distant, poured on the field continual broadsides from their immense rifle-guns. Though it is questionable, as we have suggested, whether any serious loss was inflicted on us by the gunboats, the horrors of the fight were aggravated by the monster shells, which tore shrieking through the forests, and exploded with a concussion which seemed to shake the solid earth itself. The moral effect on the Yankees of these terror-inspiring allies must have been very great; and in this, we believe, consisted their greatest damage to the army of the South. It must not be inferred from the above account that the slaughter was all upon our side. We have the best reasons to know that the welldirected fire of our cannon and musketry, both before and subsequent to our efforts to storm the enemy's position, fell with fatal effect upon his heavily massed forces. At ten o'clock P.M. the last gun was fired from our side. Each side held the position occupied when the fight began, and during the remainder of the night each was busily engaged removing their wounded. The rumble of the enemy's ambulances and wagons, in rapid and hurried motion, did not cease even with the dawn. At ten o'clock on Wednesday morning they were still busy, and discontinued their labors, not because their wounded had been removed, but for fear of our advance. Our wounded were carried from the field directly to the farm-houses in the neighborhood, whence, after their injuries had been examined and dressed, they were brought to this city. enemy. Many of the latter were still alive, having been left by their friends in their indecent haste to escape from the rebels. Great numbers of horses were killed on both sides, and the sight of their disfigured carcasses, and the stench proceeding from them, added much to the loathsome horrors of the bloody field. The corn-fields, but recently turned by the ploughshare, were furrowed and torn by the iron missiles. Thousands of round shot and unexploded shell lay upon the surface of the earth. Among the latter were many of the enormous shells thrown by the gunboats. They were eight inches in width by twenty-three in length. The ravages of these monsters were every where discernible through the forests. In some places long avenues were cut through tree-tops, and here and there great trees, three and four feet in thickness, were burst open and split to very shreds. In one remarkable respect this battle-field differed in appearance from any of the preceding days. In the track of the enemy's flight there were no cast-away blue great-coats, no blankets, tents, nor stores. He had evidently, before reaching this point, thrown away every thing that could retard his hasty retreat. Nothing was to be found on this portion of the field but killed and wounded Yankees, and their guns and knapsacks. The battle of Tuesday evening has been made memorable by its melancholy monument of carnage which occurred in a portion of Gen. Magruder's corps, which had been ordered, in very inadequate force, to charge one of the strongest of the enemy's batteries. There are various explanations of this affair. The fire upon the few regiments who were ordered to take the ememy's battery, which was supported by two heavy brigades, and which swept the thin lines of our devoted men, who had to approach it across a stretch of open ground, is said to have been an appalling sight. It will be recollected that it was stated, with great precision of detail, that on Saturday evening last we had brought the enemy to bay on the south side of the Chickahominy, and that it only remained to finish him in a single battle. Such, in fact, appears to have been the situation then. The next morning, however, it was perceived that our supposed resources of generalship had given us too much confidence; that the enemy had managed to extricate himself from the critical position, and having massed his forces, had succeeded, under the cover of the night, in opening a way to the James River. Since this untoward event, the operations of our army on the Richmond side of the Chickahominy have been to follow the fugitive enemy through a country where he has had admirable opportunities of concealment, and through the swamps and forests of which he has retreated with a judgment, a dexterity and a spirit of fortitude which, how ever unavailing they may be to save his entire command, must challenge our admiration for his generalship. The glory and fruits of our victory may have| been seriously diminished by the grave mishap or fault by which the enemy was permitted to leave his camp on the south side of the Chickahominy, in an open country, and to plunge into the dense cover of wood and swamp, where the best portion of four or five days has been consumed in hunting him and finding out his new position, only in time to attack him under the uncertainty and disadvantage of the darkness of night. But in spite of delays and embarrassments which have already occurred in bringing the enemy to a decisive action, the successes of the week's engagements, as far as now known to us, are not to be lightly esteemed. We would not