The inclosed letter of my assistant adjutant-general, written on the 23rd instant, but received only on my arrival at the gun-boat point yesterday evening, confirms the information given in my last report. With the next steamer I will have the honor to submit a detailed report of the expedition.

Very respectfully, captain, your obedient servant,

ASBOTH,

Brigadier-General, Commanding.

Captain OLIVER MATTHEWS,

Assistant Adjutant-General.

[Inclosure.]

BARRANCAS, FLA., July 23, 1864.

Brigadier-General ASBOTH:

GENERAL: A refugee just came from Fifteen-Mile Station and says Maury was telegraphed at Mobile, from telegraph station 5 miles above the Fifteen-Mile Station, to go there at once and engage you. He says the dispatch was sent yesterday morning, and that Maury has 1,300 strong, including a light battery of six guns. Excepting the battery Maury's force consists of cavalry. The refugee informs us that you surprised the Seventh Alabama at Fifteen-Mile Station and captured their horses, &c. Nothing new of importance here. No arrivals from New Orleans. All quiet.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

SAML. T. BUELL,

Lieutenant, &c.

HEADQUARTERS DISTRICT OF WEST FLORIDA,
Barrancas, July 30, 1864.

MAJOR: I have the honor to submit in the following my report of an expedition which left this post on July 21, in the afternoon, and returned on the morning of the 25th:

Having received on the 20th instant, by the steamer Clyde, a communication from headquarters Military Division of the West Mississippi, of 17th instant, with the extract of General Shermans' dispatch requiring me to look out for a lightly equipped force of his army which may be compelled to descend to Pensacola about the 20th or 25th of July, I started the following day, the 21st, in the afternoon, with four companies of the Seventh Vermont Veteran Volunteers, the Eighty-second U. S. Colored Infantry, and six companies of the Eighty-sixth Regiment U. S. Colored Infantry, under command of Colonel W. C. Holbrook, Seventh Vermont Veteran Volunteers, and four companies of the First Florida Cavalry (not mounted), one section of the First Florida Battery, and Company M, Fourteenth New York Cavalry, under command of Colonel E. von Kielmansegge, First Florida Cavalry, the whole under my persona command, numbering 1,000 men. (See inclosed Special Orders, Numbers 167.) The infantry crossed the Bayou Grand in scows at Bragg's Bridge, while the artillery and the train, guarded by the cavalry, went around the head of the bayou, joining the infantry before dark at Jackson's Bridge, 2 miles beyond the bayou. After a short halt the united column moved forward, leaving Pensacola on the right, and arrived, after a continuous night march of 15 miles, at daybreak of the 22nd at the rebel pickets near Gonzales', a permanent rebel camp at the