resolved to keep my own counsel for the second time that day. And so the flight went on. At one time a whole mass of infantry, with fixed bayonets, ran down the bank of the road, and some falling as they ran, must have killed and wounded those among whom they fell. As I knew the road would soon become impassable or blocked up, I put my horse to a gallop and passed on toward the front. But mounted men still rode faster, shouting out, "Cavalry are coming." Again I ventured to speak to some officers whom I overtook, and said, "If these runaways are not stopped, the whole of the

leaves at 2 on Monday, and so I put my horse | into a trot, keeping in the fields alongside the roads as much as I could, to avoid the fugitives, till I came once more on the rear of the baggage and store carts, and the pressure of the crowd, who, conscious of the aid which the vehicles would afford them against a cavalry charge, and fearful, nevertheless, of their proximity, clamored and shouted like madmen as they ran. The road was now literally covered with baggage. It seemed to me as if the men inside were throwing the things out purposely. "Stop," cried I to the driver of one of the carts, "every thing is falling out." ". you," shout-posts and pickets in Washington will fly ed a fellow inside, "if you stop him, I'll blow your brains out." My attempts to save Uncle Sam's property were then and there discontinued.

also! One of them, without saying a word,
spurred his horse and dashed on in front. I do
not know whether he ordered the movement
or not, but the van of the fugitives was now
suddenly checked, and, pressing on through the
wood at the roadside, I saw a regiment of in-
fantry blocking up the way, with their front
towards Centreville. A musket was levelled
at my head as I pushed to the front-" Stop,
or I'll fire."* At the same time the officers
* As a commentary on the picture here presented, we
quote part of an article in the Knickerbocker Magazine
from an eye-witness of this part of the retreat, who met

Mr. Russell at the very head of the stampede.-Editor.
We pushed on toward the field. Vehicles still passed
disaster or of haste. The first indication of disturbed
coatless, clinging to the bare back of a great bony, wagon-
nerves met us in the shape of a soldier, musketless and
horse-sans reins, sans every thing. Man and beast camo
panting along, each looking exhausted, and just as they
his rider tumbles off and hobbles away, leaving the horse
pass us, the horse tumbles down helpless in the road, and
to his own care and his own reflections. Still we pushed

on.

[Several visitors from the field, up to this time, had reported a complete victory of the Union troops.]

On approaching Centreville, a body of German infantry of the reserve came marching down, and stemmed the current in some de- | gree; they were followed by a brigade of guns and another battalion of fresh troops. I turned up on the hill half a mile beyond. The vehicles had all left but two-my buggy was gone. A battery of field-guns was in position where we had been standing. The men looked well. As yet there was nothing to indicate more than a retreat, and some ill-behavior among the wagoners and the riff-raff of different regi-moderately, but their occupants appeared unconscious of ments. Centreville was not a bad position properly occupied, and I saw no reason why it should not be held if it was meant to renew the attack, nor any reason why the attack should not be renewed, if there had been any why it should have been made. I swept the field once more. The clouds of dust were denser and nearer. That was all. There was no firing-no musketry. I turned my horse's head and rode away through the village, and after I got out upon the road the same confusion seemed to prevail. Suddenly the guns on the hill opened, and at the same time came the thuds of artillery from the wood on the right rear. The stampede then became general. What occurred at the hill I cannot say, but all the road from Centreville for miles presented such a sight as can only be witnessed in the track of the runaways of an utterly demoralized army. Drivers flogged, lashed, spurred, and beat their horses, or leaped down and abandoned their teams, and ran by the side of the road; mounted men, servants, and men in uniform, vehicles of all sorts, commissariat wagons, thronged the narrow ways. At every shot a convulsion, as it were, seized upon the morbid mass of bones, sinew, wood, and iron, and thrilled through it, giving new energy and action to its desperate efforts to get free from itself. Again the cry of "Cavalry" arose. "What are you afraid of?" said I to a man who was running beside me. "I'm not afraid of you!" replied the ruffian, levelling his piece at me, and pulling the trigger. It was not loaded, or the cap was not on, for the gun did not go off. I was unarmed, and I did go off as fast I could,

