...ated at 9,000, under General Stephens. If this is the true estimate it certainly would seem as if we could hold them in check for any length of time. Fort Sumter is about three miles distant from Secessionville , but it seems to me impossible for the enemy's gunboats ever to come from that quarter to attack us, as the stream is only navigable to very small boats, and that, too, only at very high tides. The...