deprecate results already accomplished, because of errors which, if they had not occurred, would have made our victory more glorious and more complete. The siege of Richmond has been raised an army of one hundred and twenty thousand men have been pushed from their strongholds and fortifications, and put to flight; we have enjoyed the éclat of an almost daily succession of victories, some of which have been achieved in circumstances in which the valor of our troops has alone redeemed us from the faults of military science; we have gathered an immense spoil, in which we are reported to have taken at least ten thousand prisoners, and from seventy to eighty pieces of artillery; and we have demoralized and dispersed, if we have not succeeded in annihilating, an army which had every resource that could be summoned to its assistance, every possible addition of numbers within the reach of the Yankee government, and every material condition of success to insure for it the result of the contest which it now abandons in dismay. THE DEAD ON THE FIELD. During Tuesday night, those engaged in carrying the confederate wounded off the field could not use their lanterns, as every flicker from them was sure to draw the fire of the Yankees. . . . . Nothing was to be found on this portion of the field but killed and wounded Yankees and their guns and knapsacks. A mute, and to Virginians a most interesting story, was told by these knapsacks. Upwards of three hundred of them belonged to the famous New-York Seventh regi ment who were once so feasted and fondled in this city. If a remnant of them return to the Empire City, they may say with truth that on Virginia soil they were appropriately welcomed on the occasion of both their visits as friends and foes. [The Seventh regiment alluded to was not on the field.-ED.] ADDRESS OF JEFFERSON DAVIS. RICHMOND, VA. SOLDIERS: I congratulate you on the series of brilliant victories, which under favor of Divine Providence you have lately won; and as the President of the confederate States, I do hereby tender you the thanks of the country whose just cause you have so skilfully and heroically saved. Ten days ago, an invading army, vastly superior to you in numbers and materials of war, closely beleaguered your capital, and vauntingly proclaimed its speedy conquest. You marched to attack the enemy in his intrenchments. With well-directed movements and death-daring valor, you charged upon him in his strong position, drove him from field to field over a distance of more than thirty-five miles, and spite of his reënforcements, compelled him to seek shelter under cover of his gunboats, where he now lies, cowering before the army he so lately derided and threatened with entire subjugation. The fortitude with which you have borne the trials and privations, the gallantry with which you have entered into each successive battle, must have been witnessed to be fully appreciated, but a grateful people will not fail to recognize your deeds, and bear you in loved remembrance. Well may it be said of you that you have done enough for glory; but duty to a suffering country and to the cause of constitutional liberty, claims for you yet further efforts. Let it be your pride to relax in nothing which can promote your own future efficiency, your own great object being to drive the invaders from your soil, carrying The different postures of the dead always your standard beyond the outer boundaries of strike a spectator as he passes over the battle- the Confederacy, to wring from an unscrupulous field. One lay on his back, with his arms stretch-foe the recognition which is the birth-right of ed upward at length; another, with his head every independent community. plunged into a pool of mud and water, having evidently died slaking his thirst; a third lay partly on the bank and partly in the water of a creek, having been shot in crossing, and died clutching the twigs and bushes on the opposite bank. One, shot through the head, had made himself a bed of leaves, and laid down, drawing his blanket and overcoat about him. His uniform and face betokened an officer of some rank. All of the above were of the Yankee slain. Doc. 79. JEFFERSON DAVIS GENERAL MCCLELLAN'S ADDRESS. SOLDIERS OF THE ARMY OF THE POTOMAC: trated the valor and endurance of the American soldier. Attacked by superior forces, and without hope of reënforcements, you have succeeded in changing your base of operations by a flank movement, always regarded as the most hazardous of military expedients. You have saved all your material, all your trains and all your guns, except a few lost in battle, taking in return guns and colors from the enemy. Upon your march, you have been assailed day after day with desperate fury, by men of the same race and nation, skilfully massed and led. Under every disadvantage of number, and necessarily of position also, you have in every conflict beaten back your foes with enormous slaughter. Your conduct ranks you among the celebrated armies of history. No one will now question that each of you may always with pride say: "I belong to the Army of the Potomac." You