Additional from the North.
We have received, through the courtesy of Hon. Robert Ould, files of Northern papers from the 6th to the evening of the 17th inst., which arrived by flag of truce. We give a summary of the news they contain:
The Seymour-Lincoln correspondence.
We find the following two last letters of the Seymour-Lincoln correspondence in the Northern papers:
Seymour to Lincoln.
--I received your communication of the 7th inst this day.While I recognize the concessions you make, I regret your refusal to comply with my request to have the draft in this State suspended until it can be ascertained if the enrollments are made in accordance with the laws of Congress, or with the principles of justice. I know our army needs recruits, and for this and other reasons I regret a decision which stands in the way of a prompt and cheerful movement to fill up the thinned ranks of our regiments.
New York never paused in her efforts to send volunteers to the assistance of our gallant soldiers in the field. She has not only met every call heretofore made, (while every other Atlantic and New England State, except Rhode Island, has been delinquent;) but has continued liberal bounties to volunteers when all efforts were suspended in many other quarters. Active exertions are now being made to organize new and fill up the old regiments. These exertion will be more successful if the draft is suspended, and much better than reluctant conscripts will be in the armies.
On the 7th I advise you by letter that I would furnish the strongest proof of the injustice, if not fraud, in the enrollment in certain districts. I now send the full report made to me by Judge Advocate Waterbury. I am confident that when you have read it you will agree with me that the honor of the nation and your Administration demands that the abuses which it points out be corrected and punished. You say we are contending with an enemy who, as you understand, "drives every able bodied man he can reach into the ranks, very much as the butcher drives bullocks to the slaughter pen." You will agree with me that even this, impartially done to all classes, is more tolerable than any scheme which shall fraudulently force a portion of the community into the military service by a dishonest perversion of the law.
You will see by the report of Mr. Waterbury that there is no theory which can explain or justify the enrollment in this State. I wish to call your attention to the tables on pages 5, 6, 7, and 8, which show that in nine Congressional districts, in Manhattan, Long, and Staten Islands the number of conscripts called for is 33,729, while in nineteen other districts the number of conscripts called for is only 39,626.
This draft is to be made from the first class, viz: those between the ages of 20 and 35. It appears, by the census of 1860, that in the first nine Congressional districts there were 164,797 males between 20 and 35, and they are called upon to supply 33,729 conscripts. In the other 19 districts, with a population of males between 20 and 35 of 270,786, only 39,626 are demanded.
Again, to show the partizan character of the enrollment, you will find on the 21st page of the military report in the first nine Congressional districts, the total vote in 1860 was 151,243. The number of conscripts now demanded is 33,729. In the 19 other districts the total vote was 457,257. Yet these districts gave majorities in favor of one political party, and each of the nine districts gave majorities in favor of the other party.
You cannot, and will not, fail to right these gross wrongs.
Horatio Seymour,
Lincoln's reply.
To His Excellency, Horatio, Seymour, Governor of New York:
In view of its great length and the known time and apparent care taken in its preparation, I did not doubt that it contained your full case as you desired to present it. It contained figures for twelve districts, omitting the other nineteen, as I supposed, because you found nothing to complain of as to them. I answered accordingly. In doing so I laid down the principle to which I purpose adhering, which is to proceed with the draft, at the same time employing infallible measures to avoid any great wrong.
With the communication received to-day you send figures for twenty-eight districts, including the twelve sent before, and still omitting three, for which, I suppose, the enlistments are not yet received. In looking over the fuller list of twenty-eight districts I find that the quotas for sixteen of them are above 2,000 or below 2,700, while of the rest six are above 2,700 and six are below 2,000.--Applying the principle to these new facts, 5th and 7th districts must be added to the four in which the quotas have already been reduced to 2,200 for the first draft, and with these four others must be added to those to be enrolled. The correct case will then stand:
The quotes of the 2d, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th districts is fixed at 2,200 for the first draft. The Provost Marshal General informs me that the drawing is already completed in the 16th, 17th, 18th, 23d, 24th, 26th, 27th, 28th, 29th, and 30th districts. In the others, except the three outstanding, the drawings will be made upon the quotas, as now fix.
After the first draft the 2d, 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 16th, 17th, 21st, 25th, 29th, and 31st will be re-enrolled for the purpose and in the manner stated by my letter of the 7th, inst. The same principle will be applied to the now outstanding districts when they shall come in. No part of my former letter is re- pudiated by reason of not being restated in this, or for any other reason.
A. Lincoln.
A Northern view of what the Confederates
are about to Do — an Audacious movement Feared.
