May 23.—Colonel Kenly’s command of infantry and cavalry, in General Banks’s department, was driven from Front Royal, with considerable loss, by a large body of rebels.—(Doc. 43.)
—Captain Tilford, stationed with forty men on the east side of the Rio Grande, seven miles below Fort Craig, N. M., received a summons to surrender from a band of two hundred Texans. He refused; but after fighting for three hours, was obliged to retreat to Fort Craig with the loss of three wounded.—Denver Herald.
—Portions of the army of the Potomac crossed the Chickahominy River in two places, at the Railroad Bridge and at Bottom’s Bridge.
—The battle of Lewisburgh, Va., was fought this day. The rebel Colonel Heath attacked Col. Crook with three thousand infantry and cavalry, and six cannon. After a spirited fight of an hour, the rebels were put to flight in utter confusion, and their flight soon became a rout. Col Crook captured four rifled cannon — one so near his position that it was loaded with canister—and caissons, and eight rounds of ammunition.
The rebels, in the early part of the fight, carried off their killed and wounded, but left on the field thirty-eight dead, including several officers, and sixty-six wounded. A hundred prisoners were captured, among them Lieutenant-Colonel Finney, Major Edgar, and others. Three hundred stand of arms were taken. In the evening, to secure their retreat, they burned Greenbrier bridge, beyond which they could not be pursued. Crook’s victory was won only by hard fighting against greatly superior forces. The Nationals lost fourteen killed, sixty wounded, and five pickets captured. Some of the wounded were shot in the streets of Lewisburgh, as they were returning to the hospital, by the citizens of the town.—(Doc. 44.)
—The town of Grand Gulf, Miss., was shelled by the Union gunboats Richmond and Hartford. Considerable damage was done to the town, but no person was injured.
The reason assigned for the shelling was, that two United States transports loaded with soldiers were fired into by a masked battery of four guns in the vicinity of the town.—Jackson Mississippian, June 4.
