E. M. Stanton, June 21, 1864

June 21, 1864. (Received 11 a. m. 22d.) The Petersburg Express of this morning contains a report that General Hunter attacked Lynchburg on Saturday last and was repulsed. He approached the town by the Salem road. The report gives no account of casualties on either side or other circumstances, and I judge from its statement that the attack was nothing more than a reconnaissance. The Express says that a great battle was expected at Lynchburg on Sunday. All has been quiet at Petersburg during the day, except that the enemy threw a good many shells at the right of our lines this morning, doing no damage. The President arrived here about noon and has just returned from visiting the lines before Petersburg. As he came back, he passed through the division of colored troops commanded by General Hinks, which so greatly distinguished itself on Wednesday last. They were drawn up in double lines on each side of the road and welcomed him with hearty shouts. It was a memorable thing to behold the President, whose fortune it is to represent the principle of emancipation, passing bareheaded through the enthusiastic ranks of those negroes armed to defend the integrity of the American nation. Hon. E. M. STANTON, Secretary of War. Fort MonrROgE, V. A., June 22, 1864—11.30 a. m. (Received 6 p. m.) Insert in Dana’s of 21st, sent this morning, between ‘doing no damage” and “the President arrived,” the following : I was at Petersburg at 6p.m. One division (Barlow’s) of the Second Corps had already taken up its position on the left of the Fifth, and the other two divisions were moving in the same direction. The Sixth Corps was all ready to withdraw from the lines on our right, and move to the left of the Second, or in case the Second should be attacked in the morning tosupportit. The Kighteenth Corps was in the rear, waiting to occupy the lines in place of the Sixth. General Foster reports from Deep Bottom that his cavalry scouts had fallen in with a considerable infantry force of theenemy. A woman in theneighborhood had also informed him that a whole division under a General Lee was about to attack him, but as he received this information this morning, and no sound of battle has yet been heard from that direction, it is probable that his anxiety was groundless. City Pornt, July 1, 1864—10.30 a. m. (Received 8 p. m.) I arrived here an hour since, the boat having lain by last night and night before. The army occupies about the same lines as when you were here. The Highteenth and Ninth Corps are alone engaged in anything like siege work, their effort being to get possession of a knoll before them. If they succeed in this the enemy will have to abandon this side of the Appomattox. On the left of the Ninth Corps the Fifth is posted, extending nearly southward across the Jerusalem road, but at so great a distance from the rebel fortifications as to have no immediate effect uponthem. The Second and Sixth Corps are both well protected. No attempt has been made to establish intrenchments toward the Appomattox on the Jeft since the failure of the Second and Sixth Corps on Thursday night of last week. It seems that the rebels are very strongly fortified there, also, and that if we were to attempt to envelop them for the whole distance, we should not only render our lines weak from their great extension, but should have no free infantry force to operate with elsewhere. Our batteries of heavy guns are used with much effect on Smith’s front. He keeps silent the rebel fort, Clifton, which you will recollect is on the west side of the Appomattox, and, as he thinks, has much damaged therailroad bridge. To this he is directing special attention. Grant thinks all the railroads are well broken up. The Weldon road Wright has pretty thoroughly destroyed with his infantry. On Butler’s front at Bermuda Hundred all is substantially as when you were here. 1 have in the most informal way communicated to Grant the substance of what you said respecting Rosecrans and Curtis. He thinks the most useful way to employ Rosecrans would be to station him at some convenient point on the Northern frontier with the duty of detecting and exposing rebel conspiracies in Canada. His Excellency the PRESIDENT, Washington. City Pont, V. A., July 1, 1864—11 a. m. (Received 8.30 p. m.) Grant thinks the difficulty between Meade and Warren has been settled without the extreme remedy which Meade proposed last week. Butler is pretty deep in controversial correspondence with “Baldy” Smith, in which Grant says Butler is clearly in the wrong. A report is here that Wilson has been surrounded and destroyed, but it is improbable. Grant does not believe it; besides, he thinks Wilson to be as likely as any other man to get safely out of a tight place. All that is certain is, that Kautz got separated from him, and that some men of Wilson’s division came in with him. It appears that Wilson had not the sort of roving commission which Grant supposed, but that Meade gave him explicit