The National Register. — London, England, 1813-06-20 00:00:00

r.....~ THE NATIONAL REGISTER. I Wet eded in performing the whole of this distance, without stopping, in thirty hours. On my arrival at Hadmerslehcn, I learnt that a second convoy was at Hessen, on the Brunswick road, three miles and a halt from Halberstadt, where it sv; s infeteled to arrive in the morning to join the first, in the view of prneeeding with greater safety on its march to the Grand Army. This last convoy was escorted by t o ur thou sand infantry, five hundred cavalry, and Inlay pieces of artill• ry. • Notwithstanding the fatigue. of :fly men and bores, after so harrassing a march, I resolved to continue my route, and to make an immediate attack upon the enemy at Halberstadt, before the arrival of the re inforcement ; and in order to take advantage of the fault he had ennmitted in placing his guns and the convoy outside of the town, although at a very short distance from the walls. After recounuit tri og at four o'clock in the morning, I ascertained that the enemy had placed his guns in a square, the middle of which wig filled with ammunition waggons and other carriages. al(' was lined with infan try, the flanks being covered by two hundred am! fifty horse. The whole fOrmed a sort of fortress, almost impenetrable to cavalry. One of niy first cares having been to cut offtlie enemy from the town , a single gate which the enemy hail neglected to close, afforded me the means ofgetting possession of the town, where the brave Colonel Trecotf charged the rear of the •I roops which were marching out to join the square, and pursued them very nearly up to the guns. OU the other side, Colonel Wlassaw, whom I had sent forward with two regiments, in hopes of surprising the enemy, made two very fine charges against the square; but the enemy having notice of our march, and being upon their guard, he could not make any impression. The enemy- now opened a heavy cannonade from four teen gnus, to which I could only oppose two; by the file of which, however, five of the enemy's ammunition waggons were blown up. Oise of mine met the siinie fiats, and four horses were killed. At this moment, a regiment of Cossacks, which I had detached upon the road by which the enemy's reinforcements were advancing, brought me intelligence that they were within two miles of us; this determined me to make a general and decisive (gal against the square with all my troops. With this view I ordered all the scattered Cossacks to seize the same moment at which the attack would be ma:le by the regular cavalry. After exhorting my soldiers to do their duty, I ordered all my people to charge at the same moment. This brilliant attack against a for►nidable squaw, defended by fourteen pieces of cannon, su.- pwsed my expeet.;tions, and covered with glory the hussars of bourn, mum:llB4d by Colouel Tiernan, and two regiments of Riga dragoons; the Coswk4 also seconded admirably the aim. of these four Itundre,i horse. In an instant the batteries were carried, and my brave men in the middle of the square here the carnage was horrib'e, as the enemy defended binrielf obstioately, even tiring upon us from the car riages : More than 700 %yeri ki:led, the rest taken, awl I venture to assert that not an individual escaped out of all this corps. Scarcely was the slaughter t: retinated when the enemy's colnnub began to appear, pressing upon my Cossacks. I was then ohlig f . 4 l to support them, in order to gain time to send off the captured guns and prisoners. From want of time I con' carry off only the 14 guns and 12 ammunition waggons; I blew op the rest in the very presence of the enemy. I destroyed or distributed to the inhabi tants all the stores which were in tie ti.wn, and ut seven in the evening I retired with my booty to Coc!tacit. Such is the sum mary account of this exploit : it has the more merit thnt its having been undertaken after a march of fifteen miles, which has been fol. lowel 'ay an engagement of woe than seven hours. It is beyond my power to express to your Excellency how well all my people have dime their duty in this hi illiant affair. That the Coisacks shoal I have been ante to support a march of fifteen mites, and a combat of seven hours afterwards, has not sur prised me so mach as to see my regular cavalry perform it as well as them, without leaving a si horse behind. (Signed) CZE4Nicurrr, ARMISTICE. The fortunes of Prance continue to revive. The battles of Bautzen and Wurtchen, immediately followed by the abandonment of the capital and one half of Silesia, have led, as in former wars to au Armistice between the Belli gerents. It is most favourable to the enemy, whom it leaves in possession of all the country he had occupied, compels the detached Prussian and Russian corps that acted in his rear and intercepted his convoys to recross the Elbe, and sti • pulates that all the fortresses which his troops still bold on the Lower Oder, the Vistula, and in the Duchy of Warsaw, and which bad been long blockaded, shall be re-victualled every five days by the Allies, and a league of territory eva cuated round each of them. In most campaigns, an armi stice extended only to the two armies between which it was concluded, and the other distant and independent corps were left free to act as their respective situations allowed. The present suspension of hostilities, on the contrary, is ge neral, and the Swedes have no soo:r reached the scene of action than all their force is paralised without a blow , at a time, too, when uniting with the Prussian division, which under BuLow lately had a severe engagement with OUDI• NOT at lloyeswerda, and with the troops under TETT EN• BORN and Won° N zow on the Elbe, they might have formed an accumulation of force in the rear of the enemy sufficient t 6 seriously it ipede his further advance, if not to com pel him to retreat. This is not the only advantage that NAPOLEON derives from this armistice. It gives him time to being up the army of reserve collected between the Rhine and the Mayne, to the Elbe, and to build several strong places to complete the chain of fortresses that defends the passage of that river, and prevent the future in cursions of the detached corps of the Allies, should the negociations not lead to a peace. Besides two new fortresses which are ordered to he immediately erected on the banks of the Elbe between Magdeburg and Ifamburgh, the latter city is to be turned into a place d'armes, and the communi mum with Harburg secured by fortifications on the islands. BUONAP ABIOS dreaded vengeance has at length burst on the Ilamburghers, but in a less sanguitialy way than usual. He has demanded their gold, and not their blood, and has imposed a contribution of 84 millions of franks (near four millions sterling) upon them, to be paid in four weeks, one half in cash and the other in bills, a greater proportion by those who subscribed most liberally for the liberty of Cer many As the Armistice, which was signed on the 4th inst. is to last to the 20th of July, six days notice being given of the renewal of hostilities, and Breslau with a tongue of ter ritory extending from Bohemia to the Oder, is to remain neutral between the two armies. NAPOLEON has removed hit bead-quartets to Dresden, from whence - be can equally attend to the negociations for peace and his preparations for renewed hostilities. Ile has encamped his different eorps at a stoat distance from each other along the line of denier• cation and fully provisioned Cllogau. it appears that Aus tiia has really allowed the Polish corps under PONIATOWSKI to pass through her territories, at the date of the last Path papers. the eth inst. the Poles were only a few days march from the French. The Emperor of AUSTRIA had quitted his capital for Prague, it was supposed to presume over the Congress. The fact of WITTGENSTEIN having resigned the com mand of the Allies to BARCLAY DE TOLLY, is unfortu nately placed beyond doubt by the terms of the Armistice which is died by the latter as Commander in Cbitf, JUNE 2r; '