The Daily Dispatch: October 31, 1861., [Electronic resource]

The blockading fleet off New Orleans — News direct from the enemy.

We had the unexpected pleasure last evening of receiving a visit from our worthy friend, Dr. H. Lefebvre, who had just arrived in this city, direct from the blockading fleet, and was in high spirits at having escaped from an imminent risk of visiting Fort Lafayette. He was set adrift in a small boat, with Mr. Fernandez, of this city, and a captured sailor of the schooner Isilda, who happened to be a Maltese, at sea, five miles off Fort Livingston. They rowed to the fort and came up from Barataria in the little steamer Bee. Last evening they reported themselves to General Lovell, at the army headquarters.

Dr. Lefebvre was on the schooner Joseph H. Toone, (recaptured by Commodore Hollins,) coming from Havana, when she was captured at half-past 7 o'clock in the evening of the 1st of October, forty miles off Barataria. Capt. Pennington and the crew, with Messrs. Theodore Lewis, (brother of Maj. Gen. Lewis,) Aymar and Dr. Lefebvre, of this city, as passengers, were held prisoners on board the South Carolina, where they found Buttendorf and Fernandez, who were passengers on board the Isalda, captured by the South Carolina on the 30th of September. This schooner was a returning prize of the Sumter, and Lieut. Hicks, of the Sumter, and a prize crew were aboard, and taken prisoners.

The English schooner Edward Bernard, Captain Watson, who had left Mobile on the 13th with a cargo of turpentine, was captured on the 15th, at 10 o'clock A. M., between Pass a Loutre and the Sound, thirty miles from land. The master and Captain Wright, who was aboard, and all the crew were made prisoners.

The Joseph H. Toone had a cargo of arms and munitions of war valued at $10,000, that would have been worth four or five times that amount had she run safely into Barataria. Dr. Lefebvre had nothing on board under his name, and was fortunately provided with a French passport and French patents. So when he was informed that he must consider himself a prisoner of war, he waxed wroth and indignant, showed his country passport, declared it to be an outrage upon France, and demanded to be sent ashore. Mr. Fernandez was likewise provided with the papers of a Spanish citizen, and they were both promised to be liberated, and in the meantime treated with great courtesy and consideration. They were informed that while the South Carolina had been on this station she had captured seventeen prizes from us, all small craft.

On the 12th instant, the day of Commodore Hollins's attack on the enemy at the head of the passes, the steamers South Carolina and McClellan, which were then cruising off Barataria, were sent for to come to the assistance of the vessels in the Mississippi. They responded without loss of time to the call, and found the sloop-of-war Vincennes hard aground opposite the telegraph station. She threw overboard her entire armament, consisting of twenty heavy guns, before she could be pulled off.

Dr. Lefebvre was told by the United States naval officers that neither the Richmond nor the Water Witch, the Vincennes nor the Preble had been struck at all in the night attack, but it was the schooner Joseph H. Toone, (which our readers well know is now lying below the city without a scratch) that was run into by the Turtle. He did not see the Preble, and was told she had gone to Pensacola ! Dr. Lefebvre says they were in a state of high excitement, and entertained a perfect terror of our little ram, and especially of the fireships. He is sure they will not enter the river again, but will content themselves with cruising off the mouths. This sentiment hardly coincides with their assertion that ‘"nobody was hurt"’ in the naval action. --Every day, the Doctor says, our little gunboat Ivy ran out to sea a short distance and reconnoitered the fleet in the sauciest manner imaginable.

During the recent storm on the coast two of the enemy's pilot boats, the Frolic and the John Burner were blown ashore, and burned up by their crews. Dr. Lefebvre likewise informs us that Fort Livingston, where he landed in the small boat, is a truly formidable affair, with a heavy armament, and in a state of complete preparation to resist a naval attack.

Dr. Lefebvre informs us that it was the current report in the fleet that the captain of the Richmond would be court-martialed for having fled down the river before our little fleet, but he had said, in his own defence, that it was on account of our fireships that he fled, and that no navy could remain in the river while we employed fireships against them.