The following article is from Harper's Weekly Journal of Civilization, dated July 12, 1862:

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The Battle of Mechanicsville

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          Another terrible battle took place before Richmond on 26th and 27th. It appears that General McClellan had become convinced by the 25th that General Fitz John Porter's corps, which was on the north side of Chickahominy, should be moved across the river so as to be on the same side as the rest of the army, and the movement of commissary stores and tents had already begun. This movement will eventually necessitate the abandonment of the railroad to the Pamunky and of our depot at White House; and orders were sent to White House to embark our stores and send them to Fortress Monroe, with a view to the establishment of a new depot on the James or Chickahominy rivers.

          On 26th the enemy attacked simultaneously General Porter's corps near Mechanicsville (the rebels having crossed the Chickahominy near the Virginia Central), and our forces near Hanover Court House. They took nothing by the attack, General McCall's division, which was in the advance, being thoroughly able to hold their ground.

          Early on the morning of the 27th McCall received orders to fall back slowly in the direction of Gaines's Mills. The order was obeyed. The retreat, was so slow that the troops took six hours to march less than six miles. After passing Gaines's Mills they reached the ground where they had been directed to make a stand -- a large plain lying some distance east of Gaines's Mills, southeast of Coal Harbor and north of the Chickahominy. There they awaited the attack of the enemy, who came on in great force at about 3pm on the 27th. The battle raged fiercely till night, without change of position. At one time General Porter was so hard pressed -- the enemy having received reinforcements -- that he sent across the Chickahominy to to McClellan for help. It came at once. A few thousand men, under Generals Slocum, Palmer, French, and Meagher, were hurried across the river, and with this reinforcement General Porter held his ground firmly, and holds it still. Night put an end to the conflict.

          The effect of these battles is to change somewhat the line of our army before Richmond. Instead of stretching from Mechanicsville, on the north side of the Chickahominy, to Bear and White Oak Swamp, on the south bank of the river, a distance of some twenty miles, our forces are now concentrated on the Chickahominy, at what was till recently our left flank. As soon as a new depot and base of operations are established, the whole army will move forward without delay upon the rebel right and Richmond -- probably along the bank of the James River.

          General Jackson is said to have reinforced the reels with his army from the Shenandoah Valley.

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The following article is from Harper's Weekly Journal of Civilization, dated July 26, 1862:

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Battle of Beaver Creek

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          Where McCall's division, Fitz-John Porter's corps, was attacked on the 26th by an overwhelming force of rebels. We gave an account of the battle in our last number. Mr. Waud says: "This battle was fought by McCall's divisions, Thursday, June 26. The enemy having made a bridge below Mechanicsville, with a view to passing the swamp and cutting off McCall's command from the rest of the army, that General withdrew his forces across Beaver Creek. Here the rebels attacked him, the fight lasting till after dark, when having repulsed the enemy, McCall fell back still further, in pursuance of McClellan's plan of drawing his right wing across the Chickahominy, and taking the James River for the base of operations." We will add the following description of the country from the Tribune correspondence:

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          The battle was fought in dense woods. Our forces were posted on the south side of a belt of forest on a line nearly two miles long, the general course of which was nearly parallel with the Chickahominy. The woods vary in depth from 40 to 100 rods; a small stream flows the entire length, and the ascent on either side is quite sharp. Cultivated fields cover the brow and crest of the hills on either side and in the right rear of our position extend half a mile to the bottom land of the Chickahominy. On the left the fringe of woods reaches to this bottom land. At 11 a.m., when I reached the field, our pickets occupied the top of the hill across the ravine along its whole winding length. They reported a battery of the enemy at Gaine's House, a mile north in his left rear, and numbers of rebels in distinct view. This battery soon exchanged shots with guns on our right. Half an hour later they saluted our left with an occasional shell from a position so far westerly as to enfilade our line. meanwhile, an occasional report from a sharp-shooter's rifle warned of the enemy's approach. The fire of our batteries on the right gradually grew more rapid, but the day wore away until it was 3 p.m. and there had been few casualties. Would the enemy make a serious demonstration: A volley from one company of regiment on the left, directed at as many of the enemy who appeared on the crest of the opposite hill, causing them to hurry back, did not answer the question conclusively, for it was followed by dead silence. Twenty minutes later the answer came, and it was unmistakable -- it was a tornado of musketry.

          The ball opened with the centre, but only a moment, and the tornado swept right and left as if one current of electricity had discharged every man's musket. Our men disappeared, sending back cheerful shouts as they rushed into that dense wood where now corpses are thick as the trees. A spatter of rebel lead lifted little puffs of dust on the hill from which, with straining eyes, I in vain sought to penetrate those dark recesses. A dull, heavy under-current of murmur as of the swarming of bees, the sharp ring of random Minie overhead, the incessant roar of musketry, and now the wounded and the dead being borne out of the jaws of death.

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