CORNELL 
 
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 LIBRARY 
 
Cornell University Library 
 !596 .S53 
 
 istory of the Confederate States navy f 
 
 olin 
 
 3 1924 032 779 609 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924032779609 
 
J. THOMAS SCHAEF. 
 
H rS T O R Y 
 
 OF THE 
 
 CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY 
 
 FROM ITS ORGANIZATION 
 
 TO THE SURRENDER OF ITS LAST VESSEL. 
 
 ITS STUPENDOUS STRUGGLE WITH THE GKEAT NAVY OF THE 
 
 UNITED STATES ; THE ENGAGEMENTS FOUGHT IN THE RIVERS 
 
 AND HARBORS OP THE SOUTH, AND UPON THE HIGH SEAS; 
 
 BLOCKADE - RUNNING, FIRST USE OF IRON-CLADS 
 
 AND TORPEDOES, AND PRIVATEER HISTORY. 
 
 BY 
 
 J. THOMAS SCHARF, A. M., LL.D. 
 
 AN OFFICER OF THE LATE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 
 
 Author of ''''Chronicles of Baltimore ^^ '' History of Maryland,^^ "History of Baliimore," ^* History 
 of St. Louis,'' "History of IVestem Maryland,'' "History of Philadelphia," "History of 
 JVesichester County, JV. V.," etc. Also, Member of Historical Societies of Virginia, 
 Georgia^ South Carolina, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New York, Wis- 
 consin, Minnesota^ Philosophical Society of Ohio, etc., etc. 
 
 PROFUSELY ILLUSTRATED. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 ROGERS & SHERWOOD, 
 
 1887. 
 
Copyright, 1886. 
 Bt J. Thomas Schaef, A, M., LL.D. 
 
 All Eights Reserved. 
 
THE OFFICERS OF THE NAVY OF THE CONFEDERATE STATES, 
 
 ■WHO, IMPELLED BY CONVICTIONS OF DUTY, EESIGNED THEIR COMMISSIONS IN THE NAVY OP THE 
 
 UNITED STATES, AND SACRIFICING AMBITION, PROMOTION AND THE COMFORTS OF AN HONORABLE 
 
 SERVICE, OBEYED THE ORDINANCES OF THE STATES OP WHICH THEY WERE CITIZENS, 
 
 AND WERE COMMISSIONED IN THE NAVY AND ARMY OF THE CONFEDERATE STATES ; 
 
 AND TO THEIR COMEADES, 
 
 WHO FROM CIVIL LIFE BECAME OFFICERS IN THAT SERVICE; AS WELL AS 
 
 TO THE BRAVE SAILORS 
 
 WHO SHARED THE PERILS AND PRIVATIONS OF THAT NAVY, 
 
 THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED, 
 
 AS THE author's TRIBUTE TO CONSCIENTIOUS DUTY WELL PERFORMED, TO UNSURPASSED COURAGE 
 BRILLIANTLY DISPLAYED ; TO PRIVATIONS UNCOMPLAININGLY BORNE, AND TO THEIR SPLENDID EX- 
 AMPLE OF CITIZENSHIP IN POVERTY SINCE THE TERMINATION OF THE WAR BETWEEN THE STATES. 
 WHILE IT CAN ADD NOTHING TO THEIR HONORABLE RECORD, IT WILL PRESERVE THE STORY 
 OF A SERVICE WHICH IS SURPASSED BY THAT OF NO OTHER PEOPLE IN HONORA- 
 BLE ACTION, AND IN GLORIOUS ACHIEVEMENTS, WHICH INADEQUATE MEANS 
 RENDERED FRUITLESS, BUT WHICH DEFEAT CANNOT OBLITERATE. 
 
PREFACE, 
 
 IT is no exaggeration of the services rendered in the late war 
 by the navy of the United States, to say that without its 
 aid the armies of the Union would not have been successful; 
 that if the United States had been as destitute of a navy 
 and of naval resources as the Southern Confederacy was, that 
 the Union would have been dissolved; that without Farragut 
 and Foote, Grant and Sherman would occupy in history the 
 same plane with McDowell and Banks, Burnside and Hooker; 
 that when the navy was not co-operating McDowell was hurled 
 back. on Washington; McClellan was driven from Richmond 
 to seek protection under the guns of the navy on James River; 
 that Pope was bounced from Cedar Mountain and, ricochetting 
 at Manassas, rested like a spent ball under the defences of the 
 capital; that in the West the "tin-clad" navy conveyed the 
 army to Fort Henry, and was its effective left wing at Donel- 
 son; that the Mississippi River from Cairo to its mouth was 
 firmly held by the Confederates until Foote from the North 
 and Farragut from the South broke its barriers and opened its 
 navigation ; that Vicksburg and Port Hudson successfully de- 
 fied and defeated the land forces, and surrendered as much to 
 the navy as to the army; that Sherman would never have un- 
 dertaken the " march to the sea " if the navy had not provided 
 protection on the seaboard; that Grant, in the Wilderness, di- 
 verted by Lee from his direct march on Richmond, sought the 
 friendly help of the navy in his campaign to capture the Con- 
 federate capital; that the blockade from the Chesapeake Bay 
 to the mouth of the Rio Grande shut the Confederacy out from 
 the world, deprived it of supplies, weakened its military and 
 naval strength, and compelled exhaustion, by requiring the 
 
VI PKBFACE. 
 
 consumption of everything grown or raised in the country; 
 that there was not an act in either army that surpassed in 
 magnificent courage the bold defiance by Lieut. Morris, of the 
 U. S. Navy, of death alike from shot and drowning, on the deck 
 of the sinking Cumberland, rather than surrender the ship. 
 
 And it was in the school of that navy that Buchanan, Tat- 
 nall, Ingraham, Mitchell, Semmes, Wood, Hollins, Tucker, 
 Jones, Mafiitt, Maury, Wilkinson, Davidson, Pegram, Brown, 
 Bulloch, Brooke, and their associates, learned examples of 
 heroic seamanship which enabled them to write the story of 
 the Confederate Navy in high relief across the page of his- 
 tory. 
 
 That story it is the province of this book to tell, but the 
 difficulties and embarrassments which have surrounded the 
 subject can be known only to the author. Of official records 
 there are very few of any kind in existence, and not a com- 
 plete set for any department, or of the operations at any port, 
 or of any vessel, except that preserved by Admiral Semmes of 
 the Alabama. To meet that difficulty the author was com- 
 pelled to rely mainly on the aid and assistance of Confederate 
 naval officers. But while willing and anxious to aid in every 
 way, these officers possessed but very few records and were 
 unwilling to rely merely on their memory. However, in reply 
 to letters sent out by the author, much reliable information 
 was obtained and valuable suggestions made, which when 
 followed up led to the solving of many difficulties and the 
 clearing away of much doubt and uncertainty. The "Official 
 Records," now being published by the United States Govern- 
 ment, have in the published volumes but very little that refers 
 to naval affairs. Thus, the author has been compelled to rely 
 upon his own unequaled collection of naval material, which 
 he has been fifteen years in collecting, on contemporary ac- 
 counts of operations, collected and preserved in newspapers, 
 private letters, and individual papers, which compared with 
 Federal authorities and such official Confederate records as 
 escaped destruction, were again in many chapters referred to 
 those officers now living who participated in the scenes and 
 actions described for their supervision and correction. 
 
 The author's object was the truth, the whole truth as far 
 as practicable, and nothing but the truth, in all he wrote. 
 Many worthy and deserving officers, who fully and faithfully 
 performed their arduous duties, have not received mention in 
 the book, solely because the author had not the record which 
 would enable him to relate the service rendered; while there 
 is abundant authority to establish the truth of all that is told 
 in the book, much valuable service has been lost to history by 
 the destruction of records. 
 
 It is to be hoped that the book will serve to excite surviv- 
 ing officers, and the representatives of those deceased, to 
 search for and recover lost manuscripts, so that future edi- 
 
PREFACE. Vll 
 
 tions may add to this labor of love, the record of services 
 omitted in this. 
 
 Notwithstanding the difficulties which beset the author, 
 many facts have been brought to light, doubtful statements 
 settled, errors corrected, and character rescued from misrep- 
 resentation and falsehood. Histories of the IF. S. Navy writ- 
 ten during the war, or immediately after its close, have under- 
 taken to g^ve accounts and details of Confederate action and 
 motive, without the facts, and without knowledge of the cir- 
 cumstances of the Confederate side of the question, or of the 
 particular action described. Errors, not necessarily inten- 
 tional, but unavoidable, have thus been introduced into his- 
 tory, which the author of this work has endeavored to correct 
 and explain. While vindicating the political views of Confed- 
 erate officers, no criticism has been found necessary of those 
 whose convictions of duty impelled them to take the " other 
 side." 
 
 If, therefore, in this effort to relate the deeds of daring, 
 the instances and examples where ingenuity, enterprise and 
 device rose above the embarrassments of restricted and lim- 
 ited resources, we have exhibited a partiality or seemed to 
 detract from the glory of the parent navy, it must be attrib- 
 uted to sympathy with a common suffering, rather than a 
 purpose to lesson that renown in which every American must 
 now participate. Time has deprived prejudice of its rancor, 
 politics of its bitterness, and, without changing convictions of 
 duty, has united both sections of the Union under the govern- 
 ment instituted by our fathers, and under its influence each 
 party to the war can now read with profit the deeds of those 
 who 
 
 " Gashed -with honorable scars, 
 
 Low in glory's lap they lie, 
 Though they fell they fell like stars, 
 
 Streaming splendor through the sky.'' 
 
 That navy at all times carries in pride, and we hope will 
 always bear in triumph, that flag which now belongs alike to 
 North and South. If we tell how the stars and bars wrested 
 victory from the stars and stripes, we shall only exhibit the 
 heroism of Americans, and make plain a glory that belongs 
 to all the citizens of the Great Republic. 
 
 The author heartily acknowledges the intelligent aid and 
 generous encouragement which he has received from his pub- 
 lishers ; and he also acknowledges his indebtedness to the pub- 
 lishers of Admiral Porter's " Naval History of the Civil War," 
 for the loan of maps and illustrations. 
 Baltimore, May 1st, 1887. 
 
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Alabama, Cbuisee 800 
 
 AiBEMABLE, RaM, DIAQBAM 403 
 
 Atlanta, Cbuisee 6^1 
 
 Beall. Lloid J "^69 
 
 Attack on Forts Jackson and St. Philip . . 290 
 
 Beooke, JohnM *^ 
 
 Browne, IsAAO N 312 
 
 Buchanan, Franklin 162 
 
 Bulloch, J. D 56 
 
 Caieo, U. S. IeoIt-Clad 762 
 
 Chataeb. Feedeeiok 104 
 
 Cooke, James W 408 
 
 Davis, Jeffeeson H 
 
 Flobida, Ceuibeb 7^2 
 
 Foeeest, Feehch 40 
 
 FoET HiNUMAN, Plan OF 348 
 
 FoetMobgan 6SS 
 
 Fey. James 344 
 
 GovEBNOE MooEi:, Steamee 285 
 
 Haeeiet Lane, Steamee 608 
 
 Haebiet Lane, Capture of 605 
 
 HOLLINB, Geoege N 243 
 
 Howell. Jeffebson Davis 780 
 
 HuGEE, Thomas B 288 
 
 Indianola, Ibon-Clad 362 
 
 Ingeaham, B. N ^0 
 
 Jones, C. ap E 184 
 
 Lee, R. E.,BlookadeEunnee 468 
 
 Lee, Sidney Smith "^l^ 
 
 Louisiana, Ram 266 
 
 Matfitt, John T '. 392 
 
 Malloey. Stephen R 27 
 
 Manassas. Bam 264 
 
 Manassas, in flames 29G 
 
 Mauey, Matthew F 96 
 
 MoInto6H,C.F 280 
 
 Meebimao (See Vieginia) 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Mississippi, BELOW New Oeleans 290 
 
 Mitchell, John K 297 
 
 Mobile Bay, Diageam ■ 652 
 
 monitob, pbofele 172 
 
 moeeis, c. m 83 
 
 Mound Batteby 424 
 
 Nashville, sinking D. S. Vessel 633 
 
 Page, Richaed L 653 
 
 Faekeb, William H 176 
 
 Pateick Henby, School Ship 776 
 
 Penbacola Naty-Yaed, Desteuction of — 615 
 
 Queen of the West, Ram 362 
 
 Roanoke Island, Pi^an 388 
 
 RocHELLE, John H 704 
 
 Savannah, Defences of 636 
 
 Schaef, J. Thomas Feontispiece 
 
 Semmes, Raphael 744 
 
 Shenandoah, Cbuisee 809 
 
 Smith's Island, Diagbam 423 
 
 Stonewall, Ram 784 
 
 SuMTEB, Cbuisee 787 
 
 Tathall, JOSIAH 216 
 
 Tennessee, Peofile 653 
 
 Tennessee, Diagbam. 655 
 
 Tennessee, afteb oaptube 574 
 
 tobpedoes 751-764 
 
 ToEPEDo Boats 769 
 
 Tuckee, JohnR... 300 
 
 TubbetShip 788 
 
 Virginia, in dock 154 
 
 Virginia, Peofile 172 
 
 Vieginia, Sinking Oumbeeland 160 
 
 Vieginia and Monitoe in Battle 168 
 
 Waddell.I.T 816 
 
 Whittle, William 300 
 
 Wilkinson, John 464 
 
 Wood, John Tayloe 121 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Introduction, .... .... 11 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 Want of PREPARATio;>f for War, . . . . .15 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 Organization op the Navy, .... .27 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Privateers, or Letters op Marque, . . , .53 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 Virginia Waters, . . . .... 94 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 Captures in Virginia Waters, . . . .ill 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 Hampton Roads, ........ 128 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 The First Iron-clad, ....... 145 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 The NA.VAL Battle in Hampton Roads, .... 157 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 The Virginia (Merrimac) and Monitor, . . . .167 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 The Mississippi River from Cairo to Vicksburg, . . 33& 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 Building a Navt at New Orleans, . . . 263 
 
X CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 Mississippi River from the Gulf to Vicksbubg, . . 278 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 The Rams "Arkansas," "Queen op the West," " Indianola," 
 
 AND "Webb," . . . • • -303 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 J^orth Carolina Waters, . • ■ ■ -368 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 The Blockade, . ..... 428 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 Trans-Mississippi Waters, . . . 494 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 Alabama Waters, . . . 533 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 Florida Waters, . . .599 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 Georgia Waters, . . .... 623 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 South Carolina Waters, . ... 655 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 Virginia Waters (continued), , ... 708 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 The Torpedo Service, . ..... 750 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 The Confederate States Marine Corps, . . . .769 
 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 The Confederate States Naval Academy, . . .773 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 The Confederate States Cruisers, . . . . .782 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 Names of Commissioned and Warrant Officers, C. S. Navy, . 819 
 
 Index, . . . . . . . . . 821 
 
CHAPTER I. 
 INTEODUCTION. 
 
 •/ 
 
 WHILE it does not enter within the scope of this work 
 to discuss the political subjects which, after long years 
 of debate, culminated in the late war between the 
 States, yet we are confronted at the very threshold of 
 ■our undertaking with the moral question : Whether there was 
 either violation of oath, or ingratitude to the United States, in 
 resigning commissions in that service, and accepting commis- 
 sions under their States, by those officers who had been educated 
 in the military and naval schools at West Point and Annapolis ? 
 That question involves in its solution the theories upon 
 which the Constitution of the United States was framed. For, 
 if it was ordained and established by one people, then the rela- 
 tion of citizenship to the United States was wholly outside of 
 all relation to the States, and the allegiance of those officers 
 was due directly and entirely to the United States. If, on the 
 contrary, the Constitution was ordained and established by 
 the States, in their sovereign and independent character, then 
 allegiance was due primarily to the States, and became due to 
 "the United States only through the action of the States. If, 
 therefore, the States, by their sovereign act, transferred the 
 •allegiance of their citizens to the United States, that allegiance 
 could only be by the act of the State, and remain due only 
 so long as the State continued a party to the Constitution of 
 the United States. 
 
 Whether the theory of a national, or of a compact, govern- 
 ment be the true theory of the Constitution, now and here- 
 after, it is not necessary to discuss. The compact theory of 
 the United States Constitution, announced in 1800 to all the 
 States, and denied by none, continued to be held by the people 
 of the Southern States down to the year 1861. From that 
 theory was derived the axiom of political faith, that the State, 
 and not the citizen, was the contracting party to the Constitu- 
 tion, and that the power, right and duty of continuing with or 
 withdrawing^ from the Union remained with the State. Hence 
 
13 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 all Southern men held that the sovereign act of the State was 
 obligatory on her citizens, and of such efficacy that disobedi- 
 ence by her citizen to the ordinance of secession would have 
 been treason to the State. In the political relations of States 
 there are questions which the State only can determine ; of 
 these that of allegiance is the first and of most importance. At 
 the formation of the Constitution of 1789, the States trans- 
 mitted the allegiance of their citizens to the United States. 
 The act of the State, by which the citizen was bound to obey 
 the authority of the United States, did not divest the citizen of 
 his duty to obey the State, but made allegiance to the United 
 States to be the citizen's duty because the State was one of 
 the United States. That act of the State did not create a 
 double allegiance — one to the State, and another to the United 
 States — but transferred, while the State was a party to the 
 United States Constitution, the single allegiance of her citizen 
 to the United States through and by virtue of the act of the 
 State. 
 
 Under any theory of double allegiance it would have been 
 impossible for the citizen to have escaped committing the 
 crime of treason. For, if the State should be driven by 
 oppression to withdraw from the Constitution of the United 
 States, her citizen, under this double allegiance, would have- 
 been bound to the United States. Hence, if the citizens should 
 obey their own State, they would be pursued and hunted 
 down as traitors to the Federal government; and, if forsaking 
 the State to which their allegiance was originally exclusively 
 due, they should adhere to the Federal government, they 
 would be traitors to their own State and enemies to their fire- 
 sides. Such a scheme of government would be a monstrous 
 engine of cruelty and oppression, which no man can believe 
 the fathers of the Constitution erected to crush and grind 
 their posterity between the upper and the nether millstones 
 of the two governments, and then pronounce it to be a scheme 
 "to secure the blessings of liberty to themselves and their 
 posterity. " 
 
 With the officers of the army and navy there was no- 
 party politics — but they held a faith or conviction upon the 
 relation of their States to the Federal Union, disconnected 
 from all party association, which did not permit them to dis- 
 cuss whether their States were acting wisely or prudently — 
 but only that their States had acted, and that they were bound 
 by the sovereign act of their States. It was their sense of 
 duty — their view of citizenship, their conviction of allegiance 
 to the State — that impelled them to resign their commissions in 
 the service of the United States and cast their fortunes with 
 their States. 
 
 By ordinance of the Virginia Convention, it was "ordained 
 that all officers, civil and military, and the people generally of 
 this State, be and they are hereby released from any and all 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 13 
 
 oaths which they may have taken to support the Constitu- 
 tion of the late confederacy, known as The United States of 
 America, and that the said oaths and the said Constitution 
 are inoperative and void, and of no effect." 
 
 Thus a political oath, taken by virtue of a command from 
 the State, was absolved and released by a like sovereign act 
 of the State. 
 
 As to the resignation of those officers, Admiral Semmes 
 very justly remarks : 
 
 " It must be admitted, indeed, that there was some little nerve re- 
 quired on the part of an oflBcer of the regular army or navy to elect to 
 go with his State. His profession was his only fortune ; he depended 
 upon it for the means of subsisting himself and family. If he remained 
 where he was, a competency for life, and promotions, and honors, prob- 
 ably, awaited him ; if he went with the South, a dark, uncertain future 
 was before him ; he could not possibly better his condition, and, if the 
 South failed, he would have thrown away the labor of a life-time. The 
 struggle was hard in other respects. All professions are clannish. Men 
 mutually cling together who have been bred in a common pursuit, and 
 this remark is peculiarly applicable to the ai"my and the navy. West 
 Point and Annajjolis were powerful bonds to knit together the hearts of 
 young men. Friendships were there formed which it was difficult to 
 sever, especially when strengthened by years of after-association in com- 
 mon toils, common pleasures, and common dangers. Naval officers, in 
 particular, who had been rocked together in the same storm, and had 
 escaped perhaps from the same shipwreck, found it very difficult to draw 
 their swords against each other. The flag, too, had a charm which it 
 was difficult to resist. It had long been the emblem of the principle that 
 all just governments are founded on the consent of the governed, vindi- 
 cated against our British ancestors in the War of the Revolution; and it 
 was difficult to realize the fact that it no longer represented that principle, 
 hut had become the emblem of its opposite : that of coercing unwilling 
 States to remain under a government which they deemed unjust and 
 oppressive." 
 
 Of the same tenor is the testimony borne by Capt. Bulloch 
 and Parker, and by the sentiments of affection in every 
 Southern officer who resigned from the United States Navy. 
 It required no sacrifice and entailed no inconvenience to re- 
 main loyal to the Union ; but to resign from that service 
 involved every consideration which might deter a man not 
 actuated by exalted principles. 
 
 There could not, therefore, be any violation of an oath 
 which had been taken by command of the State, after the 
 State absolved and released her citizen from its obligation and 
 commanded his services in her own defence. 
 
 As to ingratitude, in resigning after education in the 
 military and naval schools — the same reasons apply with equal 
 force. Those schools had been established and maintained by 
 the States, in their associated capacity as " The United States 
 of America," for the defence only of the States, for outside of 
 the States there was nothing to defend. The citizens of the 
 States were appointed cadets from the States, maintained by 
 the taxes of citizens of the States, and were appointed to the 
 army and navy which was designed only to protect and 
 
14 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 defend the States. It is hardly necessary to say that it never 
 was within the contemplation of the States, when the schools 
 at West Point and Annapolis were established, to conjecture 
 or suppose that the graduates would ever be called upon to 
 fight against the States — even for the union of the States. 
 But in 1861 events had presented to the States that most un- 
 expected result — the soldiers and sailors, educated by the 
 Federal government in its character of agent of the States, 
 were called upon by that agent to fight against its principal — 
 by the servant to make war on the master; by the creature 
 to destroy the creator. In that anomalous condition of the 
 relations of the States to the Federal Union, the eleves of 
 "West Point and Annapolis returned to their States without the 
 least ingratitude to the United States, which had lost sight of 
 its origin arid assumed a mastery where only a service or 
 agency was designed.' 
 
 Such was the firm and honest sense of duty entertained 
 not only by these officers, but taught and inculcated in the 
 political literature of the Southern States, and incorporated in 
 the great principles of government and parties from the election 
 of Mr. Jefferson in 1800 to the close of Mr. Buchanan's in 1860. 
 The resolutions of Virginia and Kentucky, in 179S, was the 
 magna charta of political principles not only for the Southern 
 States, but New England, in 1815, drew from them her justifica- 
 tion of opposition to the war with Great Britain. That those 
 resolutions had been assailed and the inference of the right of 
 secession controverted by eminent statesmen and jurists at 
 the North is not denied, but they retained throughout the 
 South their great cardinal features of political faith. In obey- 
 ing convictions directly resulting from the teachings of Mr. 
 Jefferson and Mr. Madison, ratified and confirmed by the re- 
 peated elections of both of the authors of those resolutions, 
 the officers discharged a duty as binding upon their consciences 
 as was their faith in the Supreme Being. 
 
 1 At the beginning of tlie war a great deal was ARMY. South. Norths 
 
 said about the way the body of the officers Generals 2 2 
 
 who commanded the army and navy was con- Colonels 14 18 
 
 stltuted with reference to the North and the Lieutenant-Colonels 11 18 
 
 South, and much speculation was rife as to the obtains* 151 189 
 
 course these gentlemen would pursue in case Lieutenants*. ".'..".'!.'.".'.!".*' "*".'.*.'. 238 293 
 
 of conflict between the two sections. Mr. 
 
 Seward, in the political campaign of 1860, de- Total 467 679 
 
 nounced both services as mere slave-catching NAVY. 
 
 and slave-keeping institutions, and declared Captains 34 45 
 
 for the abolition of both when he was speaking Commanders 62 62 
 
 in the West, where the Navy was particularly Lieutenants 135 190 
 
 unpopular. 
 
 Surgeons 25 44 
 
 Assistant Surgeons 44 
 
 The impression, in 1860, seemed prevalent Paymasters 30 34 
 
 thatthemajority of the officers in both branches Chaplains 7 16 
 
 of the service came from the South, and had Masters 15 29 
 
 Southern prejudices, but the army and navy ^'5^'^'??? "V .• '* "^ 
 
 registers give the following tables, from which Ct°iSis ^^^ 14 'o? 
 
 it will be seen that there was a majority in Gunners 20 26 
 
 favor of the North in both serviceB— a majority 
 
 of 112 in the army, and of 253 in the navy : Total 460 7] 3 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 WANT OF PREPARATION FOR WAR. 
 
 IN the same line of reckless aspersion as that against the 
 resigned officers was the charge made against the Southern 
 States of having, while in the Union, prepared resources of 
 
 arms and collected munitions of war to effect its disso- 
 lution. 
 
 In support of that assertion, the Potter Committee of the 
 Federal Congress reflected with severity upon the transfer of 
 certain arms to the Southern States during the year 1860, prior 
 to the election of Mr. Lincoln, and when secession was being 
 discussed in the same language which had been used on that 
 subject for thirty years before. But the subsequent secession 
 of the Southern States gave point and application to the charge 
 that Secretary Floyd had prepared the South for war by arm- 
 ing the States with United States arms. The raid of John 
 Brown into Virginia had put into actual war the continued 
 threat of the avowed Abolitionists, who regarded the Consti- 
 tution as a "compact with the devil and a league with hell" 
 — and who swore to 
 
 " Tear down that flaunting lie ! 
 Half-mast the starry flag ! 
 Insult no sunny sky 
 
 With hate's polluted rag.'' 
 
 For defence against those attacks of invasion the peace- 
 ful policy of Virginia had rendered her wholly unprepared. 
 Northern cupidity availed itself of that excitement and 
 vociferously cried to Congress for the manufacture of more 
 arms. Pittsburgh manufacturers lobbied a bill through Con- 
 
 fress for the manufacture of cannon to arm the unfinished 
 outhern forts. 
 
 The appropriation for casting these cannon was passed 
 by Congress, without the knowledge or solicitation of Secre- 
 tary Floyd, under the industrious lobbying of Pittsburgh iron- 
 founders. The guns were cast in obedience to law, and the 
 early shipment of them in advance of the full completion 
 
 (15) 
 
16 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of the forts, though not in advance of the readiness of the 
 forts to receive their armament, was due more to the fact 
 that the Pittsburgh iron-founders were bound by their con- 
 tract to deliver them before receiving their pay than to the 
 special eagerness of the Secretary to get them off. The Secre- 
 tary simply obeyed a mandate of Congress, and the Pittsburgh 
 contractors simply obeyed the influences of cupidity. But 
 those guns never reached the Southern forts, their shipment 
 was stopped in Pittsburgh by Secretary Holt. Much was also 
 said about one hundred thousand muskets having been ordered 
 to be sold to one Belknap at two and one-half dollars each, as 
 being a part of the same scheme to arm the South. But that 
 order was made under a standing law and in pursuance of 
 numerous reports of competent boards of ordnance officers, 
 declaring the Government would do well to get rid of them 
 at two dollars. Those muskets never came to the South ; for, 
 though offered to and urged upon the Southern States, they 
 would not take them. Virginia had previously taken a few 
 thousand, Mississippi as many more, and Alabama a still 
 greater number. Probably South Carolina and Georgia took 
 also a few thousand; but when a hundred thousand more could 
 have been had for a song they paid no attention to the subject. 
 The offer to the States was at two dollars ; the offer to Bel- 
 knap was not till afterwards, and at two and one-half dollars. 
 Belknap's scheme was to sell the muskets in Europe, and not 
 to the South, as the committee's report insinuated. 
 
 For years prior to 1860 it had been the policy of the Federal 
 war department to allow all the rifles and muskets manufac- 
 tured at the Federal armories to be deposited in Northern 
 arsenals. That at Watervliet, near Troy, N. Y., contained 
 probably one-half of all the arms of improved patterns owned 
 by the Federal government. 
 
 The attack of John Brown upon Virginia, and the numer- 
 ous efforts of Northern emissaries to excite Southern slaves to 
 insurrection, suggested the importance of distributing their 
 quota of these fine guns among the Southern States. Accord- 
 ingly, orders were issued in 1860, by Secretary Floyd, to 
 transfer the Southern quota of the arms from the Northern 
 arsenals. 
 
 On May 30th, 1860, prior to the nomination even of Mr. 
 Lincoln, an order was made for the transfer of the quota of 
 arms to the Southern arsenals. Under which order the trans- 
 fer was as follows : 
 
 Percus'n Muskets. Altered Muskets. Percus'n Rifles. 
 
 Charleston (S. C.) Arsenal, . . 9,280 5,730 2,000 
 
 North Carolina Arsenal, . . 15,408 9,520 2,000 
 
 Augusta (Ga. ) Arsenal, . . . 12,380 7,620 3,000 
 
 Mt. Vernon, Ala., . . 9,380 5,720 2,000 
 
 Baton Rouge, La., . . 18,820 11,420 2,000 
 The number of arms transferred to these arsenals under this order 
 being 114,868. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 17 
 
 That transfer of arms was made prior to the nominations 
 of political parties in 1860, long anterior to the presidential 
 election and entirely without the least expectation of seces- 
 sion or war. The safety of persons and property at the South, 
 the preservation of order and social life in the slave-holding 
 States, had been put in jeopardy by Northern incendiaries, and 
 that transfer of arms was justified by what had already taken 
 place at Harper's Ferry under John Brown, and by the sym- 
 pathy shown to and martyrdom conferred upon that insurrec- 
 tionist and incendiary. The portion borne by the Southern 
 States in the expenditures of the Federal government entitled 
 them to the custody of a fair quota of this sort of public prop- 
 erty. They were taken under undisputed legal right ; and 
 more than the portion taken belonged to the Southern States 
 by right of property fairly paid for. That transfer of arms 
 was the act of the Federal government, and not the prepara- 
 tion for war by any State. 
 
 But the charge of previous preparation for war was be- 
 lieved by -many at the North, and has been since the war 
 repeatedly asserted by writers who ought to have known bet- 
 ter. . If those who made the assertion had shown that prepar- 
 ation for war had been even commenced, that materials of 
 war had been collected, that any steps had been taken to 
 make successful an attempt to dissolve the Union, there might 
 be some probability in the assertion. But the fact is now ap- 
 parent and within the reach of all, that, until the organization 
 of the Confederate States, there was not a ship owned by any 
 State, nor the least effort made to procure one ; that there was 
 not a piece of ordnance of any kind; not a yard in which a 
 yawl-boat could be built; not a machine shop capable, without 
 material alterations, of constructing the simplest piece of 
 naval machinery; not a rope-yard, not a percussion-cap 
 machine ; only one powder mill, no supply of nitre, or sulphur, 
 or lead — not the least preparation of any kind. 
 
 Why was it that there were no preparations ? The answer 
 must be found in the conviction of all men, that none could be 
 needed — because secession was a peaceful remedy — and war 
 would not follow separation from a Union which owed its 
 existence to a peaceable secession from an older Union. _ Hence 
 there was no preparation for war — until President Lincoln's 
 Proclamation, calling on all the States for 75,000 men to recap- 
 ture the forts, etc., held by the seceded States, made war not only 
 imminent but actual. It was that proclamation which brought 
 the two sections of the Union face to face in war, as independ- 
 ent and hostile Eepublics, but without the least preparation on 
 the part of either. The United States was in better condition 
 and situation for war than the Confederate States, but not with- 
 out less preparation. That government had the small army 
 as a nucleus for a larger, and all the ships of the navy — for no 
 Southern officer who resigned brought a ship with him to the 
 
18 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Confederacy. They did not presume to take upon themselves 
 the duty of dividing the navy among the States, notwithstand- 
 ing it was the common property of all the States. In the excite- 
 ment of the times, it would have been pardonable conduct to 
 have brought their ships to the defence of the States; but their 
 delicate sense of honor, and a sailor's duty to the government 
 whose commission he bore, required that he should divest him- 
 self of every selfish motive before he returned his commission 
 to the Federal government. In the light of such honorable con- 
 duct, the petty malice with which Secretary Welles was actu- 
 ated, when he endeavored to stigmatize these officers with 
 having ''deserted the service," reacts with more effect against 
 the character of the Secretary than against the conduct of these 
 officers. 
 
 The forts, arsenals, etc., situated in and attached to the soil 
 of the States, had all been conveyed to the United States, with 
 the reservation of the State's right of re-entry and occupa- 
 tion, when the forts, etc., ceased to be used for the defence of 
 the State. The property was held in trust for all the States, as 
 a means of defending all, through the avenues of commerce 
 in the particular State. Hence, when the State, in which the 
 fort, arsenal and dock-yard was situated, withdrew from the 
 Union, the purposes of the trust ended, and she resumed her 
 right and jurisdiction over the fort. The money expended in 
 improving the fort was, of course, to have been returned to 
 the United States in the settlement of accounts between the 
 seceded States and the United States ;' and that was one of 
 the objects of the diplomatic mission of Messrs. Forsyth and 
 Crawford to the government at Washington, in March, 1861. 
 
 Every act of the seceded States had been peaceful, and there 
 was no occasion for war until the authorities at Washington 
 put in practice their new scheme or theory invented by Presi- 
 dent Lincoln: that he would re-occupy and hold the forts in 
 the seceded States. The little garrison at Sumter could not 
 have effected the result of the issue between the Confederate 
 States and the United States, whether it yielded under the 
 pressure of a want of supplies, or was delivered to South 
 Carolina under the constitutional view that it belonged to 
 that State. But Major Anderson and his little command offered 
 an excellent opportunity for the application of the new theory 
 to re-occupy and hold the forts, etc. — and, better, it could be so 
 managed as to make the Confederates States ^re the first gun. ^ 
 
 1 The Provisional Constitution of the Con- that Union, iipon the principles of right, justice, 
 
 federate States provided that: equity and good faith." — Stat, at Large, Prov. 
 
 "The government hereby instituted shall Gov't, C. S A., pp. 27, 28. 
 take immediate steps for the settlement of all 2 The New Xork Herald of April 5, 1861, said: 
 matters between the States forming it and "We have no doubt Mr. Lincoln wants the 
 their other late confederates of the United Cabinet at Montgomery to take the initiative 
 States, in relation to the public property and by capturing the two forte in its water's, for 
 public debt at the time of their ^Nithdrawal it would give him the opportunity of throw- 
 fromthem: these States hereby declaring it to ing upon the Southern Confederacy the re- 
 be their wish and earnest desire to adjust sponsibility of commencing hostilities. But 
 everything pertaining to the common property, the coimtry and posterity will hold him just as 
 common liabilities, and common obligations of responsible as if he sti-uck the first blow." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 19 
 
 It is no part of our purpose to trace the course of that de- 
 vious and disgraceful diplomacy which, in Washington City, 
 during March and April, 1861, was running both above and 
 below the surface — the Secretary of State promising peace 
 and the evacuation of Sumter, and the Secretaries of War 
 and Navy preparing military and naval expeditions to force 
 the firing of the first gun upon the Confederates. Secretary 
 Welles, in the Galaxy for November, 1870, told the story of 
 the double and triple negotiations by which the war was in- 
 augurated, and a few extracts will fully sustain us in saying 
 that war, and not peace, was the object of the Washington 
 •authorities. Mr. Welles says: 
 
 " Mr. Seward from the commencement doubted not only the practica- 
 iDility of reinforcing Sumter, but the expediency of any attempt to provision 
 the garrison, therein differing from every one of his colleagues, though in 
 perfect accord with General Scott. The subject in all its aspects was less 
 novel to him than the rest of us, and from some cause his conclusions 
 were wholly imUke the others. If not indifferent, he had none of the zeal 
 which inspired his colleagues, but seemed to consider it an unimportant 
 or settled question. The insurgents had possession of Fort Moultrie, 
 Castle Pinckney, and, in fact, all the defences of Charleston; what bene- 
 fit, he asked, could we derive from retaining this isolated fortress, if it 
 "were possible to do so ?" 
 
 Mr. Welles was one of those colleagues whose "zeal," not 
 born of wisdom, circumvented the patriotic and pacific pur- 
 poses of Mr. Seward. Indeed, the Oalaxy article on "Fort 
 Sumter," when read between the lines, is a covert and insid- 
 ious impeachment of Mr. Seward's loyalty to the Republican 
 purpose of forcing war upon the South, hence Mr. Welles fur- 
 ther says : 
 
 "The Secretary of State was the only member of the Cabinet who did 
 not cordially concur in these conclusions (to reinforce and provision Fort 
 Sumter), and he could not successfully conti'overt them. He did not, 
 however, give his earnest approval, but, in acquiescing, reiterated what he 
 had previously urged: that the attempt, if made, would prove a failure; 
 that the failure would strengthen the secessionists and weaken the gov- 
 ernment; that in the attitude of parties it would be received as the com- 
 mencement of hostilities, would foreclose all measures of reconciliation, 
 and place the Administration in a wrong and false position." 
 
 Mr. Welles, writing in the spirit of a partisan rather than 
 in that of a statesman, admits that the " political necessities " 
 demanded the attempt to reinforce Sumter. The subsequent 
 events demonstrated the wisdom of Seward; and Mr. Welles, 
 in attempting to impeach the party fidelity of Mr. Seward, 
 demonstrates the efforts of the latter to keep faith with his 
 plighted word to the Governor of South Carolina, that the 
 situation at Sumter should not be changed. The Galaxy ar- 
 ticle, notwithstanding it uncovers much that was hidden and 
 unknown of the doings about Sumter, also discloses that the 
 opening of the war by the South was the object for which all 
 but Seward, and, perhaps, Mr. Lincoln, were playing in their 
 desperate game prior to the assault upon Fort Sumter. 
 
aO THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The object of Mr. Lincoln and his party was accomplished : 
 the first gun was fired by the Confederates. In the excitement 
 which followed, men did not remember that between nations 
 the aggressor is not he who first uses force, but he who first 
 makes force necessary. The scheme, or rather the trick, suc- 
 ceeded, by which the North was to be aroused and angered 
 into war. The "blood-letting" policy avowed by Mr. Z. Chand- 
 ler' had been successfully shifted to the South, and yet had 
 been the means of arousing the North. The " Peace Conven- 
 tion" had " ended in thin smoke," as Mr. Chandler desired, by 
 laaving delegates of the " stiff -backed " sort sent to Washington 
 to defeat every effort at peace and reunion. 
 
