Correspondence of the Richmond Dispatch.
look out for spies.
Fredericksburg, June 5th, 1861.
Though I am not in the habit of writing for newspapers, I feel it my duty, as a Southern man, to make known, through you, some facts which you and others may think important.
I am, you see, near our border, and hence have opportunity to see and hear much.
I go to Aquia Creek two or three times a week, marking closely men and things.
Yesterday morning I went over, as usual, and after arriving there, a fellow who came down in the same train with myself stepped up and inquired of me the number of men at the batteries, and several other questions of the same character.
Discovering at once that he had a Northern tongue, I gave him such answers as I thought a Southern gentleman should give a Northern vandal, for such I at once regarded him. I soon discovered him and two others, out in the swamp near the point, pretending that they were looking for pieces of shell.
I inquired of several of the soldiers as to who they were, one of whom told me that he thought that they came there for the purpose of ‘"laying off batteries."’ I then went to two of the officers.
They told me that they were some gentlemen who came down on the cars.
No disposition seemed to be manifest as to who they were or where they came from.
I was surprised at this carelessness, and determined to keep an eye upon them as long as I could.
When the train left I was ‘"aboard,"’ and after leaving the Creek a mile or two, I determined to see if they were on the cars.
I went through the train from the first coach to the last and could not find them.
In a little valley, this side the Potomac some four or five miles, the cars stopped, and then it was that I discovered that the same three chaps referred to were aboard, either with the engineer, or on the ‘#x34; tender,"’ or in some other place where it is not usual for passengers to go. They got off there on the farm of Mr. Hedgman.
I soon discovered that one of them carried a surveying compass, which he planted a few steps from the railroad.
The cars left; I watched them until I was carried away, and they were lost in the distance.
The last I saw of them, the three were standing a few feet from the instrument, (standing on three legs,) and seemed to be in close consultation about something.
They spoke the dialect of the North.
They spent their time at the Creek, nearly the whole of it away from the crowd, out in the swamp, perhaps to see whether it was firm enough to carry troops.
They did not leave then in the cars, yet they came on them or under them, to the place above referred to, and then at 4 o'clock--knowing, too, that it was the last train for the day — they were put down, prepared to survey the country about them.
Not a man in the cars, or at the battery, seemed to know anything about them.
I believe that they were Yankee spies, here for the purpose of plotting our destruction.
This is only one instance in many I could give you. The border of Virginia is being overrun by these wolves in sheep's clothing, and Virginia men, who ought to take this matter in hand, must wait until they get ‘"something to prove"’ before they are imprisoned, as they should be. 