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A LETTER FROM CAPTAIN SEMMES.

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ical warfare, yet but few of our misguided just given, "would seem to show that, countrymen have prostituted themselves although it was penned ostensibly against to the purposes of plunder, though there- myself, it was, in fact, levelled at those to invited, and these few have been in European powers which had acknowconstant flight to escape the avenging ledged the Confederate States to be a power of our vigilant naval forces. Such lawful belligerent in the war which had of these cruisers as eluded the blockade been forced upon them. On no other and capture were soon wrecked, beach- supposition could it charge me with 'robed, or sunk, with the exception of one, bery' on the high seas, and with being a the steamer Sumter, which, by some 'piratical rover.' A pirate is hostis fatality, was permitted to pass the humani generis, and may be seized and Brooklyn, then blockading one of the summarily dealt with by any and all passes of the Mississippi, and, after a the nations of the earth; but the fact is, brief and feeble chase by the latter, was these officers of the defunct Federal allowed to proceed on her piratical voy- Union are so blinded by their venom age. An investigation of this whole oc- against the South that they have no currence was ordered by the Depart- longer the power to distinguish between Soon the Niagara and the Pow- terms. Mr. Welles, also, in imitation of hatan, from the Gulf squadron, followed the dirty and mendacious Press of the in vigorous pursuit, the latter, though Yankee States, calls me a privateer. He long in commission, and with defective knows better than this. He knows that boilers and machinery, under her ener- a privateer is a vessel that bears a letter getic commander, tracking the piratical of marque, and that I am cruising under craft as far as Maranham. The Key- no such letter. He knows that I have stone State, Richmond, Iroquois, and been regularly commissioned as a shipSan Jacinto, were also in search of her of-war of the Confederate States. If at different points and periods. Although he and his deluded associates insist a piratical rover, without license from upon calling the citizens of the Confedany recognized or acknowledged gov-erate States 'rebels,' under the idea that ́ ernment, and avowedly engaged in the robbery and plunder of our citizens, I regret to say this vessel has been received and her wants supplied, against the remonstrance of our Consuls, by public authorities in many foreign ports where her character was well known."

Mr.

those States still form a part of the old Yankee concern, then he might characterize me as a rebel man-of-war. But if I am this, so were all the ships of the American colonies commissioned by the Virginian George Washington. Welles tells the President and Congress, Captain Semmes who appears to have that by 'some fatality,' I ran the blockreceived this public document on his ar- ade of New Orleans, and that he has orrival at Cadiz, wrote from that place a dered the whole affair to be investigated. trenchant and very peculiar letter to With the blind rage of a baffled mad the London Times, which, as it throws man, quem Deus vult perdere, etc., he considerable light upon the spirit or will no doubt endeavor to crush the frame of mind in which its writer re- harmless and inoffensive commander of garded and conducted the extraordinary the Brooklyn, who, poor man, did his service in which he was engaged, we best. He says, also, that he has had six may here present to the reader. "The of his largest and fastest steamers in closing paragraph," says he, "of the above elegant extract from an American State paper," alluding to the passage from Mr. Welles' report which we have

pursuit of me, and that the commander of one of them was so energetic as to perform the wonderful feat of tracking me as far as Maranham, in Brazil. This,

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of the fastest and finest of his Yankee ships, the Iroquois, and which is more than twice my force. Poor Captain Palmer, I fear that he, too, will be immolated on the altar of the Universal Yankee Nation,' because he did not catch the Sumter, though, from all we can learn, he had fits on the occasion. This honorable captain is indeed a fit representative of the honor of Yankee Doodledom, for he violated the sovereignty of France, and his own solemn pledge at the same time, given to the commanding French naval officer present, by causing blue lights (brought all the way, no doubt, from New London, Conn.), to be burnt on board a Yankee schooner in the harbor, to signal to him my departure. But I only allude to this en pas

