We are indebted to Sergeant William S. White, a gallant member of the third company of Richmond Howitzers, for a copy of the New York Herald of the 27th. There is hardly a word in the Herald about the recent movement of Grant's army. A Washington dispatch says that arrangements are "in process of execution which insure the early capture of Richmond." In the same telegram it is announced that the next news from Sheridan will bring the intelligence of the capture of Early's army; but, unfortunately for the truth of this statement, the "next news" they got in Washington was the fact that Sheridan was retreating down the Valley with Early after him. The following in.
Stanton's official Dispatch:
War Department,
Washington, district of Columbia,
September 26--10:30 A. M.
Dispatches from General Sheridan up to eleven o'clock on Saturday night, dated six miles south of New Market, have been received.
He had driven the enemy from Mount Jackson without being able to bring on an engagement.
The enemy were moving rapidly, and he had no cavalry present to hold them.
General Torbert had attacked Wickham's force at Luray and captured a number of prisoners.
General Sheridan found rebel hospitals in all the towns from Winchester to New Market, and was eighty miles from Martinsburg.
Twenty pieces of artillery were captured at Fisher's Hill, together with eleven hundred prisoners, a large amount of ammunition, caissons, limbers, &c., and a large quantity of entrenching tools, small arms, and debris.
No list of the captured materiel has yet been received.
The small towns through the Valley have a great many of the rebel wounded.
General Stevenson reports the arrival at Harper's Ferry of a train of our wounded, twenty captured guns and eighty additional captured officers.
Breckinridge has gone to take command of the rebel Department of the Southwest.
Dispatches received this morning from General Sherman's command state that Hood appears to be moving towards the Alabama line.
A strong force of rebel raiders were reported to be operating against Sherman's communications, and had captured Athens, Alabama.
Vigorous exertions were being made to overtake and destroy this force.
Jeff. Davis is reported to be at Macon.
Reports have also been received from Major-General Canby. General Steele had been strongly reinforced, and had taken the offensive.
Dispatches from General Grant, dated at 10 o'clock last night, report no military operations.
The above comprises the substance of military information proper for publication received to the present date by this department. Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War.
Yankee reports of operations in the Valley — Averill relieved from duty.
We find in the Herald several dispatches from the Valley, which, however, do not contain as late intelligence as has already been received from Confederate sources from that quarter. A telegram from Sheridan's headquarters, dated the 24th, speaking of the capture of Fisher's Hill, says: ‘ At Fisher's Hill he rested his right upon the Massanutton mountain, and his left upon North mountain, having his front, about three miles in length, covered by strong natural and artificial defences.--His right, which was about one mile in advance of his left, was considered almost impregnable. ’ On the 21st, an important position in front of the enemy's centre was gained by Wright's corps. On the 22d, the main attack was begun by a strong demonstration by Emory's troops on the enemy's right. About noon, or a little later, Ricketts's division of the Sixth corps advanced and secured some important heights in front of the centre, while Averill's division of cavalry attacked and drove the enemy at a gallop from his advanced position on his left one mile back into his main works and held him there, while Crook's corps, which had been concealed during the day, was transferred in the rear of Averill's division to the enemy's extreme left. At five in the afternoon, Crook and Averill stormed and carried the works of the enemy, the cavalry leaping the barriers erected by the enemy, capturing two battle flags, four guns and over one hundred prisoners.--While Crook swept towards the enemy's centre, the Sixth corps attacked, followed by the Nineteenth, while Averill swept along the base of the North mountain outward seven miles, captured one hundred and seventy-five cavalry horses, four caissons, fourteen wagons, eight ambulances and a number of fugitives. The enemy, having probably learned of the movement upon his right and rear, had commenced leaving this position some two hours before our attack. His departure was so hastened that he was compelled to leave sixteen guns and over a thousand prisoners in our hands. Yesterday morning the pursuit of the enemy was promptly continued by our cavalry, and he was found in position at Mount Jackson, twenty-five miles south of Fisher's Hill, where he seems disposed to offer a stubborn resistance to our further advance. Yesterday morning Early's rear was overtaken near Hawkins's bridge by General Averill, with a cavalry division and the brigade of General Devins, and driven to the town of Mount Jackson, where his entire force was found in possession. General Averill was relieved from duty with his division this morning, and granted a leave of absence for twenty days. This order has caused a universal feeling of amazement in this army, and it is generally thought that some question of rank between General Averill and General Torbert is involved, the former being the ranking officer, but the latter chief of cavalry of this military division. Averill's division officers and men exhibited their devotion to him by the most marked demonstrations. The officers, who seemed to love him as an elder brother, shed tears at his departure, and as the General rode along the lines for the last time the men greeted him with the most enthusiastic cheers and many expressions of affection. General Averill called the officers together and addressed them, enjoining upon them to continue as energetic and attentive in the future as they had been in the past, and to yield the same obedience to his successor as they had to him. There is a prospect of an engagement in front. Colonel Patten, commanding a brigade in Breckinridge's corps, died yesterday. He was mortally wounded in the fight of Monday, and was carried to Mr. Williams's house, in this town, from which he will be buried some time to-day. General Early sent a flag of truce to General Sheridan to inquire respecting him.The entry of General Price into Missouri--Federal Estimates of his force.
