The Sun.
London, England, 1864-06-08 00:00:00

111 Z CIVIL WAR IN AMERICA,

(From the limes Correspondent.)

NEW YORK, May 24.
Mr Stanton's official telegrams of the progress of
General Grant are not entirely confirrued by the
correspondents of the New York journals and other
eyewituesses of the fearful battles of the Wilder-
ness and Spottsylvania Court-house. With every
disposition to do honour to the bravery of the army
and to claim a victory in every indecisive action,
these gentlemen are constrained to admit that Grant
has been foiled by General Lee in every movement
he has made, and beaten in every battle, and in
almost every skirmish. On Friday last, after re-
posing for a week and receiving large supplies and
reinforcements, the Federal army was declared by
its corps commanders to be ready to renew the
fight. It was found, however, that Lee's position at
Spottsylvania Court-house—against which all the
efforts of Grant had been futile—was so strong as to
be impregnable, unless at the sacrifice of half his
legionr. As this was a sacrifice which, with all his
extravagant recklessness of human life, General
Grant did not think it prudent to make, a flank
movement was determined upon and commenced
that evening, with the view of turning the position,
and forcing Lee to fall back to the line of the North
Anna. Mr Stanton's official telegram, dated on
Sunday evening at 10 o'clock, informed the public
of this movement, since which time up to the hour
of the despatch of this letter to Boston, to meet the
Cunard steamer, no details of the movement have
been made public, As the telegrams from Wash-
ington are submitted to military censorship before
they are transmitted over the wires, and as all the
journals are warned against the publication of
any news having a tendency to give encourage.
meat to the enemy, the public is forced to rely
upon Mr Stanton for telegraphic information ;
or, if too impatient to Wait for information con•
veyed through the post-office, to feed upon the
rumours, often grossly exaggerated, and as often
wholly false, that circulate in every place of
resort. Mr Stanton says as little as he can, and
as people argue that he would certainly say a great
deal if he had anything favourable to communicate,
they reverse the old proverb which declares no news
to be good news, and persist in believing that Grant,
like every other General who has attempted to take
Richmond, has miscalculated his means and the
force opposed to him. In a despatch dated last night
the secretary reports that he has no intelligence
either from Grant or. Batler. He endeavours, how-
ever, to keep up the spirits of the public by the
assurance that all the losses of the army have been
repaired; that since the great battle at Spottsyl-
vania Court-house, which he no longer claims as a
Federal victory, " many thousand veteran troops
have been forwarded to General Grant ;" that " the
whole army has been amply supplied with full
rations ;" that " several thousand fresh cavalry
horses have been furnished ;" that "several thou.
sand reinforcements have ale) been forwarded ;"
and that during the last eight days " over 30,000
volunteers for 100 days have been mustered into
the service, clothed, armed, equipped, and trans-
ported to their respective positions." It is only in
the case of these volunteers that Mr. Stanton
escapes from the vagueness of " several," and
"many thousands," into the exactitude of a specific
number. As it is to be inferred that the 30,000
are a portion of the 100,000 militia of the Western
States offered by the respective Governors for garri-
son and frontier duty, and accepted by Congress at
the cost, for the hundred days, of 25,000,000 dole.,
it would seem as if the anticipations of reinforce-
ments from this source had not yet been fully rea-
lised, and that it was much easier for Congress to
be liberal than for the West to b© ready, and for
the Governors to promise 100,000 men than to find
them. Thus, although Mr. Stanton's information
is meant to be cheerful, it does not quite fulfil its
purpose. And as enough is known of the direction
which Grant has taken to make it obvious that
the line of the Rappahannock, where he will be
supported by the naval strength of the Federal Go-
vernment, is to be his new base, and as that line pro-
vides the means of escape for the army by the gun-
boats and transports in case of an overwhelming
defeat, people conclude that Grant's situation can-
not be so hopeful as it has been represented, while
many are quite prepared to hear that the last and
greatest failure to capture Richmond is on the point
of consummation. The undoubted victory of Gene.'
ral Breckenridge, ViceePresident et the United &tette
under Mr. Buchanan, achieved over the forces of
General Sigel in the Shenandoah valley, must have
deranged the plans of Grant; and the virtual failure
of General Butler's expedition to the James River,
on the bank of which he lies intrenched, unable to
move and in danger of annhilation, must also be
taken as an iccident on which the Lieutenant-Gene-
ral did not calculate, and a disturbing influence upon
the result of the campaign. It is true that the pro-
gress of General Sherman from Chattanooga towards
Atlanta looks like a success, as far as the circum-
stances are known; but there are too many thought-
ful and observant persons who remember how often
in the progress of the war the North has been taught
to beware of an advance by Lee and of a retreat by
Joseph Johnson, to permit the public to draw all the
consolation that might otherwise be derived from
Sherman's movements.