I suppose, is one of those daring acts-Island of Martinique, in the face of one the officer being in command of a heavy frigate which called forth the panegyric of the Yankee navy, which we find in a subsequent part of Mr. Welles' report, for, after praising his clerks, this officer goes on to remark: To the patriotic officers of the navy, and the brave men who, in various scenes of naval action, have served under them, the Department and the Government justly owe an acknowledgement even more earnest and emphatic,' than that they owe to his clerks! Oh! for a James to pourtray these 'scenes of naval action,' confined to a predatory warfare on the Potomac river, directed chiefly against women and children; to the capture of a sandbag battery at Hatteras; to the masterly movement of the great Dupont, the greatest naval commander sant, as France is abundantly able to of the age,' in Yankee hyperbole, who take care of her own honor,not only knows how to use gunpowder, but, with Yankee thrift, to turn an honest penny by selling it to the Government; and to the pursuit of the piratical Sumter, away ever so far, even to the shores of Brazil, by the gallant Porter, who probably for this fact-so little material has Mr. Welles for heroes-will be made a 'flag officer.' I feel honored to have been thus pursued by six frigates, and if one of them caught Messrs. Mason and Slidell, instead of catching me, why that is John Bull's affair, and not mine. But I am fleeing from these ships, says Mr. Welles. Soft, Mr. Welles! He would have me fall into a Yankee trap he has set for me, and rush to the encounter of his six frigates, the least of which is twice my size, and of more than twice my weight of metal. He dares not send a ship of equal force to meet me, and if he did dare do so, being safely ensconced himself in his arm-chair, I venture to say that the officer would not dare to find me. But I have to inform Mr. Welles that by the same fatality,' I have run another blockade. I have lately steamed out of the port of St. Pierre, in the

"If the universal Yankee nation Can whip all creation!" When Mr. Welles learns, too, that on my way hither I burnt three more Yankee ships, and liberated a fourth, only because she had an English cargo on board, he will probably send six more of his doughty war-ships after me-that is to say, if he can spare them from burning corn-cribs and frightening women and children along our Southern coast. He will take especial care, too, to put plenty of men and guns on board of them, for otherwise I might not be in such constant flight to escape the avenging power of our vigilant naval forces.' A word or two more and I have done. What can wise Mr. Welles mean when he objects to the 'robbery of merchants and others engaged in peaceful commerce and lawful pursuits?' Does he not know that all property, with rare exceptions, captured on the high seas, is property belonging to 'merchants and others engaged in peaceful commerce and lawful pursuits? Why this senseless diatribe, then, about robbery and piracy, and private property

THE UPPER POTOMAC.

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Welles! The fact is, that this Northern horde of the Alani, which is bearing down upon the sunny fields of the South, in imitation of their ancient prototypes, has (while Mr. Welles is singing this hypocritical song) set all the rules of civilized warfare at defiance, and captured private property on the land as well as on the sea. The gallant Dupont laid his unscrupulous hands upon all the cotton he could find at Beaufort-a few bales only, as it happened and, first and last, many brilliant achievements in the way of stealing negroes and robbing and burning private residences, have been accomplished by these Northmen amid the various scenes of naval action,' in which they have flourished. But I grow tired of the subject, and I fear I have already trespassed too much upon your space and patience. I am reminded, too, of the old adage, that he who meddles with pitch shall be defiled,' and so I will take leave of Mr. Gideon Welles and his scurrilous report.

and peaceful commerce, and lawful pur-
suits? If Mr. Welles would give me an
opportunity of capturing some of his pub-
lic property, I would be much obliged to
him. But he takes very good care not
to do this, by sending his heaviest ships
after me; and have the Yankee naval
officers in those scenes of naval action'
in which they have distinguished them-
selves, refrained from the capture of pri-
vate property? I saw recently in a Yan-
kee paper an account of a wood-sloop-
that is, a sloop loaded with firewood-
having been most gallantly' captured
and burnt the other day on the Poto-
mac, and a number of other small craft,
belonging to the poor people along the
coast, have been captured from time to
time and sent to Yankeedom for adjudi-
cation. Even fishermen have been sub-
jected to the same fate-a class exempt
by all civilized nations. But I suppose
it is only when the vessel is a fine one
of 1,000 tons, belongs to a Yankee, and
is captured by the Sumter, that the
property becomes private-astute Mr.-R. SEMMES."