 The recital of the facts, as they existed at the South in 1861, 
 establishes beyond controversy that no preparation for war 
 had been made by any Southern State prior to secession — that 
 not one of the States desired war — that there ought not to 
 have been war — and that there would not have been war, 
 except to " save the Republican party from rupture." The 
 facts of the times'* and the acts of men cannot be covered 
 up from the search and exposure of the historian, who, when 
 he comes to write the causes of the terrible war of 1861-5, 
 must discover and expose those who, to secure themselves in 
 the possession of political place, deliberately played with the 
 excited passions and feelings of the hour, to involve the coun- 
 try in war, and dissolved the Union, so that its reconquest 
 would perpetuate their party ascendancy, or that the loss of 
 the Southern States would deprive their political opponents of 
 the great bulk of their strength, and thus secure for them- 
 selves the possession of power in either the reconstructed 
 Union or in the dismembered and divided Northern part. 
 
 The State of South Carolina adopted her Ordinance of 
 Secession on Dec. 30th, 1860. Major Anderson complicated 
 the diflficulties of a peaceful arrangement by evacuating Fort 
 Moultrie and occupying Fort Sumter on Dec. 25th; but his act 
 was not without material aid to South Carolina, for he left 
 behind him all the guns of Fort Moultrie. This was the first 
 supply of munition of war obtained by South Carolina. It is 
 no part of the purpose of this work to discuss whether Major 
 Anderson did wrong in abandoning Fort Moultrie — the fact 
 gives the information of how South Carolina was able to 
 girdle Sumter with her batteries and compel its surrender. 
 After Major Anderson occupied Sumter, the South Carolina 
 authorities occupied both Fort Moultrie and Castle Pinckney, 
 Fort Johnson, and the United States arsenal in Charleston. 
 
 In pursuance of her purpose and in preparation for the de- 
 fence of her soil, the Governor of South Carolina, on the 30th 
 December, 1860, informed Commander T. T. Hunter, United 
 States Lighthouse Inspector at Charleston, that he could depart 
 the State, but prohibited him from removing any property of 
 
 1 Letter to Gov. Austin Blair, Feb. 11, 1861. 2 Z. Chandler, Feb. 11, 1861. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 21 
 
 the United States from the buoy-shed. On the 1st of January, 
 the Governor forbade the removal of vessels belonging to the 
 lighthouse establishment from Charleston, but the Inspector 
 (Commander Hunter) was allowed to leave by land. On the 
 8th, the removal of the light- vessel at Eattlesnake Shoals, off 
 the harbor of Charleston, was reported to the Lighthouse 
 Board, and the board was informed that the three tenders in 
 the harbor of Charleston had been seized by the authorities of 
 South Carolina. 
 
 The information of the removal of buoys and a light-ship at 
 Rattlesnake Shoals, on Morris Island, and at the entrance of 
 Charleston Harbor, was made public, January 20, 1861, by 
 Raphael Semmes, then the Secretary to the U. S. Lighthouse 
 Board. 
 
 The U. S. revenue cutter Wm. Aiken was lying at Charles- 
 ton and was a first-class boat of ninety tons; she was ready 
 for service and was armed with one forty- two- pounder pivot 
 
 fun, and her crew, on a war footing, numbered thirty men. 
 he was seized by the State authorities, and with the steam 
 cutter Gray, purchased by the authorities, were the first ships 
 in the navy of South Carolina. 
 
 Mississippi passed her Ordinance of Secession on January 
 9, 1861, and made provisions for a State army, and appointed 
 Hon. Jefferson Davis her Major General to command her army, 
 and authorized such measures as were practicable to obtain 
 the arms necessary for it. The State had few serviceable 
 weapons, and no establishment for their manufacture or re- 
 pair. Her authorities seized the fort on Ship Island, and 
 the U. S. Hospital on the Mississippi River. 
 
 Florida seceded on January 10, 1861, and on the 12th the 
 navy-yard, Forts Barrancas, McRea, and Marion, and the 
 arsenal at St. Augustine, were seized. It is said that the 
 Chatahoochee arsenal contained 500,000 rounds of musket 
 cartridges, 300,000 rifle cartridges, and 50,000 pounds of gun- 
 powder. The coast survey schooner F. W. Dana was also 
 taken possession of. 
 
 Alabama seceded on January 11, 1861, and took posses- 
 sion of Fort Morgan, containing about 5,000 shot and shell, 
 also Mt. Vernon arsenal, containing 20,000 stand of arms, 1,500 
 barrels of powder (150,000 pounds), some pieces of cannon and 
 a large amount of munitions of war. The revenue cutter 
 Leivis Cass, and the tender Alert, belonging to the lighthouse 
 establishment, were seized at Mobile by order of the command- 
 ing officer of the State troops at Fort Morgan. On the 21st, 
 T, Sanford, Collector of the Customs at Mobile, notified Com- 
 mander Handy that he, " in the name of the sovereign State 
 •of Alabama, takes possession of the several lighthouses within 
 the State, and all appurtenances pertaining to the same. Mr. 
 Sanford had resigned his commission as U. S. Collector on tbe 
 12th of the same month. 
 
33 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 On the 1st of February, Commander Handy transmitted 
 to Washington a copy of a letter addressed to R. T. Chapman, 
 late of the U. S. navy, by T. Sandford, Collector, appointing- 
 him Lighthouse Inspector in place of Commander Handy, to 
 whom the appointment was tendered by the authorities of 
 Alabama, but who refused to accept it. 
 
 Georgia seceded on Jan. 18, 1861, and seized Forts Pulaski 
 and Jackson, and the arsenal at Augusta, containing twa 
 twelve-pounders, two cannons, 33,000 muskets and rifles, and 
 large stores of powder, balls, grape, etc., and U. S. steamer Ida. 
 
 On the 6th of February, the keeper of the St. Simon's light, 
 near Darien, Ga., reported that his light had been obscured by 
 a party of persons claiming authority from the State; but the 
 light was not extinguished. 
 
 On the 8th, Capt. W. H. Whiting, of the United States. 
 Engineers, reported that possession had been taken of his office, 
 furniture, etc., in Savannah, by the authorities of the State. 
 
 Louisiana seceded on Jan. 36, 1861, and seized Forts Jack- 
 son and St. Philip, on the Mississippi, and Fort Pike, on Lake 
 Ponchartrain, and the arsenal at Baton Rouge. The latter 
 contained 50,000 small arms, 4 howitzers, 30 pieces of heavy 
 ordnance, 3 batteries, 300 barrels of powder. At Bellville 
 iron- works the armament of the revenue cutter Lewis Cass 
 was stored, and that was also obtained by the State. 
 
 On Jan. 14, 1861, the United States barracks below New 
 Orleans, which was being used as a hospital, was taken pos- 
 session of by the Louisiana authorities. But this seizure, 
 though, in one sense, of a military character, was rather an 
 embarrassment than an aid to war, since all it contained was 
 316 invalids and convalescent patients. The removal of the 
 sick patients was requested by Capt. C. M. Bradford, which 
 request being reported by Collector F. H. Hatch to Secretary 
 of the Treasury, John A. Dix, the latter telegraphed Jan. 37, 
 1861, to "remonstrate with the Governor against the inhuman- 
 ity of turning the sick out of the hospital," and that telegraph 
 was followed by a letter, which, with many variations on the 
 duty of humanity, protested against the request of Capt. 
 Bradford. All of which was needless, as the Governor had 
 before their receipt ordered the sick to be left unmolested, and 
 Collector Hatch was informed that his protest was unnecessary, 
 as " the authorities would never have exercised the least inhu- 
 manity towards these patients ; for, if the barracks had been 
 required for the use of the troops Louisiana has been compelled 
 to raise for her protection and defence, her charity hospital — 
 justly the glory and pride of her munificence, into whose portals 
 the afflicted of all nations can enter without money and without 
 price — would have amply provided for their wants. In closing- 
 this communication, I am constrained to observe, in reply to 
 the remark in your letter of the 38th, that you 'fear no public 
 property is likely to be respected'; that, in compliance with. 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 33 
 
 the ordinance of the Convention of the people of Louisiana, 
 the State tool?: possession of the public property, in trust, to 
 prevent any abuse of the same by the Federal government, 
 which, it was believed, would pervert that which the Consti- 
 tion intended for defence to the purposes of destruction. This 
 property she will be ready to render a just and true account of 
 at the proper time." 
 
 The Treasurer of the branch mint at New Orleans was 
 ex-officio Assistant Treasurer of the United States. It appears 
 from the report of Secretary of the Treasury, John A. Dix, 
 that, on the 31st January, 1861, there were in the hands of the 
 Treasurer of the branch mint at New Orleans, the following 
 sums : 
 
 As Treasurer of the Mint, $389,267 46 
 
 As Assistant Treasurer to the credit of the Treasurer 
 of the United States, 265,445 14 
 
 As Assistant Treasurer to the credit of disbursing 
 officers, 335,374 80 
 
 Total $880,087 40 
 
 On January 21, 1861, Secretary Dix drew a draft for $.350,000 
 on the Assistant Treasurer at New Orleans in favor of Adams' 
 Express Company, which was not paid on presentation be- 
 cause there were not sufficient funds in hand to pay the draft, 
 and the Assistant Treasurer declined paying any part until 
 he could pay the whole. This reply Mr. Dix regarded as eva- 
 sive and designed to create delay, in order that the action of 
 the Louisiana Convention might prevent the transfer of any 
 part of the propertj'' of the United States beyond the power of 
 the Convention. Whether so intended or not, the delay had 
 that effect, for the State authorities seized the mint and its 
 contents on January 31. 
 
 The Custom House at New Orleans and its contents were 
 seized by the State authorities on the 31st of January, 1861, 
 and Collector Hatch retained the position under the State. 
 Under the revenue system of the United States, goods in bond 
 were permitted to pass the port of entry, and the customs' duty 
 could be paid at the interior Custom House. To continue that 
 system would have deprived Louisiana, then a sovereign State, 
 of her right to collect revenue from imports at her chief port of 
 entry. Hence the collector at New Orleans refused to pass goods 
 in bond, for transportation to port of delivery in States of the 
 United States, without the duty being paid at New Orleans. 
 This would have subjected importers in St. Louis, Louisville, 
 and other river ports to the hardships of paying double duty 
 — first to Louisiana, and second to the United States. This was 
 practically a fatal blow at the free navigation of the Missis- 
 sippi River, as well as a means of supplying revenue to Louisi- 
 ana. Such action on the part of the State rose above its rela- 
 tions to the ports above New Orleans, and took the importance 
 of an international question. The free navigation of the 
 
24 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Mississippi River was recognized as a natural right, and, when 
 Lousiana ratified the Confederate Constitution, that right 
 of free navigation was accorded by Act of Congress, Febru- 
 ary 35, 1861 — which declared and established the free Naviga- 
 tion of the Mississippi River "to the citizens of any State 
 upon its borders, or upon the borders of any of its navigable 
 tributaries, of all ships, boats, or vessels, without any duty 
 or hindrance, except light-money, pilotage, and like charges."' 
 
 The U. S. revenue cutter, which was lying at New Orleans 
 for repairs, was seized by the State authorities. The U. S. 
 revenue cutter Robert McClelland, under command of Capt. 
 J. G. Brushwood of the revenue service, was ordered from the 
 lower Mississippi to New Orleans by Collector Hatch and 
 seized by the State authorities. To prevent that seizure. Secre- 
 tary Dix, on January 19, 1861, ordered W. Hemphill Jones to 
 proceed to New Orleans and take possession of the McClelland. 
 Capt. Brushwood refused to recognize Mr. Jones' authority, 
 which refusal being communicated to Secretary Dix, he ordered, 
 by telegraph, Lieut. Caldwell to arrest Capt. Brushwood, assume 
 command of the cutter, if Brushwood interfered to treat him 
 as a mutineer, and " if any one attempted to haul down the 
 American flag, shoot him on the spot!" This spirited order 
 came too late — the State authorities already had possession of 
 tlae cutter. 
 
 Texas seceded on February 1, 1861, and seized Forts Chad- 
 bourne and Belknap, and General Twiggs surrendered govern- 
 ment stores valued at $1,300,000, consisting of $65,000 in specie, 
 35,000 stand of arms, 36 pieces of mounted artillery, 44 pieces 
 dismounted, with ammunition, horses, wagons, forage, etc., 
 etc. In Galveston Bay, the revenue cutter Dodge was seized, 
 and Fort Brown surrendered. 
 
 Arkansas seceded May 6, and the arsenal at Little Rock, 
 containing 9,000 small arms, 40 cannon, and some ammunition, 
 was taken possession of. 
 
 The following is a list of the seizures of vessels made by 
 the States as they seceded from the Union, and which formed 
 the nucleus of the Confederate States navy : 
 
 Namt of Vesta. Number of Guns. • Styles of Gum. Crew. 
 
 McClellan .... 5 4 side guns and 1 pivot . 35 
 
 Lewis Cass ... 1 68-pounder ... 45 
 
 Aiken 1 43-pound er. ... 45 
 
 Washington ... 1 42-pounder ... 45 
 
 Dodge 1 Pivot — 
 
 And, in addition to the above, the following : 
 
 Ifame. Class. Ouns. How obtained. 
 
 James Gray . Propeller ... 1 Purchased at Charleston. 
 
 Bonita . Brig ... 1 Captured Slaver. 
 
 Ifina . . Steam gunboat . 1 
 
 Everglade . Steamer . . — 
 
 Fulton . . U. S. War Steamer . 3 Seized at Pensacola. 
 
 I Stat, at Large, Prov. Gov't, C. 8. A., pp. 36-38. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 25 
 
 The gun on the James Gray was a forty-two-pounder 
 columbiad, and those on the Fulton thirty-two-pounders. 
 
 recapitulatiok:. 
 
 Vessels 10 
 
 Number of Guns 15 
 
 The weight of metal these fifteen guns carried was com- 
 paratively light, only one being a sixty-eight-pounder, three 
 forty-two-pounders, and the rest of still less calibre. 
 
 The Fulton had been wrecked off Pensacola, and was of 
 very little account, but was repaired and rebuilt by the Con- 
 federate government. ' 
 
 The seceded States met, by delegates, at Montgomery, on 
 the 4th of February, 1861, and adopted the Provisional Constitu- 
 tion of the Confederate States of America. On that day the Con- 
 federacy had neither army or navy, and the States which com- 
 posed it had only such munitions of war as every State in the 
 United States had at all times — namely, their volunteer soldiery 
 — badljT^ armed, poorly drilled, and in very limited numbers. 
 The evidence of preparation nowhere existed, but the peaceful 
 condition of public affairs plainly told that no purpose of disso- 
 lution had been long maintained, but that it was the sudden 
 appearance of a long-dreaded danger that had driven them to 
 the last alternative in a federative union — Secession ; and 
 "that the States expected it to be peaceful, but that Mr. Lincoln 
 and his advisers had outwitted and overreached all the pre- 
 cautions of peace taken at the South, and, by deftly and 
 cunningly drawing the fire of the Charleston batteries, had 
 inaugurated war. The latent spirit of devotion to the Union, 
 which the echoes of the guns at Charleston aroused into such 
 
 1 At the breaking out of the war the United Pittsburgh, Pa., Allegheny . . , .Keceiving-ship at 
 states owned ten navy-yards, viz. ; — Kittery, Baltimore. 
 
 Me.; PortBmouth, N. H.; Charlestown, Mass.; Charlestown, Mass., Inde- 
 Brooklyn, N. Y.; Philadelphia, Pa.; Washing- pendence Pacific receiving- 
 
 ton, D.C.; Norfolk, "Va.: Pensacola, Pla. ; Mare ship. 
 
 Island, Cal.; Sackett's Harbor, N. Y. Boston, Mass., Princeton Philadelphia re- 
 
 The following liat shows the number and rate ceiving-ship. 
 
 of vessels biiilt at each of these yards before Charlestown, Mass., Warren... Panama receiv- 
 1861: ing-ship. 
 
 ^ .^ Charlestown,Mass., Falmouth, Aspinwall receiv- 
 
 ing-ship. 
 By the secession of Virginia and Morida the 
 Federal government lost the Norfolk and Pen- 
 sacola navy-yards ; but. owing to the rigid 
 blockade, they were of little service to the 
 Confederacy. The Norfolk navy-yard was one 
 of the oldest and perhaps the most valuable 
 in the United States. From its stocks were 
 launched two ships-of-the-line, one frigate, 
 four eloopa-of-war, one brig, four screw steam- 
 ers and one side-wheel steamer, besides doing 
 a vast amount of refitting and rebuilding of 
 vessels. The Pensacola yard had only turned 
 out two vessels — the Pensacola, a second-class 
 screw steamer of 2,168 tons. Her hull was 
 built there, but she was completed at the 
 .Washington navy-yard. The other vessel built 
 at Pensacola was the Seminole, a third-class 
 screw steamer of 801 tons. It will thus be seen 
 BUILT AT OTHEB PLACES. tij^t the Northern navy-yards had always buUt 
 
 lErie, Pa., steamer Michigan, then on the Lakes. the largest number of vessels. 
 
 Yard. ^^ 
 
 •? 
 
 i 
 
 $ 
 
 pg 
 
 
 •§ 
 
 § 
 
 b; 
 
 25 
 
 a, 
 
 <g 
 
 i? 
 
 e:; 
 
 Portsmouth . . . . — 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Charlestown... 2 
 
 1 
 
 4 
 
 1 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 12 
 
 Brooklyn .. 1 
 
 1 
 
 4 
 
 1 
 
 i 
 
 I 
 
 12 
 
 Philadelphia... 2 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 
 
 4 
 
 2 
 
 13 
 
 ■Washington.... 1 
 
 3 
 
 2 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 8 
 
 Norfolk 2 
 
 1 
 
 4 
 
 1 
 
 4 
 
 1 
 
 13 
 
 Pensacola — 
 
 
 
 
 2 
 
 
 9. 
 
 Mare Island — 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 Sackett's Har- 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 bor 1 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 Kittery 1 
 
 2 
 
 3 
 
 — 
 
 2 
 
 1 
 
 9 
 
 STOEE-SHIPS, 
 
 REOBrvING-SHIPS, ETC. 
 
 
 Purchased vessels. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 9 
 
26 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 terrible force and proportion, stopped not to consider the trick 
 by which the war had been begun. It only saw. the flag of the 
 Union in the smoke of battle, and, whether right or wrong, 
 rushed to its defence. But neither that expression of loyalty 
 to the Union, nor the extraordinary efforts in its defence, nor 
 the triumphs of its army and navy, will be able to cover up 
 and conceal from the reprehension of history the shameful 
 subterfuge of provisioning Sumter as a start to war; but his- 
 tory will separate the glory of the people's defence from the 
 shame of the politician's trick. 
 
HON. STEPHEN RUSSELL MALLORY. 
 
 SEOKETiBT OF THE NAVY OP THE CONFEDERATE STATES. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 ORGANIZATION OF THE NAVY, 
 
 DELEGATES from the seceded States met at Montgomery, 
 Alabama, in February, 1861, and on March 11th unani- 
 mously adopted the "Constitution for the Provisional 
 Government of the Confederate States of America." 
 This Constitution, and the one afterwards adopted as the per- 
 manent Constitution of the Confederate States, empowered 
 Congress "to provide and maintain a navy," and made the 
 President the Commander-in-Chief of the Army and Navy. 
 
 The first statute enacted by the Confederate Congress 
 continued in force all the laws of the United States not incon- 
 sistent with the Constitution of the Confederate States, until 
 altered or repealed by Congress. Ey that legislation, law and 
 order were maintained in the midst of a total change of for- 
 eign and domestic relations, the public business continued 
 without interruption, and private intercourse experienced no 
 shock. All officers connected with the customs revenue were 
 continued in office, and the existing postal arrangements 
 were left undisturbed. Thus the people in the Confederate 
 States passed into their new relations without the least inter- 
 ruption of their business affairs. 
 
 Before either of the Cabinet departments were constituted 
 hj law, Congress, on February 1-lth, passed a resolution author- 
 izing "the Committee on Naval Affairs to procure the attend- 
 ance at Montgomery of all such persons versed in naval 
 affairs as they may deem advisable to consult with." C. M. 
 Conrad, the Chairman of the Committee, immediately upon 
 the passage of the resolution, addressed telegrams to a num- 
 ber of United States navy officers whose sympathies were with 
 the South, requesting them to repair to "Montgomery at their 
 earliest convenience. Among those who received a telegram 
 from the chairman of the committee was Commander 
 Eaphael Semmes, who was still at his post, in Washington, 
 performing his duties at the Lighthouse Board. Commander 
 Semmes immediately tendered his resignation, which was 
 
 (27) 
 
28 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 accepted on the 16th, and on the 18th he arrived at Mont- 
 gomery, where a number of navy officers had preceded him. 
 On the following day he attended a joint session of the mili- 
 tary and naval committees, which discussed the military and 
 naval resources of the country, and devised such means of 
 defence as was within their reach to enable the Confederacy 
 to meet the most pressing exigencies of the situation. But 
 few naval officers of any rank had as yet withdrawn from 
 the old service: Rousseau, Tatnall, HoUins, Ingraham and 
 Randolph were all the captains, and Farrand, Brent, Semmes 
 and Hartstene were all the commanders. Of those who were 
 present before the committees, besides Semmes, was Rousseau, 
 Ingraham, and Randolph, of the old navy. As the result of 
 the deliberations of the committee. Congress, on the 30th, 
 passed an act to "provide munitions of war," by purchase 
 and manufacture. Jefferson Davis having been inaugurated 
 President on the 18th of February, on the 31st dispatched 
 Commander Semmes to the United States, and at the same 
 time sent Caleb Huse to Europe to purchase arms and mu- 
 nitions of war. ' 
 
 On the same day, "the act to establish the Navy Depart- 
 ment " was passed, providing for a Secretary of the Navy, a 
 chief clerk, and such other clerks as may be authorized by 
 law.'' 
 
 The Secretary of the Navy, under the President, was to 
 have charge of all matters and things connected with the 
 navy. Bureaus of ordnance and hydrography, of orders and 
 details, of medicine and surgery, of provisions and clothing, 
 were also provided; and the Secretary of the Navy was required 
 to prepare and publish regulations for the general government 
 of the navy, and all laws of the United States relating to the 
 navy and its officers, and not inconsistent with this act, were 
 enacted as laws for the government of the Confederate navy. 
 
 1 The letter of instruction to Com. Semmes social intercourse, at their private residences, 
 
 ■was written by Mr. Davis, who then was with- Com. Semmes found them ready to help on the 
 
 •out Cabinet oflacers or even a private secretary, cause of the Confederate States with their " aid 
 
 and is full, precise, and much in detail, exhibi^ and comfort,*' and in a much more elficient 
 
 ing a minute acquaintance with bureau duties, manner than was charged against Secretary of 
 
 with the resources of the North, and with the War, Floyd, who merely sent to the Southern 
 
 men there who would furnish the supplies States the proper quota of their arms, 
 
 needed. Com. Semmes found "thepeople every- While in New York, on that mission. Com. 
 
 where not only willing but anxious to contract " Semmes received from Secretary Mallory, who 
 
 with him, and he purchased large quantities of had been appointed to the Navy Department, a 
 
 percussion-caps in the city of New York, and letter of date March 13th, directing him to select 
 
 sent them by express without any disguise to and purchase two steamers of strength and light 
 
 Montgomery. He made contracts for batteries draft. But Com. Semmes could find none. The 
 
 of light artillery, powder and other munitions, month of March was closing, and as the new 
 
 and succeeded in getting large quantities of the Federal Administration became fixed in their 
 
 powder shipped, and it was agreed between positions the hopes of peace departed and the 
 
 the contractors and Com. Semmes that when clouds of war began to thicken; yet, curiously 
 
 tUe telegraph was used certain sign or agreed enough, the New York and Savannah steamers 
 
 words should be substituted for those of military continued to run, " carrying the Federal flag at 
 
 import— to avoid suspicion. He made a con- the peak and the Confederate flag at the fore "' 
 
 tract tor the removal to the South of a complete in one of which steamers, on the last day of 
 
 set of machinery for rifling cannon, and with March, Com. Semmes embarked, and arrived in 
 
 the requisite workmen to put it in operation. Montgomery on the 4th of April, 1861. 
 
 "Some of these men," says Com. Semmes, a The act of March 8th established the clerical 
 
 " who would thus have sold body and soul to force of the Navy Department to consist of a 
 
 me for a sufficient consideration, occupied high chief clerk, a corresponding clerk, .and three 
 
 social position and were men of wealth." In other clerks, and a messenger. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 
 
 29 
 
 The act of March 16th authorized the President to appoii:it four 
 captains, four commanders, thirty lieutenants, five surgeons, 
 five assistant surgeons, six paymasters, and two chief engi- 
 neers, and to employ as many masters, midshipmen, engineers^ 
 naval constructors, boatswains, gunners, carpenters, sailmak- 
 ers, and other warrant and petty officers and seamen, as he 
 may deem necessary, not to exceed in the aggregate three 
 thousand. The act also made provision for a marine corps, to 
 consist of one major, one quartermaster, one paymaster, one 
 adjutant, one sergeant-major, one quartermaster-sergeant, 
 and six companies, each company to consist of one captain, 
 one first and one second lieutenant, four sergeants, four cor- 
 porals, one hundred men and ten musicians, with pay and 
 allowance the same as in the infantry. 
 
 Under the law passed February 21st,the President immedi- 
 ately called to the Navy Department, as Secretary of the Navy,. 
 Hon. Stephen Russell Mallory, of Florida. ^ 
 
 Secretary Mallory immediately organized his department 
 by assigning Capt. Franklin Buchanan to the Bureau of 
 Orders and Detail ; Commander George Minor to that of 
 
 1^ Mr. Mallory was bom in the Island of Trini- 
 dad, near the coast of Venezuela, in the year 1813. 
 He was the second son of Charles Mallory, and 
 Ellen his wife, who at the time of his birth were 
 living in or near the town of Port of Spain, in 
 Trinidad. Charles Mallory, his father, was from 
 the town of Reading, Conn., a civil engineer by 
 profession, and for some years before the birth 
 of Stephen had been engaged as a civil engineer 
 on some public work at Port of Spain. 
 
 Ellen Russejl, the mother of Stephen Russell 
 MaUory, was born at Carrick-on-Suir, County 
 "Waterf ord, Ireland. When about thirteen years 
 of age she was adopted by two bachelor uncles, 
 her mother's brothers, who were planters in 
 Trinidad, and taken by them to their home in 
 that island, where she met Charles Mallory, and 
 was married to him when she was not more 
 than sixteen years of age. Charles and Ellen 
 Mallory had but two children— John, who was 
 bom about 1811, and Stephen. John died when 
 he was about fourteen years old, at Key West. 
 
 When Stephen was about a year old his parents 
 left Trinidad and came to the United States. 
 Charles Mallory's health was feeble, and after 
 trying the climate of Havana for a short time, 
 he removed to Key West about 1820, when the 
 island was inhabited by only a few fishermen. 
 He died of consumption at Key West about two 
 years afterwards, leaving hie widow and the two 
 boys. Before settling at Key West, or going to 
 Havana, Mr. and Mrs. Mallory visited Mobile, 
 Ala., and while there concluded to place the 
 youngest boy, Stephen, at a school on the east- 
 ern shore of Mobile Bay, at a place that was 
 known as " the village." Stephen, who could 
 not have been more than six or seven years old, 
 remained there for six months or a year, and 
 then went over to Key West, where his parents 
 were then living. He remained at Key West 
 until he was about fourteen years of age, when 
 his mother, who was then a widow and had lost 
 the oldest boy John, sent him to the Moravian 
 School for boys at Nazareth, Pa. He was at that 
 school about three years, and returned to Key 
 West when about sixteen or seventeen. This was 
 all the schooling he ever had. 
 
 When about nineteen years of age he received 
 the appointment of Inspector of Customs at Key 
 West, which he held for several years, and was 
 subsequently appointed Collector of Customs at 
 Key West. While Inspector of Customs he stud- 
 ied law with Judge William Marvin, at that time 
 Judge of the United States District Court at Key 
 West, and was admitted to the Bar about 1839. 
 During the Indian war in Florida he volunteered, 
 and served for those years in active operations- 
 against the Seminoles. 
 
 In 1838 he married Angela Moreno, daughter- 
 of Francisco Moreno of Pensacola, Fla.; she i& 
 still (1886) alive. After leaving the office of Col- 
 lector of Customs at Key West, and having at- 
 tained a high reputation as a skillful practitioner 
 of the law, and enjoying a large and lucrative 
 practice, in 1860 he was selected as a delegate to 
 the great commercial convention which met at 
 Nashville; but, though heartily favoring its pur- 
 pose, was compelled by other engagements tO' 
 decline the honor. In 1851 he was elected by 
 the Florida Legislature to the United Statea 
 Senate for six years, his opponent being Hon. 
 David L. Yulee. Mr. Mallory was at Key West 
 at the time, and did not even know that he was a. 
 candidate for the office. Mr. Yulee contested hi& 
 election before the United States Senate, having 
 as his attorney the late Edwin M. Stanton, after- 
 wards the Federal Secretary of War; but failed, 
 to make good his contest. The Senate unani- 
 mously awarded the position to Mr. Mallory, and. 
 he took his seat in December following. At the 
 expiration of his term as Senator, Mr. Mallory 
 was again elected by the Florida Legislature to- 
 succeed himself in 1857. and continued to rep- 
 resent Florida in the Senate until the secession 
 of his State in 1861, when be resigned his seat 
 and at once took an open and active part with the 
 States of the South. He returned to his home at 
 Pensacola, to which place he had removed from 
 Key West in 1858. During most of his service in 
 the Senate he was Chairman of the Committee 
 on Naval Affairs, a position his familiarity with 
 marine matters qualified him to fill. He wa& 
 also a member of the Committee on Claims. As. 
 a speaker he never gained a high reputation in 
 
30 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Ordnance and Hydrography; James A. Semple, paymaster, 
 to that of Provisions and Clothing, and W. A. W. Spotswood, 
 fiurgeon, to that of Medicine and Surgery. Capt. Raphael 
 Semmes was, upon his return to Montgomery, appointed to 
 the Lighthouse Board, which had been made a bureau of the 
 Treasurv Department. Edward M. Tidball was appointed 
 Chief Clerk of the Navy Department, March 13, 1861. 
 
 The appointment of Mr. Mallory has been criticised with 
 great severity, but no single good reason has been shown as 
 to his incompetency or unfitness; his loyalty to the Confeder- 
 acy was by innuendo impeached, but the malice which invented 
 the aspersion was too apparent to give it probability. He 
 could not command success, but he deserved it by faithful and 
 diligent labor, and by intelligent and discreet effort. 
 
 When a Senator of the United States, he had been Chairman 
 of the Naval Committee, where the information derived from 
 his previous employment at Key West soon enabled him to 
 obtain a thorough knowledge of the organization, equipment 
 and general disciplinary rules of the U. S. navy. He found 
 himself at the head of a naval department on the eve of a great 
 war, without a ship or any of the essentials of a navy; he 
 had not only to organize and administer, but to build the 
 
 the Senate, He was not a showy orator, but 
 occasionally delivered speeches showing careful 
 preparation and a clear knowledge of the sub- 
 ject treated. His vote was always for the South 
 on every question, and be could be counted upon 
 to support any measure his more able leaders 
 pi'opoaed. In 1858 Mr. Buchanan tendered him 
 the appointment of Minister to Spain, which he 
 declined. On the secession of Florida he was 
 appointed Chief Justice of the Admiralty Court 
 of the State, but declined the high honor. 
 
 During the time he was at his home he took an 
 .actire part in all matters relating to the defence 
 of his State, and on January 28, 1861, sent the 
 following warning letter to the United States 
 Authorities through the "Hon. John Slidell, or 
 Hon. R. M. T. Hunter, or Governor Bigler": 
 ^' We hear the Brooklyn is coming with reinforce- 
 ments for Fort Pickens. No attack on its gar- 
 rison is contemplated, but, on the contrary, we 
 desire te keep the peace, and if the present status 
 be preserved we will guarantee that no attack 
 will be made upon it; but if reinforcements be 
 attempted, resistance and a bloody conflict seem 
 inevitable. Should the Govei-ment thus attempt 
 to augment its force — when no possible call for 
 it exists, when we are preserving a peaceful 
 policy — an assault may be made on the fort at a 
 moment's warning. All preparation are made. 
 Our whole force — 1,700 strong — will regard it as 
 a hostile act. Impress this upon the President, 
 and urge that the inevitable consequence of re- 
 inforcements under present circumstances is 
 instant war, as peace will be preserved if no re- 
 inforcements be attempted. If the President 
 wants an assurance of all I say from Colonel 
 •Chase, commanding the forces, I will transmit 
 it at once. / am determined to stave off war if ■pos- 
 sible." — Official Records, Senes 1, Vot. 11., p. 354. 
 But that not being possible, he accepted the port- 
 folio of Secretary of the Confedex'ate Navy of 
 President Davis and held it continuously through 
 the war. Ho was a gentleman of excellent sense, 
 xmpretending manners, and probably conducted 
 
 his department as successfully as was possible 
 with the limited naval resources of the South. 
 
 Mr. Mallory left Bichmond in company with 
 Mr. Davis on the abandonment of that city by 
 the Confederate Government, and accompanied 
 the President to Washington, Ga., where they 
 separated, Mr. Mallory going to La Grange, Ga., 
 where his family was then living. He was in 
 La Grange about a week, when he and Hon. 
 Benjamin Hill, who was also there, were arrested, 
 taken to Atlanta, and thence carried to Fort 
 Lafayette in New York Harbor. He was arrested 
 on May 20. 186C, and bis devoted wife in a letter 
 written at the time thus describes the event : 
 
 " Night before last, at half- past twelve o'clock, 
 we were aroused from sleep by a heavy knock at 
 the door, and a threat of breaking it open fol- 
 lowed before any one had time to answer. When 
 a light was procured the servant opened the 
 door, and some twenty armed men entered to 
 arrest my husband; at the same time another 
 party went to Senator Hill's house, at which Mr. 
 Mallory was staying, and there arrested him. 
 Mr. Mallory was hurried off like a malefactor, 
 without being given even enough time to put on 
 proper clothing. They would not listen to the 
 tears and entreaties of his wife and children to 
 let him remain with them only until daylight. 
 I sent Buddie to Atlanta as soon as it was day- 
 light with clothing and money." 
 
 Mr Mallory was confined in Fort Lafayette ten 
 months, being released on parole in March, 1866. 
 
 He returned to Pensacola in July, 3866, still 
 under parole, and resumed the practice of law, 
 and successfully continued it until his death, 
 November 9, 1873. 
 
 Mr. Mallory was a hard student all his life, 
 and though his three years at Nazareth were 
 about all the real schooling he ever had, he, 
 nevertheless, at the age of thirty-five, was able to 
 speak French and Spanish correctly and fluently. 
 His mother lived to see him in the United States 
 Senate, she dying at Key West about the year 
 1855. 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 31 
 
 ships and boats, provide as best he could their ordnance, and 
 create a naval force in a country which in a few days was 
 shut out from the world by an almost impenetrable blockade, 
 and which possessed within its limits resources only in the 
 rude, crude and unmanufactured state. The timber for his 
 ships stood in the forest, and when cut and laid was green and 
 soft ; the iron required was in the mines, and there were 
 iieither furnaces nor workshops; the hemp required for the 
 ropes had to be sown, grown, reaped, and then there were no 
 rope-walks. The Southern States had never produced a suffi- 
 ciency of iron for the use of their people in time of peace, and 
 now that war was greatly to multiply the uses of that in- 
 dispensable metal, the price rose from $25 to $1,300 per ton; 
 and yet neither money nor industry could supply the demand 
 which the navy, the army, the fast- wearing rails and engine^ 
 of the railroads, and all the other necessities a great war re- 
 quired. 
 
 With not a rolling-mill capable of turning out a 2|-inch 
 iron plate, nor a workshop able to complete a marine engine, 
 and with a pressing need to build, equip and maintain ships- 
 of-war, the embarrassments and difficulties which Mr. Mallory 
 encountered may be estimated. When the Confederate gov- 
 ernment Was formed in February, 1861, Virginia had not se- 
 ceded, and the Tredegar Iron Works and Belona Foundry, at 
 Richmond, were not accessible to the use of the Confederate 
 States navy, and the Pensacola navy -yard with its dock-yard 
 was not a yard of construction, but merely for shelter and 
 repair. 
 
 From the 21st of February to the 15th of April there was not 
 time enough, with all the appliances of a first-class manufac- 
 turing people, to organize a navy and build and equip its ships; 
 and yet that was what the Confederate Navy Department had 
 before it. When the navy -yard at Norfolk fell into the hands 
 of Virginia, it was burnt and damaged, yet was of inestimable 
 service to the Confederate navy, after being transferred to the 
 Confederate States. The administration of Mr. Mallory is not 
 to be judged and condemned by its failure, but it will excite sur- 
 prise and win admiration for what was accomplished with the 
 means and resources at his command. The efforts made and 
 the results accomplished will be best understood and appreci- 
 ated in connection with the operations of attack and defence; 
 but we shall, for the benefit of a clearer understanding of the 
 merits and demerits of the Navy Department, briefly review 
 the administrative acts in connection with the organization 
 otpersonnel and material in advance of those movements of 
 offensive and defensive action. 
 
 At the time of the organization of the Confederate gov- 
 ernment, its treasury was not only absolutely empty, but the 
 legislation and agency for collecting the necessary means of 
 support had to be adopted and applied. Under even the most 
 
32 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 favorable circumstances, time and experience would be neces- 
 sary before the supplyof money could be collected and on hand 
 to meet expenses which had already begun. But this difficulty 
 was aggravated and increased beyond calculation in the face 
 of an impending conflict with the United States. In this- 
 emergency, early in March, 1861, the Convention of the State 
 of Louisiana, by ordinance, transferred to the Confederate 
 States the "Bullion Fund," then in the hands of A. J. Guirot, 
 State Depositary, and which was seized in the U. S. Mint, 
 amounting to $389,367.46, and the further sum of $147,519.66, 
 the amount collected from customs between the 31st January 
 and March 1, 1861. 
 
 The total expenditures of the Confederate government from 
 February, 1861 to August, 1862, a period of eighteen months, 
 were $347,372,958.58; the receipts were $303,482,096.60. Of the 
 expenditures the navy used $14,605,777.86.' 
 
 The resignations of naval officers from the U. S. navy fol- 
 lowed the secession of the State of which they were citizens. 
 South Carolina being the first State that severed her connec- 
 tion with the United States, the first resignation came from her 
 officers, and as each of the other States withdrew from the 
 Union, their officers, following the sense of duty of their alle- 
 giance, resigned their commissions, until by June 3, 1861, 
 about one-fifth of the officers of the United States navy had 
 resigned. A publication of that date gave a list of all the resig- 
 nations, with the entire number of officers in the service, as- 
 follows: 
 
 
 Whole 
 
 Southerners 
 
 Southerners 
 
 
 Number, 
 
 Jiesigned. 
 
