Dispatch correspondence.
Norfolk, May 22, 1861.
Yesterday, a steamer which had been above Newport News, blockading the entrance to James river, attempted to go down to Fort Monroe.
When nearly opposite the battery at Sewell's Point a shot was fired from that place, which brought her to. She returned the fire, but after several shots had been exchanged between them, finding she could not pass the battery, she put back to the place from which she came.
She is now fastened in there, unless she passed out during the night --that was in the morning.
Yesterday afternoon the tug Young America ran up within a mile and exchanged two or three shots with the fort at Sewell's Point, but being backed out by the fire from the fort, she ran off to the steam frigate Minnesota, which came up and rounded to about two miles (which is as near almost as she can approach) from the fort, and opened with shot and shell upon the battery at Sewell's Point, firing about fifteen times.
The battery answered with great spirit from several heavy guns, which caused her to back out, or rather they let her drift out of range.
Her fire had no effect upon the battery, nor was any one within it the least injured.
Whether she sustained any injury or not has not been ascertained.
The turning back of the steamer from James river, I think, will be of great advantage, as the battery at Sewell's Point will soon be in a condition to protect the entrance, and thus break up the blockade, so far as the passage from Richmond to Norfolk is concerned, in a short time.
Send down the steamers Yorktown and Jamestown, heavily armed and well manned, and I'll guarantee their safe passage from Norfolk to Richmond.
Our Northern friends(?) may think that they have us safe, and by their loud bragging of so many thousands already stationed at Fort Monroe, and more to come, that they can intimidate us. Well, let them try it, in any shape or form; they will perhaps find, when too late, that they have reckoned without their host, and that we are prepared to receive them in any form or numbers.
Powder. 