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THE UPPER POTOMAC AND BATTLE OF BALL'S BLUFF, VA., OCTOBER 21, 1861.

SHORTLY after the battle of Bull Run, General Banks, the successor of General Paterson, in the Department of the Shenandoah, withdrew the Union troops from Harper's Ferry, by a ford above the burnt bridge, over the Potomac to the Maryland side of the river. This movement was made on Sunday, the 28th of July. The Union troops then in possession of the Maryland Heights, where the battery of Major Doubleday, of Fort Sumter memory, fully commanded the opposite town and its neighboring defences, were encamped along the river in the neighborhood at Sandy Hook, and other localities suffi

ciently near to keep up a military supervision of the enemy, should they attempt any hostile movements. The policy of evacuating Harper's Ferry was obvious, in view of the outlying enemy in Virginia, and the necessity of organizing the newly-arrived regiments of volunteers, who came to take the place of the now rapidly departing three months' militia men. The service on the river, indeed, was well calculated to afford the new troops a practical experience of the art of war, since their camps were constantly liable to attack, and there were frequent minor conflicts with the enemy, keeping the division always on the alert. Among

other skirmishes with the foe, there was a spirited attack by Captain Bush of Lockport, N. Y., at the head of a detachment of the New York 28th Volunteers, mostly composed of firemen, on the 5th of August, upon a squad of rebel cavalry, on the Virginia side, opposite Point of Rocks, when five of the enemy were killed, three wounded, and nine taken prisoners, with the capture of twenty horses. A week later a detachment of a hundred men of the New York 19th Volunteers, under Captain Kennedy, left the camp at Sandy Hook to attack a body of rebel cavalry which had made their appearance at Loudon county. Captain Kennedy crossed the river shortly after midnight, and reached Lovettsville, some seven miles distant through a rocky pass, about daylight. Disappointed in finding the enemy at that place, they were returning, when word was brought to them that Stewart's cavalry had reoccupied the town. Upon hearing this, they turned back, charged upon the town, and drove the enemy before them.

On the 15th of September there was an attack by about 450 of the enemy upon the right of the pickets of Colonel John W. Geary, about three miles above Darnestown, opposite Pritchard's Mills. This officer, to whom the command of the troops, immediately opposite Harper's Ferry, was assigned, was an eminent citizen of Pennsylvania, whose military zeal had been displayed in the Mexican war, in command, on the field, of a regiment of volunteers from that State. He was wounded at Chapultepec, and distinguished himself in the attack upon the capital. On the conclusion of the war he became a resident of California, and was elected the first mayor of San Francisco. His subsequent appointment by President Buchanan as Governor of Kansas, will be remembered among the attempts to introduce order

* Berlin, Md., correspondence of the New York Tribune,

August 9, 1861.

in that unsettled country. On the open-
ing of the present war, Colonel Geary
left his retirement in Pennsylvania to
raise a regiment for the war. This he
readily accomplished, and at the head
of the 28th Regiment of State Volun-
teers, his command speedily proved one
of the most important acquisitions of the
service. "The affair above Darneston,"
says Colonel Geary, in his dispatch to
General McClellan, "was a spirited one,
lasting about two hours.
The enemy
was driven from every house and breast-
work which they occupied. Eight or ten
of them are said to be killed, and a num-
ber wounded. Our loss was one killed.
Our victory was complete. The troops
behaved admirably. Our cannon were
indispensable, and rendered good service
in this action."