About half past four, possibly nearer five, Centreville was still (as it proved) a mile or so ahead of us. We reached the top of a moderate rise in the road, and as we plodded on down its slope, I turned a glance back along the road we had passed; a thousand bayonets were gleamtaking us in double-quick step, having come up (as I soon ing in the sunlight, and a full fresh regiment were overafter learned) from Vienna. They reached the top of the hill just as we began to pick our way across the brook which flooded the road in the little valley below. At this moment, looking up the ascent ahead of us, toward the battle, we saw army wagons, private vehicles, and some six or eight soldiers on horseback, rushing down the hill in front of us in exciting confusion, and a thick cloud of dust. The equestrian soldiers, it could be seen at a glance, unused to this melting mode, most of them being barewere only impromptu horsemen, and their steeds were all backed. Their riders appeared to be in haste, for some rather leading the van, was a solitary horseman of differ reason best known to themselves. Among them, and ent aspect figure somewhat stout, face round and broad, gentlemanly in aspect, but somewhat flushed and impa tient, not to say anxious, in expression. Under a broadbrimmed hat a silk handkerchief screened his neck like a Havelock. He rode a fine horse, still in good condition, sonal alarm or not, it would be impertinent to say. His and his motto seemed to be "onward"-whether in per identity was apparent at a glance. As his horse reached the spot where we "five" stood together, thus suddenly headed off by the stampede, the regiment behind us had reached the foot of the hill, and the colonel, a large and resolute-looking man, had dashed his horse ahead of his men, until he was face to face with the stampeders.

"What are you doing here?" shouted the colonel in a tone that "meant something." "Halt!" (to his men.) turning to the white-faced soldiers from the field, and bran"Form across the road. Stop every one of them!" Then dishing his sword, "Back! back! the whole of ye! Back!

were shouting out, "Don't let a soul pass. I
addressed one of them, and said, "Sir, I am a
British subject. I am not, I assure you, run-
ning away. I have done my best to stop this
disgraceful rout, (as I had,) and have been tell-
'ing them there are no cavalry within miles of
them." "I can't let you pass, sir." I bethought
me of Gen. Scott's pass. The adjutant read it,
and the word was given along the line, "Let
that man pass!" and so I rode through, uncer-
tain if I could now gain the Long Bridge in time
to pass over without the countersign. It was
about this time I met a cart by the roadside
surrounded by a group of soldiers, some of
whom had "69" on their caps. The owner,
as I took him to be, was in great distress, and
cried out as I passed, "Can you tell me, sir,
where the 69th are? These men say they are
cut to pieces." "I can't tell you." "I'm in
charge of the mails, sir, and I will deliver them

I say," and their horses in an instant are making a reverse movement up the hill, while the army wagons stand in statu quo: the thousand muskets of the regiment, in obedience rather to the action than to the word of the colonel, being all pointed at the group in front, in the midst of which we stand. All this and much more passed in much less time than it takes to tell it.

"But, sir, if you will look at this paper," thus spake our distinguished visitor in the advance to the determined and now excited colonel, "you will see that I am a civilian, a spectator merely, and that this is a special pass," (here I half-imagined a doubt of the character of the regiment flashed in for a second,) "a pass from General Scott,"

The manner and the tone indicated that the speaker and "Pass this man up," shouted the colonel somewhat bluntly and impatient of delay, and on galloped the representative of the Thunderer toward Washington.

his errand were entitled to attention.

