The Sun.
London, England, 1863-07-29 00:00:00

THE SOUTHERN CONFEDERACY.

(From the Special Correspondent of the Times.)
HEADQUARTERS OF GEN. LEE, NEAR CHAM-
BERSBURG, PENNSYLVANIA, June 29.
Up to the present time nothing can exceed the
success which has attended the onward march of
Gen. Lee across the border of Virginia and the heel
of Maryland, up the rich Cumberland Valley, and
deep into the bowels of the State of Pennsylvania.
If my recent letter from Berryville has ever reached
England your readers will understand with what
admirable dexterity the large army of the Confede-
rates has moved from Fredericksburg into the
Northern States, snapping up the force of Gen Mil-
roy at Winchester en route, and masking its ex-
tended lines behind the gaps of the Blue Ridge,
firmly held as they were by Gen. Lee. This advan-
tage has been gained without striking a blow, ex-
cepting those which have been interchanged in the
brisk cavalry skirmishes between Gen. Stuart and
Gen. Pleasanton. In my last letter I alluded to the
serious wound which Major Von Borcke, the chief
of Gen. Stuart's Staff, contracted in one of these
skirmishes. It will be a matter of interest to' those
Englishmen who have lately visited the Confede-
racy, and who have most of them carried away agree-
able recollections of Major Von Borcke, to learn that
this gallant Prussian officer, who has likewise suc-
ceeded in gaining the affections and admiration of i
the whole of Gen. Stuart's command, has hitherto
progressed favourably, and that he has not en-
countered the danger which I apprehended for him
when last I wrote—the danger, namely, of his being
taken prisoner, although two Federal officers actu-
ally entered the house in which he lay wounded.
The bullet is still, I fear, buried in the muscles at
the back of his neck; but I understand that no
danger to his life is apprehended, unless the slough-
ing of the wound subsequently injures an artery.
The movement of an enormous army like Gen.
Lee's, with its vast ammunition or ordnance trains,
its weary length of waggons, laden with the infinite
stores of the Quartermaster-General's and Commis-
sary-General's departments, its interminable bat-
teries of artillery, to say nothing of brigade after
brigade of infantry, and squadron after squadron of
cavalry, can be compared to nothing but the action
of mighty forces in the laboratory of nature, the
bursting of the St. Lawrence at the commencement
of each May through the penthouse of ice which has
for seven months controlled its limbs, the upheaval
of strata among the volcanic summits of the Andes.
Any time duringthese last 10 days a traveller might
sit by the wayside in the Valley of Virginia, or on
the edge of the Potomac--that Rubicon which the
Confederates have at length crossed to teach their
pertinacious enemy some of the anguish which Vir-
ginia, Tennessee, Louisiana, North Carolina, and
Mississippi have in different degrees so long en-
dured—and at Hagerstown in Maryland, or at
Greencastle in Pennsylvania, and wonder at the
endless files of footmen and horsemen, accompanied
by troops of negro camp-followers which passed
before him, the men still ragged and unkempt, but
hardly one without good substantial shoes; the mules
and horses for the most part sleek and fat, the army
altogether in infinitely better case than I ever saw
it before. It is not likely that any such traveller
would occupy his post long without being subjected
to any amount of " chaff," all the more so if his
dress or appearance offered any salient points of
attack. With jest and song and banter for each
and all that they met, with saucy cheers as they
tramped through Pennsylvanian hamlets to the
tune of " Dixie" villainously interpreted by a Con-
federate field band, heedless of the half-cowed,
half-menacing looks of the groups of Yankee men and
women, the ragged rebels press insolently forward,as
though defeat and discomfiture were possibilities not
dreamt of in their philosophy. Within the county
of Franklin, of which Chambersburg is the county
town, hardly a horse, or mule, or head of cattle has
escaped the Confederates; and it is hard to see,
even if the Confederate army was withdrawn to-
morrow, how the harvest, which lies thick and pro-
mising in many a fair field, could be saved or gar-
nered. The farmers gather ruefully in the streets,
emboldened by the impunity which they have
learnt from the experience of the last fortnight is
everywhere extended to them by the Confederates,
and moodily discuss the future and anathematise
President Lincoln and Governor Curtin and General
Hooker. But it is a strange commentary upon this
war, especially in the eyes of one who has during
these last four months visited hundreds of
Southern towns, and encountered hardly a soul hut
old men and young boys and women, to see thou-
sands of young and middle-aged stalwart men
standing idle in the marketplace, glaring as fiercely
as they dare at their ragged invaders. but declar-
ing that "it is none of their business to fight."
Surely, if the men of Chambersburg are not goaded
into rising by the presence of their foe, by the
seizure of all their horses and cattle, and by grie-
vious exactions in the shape of any number of
rations, paid for, it is true, in Confederate scrip, but
demanded at their hands by the Southern army, it
is bard to say what amount of pressure will con-
strain the men of Pennsylvania to acquit themselves
like men. Hitherto, though I have conversed with
many of them, and have heard the measure of their
irritation against the Confederates expressed in
various keys, there seems, so far as I can discern,
no sense of individual responsibility among the
men, no consciousness that the tread of an invader
on their soil is the worst of pollutions. There
has been, it is true, some little " bushwhacking"
as the Confederates advanced, but it has been
checked by the capture of the offenders, some 15 or
20 in number, and their dismissal as prisoners to
Richmond. When General Ewell first occupied
this town some five days ago he immediately caused
a search for muskets to be made, and discovered
some 500 or 600 of them, which, as he had no wag-
gons to spare to carry them to the rear, and as all
his own men were armed, he caused to be destroyed.
It is safe to say that there is no town throughout
the length and breadth of the Confederacy which
would not have sent each of these muskets into the
field against an army of Yankee invaders, in the
hands possilely of old men and boys, in the hope
that scene Federal straggler might be picked off
and their advance arrested until a sufficient force of
men might be
gathered
If any proof
were
to meet them face to face.
re wanting of the inferior earnest-
ness North fighting as compared
wneistsh wthiteh Which
South,
it is
to be found in the aspect of
the streets of Chambersburg this day. It is hardly
conceivable that this degradingarms apathy should con-
Curtin, or any
otherare promised to them by Go-
vernorChambersburg and other
authority, the men of
bourhood would refuse to authority,
towns in this neigh-
spot, and to strike pro arisepetai f r to any designated
s.
But, up to the
present time, I am bound to record that t
by
. tbl, excep
vague threats of what the
in
army is going to do, and by female denunciationsie Northern
of the Confederates, comparing them
to Pharaoh'
army marching to the Red Sea, Pennsylvanias
borne the presence, first of the arm
Y of Ewell, and
now of that of General Lee, like Issach ar crouching
down between two burdens.
It must not be supposed that when General Lee
ge is deeper into Pennsylvania, and, above all, if he
should ever cross the Susquehannah river, it is his
intention to keep open h:s long lines of communi.
cation with Virginia. Hitherto, although we are
nearly 30 miles from the Potomac at Williamspert,
the line of communicat , g
io th h xposed to much
and courn ouiers withe despatches pass
hazard, is open,
to and tro. But it is certain that the time is at hand
when the movements of Gen. Lee and his army will
hmond only thro.ugh the jour-
become known to Ric
our
readers will imagine with
teals of the North. o
beset in my attempt to get
hat difficulties I am
d intercepted as I am
o mmunications to England,
d and in
b the heart of he
from Richmon ,
aissatt to be
'try's e pronouucedt y
btless
's country. It will doh
enc Gen. Lee is sinning
min tory critics in England that
hich guide the art of
agai nict the orthodox rules which
sy
war whorl it is known that he has turned
en baser m
, no
adri ft in a hostile country, with no op
of apoleon
line of communication. The authority
and specially
will Terhaiss be invoked against him, a
will the Emperor's famous letter to his brother,
King Joseph, be quoted, in which the opinion is re-
cordei I that a general who acts without keeping open
co mmunication with his base deserves to lose his
head. This is not the moment to enter into disqui-

