February 23.—Gen. Buell, with three hundred mounted men and a battery of artillery, took possession of Gallatin, Tenn.—New-York Herald, March 3.
—This day Fayetteville, Arkansas, (a town on White River, one hundred and ninety-six miles northwest of Little Rock,) was captured by Gen. Curtis. The rebels fled in great confusion across the Boston Mountains. They burnt a portion of the town before they retired, besides perpetrating an act of cowardly vandalism, which it is almost difficult to believe, had it not been too fatally verified. The rebels left a quantity of poisoned meat behind them, which unhappily was partaken of by the National troops, and resulted in poisoning forty officers and men of the Fifth Missouri cavalry, among them one or two valuable commanding officers. Such deeds entitle the perpetrators to no mercy.—(Doc. 60.)
—The Eighty-first regiment of New-York volunteers, under the command of Col. Edwin Rose, arrived in New-York from Albany.
—Gen. Halleck issued an order, to be read to all the troops under his command, defining the policy to be pursued by the forces as they advance. Private property is to be strictly respected, and all non-combatants are to be regarded as neutrals in the existing war; these, however, who give any aid to the secessionists are to be regarded as belligerents, and treated as such. Regarding the slavery question as a matter in which the civil and not the military authorities have jurisdiction, he prohibits the admission of fugitive slaves within the lines of the army, except by special order of the generals commanding.—(Doc. 61.)
—Nashville, Tenn., was evacuated by the rebel troops this day.