 Remaining. 
 
 Captains .... 
 
 93 
 
 16 
 
 22 
 
 Commanders 
 
 137 
 
 34 
 
 30 
 
 Lieutenants . 
 
 351 
 
 76 
 
 75 
 
 Surgeons .... 
 
 69 
 
 11 
 
 30 
 
 Passed Assistant Surgeons 
 
 43 
 
 10 
 
 11 
 
 Assistant Surgeons . 
 
 36 
 
 7 
 
 11 
 
 Paymasters . 
 
 64 
 
 10 
 
 17 
 
 Chaplains . 
 
 24 
 
 1 
 
 5 
 
 Profs. Mathematics 
 
 12 
 
 1 
 
 6 
 
 Masters .... 
 
 45 
 
 6 
 
 10 
 
 1 The aggregate appropriation b fnr each depart- 
 ment of the Confederate government early in 
 March, 1861, was : 
 
 Legislative $55,7i0 
 
 Executive 83,060 
 
 Department of State 44,200 
 
 Treasury Department 70,800 
 
 War Department 69,000 
 
 Navy Department 17,300 
 
 Post Oifice Department 44,900 
 
 Judiciary 63,200 
 
 Mint and independent treasury 80,000 
 
 Foreign intercourse 100,000 
 
 Lighthouses 160,000 
 
 Expenses of collecting revenue 546,000 
 
 Executive mansion 5,000 
 
 Miscellaneous 200,000 
 
 Total $1,468,190 
 
 The Act of March 15 appropriated 
 
 1. Forpay of officers of the navy $131,76C> 
 
 2. For pay of marine corps 175,612 
 
 3. For provisions and clothing 133,86(>- 
 
 4. For pay of warrant and petty 
 
 ofl&cers, etc 168,000 
 
 6. For expenditure for coal 235,000 
 
 6. Probable cost of 10 gunboats 1,100,000 
 
 7. For completing and equipping 
 
 steamer Fulton, at Pensacola. . . 26,000- 
 
 8. For pay of officers, etc , at Pensa- 
 
 cola navy -yard 54,363 
 
 0. For compensation of ex-clerk in 
 
 Navy Department 6,000- 
 
 Total $2,028,686! 
 
Whole 
 
 Southerners 
 
 Southerners 
 
 Number. 
 
 Hesiffned. 
 
 Remaining. 
 
 55 
 
 5 
 
 15 
 
 367 
 
 106 
 
 33 
 
 47 
 
 2 
 
 9 
 
 45 
 
 1 
 
 19 
 
 40 
 
 3 
 
 11 
 
 13 
 
 3 
 
 3 
 
 20 
 
 6 
 
 4 
 
 30 
 
 5 
 
 7 
 
 38 
 
 4 
 
 4 
 
 43 
 
 6 
 
 17 
 
 29 
 
 1 
 
 9 
 
 93 
 
 7 
 
 33 
 
 THE CONFBDEKATE STATES NAVY. 33 
 
 Midshipmen . 
 Acting Midshipmen . 
 Gunners .... 
 Carpenters . 
 Sailmakers 
 
 Marine Corps. 
 Captains .... 
 First Lieutenants . 
 Second Lieutenants . 
 Chief Engineers 
 First Assistants . 
 Second Assistants . 
 Third Assistants 
 
 1,563 321 350 
 
 Commander Henry J. Hartstene, in command of the gun- 
 boat Pawnee, apprehending that he might be ordered to Charles- 
 ton, asked to be relieved, and then resigned. Lieut. Thomas 
 P. Pelot and Lieut. J. R. Hamilton resigned immediately after 
 ascertaining that South Carolina had seceded. Lieut. Haral- 
 ton addressed the "Southern officers of the U. S. navy" a 
 warm appeal, under date of Jan. 14, 1861, to resign and ac- 
 cept commissions from their States. His earnest appeal to 
 the officers, "to bring with you every ship and man you 
 can, that we may use them against the oppressors of our 
 liberties," received no response, and not a United States vessel 
 was delivered up by a Southern officer. 
 
 After the secession of the States those officers were scat- 
 tered throughout the States, some in shore batteries, others de- 
 vising means of defence, procuring ordnance supplies, and in 
 one way and another doing all in their power to aid in the 
 defence of their States. These officers were transferred 
 by their States to the Confederate States for appointment in 
 the navy, and to the same rank they held in the navy of the 
 United States. Thus, at its very beginning, the new government 
 found itself embarrassed with a wealth of officers, while it was 
 poor beyond description in every other essential of a navy. 
 
 To provide for the officers who had resigned from the 
 U. S. navy, the Confederate navy, as provided for by the act of 
 February 31, 1861, was increased by the Amendatory Act of 
 April 31, 1862, and made to consist of 
 
 " Four admirals, 10 captains, 31 commanders, 100 first lieutenants, 25 
 second lieutenants, 30 masters, in line of promotion; 13 paymasters, 40 
 ■assistant paymasters, 23 surgeons, 15 past assistant surgeons, 30 assistant 
 surgeons, 1 engineer-in-chief, and 13 engineers. 
 
 " That all the admirals, 4 of the captains, 5 of the commanders, 23 of 
 the first lieutenants and 5 of the second lieutenants shall be appointed 
 solely for gallant or meritorious conduct during the war. The appoint- 
 ments shall be made from the grade immediately below the one to be filled 
 and without reference to the rank of the oflEicer in such grade, and the 
 service for which the appointment shall be conferred shall be specified in 
 the commission: Provided, that all officers below the grade of second- 
 lieutenant may be promoted more than one grade for the same service. 
 
34 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " That the warrant officers shall be as follows : 30 passed midshipmen, 
 106 acting midshipmen, 50 first assistant engineers, 150 second assistant, 
 engineers, 150 third assistant engineers, 10 boatswains, 20 gunners, 6 sail- 
 makers, and 20 carpenters. 
 
 "That the annual pay of the additional grades created by this act 
 shall be as follows :— Admiral, $6,000; second lieutenant, for service afloat, 
 $1,300; when on leave or other duty, $1,000; master in the line of promo- 
 tion, $1,000 for service afloat; when on leave or other duty, $900; past mid- 
 shipman, $900 for service afloat; when on leave or other duty, $800. 
 
 "That the annual pay of assistant paymasters shall hereafter be, 
 when on service afloat, $1,200; on other duty, $1,100." 
 
 By the latter act the following was established as the pay 
 table of the ofl&cers of the navy : 
 
 Grades. 
 
 Pay 
 per annum. 
 
 Admiral $6,000 
 
 Captains — 
 
 When commanding squadrons 5,000 
 
 All others at duty on sea 4,300 
 
 On other duty 3,600 
 
 On leave or waiting orders 3,000 
 
 Commanders — 
 On duty at sea first five years after date of commission . 2,825 
 On duty at sea second five years after date of commission . 3,150 
 On other duty first flve years after date of commission . 2,663 
 On other duty second flve years after date of commission . 3,825 
 All other commanders .... . . 3,350 
 
 Lieutenants Commanding — at sea ... . 3,550 
 
 First Lieutenants — 
 
 On duty at sea 1,500 
 
 After seven years' sea service in the navy .... 1,700 
 
 After nine years' sea service in the navy .... 1,900 
 
 After eleven years' sea service in the navy .... 3,100 
 
 After thirteen years' sea service in the navy . . . 3,350 
 On other duty ....... . . 1,500 
 
 After seven years' sea service in the navy .... 1,600 
 
 After nine years' sea service in the navy . . . 1,700 
 
 After eleven years' sea service in the navy . . . . 1,800 
 
 After thirteen years' sea service in the navy . . . 1,875 
 
 On leave or waiting orders 1,200 
 
 After seven years' sea service in the navy . . . 1 366 
 
 After nine years' service in the navy . ... 1,333 
 
 After eleven years' sea service in the navy .... 1,400 
 After thirteen years' sea service in the navy . 1,450 
 
 Second Lieutenants — 
 Duty afloat .... .... 1,200 
 
 When on leave or other duty . . . . 1,000 
 
 Fleet Surgeons . . 3,300 
 
 Surgeons — on duty at sea — 
 Eor first five years after date of commission as surgeon . 8,300 
 For second five years after date of commission as surgeon . 3,400 
 For third five years after date of commission as surgeon . 3,600 
 For fourth flve years after date of commission as surgeon . 3,800 
 For twenty years and upwards after date of commission . 3,000 
 
 On other duty — 
 For first flve years after date of commission as surgeon . 3,000 
 For second flve years after date of commission as surgeon . 3,200 
 For third flve years after date of commission as surgeon . 3,400 
 For fourth five years after date of commission as surgeon . 2,600 
 For twenty years and upwards after date of commission . 2,800 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 35 
 
 The loss and destruction of naval records render it impos- 
 sible to follow the changes and details that took place in the 
 Confederate Navy Department. In the earlier days of the war 
 many assignments were made hurriedly and for immediate 
 necessity which the imperfect records do not explain or con- 
 secutively follow, and officers are found discharging duties 
 at stations for which no orders are now obtainable. 
 
 The difficulty is further increased by the simultaneousness 
 of the preparations for war in every part of the country, and 
 at every port, in every river, and along the whole coast. 
 The States, after secession, ordered the officers who resigned 
 from the U. S. navy to different places within their limits, 
 and they remained at those posts after the formation of the 
 Confederate government until ordered elsewhere. Thus, 
 South Carolina, before the formation of the Confederate gov- 
 ernment, preparing for the capture of Fort Sumter, had as- 
 signed Capt. Hartstene to the command of her naval forces 
 in Charleston harbor, where, on the 8th of January, the first 
 gun in the war was fired at the Star of the West on her ill-ad- 
 vised attempt to reinforce Sumter. 
 
 General Beauregard, after the formation of the Confederate 
 government, assumed command of the Confederate forces be- 
 leaguering Fort Sumter, and in erecting the batteries which 
 surrounded the fort was aided by Confederate naval officers. 
 In his report of April "Zl, 1861, he mentions " the naval de- 
 partment, especially Capt. Hartstene, as perfectly indefati- 
 gable in guarding the entrance into the harbor "; and the same 
 officer as having had charge of the arrangements with the 
 United States fleet off the harbor for the transportation of 
 Major Anderson's command to some port of the United 
 States; Captains Hamilton, Hallonquist, and Lieut. Valentine 
 for the rapidity and accuracy of their mortar practice; and 
 Surgeon A. M. Lynah, C. S. navy, for intelligent professional 
 arrangements in anticipation of the casualties of battle. 
 
 Hon. G. V. Fox, afterwards Assistant Secretary of the 
 U. S. Kavy Department, while in New York arranging for 
 the expedition, which, under his direction, was designed to 
 relieve Sumter, encountered the agents of the State of South 
 Carolina negotiating to purchase two tugs; and writing to 
 Mr. Blair, under date of March 1, 1861, Mr. Fox mentions 
 "Hartstene, now a captain in the Confederate States navy, 
 who thinks he has prevented an attack upon Sumter so far, 
 but says it will soon be done and will be a very sanguinary 
 affair. Paul Hamilton commands the floating battery now 
 launched. They have four tugs, which do not amount to 
 much compared to one of these powerful New York ones." 
 When Mr. Fox visited Charleston, March 21, he was carried 
 down to Fort Sumter under the escort of Capt. Hartstene, who 
 commanded the little fleet of three steamboats which kept 
 watch and ward over the outer harbor of Charleston, lighting 
 
36 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the entrance with floating lightwood fires, and directing the 
 motion of the Drummond lights whenever the alarm of " the 
 boats are coming " might be signalled. 
 
 The States which provided the personnel of the navy, also, 
 under the resolution of the Confederate Congress of March 
 15, 1801, in reference to property captured from the United 
 States, turned over the ships seized by them, at the time of 
 their secession. This bare nucleus of a navy, Congress, on 
 March 15, 1861, authorized the President to increase by con- 
 struction or purchase of ten steam gunboats for coast de- 
 fences, whereof five were to be of a tonnage not exceeding 
 seven hundred and fifty tons, and five of one thousand tons. 
 In consequence of the resolution of the same date, the States 
 turned over to the Confederate government the forts, arsenals, 
 navy-yards, dock-yards and other property formerly belong- 
 ing to the United States. This transfer placed at the disposal 
 of the Navy Department the navy - yard at Pensacola, 
 Florida, which having been a yard mainly for shelter and re- 
 pairs, was but indifferently adapted to building purposes, and, 
 lying in an exposed position, was of no immediate aid to the 
 Navy Department. 
 
 The efforts of the Confederate Navy Department in organiz- 
 ing the naval stations were directed in March, 1861, to New 
 Orleans, whither a commission, composed of Commander L. 
 Eousseau, Commander E. Farrand and Lieut. Robert T. Chap- 
 man, was sent on the 17th of that month to purchase or con- 
 tract for constructing the new gunboats authorized by 
 Congress. Under their administration at New Orleans, the 
 Sumter, the first Confederate cruiser, was dispatched to sea 
 from that city on April 18, 1861. 
 
 Commander L. Rousseau, thus appointed, to the command of 
 the New Orleans naval station, was chiefly engaged in the ex- 
 amination of river craft for conversion into gunboats, and col- 
 lecting such material as the city and adjacent country afforded 
 suitable to naval purposes. He continued in command until 
 July 31st, when he was relieved by Capt. George N. HoUins. 
 
 Capt. Duncan N. Ingraham, C. S. navy, in charge of naval 
 affairs in the waters of Alabama, was ordered, May 20, 1861, 
 to ascertain the practicability of obtaining wrought-iron plates 
 of from two to three inches in thickness; and whether, if such 
 plates could be furnished according to a given form, dimen- 
 sion and weight, what would be the price per pound, together 
 with the best means of forwarding them to New Orleans.- 
 Capt. Ingraham reported that neither the Tennessee Iron 
 Works nor the Messrs. Hillman & Co., on the Cumberland 
 River, in Kentucky, would undertake work for the Confeder- 
 ate States in the then condition of the country in which their 
 works were located, and that Messrs. Wood & Co. were not 
 prepared to roll heavy work under any circumstances. He 
 also ascertained that the mills at Atlanta, Georgia, could not 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 37 
 
 roll such iron as was needed, as it would involve an entire 
 change in their mill, which they declined to make at that time; 
 but afterwards, in November, 1861, the Atlanta mills were 
 changed and became a mill for rolling iron plates for vessels- 
 of-war. 
 
 On November 16, 1861, Capt. Ingraham was assigned to 
 duty in Charleston harbor, and ordered to superintend the 
 preparation and armament of the batteries for its defence, as- 
 sign to duty the naval officers at his disposal as ordnance offi- 
 cers at the batteries, and to execute all orders relating to the 
 naval operations in the harbor which he might receive from 
 Flag-officer Tatnall. 
 
 Capt. Victor M. Randolph, late of the United States navy, 
 was appointed by the State of Florida to the command of 
 the navy-yard at Pensacola, and assisted Colonel Wm. H. 
 Chase, then in command of the State forces around Pensacola, 
 in the reduction of that navy-yard; Commander Ebenezer Far- 
 rand and Lieut. Francis B. Eenshaw were also officei-s of the 
 United States navy, and on duty at the Pensacola navy-yard. 
 Capt. Farrand continued to command the navy-yard until its 
 evacuation and destruction by order of Gen. Braxton Bragg, 
 March 11_, 1863. The Navy Department entered into contracts 
 with OUiriger & Bruce, November 4, 1861, and with F. G. 
 Howard, October 39, 1861, for the construction of two gun- 
 boats at the head of Pensacola Bay, thirty-five miles from Fort 
 Pickens; which, under the supervision of Commander Far- 
 rand, were well and strongly built, and their destruction was 
 condemned by Commander Farrand as unnecessary. He con- 
 sidered that they could have been removed up Escambia River, 
 out of reach of the enemy's gunboats, and there completed, 
 where they would have rendered important service in any at- 
 tack by the enemy on Pensacola. It was the action of the 
 commander. General Samuel Jones, under positive orders of 
 General Bragg, and not the Navy Department,or its executive 
 officer. Commander Farrand, that thus destroyed two valuable 
 gunboats. It is not true, as Admiral Porter says, that " Pen- 
 sacola was evacuated by the Confederates ... on a scare, 
 they thinking that Farragut's fleet was on its way to take it " 
 — but the evacuation was rendered necessary, in General 
 Bragg's opinion, because " our fate may depend on two weeks 
 in the valley of the Mississippi." The letter from which we 
 extract that remark was written March 1, 1863, and ordered 
 the troops from Pensacola to the valley of the Mississippi after 
 all the guns and other military and naval stores had been re- 
 moved. Among the troops defending Pensacola was Capt. 
 Thom's company of marines, which were transferred to Vir- 
 ginia November 39th, at which date General Bragg renewed a 
 request made " as early as last spring, and frequently since, for 
 some young naval officers, but without success," notwithstand- 
 ing he had "two steam gunboats commanded by landsmen." 
 
38 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Commander Tatnall resigned his commission in the United 
 States navy on February 31, 1861, and was appointed senior 
 flag-officer in the navy at Georgia, February 38th, and com- 
 missioned a captain in the Confederate Navy in March, 1861. 
 The Navy Department immediately assigned Capt. Tatnall to 
 the command of the naval defence of the waters of Georgia 
 and South Carolina, with directions to improvise as best he 
 could a squadron, to be composed of such light steamers and 
 river craft as he might be able to secure. Contracts for the 
 building of four gunboats at Savannah, Ga., and of two at 
 Saffold, in that State, were made by the Navy Department dur- 
 ing the first year of the war. 
 
 The Proclamation of President Lincoln, April 15, 1861, 
 calling upon Virginia and the other States for 75,000 troops to 
 enable the United States authorities to repossess and hold the 
 forts, etc., seized by the seceded States, had no uncertain signi- 
 fication in Virginia. There it was understood and accepted as 
 the declaration of war on the part of the United States. Vir- 
 ginia could be no neutral in that war and had no desire to 
 occupy any such position. It was apparent that her territory 
 would become the Flanders of the war, and that between her 
 northern and southern boundaries would be fought those 
 great battles upon the results of which would depend the fate 
 and fortune of the Confederate States. 
 
 Among the first acts of the State Convention after the 
 adoption of the Ordinance of Secession, on April 17, 1861, was 
 Ordinance No. 9, passed on the same day, by which the Gover- 
 nor of the State, after being authorized and required to call 
 for volunteers, was also directed to " immediately invite all 
 efficient and worthy Virginians and residents of Virginia in the 
 army and navy of the United States to retire therefrom, and 
 to enter the service of Virginia, assigning them to such rank 
 as will not reverse the relative rank held by them in the United 
 States service, and will at least be equivalent thereto." 
 
 By the same Ordinance the Governor was ordered to "re- 
 pel invasion and see that in all things the commonwealth take 
 no detriment," and to that end an appropriation of $100,000 
 was made. 
 
 An invitation was also extended by the Convention to all 
 Virginia officers in the Revenue service and Coast Survey of 
 the United States to enter the service of the State, and the 
 Governor was authoi'ized to make proper provision for them. 
 
 A commander-in-chief of the military and naval forces 
 of the State, with the rank of Major General, was authorized 
 by Ordinance of April 19, 1861, who should, when appointed, 
 take rank over all other military and naval officers of the 
 State without regard to date of commission. 
 
 The oath to support the Constitution of the United States, 
 which had been taken by citizens of Virginia while the State 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 39 
 
 was a member of that confederacy, was declared inoperative 
 and void, and of no effect, and the statutory provisions of the 
 State which heretofore gave efficacy to that oath were repealed. 
 
 Having thus disrobed herself of the constitution and 
 union of the United States, Virginia prepared as best she 
 could to meet the responsibilities of her acts. A provisional 
 army was created, and on April 27th an Ordinance, establish- 
 ing the navy of Virginia was passed, to consist of 3,000 sea- 
 men and marines, with their proper oflBcers. The officers 
 were to be those of the U. S. navy who had or who might 
 thereafter avail themselves of the invitation extended by 
 Ordinance No. 9, of April 17th. The Governor was directed 
 to prescribe the pay, rations, and allowances, which were to 
 be the same in all respects as those then in the U. S. navy; 
 Virginians on the retired list of the U. S. navy were to be 
 provided for by the Governor, and to perform such duties as 
 they were able to discharge; the rules for the government of 
 the U. S. navy were directed to be revised by a Board of 
 officers to be ordered by the Governor, and made applicable to 
 the navy of Virginia; the term of enlistment for seamen was 
 feed at three years, and for marines at five years; a medical 
 department was directed to be organized by the Governor, to 
 which none but surgeons and assistant surgeons late of the 
 U. S. navy were to be appointed. 
 
 An Auditing Board for all claims and expenditures for the 
 army and navy was appointed, consisting of George W. 
 Munford, John R. Tucker, and Jonathan M. Bennett. 
 
 On the 22d of April, 1861, Robert E. Lee, late a colonel in 
 the U. S. cavalry, was appointed by Governor Letcher and 
 confirmed by the convention to be Commander-in-chief of the 
 army and navy of Virginia, and immediately entered upon 
 the duties of his position. 
 
 Two days after that appointment, on April 24th, a conven- 
 tion between Virginia and the Confederate States of America 
 was entered into, which provided that : Until the union be- 
 tween the State and the Confederacy was fully completed the 
 whole military and naval operations, offensive and defensive, 
 of the State, in the impending conflict with the United States, 
 shall be under the chief control and direction of the President 
 of the Confederate States, and that, after the completion of 
 said union, the State would turn over to the Confederate 
 States all the public property, naval stores and munitions of 
 war then in her possession, acquired from the United States, 
 and that whatever expenditures of money the State might in- 
 cur would be met and provided for by the Confederate States. 
 The Constitution of the Confederate States was ratified and 
 ordained,, and proclaimed binding on the people of Virginia 
 "by Ordnance No. 56, adopted June 19, 1861. 
 
 In the interval between April 17th and June 19th the 
 States seized the Gosport navy-yard, Harper's Ferry, two 
 
40 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 steamers at Richmond, and began to fortify the Potomac, 
 Rappahannock, York and James Rivers with batteries, under 
 the command and direction of her naval oflficers. 
 
 Commodore French Forrest, having resigned his commis- 
 sion in the U. S. navy, was appointed in the Virginia navy, 
 and assigned to duty as flag-officer at the Norfolk navy-yard 
 immediately upon its evacuation by the United States authori- 
 ties; at the same time Capt. Arthur Sinclair, also of the old 
 navy, was appointed to the same rank in the navy of Virginia, 
 and assigned to the command of Fort Norfolk; Robert B. 
 Pegram and Catesby Ap R. Jones were appointed on April 18, 
 1861, captains in the Virginia navy, and James H. Rochelle, a 
 lieutenant. These officers were immediately ordered to Nor- 
 folk, under the following order addressed to Capt. Pegram : 
 "You will immediately proceed to Norfolk and there assume 
 command of the naval station, with authority to organize naval 
 defences, enroll and enlist seamen and marines, and tem- 
 porarily to appoint war officers, and do and perform whatever 
 may be necessary to preserve and protect the property of the 
 Commonwealth and the citizens of Virginia." This order was 
 of date April 18th, but was superseded in a few days by that 
 assigning Flag-officer Forrest to the command of the naval 
 station at Norfolk. 
 
 Lieut. John M. Brooke, of the C. S. navy, was assigned 
 to duty, as aide-de-camp, at the headquarters of Major Gen. 
 Robert E. Lee, then commanding the army of Virginia, and 
 Commander M. F. Maury was attached to the Advisory Council 
 of the State of Virginia; Wm. L. Maury and Wm. Taylor Smith, 
 lieutenants in the Virginia navy, were assigned to duty under 
 Gen. Philip St. George Cocke, commanding on the line of 
 the Potomac, and were engaged in erecting batteries of that 
 river; Capt. William C. Whittle, of the navy, was assigned 
 to duty at Gloucester Point. Capt. Thos. J. Page while in 
 the Virginia navy was aide-de-camp to Governor Letcher. 
 Capt. Wm. F. Lynch was assigned to duty on the Potomac 
 River. Commander A. B. Fairfax was ordnance officer at 
 the Norfolk navy-yard, and Lieut. H. H. Lewis was on 
 duty on the Rappahannock. Capt. J. Wilkinson was assigned 
 to the duty of constructing Fort Powhatan on the James 
 River. 
 
 The naval school established by Secretary Mallory at 
 Richmond, under the superintendence of Lieut. Wm. H. 
 Parker, proved of great benefit to the service. The exigencies 
 of defence required not only trained officers, but men capable 
 of training others. The naval academy educated and trained 
 a large number of the younger officers of the service, some of 
 whom subsequently acquired great distinction. 
 
 The number of experienced seamen in the Southern States 
 prior to the war was very limited, and these were entirely 
 absorbed by the Conscript Law of February 17, 1864, placing 
 
CAPTAIN FKENCH FOREBST. 
 
 CONFEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 41 
 
 in the military service all white men residents of the Confed- 
 erate States between the ages of seventeen and fifty; notwith- 
 standing the law of May 1, 1863, provided for the transfer of 
 all seamen and ordinary seamen from the army to the navy, 
 in practice this law was almost entirely disregarded — the 
 only favorable response that was made to numerous calls 
 made on the ..army for seamen, under this law, was to an 
 order from the War Department of March 22, 1864, which 
 directed the transfer to the navy of 1,200 men, under which 
 960 men were transferred from all the armies on the 
 east of the Mississippi River. The law of October 2, 1862, 
 gave the right of election to all persons enrolled, or about 
 to be enrolled, at any time before being assigned to any 
 company, who should prefer the navy or marine corps, to 
 be enlisted in that service, but this availed very little to the 
 navy; and notwithstanding naval officers were sent to the dif- 
 ferent conscript camps to facilitate recruiting for the navy, a 
 favorable result was not attained; hence, recruiting for the 
 navy was barely sufficient to supply the deficiencies occasioned 
 by deaths, discharges and desertions. In 1864 the whole num- 
 ber of enlisted men in the navy was 3,674. 
 
 The United States naval register of 1861 shows a navy of 90 
 vessels, of which number 21 are designated as unserviceable, 
 27 available but not in commission, and 42 in commission; 
 there were distributed to the home squadron 12 vessels of 187 
 guns; Mediterranean, 3 vessels, 37 guns; coast of Brazil, 2 ves- 
 sels, 53 guns; East Indies, 3 vessels, 42 guns; while those in 
 the Pacific aggregated the 42 vessels in commission, which 
 mounted 555 guns; and with over 7,000 men. With the ves- 
 sels not then in commission, but which were immediately put 
 in commission. Admiral Porter enumerates as the "old navy," 
 76 vessels, mounting 1,783 guns. Mr. Welles, the United States 
 Secretary of the Navy, took immediate steps for the purchase 
 of 136 vessels, which were altered and commissioned, and 
 rnounted with 518 guns ; and also began the construction in 
 different yards, both of the government and of private parties, 
 63 vessels to carry 256 guns, which, by December of 1861, 
 composed a navy of 264 vessels, carrying 2,657 guns, manned 
 by 22,000 seamen, and of an aggregate tonnage of 218,016 tons. 
 
 Prof. Soley enumerates five distinct measures which were 
 immediately adopted by the Administration at Washington 
 to increase the naval force: 
 
 First. To buy everything afloat that could be made of ser- 
 vice — a measure which was impossible for Mr. Mallory to 
 imitate, because in the Confederacy there was nothing afloat 
 to buy, and no money with which to purchase. 
 
 Second. The United States immediately began, and pushed 
 with unexampled energy, the construction of eight sloops-of- 
 war. This was another measure impossible to Mr, Mallory, 
 
42 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 who had neither ship-yards nor ship-carpenters, neither the 
 means of building nor the power to buy. 
 
 Third. To contract with private parties for the construc- 
 tion of heavily armed iron -plated screw gunboats; these 
 " ninety-day gunboats " were for service at sea. Nine of these 
 gunboats passed the forts below New Orleans with Admiral 
 Farragut. 
 
 Fourth. For service in narrow waters, twelve paddle- 
 wheel steamers — " double - ender " — and twenty-seven of a 
 larger classj some of which were of iron, were contracted for 
 and built with the greatest dispatch. 
 
 Fifth. The iron-clads. 
 
 In addition to these five types of vessels, there was also 
 an "immense river fleet, composed of river steamboat rams, 
 iron-clads, tin-clads, and mortar boats"; and lastly, under the 
 sting of the Alabama, the Florida, and other " commerce- 
 destroyers," the Federal government undertook the construc- 
 tion of a class of war-vessels, — " large wooden steamers, with 
 fine lines, excessively long and sharp and narrow, of light 
 draft for their size, in which every quality was sacrificed to 
 speed" — their main purpose was to destroy the "commerce- 
 destroyers," as well as, under other circumstances, "to do a 
 little commerce-destroying themselves." The Appendix to 
 Prof. Soley's "Blockade and Cruisers" shows 1^6 wooden 
 vessels constructed between 1861 and 1865, mounting 1,.307 
 guns, and 74 iron-clads, mounting 313 guns — a total of 200 ves- 
 sels, mounting 1,520 guns. 
 
 Against that naval force, Prof. Soley says: 
 
 " The Confederate States had at its disposal a small number of trained 
 officers; . . . some of these, like Buchanan, Semme^, Brown, Maffltt, and 
 Brooke, were men of extraordinary professional qualities; but, except its 
 officers, the Confederate government had nothing in the shape of a navy. 
 It had not a single ship-of-war. It had no abundant fleet of merchant- 
 vessels in its ports from which to draw reserves. It had no seamen, for 
 its people were not given to seafaring pursuits. Its only ship-yards were 
 Norfolk and Pensacola. Norfolk, with its immense supplies of ordnance 
 and equipment, was, indeed, valuable ; but though the 300 Dahl- 
 gren guns captured in the yard were a permanent acquisition, the 
 yard itself was lost when the war was one-fourth over. The South was 
 without any large force of skilled mechanics; and such as it had were 
 eaily summoned to the army. There were only three rolling mills in the 
 country, two of which were in Tennessee ; and the third, at Alabama, 
 was unfitted for heavy work. There were hardly any machine shops that 
 were prepared to supply the best kind of workmanship, and in the begin- 
 ning the only foundry capable of casting heavy guns was the Tredegar 
 Iron Works, which, under the direction of Commander Brooke, was em- 
 ployed to its fullest capacity. Worst of all, there was no raw materials, 
 except the timber that was standing in the forests. Under these circum- 
 stances, no general plan of naval policy on a large scale could be carried 
 out, and the conflict on the Southern side became a species of partisan, 
 desultory warfare." 
 
 Without assenting to the conclusion of Prof. Soley, it must 
 be admitted that his picture of Confederate naval prospects 
 at the beginning of the war is not overdrawn or too highly 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 43 
 
 colored. Not dismayed by the unpromising prospects before 
 him, Secretary Mallory obtained the passage of the secret acts 
 of Congress of May 10, 1861, which authorized the dispatch of 
 Naval Agent James D. Bulloch to England, where he arrived 
 on June 4, 1861. But, anticipating legislation on March 13th, 
 an oflBcer was sent to New York to examine and ascertain 
 whether vessels could be purchased there suitable for war 
 purposes; and, if he could, to procure them. On the 19th of 
 March, an engineer officer was dispatched to New York, 
 Philadelphia and Baltimore in search of suitable vessels for 
 naval purposes, and his report was that but one vessel of the 
 character desired could be found in any Northern city, and 
 that was the steamer Caroline, of Philadelphia. There nego- 
 tiations were rendered abortive by the outbreak in Baltimore 
 ■on the passage of Massachusetts troops through that city, and 
 "the agents returned to Montgomery. The agents in Canada 
 reported, 6th of June, that the U. S. government had secured 
 every available steamer in Canadian waters. 
 
 The subject of iron-clad ships was brought by the Navy De- 
 partment to the attention of the naval committee by letter of 
 May 8, 1861, in which Mr. Mallory, after reviewing the his- 
 tory of iron-clad ships in England and France, continued: 
 
 " I regard the possession of an iron-armored ship as a matter of the 
 first necessity. Such a vessel at this time couJd traverse the entire coast 
 of the United States, prevent all blockades, and encounter, with a fair 
 prospect of success, their entire navy. 
 
 "If to cope -with them upon the sea, we follow their example and 
 IjTiild wooden ships, we shall have to construct several at one time, for 
 one or two ships wiU fall an easy prey to her comparatively numerous 
 fiteam frigates. But inequality of numbers may be compensated by in- 
 vulnerabUity, and thus not only does economy but naval success dictate 
 the wisdom and expediency of fighting iron against wood without regard 
 to first cost. . . . Should the committee deem it expedient to begin 
 at once the construction of such a ship, not a moment should be lost. 
 An agent of the department will leave for England in a day or two charged 
 with the duty of purchasing vessels, and by him the first step in the 
 measure ma.v be taisen." 
 
 The recommendation of that letter was embodied in a law, 
 and the Merrimac was expected to be the kind of vessel therein 
 suggested. The report of the Secretary of the Navy, July 18, 
 1861, says: 
 
 " The frigate i/errimac has been raised and docked at an expense of 
 $6,000, and the necessary repairs to hull and machinery to place her in 
 her former condition is estimated by experts at $450,000. The vessel 
 would then be in the river, and by the blockade of the enemy's fleets and 
 batteries rendered comparatively useless. It has, therefore, been deter- 
 mined to shield her completely with three-inch iron, placed at such angles 
 as to render her ball-proof, to complete her at the earliest moment, to arm 
 her with the heaviest ordnance, and to send her at once against the en- 
 emy's fleet. It is believed that thus prepared she will be able to contend 
 successfully against the heaviest of the enemy's ships, and to drive them 
 from Hampton Roads and the ports of Virginia. The cost of this work 
 is estimated by the constructor and engineer in charge at $172,533, and, as 
 time is of the first consequence in this enterprise, I have not hesitated to 
 commence the work, and to ask Congress for the necessary appropriation." 
 
44 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Lieut. James H. North was sent abroad in May to procure- 
 iron-clad ships, if possible; but finding it impracticable to pur- 
 chase in Europe, the department commenced the construction 
 of such vessels in the waters of the South. It was recognized 
 by Secretary Mallory in his report of November 20, 1861, that 
 " iron-clad steamships capable of resisting the crushing weight- 
 of projectiles from heavy ordnance must at an early day 
 constitute the principal part of the fighting vessels of all naval 
 powers"; and to secure iron for covering, construction and 
 ordnance of naval vessels, the department, as soon as Virginia^ 
 entered the Confederacy, contracted with Joseph R. Anderson 
 & Co. and the Messrs. Deane for a supply of all classes of 
 iron, including ordnance and projectile, as far as those shops^ 
 could supply. 
 
 At various dates from June 28th, 1861, to Dec. 1st, 1862, 
 Secretary Mallory entered into thirty-two contracts, for the 
 construction of forty gunboats, floating batteries and vessels- 
 of-war, with parties in various cities, from Norfolk to New 
 Orleans and Memphis. In addition to these, the depart- 
 ment had vessels under construction superintended by its own 
 officers. This did not include the vessels under contract and 
 construction in foreign countries. 
 
 These contracts were with John Hughes & Co. , Myers & 
 Co. , Ritch & Farrow, David S. Johnston, Frederick G. How- 
 ard, OUinger & Bruce, H. F. Willink, Jr., Gilbert Elliott, 
 William A. Graves, N. Nash, Krenson & Hawkes, P. M. 
 Jones, Wm. O. Safford, Lindsey & Silverton, Henry D. Bas- 
 sett. Porter & Watson, I. E. Montgomery and A. Anderson, 
 Howard & Ellis, Thomas Moore and John Smoker, for the 
 immediate construction of forty-two gunboats and floating 
 batteries. Many of these vessels were constructed and deliv- 
 ered, and performed valuable service in the Confederate 
 navy. 
 
 The building of these gunboats was hindered by a variety 
 of causes, and in many instances their completion prevented 
 by the enemy capturing the localities where the boats were^ 
 being built. Such failures could not have been prevented by 
 the Navy Department, and the wonder is, not that greater suc- 
 cess did not attend Secretary Mallory's efforts, but that so 
 much was done with such limited means, and in spite of the 
 active and unremitting advances of a powerful enemy. 
 
 The preparation in 1861 of an iron-clad fleet of gunboats 
 at St. Louis by the U. S. government attracted the atten- 
 tion of the Navy Department at Richmond, and immediate 
 steps were taken to have reliable mechanics sent to St. Louis 
 and employed on those boats who would obtain accurate infor- 
 mation of their strength and fighting character and the prog- 
 ress made toward their completion. These reports, witn an 
 accurate plan and description of the Benton, were made to 
 Mr. Mallory. In consequence of which, it was deemed of more 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 45 
 
 immediate importance to defend New Orleans against an at- 
 tack from above rather than from the Gulf. 
 
 To this end the Act of Congress of August 30th was 
 passed, authorizing and directing the "preparation immedi- 
 diately of floating defences best adapted to defend the Miss- 
 issippi River against a descent of iron-plated steam gun- 
 boats." Under this act contracts were made, August 24, 
 
 1861, at Memphis, for the construction of the Tennessee and 
 the Arkansas, both to be completed by December 34, 1861. 
 The enemy's fleet, building at St. Louis, threatened the Cum- 
 berland and Tennessee Rivers, and the country through which 
 these rivers flowed equally with that along the banks of the 
 Mississippi. The Legislature of Tennessee, apprehending an 
 invasion along the line of one or perhaps both of those rivers, 
 called the attention of Congress, by joint resolution of date 
 June 24, 1861, to their unprotected condition; and efforts to 
 purchase and adapt to defensive purposes the river steam- 
 boats Helman, Jas. Johnson, J. Woods, and B. M. Runyon, 
 lying at ISTashville, were immediately undertaken, and were 
 in such progress that, on November 8, Gen. C. F. Smith, U. S. 
 army, commanding at Paducah, called the attention of the 
 authorities at Washington to the fact that, " some eight miles 
 above Fort Henry, the enemy has been for many weeks 
 endeavoring to convert river steamers into iron-clad gunboats. 
 This fort is an obstacle to our gunboats proceeding to look 
 after such work." The construction of the gunboat Eastport, 
 on the Tennessee River, was commenced, but not being com- 
 pleted when the forts fell was destroyed by the orders of 
 Gen. A. S. Johnston. 
 
