HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE SOUTH,
Hilton Head, S. C., November 11, 1864.

Lieutenant General W. J. HARDEE,

Commanding Confederate Forces, S. Carolina, Georgia, and Florida:

GENERAL: I have the honor to inform you that several large steamers, bearing between 3,000 and 4,000 sick and wounded Confederate soldiers, have arrived in this harbor. Others are to follow, bringing, in all, 10,000 men.

Lieutenant-Colonel Mulford, agent for exchange, is here and is prepared to enter upon an exchange of these prisoners for our own sick and wounded in your hands at once. He will ascend the Savannah River ro-day, and meeting your flag-of-truce boat will make proper arrangements with Colonel Ould, or such agent of exchange as may be designated, to facilitate the exchange.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

J. G. FOSTER,

Major-General, Commanding.

HEADQUARTERS DEPARTMENT OF THE SOUTH,
Hilton Head, S. C., November 11, 1864.

Major General H. W. HALLECK,

Chief of Staff of the Army, Washington, D. C.:

GENERAL: Herewith I have the honor to transmit copies of statements made by Union officers and soldiers who have recently escaped from the rebel lines.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

J. G. FOSTER,

Major-General, Commanding.

[Inclosure No. 1.]

Statement of Union officers who came into our lines on the 5th of November, having escaped from the Souther Confederacy.

C. J. Epeneter, captain, Sixth Regiment U. S. Colored Heavy Artillery, captured at Fort Pillow April 12: I was carried to Macon, Ga., and from there to Charleston, S. C. Have been in Charleston since July 28. On the 4th of October the officers were all sent to Columbia. I escaped in the confusion and crawled through a drain. I was helped by some person in the city and stayed there until the 4th of this month. I got protection papers, signed by the acting consul of Prussia, which were made out for other persons.

Lieutenant E. Hepp, Eighty-second Illinois Infantry: I was captured at Gettysburg, Pa., on the 1st of July, 1863.

Captain I. Burton, First Kentucky Cavalry, captured at Philadelphia, East Tenn., October 21, 1863: On the 4th we all went out as a working party to New Station, near Adams Run. We went over the Savannah railroad bridge, we came down on the Edisto River, and met a gun-boat there, and were sent to the admiral, and from there to Morris Island. On the south and east battery there are mounted one 13-inch smooth-bore gun and three or four 32-pounders. On Cooper River they have three batteries on the city side, two or three guns each. They are building a new battery on the Ashley River, near the Savannah wharf. One of these officers, Lieutenant Hepp, Eighty second Regiment Illinois Infantry, went a fishing down the harbor, and went within a few yards of Sumter. The face of Sumter toward Moultrie is partly knocked down. He heard that there were two field pieces in Sumter. There are two Quaker or wooden guns in Fort Ripley.