June 25, 1863, The New York Herald
Our Baltimore Correspondence.
BALTIMORE, June 19, 1863.
General Lee’s delay in attacking Hooker has led to some doubts as to whether Washington is really the object at the capture of which he is aiming. But of this there can be no doubt, in view of the following facts, which I have learned today. It is evident from these facts that the delay, so far from affording cause for congratulation, is really a most ominous circumstance.
On crossing the Rappahannock to move northward Gen. Lee took with him a very large pontoon train, which was sent up to him from Gordonsville, but which was said to come from Richmond. The boats are all new and the train is compete in all its appliances. What river does General Lee intend to cross with these pontoons? Certainly not the Upper Potomac, for that is easily fordable. Certainly not the Susquehanna, for there are no indications of a movement of the rebel forces towards that river. The whole rebel force that has been in Pennsylvania was only two thousand mounted guerillas, and they have probably left the State now. The fact that General Lee has this pontoon train with him I know to be true.
It is stated on authority heretofore proved worthy of credence that, on leaving Warrenton for Thoroughfare Gap, General Lee detached one whole corps, at least thirty thousand strong, who are now en route for Dumfries, by way of Brentsville. It is stated that this column is accompanied by forty pieces of artillery, among which are eighteen of the largest rifled cannon, ten small rifled cannon and six sixty-four pounders, and also by a pontoon train. If this pontoon train is the one mentioned above, there can be but one explanation of the movement. General Lee designs this corps to cross the Potomac at Budd’s Ferry, which is only fifteen miles below Washington, and to advance on the capital by the way of Bladensburg. It is possible also that General Lee expects the Union forces now on the peninsula to be sent up the Potomac to Washington, and that he will seek to re-establish the old batteries on the Potomac, in order to sink the transport vessels that may be conveying the troops from the peninsula.
The rebel infantry which defeated General Milroy at Winchester, Colonel McReynolds at Berryville, and General Tyler at Martinsburg, did not cross the Potomac at all. After taking possession of Martinsburg they proceeded along the line of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad as far west as Cumberland, and as far east as Point of Rocks. The railroad between these two points, a distance of ninety miles, is completely in their possession. During the last four days they have been engaged in tearing up the track near Martinsburg and at points further west and in destroying bridges. In a military point of view, the whole road, therefore, has been rendered entirely useless to the government, and railroad communication between Washington and the West, so far as that road is concerned, is completely cut off.
It is now understood that General Lee, instead of moving on Centreville, is advancing with his main body towards Gum Spring, Dranesville and Coon’s Ford. If this should prove to be true, doubt will no longer exist as to the direction which his plans will take. From Coon’s Ford to Rockville, and from Rockville to the Baltimore Railroad, will be but a short march. This railroad once cut, whether by this column or by the one advancing from Budd’s Ferry, or by both co-operating, Washington will be as completely isolated from the North and East as it is now from the West. The capture of Washington will then be reduced to a question as to the relative strength of the armies of Lee and Hooker. If the forces under General Dix, General Peck and General Foster could be hurried up to Washington they would swell Hooker’s numbers to a very high figure. But that does not seem to be the intention of the War Department at present. Probably they will be ordered up when Lee is thundering at the very gates of the capital, and when the batteries on the Potomac have been re-established, and when the railroad between Annapolis Junction and Washington has been destroyed.
So far as General Lee is concerned, having sent 30,000 troops towards Budd’s Ferry, and having 10,000 or 15,000 near Harper’s Ferry, he is probably only waiting for certain reinforcements, which were on the way some time ago to join him. During the last two weeks no less than 40,000 rebel troops have passed through Lynchburg, bound for Richmond and the North. There were General Lee’s old troops, which he had sent to Chattanooga some weeks ago, and 20,000 others from Bragg’s army. This, with the 10,000 troops which have been sent to him by General Beauregard at Charleston, will make his forces amount to 150,000 troops. The government will no doubt see to it that Hooker has as many. It is no longer in Hooker’s power, however, to fight on ground of his own choosing, even although he is fighting under the very walls of the capital. Neither is it in his power […..] deliver battle, or not to deliver it,” as he boasted that it was. He will be compelled to fight just at the moment that General Lee thinks proper to attack him, and he cannot postpone a fight when that day comes. He will have to fight on whatever ground General Lee chooses, nor can he change the ground. And the reason of this is that he has within himself none of those strategical resources the possession of which would have enabled him not only to choose the time and place where he would fight, but even to have prevented General Lee from crossing the Rappahannock at all.
The New York Seventh regiment arrived here yesterday, and were received with a rapturous welcome by the citizens, among whom they made hosts of friends during their sojourn here last year. They will be stationed for the present in one of the forts here. They would do a great deal more good, however, somewhere on the railroad between here and Washington.