The New York Tribune's Washington correspondent, writing on the 15th inst., gives the following view of the situation: Again we are brought to the conclusion that the main and final contest must be between the two capitals. The rebels must see that their only chance of success, now, is the strategic capture of Washington, and the breaking or crippling of the strong arm that is so persistently crushing them. What else can they attempt? They cannot spare their main army from the Potomac side of Richmond for any other purpose whatever.--If there were any other purpose that could avail them anything. And of course they are not going to give up the contest without making yet a last grand desperate effort to save themselves — not without exhausting all of their resources, physical and strategic.
* * * * *
With their converging railroad facilities they can suddenly concentrate all their forces, veteran and conscript, from all quarters of the Confederacy at Richmond, and march upon the Army of the Potomac and Washington, with an overwhelming force, before their movements can be known, either in their front or rear. This is the only true rebel policy left them, and it is in keeping with their past strategy and their recent demonstrations. It is no doubt the programme of the last grand desperate effort they intend to make. It is the only effort they can make with any hope of success, and of course they will make it before giving up their grand stake, promising as the effort must be to them, from their past experience in panic making, and from their staking all, and throwing all their strength into the single coup de main.
It is unnecessary for me to detail at this late day what the moral and political effect of the occupation of Washington by the rebels would be. At once disastrous to the Federal Government and army, and putting the rebels in a position to dictate terms of peace to the Federal Government and people, it would leave the foreign Ministers resident here, already accredited to the defacto Government, and save their home Governments the trouble of any further recognition, as well as the successful rebels any further anxiety on that subject, while the late Federal Government, in turn, would be without a local habitation and a name among the nations of the earth.
Let the Federal Government, then, be prepared for this last grand desperate effort, which is no doubt the final act on the rebel programme. Let them either mass an invincible army on this side of Richmond to meet it, or, what would be a safer policy, immediately crush the rebel army of Virginia before it can be reinforced, as reinforced it is bound to be, if not prevented, by the entire rebel army from all quarters, for a last grand desperate advance upon Washington is a final and only resort. God grant that this last grand desperate effort may be thwarted, and the Union at once restored to more than its pristine beauty and power.
The Administration was warned of Lee's invasion of Pennsylvania by a similar theory from this humble writer more than a month before it took place. If that theory proved entirely and exactly correct in every respect, this tamed upon precisely the same reasoning is at least entitled to a passing consideration.
Yankee account of the Atrocious
slaughter of a Confederate family in Mississippi.
A correspondent of the Missouri Democrat furnishes the following particulars of a brutal murder near Island No.10, in the Mississippi: ‘ Yesterday, the 4th, a white man, who held no commission under any Government, established or assumed, unaccountably in command of a body of negroes, some forty-five, not one of whom was entitled or otherwise in the service of the United States, at Island No.10, sent eleven of these men to the house of a family named Beckman, living near the line in Tennessee, consisting of eight males and females, with instructions to bring from thence two contraband boys, peaceably if possible; but should resistance be offered, to kill every member of the family and to burn their house.
’ They proceeded there and literally fulfilled orders, with the exception of firing the house; they sacked it, however, and in this condition it was found by a party of United States cavalry that happened there by the merest accident, and soon after the massacre took place. Immediately upon ascertaining the direction which the fugitives had taken, the cavalry started in pursuit, overtaking nine of the negroes ere they had crossed to the island. Another was subsequently captured — by whom, or where, I was unable to learn — but I understand that ten of the negroes, Dwyer, and a man called Fevran, who is suspected of being implicated in some way, are in confinement at Island No.10, and no doubt remains of all parties concerned having speedy and sure justice done them.
Gunboats came up shortly afterward, and fired several broadsides with the hope of causing the bodies of some of the victims who were thrown into the river to rise to the surface. As far as known, it succeeded only in one instance; one of the victims, a Mr. Beckman, 35 years of age, and father of the children, came to the surface and was taken to the shore. His hands and feet were tied together, a deep gash in his back, apparently made by an axe, and that portion of his forehead immediately above his left eye torn away. The body of an old man, of sixty or seventy years of age, and that of a boy of six, were recovered previously; but those of the three daughters, aged from eight to fourteen, have not yet been found.
From the appearance of the corpses, and the confessions of the negroes, they fought most desperately, but were overpowered. The mother was away from the house visiting; and her son, a lad of thirteen, was also absent, at school, at the time. These were the only ones of the family who escaped.
The late raid on the Cape Charles light-house.
We recently published the fact that a small party of Confederates had accomplished the destruction of Cape Charles light-house. The Worcester (Md.) Shield says:‘ A bold and successful foray was made on Monday morning last on the light-house and Government property on Smith's Island, just outside of the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay. A party of nine men in a boat issued out from a concealment on Mockhorn Island and made for Smith's Island, where they landed. They gave themselves out as fishermen; but, after asking many questions, privately informed the keeper of the light-house, Wm Webb States, that they had come to destroy his light and to carry off the movable property in his charge. Setting hard to work, they removed four hundred gallons of sperm oil to then boat, and deliberately, and with some skill in the use of the proper tools, took down and similarly carried off the various parts of the lantern, reflectors, lamps, &c.