Now, the art of bragging and the habit of exaggeration

better

if I die for it. You are a gentleman and I can depend on your word. Is it safe for me to go on?" Not knowing the extent of the débâcle, I assured him it was, and asked the men of the regiment how they happened to be there. "Shure, the Colonel himself told us to go off every man on his own hook, and to fly for our lives! replied one of them. The mail agent, who told me he was an Englishman, started the cart again. I sincerely hope no bad result to himself or his charge followed my advice; I reached Fairfax Court-House; the people, black and white, with anxious faces, were at the doors, and the infantry were under arms. I was besieged with questions, though hundreds of fugitives had passed through before me. At one house I stopped to ask for water for my horse; the owner sent his servant for it cheerfully, the very house where we had in vain asked for something to eat in the forenoon.

plete picture, or for a conclusive answer to the question: "Did all our army run away?"

For us, two individuals who had not seen the battle or the first of the panic, but only this tail-end of it, no discussion of the matter at the moment was thought of. We didn't ask each other, or anybody else, whether it was safe to stay there, or to go near the main army. But if the question had been asked, our reply, merely echoing our thoughts at the moment, would have been thus:

"We have lost the day; our army, or a part of it, after a sturdy fight of nine hours against the great cdds of a superior force, strongly intrenched behind masked batteries, and after an actual victory, have fallen back at the last moment, and a part of one wing, with the wagons and outsiders, have started from the field in a sudden and unaccountable panic. But so long as we still have forty thousand men between us and the enemy, more than half of them fresh, in reserve, at Centreville; so long as this, the only main road Potomac-wise from the field, is now quiet and clear, and order reigns' at Centreville, where our main body will rest; what is the use of being in a hurry? Let us rest awhile here, and then take our time and go on either South or North, as the appearance of things may warrant." Briefly and distinctly, no worse view of the matter was indicated by any thing we saw or heard while waiting TWO HOURS in that very spot in the road where the panic was first stopped, [and two hours after Mr. Russell had galloped on to write the worst account of the disorder.]

as

The writer of the above slept at Fairfax Court-House long after Mr. Russell was safe in Washington. As late 11 P. M., the straggling soldiers from the field were stopped and turned back by platoons of the reserve at Fairfax; and this was done as late as 7 A. M. at Alexandria. In corroboration of the fact that all alarm and disorder had been checked immediately after Mr. Russell's hasty retreat, we quote the following from Mr. H. H. Tilley, of Bristol, R. I., dated at Washington, July 24.

are vices to which all we Americans are but too much addicted. But if I say that my friend T- and myself stood in the midst of this mêlée much more impressed with its ludicrous picturesqueness than with any idea of personal danger, my friend at least would agree that this was the simple truth. The brief parley of Our Own Correspondent" suggested merely the thought that it was a pity such a stranger should be annoyed by such a crowd; I'd 16 say: Colonel, this is Mr. Russell of the London Times; pray don't detain him." However, this all passed in a twinkling. Our two soldier-friends and the surgeon had pushed on between the wagons toward the field; the distant firing had ceased; the wagons quietly stood still; so T- and I passed up through the regi ment, which they told us was the First or Second New Jersey, Col. Montgomery, from the camp at Vienna; and we sat down comfortably near a house at the top of the hill and waited to see "what next?" In less than twenty minutes the road was cleared and regulated; the army wagons halted, still in line, on one side of the road; the civilians were permitted to drive on as fast as they pleased toward Washington; the regiment deployed into a field on the opposite hill, and formed in line of battle command- "Our two companions, Burnham and Young, after pushing the road; a detachment was sent on to "clear the ing ahead a little way on the track, repented of their temertrack" toward Centreville and presently the regimentity, and retraced their steps, as we did, to the station, and itself marched up the road in the direction of the field of then took the road, also, to Fairfax Court-House; but on conflict. It was now about half-past five. reaching the road leading to Centreville, they turned into that, and by thus cutting off the angle that we made, they were enabled to pass through that place, and even get quite near to the battle-field-full as near, in fact, as I think we should have cared to, for Burnham says that after they attacked the hospital, and the retreat commenced, they heard a cannon-ball whistle over their heads, which, I infer, contributed in a slight degree to an acceleration of their movements. They say they were at the place in the road when Colonel Montgomery (as I see it was by the papers) made that famous 'halt 1 of the light brigade, (Russell and Company,) soon after it occurred, and they stopped there, procuring tea and a lodging at a house near by. They started on their return tramp at about twelve, [eight hours after Mr. Russell's retreat,] and must have been only a little way behind us, all the way-reaching here in less than an hour after we did."