sitions as to the military genius of Gen. Lee, but it
may be remarked that the circumstances under which
war is conducted in this country necessify a abnor-
mal actiov on the part of Gen. Lee, which in pre-
sence of the disciplined armies of Europe, com-
manded by enterprising generals, might be hazard-
ous in the extreme. There are men by dozens in
this tatterdemalion army who have been (not to
speak of skirmishers) in 32 engagements, and yet
have never known one decided repulse. Surely;
with men of this stamp, enthusiastic about their
general, and animated with a deep sense of
the batter outrages which tha Yankees have inflicted
upon every State in the Confederacy, some risk may
be ventured on? It seems that little more was wanted
than the safe transference of Gen. Lee's army from
Fredericksburg to Pennsylvania to insure at least sub-
stantial successes for the Confederacy, and to de-
monstrate the worthlessness of Gen. Hooker's re-
peated assurances to his Government that " he had
Gen. Lee just where he wanted him"—" that it was
impossible for Gen. Lee either to advance or to fall
back." How safely and dexterously this transfer-
ence has been made your readers are now aware.
Nothing shall persuade me that any amount of
force which the North can spasmodically throw
into the field, backed by all the prestige of the
Grand Army of the Potomac and its commander—
an army which is believed at this moment not to be
numerically superior to Gen. Lee's—can cut off and
prevent the Confederate General from returning
when he likes and where he likes into Virginia,
should occasion arise. In the meantime, so long as
he is on Pennsylvanian soil the North will be sup-
porting both armies, to say nothing of the extem-
porised soldiery thrown into the field by Penn-
sylvania in her agrmy, and likely to be thrown out
of the field by the shriek of the first Parrot shell
which bursts over their head. The contempt enter-
tained by Napoleon's OM Guard, by Wellington's
veterans of Orthez or Toulouse for citizen soldiery,
could not be more sublime than that which is felt
by the tried ragamuffins of Gen, Lee.

