December 2.—Abbeville, Miss., was evacuated by the rebels, and occupied by the National cavalry belonging to the army of General Grant—A fight took place near Franklin, Va., between a force of Union troops, under the command of Colonel Spear, Eleventh Pennsylvania cavalry, and a body of rebel cavalry, supported by artillery, resulting in a complete rout of the rebels, with considerable loss.—(Doc. 57.)
—Lieutenant Hoffman of the First New-Jersey cavalry, and six of his men, were surprised while on picket-duty, at a point three miles from Dumfries, Va. In their unsuccessful resistance, private Thomas Buffin was seriously wounded.— General Averill sent a reconnoisance from Brooks’s Station, up the Rappahannock River, which succeeded in capturing a number of rebel pickets, and obtaining valuable information.—At three o’clock this morning parts of two companies of the Eighth Pennsylvania cavalry, numbering sixty men, under the command of Captain Wilson, were attacked at King George Court-House, Va., by a large body of rebels, who succeeded in getting between their station and the main body of the National cavalry, and thus compelled them to retreat with some loss.—A portion of the expedition under the command of Major-General Banks, sailed from New-York.—Reverdy Johnson, of Maryland, in an elaborate letter to the National Intelligencer, refuted the charges, made by a New-Orleans journal, reflecting on his conduct as Commissioner of the United States, in that city.—Major-General Halleck made a report of the operations of the armies of the Union, from the twenty-third day of July, when, in compliance with the President’s order, he assumed command as General-in-Chief, to this date.—(Doc. 58.)
— Colonel J. M. Glover, commandant at Rolla, Mo., having intelligence that several hundred rebels were in camp on Current River, at the head waters, on the thirtieth ultimo, proceeded with one hundred and thirty men to attack them. His force were parts of companies A and B of the Third Missouri cavalry, and part of company H, Ninth Missouri cavalry. This morning he found a light force of the enemy in the gorges of the Ozarks and routed them, killing four, capturing two, and taking four horses. The detachment marched two hundred miles in seven days, and not a man of it was harmed. No considerable body of the rebels could be found, and the force returned to Rolla.—General Curtis’s Despatch.
—A successful reconnoissance was this day made from Bolivar Heights, Va., by a force of Union troops, under the command of General Geary, to Charleston, Berryville, Winchester, etc—(Doc. 59.)
