November 8.—Yesterday General Bayard was attacked by the rebels at Rappahannock Bridge, Virginia, but succeeded in repulsing them. This morning he continued his operations and compelled them to retire, leaving him in possession of the bridge and all the neighboring fords. During the day, he captured Lieutenant-Colonel Blunt, of General Longstreet’s staff, together with two servants and ten men of the rebel army.— A very heavy snow-storm occurred in Richmond, Virginia, and its vicinity.—The First company of the South-Carolina colored volunteers was mustered into the service of the United States, at Beaufort, South-Carolina, by General Saxton.
—Colonel Lee, of the Seventh Kansas, with about one thousand five hundred Union cavalry, made a successful reconnoissance in the vicinity of Hudsonville, Mississippi, defeating a party of rebels in a short skirmish, killing sixteen, and capturing one hundred and seventy-five of their number, one hundred horses, and a stack of firearms.—(Doc. 39.)
—The ship T. B. Wales, in latitude 28°, 30′, longitude 58°, was captured and burned by the privateer Alabama.—General Pleasanton, in a skirmish with the rebel General Stuart, captured three pieces of artillery, a captain, a lieutenant, and five privates, without loss. The Richmond Whig, of this day, declared that the success of the Democrats in the elections at the North was “about equal to a declaration of peace.”—Holly Springs, Mississippi, was evacuated by the rebels. —Mobile News.
—Prince Gortschakoff, the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, sent a despatch to Paris, in reply to a proposal of concerted mediation between the belligerents in America, made to the Russian government by the Emperor of the French. The despatch says: “We are inclined to believe that a combined step by France, England, and Russia, no matter how conciliatory and how cautiously made, if it were taken with an official and collective character, would run the risk of causing the very opposite of the object of pacification, which is the aim of the wishes of the three Courts.”
—A skirmish occurred near Marianna, Ark., between a detachment of the Third and Fourth Iowa and Ninth Illinois cavalry, under the command of Captain Marland L. Perkins and a party of rebels, resulting in defeat of the latter, with a loss of five killed The Nationals had one man wounded.—Missouri Democrat.