 Near the end of the first year of the war, on March 4th, 
 
 1862, Mr. Mallory, in response to a resolution of the House of 
 Representatives, urged that the immediate procurement of 
 " fifty light-draft and powerful steam-propellers, plated with 
 five-inch hard iron, armed and equipped for service in our 
 own waters, four iron or steel-clad!^ single deck, ten-gun frig- 
 ates of about two thousand tons, and ten clipper propellers 
 with superior marine engines, both classes of ships designed 
 for deep-sea cruising, three thousand tons of first-class boiler 
 plate iron, and one thousand tons of rod, bolt and bar iron "; 
 and under the head of munitions of war the Secretary enumer- 
 ated as necessary for immediate use, " two thousand pieces of 
 heavy ordnance, ranging in calibre from six to eleven inches, 
 and in weight from six thousand to fourteen thousand pounds, 
 two thousand tons of cannon powder, one thousand tons of 
 musket powder for filling projectiles and pyrotechny, four 
 thousand navy rifles, and four thousand navy revolvers, and 
 four thousand navy cutlasses, with their equipment and am- 
 munition." There were required, he further urged, "three 
 thousand instructed seamen, four thousand ordinary seamen 
 and landsmen, and two thousand first-rate mechanics," and 
 
46 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 he requested that five millions of dollars he immediately- 
 placed in Europe. 
 
 A joint select committee of the two Houses of Congress 
 was raised on the 37th of August, 1863, to investigate the ad- 
 ministration of the Navy Department. New Orleans had fallen, 
 and the great gunboats Louisiana and Mississippi, of which 
 so much was expected and had been promised, had been 
 burned, without delivering any seriously damaging blow at 
 the enemy. Norfolk had been captured, and with her fall the 
 great navy-yard at Gosport had returned to the control of the 
 United States, and the pride of the Confederate navy, the 
 Virginia, while riding triumphant in Hampton Roads, had 
 been destroyed by the match in Confederate hands. Dis- 
 appointment and disaster made men unjust in their review of 
 causes, and a scapegoat was attempted to be made of the 
 Secretary of the Navy. His department was charged with, 
 incompetent management, with wastefulness of means, with 
 partiality and favoritism, and with the responsibility for the 
 loss of New Orleans and Norfolk— for the unnecessary de- 
 struction of the Mississippi and the Virginia. 
 
 In their report the committee state that they inquired into 
 everything relating to the materials and the operations of 
 the navy of the Confederate States ; the means and resources 
 for building a navy ; the efforts to purchase or build vessels 
 and to obtain ordnance stores ; the naval defences of the 
 Mississippi River, and especially of New Orleans, of the Cum- 
 berland, Tennessee and James Rivers, and of the city of 
 Norfolk. 
 
 Before the war but seven steam war- vessels had been built 
 in the States forming the Confederacy, and the engines of only 
 two of these had been contracted for in these States. All 
 the labor or materials requisite to complete and equip a war- 
 vessel could not be commanded at any one point of the Con- 
 federacy. 
 
 In justification of the Secretary of the Navy, the commit- 
 tee state that he had invited contracts for building gunboats 
 wherever they could be soonest and best built and most advan- 
 tageously employed, and that his contracts were judicious and 
 seemed to have been properly enforced. In relation to the de- 
 struction of the Mississippi at New Orleans, the committee say, 
 the contractors— Messrs. Tift — undertook her construction 
 without pecuniary reward, and prosecuted the work on her 
 with industry and dispatch, and that neither they nor the 
 Secretary were censurable for the incompleteness of that vessel 
 when the enemy reached New Orleans, or for her destruction. 
 
 With reference to what the department had accomplished 
 since its organization, the committee state that it erected a 
 powder mill which supplies all the powder required by our 
 navy; two engine-boiler and machine shops, and five ordnance 
 workshops. It has established eighteen yards for building 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 47 
 
 war-vessels, and a rope-walk, making all cordage, from a rope 
 yarn to a nine-inch cable, and capable of turning out 8,000 
 yds. per month. 
 
 Of vessels not iron-clad the Department has purchased and other- 
 wise acquired and converted to war-vessels. ... 44 
 
 Has built and completed as war-vessels ... 13 
 
 Has partially constructed and destroyed, to save from the enemy ... 10 
 
 And has now under construction. . . . . 9 
 
 Of iron-clad vessels it has completed and has now in commission ... 13 
 Has completed and destroyed, or lost by capture . . .4 
 
 Has in progress of construction, and in various stages of forwardness . 33 
 
 It had also one iron-clad floating battery, presented to 
 the Confederate States by the ladies of Georgia, and one iron- 
 clad ram, partially completed and turned over to the Confed- 
 eracy by the State of Alabama. 
 
 In spite of all embarrassments and difficulties, the navy 
 had afloat in November, 1861, the Sumter, the Dixie, the 
 Jeff. Davis, the Gordon, the Merrimac, the Petrel, the Ever- 
 glade, the Savannah (captured), the Webb, the McClelland, the 
 McRae, the Yorktown, the Patrick Henry, the Resolute, the 
 Sallie, the Bonita, the James Grey, the Calhoun, the Ivy, the 
 Dodge, the Lady Davis, the Lewis Cass, the Washington, the 
 Nina, the Jackson, the Tuscarora, the Pickens, the Bradford, 
 the Nelms, the Coffee, the Nashville, the Manassas, the George 
 Page, the Judith (destroyed), and several other vessels. The 
 "personnel of the navy then consisted of — Captains, 9; Com- 
 manders, 25; Lieutenants, 24; Midshipmen, 6; Surgeons, 7; 
 Paymasters, 8; Chief Engineer, 1; First Assistant Engineer, 
 1: "Navy Agents, 2; Colonel of Marines, 1; Lieut. Colonel of 
 Marines, 1; Major of Marines, 1; Captains of Marines, 2; Sec- 
 ond Lieutenants of Marines, 3. — Total, 87. 
 
 Notwithstanding the military reverses of 1861 and 1862, 
 by which so many important points were taken possession of by 
 the enemy, the Navy Department, in May of 1863, had twenty- 
 three gunboats in progress of construction, twenty of which, 
 were of iron and three of wood. The report of Naval Con- 
 structor John L. Porter, of November 1, 1862, shows that an 
 iron-clad steamer had just been launched at Richmond, and 
 that at the same place an iron-clad ram was then on the 
 stocks, and four torpedo-boats under construction. At Hali- 
 fax, N. C, a gunboat of light draft for use in the waters of 
 the Sound would be ready in two months; at Edward's Ferry, 
 on the Roanoke River, a wooden gunboat of light draft, for 
 operations on that river, was approaching completion, and at 
 the same place an iron-clad gunboat for Albemarle Sound was 
 awaiting her machinery. At Wilmington, N. C. , there was 
 being built an iron-clad steamer, of such draft of water as 
 would enable her to go out and in at all stages of the tide; 
 the machinery of this steamer was being completed at Colum- 
 bus, Ga., under the supervision of Chief Engineer J. H.Warner, 
 
48 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 C S. navy. At Pedee River Bridge, a wooden gunboat had 
 just been completed with two propellers, the engines of 
 which were built at the naval works at Richmond, and that 
 there was also on the stocks at the same place a small side- 
 wheel steamer for transportation purposes on the Pedee River, 
 as well as a torpedo-boat. At Charleston, an iron-clad steamer 
 was nearly completed, with citadel armor-plated, with iron 
 six inches thick, and mounting six guns; also two first-class 
 steamers, for which there was no iron available at that time. 
 At Savannah, an iron-clad was ready for launching, whose 
 engines were also built by Chief Engineer Warner at Colum- 
 bus, and another iron-clad was also ready for her armament. 
 At Columbus, Ga., a double propeller iron-clad steamer 
 awaited the rising of the river for launching, and the steamer 
 Chattahoochee had just been thoroughly overhauled and re- 
 paired. At Mobile, a large iron-clad side-wheel steamer, built 
 by Montgomery & Anderson, and two light-draft, double pro- ' 
 
 Eeller, iron-clad steamers, by Porter & Watson, on the Tom- 
 igbee River, awaited iron for plating. 
 
 " It will be seen," says Mr. Porter, " that everything has been done to 
 get up an iron-clad fleet of vessels which oould possibly be done under 
 the circumstances; but in consequence of the loss of our iron and coal 
 regions, with the rolling mill at Atlanta, our supply of iron has been very 
 limited. The mills at Richmond are capable of rolling any quantity, but 
 the material is not on hand ; and the amount now necessary to complete 
 vessels already built would be equal to four thousand two hundred and 
 thirty tons, as follows : 
 
 Tms. 
 
 At Richmond, for two vessels 575 
 
 " Wilmington, for one vessel. 150 
 
 " Charleston, for two vessels 800 
 
 " Savannah, for two " 750 
 
 " Columbus, for one vessel . . 280 
 
 " Mobile, for three vessels .... 1,250 
 
 On Tombigbee, for three vessels 425 
 
 Total 4,230 " 
 
 Before the war there was no powder stored in any South- 
 ern States, except such small quantities of sporting powder as 
 was usual in a country whose people were engaged in field 
 sports. But of powder for military and naval purposes, that 
 captured at the Norfolk navy -yard, and some obtained in the 
 arsenals in the Southern States, amounting in all to about 
 60,000 pounds, was the only supply on hand. 
 
 " I earnestly beg," Governor F. W. Pickens, of South 
 Carolina, wrote, on September 1, 1861, "if possible, that you 
 will order me, if you have it at Norfolk, 40,000 pounds of can- 
 non powder. I loaned the Governor of North Carolina 25,000 
 pounds, and also the Governor of Florida, for Fernandina and 
 Saint Augustine, 5,000 pounds, besides what I sent to Mem- 
 phis, Tenn. If I could be sure of getting 40,000 pounds as a 
 reserve for Charleston, I would immediately order a full 
 
COMMANDER JOHN M. BROOKE, 
 
 CONFEDEHATE STATES NAVT, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 49 
 
 supply of cannon powder for about 100 guns I have now on our 
 •coast below Charleston. As it is, I fear to drain Charleston 
 entirely. I bought for the State, last December and January, 
 about 300,000 pounds from Hazard's Mills in Connecticut, buo 
 I have distributed all of it but about 40,000 pounds." About 
 the same time, General John B. Grayson wrote: "Assure as 
 the sun rises, unless cannon powder, etc., be sent to Florida 
 in the next thirty days, she will fall into the hands of the 
 North. Nothing human can prevent it. There are not 
 4,000 pounds of powder at every post combined." At Fort 
 Pulaski, in September, 1861, the powder in the magazine was 
 " about 45,000 pounds" — on which the navy held an order for 
 1,800 pounds. The Governor of Florida was writing also : 
 '" No powder or fuses — we need guns of larger calibre and am- 
 munition — Florida wants arms. She has never received a 
 musket from the Confederate States." The same demand 
 for powder and arms came up to Richmond from every centre 
 ■of military operations. 
 
 The stock of percussion-caps amounted to less than half a 
 million, if that amount was available, and there was not a 
 machine for making them in all the Southern States. Major 
 Oorgas, in his monograph, says : 
 
 "We began in April, 1861, without an arsenal, laboratory or powder 
 mill of any capacity, and with no foundry or rolling-mill except at Rich- 
 mond, and before the close of 1803, within a little over two years, we sup- 
 plied them. During the harassments of war, while holding our own in 
 the field defiantly and successfully against a powerful enemy; crippled 
 by a depreciated currency; throttled with a blockade that deprived us of 
 nearly all the means of getting material or workmen; obliged to send al- 
 most every able-bodied man to the field ; unable to use slave-labor, with 
 which we were abundantly supplied, except in the most unskilled depart- 
 ments of production ; hampered by want of transportation even of the 
 commonest supplies of food; with no stock on hand even of articles such 
 as steel, copper, leather, iron, which we must have to build up our estab- 
 lishments — against all these obstacles, in spite of all these deficiencies, 
 we persevered at home, as determinedly as did our troops on the field 
 ■against a more tangible opposition ; and in that short period created, al- 
 most literally out of the ground, foundries and rolling mills at Selma, 
 Richmond, Atlanta and Macon, smelting works at Petersburg, chemical 
 works at Charlotte, North Carolina; a powder-mill far superior to any in 
 the United States, and unsurpassed by any across the ocean, and a chain 
 ■of arsenals, armories and laboratories, equal in their capacity and im- 
 provemerfts to the best of those in the United States, stretching link by 
 link from Virginia to Alabama." 
 
 The work of preparing for the manufacture of ordnance, 
 •ordnance stores and naval supplies was greatly advanced by 
 the Bureau of Ordnance and Hydrography under Commander 
 George Minor, C. S. navy, Lieut. Robert D. Minor, C. S. navy, 
 and Commander John M. Brooke, whose banded guns, manu- 
 factured under his supervision at the Tredegar Works in 
 Richmond, proved so remarkably efficient throughout all the 
 conflicts of the war. The Ordnance Bureau at Richmond sent 
 to New Orleans from May, 1861, to May, 1863, 230 heavy guns. 
 
50 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The Bureau of Ordnance and Hydrography later in the 
 war was transferred to Commander John M. Brooke, and in its 
 various departments and different stations became the most 
 valuable branch of the navy. The ordnance works at Rich- 
 mond, Va., under Lieut. R. D. Minor and R. B. Wright, sup- 
 plied nearly all the equipments of the vessels in James River 
 and at Wilmington, as well as the carriages for the heavy 
 navy guns in batteries on shore. The employes enrolled in 
 a naval battalion were frequently called from their work to 
 the field, thus interrupting and delaying work far more valu- 
 able than any field service it was possible for them to render. 
 At Charlotte, N. C. , the naval ordnance works, under the super- 
 intendence of Chief Engineer H. A. Ramsay, became one of 
 the most important and valuable aids to the naval service. 
 It was the only establishment where heavy forging could be 
 done; and there the shaftings for steamers and the wrought- 
 iron projectiles were forged and finished; gun-carriages-, 
 blocks, and ordnance equipments of nearly every description, 
 including the productions of an ordnance laboratory, were 
 manufactured in great quantities and with great regularity, 
 because its operations were less liable to interruption by calls 
 upon its workmen for service in the fields. At Selma, Com- 
 mander Catesby Ap. R. Jones superintended the various 
 branches of the foundry employed chiefly in the manufacture 
 of guns specially adapted for service against iron-clads. 
 Forty-seven of these guns were supplied from these works to 
 the defences of Mobile, and twelve were in batteries at 
 Charleston and Wilmington. The naval powder mills at 
 Columbia, under the superintendence of P. B. Gareschi, be- 
 came in time capable of fully supplying the demands of the 
 navy, and the powder there maniifactured was of an excellent 
 quality. 
 
 Lieut. D. P. McCorkle, in charge of the ordnance works at 
 Atlanta, finding his plant threatened by the movements of 
 the enemy, transferred the whole machinery and stores to 
 Augusta, and set to work in temporary buildings to manufac- 
 ture shot, shells, gun-carriages for Charleston, Savannah and 
 Mobile. 
 
 The great and pressing demands for ordnance and ord- 
 nance stores for the defences of the country, at every point, 
 rendered it impossible for the Navy Department at Richmona 
 to comply promptly with requisitions made upon the Bureau 
 of Ordnance from every assailed point in the Confederacy. 
 To meet the urgent demands of the navy at New Orleans, a 
 laboratory was established on a large scale in that city for 
 the preparation of fuses, primers, fireworks, etc., and to 
 authorize the casting of heavy cannon, the construction of 
 gun-carriages, and the manufacture of projectiles and ord- 
 nance equipments of all kinds. The laboratory was first under 
 the direction of Lieut. Beverley Kennon, C. S. navy, and 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY, 51 
 
 afterwards under Lieut. John E. Eggleston, and then of Acting- 
 Master W. A. Robins. General Lovel had already set up a 
 powder mill and was manufacturing an excellent powder, which 
 he supplied to both the array and navy as far as it was possible, 
 but the constant and ever-recurring urgent demands upon his 
 mills were greatly beyond their possible supply. By Decem- 
 ber 5, two powder mills were in running order and turning 
 out two tons of powder per day, and contracts for two hun- 
 dred tons of saltpetre, promised to relieve the pressing needs 
 of the defences of the city from the danger of a short supply. 
 But the explosion of one of the mills on December 28, just 
 as the ships of the enemy were assembling at Ship Island, 
 caused great anxiety. Contracts for powder at 83 cts. per 
 pound were ordered and entered into; and on Jan. 13,1863, the 
 supply at New Orleans was reported at 116,750 pounds. On 
 Jan. 33, 1863, the price of powder under contracts had risen to 
 $1. 14 per pound, with an advance of two-thirds of the price 
 before its manufacture began. 
 
 In addition to this want of ordnance stores, the navy was 
 further embarrassed in its supply of coal — the incursions of 
 the armj'' at some points contiguous to the coal supply was 
 to a great extent the cause of this; so that, in the last year of 
 tlae war, the mines at Richmond, in Worth Carolina and in 
 Alabama, were the only sources of supply, but deficiencies of 
 transportation increased the difficulty of obtaining coal from 
 those mines for distant points on the seaboard. 
 
 The navy erected at Petersburg rope-walks, which proved 
 adequate to all, the demands of the navy and supplied also 
 the army, the coal mines, the railroads and the canal compa- 
 nies. Cotton, manufactured with tar, was found to be a valu- 
 able substitute for hemp cordage. 
 
 Thus, the Confederate States, which, in 1861, were totally 
 destitute of every appliance, of all machinery, of all tools and 
 mechanics, for the manufacture of naval ordnance of any 
 kind, while fighting a multitudinous enemy over a vast terri- 
 tory, and surrounded by the navy of the enemy which closed 
 every port, was able to erect at Richmond, Atlanta, Augusta, 
 Selma, New Orleans, Charlotte, Columbia, Petersburg, Co- 
 lumbus, those extensive works which, before the war closed, 
 supplied her navy and batteries with all the ordnance they re- 
 quired. These various works developed into usefulness as 
 the war progressed, notwithstanding its exacting demands 
 upon the country for every man capable of bearing arms. 
 Their efficiency was frequently retarded by the calls to arms 
 which took the workmen from the shop to the field, and at all 
 times the comparatively small number of mechanics available 
 for work at these stations was a matter of serious embarrass- 
 ment. 
 
 If the United States surprised the nations of the world by 
 the development of its war power during that war, a careful 
 
62 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 examination of what was accomplished in the Confederate 
 States will be found to have greatly exceeded the results in the 
 United States when the conditions and circumstances of the 
 two parties to the war are considered and contrasted. If, 
 while fighting each other and each party destroying every- 
 thing that could not be removed, these grand results were 
 respectively accomplished — what limit shall be set to the ca- 
 pabilities of such a people united and excited by the same de- 
 termination in their defence of their common country ? 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 PRIVATEERS, OR LETTERS OF MARQUE. 
 
 AS we have seen, the surrender of Fort Sumter on the 13th 
 of April, 1861, was the initial act of the war between the 
 States. On the 15th the President of the United States 
 issued a proclamation, calling out troops to the 
 number of 75,000. President Davis, on the 17th, published a 
 counter - proclamation, inviting applications for letters of 
 marque and reprisal to be granted under the seal of the Con- 
 federate States, against ships and property of the United 
 States and their citizens. ^ 
 
 Doubting the constitutional power of the ezecutive to 
 grant letters of marque to private armed ships, President 
 Davis, with characteristic regard for law, determined not to 
 commission privateers until duly authorized by Congress. 
 That body assembled in special session on April 29, in obedience 
 
 1 After appropriately recognizing tlie condi- 
 tion of public affairs, and inviting energetic 
 preparation for immediate hoBtilities, he said: 
 
 "Now, therefore, I, Jefferson Davie, President 
 of the Confederate States of America, do issue 
 this, my proclamation, inviting all those who 
 may desire, by service in private armed vessels 
 on the high aeas, to aid this government in re- 
 sisting so wanton and wicked an aggi-ession, to 
 make application for commissions or letters of 
 marque and reprisal, to be issued under the seal 
 of these Confederate States; and I do further 
 notify aU persons applying for letters of marque 
 to make a statement in writing, giving the name 
 and suitable description of the character, ton- 
 nage, and force of the vessel, name of the place 
 of residence of each owner concerned therein 
 and the intended number of crew, an4 to sign 
 each statement, and deliver the same to the 
 Secretary of State or Collector of the Port of 
 Entry of these Confederate States, to be by him 
 transmitted to the Secretary of State, and do 
 further notify aH applicants aforesaid, before 
 any commiasion or letter of marque is issued to 
 any vessel, or the owner or the owners thereof, 
 and the commander for the time being, they will 
 be required to give bond to the Confederate 
 States, with at least two responsible sureties 
 not interested in such vessel, in the penal sum 
 of $5,000; or if such vessel be provided with 
 
 more than 150 men, then in the penal sum of 
 ®10,000, with the condition that the owners, 
 ofl&cers, and crew who shall be employed on 
 board such commissioned vessel, shall observe 
 the laws of these Confederate States, and the 
 instructions given them for the regulation of 
 their conduct, and sliall satisfy all damages 
 done contrary to the tenor thereof by such 
 vessel during her commission, and deliver up 
 the same when revoked by the President of the 
 Confederate States. And I do further specially 
 enjoin on all persons holding ofl&ces, civil and 
 military, under the authority of the Confederate 
 States, that they be vigilant and zealous in the 
 discharge of the duties incident thereto ; and I 
 do, moreover, exhort the good people of these 
 Confederate States, as they love their country — 
 as they prize the blessings of free government — 
 as they feel the wrongs of the past, and these 
 now threatened in an aggravated form by those 
 whose enmity is more implacable because un- 
 provoked—they exert themselves in preserving 
 ■ order, in promoting concord, in maintaining the 
 authority and efl&cacy of the laws, and in sup- 
 porting, invigorating all the measures which 
 may be adopted for a common defence, and by 
 which, under the blessings of Divine Provi- 
 dence, we may hope for a speedy, just, and 
 honorable peace. ' 
 
 (53) 
 
54 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 to a proclamation of the President, in which he advised legis- 
 lation for the employment of privateers. On the 6th of May 
 Congress passed an act, entitled, "An act recognizing the 
 existence of war between the United States and the Confeder- 
 ate States, and concerning letters of marque, prizes, and 
 prize goods." The first section of this act was as follows : 
 
 " The Congress of the Confederate States of America do enact that 
 the President of the Confederate States is hereby authorized to use the 
 "whole land and naval force of the Confederate States to meet the war 
 thus commenced, and to issae to private vessels commissions or letters of 
 marque and general reprisal, in such form as he shall think proper, under 
 the seal of the Confederate States, against the vessels, goods, and effects 
 of the United States, and of the citizens or inhabitants of the States and 
 territories thereof ; provided, however, that property of the enemy (unless 
 it be contraband of war) laden on board a neutral vessel, shaU not be 
 subject to seizure under this act ; and provided further, that vessels of the 
 citizens or inhabitants of the United States now in the ports of the Con- 
 federate States, except such as have been since the 5th of April last, or 
 may hereafter be, in the service of the Government of the United States, 
 shall be allowed thirty days after the publication of this act to leave said 
 ports and reach their destination ; and such vessels and their cargoes, 
 excepting articles contraband of war, shall not be subject to capture under 
 this act during said period, unless they shall have previously reached the 
 destination for which they were bound on leaving said ports." 
 
 The act then proceeded to lay down in detail regulations 
 as to the conditions on which letters of marque should be 
 granted to private vessels, and the conduct and behavior of 
 the officers and crews of such vessels, and the disposal of such 
 prizes made by them, similar to the regulations which have 
 been ordinarily prescribed and enforced with respect to priva- 
 teers in the United States, and by the maritime powers of 
 Europe. 
 
 The fourth and seventh sections were as follows : 
 
 " That, before any commission or letters of marque and reprisal shall 
 be issued as aforesaid, the owner or owners of the ship or vessel for which 
 the same shall be requested, and the commander thereof for the time 
 being, shall give bond to the Confederate States, with at least two respon- 
 sible surieties not interested in such vessel, in the penal sum of $5,000, or, 
 if such vessel be provided with more than 150 men, then in the penal sum 
 of sio,000, with condition that the owners, officers, and crew who shall be 
 employed on board such commissioned vessel shall and will observe the 
 laws of the Confederate States, and the instructions which shall be given 
 them according to law for the regulation of their conduct, and will satisfy 
 all damages and injuries which shall be done or committed contrary to 
 the tenor thereof by such vessel during her commission, and to deliver up 
 the same when revoked by the President of the Confederate States. 
 
 " That before breaking bulk of any vessel which shall be captured as 
 aforesaid, or disposal or conversion thereof, or of any articles which shall 
 be found on board the same, such captured vessel, goods, or effects, shall 
 be brought into some port of the Confederate States, or of a nation or 
 State in amity with the Confederate States, and shall be proceeded 
 against before a competent tribunal ; and after condemnation and forfeit- 
 ure thereof, shall belong to the owners, officers, and crew of the vessel cap- 
 turing the same, and be distributed as before provided ; and in the case 
 of all captured vessels, goods, and effects which shall be brought within 
 the jurisdiction of the Confederate States, the district courts of the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 55 
 
 Confederate States shall have exclusive origmal cognizance thereof, as the 
 civil causes of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction ; and the said courts, 
 or the courts being courts of the Confederate States into which such cases 
 shall be removed, in which they shall be finally decided, shall and may 
 decree restitution in whole or part, when the capture shall have been 
 made without just cause. And, if made without probable cause, may 
 •order and decree damages and costs to the party injured, for which the 
 owners and commanders of the vessels making such captures, and also 
 the vessels, shall be liable." 
 
 A further act, entitled, "An act regulating the sale of 
 prizes and the distribution thereof," was likewise passed by 
 the Congress of the Confederate States on the 14th of May, 
 1861. 
 
 Meanwhile, on the 19th of April, the President of the United 
 States issued a further proclamation, in which, after referring 
 to the proposed issue of letters of marque, declared that he had 
 deemed it advisable to set on foot a blockade of the ports 
 within the States of South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, 
 Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas, in pursuance of the laws of 
 the United States and the law of nations in such cases 
 provided. By another proclamation, dated the 27th of April, 
 the blockade was so extended as to include the Southern ports 
 as far north as Virginia. 
 
 The blockade declared by the foregoing proclamations was 
 actually instituted, as to the ports within the State of Virginia, 
 on the 30th of April ; '■ and was extended to the principal ports on 
 "the sea-board of the Confederate States before the end of May. 
 The Federal cruisers soon began to make prizes of neutral 
 ships for alleged breach of blockade, and they were condemned 
 with very short shrift by the United States prize-courts. 
 
 On the 3rd of May, 1861, the proclamation of the blockade 
 was published in the London newspapers; on the 10th of May 
 copies of the proclamation of blockade, and of the counter- 
 proclamation of President Davis, were received by Lord Rus- 
 sell from the British Minister at Washington, and finally the 
 blockade was officially communicated to Lord Russell by the 
 United States Minister on the 11th of May. 
 
 On the 6th of May, Lord Russell stated in the House of 
 Commons, that, after consultation with the law officers, the 
 government had come to the conclusion that the Southern Con- 
 federacy must be treated as belligerents; and, on the 14th, 
 Her Majesty's Proclamation of Neutrality was issued, which 
 
 1 The following is an official copy of the notice 1861, for an efficient blooiade of the ports of 
 
 of blockade sei-ved on Captain Russell of the Virginia and North Carohna, and warn all per- 
 
 steamer Louisiana, of the Chesapeake Bay line sons interested that I have a sufficient naval 
 
 •of steamers, running between Baltimore and force here for the purpose of carrying out that 
 
 JTorfolk : proclamation. 
 
 " UNITED States Flag-ship aumberland. ) " ^^ V'^^"^^ ^^■!^Sj'^LT'f^n^J'^c3^^^ 
 
 " Gfi? Fobtbess Moneoe, "omfg *?-.o=^ * distance and ignorant of the 
 
 "Vthctntj Ani-il <!n ISfi! 1 proclamation, will be warned off, and those 
 
 ,.^„u ■ ""<*""*• ^P"l ^''' l^"!- > passing Fortress Monroe wiU be required to 
 
 To all whom it may concern : anchor under the guns of the fort and subject 
 
 "I hereby call attention to the proclamation themselves to an examination. 
 
 •of his Excellency Abraham Lincoln President " G. J. Phekdebgeast, 
 
 of the United States, under date of April 27, "Flag-Officer, Commanding Home Squadron." 
 
56 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 acknowledged the existence of a civil war, and thereby recog- 
 nized the Confederate States as belligerents. The example of 
 Great Britain was soon followed by the chief maritime powers 
 in the following order: France, June 10th; JSTetherlands, June 
 16th; Spain. June 17th; Brazil, August 1st. The remaining 
 powers issued *' notifications" at various dates, prohibiting the 
 entry of privateers or prizes into their ports, and defining the 
 conditions under which the public vessels of both parties 
 should be permitted to enter and receive supplies, and draw- 
 ing no distmction between them as belligerents. * 
 
 Mr. Seward could not bring himself to a dignified acquies- 
 cence in the common verdict of the great maritime powers of 
 Europe. He indulged in repeated and petulant complaints, 
 and urged with vehement earnestness that all the world should 
 be subservient to his will, and should re-fashion the code of 
 public law to suit his policy.'^ He wished to practice all the 
 rights which a state of war confers upon a belligerent, but 
 begged to be excused from performing the duties which attach 
 in equal degree to that condition. 
 
 S"otwithstanding the English government considered the 
 privateers of the Confederate States as the lawfully commis- 
 
 1 ITie Secret Service of the Confederate States in 
 Euriype, by James D. Biilloch, Naval representa- 
 tive of the Confederate States in Europe during 
 the Civil War.— Vol. II., p. 294. Commander 
 Bulloch's account of the purchasing, building, 
 and equipment of the Confederate cruisers 
 abroad is straightforward, sincere, and adorned 
 by the graces of style. It is probably the ablest 
 book from the Southern side yet written. 
 
 2 He affirmed that the so-oalled government 
 at Bichmond merely represented " a discon 
 tented faction." Writing to Mr. Dayton on the 
 30th of May, 1861, he says : " The United States 
 cannot for a moment allow the French govern- 
 ment to rest under the delusive belief that they 
 will be content to have the Confederate States 
 recognized as a belligerent power by States with 
 which this nation is at amity. No concert of 
 action among foreign States so recognizing the 
 insurgents can reconcile the United States to 
 such a proceeding, whatever may be the con- 
 sequences of resistance." — Geneva Arbitration. 
 United States Appendix, Vol. I., p. 192, quoted by 
 Sir A. Cockbum, p. 82; Bulloch, Vol. 11., p. 294. 
 
 The views of the British government were ex- 
 pressed in a dispatch to Lord Lyons, her 
 Majesty's Ministtr at Washington, dated June 
 21, 18G1. Lord Russell, in the dispatch referred 
 to, mentions that Mr. Adams had complained of 
 the Queen's proclamation of neutrality as having 
 been hasty and premature, and then adds : "I 
 said (to Mr. Adams), in the first place, that our 
 position was of necessity neutral; that we could 
 not take part either for the North against the 
 South,' or for the South against the North. To 
 this he willingly assented, and said that the 
 United States expected no assistance from us to 
 enable their government to finish the war. I 
 rejoined that if such was the case, as I sup- 
 posed, it would not have been right either 
 towards our admirals and naval commanders, 
 nor towards our merchants and mercantile 
 marine, to leave them without positive and 
 public orders ; that the exercise of belligerent 
 rights of search and capture by a band of ad- 
 
 venturers clustered in some small island in the- 
 Greek Archipelago or in the Atlantic would 
 subject them to the penalty of piracy; but we 
 could not treat 6,000,000 of men, who had de- 
 clared their independence, like a band of 
 marauders or filibusters. If we had done so, we 
 should have done more than the United States- 
 themselves. Their troops had taken prisoners 
 mMiy of the adherents of the Confederacy; but 
 I could not perceive from the newspapers that 
 in any case they had brought these prisoners to 
 trial for high treason, or shot them as rebels." 
 
 The policy of the British government was- 
 more fully explained and justified in a letter 
 from Lord Russell to Mr. Adams, dated May 4, 
 1866. He says : ' • What was the first act of the 
 President of the United States ? He proclaimed 
 on the 19th of Apzil, 1861, the blockade of the- 
 ports of seven States of the Union. But he 
 could lawfully interrupt the trade of neutrals to 
 the Southern States upon one gi'ound only, 
 namely, that the Southera States were cai'rying 
 on war against the government of the United 
 States ; in other words, that they were belliger- 
 ents. Her Majesty's government, on heai'ing of 
 these events, had only two courses to pursue, 
 namely, that of acknowledging the blockade 
 and proclaiming the neutrality of her Majesty, 
 or that of refusing to acknowledge the blockade^ 
 and insisting upon the rights of her Majesty's- 
 subjects to trade with the ports of the South. 
 Her Majesty's government piu'sued the former 
 course as at once the most just and the most 
 friendly to the United States. * * * So much as 
 to the step which you say your government can 
 never regard ' as otherwise than precipitate.' of 
 acknowledging the Southern States as belliger- 
 ents. It was, on the contrary, your own govern- 
 ment which, in assuming the belligerent right 
 of blockade, recognized the Sotithem States as 
 beUigeronts. Had they not been belligerents, the 
 armed ships of the United States would have had 
 no right to stop a single British ship upon the 
 high seas."— United States Documents, Vol. I., pp. 
 2U, 216, quoted by Sir A. Cockbum, pp. 80, 82,83. 
 
CAPTAIN JAMES D. BULLOCH, 
 
 COKFEDEBATE STATES NAVY AGENT IN ENGLAND. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 57 
 
 sioned vessels of a belligerent nation, and did not take Mr. 
 Lincoln's view of the " artificial crisis" in America, yet it did 
 not suffer the privateers of the Confederacy to refit and sell 
 their prizes in the English ports. 
 
 On the 1st June, 1861, Her Britannic Majesty's govern- 
 ment issued orders by which the armed ships of both belliger- 
 ents, whether public ships-of-war or privateers, were inter- 
 dicted from carrying prizes made by them into the ports, har- 
 bors, roadsteads, or waters of the United Kingdom, or of any 
 of Her Majesty's colonies or possessions abroad. 
 
 The government of the Confederate States remonstrated 
 warmly against these orders, as practically unequal in their 
 operation, and unduly disadvantageous to the belligerent 
 whose ports were blockaded. The Secretary of State of the- 
 United States expressed his satisfaction with them, as likely 
 to " prove a death-blow to Southern privateering." These orders, 
 were strictly enforced throughout the whole period of the war, 
 and no' armed vessel was suffered to bring prizes into any 
 British port. The foreign powers admitted the legality of the 
 blockade, and as a necessary and legitimate consequence they 
 acknowledged the Confederate States as belligerents, and threw 
 open their ports to both parties on the same conditions and 
 under precisely similar restrictions. "What Mr. Seward 
 wanted," truthfully says Commander Bulloch, " was that Eu- 
 rope should permit the United States to remain in the enjoy- 
 ment of every privilege guaranteed by treaties of peace, free 
 and unrestricted access to the ports, the right to buy arms and 
 transport them unmolested across the sea, to engage men and 
 forward them to the battle-fields in Virginia without question, 
 and, at the same time, that the whole world should tolerate a 
 total suppression of trade with eleven great provinces, and 
 suffer the United States to seize ships on the high seas, and 
 hale them before prize-courts, unless they were protected by 
 the certificate of an American Consul.'" 
 
 The European Powers having acknowledged the existence 
 of a de facto government at Montgomery, and afterward at 
 
 1 The Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, engaged in war with eleven other 
 through Justice Grier, gave the following judg- great States, adhering to a common authority at 
 ment of a prize case brought before it : *' To Richmond. This was the actual condition of 
 legitimatize the capture of a neutral vessel or affairs. All the special pleading of the politicians 
 property on the high seas, a war must exist at Waehington, all the finesse of diplomatic 
 de/acto, and the neutral must Jiave a knowledge reasoning, could not alter the facts. Foreign- 
 er notice of the intention of one of the parties powers perceived the actual state of affairs, and 
 belligerent to use this mode of coercion against the proclamations of neutrality, and the regula- 
 a port, city, or territory, in possession of the tions specifying the conditions upon which their 
 other, * * * The proclamation of the blockade ports might be used, were framed in accordance- 
 is itself of&cial and conclusive evidence to the with the fact that there was a state of war be- 
 cOurt that a state of war existed which de- tween two separate powers, and although one 
 manded and authorized a recourse to such a could glory in the fuU-iiedged title of "a 
 measure under the circumstances peculiar to government dejure," and the other was shackled 
 the case. The correspondence of Lord Lyons with the more restrictive appellation of "a. 
 with the Secretary of State admits the fact and government de facto," yet in regard to belliger- 
 concludes the question." ent rights and duties they were placed on pre- 
 _ The European powers, acting upon this de- cisely the same footing by the common consent, 
 -cision, acknowledged the Confederate States as and common action of the whole civilized^ 
 belligerents. They saw eighteen or more great yioAA..— Bulloch, Vol. I., p. 303. 
 States, acknowledging a central government at 
 
ss 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Richmond, bv eleven great States, with a population of more 
 than six millions of people, that acknowledgment carried with 
 it the concession of all belligerent rights. Privateering being 
 ■one of these rights, the right of the Confederate government to 
 issue letters marque to private vessels to enable them to cap- 
 ture those of the enemy, was as well established by the code 
 ■of international law as any other vested in a belligerent for its 
 protection and defence. All governments have resorted to 
 privateering whenever they found it available against a mari- 
 time foe. The United States always regarded the right as 
 unquestionable, and never surrendered it, though Great Brit- 
 a.m, France, Austria, Prussia, Eussia, Sardinia, and Turkey 
 agreed among themselves to do so in 1856 by the treaty of 
 
 When the circular invitation of the Powers was sent to 
 ihe United States government in 1856, Secretary of State 
 Wm. L. Marcy, in his letter, dated July 28th, to the foreign 
 Plenipotentiaries, proposed to amend the rules by the addition 
 ■of a new article, excepting private property at sea from cap- 
 ture. No action was taken on the proposal, and the negotia- 
 tions were suspended until Mr. Lincoln's accession to office/ 
 
 1 The following ia the language of the terms of 
 the treaty ; 
 
 "1. Privateering is and remains abolished. 
 
 2. The neutral flag covers enemy's goods with 
 4he exception of contraband of war. 
 
 3. Neutral goods, with the exception of con- 
 traband of war, are not liable t<i capture under 
 the enemy's flag. 
 
 4. Blockades in order to be binding must be 
 •effective — that is to say, maintaiued by a force 
 ^uflicient really to prevent access to the coast of 
 the enemy. 
 
 The governments of the undersigned Plenipo- 
 tentiaries engage to bring the present declara- 
 tion to the knowledge of the States which have 
 not taken part in the Congress of Paris, and to 
 invite them to accede to it. 
 