The actual crossing of the Peomac, which was
effected by Generals Lee and Longstnet at Williams-
port on the 25th inst., and by various divisions of
the Confederate army at the same point, and at
Shepherdstown about the same date, had in it much
of the enthusiasm which accompanied the Last entry
of the Confederates into Maryland before the battle
of Sharpsburg. It was then the impression of
the Southern army that they were entering into
the friendly State of Maryland, ground down
under the iron heel of a despotic Government,
and anxious and willing, upon the first opportu-
nity, to arise and burst its bonds. But the unmis-
takeable sympathy of Hagerstown, Boonsboro,
Sharpsburg, and other small towns in Western
Maryland with the Federals, the jeers and taunts
of the women at the expense of the rebels, have
taught the latter to expect in the western counties
of Maryland no more aid and comfort than would
be extended to them in Massachusetts. The men
stare gloomily but timidily on the invaders, getting
abjectly out of the way as the Confederates stalk
through the streets ; and whatever spirit is left in
the population finds expression, as usual, from the
lips or by the gestures of the women. To-day, as
General Hood's division of Texans was passing in
front of a house, a young lady showed herself osten-
tatiously in front with a small Union flag pinned
on her bosom. One of the Texans, with an air of
great respect, remarked to her, "You had better
lower that flag, madam ; our boys are tigers at
breastworks, especially when they mount the Yankee
colours."

June 30.

This day has witnessed a change in our apparent
programme. Harrisburg and the Susquehannah are
no longer our destination, but reports of the move-
ments of the grand army of the Potomac, vow no
longer under the command of General Hooker, but
instructed, as is rumoured, to General Meade, a
Pennsylvanian General lately in command of the
sth Corps of the Northern Army, have decided
General Lee to turn his face eastward, and confront
the only formidable enemy which be has to fear.
Our eyes, therefore, are looking unto the hills,
which are the continuation of the Blue Ridge
which strikes southward from Harper's Ferry
across Virginia, whereas the range which we are
this day to cross strikes northward, though at a
lower elevation and only for a short distance, into
Pennyslvania. Upon this same range of hills
was fought last autumn the battle of Sharps-
burg, at a point considerably nearer to the Potomac
than the pass which we shall cross to-day, and in a
different State. These hills are not unlike a diminu-

tive Jura, with pretty sylvan scenery interspersed
with rich meadows of clover and hay, and watered
by small sparkling streams. The population seems
almost entirely German, containing in its midst a
large Quaker element, with conscientious object-
tions to war, never so heartily expressed as when it
comes to their own threshold.

Doubtless the peaceful population of the
i Cumber-
land Valley is under the impression that t has seen
war in its most terrible aspect,
and that nothing
which Virginia or any other Southern State has en-
dured can be compa red with the desolation which
the Confederate army has left in its track. " 0 for-
tunate nirnium, sua si bona norint !" It is not neces-
sary to go further than a few miles across the border
into Virginia to see how the Federals make war,
and to compare their system with that of General
Lee. In a dozen instances in the dozen miles which
separate Martinsburg from the Potomac—a region
which is rgarded by the Confederates as tainted by
the influence of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad,
and strongly Yankee in its sympathies—l noticed
large farmhouses and all th-ir outhouses and farm
buildings given to the flames. " Who destroyed
that house ?" was the first question of every passer-
by. " The Yankees." " Who lived there ?" "A
strong Secessionist." Itlis waste of time to talk of
rails universally burnt, agricultural instruments
destroyed, horses, sheep, and cattle stolen without
a word of compensation, havoc and wilful rapine
and ravage sown broadcast over Virginia. We are
now in Pennsylvania. Every motive which ordi-
narily guides human action prompts to direct re-
Liliation,but here is the programme of General Lee :