CAMP PAINE, PADUCAH, KY., October 24, 1861.
Mr. Editor : When I last wrote I confidently expected that ere we should have a battle here, or be ordered forward to strike a blow at the rebels in their dens if they should fail to come and visit us; but the calm that has rested upon all departments of the army, is resting upon us. It seems like a day when the clouds hang heavy, occasionally sending forth a few drops of rain, keeping one anxiously watching them as they slowly pass; but the impending storm, that every hour becomes threatening, comes not. We have not been idle here, though we have done no fighting. We have performed a vast amount of labor, having thrown up several fortifications to guard the entrance to the city, and constructed a floating battery of formidable proportions.
We begin to experience in some degree the annoyance which is apt to prove troublesome to advance guards; that is, occasional attacks on our pickets. Last week a party of rebels very stealthily attacked six men of the regular cavalry performing picket duty two miles and a half in advance of the camp. The rebels, about forty in number, fired on them, sounding two, taking two prisoners, and capturing all their horse and equipment. They fired indiscriminately, and moved without order, killing two and wounding several of their own number. They cut the ropes which held the horses, and suddenly decamped. Our Provost Marshall investigated the matter, and ascertained that they were a party of rebel citizens of the surrounding country, collected for that purpose. He has succeeded in arresting seven of them.
The artillerymen here have manufactured a queer kind of shot, by filling tin cans with railroad spikes; they will prove terribly destructive. - L. W.
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