’ They also possessed themselves of a valuable clock, their spoils altogether being valued at $2,000. They kept Mr. Stakes and family, as well as the four other families, on the island, under pledge to give no information till the third day after they had left. Part of their plunder they packed in a new boat belonging to the Government, which they towed away to seaward: They told Mr. Stakes they were from Richmond, and that a similar raid would be made on Hog Island Light, a few miles further up the coast.--They paid for a dinner they compelled Mr. Stakes to set for them with a $5 Confederate note. The party was well-armed with revolver and bowie-knife, and had a case of rifles in their boats.
A body of Union soldiers have been sent down the Peninsula to act as a guard, and the occasion will be used to fill. Accomac and Northampton with troops. There was a report but seemingly without authentica- tion, that a number of rebel soldiers had encamped near the point of Cape Charles.
The Yankee occupation of Martinsburg.
The Yankee force guarding the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad is occupying Martinsburg. A letter in the Wheeling Intelligencer, dated from that town on the 12th inst., says:‘ We marched from Sharpsburg, Maryland, to this place the 4th instant, and are at present pleasantly encamped near town, on the beautiful grounds surrounding the palatial residence of Col. Charles J. Faulkner, once member of Congress, afterwards French Minister, and now on the staff of General Ewell in the rebel army.
’ We have kindly furnished Mrs. Faulkner with a guard for every door step, every potato hill, and every flower bed. The property, consisting of a princely mansion and 800 acres of well cultivated land, belongs to Mrs. F. and her heirs, being a part of a legacy bequeathed to her by her father, old General Boyd, who was a man of immense wealth.
Mrs. F., and her daughter, a beautiful girl of some eighteen summers, are the only occupants of the house, and have been staunch Union women from the beginning.
They are very kind to our soldiers, especially the sick, and contribute many nice things for their comfort, as well as furnish a great deal of reading matter from the Colonel's library for the boys to peruse.
Col. Klunk is acting as Brigadier General over the infantry forces here, and Col. McReynolds, of the 1st New York cavalry, commands the division. They are both in Washington now, attending the court martial of Gen. Milroy, but will return soon.
Yesterday we hailed with joy the appearance of the first through train on the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad since its destruction by the rebels, and now we expect plenty to eat and a daily mail from the East and from the West. Great credit is due the proprietors of this road for the alacrity and celerity of their movements in entirely rebuilding anew about thirty miles which was entirely destroyed by the rebels some three weeks since. It is well guarded now by several regiments of soldiers, and a number of iron-clad cars are distributed along the road.
Affairs in the Southwest.--Gen. Price to be attacked.
A dispatch from Memphis, dated the 11th inst., says:‘ Steamers arriving from below represent everything quiet on the river from hence to New Orleans. Gen. Price's quarters at Des Are will be anything but pleasant a few days hence. Farmers in from the country represent all as being very quiet in the surrounding neighborhood.
’ There are very few Confederate troops in Arkansas, and if Price is allowed to return home the entire Confederate army in that State will disband. I think Steele will have very little opposition anywhere in Arkansas.
A scouting party of twenty coming from Gen. Davidson's command to Helena, were attacked about twenty miles of the town on Sunday last. We lost seven killed. There were upwards of a hundred rebels. General Solomon is in command at Helena. General Prentiss has gone up the river.
Arkansas will soon be opened up to trade. Already our lines have been extended. At Helena and a Board of Trade opened, the people for thirty miles around coming in and getting supplies.
The Latest from Charleston.
A despatch from New York, dated the 17th, announces the arrival of a steamer there from Charleston, and says:‘ On Thursday evening the monitors were all stripped and prepared for action, and at daylight Friday morning the batteries on Morris Island opened their fire, which, lasted only an hour or two, when at ceased. The monitors did not fire as shot, and as soon as the batteries ceased firing the monitors put up their awnings. No explanation is given for this move. The strongest confidence is expressed of a favorable result.
’ Our informant says that during the short engagement Friday morning he saw several shot strike Fort Sumter, which caused the brick and mortar to fly profusely. One of the officers of our transports, who left Morris Island on the 14th, says that upon receiving certain restrictions in regard to conveying news by Quartermaster Dunton, he asked him what he should tell his friends at Fortress Monroe. The Quartermaster said, ‘"Tell them a great battle will come, off here Saturday, 15th, or Sunday, 16th, and that we will be victorious."’
Miscellaneous.
Levi Cohen, E. P. Rosenheim, Herman Simon and Henry Heinman were arrested in Baltimore Sunday on the charge of being refugees from the South. They were examined, paroled and released.Prominent Western men, among them Gov. Tod, called on Lincoln last week and urged the immediate organization of a mounted force to operate in Tennessee.