Early in October there was something of greater importance in his command for Colonel Geary to communicate. On the 8th of the month Major J. P. Gould, of the 13th Massachusetts Volunteers, was sent across the river to seize a quantity of wheat held by the rebels at the mills, a few miles above Harper's Ferry. His arrival on the Virginia shore appears to have been the signal for the concentration of a body of the enemy in the neighborhood. Colonel Geary was called upon for reinforcements, which he promptly supplied, crossing himself on the 14th, aiding in the removal of the wheat, and holding the enemy in check. The troops under his command on the Virginia side, were four companies of his own 28th Pennsylvania regiment, three companies of the 13th Massachusetts, and three of the 3d Wisconsin, in all about 600 men. He had with him also two pieces of cannon under command of Captain Tompkins of the Rhode Island battery, and two pieces of the 9th New York battery, under Lieutenant Martin. Major Gould was placed in command of the troops left on the Maryland side, 100 men of the Massachusetts regiment, and four pieces

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of artillery on the heights, and com- took position near the old rifle works, manding the approaches from Harper's and during the action rendered good Ferry, Having accomplished his ob- service there. There then remained unject, in the capture of the flour, Colonel der my immediate command about four Geary was about to recross the river hundred and fifty men. With these the when, on the morning of the 16th, his fierce charge of the enemy's cavalry was pickets, stationed on the heights above soon checked and turned back, only to Bolivar, extending from the Potomac to be renewed with greater impetuosity, the Shenandoah river, about two and a supported, in addition to the artillery, half miles west of Harper's Ferry, were by the fire of long lines of infantry stadriven into the town of Bolivar by the tioned on Bolivar Heights; but they were enemy, who approached from the west in as soon repulsed. Three charges were three columns, consisting of infantry and thus made by them in succession. Under cavalry, supported by artillery. "I this concentrated fire our troops held was upon the ground," continues Colonel their position until eleven o'clock, when Geary, in his report of the action which Lieutenant Martin, by my order, joined ensued, "and rallied my pickets upon me with one rifled cannon, which had the main body in Bolivar. In a short been placed to cover the ferry, he havtime the action became general. The ing crossed the river with it under a advanced guard of the rebels, consisting galling fire of riflemen from Loudon of several hundred cavalry, charged gal- Heights. I then pushed forward my lantly toward the upper part of the town, right flank, consisting of two companies and their infantry and artillery soon (A and G) of the 28th Pennsylvania took position upon the heights, from Volunteers. They succeeded in turning which my pickets had been driven. the enemy's left near the Potomac, and Their three pieces of artillery were sta- gained a portion of the heights. At the tioned on and near the Charlestown road, same time Lieutenant Martin opened a where it crosses Bolivar Heights. They well-directed fire upon the enemy's canhad one thirty-two-pounder columbiad, non in our front, and Captain Tompkins one steel rifled thirteen pounder, and succeeded in silencing some of the enemy's one brass six-pounder, all of which were guns on Loudon Heights. The services, served upon the troops of my command simultaneously rendered, were of great with great activity, the large gun throw- importance, and the turning of the ing alternately solid shot, shell and enemy's flank being the key to the sucgrape, and the others principally fuse cess of the action, I instantly ordered a shell. While these demonstrations were general forward movement, which terbeing made in front, a large body of minated in a charge, and we were soon men made their appearance upon Lou- in possession of the heights from river to don Heights, with four pieces of cannon, river. There I halted the troops, and stationed at the most eligible points of from that position they drove the fugithe mountain, to bombard our troops tives, with a well-directed aim of cannon and prevent the use of the ferry on the and small arms, across the valley in the Potomac. The commencement of the direction of Hallstown. If any cavalry firing upon our front and left was al- had been attached to my command the most simultaneous. In order to pre- enemy could have been cut to pieces, as vent the enemy from crossing the Shen- they did not cease their flight until they andoah, I detached a company of the reached Charlestown, a distance of six 13th Massachusetts regiment, under com- miles. Immediately after the capture mand of Captain Schriber, for the de- of the Heights, Major Tyndale arrived fence of the fords on the river. He with a reinforcement of five companies

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