have reached the new base, complete in organization and unimpaired in spirit. The enemy may at any moment attack you. We are prepared to meet them. I have personally established your lines. Let them come, and we will convert their repulse into a final defeat. Your Government is strengthening you with the resources of a great people. On this, our nation's birth-day, we declare to our foes, who are rebels against the best interests of The facts of the "farmer's story are these. I mankind, that this army shall enter the capital met at Rienzi, on Sunday, the first June, the citof the so-called Confederacy; that our national izen whose house Beauregard occupied while Constitution shall prevail, and that the Union, there, and his statement to me was that Beaurewhich can alone insure internal peace and ex-gard was much excited and utterly surprised at ternal security to each State, "must and shall be preserved," cost what it may in time, treasure and blood. GEO. B. MCCLELLAN. only two hours behind the retreating army, and found the bridges between Rienzi and Booneville so recently fired that the timbers were nearly all saved. My advanced guard came up with the enemy late in the afternoon of the first June, about four miles from Booneville, and chased them within one mile of the town, when it was halted by my order, on account of the lateness of the hour. At five o'clock on the morning of the second June, I entered Booneville, and during all of that day my cavalry was constantly skirmishing with the enemy on every road leading southward and westward from Booneville to Twenty-mile Creek. Doc. 80. BEAUREGARD'S RETREAT FROM CORINTH. LETTER FROM GENERAL GRANGER.* HEADQUARTERS CAVALRY DIVISION, On the next day I made a reconnoissance in force towards Baldwin, driving the enemy across Twenty-mile Creek; and on the fourth another reconnoissance was made by Colonel Elliot, via Blacklands, with similar results. On the tenth, Baldwin and Guntown were occupied by my troops, which was as far as the pursuit has been carried. Booneville is twenty-four miles by the railroad from Corinth, and Twenty-mile Creek is eleven miles further. By the highway the distance from Corinth to Twenty-mile Creek is reckoned by the inhabitants at thirty-nine miles. the explosion of the ordnance in the burning cars, fired by Colonel Elliott at Booneville, that he pronounced it to be at Corinth, and that he violently swore at a report that reached him, that the explosions were at Booneville. That he sent all over town to ascertain the author of the rumor, and while engaged in this search a messenger arrived direct from Booneville confirming the report that "the Yankees were there." Whereat, Beauregard altered his route and galloped away immediately, taking the roundabout way of Blackland to Baldwin. This statement was made in the presence of several officers, and was entirely vol untary and unasked for. I HAVE read with mingled feelings of surprise and regret a communication signed by G. T. BeauColonel Elliott arrived at Booneville on the regard, addressed to the Mobile News of the nine-thirtieth of May, at two o'clock A.M. He remainteenth ultimo surprise, that facts so patent and ed secreted in the woods east of the railroad until so easily susceptible of proof, should be denied by daylight, when he moved down upon the town, him; and regret, that so weak, wicked and un- and was met by a body of about two hundred holy a cause as is this cursed rebellion, should rebel cavalry, who incontinently fled at a volley have rendered utterly false and unscrupulous a from Captain Campbell's Second Michigan revolvman whom, for fifteen years, I have always asso-ing rifles. This was the only resistance Colonel ciated with all that was chivalric, high-minded and honorable. Elliott encountered. He found in the town about The pursuit from Corinth I led with one bri-eight hundred well soldiers and two thousand gade of my cavalry and a battery, leaving Farmsick and convalescent; but none were inclined to ington at noon on the thirtieth day of May. On dred wished to go back with him as prisoners, oppose him. On the contrary, at least five hunthe evening of the same day I came upon the rear- but it was impossible for him to take them. guard of the enemy, whom I found strongly'post- The two thousand sick and convalescent found ed in the bottom of Tuscumbia Creek, eight miles by Colonel Elliott were in the most shocking consouth of Corinth. The next day this rear-guard dition. was driven out, and on Sunday, the first June, the pursuit recommenced. We passed Rienzi *See Doc. 78, page 221 ante. lying side by side together, festering in the sun, The living and the putrid dead were on platforms, on the track and on the ground, just where they had been driven off the cars by their inhuman and savage comrades. No surgeon, no nurses were attending them. They had had no water or food for one or two days, and a more horrible scene could scarcely be imagined. Colonel Elliott set his own men to removing them to places of safety, and they were all so removed before he set fire to the depot and cars, as can be