 Convinced that the maxims which they now 
 proclaim cannot but be received with gratitude 
 by the whole world, the undersigned Plenipo- 
 teutaries doubt not that the efforts of their gov- 
 ■eruments to obty,in the general adoption thereof 
 will be crowned with full success. 
 
 The x>resent declaration is not and shall not 
 be binding except between those powers who 
 have acceded or shall accede to it. 
 
 Done at Paris, the 16th of April, 1856." 
 
 2 In his letter to the foreign powers Mr. Marcy 
 strongly defended privateering. He said, among 
 other things, that: 
 
 '• In regard to the right to employ privateers, 
 which is declared to be abolished by the first 
 principle put forth in the 'beclaration,' there 
 was, if possible, less uncertainty. The right to 
 resort to privateers is as clear as the right to use 
 public armed ships, and as incontestable as any 
 other right appertaining to belligerente. The 
 policy of that law has been occasionally ques- 
 tioned—not, however, by the best authoritiea ; 
 but the law itself has been universally admitted, 
 .and most nations have not hesitated to avail 
 themselves of it ; it is as well sustained by prac- 
 tice and public opinion as any other to be found 
 in the maritime code. 
 
 "There is scarcely any rule of international 
 law which particular nations in their treaties 
 have not occasionally suspended or modified in 
 regard to its application to themselves. Two 
 treaties only can be found in which the con- 
 tracting parties have agreed to abstain from the 
 employment of privateers in case of war be- 
 tween them. The first was a treaty betweeu the 
 King of Sweden and .the States General of the 
 United Provinces, in 1676. Shortly after it was 
 concluded, the parties were involved in war. and 
 the stipulation concerning privateers was en- 
 tirely disregarded by both. The second was the 
 treaty of 1785, between the United States and the 
 King of Prussia. When this treaty was renewed in 
 1799, the clause stipulating not to resort to priva- 
 teering was omitted. I'or the last half-century 
 there has been no anungement.by treaty orother- 
 wise, to abolish the right until the recent proceed- 
 ings of the Plenipotentiaries at Paris. * * * 
 
 " In a work of much repute, published in 
 France almost simultaneously with the proceed- 
 ings of the Congress at Paris, it is declared that 
 ' The issuing of letters of m arque, therefore, is a 
 constantly customary belligerent act. Privateers 
 are bona fide war vessels, manned by volunteers, 
 to whom, by way of reward, the Sovereign re- 
 signs such prizes as they make, in the same man- 
 ner as he sometimes assigns to the land forces a 
 portion of the war contributions levied on the 
 conquered enemy.*' — Pistoye et Duverdy, des 
 Prises Maritimes. * * * 
 
 " No nation which has a due sense of self-re- 
 spect will allow any other, belligerent or neutral, 
 to determine the character of the force which it 
 may deem proper to use in prosecuting hostili- 
 ties; nor will it act wisely if it voluntai'ily sur- 
 renders the right to resort to any means, sanc- 
 tioned by international law, which under any 
 circumstances maybe advantageously used for 
 defence or aggression. * • * The importance 
 of privateers to the community of nations, ex- 
 cepting only those of great naval strength, isnot 
 only vindicated by history, but sustained by 
 high authority . The following passage in the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 59 
 
 About a week after President Davis' proclamation was 
 issued, announcing his purpose of issuing letters of marque, 
 Mr, Seward instructed the Minister of the United States at 
 London to re-open negotiations, and offered to accede uncon- 
 ■ditionally to the Paris Declaration. This proposal seemed to 
 point too strongly to an effort to treat President Davis, Lee 
 ^nd Stonewall Jackson as common brawlers or '' rebels," and 
 the "piratical rovers " as unworthy of shelter or assistance, 
 .and fit only to be pursued and destroyed as a common enemy 
 and a common pest, which the British government refused. ^ 
 As the United States were thus debarred from any present 
 advantage to be derived from the adoption of the rule, the 
 whole question was dropped, and both belligerents were kept 
 under the same restrictions. ^ 
 
 The right, therefore, of President Davis to issue ''letters 
 of marque " was not questioned by any of the European 
 
 "treatise on maritime prizes, to whicli I have be- 
 fore referred, deserves particular attention : 
 
 " Privateers are especially useful to those pow- 
 ers whose navy is inferior to that of their ene- 
 mies. Belligerents, with powerful and exten- 
 .sive naval armaments, may cruise upon the seas 
 with their national navies; but should those 
 States, whose naval forces are of less power 
 and extent, be left to their own resources, they 
 could not hold out in a maritime war; whilst 
 l)y the equipment of privateers they may suc- 
 •ceed in inflicting upon the enemy an injury 
 ■equivalent to that which they themselves sus- 
 tain. Hence, governments have frequently 
 been known, by every possible appliance, to fa- 
 Tor privateering armaments. It has even oc- 
 -curred that aovereigna, not merely satisfied with 
 issuing letters of marque, have also taken, as it 
 were, an interest 'in the armament. Thus did 
 Xouis SrV. frequently lend out his ships, and 
 sometimes reserve for himself a share in the 
 prizes," * * * 
 
 " History throws miich light upon this sub- 
 ject. France, at an early period, was without a 
 navy, and- in her wars with Great Britain and 
 Spain, both then naval powers, she resorted with 
 aignal good effect to privateering, not only for 
 protection, bat successful aggression. She ob- 
 tained many privateers from Holland, and by 
 this force gained decided advantages on the 
 ■ocean over her enemy. Whilst in that condi- 
 tion, France could hardly have been expected 
 to originate or concur in a proposition to abolish 
 privateering. The condition of many of the 
 smaller States of the world is now, in relation to 
 naval powers, not much unlike that of France 
 in the middle of the sixteenth century. At a 
 later period during the reign of Louis XIV.. sev- 
 eral expeditions were fitted out by him, com- 
 posed wholly of privateers, which were most 
 ■effectually employed in prosecuting hostilities 
 with naval powers. * * * 
 
 "The ocean is the common property of all 
 ■nations, and instead of yielding to a measure 
 which will he likely to secure to a few— pos- 
 sibly to one — an ascendancy over it each should 
 pertinaciously retain all means it possesses to 
 •defend the common heritage." 
 
 1 Sir Admiral Cockbum said: "Men refused 
 to see in the leaders of the South the 'rebels' 
 and the ' pirates ' held up by the United States 
 to public reprobation." 
 
 *' Whatever the cause in which they are ex- 
 hibited, devotion and courage will ever find re- 
 spect, and they did so in this instance. Men 
 could not see in the united people of these vast 
 provinces, thus risking all in the cause of na- 
 tionality and independence, the common case 
 of rebels disturbing peace and order on account 
 of imaginary grievances, or actuated by the de- 
 sire to overthrow a government in order to rise 
 upon its ruins. They gave credit to the states- 
 men and warriors of the South — their cause 
 may be right or wrong — for the higher motives 
 which ennoble political action, and all the oppro- 
 brious terms which might be heaped upon the 
 cause in which he fell could not persuade the 
 world that the earth beneath which Stonewall 
 Jackson rests does not cover the remains of a 
 patriot and a hero. ' ' — Geneva Arbiirat'n, p. 72, 114, 
 
 2 The President of the United States was him- 
 self at one time an avowed secessionist or revo- 
 lutionist. In a speech delivered in the House 
 of Eepresentatives on the 12th of January, 1848, 
 Mr, Lincoln, then an honorable member from 
 Illinois, used this language: 
 
 "Any people anywhere being inclined and 
 having the power have a right to rise up and 
 shake off the existing governmeut and form a 
 new one that suits them better. This is a most 
 valuable, sacred right — a right which, we be- 
 lieve, is to liberate the world. Nor is this right 
 confined to cases in which the whole people of 
 an existing government may choose to exercise 
 it. Any portion of such people that can may 
 revolutionize and make their own of so much 
 of the territory as they inhabit. More than this: 
 a majority of any portion of such people may 
 revolutionize, putting down a minority inter- 
 mingled with or near about them, who may op- 
 pose their movements. It is a quality of revo- 
 lutions not to go by old lines or old laws, but to 
 break up both and make new ones." —Appendix, 
 Congressional Globe, 1st Session, SOtk Congress, p. 
 94. See also on this subject, opinion of Alexan- 
 der Hamilton, Baucroft's History of the United 
 States, pp, 213 and 232; also to language of John 
 Adams in same work. Also Eaivle on the Consti- 
 tution, p. 292. Appendix to the Virginia edition 
 of Blackstone's Commentaries by St. George Tucker 
 in 1802, pp. 73, 74; Dwight's History of Con- 
 neciicut, pp. 436, 436, 437; 8th Mass. Mep&rts,54:6; 
 Sch&rt's History of Maryland, Vol. III., pp. 338 
 to 346, etc. 
 
60 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 powers, and he was justified in his course by the acts of the 
 de facto government of the revolted colonies in 1776, and by 
 the more formally recognized government at Washington, in 
 1812-15, and 1861-5. 
 
 In July, 1861, the U. S. House of Representatives passed 
 a resolution authorizing the Secretary of the Treasury to em- 
 ploy a sufficient force to protect the commerce of the United 
 States from the Confederate privateers. The object of this 
 act was to send out privateers to capture those of the Confed- 
 eracy that were annoying U. S. commerce. 
 
 In October following, Secretary Welles wrote" the follow- 
 ing letter in relation to granting letters of marque: 
 
 " Navi Department, WASHiNaTON, Oct. 1, 1861. 
 " In relation to the communication of R. B. Forbes, Esq. — a copy of 
 ■which was sent by you to this department on the 16th ultimo, inquiring^ 
 ■whether letters of marque cannot be furnished for the propeller Pembroke, 
 ■which is about to be dispatched to China — I have the honor to state that 
 it appears to me that there are objections to, and no authority for, grant- 
 ing letters of marque in the present contest. I am not aware that Con- 
 gress, which has the exclusive power of granting letters of marque and 
 reprisal, has authorized such letters to be issued against the insurgents; 
 and were there such authorization, I am not prepared to advise its exer- 
 cise, because it would, in my view, be a recognition of the assumption of 
 the insurgents that they are a distinct and independent nationality. Un- 
 dei" the act of August 5, 1861, ' supplementary to an act entitled an act 
 to protect the commerce of the United States and to punish the crime of 
 piracy,' the President is authorized to instruct the commanders of ' armed 
 vessels sailing under the authority of any letters of marque and reprisal 
 granted by the Congress of the United States, or the commanders of any 
 other suitable vessels, to subdue, seize, take, and, if on the high seas, to 
 send into any port of the United States any vessel or boat, built, pur- 
 chased, fitted out or held,' etc. This allusion to letters of marque does 
 not authorize such letters to be issued, nor do I find any other act eontam- 
 ing such authorization. But the same act, in the second section, as above 
 quoted, gives the President power to authorize the ' commanders of any 
 suitable vessels to subdue, seize,' etc. Under this clause, letters permis- 
 sive, under proper restrictions and guards against abuse, might be granted 
 to the propeller Pembroke, so as to meet the views expressed by Mr. 
 Forbes. This would seem to be lawful and perhaps not liable to the ob- 
 jections of granting letters of marque against our own citizens, and that, 
 too, without law or authority from the only constituted power that can 
 grant it. I have the honor to transmit herewith a copy of a letter from. 
 Messrs. J. M. Forbes & Co., and others, addressed to this department, on 
 the same subject." Gideon Welles.'' 
 
 With the view of destroying Confederate privateers, the 
 United States Congress, in March, 1863, passed a bill author- 
 izing the President to issue letters of marque. 
 
 "By this measure," the New York Herald, of March, 8th, 1863, said, 
 " Mr. Lincoln will have power to cause the ocean to swarm with our 
 'militia of the seas, ' * * * The American republic is not guided by 
 the policy of European powers. It is not bound by the declaration of 
 the Congress of Paris, for the simple reason that it did not agree to It. At 
 the time, Mr. Marcy, on the part of the United States, offered to agree to 
 the proposition to abolish privateering if the European Powers would 
 agree to abolish all captures on the sea of private propei'ty, except 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 61 
 
 contraband of war— thus extending to the ocean the rule that prevails in 
 modern times exempting private property from, capture on the land. 
 England and Prance objected, particularly England, by whose influence 
 the offer was rejected. Again, since our civil war began, Mr. Seward pro- 
 posed to England and France to adopt the proposition in the declaration 
 of Paris, to abolish privateering, provided they would agree to treat it as 
 piracy all over the world, Uke the African slave trade. But, though no 
 nation could be aggrieved by the establishment of this rule, and although 
 all the minor powers of Europe had agreed to the proposition of the 
 Paris Conference— even those in the interior, who had not a single ship 
 on the sea — ^yet the Western Powers refused the overture of the Ajmeriean 
 government, on the ground that it was then too late." 
 
 The Royal Gazette of England, on July 31, 1863, comment- 
 ing upon the act passed by the U. S. Congress, authorizing 
 the issuing of letters of marque, said: 
 
 "The U. S. Congress, in its last session, authorized the President, if 
 he deemed it proper, to issue letters of marque. His having not done so, 
 in view of the destruction of property by the Alabama and the Florida, 
 is severely censured by a writer in one of the late New Tork papers. This 
 writer suggests that a reward of $500,000 be given to any letter of marque 
 that should capture and brin^into any of the ports of the United States 
 any Confederate privateer, or $250,000 for the sinking or otherwise de- 
 stroying of such a privateer. The writer concludes by observing that the 
 ' almighty dollar might then be the means of bringing privateering to an 
 end.' 
 
 "We can hardly understand why such a measure should be adopted. 
 When patriotism is not sufQcient to induce men to serve their country, is 
 it probable that the dollar will? Will the dollar inspire courage to a man 
 when the sight of his lowered flag fails to do so ? And, besides, are there 
 not enough U. S. ships-of-war skimming the seas after the Alabama and 
 the Florida, the only two known Confederate privateers, and are these 
 Federal vessels not commanded by admirals and officers that the Union 
 boasts of 1 The issuing by the Washington government of letters of 
 marque would be, indeed, an acknowledgment of the inefficiency of their 
 navy compared to the two or three comparatively small vessels-of-war 
 owned by the Confederacy, and of the incapacity of the men at the 
 head of their fleet." 
 
 If the precedents established by the United States vsrere 
 just and lawful acts of war, then similar acts done by authority 
 of the de facto government of the Confederate States in 1861-5 
 were not "criminal" and "nefarious." 
 
 The license or "letters of marque," issued by a belligerent 
 government to a private armed ship, to capture the ships and 
 goods of the enemy at sea, had its origin in the Middle Ages, 
 when princes issued to their subjects -licenses to cross the 
 march or frontier of a neighboring power in order to make 
 reprisals for an injury. It was extended to the high seas in 
 the fourteenth century. But the practice was not general 
 till the end of the sixteenth century. The first instance in 
 which the aid of privateers was deemed important in war was 
 in the struggle between Spain and her revolted provinces of 
 the Netherlands. The Prince of Orange, the leader of the 
 revolt, issued letters of marque against Spain in 1570, and his 
 privateers became terrible. Ever since that time the use of 
 
63 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 privateers has been legalized in Europe, unless where parties 
 agree by treaty to abolish it as against each other. The- 
 French were the first, on a large scale, to send out those 
 scourges of the sea. The British imitated their example, and 
 their illustrious naval commander, Drake, was a privateers- 
 man. At the close of the French war with England, by the 
 peace of Amiens, the latter nation had 30,000 French sailors- 
 in prison. In our Revolutionary war with England, the 
 American privateer played a very important part. 
 
 On May 20, 1775, articles of confederation and perpetual 
 union were entered into by the delegates of the several colo- 
 nies of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, etc. A resolution was 
 at the same time passed, that after the expiration of six 
 months (from July 30, .1775) all the ports of the said colonies 
 were declared to be thenceforth open to the ships of every State 
 in Europe that would admit and protect the commerce of the 
 colonies. ' 
 
 Although by the above articles the colonists usurped the 
 rights of sovereignty with regard to peace and war, the enter- 
 ing into alliances, the appointment of civil and military 
 officers, etc., still their connection with Great Britain was- 
 maintained, and no de facto independent government was- 
 established. 
 
 On June 13, 1775, General Gage issued a proclamation, by 
 which a pardon was offered in the King's name to all those 
 who should forthwith lay down their arms, threatening the 
 treatment of rebels and traitors to all those who did not accept 
 the proffered pardon. This proclamation was looked upon as 
 the preliminary to immediate action, and on the 17th June 
 hostilities commenced between the colonists and royal troops 
 in the neighborhood of Charlestown. In July, 1775, the confed- 
 eracy assumed the appellation of the Thirteen United Colonies, 
 and General Washington was appointed to the command of 
 the army of the confederation. Hostilities were carried, not 
 only in the colonies, but Canada was also invaded by the 
 colonial forces. 
 
 The first act of the Congress for the formation of a navy 
 was promulgated on October 13, 1775, when two vessels were 
 ordered to be armed, and on the 30th of the same month two 
 more armed vessels were ordered to be fitted for sea. On 
 November 35, 1775, resolutions were passed, directing seizures 
 and capture under commissions obtained from the Congress, 
 together with the condemnation of British vessels employed 
 in a hostile manner against the colonies; the mode of trial 
 and of condemnation was pointed out, and the shares of the 
 prizes were apportioned. On November 38, 1775, Congress 
 adopted rules for the regulation of the navy of the United 
 Colonies. On the 13th December, a report was sanctioned for 
 
 1 The trade of the British colonists in America at this period was carried on solely by British, 
 and colonial shipping. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 6$ 
 
 fitting out a naval armament, to consist in the whole of thir- 
 teen ships. On the 23d December, officers were appointed tO' 
 command the armed vessels. On January 6, 1776, a regula- 
 tion was adopted relative to the division of prizes and prize- 
 money taken by armed vessels. On March 23, 1786, resolutions- 
 were adopted authorizing the fitting out of private armed ves- 
 sels to cruise against the enemies of the United Colonies. On. 
 April 2d, 1776, the form of a commission for private armed 
 vessels was agreed upon, and on the 3d April instructions to 
 the commanders of private armed vessels were considered and 
 adopted. They authorized the capture of all ships and other 
 vessels belonging to the inhabitants of Great Britain on the^ 
 high seas, or between high-water and low-water marks, except 
 vessels bringing persons who intended to reside and settle ia 
 the United Colonies. 
 
 The whole of these laws were promulgated previously tO' 
 the final Declaration of Independence issued on July 4, 1776. 
 In the meantime, the different powers of Europe, notwith- 
 standing the declarations of neutrality in the conflict between 
 Great Britain and her colonies, more particularly France, 
 Spain, and Holland, almost openly expressed their sympathy 
 with the cause of the colonists, and aided them with arms- 
 and money, and allowed the fitting out of ships, the repairs 
 and armaments, of privateers in their ports, even previous 
 to the receipt of the Declaration of Independence of the colo- 
 nies, passed on July 4, 1776 ; the letter from the American 
 Committee of Secret Correspondence to Mr. Silas Deane, their 
 agent in Paris, inclosing the Declaration of Independency, 
 with instructions to make it known to the powers of Europe, 
 not being received until November 7, 1776. 
 
 The exploits of Paul Jones by land and sea, making raids- 
 upon the British coasts, and sometimes capturing English 
 ships-of-war, are more like romance than reality. The deeds 
 of Captain Reed, of the General Armstrong, are well known. 
 The letters of marque issued by the Continental Congress were 
 held to be valid two years before the new government was- 
 recognized by any foreign power; and during the first year 
 the American privateers captured 530 British vessels and their 
 cargoes, valued at $5,000,000. During the Revolutionary war 
 this country had 1,500 privateers on the ocean, having 15,000 
 guns. 
 
 In 1781, according to the Salem (Massachusetts) Gazette, 
 privateering was the principal business of the town. In Mr. 
 Mies' volume, containing " principles and acts of the Revolu- 
 tion," will be found, at p. 376, a " list of privateers fitted out 
 and chiefly owned in Salem and Beverly, from March 1 to 
 November 1, 1781," embracing 36 ships, with 476 guns and 
 3,645 men ; 16 brigs, with 306 guns and 870 men ; 8 schooners, 
 with 50 guns and 335 men ; 2 sloops, with 14 guns and 70 men; 
 and 7 shallops, with 130 men. 
 
64 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Massachusetts has taken the lead in several operations in 
 this country. She and some of the other New England States 
 took the leading part in the slave trade; she also took the lead 
 in the early part of this century in secession, or nullification. ' 
 Before the Declaration of Independence, and of course long 
 before the formation of the Dresent Constitution, as early, 
 indeed, as the 10th of November, 1775, the State of Massachu- 
 setts passed a law to authorize the fitting-out of privateers and 
 to establish a court for the trial and condemnation of prizes. "^ 
 That law preceded by fifteen days the action of the old Con- 
 tinental Congress upon the same subject; for it was on the 
 25th of November, 1775, that the Congress passed a law author- 
 izing privateering. Massachusetts was two weeks ahead of 
 Congress, and she passed a law to institute and encourage 
 privateering. Massachusetts did not stand alone in this 
 act, her lead was followed by other States; by Pennsylvania, 
 Maryland and other commonwealths. The Continental Con- 
 gress encouraged the practice. 
 
 The records of the Council of Maryland show that up to 
 April 1, 1777, licenses to privateers were issued by the Council 
 of Safety, and that these vessels were so active that their prizes 
 captured and sent into the Chesapeake realized over $1,000,000. 
 From April 1, 1777, to March 14, 1783, a period of six years, the 
 privateers which sailed out of the Chesapeake, furnished with 
 letters of marque and reprisal, numbered 248, carrying in all ' 
 1,810 guns and 640 swivels. We find in the list of owners 
 of these vessels and their commanders some of the very best 
 people in the State, and the ancestors of a number of those 
 who were distinguished on the Union side during the late war 
 between the States. We need only refer to the names of John 
 Eodgers, David Porter, Alexander Murray, Joshua Barney, 
 Robert Morris (the great financier of Philadelphia, the friend 
 of Washington and Franklin), Robert Purviance, Alexander 
 McKim, James Calhoun, the first Mayor of Baltimore, and 
 "William Patterson, the father of Madame Bonaparte. 
 
 In 1793, when the war broke out between France and Great 
 Britain, Baltimore sent to sea some forty or fifty privateers 
 
 1 On the lat of August, 1812, Governor Strong, it, for, in point of fact, she never furnished her 
 
 of MasaachusettH, addressed a letter to the three qiiota, or even a solitary militiaman, we believe, 
 
 judges of Massachusetts, in which, amongst under the requisition which was made upon her 
 
 other things, he propounded to the judges this by the President. What was this but secession, or 
 
 question : " Whether it was for the President of revolution, or practical nullification in tJhe most 
 
 the United States, or for the States themselves, ultra shape ? We all know how persistently the 
 
 respectively, to determine the Constitutional conscription and impressment scheme of Presi- 
 
 ■exigency upon which the militia of the States dent Monroe, for raising an army in 1816, was 
 
 were liable to be ordered oiit into the service of resisted and opposed by five of the New England 
 
 the Federal govei-nment ?" The reply of the States; how it first led to a legislative protest and 
 
 judges was, " That that right was vested solely resolutions on the part of Connecticut, strongly 
 
 in the commanders-in-chief of the militia of the tinctured with secession and nullification; and 
 
 several States." This question, it is true, was howitafterwardsled to that celebrated conclave 
 
 never formally adjudicated by the judges, but called the Hartford Convention, which met on 
 
 this was their answer to the question; audit the 16th of December, 1816, and whose members 
 
 was as much as to say {so far as the Governor, were nothing more or less than a set of nuUifiers 
 
 and the judges at least could say so) that if the or secessionists under the cloak of federalism. 
 President enforced, or attempted to enforce, this 
 
 right that was claimed for him. the State of - Hildreth's HisUrfy of the United States^ Vol. 
 
 Massachusetts would resist it; and she did resist 111., p. 101. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 65 
 
 under the French flag to cruise against British commerce. 
 A great number of these vessels were afloat within three 
 months, not only equipped, armed and fitted out in port, 
 but they were owned, officered and manned by citizens of 
 Baltimore. These vessels were in the French and Spanish 
 service even after the British cruisers blockaded every French 
 and Spanish port from Antwerp to Genoa, and they made cap- 
 tures while the war continued. The records of the Supreme 
 Court of the United States abound with admiralty appeals in 
 cases of this kind during the French war, the British owners 
 trying to recover their vessels captured by American privateers 
 sailing under the French flag. 
 
 In the war of 1813 the number of British ships captured 
 by American privateers was immense. In less than five 
 months after the declaration of war Baltimore sent to sea 
 forty-two armed vessels, carrying 330 guns, and manned by 
 3,000 men. The Bossie, in forty-five days, took prizes valued 
 at $1,289,000. The next cruise of this vessel, from July to 
 November, yielded $1,500,000. The Rolla in a brief cruise took 
 seven vessels, 150 men and $2,600,000. The Amelia, in eighty- 
 five days, took $1,000,000. The Sarpy, in twenty days, took 
 $500,000. The damage done by these vessels to British com- 
 merce is hard to exaggerate. In three years the American 
 privateers captured over 3,000 vessels, of which nearly one- 
 third were taken by the Baltimore letters of marque. 
 
 The whole number of privateers and private-armed ships 
 that were commissioned as cruising vessels, and all others ac- 
 tively engaged in commerce during our war with Great 
 Britain in the years 1812, 1813, and 1814, were 250 sail. They 
 belonged to the different ports in the United States as follows: 
 
 From Baltimore, 58 ; from New York, 55; from Salem, 40; 
 from Boston, 32 ; from Philadelphia, 14 ; from Portsmouth, 
 N. H., 11; from Charleston, 10; from Marblehead, 4; from 
 Bristol, R. I., 4; from Portland, 3; from Newbury port, 3; from 
 Norfolk, 3; from Newbern, N. C, 2; from New Orleans, 2; from 
 New London, 1; from Newport, R. I.,l; from Providence, 
 E. I., 1; from Barnstable, Mass., 1; from Fair Haven, Mass., 1; 
 from Gloucester, Mass., 1 ; from Washington City, 1 ; from 
 Wilmington, N. C, 1; from other places belonging to Eastern 
 ports, 3. Total, 250. 
 
 When the South American war of independence occurred, 
 the United States furnished a great many privateers to nearly 
 all the new States. The commodore of the Columbian navy was 
 a Baltimorean, and the same city fitted out privateersmen for 
 Venezuela, Chili, Buenos Ayres, Peru, and several other States, 
 which preyed both upon Spanish and Portuguese commerce. 
 The Portuguese Minister, in 1816, complained to President 
 Monroe that twenty-six of these vessels had been fitted out 
 and armed in Baltimore alone, and in 1819 they were reported 
 to have captured fifty Portuguese vessels. 
 
66 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The British, in the Revolutionary war, spoke of the Chesa- 
 peake Bay as "a nest of pirates," and the Spanish Minister at 
 Washington in 1817, Don Luis de Onis, wrote to Mr. Monroe 
 that " it is notorious that * * * whole squadrons of pirates 
 have been fitted out " from Baltimore and New Orleans. He 
 complained that the privateer Swift, which, sailing under the 
 flag of Buenos Ayres, had just captured the Spanish polacca 
 Pastora, " is now in Baltimore River, and her captain, James 
 Barnes, who has so scandalously violated the law of nations, 
 the neutrality of this government and the existing treaty, has 
 had the effrontery to make a regular entry of his vessel at the 
 Custom House of Baltimore, declaring his cargo to consist of 
 bales and packages, containing silks, laces, and other valu- 
 able articles — all, as you may suppose, plundered from the 
 Spaniards."' 
 
 In 1861, when the Southern Confederacy recognized priva- 
 teering as a legitimate instrument of warfare, the North 
 called it piracy, as the British did in the war of 1776 and 1812. 
 But President Davis, having the example of his revolutionary 
 ancestors before him for fitting up and sending forth armed 
 vessels to prey upon the commerce of the enemies of his 
 country, soon availed himself of the opportunity. Simulta- 
 neous with the issuing of the proclamation of Mr. Lincoln, 
 blockading the Southern ports, the Collectors of the various 
 ports were directed by the U. S. Secretary of the Treasury to 
 refuse clearances to any vessels bound for ports in the States 
 which had seceded or which might afterwards secede. Ac- 
 cordingly, the lines of steamers, from New York and Balti- 
 more to Charleston and Savannah and New Orleans, dis- 
 continued their trips, and those steamers which remained in 
 New York were immediately chartered by the Federal gov- 
 ernment to carry troops. The Nashville, being at Charleston, 
 was seized by the authorities there; the Star of the West, 
 at Indianola, with provisions on board for the troops in Texas, 
 was also seized by the armed steamer Matagorde, at New Or- 
 leans. The Yorktown and Jamestown steamers were seized 
 by Governor Letcher, at Richmond. Besides these steamships, 
 a half-dozen revenue cutters and a number of schooners were 
 seized in the South and converted into war-vessels. These 
 seizures created considerable commotion in mercantile circles 
 North, where the most of them were owned. In the mean- 
 while, the authorities at the North seized all the vessels and 
 other property, belonging to the citizens of the South, in their 
 respective ports. 
 
 In retaliation for the seizure of Southern property by the 
 United States, the citizens of Mobile seized the brig Belle of 
 the Bay, lying in that port, loaded with rice from Boston. 
 Another party seized the schooners Daniel Townsend, the Stag 
 
 1 This reads lite Bome of the letters of U. S. the cruiBes of the Alabarna and other Confed- 
 Minister Adams to Lord Buseell in regard to erate men-of-war. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 67 
 
 and Anna Smith, loaded with assorted cargoes. The State 
 Artillery Continentals chartered the steamer Gunnison, and 
 captured the B. L. Gamble, and anchored her under the guns 
 of Fort Morgan; but she was afterwards released. The Mont- 
 gomery (Alabama) Mail of the 39th of May, said : " We learn 
 that there are now quite a number of privateers in the service 
 of the Confederate government cruising off the Gulf and 
 Atlantic coast, all well armed and manned — dispatches hav- 
 ing been received in the citj^ showing, that hundreds of others 
 are fitting out at various points for the same purpose.'" 
 
 Shortly after the secession of South Carolina, the State 
 appropriated $150,000 to establish a sea-coast police under the 
 direction of Governor F. W. Pickens, with authority to pur- 
 chase three screw-propellers. The Governor established a 
 State navy similar to that of the United States. He enlisted 
 thirty-two men for each of his boats, with a captain and first 
 lieutenant, besides ordinary crews, firemen and engineers. He 
 intended to station one of his boats in Charleston, another at 
 Beaufort, and the third at Georgetown. He found it exceed- 
 ingly difficult to procure boats suitable for the service and 
 had to content himself with fitting out small schooners. They 
 kept up communication between the points named, and 
 gave protection, as far as they were able, from invasion by 
 lawless bands in small crafts and skippers that infested the 
 coast. • 
 
 On the 13th of March, South Carolina put afloat her first 
 vessel-of-war since the Revolution in 1776; Gov. Pickens pur- 
 chased her at Richmond, Va., and altered her for service; 
 armed with twenty-four pounders she was regularly equipped. 
 The Governor directed her to be named Lady Davis, in 
 compliment to the lady of the first President of the Confed- 
 erate States. Her officers were Lieut. Thomas B. Huger, 
 commanding, with Lieuts. William G. Dozier and John 
 Grimball. 
 
 The Lady Davis made several captures of Federal vessels 
 off Charleston, and, on May 1, she fired on a schooner that 
 escaped from the port, belonging to Freetown, Mass., and 
 wounded one of the crew. " 
 
 1 A correspondent of the New York Herald, 2 He following is a copy of clearance of ves- 
 
 writing from Montgomerv on May 7, 1861, ^^1^ f™"" ^^^ I'"'-'* °' Charleston, S. C, with the 
 
 alterations in the seals, etc. : 
 
 * DlSTMCT OP THE POBT OF ChABLEBTON, > 
 
 " But it may he asked, who will take these State of South Carolina. 5 
 
 letters of marque? Where Is the government of 
 Montgomery to find ships? The answer is to be 
 found in the fact tJiat already numerous appUca- 
 iions have ieenreceived from the ship-owners of New 
 England, from the whalers of New Bedford, and 
 from others in the Northern States for these very 
 
 o These are to certify, all 
 
 ^ House, o ; whom it may concern. That 
 § ^:= ^ 5* ■ Master or 
 
 Sheaf 
 
 of 
 Wheat 
 
 Commander of the - 
 - called the - 
 
 _ , of burthen 
 
 S. Carolina. P : tons or thereabout, 
 
 „ o mounted with guns, 
 
 ktters of marque, accompanied by the highest navigated with men, and bound for 
 
 securities and guarantees! This statement I .5*™,^ on board cargo as per 
 
 _„t„„„i^ , . , . !-.,_,, .i annexed manifest hath entered and cleared his 
 
 make on the very highest authority. I leave it vessel according to law. 
 
 to you to deal with the facte." W. F. COLCOCK, Collector. 
 
68 THE CONFEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The privateer Savannah was the first captured, and the 
 first that received a commission from the Confederate States— 
 her letters of marque being indorsed No. 1, and was as follows: 
 
 JEFFERSON DAVIS, 
 
 PRESIDENT OF THE CONFEDBBATB STATES OP AMERICA. 
 
 To all who shall see these presents, greeting .-—Know ye, that by virtue 
 of the power vested in me by law, I have commissioned, and do hereby 
 commission, have authorized, and do hereby authorize, the schooner or 
 vessel called the Savannah (more particularly described in the schedule 
 hereunto annexed), whereof T. Harrison Baker is commander, to act as a 
 private armed vessel in the service of the Confederate States, on the high 
 seas against the United States of America, their ships, vessels, goods and 
 effects, and those of her citizens, during the pendency of the war now 
 existing between the said Confederate States and the said United States. 
 
 This commission to continue in force until revoked by the President 
 of the Confederate States for the time being. Schedule of description of 
 the vessel— name, schooner Savannah; tonnage, 53 |J tons; armament, 
 one large pivot gun and small arms; number of crew, thirty. 
 
 Given under my hand and the seal of the Confederate States, at Mont- 
 gomery, this 18th day of May, A.D. 1861. 
 
 Jefferson Davis. 
 By the President— R. Toombs, Secretary of State. 
 
 The Savannah was a fast-sailing schooner of about fifty- 
 four tons, having been formerly pilot boat Ko. 7 in Charleston 
 harbor. She carried one eighteen-pound gun amidships upon 
 a swivel, and was provided with a crew of thirty-two men, 
 including officers, as well as a necessary supply of arms, am- 
 munition, etc. In May she was fitted out in Charleston as a 
 privateer; on Sunday, June 3, she went to sea under the com- 
 mand of Capt. Thomas Harrison Baker. The instructions 
 to the commanders of all letters of marque or privateers were 
 as follows : 
 
 1. The tenor of your commission, under the Act of Congress, entitled, 
 " An act recognizing the existence of war between the United States and 
 the Confederate States, and concerning letters of marque, prizes and 
 prize goods," a copy of which is hereto annexed, will be kept constantly 
 in your view. The high seas referred to in your commission you will un- 
 derstand generally to refer to the low-water" mark; but with the exception 
 of the space within one league, or three miles, from the shore of countries 
 at peace with the United States and the Confederate States. You never- 
 theless execute your commission within the distance of the shore of the 
 nation at war with the United States, and even on the waters within the 
 jurisdiction of such nation, if permitted to do so. 
 
 3. You are to pay the strictest regard to the rights of the neutral 
 vessels; you are to give them as little molestation or interruption as will 
 consist with the right of ascertainingtheir neutral character, and of de- 
 taining and bringing them in for regular adjudication in the proper cases. 
 
 You are particularly to avoid even the appearance of using force or 
 seduction, with a view to deprive such vessels of the crews or the passen- 
 gers, other than persons in the militarjr service of the enemy. 
 
 3. Towards enemy's vessels and their crews you are to proceed, in exer- 
 cising the rights of war, with all the justice and humanity which charac- 
 terize this government and its citizens. 
 
 4. The master, and one or more of the principal persons, belonging to 
 the captured vessels, are to be sent, as soon after the capture as may be. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 69 
 
 to the judge or judges of the proper courts in the Confederate States, to 
 be examined upon oath, touching the interest or property of the captured 
 vessel and her lading; and, at the same time, are to be delivered to the 
 judge or judges all papers, charter parties, bills of lading, letters and 
 other documents and writings found on board, and the said papers to be 
 proved by the affidavit of the commander of the captured vessel, or some 
 other person present at the capture, to be produced as received, without 
 fraud, addition, subtraction or embezzlement. 
 
 5. Property, even of the enemy, is exempt from seizure on neutral 
 vessels, unless it be contraband of war. 
 
 If goods contraband of war are found on any neutral vessel, and the 
 commander thereof shall offer to deliver them up, the offer shall be ac- 
 cepted and the vessel left at liberty to pursue its voyage, unless the 
 quantity of contraband goods shall be greater than can be conveniently 
 received on board your vessel, in which case the neutral vessel may be 
 carried into port for the deUvery of the contraband goods. 
 
 The following articles are declared by this government contraband of 
 war, as well as all others that are so declared by the laws of nations, 
 viz. : 
 
 All arms and implements serving for the purpose of war by land or 
 sea, such as cannons, mortars, guns, muskets, rifles, pistols, petards, 
 bombs, grenades, balls, shot, shell, pikes, swords, bayonets, javelins, 
 lances, horse furniture, bolsters, belts, tind generally all other implements 
 of war. 
 
 Also, timber for ship-building, pitch, tar, rosin, copper in sheets, sails, 
 hemp, cordage, and generally whatever may serve directly to the equip- 
 ment of vessels, wrought iron and planks only excepted. 
 
 Neutral vessels, conveying enemy's dispatches or military persons in 
 the service of the enemy, forfeit their neutral character, and are liable to 
 capture and condemnation. But this rule does not apply to neutral ves- 
 sels bearing dispatches from the public ministers or ambassadors of the 
 enemy residing in neutral countries. 
 
 By the command of the President of the Confederate States, 
 
 Robert Toombs, Secretary of State. 
 
 FORM OF BOUI). 
 
 Know all men by these presents : That we (Note 1.) , are bound 
 
 to the Confederate States of America, in the full sum of (Note 2. ) 
 
 thousand dollars, to the payment whereof, well and truly to be made, we 
 hind ourselves, our heirs, executors and administrators, jointly and sever- 
 ally, by these presents. 
 
 The condition of this obligation is such, that whereas, application has 
 been made to the said Confederate States of America, for the grant of a 
 
 commission of letter of marque and general reprisals, authorizing to 
 
 (Note 3.) or vessel called the , to act as a private armed vessel in the ser- 
 vice of the Confederate States on the high seas, against theUnited States of 
 America, its ships and vessels, and those of its citizens, during the pen- 
 dency of the war now existing between the said Confederate States and 
 the said United States. 
 
