sterday at noon; Hardee, as
usual, retreating across the Cape Fear, burning his bridges; but
our pontoons will be up to-day, and, with as little delay as
possible, I will be after him toward Goldsboro'.

A tug has just come up from Wilmington, and before I get off from
here, I hope to get from Wilmington some shoes and stockings,
sugar, coffee, and flour. We are abundantly supplied with all
else, having in a measure lived off the country.

The army is in splendid health, condition, and spirits, though we
have had foul weather, and roads that would have stopped travel to
almost any other body of men I ever heard of.

Our march, was substantially what I designed--straight on Columbia,
feigning on Branchville and Augusta. We destroyed, in passing, the
railroad from the Edisto nearly up to Aiken; again, from Orangeburg
to the Congaree; again, from Colombia down to Kingsville on the
Wateree, and up toward Charlotte as far as the Chester line; thence
we turned east on Cheraw and Fayetteville. At Colombia we
destroyed immense arsenals and railroad establishments, among which
wore forty-three cannon. At Cheraw we found also machinery and
material of war sent from Charleston, among which were twenty-five
guns and thirty-six hundred barrels of powder; and here we find
about twenty guns and a magnificent United States' arsenal.

We cannot afford to leave detachments, and I shall therefore
destroy this valuable arsenal, so the enemy shall not have its use;
and the United States should never again confide such valuable
property to a people who have betrayed a trust.

I could leave here to-morrow, but want to clear my columns of the
vast crowd of refugees and negroes that encumber us. Some I will
send down the river in boats, and the rest to Wilmington by land,
under small escort, as soon as we are across Cape Fear River.

I hope you have not been uneasy about us, and that the fruits of
this march will be appreciated. It had to be made not only to
destroy the valuable depots by the way, but for its incidents in
the necessary fall of Charleston, Georgetown, and Wilmington. If I
can now add Goldsboro' without too much cost, I will be in a
position to aid you materially in the spring campaign.

Jos. Johnston may try to interpose between me here and Schofield
about Newbern; but I think he will not try that, but concentrate
his scattered armies at Raleigh, and I will go straight at him as
soon as I get our men reclothed an