instructions as to every part of his course. That portion of them which related to the Danville railroad he had fully executed, except that it is not yet satisfactorily ascertained whether he succeeded in destroying the bridge over the Staunton River and had got back upon the Weldon road, near Stony Creek, when he was attacked by the whole body of the rebel cavalry. This had been set free by Sheridan crossing the James River and stopping to rest, and was all at once pitched upon Wilson. No doubt he has had hard fighting and heavy losses, but I think he will bring in the mass of his division in safety. Sheridan has gone out to help him, but his horses are badly jaded, and he cannot move very rapidly. Wright has moved out to Reams’ Station to support Sheridan. Hon. E. H. M. STANTON, Washington. City PoINT, Juiy 1, 1864—2 p.m. (Received 8.20 a. m. 2d.) I have just seen General Kautz, and have obtained from him a clearer idea of the disaster to Wilson’s cavalry. It seems Wilson had been led to believe, by a dispatch trom General Meade, that our lines had extended around to the Appomattox, or at least across the Weldon railroad. He was, accordingly, confident of finding our pickets at Reams’ Station or near there. After he crossed the Sappony, on what is called the stage road, he was attacked by Hampton’s cavalry; fought them Tuesday afternoon and night between that stream and Stony Creek, relying all the while on aid from the Army of the Potomac, which he supposed to be in hearing of his cannon. One of his aides, Captain Whitaker, also cut his way through with a company and reported the case at General Meade’s, but succor could not be got up in season. Pushing on, Wilson crossed Stony Creek, when his advance, under Kautz, found before it an infantry force, which prisoners reported as consisting of three brigades, under Finegan. Wilson now determined to go back and break through Hampton’s force, but on returning to Stony Creek found that Hampton’s men had already destroyed the bridge. The case being desperate, he gave orders to destroy the train and artillery. The caissons were blown up, and the guns, twenty in number, spiked and hauled into a wooded morass just as Finegan’s force with a body of cavalry came up, charging so as to divide Kautz and Wilson. The former saw that he had a chance to bring off his command in safety, and thought that to rejoin Wilson would only be to expose himself to the danger of also being surrounded and captured. Accordingly, he marched out, bringing off his division and about 1,000 men of Wilson’s, including the whole of the Second Ohio Regiment. He does not think Wilson has been captured, but that he has escaped with the mass of his troops, either passing to the southeast between Stony Creek and the Sappony and swimming or fording the Nottoway, or else by moving to the northwest toward Dinwiddie Court-House. Sheridan marched on Wednesday night, and left Prince George CourtHouse yesterday morning at 7 o’clock, while the Sixth Corps went to Reams’ Station, but nothing has been heard from them or from any of Wilson’s troops. If Wilson took the road by Dinwiddie Court-House he would have to make a long circuit before he could again come within reach of us. Kautz says that the outermost pickets of our army were really not more than one mile and a half from the scene of these events. Up to that point the expedition had been exceedingly successful. It had thoroughly destroyed the Danville railroad from about four miles northeast of Burke’s Station to the Staunton River, which General Meade’s orders fixed as the limit to their march in that direction. The bridge at that river they were not able to destroy. It was very strongly fortified and guarded. Most of the Danville track was of flat or strap iron laid upon pine scantling, so that the destruction was easy as well as perfect. On the South Side road they destroyed about four miles, working each way from the junction at Burke’s. The expedition averaged forty miles a day, doing the work of destruction mostly by night. They found no great stock of supplies in the country. Their horses fed chiefly on green oats and wheat. About 3,000 negroes, who had joined the column in Dinwiddie and Amelia, were with it when it was attacked. Kautz’estimates the losses of his own command at about one-quarter of his division, which at starting was about 2,500 strong, but has not yet received any accurate reports from his officers. Hon. E. M. STANTON, Washington. Ciry Point, July 1, 1864—4.30 p.m. (Received 7.30 a. m. 2d.) I find that-in my last dispatch I misunderstood Kautz’s statement of the amount of railroad destruction accomplished by Wilson’s expedition. It seems before reaching Burke’s Station he had first destroyed about one mile and a half of the Weldon road, then he struck the South Side road, near Ford’s Station, and destroyed it as far as Blacks and Whites Station, after which he moved to the Junction and did what was reported in my former dispatch.

Hon. E. M. STANTON.