If we two were not "cowards on instinct," we might still be indifferent to danger through mere ignorance. This is intended to be a simple and truthful narrative only of what we saw and did, not a philosophical analysis or an imaginative dissertation. The character, cause, extent, and duration of that strange panic have already become an historical problem. Therefore, I specially aim to avoid all inferences, guesses, and generalities, and to state with entire simplicity just what was done and said where we were. Of what passed on the battle-field, or anywhere else, this witness cannot testify he can only tell, with reasonable accuracy, what passed before his eyes, or repeat what he heard directly from those who had just come singly from the fight or the panic; so much will go for what it is worth, and no more. The separate sketches from all the different points of view are needed for a com

66

"There's a fright among them," I observed, in | Long Bridge." Up hills, down into valleys, reply to his question respecting the commissa- with the silent grim woods forever by our riat drivers."They're afraid of the enemy's sides. Now and then, in the profound gloom, cavalry." "Are you an American?" said the broken only by a spark from the horse's hoof, man. "No, I am not." "Well, then," he said, came a dull but familiar sound like the shut"there will be cavalry on them soon enough. ting of a distant door. As I approached WashThere's 20,000 of the best horsemen in the ington, having left the Colonel and his escort world in Virginia!" Washington was still 18 at some seven miles on the south side of the miles away. The road was rough and uncer- Long Bridge, I found the grand guards, pickets' tain, and again my poor steed was under way, posts, and individual sentries burning for news, but it was of no use trying to outstrip the run- and the word used to pass along, "What does aways. Once or twice I imagined I heard guns that man say, Jack?" Begorra, he tells me in the rear, but I could not be sure of it in con- we're not bet at all-only retraiting to the sequence of the roar of the flight behind me. It ould lines for convaniency of fighting to-morwas most surprising to see how far the foot row again. Oh, that's illigant!" On getting soldiers had contrived to get on in advance. to the tête de pont, however, the countersign After sunset the moon rose, and amid other was demanded; of course, I had not got it. acquaintances, I jogged alongside an officer But the officer passed me through on the prowho was in charge of Col. Hunter, the com- duction of Gen. Scott's safeguard. The lights mander of a brigade, I believe, who was shot of the city were in sight; and reflected by the through the neck, and was inside a cart, es- waters of the Potomac, just glistened by the corted by a few troopers. This officer was, as clouded moon, shone the gay lamps of the I understood, the major or second in command White House, where the President was probof Col. Hunter's regiment, yet he had consid-ably entertaining some friends. In silence I ered it right to take charge of his chief, and to passed over the Long Bridge. Some few hours leave his battalion. He said they had driven later it quivered under the steps of a rabble of back the enemy with ease, but had not been sup- unarmed men. At the Washington end a regiported, and blamed-as bad officers and good ment with piled arms were waiting to cross ones will do the conduct of the General: "So over into Virginia, singing and cheering. Bemean a fight I never saw." I was reminded of a fore the morning they received orders, I beCrimean General, who made us all merry by say-lieve, to assist in keeping Maryland quiet. For ing, after the first bombardment, "In the whole course of my experience I never saw a siege conducted on such principles as these." Our friend; had been without food, but not, I suspect, without drink and that, we know, affects empty stomachs very much-since two o'clock that morning. Now, what is to be thought of an officer-gallant, he may be, as steel-who says, as I heard this gentleman say to a picket who asked him how the day went in front, “Well, we've been licked into a cocked hat; knocked to "This was his cry to teamsters escorts, convoys, the officers and men on guard and detachment, while I, ignorant of the disaster behind, tried to mollify the effect of the news by adding, "Oh! it's a drawn battle. The troops are reoccupying the position from which they started in the morning." Perhaps he knew his troops better than I did. It was a strange ride, through a country now still as death, the white road shining like a river in the moonlight, the trees black as ebony in the shade; now and then a figure flitting by into the forest or across the road-frightened friend or lurking foe, who could say? Then the anxious pickets and sentries all asking, "What's the news?" and evidently prepared for any amount of loss. Twice or thrice we lost our way, or our certainty about it, and shouted at isolated houses, and received no reply, except from angry watch-dogs. Then we were set right as we approached Washington, by teamsters. For an hour, however, we seemed to be travelling along a road which, in all its points, far and near, was "twelve miles from the

