Rensselaer Union, Volume 2, Number 45, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 August 1870 — The First Battle. [ARTICLE]

The First Battle.

The weary clays of watching and waiting have at last been rewarded, and this rooming we have the news of an engagement at Saarbruek, on Prussian territory. There are no details. It was doubtless a reconnoissance by tlie French in force, for the purpose of developing the position of the German troop 3, or else it mny have been an attempt of Napoleon to effect a crossing of the Saar, for a part of his army, from which he was repulsed. If" the reader will take a map, he will see how tl/e French frontiers, after following the Rhine in its downward course from the junction of the Swiss and Baden frontiers at Basle for about a hundred miles, stops short on the right bank of the river Lautor, aud there turns abruptly to the west, and runs with but slight inclination northward for sixty miles along the south of Rhenish Bavaria, till, a little to the east of the river Saar, Bavarian territory ceases, and Rhenish Prussia begins. Here the Prussian territory dips slightly into France, running nearly parallel to, but some eight or ten miles below, the river Saar, so as to leave Saar Louis and Saarbruek in Prussia. From Metz, at which point tbe French army has been massed, t litre are three roads into Rhenish Prussia, the first of which, (the one taken) being via Thionyille, striking flic river Saar at Saarbruek, the point of contact. From Saarbruek a railway leads to the famous field of Kaiserslauten in Rhenish Bavaria, and thence due east to Manuliein, on the Rhine. This line of otieration chosen by the French, leads them against the fortresses of Saar Louis and Laudan, on, the river Queich, upon the former of which the Prussian Government has expended much skill and labor. — The Prussian army has a very strong position, resting upon these fortresses. Up to the year 1815 .Saar Louis and Laudan belonged to France, but at the close of the first Napoleon’s disastrous campaign they were taken from the Empire and given to Germany. — They now close the two chief lines leading across the northern frontier of France to the Rhine. Advices received since this was written, represent that the movement was from Bazaine’s division of the French army to attempt the- dislodgmeutof the Prussians. The loss to the French was only twenty men. — Fighting is also reperted at Baden, but as to the extent we are left entirely in doubt- —lndianapolis Journal. The democratic congressional convention will be held at V anatab on Wednesday, August 17th, at 1 o’clock P. M. The vote is apportioned as follows: Fulton, 14; Lake, 9; Marshall, 24; Pulaski* 9; Stark, 4; White, 11; Jasper, 4; Laportc, 29? Newton, 4; Porter, 13; St. Joseph, 22. Huckleberries are being shipped from this place at the rate of twenty bushels per day, and from Grovertown, this county, they have shipped as high as one hundred bushels per day, is there any other county in the State that can beat this.— Mark Oj. letttyir.