Escaping Down the Peninsula 1864

                             FORT MONROE, VA., February 14, 1864.
                                                 (Received 3.40 p.m.)

Hon. E. M. STANTON,

     Secretary of War, Washington, D.C.:

The following telegram has just been received from General Wistar:

                                       YORKTOWN, February 14, 1864.

Col. J. W. SHAFFER,

       Chief of Staff:

 Two escaped Union officers have reached my pickets from Richmond. They report 109 more on the road. A general delivery of one prison-house was effected by digging a tunnel under the street, General DOW could not stand the fatigue of  the trip, and consequently did not come. My cavalry are in motion, scouring the Peninsula to cover the escape of the rest. Several colonels, among them Colonel Streight, are on the road, but the path is hard.

                                                   I.J. WISTAR,
                                                     Brigadier-General.

                                                 J. W. SHAFFER,
                                            Colonel and Chief of Staff.

              FORT MONROE, VA., February 14, 1864.

                                             (Received 2.35 p.m., 16th.)

Hon. E. M. STANTON,

          Secretary of War:

Twenty-six of the escaped prisoners have arrived within our lines up to to-night. We have sent cavalry patrols up the Peninsula as far as the Chickahominy to pick up all we can. Have sent an army gun-boat up the James and Chickahominy Rivers for the same purpose.

                                         BENJ. F. BUTLER,
                                   Major-General, Commanding.



- The war of the rebellion: a compilation of the official records of the Union and Confederate armies.; Series 1 Volume 33