As General Banks has been superseded for his
failure in Louisiana, and General Sigel for his
equally disastrous defeat in the Stenandoah, Gene-
ral Butler remains the only civilian amateur and
political General in command of a Federal army.
His position at Bermuda Landing, and hie military
management since he started from Fortress Monr,e,
are not suggestive of the possibility of SuCCUP, ; and
it is therefore anticipated that before r,any days
the armies of the North will, by his removal, be
wholly placed under the leadership of professional
soldiers. West Point is in the ascendant, both in
the North and the Sout'n, and the schoolfellows and
classmates:of that fatuous seminary, who competed
with each other in the Schoolroom a quarter of a
century ago, are placed at the head of two contend-
ing armies of undoubted spirit and bravery to solve
A mightier problem of liberty and civilization than
has ever had to be solved since Latin teased to be a
living language. General Sigel's removal, though
justified by necessity, has 'greatly displeased the
Germans, both in the Wclst and in this city. Re
was appointed to command less for military reasons
than for the conci
'..
winning of thr: .tation of his countrymen and the
ir votes for the Lincoln ticket at the
ensuing Presidential contest; but as the Germans
are enttaisiastic for Fremont, and have been rapidly
dese.cting the Lincoln ranks, the President gained
kat little by appointing General Sigel, and will lose
as little by superseding him. The Germans, how-
ever, resent what they consider the injustice done
to their hero, and loudly assert that if the Govern-

went can do without German generals it will have
to try if it can do without German soldiers.
The forged Proclamation of the President con-
tinues to be a topic of discussion, and bids fair to
lead to more important issues than the subject or
its author is worth. All the flaming patriots, con.
tractors, exterminators, and war Christians insisted
that the forgery was the work of a " Copperhead,"
a " Secessionist," and a friend of peace, and could
not have emanated from the brain or hand of any
other. The fact that it only appeared in two De-
mocratic or « Copperhead" journals was taken as
corroborative evidence of the iniquity of its origin.
Bat when it was discovered that Howard, the forger,
a mere penny-a-linner, contributing what is called
" city news," or accounts of fires, accidents, and
other local intelligence to the various newspapers
was—if he had a
of the city, political or any other
priccipiz—an Uitra-itt!bublican, a loyal leaguer,
cad one of the faithful flock of the Rev. Henry W.
Beecher, the dismay and chagrin of the dominant
Marty was ludicrousif not pitiable. Howard him-
self, when arrested, was quite surprised to learn the
righter O
importance that had been attaiedtohuiL perform-
ance, tln
ance, seemed to think he hlth as m

forge a State paper as the San, newspaper:whkh
had been greatly applauded for th© act, and that
Mr. Beecher and his father, a deacon or elder of

Plymouth Church, had only to intercede with the
Government to procure his release from Fort La-

fayette in a day or two, none the worse except for

the fright. But although the wretched man rind an
equally wretched accomplice do not appear to have
hail any other motives than a :9pecllLtion in the ride