proved by hundreds. General Beauregard states that the burning of two or more cars is not enough to make him frantic. The exact number of the cars destroyed by Colonel Elliott is as follows: Five cars loaded with small arms. Making a total of twenty-six cars, besides three pieces of artillery and one locomotive. This of course does not include the depot and platform, which were filled with provisions and stores of every description. The nine men of Colonel Elliott's command taken prisoners were a party who had taken a hand-car, and gone up the track a mile or two to destroy a water-tank. It is presumed they were surprised by some skulkers who were afraid to approach Booneville while Colonel Elliott was there. The charge of burning up five sick men in the depot and handing down Colonel Elliott's name to infamy, I must confess is only in character with General Beauregard's previous statements. He knows better. He knows it is false. The rebellion in which he is a prominent leader must have imbued him with more credulity than reason; a spirit of malicious exaggeration has taken the place of truth. To convict himself of inhumanity, treachery and deception in almost every word, act and deed, he has only to take the combined and concurrent testimony of thousands of his own subalterns and men, especially those who have fallen into our hands as prisoners and the large numbers who have deserted his sinking G. GRANGER, Brigadier-General. cause. Doc. 81. ARMY OF THE TENNESSEE. REPORT OF GENERAL J. A. McCLERNAND OF THE OPERA They have passed into glorious and imperishable history, and there let them rest. Devoting my attention during the interval to measures necessary to repair the consequences of a protracted and sanguinary battle, and to restore the vigor and efficiency of my command; and having prepared the way by the construction of bridges, on the twenty-fourth, pursuant to order, I moved it to the front and extreme right of the first advance made after the battle. Halting on the east side of Owl Creek and resting the right of the division on the bluffs overlooking the Creek, we pitched our tents and remained here until the thirtieth, meantime guarding the passes of Owl Creek, and making frequent cavalry reconnoissances westerly in the direction of Purdy, and southerly, on each side of the creek, in the direction of Pea Ridge. Here, as a precaution against surprise, I threw up earthworks, consisting of lunettes and intrenchments, covering my camp. These were the first that had been thrown up south of the bluffs overlooking Pittsburgh Landing. The enemy having taken refuge behind Lick Creek upon a lofty range, called Pea Ridge, commanding the approaches across the valley of that stream, felt secure in making sudden and frequent descents upon our advanced pickets. To arrest and punish these annoyances, on the twenty-fifth I ordered Colonel M. K. Lawler, (Eighteenth Illinois,) with six regiments of infantry, three companies of cavalry, and a section of McAllister's battery, to reconnoitre in front and to the left of our position, in the direction of Pea Ridge, to drive in the enemy's picket and outposts, and avoiding an engagement with a superior force, ascertain, if practicable his position, and then fall back upon our camp. Rapidly moving forward in execution of this order, he had approached within a short distance of the enemy's pickets, when, in pursuance of instructions from Major-Gen. Grant, he was ordered to halt and return his column to camp. On the twenty-ninth, however, a general advance was made in the direction of Pea Ridge and Farmington. The First division, being in ad vance, was halted about four miles from Monte rey, in view of some of the enemy's tents on Pea Ridge. The enemy's pickets fled before our advance, leaving us in possession of the ground they had occupied. Near and in the rear of this point, known as Mickey's White House, we took the position behind a branch of Lick Creek, which TIONS OF THE RESERVE CORPS FROM THE BATTLE OF had been assigned to us, and pitched our tents. SHILOH TO THE EVACUATION OF CORINTH. Major-General H. W. Halleck, Commanding De- My report of the part taken by my command, consisting of the First division of the Army of the Tennessee, in the battle of Shiloh, explains how the enemy was driven from my camp on the seventh and forced with great loss to abandon the ground he had gained on the sixth of April. I will not dwell upon the incidents of that great event now, it would be supererogatory to do so. While here, I caused a new road for some three miles, and several double-track bridges, in the direction of Pittsburgh Landing, to be made; and repaired the road still beyond to that place. At the same time and place, I received your order assigning me to the command of the Third division of the Army of the Tennessee, commanded by Major-Gen. L. Wallace, and the Fifth division of the Army of the Ohio, commanded by Brig.Gen. Crittenden, with the cavalry and artillery attached, including the siege-trains, in addition to my own division-together constituting the army corps of the reserve. I immediately as |