--Accurate Statements.
The Newborn
Progress, of Tuesday, says there is such a thing as the
Burnside fleet, and what is left of it is actually at
Hatteras:
The country is so situated about
Hatteras that it is difficult to get close enough to the enemy to take satisfactory observations without being observed.
We saw, however, and conversed with a gentlemen yesterday direct from
Portsmouth, having left that place Saturday and arrived here Sunday night, who went to Ocracoke before leaving, took a horse and rode down the bank as near to the enemy as was safe, within ten or eleven miles and took as good an observation as he could with a glass.
He says he counted 25 vessels, about two-thirds of which were steamers, all inside the bar, and about 20 inside the sound, and puts down the number at one hundred.
He was confident that he distinctly saw the wreck of what he took to be a large frigate on the bar outside, and several vessels aground inside, and gives it as his opinion, that not less than from ten to fifteen vessels of one kind or another have been lost inside the bar in the recent gale.
These observations were taken on Saturday morning. The same gentleman informs us that eight of the Ocracoke men had been impressed as pilots, but have subsequently all been released, having refused absolutely to serve in that capacity, even at the peril of their lives.
Col. T. M. Crosson, who, we are happy to learn, has been appointed in command of artillery at this post with rank of
Lieut. Colonel, went down Sunday morning in command of the
Albemarle as far as the mouth of
Pamlico river, and seeing nothing returned yesterday morning.
It is not believed that the fleet will be able to rectify the breach made by the recent storm, get through lightering their vessels over the swash, and get here for several days, perhaps a week or two; but that they intend coming, seems to be pretty generally conceded.
