The situation at Fort Hudson.
From a Yankee correspondence, dated New Orleans, 23d May, and published in the New York Herald of June 3d, we extract the following paragraph, which shows that the attack on Port Hudson was made by all the Yankee forces that could be spared from lower Louisiana:‘ Since my last all the available force in this department has been concentrated near Baton Rouge, in order to assist in the grand attack upon Port Hudson. The main body of the army is to-day doubtless between Bayon Sara and the enemy's works, while the divisions of Generals Augur and Sherman are operating to the south and cost of the great rebel stronghold. I have no doubt in my own mind that before this letter is laid before the Herold's readers Port Hudson will be occupied by our forces. Our attack will be admirably arranged, and the force brought to bear will be fully adequate to make it in all respects successful. The Generals commanding are all experienced men and soldiers, and they will so push matters that defeat will be impossible. As you may suppose, we are all anxious to hear the result and other matters are for a time forgotten.
The "grand attack" thus foreshadowed with the usual flourish of Yankee trumpets has been made; the defeat, so confidently declared to be "impossible," is acknowledged by the very same individual in his letter of the 29th, and the "entire available force" which, by his own admission, had been concentrated around Port Hudson, is now in all probability so cut up and demoralized that it will hardly be able to resume the offensive for some time to come.
We are strongly inclined to doubt the reported occupation of Milliken's Bend by Kirby Smith, and still think that his forces must be somewhere in the vicinity of Port Hudson though on the opposite bank of the river.--Should they find the means of crossing over at some point between Baton Rouge and Port Hudson, the condition of Banks must become highly critical, as he would be liable to a Bank attack, and might be cut off from his base of operations.
Among the many conflicting reports sent to us from Jackson, there was one announcing a decisive victory gained by Smith at Port Hudson, and we still look upon that news as more likely to prove true than that of the occupation of Milliken's Bend by the same General. Should the latter, however, turn out to be the correct version of Kirby Smith's movements it would show that no apprehension is felt as to the ability of our forces to maintain their position at Port Hudson. At all events, the failure of Grant and Banks in their respective operations is now placed beyond all reasonable doubt, and as they were both parts of the same plan, and were doubtless intended to co-operate to the same ends, the whole Yankee campaign may be considered as a complete failure. General Joe Johnson has now, or ought to have, the game into his own hands, and we trust that he will not be slow to avail himself of the brilliant opportunity thus given him to achieve something more than a barren triumph in the Southwest. We have had so many glorious victories leading to no appreciable results, that a battle followed by substantial benefits to our cause would be hailed by the whole country as the inauguration of a new era in the conduct of this war.
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