WAR NEWS BY THE MAIL.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XII, Issue 262, 5 November 1877, Page 2

WAR NEWS BY THE MAIL.

At daylight on the 12th September Osman Pasha directed the main attack at Plevna against the double redoubts captured by General Skobeloff pn the previous day. Six assaults in force were directed against Skobeloff during the day, who asked in vain for reinforcements. He held the redoubts for 24 honrs, when the Turks reoccupied them. He lost three cannon. General Sevilsky refused to send supports, thinking that Skobeloff had enough men to hold the fort. General Keriloff, ou his own responsibility, sent the remnant of a shattered regiment after they had been repulsed at the lower redoubt near Plevna, and were wholly unfit to go into battle. These arrived too late and then a regiment was sent from headquarters. The staff arrived after Skobeloff had retreated. He then entrenched himself opposite the Turks, holding the new ground. Skobeloff lost 2000 men in attacking, and 3000 men in defending the redoubts, the possession of which, with Gravitza, would have enabled the Russians to assume the offensive immediately. An immense number of officers under Skobeloff's command were killed and wounded. Only one commander of the regiment is alive, and scarcely a head of the battalion is left. Two officers of the staff were killed. A correspondent saw Skobeloff on the night of September 16. He was calm and collected, and said, "I have done my best, and could do no more. My detachment is half-destroyed; my regiments do not exist. I have no officers left, and have lost three guns." The correspondent asked why did they refuse you reinforcements? Who was to blame? Ue replied— « I blame nobody; it is the will of God." Colonel Welleslev, the British Commissioner, visited Skobeloflf's commaud and the Gravitza redoubt. The latter he reports as crammed full of dead Russians and Roumanians, and so dismantled as to be nearly uutenable. The Turks iv their attack on Gravitza neither ran away nor asked quarter. The Russians enteredgthinking it was abandoned, but the garrison had only retired into the galleries, and stood at bay. The fighting iv the redoubt waa all with bayonets. The Turks tried to retake it immediately, and threw large numbers of men into the adjacent entrencumeuts, who poured an incessant ritle fire at 20:) yards iuto the Russians, who bombarded them from the redoubt. The Turks being armed with repeating rifles had an enormous advantage over the Russians equal to 18 to 1 in the rapidity of tlieir fire, while exposing only oue life. The efforts to retake Gravitza were fruitless, and the Turks withdrew from the entrenchments. Two days subsequently Osman Pasha attacked the Russians in great force on the line of communication with Sophia, defeatiug the enemy and opening the road. They also defeated the Roumanian forces operating in their rear. Osman Pasha always attacks with superior numbers since the lesson he received before Plevna and prior to the fall of Lovatz. The Russians commenced sapping the Turkish works after Skobeloff's defeat. On September 22nd Osman Pasha made a night attack on the Gravitza redoubt, which was well sustained, but he was repulsed with heavy loss. Meanwhile Haffiz Pasha, with twenty battalions of infantry and two battalions and a regiment of cavalry, aided by the garrison, revictualled Plevna. The Russians acknowledge that 10,000 infantry, supported by artillery, cut through the opposing cavalry and entered Plevna Osman Pasha refused the Rnssians leave to bury their dead before the trenches. On September 25th ali the troops at Orcham were ordered to the relief of Plevna. They are commanded by Chefket Pasha, the author of the Bulgarian massacre*. Auother immense convoy of provisions and munitions of war, escorted by a division, is ou the point of starting from Archan for Plevna. j

Of fche allies posted before Plevna on September 24fch there were estimated fco be 25,000 killed and wounded. The Turkish losses before Plevna were as heavy as those of the Russians, and 14,000 wounded remain in the town, the Turks being unable to remove them. There is great sickness among the Russian troops. _ The wounded from Plevna crowd the hospitals, and there are 24,000 sick soldiers at Odessa. The Russians intend wintering at the Shipka Pass. Radetsky is supposed to have 25,000 and Sulieman 40,000 men. Two Russian gun-boats at Kilia, at the mouth of the Danube, were attacked by a Turkish ironclad and one was destroyed. The butcheries in Bulgaria by Turkish authorities beggars description. Several thousand Bulgarians who were transported to Tripoli were sent to the edge of the Great Desert by the Turkish Government ou Oct. 4. The Czarowitch has voluntarily resigned command of the lsf t, and takes command of fche Imperial Guard. His generalship when opposed to Mehemet Ali is commended.