The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1864-04-26

The Late A0air In North osre'ina-
What IL Means, saa Whist % Required
20 Defeat the nneny's Dsstgas.
The reoapture by the rebels Of the town Of
Plymouth. N. G., with the reported loss to tho
Union side Of twenty-five hundred mon. the
fort, thirty pieces Of artillery. . gunboat or
two and large amount of military stores, all
things considered. is Q moro Notifying mis-
fortune than the late disaster In Florida. An
iron-clad rebel ram. Of which Secretary Welles
has had six months warning. has, with this
rebel success ct Plymouth, passed out Of the
known, too, that the enemy have another ram
ct Kinstsn, on the Neuse river, above New.
bern, and il is shrewdly suspected that, unless
speedily disposed Of, tho Roanoke ram will
pass over into Pamlico Sound, and, ascending
the Neuss to Newbern, viii be joined by the
ram Iom Kinston and by the twelve or fifteen
thousand troops Of General Hoke Ia stimuli
taneous land and water attack upon the town.
The capture OF Newbern Is the main object
Of these rebel movements 10 North Carolina,
and the importance Of this enterprise to the
enemy will be understood with the simple ex-
PLANTATION that its success is indispensable to
the subsistence and safety Of Lees army
in Virginia. That army is now fed mainly
from the supplies Of Georgia, through the
North Carolina railroads; and flank move
pent of our forces from Plymouth or Little
Washington, or Newbern, upon those roads, in
cutting off the supplies of Lee, might compel
him to abandon Virginia, even without battle,
to recover his arteries Of subsistence and to
save bis army. But should General Hoke aud
those rebel rams succeed in an attack upon
Newbern, the yankees will be removed from
North Carolina, her railroads will DO SAFE and
large additions of rebel troops relieved from
the duty of guarding them, and large supplies
Of captured artillery, munitions of war and
provisions, il time be allowed them may thus be
secured for the army Of Lee. We are there
fore waiting with some interest for further in
telligence Of tho movements and lighting quail
ties Of the Roanoke ram; for upon that single
rebel craft may depend the issue Of the cam
paign in North Carolina. As this matter
stands, however, it exposes the drowsy inca
pacity of Secretary Welles, 6s the head of the
navy, in the boldest relief.
General Grant is thus called upon to repair
the blunders Of the Navy Department as well
as the budget of blunders of the War Office.
These last named plumbers may be reduced to
the single blunder, persistently followed up, of
frittering away great armies in such exposed
and secondary places as Harper's Ferry, Win
~ n ha
by the enemy--troops by the thousands, srtil
lery, ammunition and provisions to the extent
of millions OF dollals-and while SO far weak
ening at the same time our main Army of the
Potomac as to bring upon it the heaviest bat
ties of the war with the smallest results. This
disastrous policy of scattering our troops all
over the enemys country, to be ''gobbled up
at useless towns and cross road post Offices,
we are satisfied General Grant has abolished
1t is evident that he enters upon the work Of
this campaign, not with the false idea that this
is war for territorial conquests, and that
every foot of ground we gain must be guarded
but that it is a war for tue suppression of the
armed forces Of great rebellion, and that little
defenceless rebel towns and cross roads in his
rear 30 Tor nothing while there IL great re0el
army between him and the rebel capital.
We need not here remind our readers that
this policy Of abandoning all these little side
expeditions and secondary places for the pur-
pose OF massing an overwhelming force against
Richmond, or the main rebel army of Virginia,
which is the same thing, has been again and
again urged upon the administration by the
HERALD from the beginning OF the war. We
rejoice at length to know that concentration
the Grant system Of warfare so splendidly sue
csssfil in the West--has, with General Grant
himself, been introduced into Eastern Vir-
ginis. We expect such glorious results that we
are disposed to regard these rebel demonstra-
tions in North Carolina even il completely sue
cessful, as really amounting to nothing; for a
decisive victory over Lee demolishes the rebel
Ion.