the hundredth time I repeated the cautious account, which to the best of my knowledge was true. There were men, women, and soldiers to hear it. The clocks had just struck 11 P. M. as I passed Willard's. The pavement in front of the hall was crowded. The rumors of defeat had come in, but few of the many who had been fed upon lies and the reports of complete victory which prevailed could credit the intelligence. Seven hours had not elapsed before the streets told the story. The " Grand Army of the North," as it was called, had representatives in every thoroughfare, without arms, orders, or officers, standing out in the drenching rain. When all these most unaccountable phenomena were occurring, I was fast asleep, but I could scarce credit my informant in the morning, when he told me that the Federalists, utterly routed, had fallen back upon Arlington to defend the capital, leaving nearly 5 batteries of artillery, 8,000 muskets, immense quantities of stores and baggage, and their wounded prisoners in the hands of the enemy!

Let the American journals tell the story their own way. I have told mine as I know it. It has rained incessantly and heavily since early morning, and the country is quite unfit for operations; otherwise, if Mr. Davis desired to press his advantage, he might be now very close to Arlington Heights. He has already proved that he has a fair right to be considered the head of a "belligerent power." But, though the North may reel under the shock, I cannot think it will make her desist from the struggle,

unless it be speedily followed by blows more
deadly even than the repulse from Manassas.
There is much talk now (of "masked batteries,"
of course) of ontflanking, and cavalry, and such
matters. The truth seems to be that the men
were overworked, kept out for 12 or 14 hours
in the sun, exposed to a long-range fire, badly
officered, and of deficient regimental organiza-
tion. Then came a most difficult operation
to withdraw this army, so constituted, out of
action, in face of an energetic enemy who had
repulsed it. The retirement of the baggage,
which was without adequate guards, and was
in the hands of ignorant drivers, was misun-
derstood, and created alarm, and that alarm
became a panic, which became frantic on the
appearance of the enemy and on the opening
of their guns on the runaways. But the North
will be all the more eager to retrieve this dis-
aster, although it may divert her from the
scheme, which has been suggested to her, of
punishing England a little while longer. The
exultation of the South can only be understood
by those who may see it; and if the Federal
Government perseveres in its design to make
Union by force, it may prepare for a struggle
the result of which will leave the Union very
little to fight for. More of the "battle" in my
next. I pity the public across the water, but
they must be the victims of hallucinations and
myths it is out of my power to dispel or rectify
just now. Having told so long a story, I can
scarcely expect your readers to have patience,
and go back upon the usual diary of events;
but the records, such as they are, of this extra-
ordinary repulse, must command attention. It
is impossible to exaggerate their importance.
No man can predict the results or pretend to
guess at them.

COMMENTS ON MR. RUSSELL'S LETTER.

