CHAPTER XLIX.
Rumors of battles.—Excitement in the churches.—The South Side Road captured by the enemy.—Evacuation of Richmond.—Surrender of Gen. Lee.—Occupation of Richmond by Federal forces.—Address to the people of Virginia by J. A. Campbell and others.—Assassination of President Lincoln.
April 1st.—Clear and pleasant. Walked to the department.
We have vague and incoherent accounts from excited couriers of fighting, without result, in Dinwiddie County, near the South Side Railroad.
It is rumored that a battle will probably occur in that vicinity to-day.
I have leave of absence, to improve my health; and propose accompanying my daughter Anne, next week, to Mr. Hobson’s mansion in Goochland County. The Hobsons are opulent, and she will have an excellent asylum there, if the vicissitudes of the war do not spoil her calculations. I shall look for angling streams: and if successful, hope for both sport and better health.
The books at the conscript office show a frightful list of deserters or absentees without leave—60,000—all Virginians. Speculation!
Jno. M. Daniel, editor of the Examiner, is dead.
The following dispatch from Gen. Lee is just (10 a.m.) received:
“Headquarters, April 1st, 1865.