Lieutenant Cushing as a passenger,
and he reported in person to the Admiral the accomplishment of the
daring mission he was specially selected to perform. Though much
fatigued by the severities of his recent task, he is yet in good
health and spirits, and is at this moment the hero of the squadron.
He is the same officer that went to Smithville and captured General
Whiting's chief of staff, while a regiment of troops was quartered
in the buildings on the opposite side of the way. It was he who
took a small boat up the Wilmington river, past the forts and
batteries, landed and captured a rebel mail, staid three days in
the enemy's country, and finally came away in safety with his
trophies. But this last act of his stamps him as one of the most
daring men in the service. To attack an iron-clad like the
Albemarle, with a launch and a baker's dozen of men, would seem the
height of reckless folly; but to have succeeded in such an
enterprise, is to have earned a life lease of glory.

"In the affair, paymaster Swann, of the Otsego, is known to have
been wounded, and master's mate Howarth, of the Monticello,
captured. Lieut. Cushing speaks very highly of the conduct of all
who were with him.

"The destruction of the ram was not definitely known until the
following day, the 29th, when negroes sent to gain information
returned with the glorious news. Reports from other quarters
corroborated this intelligence, and finally a reconnoissance by the
Valley City revealed the Albemarle resting on the bottom, with only
her smoke-stack visible above the water.

"The yellow fever is said not to have entirely disappeared from
Newbern, although the succession of sharp frosts in that vicinity
has somewhat dispelled it. The steamer John Farron left for that
port yesterday, taking an immense mail, and a number of officers
who have been congregating here for some time, waiting for the
sickly season to terminate."

[Mr. Oscar G. Sawyer's Despatch]

"HAMPTON ROADS, VA., NOVEMBER 1, 1864.

"The most audacious, brilliant and successful affair of the war,
occurred in the waters of North Carolina last week, in which, after
the briefest contest, but one as it will prove of the best results,
the rebel iron-clad ram Albemarle was effectually destroyed and
sent to the bottom by a torpedo discharg