From the Chicago Tribune.

flogging, lashing, spurring, beating, and abandoning that he so graphically describes. The road was as quiet and clear as if no army were in the vicinity. A mile from Centreville we met that New Jersey regiment, a private of which, Mr. Russell says, threatened to "shoot him if he did not halt." The dozen in all, that were on their way in; but, recog officers were turning back the few fugitives, not a nized as a civilian, as the Times correspondent must have been, we passed to the rear unchal lenged. Mr. Russell, at that moment, could not have been half a mile behind us. Pushing on slowly we were overtaken by Col. Hunter's carriage, in which he, wounded, was going to the city. Mr. Russell saw it, or says he saw it, attended by an escort of troopers, at the head of whom was a major, who "considered it right to take charge of his chief and leave his battalion." We saw no troopers nor major. Hon. Isaac N. Arnold, of the House, was riding by the side of the vehicle, and he, a smooth-faced gentleman, in the garb of a respondent" for a doubtful man of war. Possibly civilian, may have been mistaken by our own cortwo miles and a half from Centreville, we stopped at a road-side farm house for a cup of water. While drinking, Mr. Russell passed. We recog nized him, rode along, and were soon engaged with him in a discussion of the causes of the check-it was not then known to be any thing more; and, in his company, we went on through Fairfax, in all a distance, perhaps, of six or eight miles; and we can affirm that not one incident which he relates

"It was about this time I met a cart by the roadside, surrounded by a group of soldiers, some of whom had '69 on their caps. The owner, as I took him to be, was in great distress; and cried out, as I passed, Can you tell me, sir, pieces.' I can't tell you.' 'I'm in charge of the mails, sir, where the Sixty-ninth are? These men say they are cut to

and I will deliver them if I die for it. You are a gentleman, and I can depend on your word. Is it safe for me to go on?' Not knowing the extent of the debacle, I assured him it was, and asked the men of the regiment how they happened to be there. 'Shure, the colonel himself told us to go off every man on his own hook, and to fly for our lives,' replied one of them. The mail agent, who told me he was an Englishman, started the cart again. I sincerely hope no bad result to himself or his charge followed my advice."

We rode into Fairfax together.

MR. RUSSELL'S letter to the London Times, the greater part of which we transferred to our columns yesterday morning, is, in many respects, a remarkable paper. We enjoyed the privilege of riding from a point a couple of miles east of Cen-white, with anxious faces, were at the doors, and the in"I reached Fairfax Court House; the people, black and treville, to another point east of Fairfax Court fantry under arms. I was besieged with questions, though House, with Mr. Russell, and when he tells what hundreds of fugitives had passed through before me." took place on that bit of road, we are competent judges of his truthfulness and fairness as a descriptive writer. We do not know and do not care what he saw, or says he saw, of the fight and the flight, before we found him; but from the errors and misstatements in that portion of his narrative with which we are immediately concerned, we should be justified in believing that he was not at the battle at all, and that the materials for his letter were gathered from some Fire Zouave or a private of the Ohio Second, who left, terror stricken, in the early part of the fray, and carried the fatal news of the rout and the race to the credulous rear.

We left Centreville without knowing that a repulse had been felt, or that a retreat to that point had been ordered. Jogging leisurely down the Washington road, perhaps ten minutes--certainly not more--ahead of Mr. Russell, we saw nothing of the

It is a small matter, this, but it marks the accuracy of the man. Not a question was asked of Mr. had passed that way; the infantry-another New Russell nor of us; not a “fugitive,” we dare affirm, Jersey regiment, if we are not mistaken--were at their usual evening parade, supposing, no doubt, that their companions in arms had won a great victory.

the owner sent his servant for it cheerfully, the very house "At one house I stopped to ask for water for my horse; where we had in vain asked for something to eat in the forenoon. There's a fright among them, I observed in reply to his question concerning the commissariat drivers.

They're afraid of the enemy's cavalry. Are you an American?' said the man. No, I am not. Well, then,' he said, there will be cavalry on them soon enough. There's twenty thousand of the best horsemen in the world in Virginny.'"

At the little one-horse tavern in Fairfax, the