on your arrival there, and arrange with him in regard to the operations in which the services of your command may be required.

Wishing you every success, I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant,

H. G. WRIGHT,

Brigadier-General, Commanding.

HEADQUARTERS EXPEDITIONARY CORPS,
Port Royal, S. C., March 8, 1862.

To the ADJUTANT-GENERAL U. S. ARMY,

Washington, D. C.:

SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your instructions of the 12th ultimo.

I fiend in impracticable top conform to those instructions with the promptitude which may perhaps be expected without incurring a strong lability to produce a misconception on the part of the blacks as to what the Government intends to do with them. There is much danger of producing a panic among them by too sudden a movement. Many of them surmise that they will ultimately be sent to Cuba and sold, and to permit a stir among them of this sort would be attended with unfortunate results.

I thinks, however, that from 400 to 500 will be induced to accept the offer made to them, viz, to accept their service for a limited period, with a promise that they shall return to their homes after their services are performed; and as soon as I hear from Edisto, if the result of the inquiry is as favorable as from other points, they shall be shipped by the first convenience.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

T. W. SHERMAN,

Brigadier-General, Commanding.

HEADQUARTERS EXPEDITIONARY CORPS,
Port Royal, S. C., March 8, 1862.

Major General GEORGE B. McCLELLAN,

Commanding U. S. Army:

GENERAL: Yours of February 14 was received on the 3rd instant. Pulaski is thoroughly cut off, and the batteries are being erected no Tybee as rapidly as the rough weather for landing the ordnance will permit.

Agreeably to your instruction no further preparations will be made for the attack of Savannah.

Before the expedition sailed for Fernandina I ascertained that Brunswick and its dependencies had been evacuated for the re-enforcement in men and guns of Savannah, and though I have not yet received any positive information from Fernandina, there is but little doubt but it was occupied without the firing of a gun.

From information we have gathered since I wrote you on the subject of Charleston, I have arrived at the conclusion that that city and its defenses can be carried with much more ease than I anticipated in that letter. Our occupation of Edisto Island and some reconnaissance made by the Navy convince me that Charleston can be beleaguered in a very