 Now, if the owners, ofiBcers and crews, who shall be employed on 
 board of said vessel when commissioned, shall observe the laws of the 
 Confederate States and the instructions which shall be given them accord- 
 ing to law for the regulation of their conduct, and shall satisfy all dam- 
 ages and injuries which shall be done or committed contrary to the tenor 
 thereof by such vessel during her commission, and shall deliver up said 
 commission when revoked by the President of the Confederate States, 
 then this obligation shall be void, but otherwise shall remain in full force 
 and effect. 
 
 Signed, sealed and delivered in the presence of , on this day 
 
 of 
 
 q' jj' ^witnesses. 
 
70 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 NOTB 1.— This blank must be filled with the name of the commander 
 for the time being, and the owners and at least two responsible sureties 
 interested in the vessel, 
 
 Note 3. — This blank must be filled with a "five " if the vessel be pro- 
 vided with only one hundred and fifty men, or a less number; if with 
 more than that number, the blank must be filled with a "ten." 
 
 Note 3.— This blank must be fiUed with the character of the vessel, 
 "ship," "brig," "schooner,'' " steamer," etc. 
 
 On the 4th of May, Capt. Baker fell in with the brig 
 Joseph, of Rockland, Maine, from Cardenas, Cuba, with a 
 cargo of sugar consigned to Welch & Co., of Philadelphia. 
 The Joseph fell an easy prize, and was sent into Georgetown, 
 S. C, where she was condemned and sold. The Savannah, 
 having accompanied the Joseph almost into port, put to sea 
 again in search for other prizes. Soon after the two vessels 
 parted company, the U. S. brig Perry, man-of-war, hove in 
 sight, a little north of the Hole in the Wall; but as her guns 
 were run back, her port-holes closed, and the vessel otherwise 
 purposely disguised, she was mistaken for a merchantman, 
 and the Savannah, flushed with success, made all sail for the 
 supposed prize. The privateer had got within a mile of the 
 brig before Capt. Baker discovered his blunder, when he 
 put about. The Perry at once gave chase, crowding all sail, 
 and fired several shots, four of which were returned by the 
 eighteen-pounder of the Savannah. Two of the shots from 
 the Perry went through the foresail of the privateer; the shots 
 of the Savannah did not take effect. Capt. Baker, seeing 
 no possible chance to escape, surrendered his vessel. The 
 officers and crew were taken on board the Perry, and were 
 subsequently transferred to the Minnesota, lying ofif Charles- 
 ton. The Minnesota put a prize crew of seven upon the 
 Savannah, Midshipman McCook commanding, and they 
 brought her to New York, where she arrived on June 15th, 
 1861. The U. S. steamer Harriet Lane, on June 25th, brought 
 the ofiicers and the remainder of the crew of the Savannah to 
 New York. 
 
 The capture of the Savannah, and the placing of her crew 
 in irons on board of the frigate Minnesota, excited consider- 
 able discussion. A great deal of debate also arose in relation 
 to- the disposition that should be made of them. The war 
 press of New York claimed that, if they were to be considered 
 privateers, they should have been hung at the yard-arm, and 
 they demanded, at all hazards, the execution of the death 
 penalty. Though the Confederate government was recog- 
 nized by the courts as belligerent, and a state of war was held 
 to exist, ' the government of the United States attempted to 
 
 1 In the caae of the prize bark Hiawatfia, the conatitute a state of war under the law of 
 
 point presented by the counsel for her owners, nations ; that no lawful blockade had been 
 
 in conjunction with the counsel for other ves- established or maintained, or violated under the 
 
 aela seized under similar circumstances, were law of nations: that no State, or combination of 
 
 that the court had no jurisdiction; that the States, could be treated as enemies of the 
 
 public disturbances which then existed did not United States government ; that the President 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 71 
 
 put those engaged in hostilities at sea upon a different foot- 
 ing, and to bring them to trial for piracy. The proclamation 
 of Mr. Lincoln, on April 19, gave expression to this principle. 
 In it he said: " And I hereby proclaim and declare that if any 
 person under the pretended authority of the said States, or 
 under any other pretence, shall molest a vessel of the United 
 States, or the person or cargo on board of her, such person will 
 be held amenable to the laws of the United States for the pre- 
 vention and punishment of piracy." 
 
 A privateer, as the name imports, is a private armed ship, 
 fitted out at the owner's expense, but commissioned by a bel- 
 ligerent government to capture the ships and goods of the 
 enemy at sea, or the ships of neutrals when conveying to the 
 enemy goods contraband of war. A privateer differs from a 
 pirate in this, that the one has a commission and the other 
 has none. A privateer is entitled to the same rights of war 
 as the public vessels of the belligerent. A pirate ship has no 
 rights, and her crew are liable to be captured and put to death 
 by all nations, as robbers and murderers on the high seas. 
 The policy of neutrals recognizing privateers as legitimate 
 belligerent ships is founded on the interests of humanity and 
 the common desire to prevent piracy. If privateers were not 
 recognized by neutral nations they would become pirates, and, 
 instead of making prisoners of the crews of prize vessels, they 
 would massacre them, appropriate the cargoes and sink the 
 ships. But, being recognized, they are under the surveillance 
 of the government commissioning them as well as the gov- 
 ernments of neutral nations, and they are responsible for their 
 acts to both. The government, moreover, which issues letters 
 of marque is liable to neutral nations for the misdeeds of its 
 privateers. To a government with a small navy, or no navy, 
 and with slender resources, privateers are a great advantage, 
 because they not only cost the government nothing, beiag 
 owned and equipped by private individuals, but, on the con- 
 trary, they are a source of revenue, for they are obliged to 
 pay a percentage on the value of their captures, in consider- 
 ation of their license. 
 
 The fact that the war was a civil one afforded no reason for 
 a distinction between combatants at sea and combatants on 
 land. As naval warfare is no more criminal than land war- 
 fare, those captured in the one occupation are as much en- 
 titled to be treated as prisoners-of-war as those captured in 
 
 lad no power to estatlish a blookafle, or declare prizes of war. It is sufScient to establish the 
 a state o£ war, without the authority of Congress. legality of the blockade, to show that the ports 
 The exception as to the jurisdiction of the blockaded are under the power and use of the 
 •court was overruled by Judge Betts of New enemies of the United States. So far as their 
 York. A state of war, the judge maintained, did own acts can make them so, the insurgents who 
 exist, and, under the law of nations, the rights hold these ports are as alien and foreign to the 
 of a war waged by a government, to subdue an United States government as if they had de- 
 insurrection or revolt of its own citizens or sub- clared themselves citizens and subjects of vari- 
 jeots, are the same in regard to neutral powers ous South American States; they thus maJte 
 as if hostilities were carried on between in- themselves avowed enemies of the Umted States 
 dependent nations, and apply equally in cap- and are waging a war for the dismemberment of 
 tures of property for municipal offences, or as the nation and destruction of the government. 
 
73 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the other.' The rights and privileges of privateering had 
 been maintained and asserted by the United States, and the 
 separate and distinct existence of the Confederate States as a 
 political power had up to the time of the capture of the Savan- 
 nah been also practically recognized in many ways by the 
 U. S. government. From the outset of the controversy, the 
 Southern States had been scrupulously exact, or rather super- 
 stitiously exact, in recognizing the courtesies and civilities of 
 warfare. Gen. Robert Anderson, who began the war as a 
 subordinate, against pledges and promises, was treated for 
 weeks with more attention and courtesies than were bestowed 
 on many Confederate officers. When taken prisoner, he and 
 his command were released with unusual honor. Gen. Harney 
 was taken prisoner at Harper's Ferry and released with honor. 
 Lieut. Col. Morris, U. S. army, was twice or thrice arrested on 
 good grounds, and yet was discharged. Many prisoners were 
 taken in Texas and at other places and honorably released. 
 
 It is not necessary to multiply instances to prove that the 
 South, because she was compelled to defend her rights by war, 
 deserved an honorable war, modified by all the limitations 
 and amenities of modern war among Christian and civilized 
 nations. The outrages, therefore, perpetrated upon the South- 
 ern privateersmen stirred the gall of every earnest man in the 
 Confederate States. In the deficiency of a navy proper, these 
 gallant men, commissioned by the Confederate government 
 as their militia of the sea, went forth to punish their enemy to 
 the extent of their ability. It was the only naval resource of 
 the South, and accorded with the laws and customs of nations. 
 It was a right which the United Colonies in 1776, and the 
 United States in 1812, freely exercised against their mother 
 
 1 Judge Daly, of New York, who from the first the same as that of the other. The question 
 
 outbreak of the war had been distinguished for then aiises — as there is in point of fact no 
 
 his zeal in the Union cause, in January, 1802, difference between them — is every seamen 
 
 addressed a letter to Senator Harris in opposi- or soldier that shall be taken in arms against 
 
 tion to the enforcement of the alleged laws the government to be hung as a traitor or a 
 
 against Southern privateers. He said : pirate ? * * * 
 
 ' ■ What is the difference between the Southern "It is natural that we should have hesitated 
 soldier who takes up arms against the govern- to consider the Southern States in the light of 
 ment of the United States upon the land and the beUigerente before the rebellion had expanded 
 SoutheiTn privateersman who does the same to ita present proportions; but now we cannot, if 
 upon the water? Practically there is none; and we would, shut our eyes to the fact that war, 
 if one should be held and exchanged as a and war upon a more extensive scale than 
 prisoner-of-war, the other is equally entitled to usually takes place between contending nations, 
 the privilege. The court before which the crew actually exists. It is now, and it will continue 
 of the Jeff'erson Davis were convicted as pirates to be. carried on upon both sides by a resort to 
 held that they could not be regarded as priva- all the means and appliances known to modem 
 teers, upon the ground that they were not acting warfare, and, unless we are to fall back into the 
 under the authority of an independent State barbarism of the Middle Ages, we must observe 
 with the recognized rights of sovereignty. This in its conduct those humane usages in the treat- 
 objection applies equally to the man-of-warsmen ment and exchange of prisoners which modem 
 in the Southern fleets, and to every soldier in civilization has shown to be equally the dictate 
 the Southern army, none of whom are acting of humanity and of policy. * * * 
 under the authority of a recognized govern- "The existing embarrassment is easily over- 
 ment. The Constitution defines treason to be come; further proseciitions can be stopped, and 
 the levying of war against the United States, in respect to the privateersmen who have been 
 and the giving of aid and comfort to its enemies. convicted, the President, acting upon the sug- 
 All of them are engaged in doing this ; and gestion of the court that tried ttiem, can,by the 
 although the Southern privateersmen may fall exercise of the pardoning power, relieve them 
 specifically under the provisions of the act from their position as criminals and place them, 
 defining piracy, the guilt of the one is precisely in that of prisonera-of-war." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 73 
 
 country, and in 1856 peremptorily refused to waive by treaty 
 stipulation. Yet, in 1861, because it bore disagreeably upon 
 their commerce, the practice was denounced by the United 
 States, and the captured Confederate privateersmen were 
 subjected to the ignominious treatment of common felons. 
 Paraded in chains through the streets of northern cities, for 
 the gaze of the hostile rabble, they were put in the wretched 
 dungeons of " the Tombs," surrounded by filth and vermin. 
 Here for long months they were kept, that confinement and 
 anxiety might prey upon their health, and that wounded self- 
 respect might fret their hearts in the torture of humiliation. 
 They were then dragged forth before the public gaze of their 
 infuriated enemies to be tried for their lives as the worst of 
 criminals — enemies to the whole human race. These were 
 the men the Confederacy sent forth to fight their battles un- 
 der the flag of their government, and this was the treatment 
 they met with as prisoners at the hands of a government which 
 claimed that it was conducting the war according to the laws 
 and usages of civilized nations. 
 
 On the 17th of July, Thomas H. Baker, John Harleston, 
 Charles Sidney Passailaigue, Henry C. Howard, Joseph C. de 
 Carmo, Handy Oman, Patrick Daly, Wm. C. Clark, Albert 
 Ferris, Eichard Palmer, John Murphy, Alexander C. Coyle, 
 and Martin Galvin, the thirteen remaining crew of the 
 Savannah, were arraigned in the U. S. Circuit Court, in 
 New York, to plead to their indictment. They were hand- 
 cuffed in pairs, and attended by ten U. S. deputy marshals. 
 The indictment against them was a very long and elaborate 
 document, to which they pleaded "not guilty." The counsel 
 for the prosecution were E. Delafield Smith, U. S. District 
 Attorney, William M. Evarts, Samuel Blatchford, and Ethan 
 Allen ; for the prisoners, Daniel Lord, James T. Brady, 
 Algernon S. Sullivan, Joseph E. Dukes, Maurice Mayer, 
 Isaac Davega, S. L. M. Barlow, G. R. J. Bondin, and Jeremiak 
 Larocque. 
 
 After the reading of the indictment the prisoners were 
 remanded to the Tombs, followed by a large crowd of excited 
 people, where they remained in confinement until the day 
 set for their trial. On the 23d of October, the trial began 
 in the U. S. Circuit Court, before Judges Nelson and Ship- 
 man, and terminated on the 31st in the disagreement of the 
 jury. After a consultation of twenty hours, the jury could 
 not agree upon . a verdict, four members out of the twelve 
 being in favor of an acquittal ; the remaining considering the 
 prisoners guilty on some of the counts only. The trial de- 
 served and attracted a great share of public attention during 
 its progress, as it involved principles of international law and 
 of national polity of the most delicate character. The man- 
 agement of the case was highly creditable to the counsel on 
 each side, and it was heard before two of the ablest Federal 
 
74 THE CONFEDERAlTE STATES NAVY. 
 
 judges in the country, and a highly intelligent jury of New 
 York City. 
 
 The facts in the case were few and simple, and were ad- 
 mitted by the defence. " The only question for the Court and 
 jury to decide," said the New York Herald, in commenting 
 on the case, ' ' was whether the act amounted to piracy, either 
 under international law or under the United States statute. 
 Arguments were made to show that it was not piracy under 
 the law of nations, because a pirate is designated as the en- 
 emy of the human race, whereas the privateer only wars on 
 the commerce of a particular nation. Under the United States 
 statute, however, the prisoners appeared to be amenable, if 
 the law were to be strictly and technically construed. But 
 the opinions and precedents of all jurists who wrote, and of 
 all courts that decided, and all governments that treated of 
 the offence, were remarkably unanimous on the point, that in 
 -a state of foreign war, or domestic revolution, those who 
 warred upon the ocean were entitled to the same humanities 
 as those who warred upon the land. There could be no good 
 reason, it was urged, why our government should treat as 
 prisoners-of-war, or should discharge, on taking the oath of 
 -allegiance, the rebels taken on land with arms in their hands 
 fighting against the republic, while they should treat as pi- 
 rates or felons those who warred against the United States on 
 the high sea. And the precedent of Great Britain in that re- 
 spect was cited to show that when the American colonies 
 revolted against her, and when the ocean swarmed with 
 
 1 The 9th Section of the Act of Congresfl of In 1775 Gen. Gage, of the British army, re- 
 
 1790, under which the prisoners were tried, is garded prisoners as persons " whose lives by the 
 
 aB follows : law of the land are destined to the cord." — 
 
 " That if any citizen shall commit any piracy Spai-ks' Collection of the Writings of Washingioni 
 or robbeiy aforesaid, or any act of hostility Vol. III., p. 500. In his reply. Gen. Washington, 
 against the United States, or any citizen thereof , on the 11th rff August, 1775, said that, he "re- 
 iipon the high seaa, under color of any com- solved to adopt the same mode of treatment 
 mission from any foreign prince or State, or on towards the British prisoners then in his pos- 
 pretence of authority from any person, such session which was practiced by Gen. Gage."— 
 offender shall, notwithstanding the pretence of Ibid, p. 6it0, 501. Congress was of a like opinion 
 any such authority, be deemed, adjudged and with the American general. After the Kings 
 taken to be a pirate, felon and robber, and on proclamation of the 23d of August, 1776, Con- 
 being thereof convicted, shall suffer death." gress declared and published "that whatever 
 
 It may be well to observe that this act was punishment shall be inflicted upon any persona 
 
 taken from the British statute of 11 and 12 Will. in the power of our enemies, for favoring, aid- 
 
 3. c. 7 ; the 8th section of which provided as ing or abetting the cause of American liberty, 
 
 follows : shall be retaliated in the same kind and the 
 
 "That if any of his Majesty's natural bom same degree upon those in our power who have 
 
 subjects or denizens of this kingdom shall com- favored, aided or abetted, or shall favor, aid or 
 
 mit any piracy or robbery or any act of hostilities abet, the system of- ministerial oppression."— 
 
 against others, his Majesty's subjects, upon the Ibid, p. 204. And when Col. Allen was taken 
 
 sea, under color of any commission from any prisoner near Montreal and thrown into irons, 
 
 foreign prince or State or pretence of authority Gen. Washington, following the order of Con- 
 
 from any person whatsoever, such offender and gress, wrote on the 18th of December, 1775, to 
 
 offenders and every of them, shall be deemed. Gen. Howe, that "whatever treatment Col. 
 
 adjudged and taken to be pirates, felons and Allen receives, whatever fate he undergoea, 
 
 robbers." euch exactly shall toe the treatment and fate 
 
 This statute was in force during the American of Brigadier Prescott, now in our hands." 
 
 Revolution, just as much as the Act of Congress This, it will be seen, was before the Dedara- 
 
 of 1790 was in force during the Southern Kevolu- tion of Independence . After that Declaration, 
 
 tion; and there was no more reason then for a general exchange of prisoners was proposed 
 
 applying the act of 1790 against citizens of the and acceded to, to wit : of ofQcers for officers 
 
 Confederate States than there was for applying of equal rank, soldier for soldier and sailor 
 
 the statute of 11 and 12 WUl. 3, c. 7, against for sailor.— Vol. IV., pp. 23, 512, also pp. 105, 
 
 citizens of the United States from 1775 to 1783. 108, etc. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 75 
 
 American privateers, she never treated those who fell into her 
 hands in any other manner than as prisoners-of-war. These 
 arguments and precedents had their weight with the jury, and 
 helped to save the accused from the verdict of guilty." 
 
 Meanwhile, pending the trial of the officers and crew of 
 the Savannah, the Confederate government threw out the 
 menace of retaliation, which, after the first battle of Manas- 
 sas, it was in a position to carry out. It decided, if one drop 
 of Southern blood was shed by Northern courts for defending 
 the Confederate States on the seas, it was to be paid for, with 
 interest, in Charleston. Self-protection and the enforcement 
 of the laws of nations and of humanity alike required, in this 
 instanceat least, full and ample retaliation. 
 
 As soon as President Davis received intelligence that the 
 ■crew of the Savannah had been placed in irons and were to be 
 tried for piracy, he sent Col. Richard Taylor, of his staff, as a 
 ispecial messenger to Mr. Lincoln, with a communication, 
 under date of July 6th, 1861, in which he said: 
 
 "Having learned that the schooner Savannah, a private armed vessel 
 In the service, and sailing under a couimission issued by authority of the 
 Confederate States of America, had been captured by one of the vessels 
 forming the blockading squadron off Charleston harbor, I directed a 
 proposition to be made to the ofHcer commanding the squadron, for an 
 •exchange of the officers and crew of the Savannah for prisoners-of-war 
 held by this government, ' according- to number and rank.' To this propo- 
 sition, made on the 19th ultimo, Capt. Mercer, the officer in command of 
 the blockading squadron, made answer on the same day that ' the prisoners 
 (referred to) are not on board of any of the vessels under my command.' 
 
 " It now appears, by statements made, without contradiction, in news- 
 papers published in New York, that the prisoners above mentioned were 
 conveyed to that city, and have been treated not as prisoners-of-war, but 
 as criminals; that they have been put in irons, confined in jail, brought 
 before the courts of justice on charges of piracy and treason; and it is even 
 rumored that they have been actually convicted of the offenses charged, 
 for no other reason than that they bore arms in defence of the rights of 
 this government, and under the authority of its commission. 
 
 " I could not, without grave discourtesy, have made the newspaper 
 statements above referred to the subject of this communication, if the 
 threat of treating as pirates the citizens of this Confederacy, armed for its 
 service on the high seas, had not been contained in your proclamation of 
 the 19th of April last; that proclamation, however, seems to afford a suf- 
 ficient justification for considering these published statements as not de- 
 void of probability. 
 
 "It is the desire of this government to so conduct the war now exist- 
 ing as to mitigate its horrors as far as may be possible; and, with this 
 intent, the treatment of the prisoners captured by its forces have been 
 marked by the greatest humanity and leniency consistent With public ob- 
 ligation. Some have been permitted to return home on parole, others to 
 remain at large, under similar conditions, within this Confederacy, and all 
 have been furnished with rations for their subsistence, such as are allowed 
 to our own troops. It is only since the news has been received of the treat- 
 ment of the prisoners taken on the Savannah, that I have been compelled 
 to withdraw these indulgences, and to hold the prisoners taken by us in 
 strict confinement.. 
 
 "A just regard to humanity and to the honor of this government 
 now requires me to state explicitly, that, painful as will be the necessity, 
 
76 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 this government -will deal out to the prisoners held by it the same treat- 
 ment and the same fate as shall be experienced by those captured on the 
 Savannah; and if driven to the terrible necessity of retaliation, by your 
 execution of any of the officers or crew of the Savannah, that retahation 
 will be extended so far as shall be requisite to secure the abandonment of 
 a practice unknown to the warfare of civilized man, and so barbarous as 
 to disgrace the nation which shall be guilty of inaugurating it. 
 
 " With this view, and because it may not have reached you, I now 
 renew the proposition made to the commander of the blockading squad- 
 ron, to exchange for the prisoners taken on the Savannah an equal num- 
 ber of those held by us, according to rank." 
 
 Col. Taylor vs^as permitted to go to Washington, but 
 was refused an audience vs^itli Mr. Lincoln, and was obliged 
 to content himself with a verbal reply from Gen. Scott that 
 the communication had been delivered to him, and that he 
 would reply in writing as soon as possible. 
 
 No answer ever came, however, and the Confederate 
 authorities were compelled to select by lot, from among the 
 Federal prisoner in their hands, a number to whom they pro- 
 posed to mete out the same fate which might await the crew 
 of the Savannah. ' But fortunately Mr. Lincoln was induced, 
 from some cause, to recede from his position — albeit he never 
 deigned an answer of any sort to Mr. Davis' letter — and the 
 horrors of retaliation were thus averted. Perhaps the Federal 
 government was influenced in this matter by wnat occurred 
 in the British House of Lords, on the 16th of May, soon after 
 Mr. Lincoln's proclamation, declaring the Confederate priva- 
 teers pirates, reached that country. On this subject the Earl 
 of Derby said: 
 
 " He apprehended that if one thing was clearer than another, it was- 
 that privateering was not piracy, and that no law could make that piracy, 
 as regarded the subjects of one nation, which was not piracy by the law 
 of nations. Consequently the United States must not he allowed to enter- 
 tain this doctrine, and to call upon Her Majesty's government not to inter- 
 fere. He knew it was said that the United States treated the Confeder- 
 ate States of the South as mere rebels, and that as rebels these expeditions, 
 were liable to all the penalties of high treason. That was not the doc- 
 trine of this country, because we have declared that they are entitled to 
 all the rights of belligerents. The Northern States could not claim the 
 rights of belligerents for themselves, and, on the other hand, deal with 
 other parties not as belligerents, but as rebels." 
 
 1 The following correspondence discIoseB the as such so long as the enemy shall continiie so- 
 
 names of the prisoners the Confederates had to treat the like number of prisonei-s-of-war 
 
 selected to await the fate of the Savannah priva^ captured by them at sea, and now held for trial 
 
 teersmen, etc. ; in New York as pirates. As these measures are 
 
 " C. S. A. War Bepastment, 1 intended to repress the infamoiis attempt now 
 
 "Richmond, Nov. 9, 1861. J made by the enemy to commit judicial murder 
 
 *'SiB — You are hereby instructed to choose by on prisoners - of - war, you will execute them 
 lot from among the prisoners-of-war of highest strictly, as the mode best calculated to prevent 
 rank one who is to be conflued iu a cell appro- the commission of so heinous a crime, 
 priated to convicted felons, and who is to be ''Your obedient servant, 
 treated in all respects as if such convict, and to " J. P. BENJAMIN, 
 be held for execution in the same manner as " Acting Secretary of War. 
 may beadoptedbythe enemy for the execution " To Brig. Gen. John Windeb, Richmond, Va."' 
 of the prisoner -of - war Smith, recently con- 
 demned to death in Philadelphia. You will also " Headquabters Department of Hesbico, ) 
 select thirteen other priaoners-of-war, the high- " Richmond, Va. Nov. 11, 1861. J 
 est in rank of those captured by our forces, to " Hon. J. P. Benjamin, Secretary of War : 
 be conSned in the cells reserved for prisoners " Sib— In obedience to instructions contained 
 accused of infamous crimes, and will treatthem in your letter of the 9th inst., one prisoner^f- 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 77 
 
 Lord Brougham said that " it was clear that privateering 
 -was not piracy by the law of nations." 
 
 Lord Kingsdown took the same view. " What was to be 
 ihe operation of the Presidential proclamation upon this sub- 
 ject was a matter for the consideration of the United States." 
 But he expressed the opinion that the enforcement of the doc- 
 trine of that proclamation " would be an act of barbarity 
 which would produce an outcry throughout the civilized 
 world." 
 
 Up to this time there had been no formal cartel for the ex- 
 change of prisoners, and the policy of the Washington govern- 
 ment seemed to be that they would not treat with " rebels " 
 in any way which would acknowledge them as " belligerents." 
 But many prisoners, on both sides, were released on parole, 
 and a proposition made in the Confederate Congress to return 
 the Federal prisoners taken at First Manassas, without any 
 formality whatever, would doubtless have prevailed but for 
 the difficulty in reference to the crew of the Savannah. 
 
 The pressure upon the Federal government by friends of 
 the prisoners became so great that they were finally induced 
 to enter into a cartel for the exchange of prisoners on the very 
 basis that the Confederates had offered in the beginning. The 
 Confederate Gen. Howell Cobb and the Federal Gen. Wool 
 entered into this arrangement on the 14th of February, 1863 — 
 the only unadjusted point being that Gen. Wool was unwilling 
 that each party should agree to pay the expenses of trans- 
 porting their prisoners to the frontier, and this he promised to 
 refer to his government. 
 
 At a second interview, the 1st March, Gen. Wool informed 
 Gen. Cobb that his government would not consent to pay 
 these expenses, and thereupon Gen. Cobb promptly receded 
 from his demand, and agreed to the terms proposed by the 
 other side. But Gen. Wool, who had said at the beginning of 
 the negotiation, "I am alone clothed with full power for the 
 purpose of arranging for the exchange of prisoners," was now 
 
 ■war of the highest rank in our poBsession -was " Headquarters Department of Henrico, 1 
 
 chosen by lot, to be held for execution in the " Richmond, Va., Nov. 12, 1861. ) 
 
 flame manner afl may be adopted by the enemy " Hon. J. P. Benjamin, 
 
 for the execution of Smith, recently condemned ' ' Secretary of War, Richmond, Va. ; 
 
 to death in Philadelphia. The names of the six " Sir — In obedience to your instructions, all 
 
 colonels -were placed in a can. The first name the wounded officers have been exempted as 
 
 drawn was that of Col. Corcoran, Sixty-ninth hostages to await the result of the trial of 
 
 Regiment, N. Y. S. M., who is the hostage chosen prisoners captured by the enemy at sea. I have 
 
 to answer for Smith. In choosing the thirteen therefore made selections by lot of Capts. H. 
 
 from the highest rank to be held to« answer for Bowman and T. Keffer to replace Capts. Ricketts 
 
 a like number of prisoners-of-war captured by and McQuade, wounded. 
 
 the enemy at sea, there being only ten field " The list of thirteen will now stand : Cols, 
 
 officers, it was necessary to draw by lot three Lee, Cogswell, Wilcox, Woodruff and Wood ; 
 
 captains. The first names drawn were Capts. Lieut. Cols. Bowman and Neff; Majors Potter, 
 
 J. B. Ricketts, H. McQuade and J. W. Rock- Revere and Vogdes; Capts. Kockwood, Bowman 
 
 wood. The list of thirteen will therefore stand: and KefEer. 
 
 Cols. Lee, Cogswell, Wilcox, Woodruff and Wood; " Respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 Lieut. Cols. Bowman and Neff; Majors Potter, "JOHN H. WINDER, 
 
 Revere and Vodges ; Capts Ricketts, McQuade "Brigadier General." 
 
 and Rockwood. The prisoners were sent to Charleston, S. C, 
 
 " Respectfully, your odedient servant, where they were put in jail in close confinement, 
 
 "JOHN H. WINDER, to abide the issue of the trials of the privateers- 
 
 " Brigadier General ' men at the North. 
 
78 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 under the necessity of stating that " his government had 
 changed" his instructions." And thus the negotiations were 
 abruptly" broken off, and the matter left where it was before. 
 The vacillating conduct of the Federal government was of 
 easy explanation, and in perfect accord with their double deal- 
 ing throughout the war. After these negotiations had begun, 
 the capture of Forts Henry and Donelson had given the 
 United States a considerable preponderance in the number of 
 prisoners held by them, and they at once reverted to their 
 original purpose of not treating with "rebels" on equal 
 terrns. 
 
 But Jackson's Valley cainpaign, the Seven Days' Battles 
 around Richmond, and other Confederate successes again re- 
 versed the "balance of power," and brought the Federal gov- 
 ernment to terms, to which the Confederate authorities were 
 always willing. Accordingly negotiations were again entered 
 into by Gen. D. H. Hill on the part of the Confederacy, and 
 Gen. John A. Dix on the part of the United States, and the 
 result was, on July 33d, 1863, the adoption of a cartel of ex- 
 change. 
 
 The rigid observance of this cartel would have prevented 
 all the horrors of prison life North and South, and have 
 averted the great mortality in Southern prisons, and the 
 greater mortality in Northern prisons, if it had been faithfully 
 carried out by the Federal authorities. 
 
 In the meantime, on the 3d of February, 1863, Hon. Alfred 
 Ely, member of Congress from New York, captured at the 
 first battle of Manassas, had an interview with Mr. Lincoln 
 and Secretary Seward, when it was determined to place the 
 privateersmen in confinement at New York and Philadelphia 
 upon the same footing as other prisoners-of-war. On the 3d, 
 the following prisoners confined in the Tombs were transferred 
 to Fort Lafayette in obedience to orders received from Wash- 
 ington, and were subsequently exchanged : 
 
 From the Savannah. — T. Hamilton Baker, John Harlpston, Henry- 
 Howard, Handy Oman, Wm. Clark, Alex. C. Coyle, C. S. Passailaigue, 
 Joseph Cuig De Carmo, Patrick Daly, John Murphy, Martin Galvin. 
 From the Dixie.— Geov^^ Gladden, Charles Forrester, J. P. M. Catro, 
 John Journell, John H Marshall. From the Sumter. — Henry Spence, 
 John Davis, A. D. Hodgier, John O'Brien, Wm. May, Peter Thompson, 
 John Donnelly, James Milner, Eugenie Ruhl. From the Confederatb 
 MAN-OF-WAR Florida. — John Williams, Patrick McCarthy, James Reilly, 
 Archibald Wilson. 
 
 The brig Jefferson Davis, formerly the slaver Echo, built 
 in Baltimore in 1854, and condemned in Charleston, was fitted 
 up in the latter city as a privateer, and on the 38th of June, 
 1861, started out upon a privateering expedition. The Davis 
 was 330 tons register and rated 1^. She was full-rigged and 
 carried four waist guns, two eighteen-pounders, and two 
 twelve-pounders, and one long eighteen-pounder of old English 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 79 
 
 make amidships. Her oflficers were Capt. Louis M. Coxetter, 
 Lieuts. Postelland Stewart, Surgeon Babcock, Capt. of Marines,, 
 Mr. Sanfrau, four prize-masters, and a crew of 70 men. 
 
 Soon after leaving Charleston, the Jefferson Davis reaped 
 a rich harvest in capturing Federal vessels, with an estimated 
 value of $335,000. On the 6th of July, the brig John Welsh, 
 bound from Trinidad to Falmouth, Eng., with a cargo of sugar, 
 was captured off Hatteras. Capt. J. 0. Fifield, of the John 
 Welsh, says : 
 
 " After the work of transferring the stores had been completed, Capt. 
 Coxsetter mustered all hands aft and said to them : ' Boys, if you molest 
 the crew of that brig or their things to the value of a rope-yarn, I will 
 punish you to the utmost of my power. Do you understand ? Now go- 
 forward.' Turning to his officers, he said : ' Gentlemen, I desire that you 
 do everything in your power to make the stay of these gentlemen as agree- 
 able as possible. ' He then invited me to dine with him in his cabin, while 
 my mate was taken into the officers' mess." 
 
 A prize crew in charge of Prize-master Stephens was then 
 put in charge of the captured vessel, and she was ordered to- 
 put in the nearest Southern port. On the same day the schooner 
 Enchantress, from Boston, bound to St. Jago, was captured off' 
 Montauk. She was placed in charge of Wm. Smith, formerly 
 a Savannah pilot, as prize-master, and ordered South. On Sun- 
 day, the 7th of July, about 150 miles from Sandy Hook, the 
 Jefferson Davis captured the schooner S. J. Waring, of Brook- 
 haven, L. I., with a valuable cargo, bound to Montevideo. 
 Montague Amiel, a Charleston pilot, was put in charge as 
 prize- master, with a man named Stevens as mate, and Mal- 
 colm Siding as second mate, and two men. The Davis left 
 William Tillman, a colored cook, two seamen, and Bryce 
 Mackinnon, a passenger, on board. Late in the afternoon 
 the schooner was headed South. The remaining crew and the 
 passenger were in hopes of a recapture by some U. S. vessel, 
 and made themselves agreeable and sociable to the privateers- 
 men, and in consequence they suspected nothing until the 
 night of the 16th of July, when fifty miles to the southward of 
 Charleston. 
 
 Seeing no prospect of their hopes being realized, and the 
 prize-captain and first mate being asleep in their berths, and 
 the second mate at the wheel, the others dozing or asleep, the 
 preconcerted plan was carried into effect by the steward, Wil- 
 liam Tillman (colored), killing the three with a hatchet, and 
 throwing the bodies overboard. One of the remaining men 
 was tied up that night, and both were released in the morning^ 
 on promise to help work the vessel, and were treated accord- 
 ingly. 
 
 After retaking the vessel, the charge of her devolved on 
 the steward. Neither he nor the others understood naviga- 
 tion, but having once got hold of the land he brought her 
 safely up to the pilot ground, when Charles E. Warner, of 
 
80 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the pilot-boat Jane, took charge, and brought the schooner 
 up to the battery in New York Harbor. ' 
 
 On July 9th, the Jefferson Davis captured the ship Mary 
 Ooodell, Capt. McGilvery, from New York for Buenos Ayres. 
 As she drew eighteen feet of water, and was useless to the 
 privateer, she was allowed to go, five of her crew joining the 
 Davis. All the prisoners captured by the privateer were put 
 aboard of the Mary Qoodell, and she sailed for Portland, Me. 
 On the same day, the brig Mary E. Thompson, of Scarsport, 
 bound to Montevideo, loaded with lumber, was made a prize 
 of. After venturing to within 100 miles southeast of 
 Nantucket shoals, and reaping a rich harvest, the Jefferson 
 Davis steered her course for the South American coast, where 
 she captured several valuable cargoes. The havoc made by 
 the Jefferson Davis among the merchant ships of the enemy, 
 within sight of the Atlantic shores, created the greatest ex- 
 citement in all the Northern ports. Immediately upon the re- 
 ceipt of the news of her seizures, the government at Wash- 
 ington ordered a fleet of revenue -cutters and gunboats to 
 be dispatched in quest of the daring privateer. The command 
 of the fleet from New York was confided to Capt. Howard, and 
 the cutters Jackson, Crawford and Varina went promptly to 
 sea in tow of the steamer Mercury. The Henrietta and the 
 gunboat Iroquois started in pursuit on the 13th of July. From 
 Boston the revenue-cutters Morris and Caleb Cushing sailed 
 on the same mission on the 13th, and the frigate Vincennes 
 sailed on the following day with orders to cruise off Nantucket 
 for a week in search of the Jefferson Davis. 
 
 The privateer arrived at St. John's, P. R. , on July 26th. Be- 
 fore entering the port, a boat and ten men were sent in for 
 provisions, but not being allowed to land, the brig was allowed 
 to go in. The captain-general informed the commander of the 
 
 1 Shortly before the hour of midnight on the called out to the two remaining of the crew aft, 
 
 16th of July, Capt. Montague Amiel was asleep in telling them that they must obey him as captain 
 
 hiscabin, together with Stevens, the mate, in the of the vessel, or he would throw them overboard 
 
 berth next to him. The second mate, Malcolm also. The men yielded up without a murmur. 
 
 Siding, was also asleep on the poop deck, and when he had them at once ironed, but subse- 
 
 the other two seamen composing the privateer quently released them on their consenting to 
 
 prize crew were lounging leisurely at the fore- assist in bringing the vessel to a Northern port, 
 
 head part of the ship. Tillman afterwards related that the time con- 
 
 Tillman stole up from between decks, with sumed in killing the men and throwing them 
 
 hatchet in hand, and first went down into the overboard and getting the vessel under his com- 
 
 captain's cabin, who was sound asleep in bed. mand only consumed seven and a half minutes 
 
 He then raised his axe and gave him a vigorous Mr. Mackinnon, the passenger on board of the 
 
 blow on his skull, from which he seemed to be Waring, afterwards gave the following account 
 
 launched into eternity, for he moved not an of the steward's bloody work: 
 
 inch. Thenegronextproceededtodeal with the " I was awakened from a light sleep by a pecu- 
 
 mate, who was also reclining near his captain fast liar sound in the captain's room, which I knew 
 
 asleep, and dealt with him in the same summary instinctively could only have been produced by 
 
 and terrible manner. After leaving both these an axe cleaving Amiel's skull. No sooner did 
 
 dead men below, Tillman came on the poop the 'Wiiw/t' strike upon my ear than Ileapedout 
 
 deck and struck the second mate a fearful blow of bed, and leaning against the door-casing in 
 
 over the temple. The unfortunate man was just the partition, saw the steward dart through the 
 
 rising from his reclining position with little ex- twilight — for he had extinguished the hght— 
 
 pectation that he was about being laimched into noiselessly as a rat, across the cabin towards 
 
 eternity. He then went below once more, took the second mate's room. I also saw, at the same 
 
 hold of the captain's body and flung him over- glance, Capt. Amiel rise from his berth and at- 
 
 board, doing the same with that of the mate and tempt to follow him, but the blood blinded him, 
 
 second mate. The coast being now clear, ho and he fell to the floor, with a horrid gurgling 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 81 
 
 Jefferson Davis that he must leave within twenty-four hours, 
 and immediately dispatched the steam - corvette Herman 
 Cortez, mounting six guns, outside the harbor to watch her 
 movements. After procuring a supply of water and provis- 
 ions, the privateer sailed on the 39th. 
 