Much excitement exists in Missouri in consequence of the intelligence that General Price has entered that State with thirty thousand Confederate troops. A force of five thousand Confederate cavalry occupied Fredericktown, Missouri, on the 24th. A Telegram from St. Louis, date the 25th, says: ‘ St. Louis, September 25.--Joe Shelby's rebel cavalry are said to be four or five thousand strong, and occupied Fredericktown, twenty miles east of Pilot Knob, yesterday. Shelby's designs are not yet developed. ’ General Ewing, commandant of the district of St. Louis, took a brigade of A. J. Smith's troops down last night, and otherwise prepared to meet the enemy. Pilot Knob is well fortified and garrisoned. Cape Girardeau, on the river, can stand a sledge; and the only damage the rebels can do is temporarily to cut the Iron Mountain railroad. When Price crossed the Arkansas river some days since, at least a part of his forces moved towards Batesville, evidently with the design of joining Shelby in Northeastern Arkansas, and with their combined commands invade Missouri from the southeast. The force at Fredericktown is doubtless the advance of this column, which is estimated to be ten or twelve thousand strong. General Mower, with part of the Sixteenth corps, left Brownsville, on the Duvall's Bluff and Little Rock railroad, a few days since, going north; and Shelby will soon have to look sharply after his rear. The situation will probably develop itself in a very few days. St. Louis, September 25, 1864. --It is now said that Price has entered Missouri with forces estimated at thirty thousand strong. His plan is supposed to be to march to the central portion of the State with three columns, and, capturing all the important points, hold the country. It is expected that Kirby Smith will join him with from ten thousand to twelve thousand men. The Arkansas guerrillas are also concentrating to aid in the movement of the column now in the southeast, doubtless under Shelby, who has some six or eight thousand men. Reports are circulating to-night that part of the force which occupied Fredericktown yesterday captured Cape Girardeau to-day; but they are very doubtful. The enemy may be demonstrating in that direction, but the post is too strong to be taken by cavalry. Military preparations here are very active, and troops are already moving southward. The blacksmiths' shops have been busy all day shoeing cavalry horses. Ordnance and ammunition are being sent to different points. Everything is being put into fine condition for immediate active service. Brigadier-General Pike has called out all the enrolled militia. General Rosecrans will issue an appeal to-morrow calling the people to arms. Major-General Blair arrived here to-day. The trains are still running on the Iron Mountain railroad, which, so far as is known, has not yet been molested.The Presidential question — Reverdy Johnson out for M'Clellan.
Reverdy Johnson has written a letter in favor of McClellan for the Presidency. His expressed opinions of Lincoln must be very refreshing to that gentleman. In his letter he says: ‘ In the early days of Mr. Lincoln's administration I lost almost all hope of a successful termination of the rebellion whilst he was at the head of the government, and this, the merest hope, is now wholly extinguished. His infirmity of purpose; his unsteadiness in any policy; his ones expressed dislike to radicalism; his subsequent adoption of its worst features; his ignorant and mischievous interference with our military campaigns; disappointment, often against advice, of high military officers of notorious incompetency; his frequent and nearly fatal change of commanders; his abandonment of the before uniform practice of his predecessors of Cabinet consultations; his permission of dishonorable dissensions among its members, displaying itself constantly to his knowledge, before others, and often, as it is known, in his presence, in personal abuse of each other; his obstinate and reckless disregard of the wishes of his political friends, communicated to him on one occasion in the solemn form of a committee, representing, as he was aware, nine-tenths, if not every friend he had in Congress, and again, and recently, expressed in terms not to be mistaken, in one of the resolutions of the convention, which nominated him for re-election; his permitting military interference with elections, virtually subjecting the ballot to the control of the bayonet; his justifying arrests without specifications of charges, though over and over again demanded, and long-continued imprisonment, and, after release, without trial of explanation; his tolerating trial, by military commission, of offences made cognizable exclusively, by acts of Congress passed since the rebellion, by the civil courts, and the virtual confiscation of private property, without even a resort to any mode of trial, and other matters of like illegality and outrage, too many to detail in a letter, while they demonstrate his utter unfitness for the Presidency, give no promise of a successful result of the contest while he is commander-in-chief of the army and navy, and intrusted by the power he wields with the shaping of our peace and war policy. This must be arrested, or, in my opinion, the country will be mined. This fatal career can be, and would be, stopped by the election of almost any loyal man in his stead, and the result is certain if General McClellan becomes the successor. His perfect devotion to the Union and his expressed determination to make its restoration the "one condition of peace"--the purity of his character, his demonstrated ability, and his military attainments — furnish guarantees that in his hands the executive power will not be abused, but be directed, in strict subordination to the constitution, to the sole end of restoring the Union, which is our inheritance, and causing it again to shed its blessings over a now sorely-troubled and bleeding nation. Wild, insane and reckless partisans may assail him with every opprobrious epithet — men who have tasted of that insane root, the obtaining of high office at home or abroad, may tell us, to the disgust of all patriotic men, that "it is not too much to say, 'that it would be far better that Robert E. Lee should enter Washington at the head of his army, as its conqueror, than that George B. McClellan should enter it as President'" A ludicrously inconsistent and even illogical premier, the half of whose official papers and speeches answer the other half, may threaten treachery on the part of the Administration, on the happening of Mr. Lincoln's defeat in November, by declaring himself unable in that contingency to "vouch for the safety of the country against the rebels during the interval which must elapse before the new administration can constitutionally come into power, " and the canvass may be continued as, with some honorable exceptions, it has begun, by the billingsgate abuse and calumnious charges against our candidates and their friends; yet, from all these causes we have nothing to fear. Success is in our hands if we are true to duty. Under the protection of Divine Providence we can achieve for our country a victory greater in its results than any present military success. We can elect McClellan and Pendleton in spite of office-holders, contractors, and administrative influence and power; and that done, in a short time thereafter State after State will be found returning to allegiance, until, at a date not remote, the Union will be restored, fraternal affections revived, and peace and plenty and happiness and national character and power be substituted for division, hatred, war, destitution, wretchedness, national dishonor and comparative weakness. ’ With regard, your obedient servant
Reverdy Johnson.
Reverdy Johnson.