December 21.—A skirmish occurred near Nashville, Tenn., between a party of National troops belonging to General Van Cleve’s division of the army of Tennessee, and a reconnoitring party of rebels, supported by four pieces of artillery, who were driven off, after exchanging a few shots.— Secretaries Seward and Chase having sent in their resignations, President Lincoln acknowledged their reception, and informed the Secretaries that the acceptance of them would be “incompatible with the public welfare.” They accordingly resumed their respective portfolios. —The expeditionary forces under General Foster, which left Newbern, N. C, on the eleventh instant, returned to their former quarters in that town to-day, having successfully accomplished the objects of the expedition.—(Doc. 73.) •
—A fight took place at Davis’s Mills, Wolf River, Miss., between the Union garrison stationed at that post, composed of two hundred and fifty men, under the command of Colonel William H. Morgan, Twenty-fifth Indiana, and a force of over five thousand rebel cavalry under General Van Dorn, resulting, after a desperate contest of three and a half hours’ duration, in the withdrawal of the latter, leaving in the hands of the Unionists twenty-two dead, thirty wounded, twenty prisoners, and one hundred stand of arms. The rebels carried off the field, in ambulances and otherwise, between two and three hundred of their wounded.—(Doc. 81.)