 On the 5th of August, after chasing several vessels with- 
 out success, the Davis captured the schooner Windward from 
 Turk's Island, with a cargo of salt. On the following day the 
 privateer made prize of the brig Santa Clara, of Eastport, 
 loaded with sugar from Porto Rico, bound to New York. It 
 had been the intention of Capt. Coxetter, of the Davis, to 
 burn or sink the Windward, but, having so many prisoners, he 
 put them on board that vessel and set them free. On July 31st 
 the Davis had captured the bark Alvarado, bound from the 
 Cape for Boston, with a valuable cargo of wool, hides, etc. 
 She was sent into the Confederacy. The bark California 
 was also captured by the Jefferson Davis, but not having 
 sufficient men to put a prize crew on board was allowed to 
 proceed. 
 
 Capt. Coxetter, finding that his provisions and water were 
 short, and that his crew had been reduced to one-half of his 
 original number, made sail for the Florida Coast, intending to 
 run into a Confederate harbor. When about 800 miles east of 
 Cape Florida, says the Richmond Enquirer, she came in con- 
 tact with the ship John Crawford, Capt. Edge, from Phila- 
 delphia, bound to Key West, with arms and coal for the 
 U. S. forces. She was found to draw twenty-two feet of 
 water, and could not possibly be brought in. The officers and 
 crew, numbering in all twenty-two persons, were taken on 
 board the privateer, the vessel fired, and holes bored in her 
 sides and bottom. This was about four o'clock in the morn- 
 ing, and about good daylight the ship was wrapped in flames, 
 
 sound in his throat. All tbis was but the work of " Then the steward came down to the cabin, 
 
 a second. Thecleavingof the skull, like the flash where I still stood while Stedding stood, pistol 
 
 from a gun preceding the report, was followed by in hand, to guard the deck. The captain cried 
 
 a weak, faint cry, like that ot a sick child, and faintly twice to me by name, • Help me— help 
 
 the gurgling iu the throat. I knew then that me,* but he was past help. Another swishing 
 
 his wound was mortal. Stooping side-ways, the blow of the axe.' and he did not repeat the cry. 
 
 steward entered the second mate's cabin, and Then the steward returned to the second mate's 
 
 once more swung his axe, but not so elfectively. cabin, where, seated on a pile of starch boxes, 
 
 " The mate started up with a ' you; his legs drawn up, and his head between his 
 
 don't strike, me again,' and clutched at the knees, was the half-stupefied man. Again and 
 steward's breast, but eluding the wounded man, again the axe f eU, and again and again the cry, 
 he ran on deck to where the man lay near the ' Don't do that,' fell on my ear, each time fainter 
 wheel-house, and keeping his axe behind him, than the last. Stedding now came down, and 
 demanded 'what all this noise was about?' The the steward and he took the corpse of the 
 mate who had been aroused by the outcries of captain by the feet, and dragging it up the 
 the captain and mate, had raised himself up on companion-way, tossed it overboard. Mean- 
 his elbow, and stared at the atcward in a half- time I had got some irons out, hoping to inter- 
 stupid, half -fascinated way, not seeing the pistol cede to save bloodshed. Stedding and the 
 which Stedding, the man at the helm, had steward once more came down, and each taking 
 pointed at him for use in case of necessity. As the second mate by the shoulder led him out 
 he turned his face toward the steward, the latter from the place where he had crouched on the 
 drove his weapon home into the base of his starch boxes. He seemed to walk, with their 
 skull. Stedding and the steward then tumbled assistance, as they went up the companion- 
 him overboard. He rose on the wave, with a way, but his head lay a pulpy mass upon his 
 hoarse cry, when about two lengths astern, the shoulder, and a moment after a loud splash 
 water having raised him ; but he must have alongside told the fate of another of the priva- 
 soon gone down' to his long account. teers." 
 
82 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 going down shortly afterwards. It was found impossible to 
 secure any of the arms, as they were stowed under the coal. 
 
 On August ] 6th, the Jefferson Davis was off St. Augustine, 
 Florida, but the wind blowing half a gale, she could not ven- 
 ture in. On the following day, while trying to cross the bar, 
 the privateer stuck. A small boat was sent ashore with Dr. 
 Babcock and Lieut. Baya, and the prisoners were landed. The 
 officers and crew of the privateer then went ashore, and were 
 greeted with the most enthusisastic demonstrations by the in- 
 habitants. About half-past nine two lightboats went off to 
 the brig along with Capt. Coxetter and other officers. The 
 starboard guns were thrown overboard to lighten the vessel, 
 in order to clear her decks of water and save as much as pos- 
 sible of the supplies on board the brig. 
 
 Every effort was made to save everything on board, but 
 it was supposed that the guns thrown overboard stove her in 
 and caused her to bilge. The lightboats, however, were filled 
 with a large amount of provisions and baggage, and finally 
 succeeded in saving all the small arms on board. 
 
 The ladies threw open their houses, and they were received 
 with cheers upon cheers. Cheers were given for the Jefferson 
 Davis, for the Southern Confederacy, and the utmost hilarity 
 and rejoicing for the safe arrival of the privateersmen was mani- 
 fested. While there they were sumptuously provided for, and 
 furnished with every comfort that could possibly be devised. 
 
 During the voyage of the Jefferson Davis, a conspiracy 
 existed among the prisoners and a portion of the crew to kill 
 the captain and officers, and take the vessel into New York. 
 After the return of the privateer to the Confederacy, the con- 
 spiracy was disclosed by one of the crew, and upon their ar- 
 rival in Charleston the suspected ones were arrested, and tried 
 before Judge Magrath on October 11th. Only one of the men 
 proved to be guilty of the charge. 
 
 AVm. Smith, one of the crew of the Jefferson Davis, was con- 
 victed in the U. S. Circuit Court, at Philadelphia, on Oct. 25th, 
 upon an indictment of piracy. Thos. Quigley, David Mullins,and 
 Edward Rockford, of the crew of the same privateer, were also 
 convicted in the same court, Oct. 29th, upon the same charge. 
 When the U. S. government, after the trial of the Savannah 
 privateersmen, decided to place the crews of the privateers 
 upon the same footing with other prisoners taken from the Con- 
 federates, on Feb. 5th, 1862, the four men belonging to the Jeffer- 
 son Davis and the thirty-four of the Petrel, who were confined 
 in the jail at Philadelphia, were sent to Fort Lafayette. ' 
 
 1 The f oUowing were the names of the priva- Robert R. JefFries, William H. Hurlehunt, Geo. 
 
 teersmen : William Smith, Thomas Quigley, S. Harrison, John Mack, Hugh Managoort, 
 
 Daniel Mullins. Edward Rockford, Wm, Perry, William Ryan, George Moaden, John Cronin, 
 
 Richard M. Hai-vey, Chas. Campbell, August Michael Delton, Henry A. Bumn, John Mullins, 
 
 Peyrupet, Robert Barrett, Henry Mills, Edward C. H. Marriott, G. H. Roberts, T. A. Brook- 
 
 Flynn, Austin C, Williams, Henry Auhnaus, banks, Richard Lewis, Edward Murphy. John 
 
 Daniel Courtney, John M. Morgan, George H. Edwards, Thomas Wood, John Q. S. 
 
 Hankins, Asa Delahey, John Cunningham, Luckett. 
 
THE CONFEDERATK STATES NAVY. 83 
 
 Capt. Coxetter, of the Jefferson Davis, after the wreck of 
 his vessel, went into the blockade-running service, and com- 
 manded the steamers Autonica {Herald), and the Beauregard 
 (Havelock). In his last trip in the Beauregard to Charleston, 
 S. C. , in 1863, he was fired at fif teeia times by the Federal 
 blockaders. He was very successsul in the service, but owing 
 to bad health was compelled to retire. 
 
 The steamer Gordon was owned by the Florida Steam- 
 ship Company, and, before the war, ran on the line between 
 Charleston and Fernandina. She was about 500 tons 
 burden, carried two guns, and was commanded by Capt. 
 Lockwood. She succeeded in running the blockade at Charles- 
 ton, and made several valuable prizes. Her name was changed 
 to the Theodora, and she frequently ran the blockade. 
 
 About the middle of July, 1861, the privateer steamer Gor- 
 don, from Charleston, captured and carried into Hatteras In- 
 let the brig Wm. McGilvery, from Cardenas bound to Bangor, 
 Me., with a cargo of molasses; also the schooner Protector, from 
 Cuba to Philadelphia, with a cargo of fruit. The privateer 
 steamer Mariner at the same time captured a schooner loaded 
 with fruit. The schooner Frank Lucas, of Philadelphia, about 
 May 1st, reported that off the eastern shore of Virginia she 
 was chased by three sailing-vessels ; and the Norfolk corre- 
 spondent of the Richmond Examiner, on Aug. 1st, said: " An- 
 other privateer left our waters yesterday afternoon, the Smith, 
 carrying two guns of heavy calibre." On the 15th of August, 
 the schooner Priscilla, bound to Baltimore from Newbern, 
 N. C, arrived at her destination, bringing the captains and 
 crews of several vessels which were captured off Cape Hat- 
 teras and taken into the port of Newbern. The steamer Coffee, 
 or Winslow, as she was afterwards called, was a small steamer " 
 and carried two guns. It is said that she was lost or abandoned 
 in the neighborhood of Hatteras after making several cap- 
 tures. The schooner Priscilla, loaded with salt, was captured 
 by the Confederate privateer steamer Winslow, Capt. Carsen. 
 The Confederates took out the salt, and, because the schooner 
 was owned in Baltimore, she was released, Baltimore vessels 
 being exempted from capture. The Priscilla brought to Balti- 
 more the captain and crew of the brig Itasco, of Warrenton, 
 Me., loaded with sugar, captured off Hatteras, on August 
 4th, by the steamer Winslow ; also Capt. Carlisle and the 
 crew of the brig William McGilvery, of New York, and the 
 crew of the steamer Sea, Witch, of New York, captured by the 
 steamer Gordon, and the officers and crew of the schooner 
 Henry Nutt, of Philadelphia. The following captured vessels 
 were at this time in the harbor of Newbern: schooner Transit, 
 of New London, captured on the 33d of June; Wm. S. Bobbins 
 and J. W. Hewes. The gunboat Ninon chased the Winslow 
 off Cape Hatteras, but could not overtake her. The Baltimore 
 brig B. B. Kirkland was boarded to the southward of the 
 
84 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Gulf Stream in July, by two privateer schooners, and thirty 
 miles south of Hatteras by a privateer steamer, but was re- 
 leased because she belonged to and was bound for the neutral 
 port of Baltimore. The privateers reported to Capt. Knight 
 that they had captured a bark belonging to New Bedford, from 
 Philadelphia, loaded with coal; also a schooner. On July 25th, 
 the schooner John Elliott, from Boston for St. Domingo, re- 
 ported that she had been chased by three privateers on three 
 successive days. The British schooner Favorite, from Picton, 
 on the 20th of July, when about sixty miles east of Halifax, 
 was chased by a privateer schooner of about 100 tons. 
 
 The privateer schooner Dixie, of about 150 tons burden, 
 after a very successful cruise, passed through the " efficient 
 blockade," and with guns booming and colors flying, on Au- 
 gust 37th, startled from their gravity the quiet people of the 
 "nest of rebellion" and anchored under the guns of Castle 
 Pinckney. The Dixie was commanded by Thomas J. Moore, 
 with Lieuts. George D. Walker, John W. Marshall, and L. D. 
 Benton; Gunner, Charles Ware; Boatswain, George O. Glad- 
 den, and a crew of twenty -four men. Capt. Moore, upon his 
 return to Charleston, gave the following interesting account 
 of his cruise : 
 
 ' ' The Dixie weighed anchor in Charleston harbor on July 19th. On the 
 following day, aided by a stiff breeze, she succeeded in getting out safely to 
 sea. The privateer pursued a southeasterly course without any incident 
 of special moment until Tuesday, the 33d ult. At an early hour on that 
 day Capt. Moore made a saU upon the leequarter, and tacking ship soon 
 overhauled her. A gun fired across the bow of the stranger speedily 
 brought her to. The captain was ordered to come on board the Dixie, 
 and his papers showed his vessel to be the barli &len, of Portland, Maine, 
 bound to Fort Jefferson, Tortugas, with a cargo of coal. Without fur- 
 ther ceremony, the Yankee skipper was informed of the business of his 
 captors, and made prisoner. A prize crew was put aboard the Glen, who 
 did not take her to Fort Jefferson, and the Dixie went on her way rejoic- 
 ing. On Thursday, the 25th, the schooner Mary Alice, of New York,' 
 from the West Indies, with a cargo of sugar, bound for New York, hove in 
 sight. A messenger from Long Tom explained the meaning of the Stars 
 and Bars, and the Jfary 4^ice was soon a prize. ' On the 37th, two sails 
 were for a short time in sight, but a heavy squall came up, accompanied 
 by a waterspout, which passed close ahead of the privateer; and, when 
 this subsided, the vessels had disappeared. On Monday, the 89th, two 
 sails were again descried, but the Dixie was unable to come up with them. 
 On the 30th, the hermaphrodite brig Robert R. Eirkland, of Baltimore, 
 loaded with salt, consigned to a firm in that city, was spoken. She was, 
 of course, permitted to pass. The captain of the brig, however, was in- 
 duced to take on board the cook of the Gflen, the prisoners on board the 
 Dixie having become more numerous than was desirable. On the evening 
 of the 31st, no less than nine sail were visible. About sundown the Dixie 
 gave chase to one of these vessels, which, from information obtained from 
 one of the prisoners, was believed to be the bark Albertina, armed with 
 two rifled-cannon. Two of the guns of the privateer were loaded with 
 grape and canister, and when the stranger was sufficiently near, a shot 
 was fired across her bow, which had the desired effect of brmging her to. 
 She proved to be the bark Rowena, of Philadelphia, from Laguayra, with 
 
 1 TMe veaael was afterwards recaptured by the blockaders. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 85 
 
 coffee for Philadelphia.. Thfi Rowena, as well as her coffee, was of course 
 duly "bagged." But inasmuch as her crew numbered thirteen, besides 
 four passengers, Capt. Moore deemed it prudent to go aboard of her him- 
 self as prize-master, taking with him several of the prisoners, and leaving 
 on board the Dixie a crew of four men, under command of Lieut. L. D. 
 Benton, with the remainder of the prisoners. 
 
 " The privateer being now in latitude 30 deg. 38 min., longitude 76deg. 
 35 min., and with the bark Rowena in her wake, was headed west. On 
 August 3d, she made a strange steamer, but managed to elude her. On 
 Sunday, August 4th, before daylight, a vessel's light was discovered to the 
 eastward, but the Dixie kept shy of her. Shortly after daybreak, a 
 steamer Was plainly seen in the same direction. For a while she gave 
 chase to the Dixie, but Lieut. Benton finding himself off a well-known 
 and convenient harbor of our coast, now a port of entry, decided" to run 
 in without delay. The steamer, finding her chase ineffectual, hauled off 
 to the southward." 
 
 On the 35th of August, the schooner Agricola, from Ells- 
 worth, Me., was overhauled twenty miles northeast from. 
 Cape Ann by the privateer schooner Freely, of Charleston, 
 S. 0. The Freely, not wishing anything the Agricola had on 
 board, allowed her to resume her voyage. The privateer 
 Sallie, formerly the fore-and-aft schooner Virginia, about 
 140 tons, and mounting one long gun amidships, with a 
 crew of forty men, commanded by Captain Libby, ran 
 the blockade from Charleston on the lOth of October. On the 
 13th, when off Charleston, she captured the brig Granada, 
 with a cargo of 400 hogsheads of sugar, melado and molasses, 
 and a quantity of cedar consigned to New York. A privateer 
 brig sailed from St. John's, P. R., on the 6th of Septetober, 
 after having obtained a supply of water and provisions. The 
 schooner Herbert Marston, with- a cargo of sugar consigned 
 to New York, and valued at $30,000, on the 3d of July, was 
 captured by a North Carolina privateer steamer twenty-five 
 miles southeast of Hatteras, and towed into Hatteras Inlet,, 
 where she was anchored under a battery. The brig B. F. 
 Martin, with a cargo of machinery, was captured on the 23d of 
 July, 186 1, off Hatteras, and the crew taken prisoners by the pri- 
 vateer York, commanded by Capt. Jeffrey. The York was a 
 large pilot-boat built in Baltimore, and armed with one rifled 
 cannon. In running down the coast to get to Hatteras Inlet, 
 the Martin was intercepted by the U. S. ship Savannah, which 
 gave chase. The brig at once sheered into shore and eluded 
 capture in the shallow water. While there, the U. S. steamer 
 Union came along and shelled the Martin, setting her on fire 
 and destroying her cargo, valued at $35,000. The brig Hannah 
 Butty, from Savannah, Ga., to some Northern port, was cap- 
 tured on June 35th, laden with molasses, by the steamer Coffee. 
 She was brought into Hatteras Inlet together with the schooner 
 Gordon, bound for Philadelphia, laden with fruit. At this 
 time the two principal ports of North Carolina, Wilmington 
 and Beaufort, were not under very rigid blockade, and an ac- 
 tive trade was carried on from them in naval stores, and the 
 
86 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 importation of provisions and military supplies. The trade 
 was with Nassau and other British ports. 
 
 The revenue cutter Aiken, which had been seized in 
 Charleston by the authorities of South Carolina before the 
 firing on Fort Sumter, was fitted out as a privateer, and 
 called the Petrel, and placed under the command of Capt. 
 Wm. Perry. On July 37th the privateer schooner sailed out of 
 Charleston, and stood for the U. S. frigate St. Lawrence, which 
 she mistook for a merchantman, as all her ports were closed. 
 When the Petrel got within range she fired three shots with- 
 out doing any damage. The St. Lawrence returned with shot 
 and shell a terrific fire, one shell exploding in the hull of the 
 Petrel, and sinking her instantly. The boats of the frigate 
 were lowered, and picked up thirty -six out of forty of the 
 
 Erivateer's crew, who were taken aboard, and their feet and 
 ands heavily mianacled. The remaining four were drowned. 
 The prisoners were afterward renioved to the U. S. gunboat 
 Flag, and brought to Philadelphia. They arrived in that city 
 on the 6th of August, and were lodged in Moyamensing prison. 
 On August 9th they were escorted from prison in two omni- 
 buses, handcufEed, and had a preliminary hearing before 
 U. S. Commissioner Hazlett. On the way out to the coaches, 
 a dense mob hooted the prisoners and threatened to hang them. 
 In the Circuit Court of Philadelphia, on November 4th, while 
 the Assistant District Attorney was urging the trial of the crew 
 of the Petrel, Judge Grier said he could not consent to have 
 the regular business of the court interrupted. " It seems like 
 a farce to try them at this time, when the country played 
 civil war. The dictates of humanity would counsel the gov- 
 ernment to treat captives on the sea the same as those taken 
 on land, and he could not understand the policy of hanging 
 the first and holding the latter as prisoners or releasing tnem. 
 Let the rebellion be crushed — and God grant that it may be 
 speedily — and these men might be tried for treason or piracy, 
 and he would assist, no matter how much he might be called 
 Jeffreys or Scroggs." 
 
 The privateer schooner Beauregard was fitted out by a 
 stock company in Charleston, and, on October 14th, President 
 Davis commissioned her to act as a private armed vessel in 
 the service of the Confederate States on the high seas. She 
 was commanded by Capt. Gilbert Hays; John B. Davis, First 
 Lieutenant; Joseph H. Stuart, Second Lieutenant; Archibald 
 Lilly, Purser, and twenty-three seamen. Several of the officers 
 and men had served on the privateer Jefferson Davis. The 
 Beauregard was 101 tons burden and carried a rifled pivot gun, 
 throwing a twenty-four pound projectile. 
 
 The Beauregard sailed from Charleston on the 7th of 
 November, and, when about 100 miles east-northeast of Abaco, 
 she was captured early on the morning of the 13th by the U. S. 
 bark W. Q-. Anderson. The privateer saw no vessel before her 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 87 
 
 capture, and did not fire a gun after leaving port. No resistance 
 was made by the Beauregard, the superiority of the armament 
 of the Anderson — six thirty-two-pounders and one rifled-cannon, 
 and a crew of 110 men — being so great that it would have been 
 madness to measure their strength. While the Anderson was 
 approaching the Beauregard, however, her crew were engaged 
 in throwing over shell, shot, muskets, etc., and before the cap- 
 ture most of the ammunition was destroyed, the sails and rig- 
 ging cut to pieces, and pivot gun spiked. The crew, 37 in 
 number, were at once placed in irons and transferred to the 
 Anderson. A prize-crew was placed in charge of the Beaure- 
 gard, and she was brought into Key West. After an exami- 
 nation on board, the officers and crew were taken to the shore 
 and placed in the county jail. ' 
 
 The Convention of Georgia having placed that State out- 
 side of the Union, at the same time adopted a resolution 
 calling upon her citizens — officers of the U. S. army and 
 navy— to resign, and give their services to Georgia. In re- 
 sponse to this call, Capt. Josiah Tatnall, Commander James 
 D. Bulloch, Lieuts. Julian Myers, Wm. A. Wayne, C. M. 
 Morris, John Kell, A. E. Armstrong, C. J. Graves, Wilburn 
 B. Hall, George A. Borchert, R. F. Armstrong, and many 
 other officers of distinction in the "old navy," resigned their 
 commissions and tendered their services to their State. _ 
 
 Among the first to accept service under Georgia was 
 Lieut. Wilburn B. Hall, who had just arrived in New York in 
 command of a captured slaver, which had been seized off the 
 coast of Africa by the U. S. frigate Constellation, with 700 
 slaves aboard. Immediately upon his arrival in the United 
 States, Lieut. Hall resigned his commission and reported at 
 Milledgeville for orders. Governor Brown, like his associates 
 of the other sea-coast States, was at that time engaged in 
 establishing a sea-coast poKce, to guard against attempts of 
 Northern slave-dealers to carry off slaves from the coasts and 
 sell them in Cuba; thus transferring their slave trade from 
 the African coast to that of the Southern States adjacent or 
 near to Cuban waters.^ To guard against these depredations, 
 a sea-coast police was necessary. Accordingly, upon his arri- 
 val at the capital of Georgia, Lieut. Hall had a conference 
 with Adjut. Gen. H. C. Wayne, who directed him, on 
 behalf of the State, to return to New York and purchase a 
 rapid steamer for coast service. The Governor and Adjutant 
 General said they had no apprehension of war, and that the 
 State only wanted a rapid steamer capable of mounting two 
 howitzers to overhaul vessels engaged in illicit trade, and to 
 give protection to the citizens of Georgia residing along the 
 
 1 All the privateersmen belongin;; to the vari- sel with slaves was ever captured by the United 
 ous -vessels were exchanged in June, 1862, at States on the coast of Africa, owned by South- 
 City Point, on ttie James Kiver. em men — all of them, with but one exception, 
 
 having been fitted out at the North. The ex- 
 
 2 It is a fact not generally known that no ves- ception was the Wanderer, 
 
88 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 coast. It was their belief, that, though the situation between 
 the two sections looked serious. " the whole matter would be 
 accommodated, and that war ships would not be needed." To 
 accomplish his mission, Lieut. Hall had $15,000 placed to his 
 credit, and started for New York, where he purchased the 
 steamer Huntress. The vessel had run as a mail-boat between 
 Boston and Portland, and was very fast, making, in smooth 
 water, twenty knots with ease. She was about 500 tons, 230 
 feet in length, very narrow beam, low in the water, immense 
 side-wheels, and painted black. Her engines were very fine, 
 and her accommodations ample, but she was old. For the 
 purpose she was intended, however, the Huntress was a great 
 bargain. 
 
 Notwithstanding that Lieut. Hall was dogged day and 
 night by government spies, with the aid of Engineer George W. 
 Tennent, afterwards of the C. S. navy, he equipped his vessel, 
 secured his crew, and about the middle of March got safely to 
 sea in a great storm, at midnight, running between the U. S. 
 steamers Vanderbilt and Harriet Lane, who were guarding 
 the port of New York. Being forced to make some harbor 
 from the equinoctial storm which was raging along the 
 coast, Lieut. Hall sought refuge in Hampton Roads, and 
 anchored close under the guns of Fortress Monroe. Having 
 put himself in communication with friends on shore, Lieut. 
 Hall soon learned that his vessel was suspected, and that her 
 seizure was certain to take place on the following morning. 
 He therefore resumed his voyage in the face of a fierce 
 gale in the night. After being storm-driven for more than 
 eight days and terribly battered, starboard wheel-house 
 knocked to pieces, coal and stores almost entirely consumed, 
 the Huntress arrived in a deplorable condition at Charleston. 
 She entered the harbor flying the Confederate flag, and a flag 
 bearing the coat-of-arms of the State of Georgia — being, it is 
 believed, the first vessel to raise the Southern flag on the high 
 seas. As the Huntress passed in between Fort Moultrie, fly- 
 ing the Confederate flag, and Fort Sumter, flying the U. S. flag, 
 with Anderson in a state of siege, she was saluted hy Moul- 
 trie. Lieut. Hall supplied his vessel with coal, and sailed for 
 Savannah, where he reported to Capt. Tatnall. Having been 
 accepted, and war having begun, the Huntress was turned 
 oyer to the C. S. navy, and placed under the command of 
 Lieut. C. M. Morris, Lieut. Hall being ordered to command 
 the C. S. steamer Savannah'. The Huntress served on the 
 Georgia coast until the battle of Port Royal, in which she took 
 an active part, when she escaped to Charleston. After the 
 negro pilot Smalls stole the steamer Planter out from Charles- 
 ton, the Huntress took her place as a dispatch-boat in the har- 
 bor. Being very fast, the Confederate government changed 
 her name to the C. S. steamer Tropic, and made her a block- 
 ade-runner. After successfully eluding and passing through 
 
CAPTAIN CHAELES M. MOBEIS, C. S. N, 
 
 COMMANDEK OF THE "FLORIDA." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 89 
 
 the blockade ships of the enemy off Charleston, the Huntress, 
 with a cargo of cotton belonging to the Confederate govern- 
 ment, was burned at sea by accident. 
 
 The Everglade, or Savannah, to which Lieut. Hall was 
 ordered from the Huntress, was a small side- wheel steamer, 
 purchased by the State of Georgia for $34,000. She was changed 
 into a gunboat, for the purpose of cruising as a coast-guard 
 at the mouth of the Savannah River. Her officers, as first 
 appointed, were as follows : Commander, J. Mcintosh Kell ; 
 Midshipmen, R. F. Armstrong, S. N. Hooper, J. A. Merri- 
 weather; Chief Engineer, Joshua Smith; Assistant Engineer, 
 Forval Meeker ; Clerk, William J. Bennett. The Everglade 
 had her name changed to the Savannah. At the attack on 
 Port Royal by the Union forces she figured as the flag-ship of 
 Commodore Tatnall. 
 
 The steamer Nina, mounting one gun, was used along 
 the coast of South Carolina as a gunboat. The brig Bonita, 
 built in New York in 1853, was 276 tons burden, and a fast 
 sailer. She was formerly engaged in the slave trade, but was 
 captured on the coast of Africa, taken to Charleston, and af- 
 terwards to Savannah, where she was seized by order of Gov. 
 Brown and converted into a privateer. The Lewis Cass was 
 a clipper-built topsail schooner, of 100 tons burden, and 
 was in the U. S. revenue service when she was seized at 
 Savannah. She was converted into a privateer, armed with 
 one long sixty-eight-pounder taken from the Pensacola navy- 
 yard. Her crew numbered forty men and officers. 
 
 The privateer schooner Judith was of 250 tons, and car- 
 ried four broadside guns and one pivot gun amidships. She 
 was destroyed at the Pensacola navy-yard by the Union 
 forces, who boarded her, spiked her guns, and then fired her. 
 
 On the 4th of May, the Georgia privateer schooner Five 
 Brothers, Capt. Wm. Barquedo, with a crew of eighteen men, 
 in Cumberland Sound, seized the brig Elisha Doane, of Boston, 
 loaded with lumber. The Doane was detained by a prize- 
 crew for eight days, and then released by order of Gov. 
 Brown. 
 
 Soon after the secession of Louisiana, Capt. Lawrence 
 Rosseau, a true son of that State, who had entered the U. S. 
 navy oti the 16th of January, 1809, and who had been in its 
 service for many years, resigned his commission and accepted 
 rank under his native State. Gov. Moore appointed him com- 
 mander of the Louisiana navy, with headquarters at New Or- 
 leans. When the delegates at Montgomery formed a Provis- 
 ional Government, Captain Rosseau was one of the first to re- 
 port for duty under the new Confederacy. In February, 
 Capts. Rosseau, Ingraham and Randolph, with other naval 
 officers, were before the Naval Committee at the Confederate 
 capital, and assisted in devising means for the establishment of 
 a navy. Soon after the organization of the Navy Department, 
 
flO THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Capt. Rosseau was ordered to New Orleans, where he aided 
 in sending out a number of privateers to cruise against the 
 commerce of the enemy, and had the high honor of equip- 
 ping and sending to sea the first Confederate man-of-war — the 
 Sumter. Early in March, 1861, he was ordered to purchase 
 for the Confederate Government the steamship Habana, af- 
 terwards named the Sumter, in honor of the victory over Fort 
 Sumter, and fit her out as a cruiser. On the 36th of the same 
 month he entered the naval service of the Confederate States. 
 
 Immediately upon the receipt of the news in New Orleans 
 that President Davis had invited privateers to prey upon the 
 enemy's commerce, several stock companies were organized 
 and several hundred thousand dollars were subscribed in a few 
 hours for the purpose of fitting out vessels. About the 14th 
 of May, the privateer steamer Calhoun, of 1,058 tons burden, 
 under the command of Capt. J. Wilson, with a crew of 100 
 men and several pieces of cannon, hastened out of New 
 Orleans to the Balize on her cruise in the Gulf. She soon cap- 
 tured the bark Ocean Eagle, from Portland, Me., with a cargo 
 of 3,147 casks of lime, valued at $24,000. Having put a prize- 
 crew on board, and towing the vessel into the Mississippi, the 
 Calhoun resumed her voyage. The Calhoun also captured the 
 ship Milan, with 1,500 bags of salt, valued at $20,000, and the 
 schooner JElla, from Tampico, with a cargo of fruit, valued at 
 f5,000. 
 
 The Calhoun was afterwards engaged in blockade-run- 
 ning, and while on her way from Havana to New Orleans 
 with a large and valuable cargo of military stores, valued at 
 $.300,000, was chased by a Federal cruiser and abandoned. 
 Capt. Wilson, who commanded the Calhoun, was formerly the 
 captain of tlie brig Minnie Schiffer, the vessel that rescued 
 the passengers of the ill-fated steamer Connaught. 
 
 The steamer Win. H. Webb, immediately upon the break- 
 ing out of the war, was converted into a gunboat and pri- 
 vateer. She steamed out of New Orleans in May, and on the 
 24th captured, about ninety miles from the Passes, three Mas- 
 sachusetts whalers, the brig Panama, and schooners John 
 Adams and Mermaid. The prizes reached New Orleans on 
 the 37th, and had on board 215 barrels of whale and sperm oil. 
 
 The privateer steamer V. H. Ivey, of about 200 tons, armed 
 with two thirty-two pound rifled guns, in May steamed out of 
 New Orleans and captured the ship Marathon, from Marseilles, 
 in ballast, valued at $35,000; ship Albino, from Boston, with a 
 cargo of ice, valued at $25,000. 
 
 The privateer steamer Music captured during the same 
 time a splendid new ship — the Marshall, from Havre, in bal- 
 last, valued at $50,000, and the ship John H. Jarvis, from 
 Liverpool, in ballast, valued at $30,000. The schooner Vigi- 
 lante, with a cargo of provisions, was captured on July 31st, 
 in Jourdan River, by Lieuts. J.V. Touloneand J. Colly, with a 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 91 
 
 detachment of the Shieldsboro' Rifles. All of these vessels 
 were condemned and sold in New Orleans by C. B. Beverly, 
 the Confederate States Marshal. ' 
 
 On April 18th, 1863, Congress passed "an act to establish a 
 volunteer navy " According to the provisions of this act, any 
 person or persons who produced to President Davis satis- 
 factory evidence as to character, competency and means, were 
 to be, under certain regulations, commissioned by the Con- 
 federate government, as regular oflScers of the volunteer 
 navy, to procure and fit out vessels of over 100 tons burden 
 for cruising against the enemy. Such officers were to be 
 " worthy to command," and such vessels were to be "fit for 
 the service," and they were to be "received into the volunteer 
 navy," "to serve during the war," and " subject to all the laws, 
 rules and regulations of the regular navy, except as otherwise 
 provided for." The grades of rank were fixed in the act from 
 commander down, and pay was provided, which, however, 
 was small, the compensation being prizes (ninety per cent, of 
 which went to the captors, and ten per cent, to the wounded 
 and widows and orphans of those slain), and a bonus of twenty- 
 five per cent, for every armed vessel, or military and naval 
 transport of the enemy, burnt, sunk or destroyed, and twenty- 
 five dollars for every prisoner captured and brought in from 
 such vessels. 
 
 The passage of this act, it was thought, would add con- 
 siderably to the navy of the Confederacy, that was doing so 
 much on the high seas for the South. Immediately after the 
 passage of the Act of Congress, " the Virginia Volunteer 
 Navy Company " was organized, and over a million and a half 
 dollars was subscribed for stock. The subscribers were men 
 of capital and influence, who saw in the measure a means of 
 most seriously damaging the enemy, as well as handsomely 
 rewarding those who embarked in it. 
 
 The company was chartered by the Legislature of Vir- 
 ginia on October 13th, 1863, with the following incorporators: 
 
 1 The New York HeraU of Jvme 2d. 1861, says: 
 
 On the 26th of last month there were under Name. Master. Hail From 
 
 seizure, or as prizes in the port of New Orleans, 
 the following vessels : 
 
 Chester Bearse Boston. 
 
 OceanEagle Luce Thomaston. 
 
 SHIPS. 
 
 iVame. Master. Hail From bchoonebs. 
 
 AbsBlHno Smith Boston. e. S. Janes Townsend. . . 
 
 -J"^^'-, Delano Bath, Me. Henry Travers Wyatt Baltimore. 
 
 American Union. Lincoln — Bath, Me. Ella Howes Philadelphia. 
 
 C. A. Farwell Farwell Rockland. 
 
 Express Frost Portsmouth, N.H. " Of the ahove yessels some doubt attaches to 
 
 Enoch Train ) -riitotoU h„„*™ tbe seizure of the Enoch Train and Wilbur Fisk, 
 
 (^obably) } ■• -Burweu.,.. uoston. ^^^ ^^^ probabilities are that they have been 
 
 iariiio™' fvler NewXrk confiscated. The seizures made by the Confed- 
 
 MarshaU ■" Spragii4"'" Providenra ®™'*^ "^ '° *'^® ^*^' accounts may be thus 
 
 MUian Eustis ..'.'.'. Bath. Me. ' enumerated : 
 
 Robert Harding. Ingraham . . Boston. Off the different ports 12 
 
 State of Maine.. Humphrey.. Portland. In port '.'.'.'.'.'.".'.'.'.'..'..'.'...'.. 30 
 
 .^^™ ■!«■ i, .■ ■ ' " ^P^'""! -"^^ York.- Steamers captured on the Mississippi 15 
 
 (problbl/)} ••Pousland... Boston. ^^^^ - 
 
93 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Samuel J. Harrison, Baker and Baskerville, Dunlap, Moncure 
 & Co., Joseph R. Anderson & Co., J. L. Apperson, R. H. 
 Maury & Co., W. F. Watson, J. P. George, John Robin Mc- 
 Daniel, R. M. Crenshaw, Thomas Branch, D. B. Dagger, 
 Thomas R. Price & Co. , Matthew Bridges, William B. Jones 
 & Co., William B. Isaacs, Boiling W. Haxall, and such other 
 persons as were then or afterward associated with them. The 
 capital of the company was not to be less than $1,000,000, nor 
 more than $10,000,000. The officers were Samuel J. Harrison, 
 President; Robert Archer, J. L. Apperson, Thomas W. Mc- 
 Cance and J. R. McDaniel, Directors. 
 
 Owing to the unfavorable turn of affairs in the South and 
 the blockade of Southern ports, the company did not embark 
 in privateering. 
 
 "The Old Dominion Trading Company" of the city of 
 Richmond, which was chartered by the Legislature of Virginia 
 on October 3d, 1863, with a capital of not less than $100,000, 
 and not to exceed $2,000,000, in shares of $500 each, did a con- 
 siderable business in blockade -running. The incorporators 
 were : A. Morris, P. C. Williams, Wm. G. Payne, D. O. Hufford 
 and E. D. Keeling. 
 
 The privateers of the Confederacy carried on their de- 
 struction of U. S. commerce for many months with consider- 
 able immunity. There was no limit to their boldness or scope 
 to their operations. By August 1, 1861, three privateer steam- 
 ers were reported in latitude 1 deg. 47 min. North, longitude 
 33 deg. 48 min. West. The British mail -steamer Tyne, on 
 August 17th, reported seeing a privateer steamer between Rio 
 Janeiro and Pernambuco. A letter from the Island of St. 
 Thomas, dated Aug. 5th, said that several privateers had been 
 seen in the neighborhood, and two of them, well armed and 
 equipped, refitted and provisioned at St. John's, in the island 
 of Porto Rico. The Liverpool underwriters, as early as June, 
 had permitted the pith of President Davis' rules for priva- 
 teers to be posted in their rooms, and an American ship— the 
 first — on May 23d, hoisted the Confederate flag in the Prince's 
 dock. The operations of the privateers upon commerce put 
 up insurance premiums so high upon all freights taken in 
 American vessels as to cause many U. S. merchants to turn 
 their vessels over to English owners, who sailed them under 
 the English flag. 
 
