November 3, 1863, The New York Herald
Sumter has been undergoing a terrible bombardment from the Union batteries. The latest news we have from Charleston is taken from the Richmond Whig of the 31st ult. — three days later than we have had before. It states that the bombardment of Fort Sumter on the previous day was the heaviest that has yet taken place. From sundown on Wednesday until sundown on Thursday one thousand two hundred shots from fifteen-inch mortars and three hundred pounder Parrotts have been thrown against the fort. The rebel loss is seven wounded.
On the evening of the 30th General Gillmore’s forces opened fire from the mortar battery at Cummings’Point upon the northeast angle of the fort. The batteries engaged were those at Gregg and Wagner, the centre battery and Cummings’ Point battery, with the addition of three Monitors. “The bombardment of Fort Sumter,” says the Whig, “goes on; but the fire is much slacker. Our batteries fire slowly and deliberately. The enemy at present pays no attention to them.”
All is quiet in the Army of the Potomac. The damaged railroads are completed. The weather is fine. Mosby’s guerillas are still dashing around everywhere. The capture of our two correspondents — Messrs. Hendrick and Hart — took place at a house in Auburn, where they were passing Saturday night. Their horses and valuables were all seized by Mosby’s men, who made a sudden descent upon the house.
General Thomas, in his official report of General Joe Hooker’s recent affair with the rebels, says that General Hooker took many prisoners, among whom were four officers and one hundred and three men. He also captured nearly a thousand Enfield rifles. His loss was three hundred and fifty officers and men, killed and wounded.
The enemy had made no demonstration since the 28th ult. A despatch from Louisville yesterday states that the rebel Generals Lee, Rhoddy, Wheeler and Forrest were then in the neighborhood of Decatur, Courtland and Tuscumbia, south of the Tennessee river, with a combined force of fifteen thousand cavalry, prepared to operate on the line of General Grant’s communications.
It was reported and generally believed in Washington yesterday that the new command allotted to General B.F. Butler is to comprise the districts of Generals Foster and Schenck, both of whom are relieved from duty. Preparations were made in Washington for the reception of General Foster and his staff.
Further details of the conspiracy in Ohio and the arrest of the alleged ringleaders are given in another column. Quite a number of individuals appear to be involved in the mischief, ranking from the state school Commissioner of Ohio down to the washer woman of the United States barracks at Newport, across the river from Cincinnati. Axes and chloroform — a curious combination of hostile weapons — seem to have been the destructive elements designed by the conspirators for the release of the prisoners at Camp Chase and the demolition of the penitentiary. It is said that the plan was to have been carried out a week ago, but miscarried, which no doubt gave the sagacious detectives who discovered the conspiracy an opportunity to complete their plans.