The number of U. S., negro troops actually in the field, is between twenty two and twenty-three thousand. Fifty additional regiments are partly organized, and speedily approaching completion. The estimate of one hundred thousand being in arms by fall will, it is thought, be fully sustained.
Gen. Banks has requested that the mails for New Orleans be sent down the Mississippi river.
Of the 27 double-bowed iron vessels, ordered by Congress to be built, 19 are afloat and receiving their machinery.
The Northern papers are publishing obituaries of the Confederate Lieut General T. Holmes, who, they claim, has died of delirium tremens in Arkansas.
The Committee of the National Democratic Convention of the United States is to meet in New York on the 7th proximo, to fix the time and place for holding the next National Convention.
Commodore Henry W. Morris, second in command to Farragut, died on the 14th instant.
Col. Charles Anderson, brother of Major Anderson of Fort Sumter fame, is the Union nominee for Lieutenant-Governor of Ohio.
Brig. Gen. Thos. Welch, commanding the first division of the Ninth Army Corps, died at Cincinnati on the 13th, of congestive fever, acquired during the campaign in Mississippi.
A Cairo dispatch, of August 11th, says:--‘"Captain Evans, Deputy Provost Marshal of Williamson and Saline counties; reported here last evening with seventy-eight deserters from the 128th and 9th Illinois regiments, as the result of two days scouring over the counties named."’
The report from San Francisco relative to a Secession uprising in Santa Clara proves to be fallacious. Gen. Wright is now engaged in erecting extensive harbor fortifications at San Francisco.
Gov. Andrew Johnson, of Tennessee, will soon authorize an election for members of a loyal Legislature, which will meet next winter in Nashville.
The trial of J. M. Whittler, for an assault on the Tribune office, during the late riots, has resulted in his being sentenced to one year's imprisonment and a fine of $250. He said he is a native of Maryland, and was formerly in the naval service.
The Hon. C. L. Vallandigham leaves Niagara Falls for Quebec immediately. After remaining there for a few days he will proceed to Windsor, Canada, opposite to Detroit, Michigan.
Gen. Grant has made an official report of his battles and capture of Vicksburg. He sets down his entire loss during the whole campaign at 1,243 killed, 7,095 wounded, an 537 missing.
An English doctor arrived at Fortress Monroe on Wednesday from Richmond. He says he left Richmond last Saturday. He reports that there are no troops, not even a guard, in Suffolk; also, that there are no troops in Richmond, but the streets are filled with rebel officers. He saw no gunboats in the harbor at Richmond, but knows that they are building two iron-clads, though he does not know how far they were advanced. The doctor was in Richmond five weeks, and complains of the high price of board, $120 per week, and hard fare at that.
The Boston papers publish the protest addressed to Secretary Seward of the Messrs. Upton, owners of the ship Nora, which was destroyed not long since by the pirate Alabama, and for which the owners hold the British Government accountable.
The barque Good Hope, from Boston for the Cape of Good Hope, was captured by the C. S. steamer Georgia on the 13th of June, in int; 22.49, long 40.00, and burned the next day. The crew and passengers were transferred to the barque J. W. Sewer, from Boston for the Amoy river, and landed at Rio Janeiro. The Confederates bonded the Seaver for fifteen thousand dollars.
The Louisville Journal says that as far as heard from the next General Assembly of Kentucky will be composed as follows: Senate, thirty-one Union, with six districts to hear from; House, sixty-eight Union and two Secessionists, with thirty counties to hear from.
Gov. Pierpoint, of "West Virginia," has established himself at Alexandria, and for the present the affairs of "the State" will be administered in that city.
The Norfolk Virginian, August 13th, says:
‘ We are requested by the Mayor of Norfolk to say that several physicians are wanted in this city, and can obtain immediately a good practice. The old physicians being required by an act of the Legislature of Virginia to take the oath of allegiance to the United States Government refuse to do so generally, and consequently there is but one doctor in the city qualified to practice.
’ Loyalty and a regular diploma are the qualifications required. Apply to W. H. Brooks, Mayor of Norfolk.
A conscript just from Wilmington, N. G., reports that within the past few days seventeen large steamers have arrived at that port, having run the blockade, loaded with stores for the rebel army, among which are ninety-six thousand English rifles, one hundred and sixty thousand army blankets, one hundred and thirty-one thousand ready-made uniforms, twenty-three thousand cases ready-made army shoes, eleven locomotives, six rifle cannon, (heavy calibre,) five cargoes railroad iron, and skillful men accompanying them.
Brig. Gen. Gonverneur K. Warren, Chief of Engineers in the Army of the Potomac, has been made a Major General.
Mrs. Lincoln took a ride down Boston harbor in a revenue cutter on the 15th inst.
Sixty National Banks have been established in the United States since June 20th.
Gold was quoted in New York on the 17th at 124a123¼.