 Notwithstanding all the naval preparations made by the 
 U. S. government from the beginning of the war to August, 
 1861, only two small privateers had been captured or destroyed, 
 the Savannah and the Petrel; only two of their prizes had 
 been retaken by government vessels, and two by the crews. 
 The little privateers, on the other hand, had captured within 
 the same length of time nearly sixty Federal vessels. How 
 many had been captured of which we have no account, it is 
 impossible to say. Several privateers, whose names are now 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 93 
 
 unknown, and of which we have no record, were undoubtedly 
 afloat along the coast or in mid-ocean, or near the shores of 
 countries where the American foreign trade was chiefly car- 
 ried on. Many prizes, no doubt, were burnt or sunk, as in the 
 case of some of those taken in the early part of the war by 
 the Sumter; and it is doubtful if we shall ever hear of them. 
 " We are satisfied," says the New York Herald of Aug. 10th, 
 1861, " that already $30,000,000 worth of property has been 
 lost in various ways through the operations of these highway- 
 men of the seas, increasing daily in numbers, and becoming 
 more and more daring from impunity. The worst effect, is 
 not the loss of the vessels and their cargoes, but the destruc- 
 tion of our trade. Our commerce with the West Indies was 
 immense before the pirates commenced their depredations. 
 Now no Northern vessel will get a charter or can be insured 
 for any reasonable premium. English bottoms are taking all 
 our trade. When the Great Eastern was here, she could have 
 been filled with cargo, if her draft of water were not so great. 
 Thus our shipping interest is literally ruined." 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 VIRGINIA WATERS. 
 
 THE secession of Virginia from the Union, following imme- 
 diately after the assault upon Sumter, dispelled all hope 
 at Washington that Virginia would not ally herself with 
 the Confederate States. It was accepted, and possibly 
 intended, as a virtual declaration that, in any collision between 
 the Federal and Confederate forces, Virginia would arraign 
 herself on the side of the latter. It was regarded at Washington 
 as a hostile act, and the waters of the State as having been 
 opened to invasion whenever the government should deem it 
 proper to send a force to occupy the rivers, bays and harbors of 
 the State. In the same light it was accepted at Richmond, and 
 Gen. Lee, in reporting to Governor Letcher, June 15th, 1861, 
 the state of military and naval preparations to that date, says: 
 
 " Arrangements -were first made for the establishment of batteries to 
 prevent the ascent of our rivers by hostile vessels. As soon as an exam- 
 ination was made for the selection of sites, their construction was begun, 
 and their armament and defence committed to the Virginia navy." 
 
 Among the very first of those arrangements, Gen. Lee 
 dispatched Capt. Wm. F. Lynch of the State navy to examine 
 the defensible points on the Potomac, and to take measures 
 for the establisliment of batteries to prevent the vessels of the 
 enemy from navigating that river. In the discharge of that 
 duty, sites for batteries along that river were immediately 
 selected, and arrangements made for their speedy erection. 
 But the entire command of the river being in the possession 
 of the U. S. government, a larger force was required for the 
 protection of the batteries than could be spared at that early 
 day from the field of active operations. 
 
 Alexandria, Va. , the practical head of navigation so far 
 as Virginia was concerned, was occupied immediately by a 
 small force of State troops under Lieut. Col. A. S Taylor, but 
 their exposed position was soon found to be untenable, and the 
 city was evacuated on May 5th, 1861, Col. Taylor's force falling 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 95 
 
 back eight miles to Springfield, on the Orange & Alexandria 
 Railroad. That force consisted of only two companies of raw- 
 recruits, numbering 150 privates, armed with flint muskets 
 of 1818, without cartridges; the Mt. Vernon Guard, 86 privates, 
 armed with new muskets, 53 men without accoutrements, and 
 15 without arms, and all with very little ammunition. ' Such 
 a force was useless for defence, and only provocative of attack. 
 The retention of the command and navigation of the Potomac 
 was even more indispensable to the Federal authorities for the 
 maintenance of their capital than to the Confederates for de- 
 fence, and, therefore, the Pawnee, Commander S. C. Rowan, 
 carrying a battery of fifteen guns, was put in commission as 
 soon as Virginia seceded, and under the protection of her guns 
 the first Zouave regiment of New York Volunteers, under Col. 
 Ellsworth, occupied Alexandria on May 34th. The removal of 
 the flag from the staff on the Marshall House was avenged by 
 Mr.. Jackson, the owner, who sacrificed his life in taking that 
 of Col. Ellsworth. Among all the acts of personal bravery 
 during the war, not one exceeds in heroism that total indiffer- 
 ence to personal safety which inspired the noble Jackson to 
 brave in his single person a whole regiment of the enemy. 
 The uselessness of the act may detract from its wisdom, but 
 cannot lessen its heroism. The authorities at Washington had 
 on April 33d the U. S. steamers Anacostia and Pocahontas, the 
 latter a vessel of some 1,800 tons, at the navy-yard, to keep 
 the navigation of the Potomac open. 
 
 On April 34th, Major Thos. H. Williamson of the Engi- 
 neers, and Lieut. H. H. Lewis of the Virginia navy, by order of 
 Gen. Ruggles, examined together the ground at Aquia Creek, 
 and selected Split Rock Bluff as the best point for a battery, 
 as the channel there could be commanded from that point by 
 guns of sufficient calibre. Cream Point, on the other side of 
 the creek, was not defensible with the small force then under 
 Gen. Ruggles, and hence was not fortified. " The Aquia Creek 
 landing and the protection of the steamer George Page, which 
 had been seized, were regarded as of secondary importance, 
 except in' the moral influence upon the neighborhood. The 
 position at Aquia was diflBcult to defend, since it was easily 
 turned by way of Potomac Creek, and exposed to disaster from 
 an attack in the rear. But it would serve the purpose of draw- 
 ing the attention of the enemy from Freestone and Mathias 
 Points, which would control the navigation of the river, and 
 which, when occupied, would render the battery at Aquia 
 Creek of little importance. ' To this end, Capt. Wm. F. Lynch, 
 Commander Robert D. Thorburn and Lieuts. H. H. Lewis and 
 John Wilkinson, of the State navy, erected at Aquia a battery 
 of thirteen guns, about May 14th, to protect the terminus of the 
 
 I Becords, Series 1, Vol. II , p. 27 Ke- April 24th, 1861, Off. Bee, Series 1, Vol. n., p. 779. 
 
 port of Col. Taylor 
 
 ' 3 Eeport of Gen. Buggies, May 6tli, Off. Bee., 
 
 2 Beportof Major ■WiUiamsonandLieut.Lewis, Vol. II, p. 810. 
 
96 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 railroad to Richmond. While serving to protect the railroad, 
 that battery was also a threat to close the navigation of the 
 Potomac, and was so considered at Washington. U. S. naval 
 authorities im.mediately organized the Potomac flotilla, consist- 
 ing of the Freeborn, carrying three guns, the Anacostia, of two 
 guns, and the Resolute, of two guns; the whole commanded by 
 Commander James H. Ward. The Aquia Creek battery was 
 commanded by Capt. Wm. F. Lynch and other officers of the 
 Virginia but afterwards of the Confederate navy. 
 
 On April 29th, Lieuts. Wm. L. Maury and Wm. Taylor 
 Smith, of the State navy, having ascertained reliably the num- 
 ber of Federal troops in Washington City to be very largely in 
 excess of that holding the Confederate lines on the Potomac, 
 advised Gen. Ruggles against erecting a battery above Aquia 
 Creek, and that the two eight-inch guns, ammunition, etc., 
 then in Alexandria, be removed to some point of greater se- 
 curity; which was immediately done, and not too soon, as the 
 enemy occupied Alexandria on May 24th. Capt. Lynch, on 
 May 6th, diverted the guns, first intended for Mathias Point, to 
 Aquia Creek, to protect the approaches to Fredericksburg from 
 the Potomac, and the guns were placed in position by Com- 
 mander Thorburn, and the necessary preparation of defence 
 actively undertaken and completed within forty-eight hours. 
 The difficulty of enrolling men for any naval service, even in 
 shore batteries, by naval officers, was experienced at that early 
 day, and for that reason Gen. Ruggles was compelled to man 
 the batteries with companies of volunteers, as well as to detail 
 infantry to work in erecting the batteries for the heavy guns. 
 
 On May 31st and June 1st, 1861, the first battle of the war 
 between the navy of the United States and batteries of the Con- 
 federate States was fought. On the first day, the U. S. steam- 
 ers opened their fire on the battery, and fired fourteen shot 
 and shell, slightly wounding one man in the hand, but doing 
 no other damage, and not by any means justifying the remark 
 of Admiral Porter that, " the batteries were silenced altogether 
 in two hours, and the secessionists driven to their earthworks 
 on hills overlooking the landing." Nothing of that kind oc- 
 curred. On June 1st, about 10 A. M., the U. S. Potomac flotilla 
 renewed their attack upon the battery, and after throwing 397 
 shot and shell retired, having hurt no one in the battery and 
 doing no injury to the works. ' 
 
 The report of Capt. W. F. Lynch, then of the Virginia 
 navy, dated June 2d, 1861, to Capt. Samuel Barron, Virginia 
 navy, in charge of Naval Detail and Equipment, shows that' 
 
 "On Friday, at 10:30 P. M., two out of three steamers abreast of the 
 battery opened fire upon us, and continued the cannonade for three 
 hours, when they withdrew. The largest steamer very much resembled the 
 Crusader. As they kept at long shot, mostly beyond our range, I eoononuzed 
 ammunition, and only fired fifty -six times. One of the steamers had a rifled 
 
 1 OjSioicd Records, Report of Gen. Ruggles, 1st Series, Vol. II., pp. 65 and 57. 
 
COMMAJJDER MATTHEW F. MAURY, 
 CONFEDEBAXE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 97 
 
 gun, the shell from which penetrated through the sand bank, and one of 
 them exploded in and completely demolished the room occupied by the 
 officers and myself. Upon our part no one was injured; but lookers-on 
 from the hUls and opposite shores state that the enemy was repeatedly 
 struck. 
 
 "Yesterday, the steamers which had laid off during the night were 
 reinforced by the Pawnee, and at 11:30 A. M. they commenced a brisk 
 cannonade, which continued with little interruption until about 4:30 P.M., 
 during which the Pawnee fired 393 shot and shell, and the other steamer 
 307, the greater portion of the latter being rifled shells. 
 
 " Our sand banks not being en barbette, we could only fire as the 
 enemy came within range through the embrasures. This, added to the 
 long distance at which he kept, and the necessity of occasionally repair- 
 ing damages to the breastwork, combined with my desire to save ammu- 
 nition, constrained me to withhold fire, except when something like a fair 
 shot presented. The houses in the rear were very much knocked about, 
 and the railroad track torn up in three or four places; but, thanks to a 
 kind Providence, who seems to smile benignly on our cause, no one with 
 us was injured. 
 
 " As the enemy had on Friday made the buildings at the extremity of 
 the wharf his line "of sight upon the battery, I had all the furniture, etc., 
 together with the weather-boarding, conveyed to the rear of the battery, 
 and in the course of the forenoon set fire to and blew up the platform 
 and outer end of the bridge. 
 
 "I have spoken of Commander Thorburn's zeal in the first engage- 
 ment, and cannot too highly applaud the spirit and alacrity, tempered 
 by deference to orders, of Commander Cooke and Lieut. Trobel. With 
 the exception of Gunner's Mate Cunningham and Master's Mate Larmour, 
 whose services were of inestimable value, our guns' crews consisted of only 
 volunteer militia, who stood their ground bravely. 
 
 " "We had yesterday, in addition to our guns, a small rifled one from 
 Capt. Walker's battery, under the immediate command of Lieut. Robert- 
 son, of Tennessee, which rendered efficient service. 
 
 "In connection with the transportation of the Columbiads to the 
 summit of a lofty hill, I cannot speak in too highly commendable terms 
 of the zeal and untiring energy of Lieut. Chas. C. Simms. " 
 
 The result, or rather want of result, of the cannonade of 
 the earth battery at Aquia Creek by the Federal gunboats, 
 attracted the immediate attention of Gen. Lee, and on June 
 10th he wrote to Gen. Holmes, commander at Fredericks- 
 burg: 
 
 " It is probable, that realizing the inutihty of cannonading the bat- 
 teries at Aquia Creek with smooth-bore guns, the naval force of the 
 United States will hereafter employ rifled cannon of large calibre at long 
 range. It is therefore advisable that the batteries should be rendered as 
 secure as possible by the application of some such means as were so suc- 
 cessfully employed at Charleston. Eailroad iron, laid at an angle of about 
 forty-five degrees with the horizon, on the exterior slope, the upper 
 ends projecting above the exterior crest, would probably answer the 
 purpose." 
 
 In that first battle, the accurate firing of the battery 
 under Capt. Lynch, C. S. navy, was attested by the damage done 
 to the flotilla — the Freeborn being obliged to return to Wash- 
 ington for repairs. The U. S. Potomac flotilla had been in- 
 creased by the Pawnee, Commander Rowan, and, though a 
 number of the shots from the battery struck the hulls of the 
 
98 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 vessels, there was no irreparable damage. ' The Federal news- 
 paper accounts of this "opening of the ball" were extravagant 
 in expression, and far beyond the facts of the fight; "the ob- 
 server, through a telescope," who "saw a number of the bodies 
 of them carried away in wagons," was himself carried away 
 in imagination. One finger was the total loss sustained in 
 the battery. Nor was the official report of Commander Ward, 
 May 31st, 18C2, more accurate in his conjectures of damage 
 inflicted by the battery of his flotilla, while his commenda- 
 tion of the working of the gun-carriage of his own invention 
 was not wholly without a business look. The report of Com- 
 mander Ward, of June 1st, is not without its testimony in behalf 
 of Capt. Lynch and the other Confederate naval officers who 
 commanded the Aquia Creek batteries. He reported that : 
 
 " Several shots came on board of us, causing the vessel to leak badly, 
 and, besides other injuries, clipping the port wheel, the wrought-iroa 
 shaft being gouged by a shot ■which would have shattered it if of cast 
 iron. * * * I proceeded to Washington to repair damages and refill 
 my exhausted magazine. The Pawnee remains meantime below to supply 
 my place in the blockade. Capt. Rowan of that ship joined me last night, 
 replenishing my exhausted stores, and most gallantly opened fire this 
 morning, having followed my lead in shore towards the batteries. His 
 ship received numerous wounds, both below and aloft, inflicted by the 
 enemy's shot. On account of her size, she being more easily hit, she ap- 
 peared to be their favorite mark, and was herself often a sheet of flame, 
 owing to the rapidity of her repeated charges." 
 
 Major Thomas H. Williamson, Chief Engineer of the State 
 of Virginia, as early as May 4th recommended the establish- 
 ment of a battery at Mathias Point, on the Potomac, where a 
 bluff-headland, twenty feet above the water, commanded the 
 channel at a distance of about three-quarters of a mile, 
 for more than a mile of sailing. Capt. Lynch, C. S. navy, 
 was also consulted, and, upon the recommendation of these 
 officers, a battery of ten heavy guns was constructed. But, 
 before the battery was commenced, a small party of the enemy, 
 on June 34th, landed at Mathias Point, and burned the house 
 of Dr. Howe; and two days after, on June 36th, Commander 
 Ward, of .the U. S. Potomac flotilla, dispatched Lieut. Chaplin 
 with a party from the Resolute, protected by the Beliance, and 
 provided with implements for holding the Point and erecting' 
 a battery. About 1 P. M. the Confederate pickets reported that 
 the enemy had landed, and that, under the heavy fire of shell 
 and shot from the enemy's steamers, they had been compelled 
 to retire. A vigorous attack was immediately made by the 
 Confederate troops under Col. R. M. Mayo, and the enemy 
 were driven to their boats and vessels, having sustained very 
 heavy loss. Capt. Ward, commander of the Potomac flotilla, 
 was killed and many wounded. Col. Mayo reported the "abso- 
 lute necessity " for a battery of heavy artillery at the Point, 
 
 1 Porter's Hist, p. 41. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 99 
 
 and the battery was erected, which, in conjunction with that 
 erected soon afterwards at Evansport, completed the blockade 
 of the Potomac. 
 
 In August the Confederate authorities determined to erect 
 the batteries at Evansport, near the mouth of Quantico Creek, 
 which had been recommended by Capt. Lynch on June 4th. 
 Brig. Gen. French, with a portion of the command of Gen. 
 Holmes, was ordered to erect the batteries under the direction 
 of Commander Frederick Chatard of the C. S. navy, assisted 
 by Commander H. J. Hartstene and Lieut. Charles W. Read, 
 all of the navy. The place selected for their erection was ad- 
 mirably suited for offence and defence. The construction of 
 the batteries was an exceedingly difficult undertaking, and 
 had to be carried on with the greatest secrecy and caution, 
 for the river was most rigidly patroled by the Federal gun- 
 boats night and day, while larger vessels and transports were 
 passing up and down at all hours. It seemed almost impos- 
 sible under such circumstances that four powerful batteries, 
 mounting in all about twenty heavy guns, could be constructed 
 without interruption at the very river's edge ; yet it was ac- 
 complished. A stinted growth of pines skirting the edge of 
 the Potomac Bluff formed the screen behind which the work 
 was performed. Two of the batteries were nearly completed 
 and fully manned when discovered on the morning of October 
 15th, 1861. Their armament consisted of nine-inch Dahlgrens, 
 forty -two-pounder navy guns, two rifled thirty-two-pounders, 
 and an Armstrong gun, which carried a ball of 135 pounds' 
 weight. It was received from England by way of Bermuda, and 
 brought in by the blockaders. The Potomac there being but a 
 mile and a half wide, tvith a channel close to the Virginia 
 shore, was completely commanded by the guns of the Con- 
 federate batteries. Before the batteries were established the 
 bosom of the broad river was whitened with the sails of trans- 
 port fleets, and its waves were plowed by rapid war 
 steamers continually passing between Washington and the 
 sea. After the establishment of the batteries nothing was to 
 be seen but the dark and swelling river, and occasionally a 
 small schooner stealing furtively along the Maryland shore. 
 On these insignificant crafts our gunners did not care to waste 
 their ammunition. Sometimes, in the darkness of night, a 
 steamer managed to slip past; but for all practical purposes 
 the river was closed against the enemy. 
 
 The first shot that notified Capt. Chatard that his batteries 
 were discovered came from the sloop-of-war Pocahontas as 
 she was passing down the river. The garrisons had been in 
 the fortifications but a few days, and the troops in Battery 
 No._ 3, at Freestone Point, preparatory to unmasking their 
 position, had been ordered to cut the small pines in front of 
 them on one side, so that each one of them afterward could be 
 easily leveled by a single blow of an axe. A storm of wind 
 
100 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 coming on at night blew some of the pines down, so that when 
 the Pocahontas came by early in the morning the battery and 
 the men at work were discovered through the openings. She 
 promptly notified the Confederates of the discovery by a shell 
 which struck the battery square in the centre of the rampart, 
 pushing its way clean through to the woodwork inside, but 
 injured no one. The Pocahontas fired but the single shot and 
 passed on. About a mile astern, and following in her wake, 
 the Seminole was steaming majestically down the river. Orders 
 were instantly given in the battery to prepare for action. All 
 concealment was now thrown off. A party of men with axes 
 soon leveled the thin green pines in front, and the details, hur- 
 riedly told off, sprang with alacrity to the guns, which were 
 quickly loaded with shot and shell. Promptly they opened on 
 her, shot after shot followed in quick succession, and the 
 Seminole, without hastening her speed, gallantly replied to 
 ^very shot, and poured her broadsides into the batteries in 
 quick succession. 
 
 A letter from the U. S. steam-sloop Seminole, published in 
 the Philadelphia Bulletin, and dated Oct. 16th, shows the accu- 
 racy of firing attained by the batteries under the instruction 
 and drill of the Confederate naval officers. The Seminole was 
 going from Washington to Old Point, and passing Evansport 
 batteries encountered their fire: 
 
 " They sent us at least thirty rifled balls and shells, all splendidly 
 aimed, their guns being evidently well manned. Some of their shot and 
 shell went over us, about eight or nine feet clear of the deck, and only a 
 few feet above nay head. These fell or burst from twenty to forty rods 
 beyond on our port side. Some burst just outside, before reaching us, 
 and some just over our heads. Fragments of shell flew about the deck, 
 and splinters in thousands. 
 
 " We were struck eleven times. One ball cut away the main stays, 
 scattering bits of iron chain down on the deck. One shot cut through and 
 shivered the mizzen mast. Several banged clear through the ship, in at 
 one side and out at the other. One rifled ball came through in that way, 
 struck and carried away the brass hand-rail guard around the engine 
 hatch, and went out through the opposite side of the ship. This ball 
 went within five feet of me, and sent a piece of brass, bent double like a 
 boomerang, whizzing over my head. How the balls do hiss, and the shells 
 sing aloud— a perfectly distinct, fascinating, locust-like song ; but grow- 
 ing louder and faster as they come nearer, plunging, hissing and bursting 
 through the air i * * * 
 
 " The fight was a severe one, and without knowing what the other 
 side suffered, I do know that the Seminole suffered severely." 
 
 Early on the morning following the firing on the Seminole, 
 the Pawnee, in passing the batteries, received seven shots. 
 One of them, a thirty -two-pounder, struck amidships, about 
 eighteen inches above the water-line. A second took effect 
 on the starboard quarter, passing through the dingy, and made 
 its ajjpearance in the ward -room, but was prevented from 
 entering by striking on the plank shear. A third struck the 
 bluff of the starboard bow, while a fourth struck the vessel in 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 101 
 
 the waist, passing from one side through to the other, cutting 
 a hammock in two in its course. The splinters flew around in 
 all directions, but she was not seriously damaged, and nobody 
 was hit. 
 
 It was supposed that the Confederates were making ar- 
 rangements for some offensive demonstration from the vicinity 
 of Aquia Creek for crossing into Maryland, and shortly after 
 the batteries were unmasked a division of troops was de- 
 tached from the Army of the Potomac and sent to southern 
 Maryland, and General Hooker given the command. The 
 line stretched along the river from Port Tobacco, opposite 
 Aquia Creek, to witlj^in about twenty miles of Washington. 
 The troops were encamped well back from the river, but the 
 bank was closely picketed by batteries and sentries day and 
 night. 
 
 Before the arrival of Hooker's troops, a small steamer — the 
 George Page — which the Confederates had captured during 
 the early part of their occupation, and which had been armed 
 and newly christened the C. S. steamer City of Bichmond, 
 ran out of Aquia Creek late in October during a storm, un- 
 der the darkness and fog, and came up the river anchored in- 
 side of Quantico Creek. On October 24th she came out in the 
 Potomac and crossed over to the Maryland side and shelled 
 the camp of Gen. Sickles' Excelsior brigade, necessitating the 
 changing of their position to a more distant location and out of 
 the reach of the Page's guns. The Page gave great annoyance 
 to the enemy and kept up the apprehension of a Confederate 
 landing in Maryland. Capt. Parks, of the U. S. tug Murray, 
 reported in Washington, October 23d, that the steamer was 
 seen crossing to Maryland at Budd's Ferry between Evans- 
 port and Shipping Point, that she was protected by the Confed- 
 erate batteries "which have recently thrown balls from their 
 rifled guns across the river (which was a mile and a half wide), 
 and to a distance of two miles into Maryland." At the time 
 the George Page was playing about the river, under the pro- 
 tection of the Confederate batteries, a Northern correspondent 
 said: 
 
 " The United States squadron off Indian Head consists of the follow- 
 ing vessels: Yankee (flagship), Commander Craven; Pocahontas, Com- 
 mander Wyman; Seminole, Commander Grillis ; Penguin, Commander 
 
 — ; Union, Lieut. Com. Harrell; Valley City, Lieut. Commanding 
 
 Chaplin ; Jacoh Bell, Lieut. Commanding McCrea ; Island Bell, Mas- 
 ter Commanding Harris; Rescue, , commanding; Jlerbert, ; 
 
 Murray, Midshipman Commanding McGlensey ; Reliance, Master 
 Commanding Hannum ; Resolute, Master Commanding Foster, and 
 Satellite. Thus our squadron consists of various descriptions of ves- 
 sels, from the smart and powerful sloop-of-war Pocahontas to those 
 tmy twin sisters, Resolute and Reliance, each mounting one brass twenty- 
 four, and are probably the smallest men-of-war in the world. Beside 
 these there are six large launches, each armed with either a twenty -four 
 howitzer, or a rifled cannon of the same calibre. In naming the foregoing 
 vessels, I have by no means exhausted the catalogue. There are a number 
 
103 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of ^nboats further down the river guarding the entrance to Aquia 
 Creels, and keeping a sharp look-out on Mathias Point and other suspi- 
 cious places. Among these is the Freeborn, -which, under the command 
 of the late gallant Commander Ward, was of so much service in keeping 
 the navigation of the river clear during the earlier period of the present 
 struggle." 
 
 And the New York Herald, October 25th, taunted the Navy 
 Department at Washington with insufficiency because, 
 
 " In the interval, on the Lower Potomac River, between the principal 
 batteries of the rebels, the rebel steamer George Page, poking her nose 
 out of Aquia Creek, has suddenly made her appearance, and has been 
 complimenting the Sickles brigade on the Maryland shore with a few speci- 
 men shells. Next we shall probably hear of another mosquito fleet, and 
 of the capture of some of our river transports, unless we put an end, and 
 that very soon, to this rebel blockade of the Potomac. Rome, we know, 
 was not built in a day; but these rebel batteries, built in a night, ought 
 not to require more than one day's work to silence them. But let us wait 
 with patience, for good news, we think, is close at hand." 
 
 On November 14th, Gen. Hooker, in reporting the burning 
 of a schooner off Mattawoman Creek by a party of rebels from 
 Cockpit Point, says that " it was executed with an air of true 
 heroism"; and later, November 27th, the newspapers said: 
 
 " Last night, the Harriet Lane, and the other vessels of the flotilla off 
 Indian Head, had their cables ready for slipping at a moment's notice, 
 had the rebel steamer George Page made her appearance out of Quantico 
 Creek, but as she did not quit her retreat she gained another lease of ex- 
 istence. Apropos of the Page, Dr Russell's remarks in the London Times 
 about her and her supposed achievements and capabilities are pure in- 
 vention. She has never landed any troops in Maryland; only one attempt 
 was miade to do so, on the day she came out of Aquia Creek, but the sight 
 of a single Union soldier caused her to turn back and run into Quantico 
 Creek, whence she never dared to stir till Friday night, when she at- 
 tempted to capture the store-ship Wyandunk, but the opportune appear- 
 ance of the Hale, with her formidable batteries, once more drove her back 
 like a rat to its hole. The rebels are capricious in their attentions to pass- 
 ing vessels. Sometimes they will let several pass without a shot, but 
 open fire on the last. It would appear from this, that when they open on 
 an unarmed vessel it is merely for target practice. Last night and to- 
 day several schooners passed unmolested. Perhaps they are short of 
 auimunition.'' 
 
 On the morning of January 3d, 1862, an experiment was 
 tried by the enemy to reduce the Confederate battery at 
 Cockpit Point. The correspondent of the New York JleraM, 
 on board the U. S. steamer Stepping Stones, said : 
 
 " At ten o'clock the Ananostia approached the battery, and took up a 
 position somewhat above and opposite the Mattawoman Creek. She 
 threw in a number of shells, several of which were seen to explode in the 
 rebel battery. The Yankee then got underway and stood for the bat- 
 tery, ranging herself right opposite. She commenced by firing two shells 
 from her bow gun, a sixty-four-pounder, and afterwards continued to 
 pour in her fire on the enemy from her after guns, consisting of a thirty- 
 two-pounder and twenty-four brass howitzer, and a twelve-pounder 
 brass rifled cannon. The enemy replied to the Yankee, for the AnacosHu 
 was so placed that the batteries could not hit her, throwing four shots, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 103 
 
 the second of which struck the Yankee, entering the forecastle on the 
 port side, her head being up the river, and knocliing away a Icnee entirely; 
 passing to the starboard side, the shot smashed another knee and drop- 
 ped on the floor, its force being spent. The shot was from a rifled gun, 
 and weighs eighty pounds." 
 
 Of these almost daily occurrences no official reports from 
 either side are to be obtained, and all information must be 
 gathered from the contemporaneous accounts in the news- 
 papers of the day, which, notwithstanding the tone of exag- 
 geration and the bitterness of feeling, then quite natural, are 
 yet reasonably accurate and to be relied on for information 
 of many gallant actions which illustrate American character, 
 and which would have been lost to history but for the zealous 
 and indefatigable newspaper correspondent. Their letters, 
 particularly those in the Federal papers, often contain the 
 only accounts that have survived those events, which, unim- 
 portant to the general conduct of the war, were nevertheless 
 of great value in training the soldier and the sailor. 
 
 The efficiency of the Potomac batteries, though not enough 
 to close the river, was, under the management of Capt. 
 Frederick Chatard of the C. S. navy, such as to compel 
 the U. S. steamer Pensacola to creep by at night under 
 cover of darkness, and signalled by lights from the Resolute, 
 Freeborn, Yankee, Reliance, the Wyandunk and the Stepping 
 Stones. ' The George Page, from her lair on Quantico Creek, 
 gave great annoyance to the navigation of the river, compel- 
 ling the convoy of the Reliance or the Wyandunk to every 
 little schooner or oyster-boat. From May, 1861, to March, 1863, 
 the N. Y. Tribune, of March 1st, said: 
 
 " There has been no safe communication by water between this 
 <iity and the capital of the nation during all this time — a period of six 
 months. This is one of the most humiliating of all the national digraces 
 to which we have been compelled to submit. It has been most damaging 
 to us in the eyes of the world. No one circumstance has been used more 
 to our disadvantage with foreign nations than this. And it has helped 
 the Confederates just in proportion as it has injured us. It has been 
 their haughty boast that they had maintained steady and effectual sway 
 over the great channel of commerce between this city and Washington, 
 through which the immense supplies of our grand army of the Potomac 
 would naturally have passed. Our own government has been subjected 
 to very heavy expense, and great inconvenience, in consequence of this 
 blockade. The inhabitants of Washington have at times suffered from 
 a scarcity of both food and fuel from the same cause. If occasionally 
 some vessel has got past the enemy's guns, it has been under the cover of 
 darkness, or at a considers ble risk, in the same way that our blockade of 
 the Southern coast is often run by the Confederates. 
 
 " Has all this damage and disgrace been a matter of necessity to us ? 
 ■or could it by a different policy, by energy and capacity, have been 
 avoided ? Let facts answer: In the month of July last Mr. Marshall O. 
 Roberts, of this city, offered to keep the Potomac River open, and free 
 from all obstruction by the enemy's guns, for the period of twelve months, 
 at his own expense; if he succeeded, the government to pay him whatever 
 
 1 N. Y. mraJd, Jan. 12th, 1802. 
 
104 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 they thought proper; if he did not, he would charge nothing. He was in 
 Washington at that time, with one of his ships, fully prepared to carry 
 his offer into immediate execution. The proposition was made to a lead- 
 ing member of the Cabinet, who at once reported it to President Lincoln, 
 and subsequently informed Mr. Roberts that it was accepted with great 
 satisfaction and pleasure— as any man in his senses would suppose it 
 must have been. But it seems that the matter was subsequently referred 
 to the Secretary of the Navy, and he rejected the proffered service. The 
 malicious may say he did so because he could not see any way for his 
 brother-in-law, Mr. George D. Morgan, to make anything out of it in the 
 shape of fat commissions or otherwise. We are sure that such conclusions 
 as this would do Mr. Welles great injustice. His errors are all of judgment, 
 not of intention. But, whatever the reason, the Potomac has remained 
 blockaded, to the infinite injury and disgrace of our government." 
 
 The Chicago Times describes the effect of this blockade of 
 the Potomac as most seriously felt: 
 
 " Washington is now beginning to feel some of the evils of the 
 beleaguered city. With its principal avenue closed by hostile batteries, 
 and in the hands of its enemies, it is dependent on the single-track rail 
 road from Baltimore here for every article of daily consumption. This 
 would be no inconvenience at all in ordinary times, when the National 
 Capital is only a mere village of 20,000 inhabitants. But now, when its 
 ordinary population is augmented by an army of 200,000 men and 
 40,000 horses, it is a very different matter. The railroad is taxed beyond 
 its utmost capacity. Yet, in spite of all, the supplies that arrive are not 
 equal to the demand. In regard to provender for the horses, it has be- 
 come so scarce that the whole country for many miles around has been 
 scoured for forage with very indifferent success." 
 
 And the Cincinnati Commercial said : 
 
 "The severe inconveniences suffered from the blockade of the Poto- 
 mac affect already nearly every person in the community, and unless 
 relief can be had in some way, it must soon ripen into actual distress. 
 Fuel and wood are the chief necessaries of life in the winter season. The 
 supply of both is wholly exotic as regards Washington." 
 
 It was not only the inconvenience which these batteries 
 gave, but they were of so much military importance that Mr.- 
 Lincoln, in General Orders No. 3, March 8th, 1862, ordered : 
 " That no more than two army corps (about fifty thousand 
 troops), of the said Army of the Potomac, shall be moved 
 en route for a new base of operations until the navigation 
 of the Potomac from Washington to the Chesapeake Bay 
 shall be freed from enemy's batteries and other obstruc- 
 tions." 
 
 The Annual Report of Secretary Welles, December 1st, 
 1862, says: "The active operations of the Potomac flotilla 
 ceased in a great measure after the erection of the extensive 
 rebel batteries on the Virginia shore in the autumn of 1861. 
 For several months the commerce on this important avenue 
 to the national capital was almost entirely suspended, though 
 at no time was the passage of our armed vessels prevented"— 
 and he ought to have added — except by stealing by under 
 cover of darkness, directed by signal lights from other vessels 
 
CAPTAIN FREDERICK CHATARD, 
 
 CONFEDSBATE STATES NATX. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 105 
 
 and points on the Maryland shore, and when they could not 
 be seen or heard from the Confederate batteries. 
 
 In consequence of the blockade of the Potomac by the 
 Confederate batteries, an immense quantity of freight was 
 carried over the Washington branch of the Baltimore and Ohio 
 railroad, running from Baltimore to the capitol. It was esti- 
 mated that more than sixty vessels, including many large 
 steamships, arrived at Locust Point, Baltimore, daily, and their 
 cargoes were immediately forwarded to Washington. For 
 some days the daily average of cars over this road numbered 
 over four hundred, and to supply the increasing demand for 
 transportation, in October, 1861, a wagon-train of nearly one 
 hundred wagons was established between Baltimore and 
 Washington. This immense amount of business which the 
 exigencies of the war created, rendered it necessary that the 
 Washington branch of the Baltimore and Ohio should be care- 
 fully guarded, and a sentinel was placed at every quarter of a 
 mile of the road. 
 
 Among the fortifications erected at Harper's Ferry by Gen. 
 Joseph E. Johnston were the naval batteries under Lieut, 
 Charles M. Fauntleroy, of the navy, which were placed on the 
 northern and southern salients of the village at Harper's Ferry, 
 and were designed to envelop with their fire the whole town 
 of Bolivar, and the approaches by the immediate banks of the 
 Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers. On May 33d, 1861, these bat- 
 teries mounted but two thirty -two-pounders each on plain plat- 
 forms, and the guns on ships' carriages. The number of guns 
 intended was six to each battery, and they would have been, 
 very formidable in resisting an attack upon the town. '■ 
 
 During Gen. Lee's command of the Virginia military and 
 naval forces, prior to their being turned over to the Confed- 
 erate States, Commander H. H. Lewis, of the navy, advised 
 him "that the points lowest down the Rappahannock River, 
 where batteries would be eflFective in preventing the passage 
 of vessels, are at Lowery's and Accoheek Points, about seven 
 miles below Tappahannock. The channel does not exceed 
 three-quarters of a mile from these points, and a small redoubt 
 with five or six guns on each point would close the passage to 
 any vessels that are likely to attempt it."^ In consequence of 
 this recommendation, Fort Lowery was erected with four thirty- 
 two-pounders and an eight-inch columbiad, and on May 4th 
 Gen. Lee directed Gen. Daniel Ruggles, commanding at Fred- 
 ericksburg, to assign a portion of the troops under his com- 
 mand for the protection of that battery. The point was selected 
 because there the river was narrowest and the channel the 
 most difficult, and could be best defended by the guns that 
 were then available; at the same time, examinations of Gray's. 
 Point and Cherry Point were made for batteries, and Col. 
 
 1 Off. Sec., Vol. II., p. 869. 2 Off. Bee, Vol. II., p. 811. 
 
106 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Talcott was ordered to complete the battery at Gray's Point 
 with the utmost dispatch and secrecy. 
 
 These batteries in the early days of the war held the Rap- 
 pahannock River above them from the operations of raiding 
 gunboats of the enemy, and enabled the formation of those 
 naval expeditions into the waters of the Chesapeake which 
 were so fruitful in dash and enterprise under Col. John Taylor 
 Wood, aide to the President, and also of the C. S. navy. 
 
 During the first year of the war, the Washington authori- 
 ties were under the impression that gunboats were being con- 
 structed at Fredericksburg. These impressions were created 
 by reports from negroes, who also reported that the St. Nicholas, 
 which Col. Thomas had captured, and the Virginia, had been 
 armed. These boats were never armed, but were used only as 
 transports between Fredericksburg and Fort Lowery. Capt. 
 S. V. Spencer, of the Potomac flotilla, suggested to Secretary 
 Stanton, March 17th, 1862, that a " few hundred troops might 
 land at Taylor's, opposite Maryland Point, and march over to 
 a place called Hop's Yard Wharf (a distance of seven miles), 
 where the steamer Neales stops to land passengers, and sur- 
 prise her, taking her past the batteries under her own colors"; 
 but the Secretary did not commend the expedition. 
 
 The movement of land forces in the early part of March, 
 1863, caused the retirement of the defensive line of Gen. Holmes 
 to the Rappahannock River, and Fort Lowery was made the 
 depot of provisions and supply for the right of Gen. Holmes' 
 army, and Col. Maloney was ordered to concentrate his forces 
 for the protection of that fort. Naval matters, on both the 
 Potomac and Rappahannock Rivers, were, with the exception 
 of Confederate States naval expeditions, brought to an end in 
 March, 1863, by the retrograde movements of the armies from 
 the line of the Potomac to that of the Rappahannock River. 
 This movement caused the removal of all guns and supplies 
 and troops from the batteries of the Lower Potomac to Fred- 
 ericksburg; and the occupation of the peninsula between those 
 rivers by the U. S. troops under Gen. Hooker. In that retro- 
 grade movement the steamer George Page was burned by the 
 Confederates in Quantico Creek, March, 1863, having for 
 nearly one year baffled every effort of the U. S. Potomac flo- 
 tilla to destroy and capture her. Close beside the burning 
 Page lay the remains of the Fairfax, another capture in the 
 Potomac, which was snatched from the tow of the Resolute 
 in October, and whose valuable cargo of hay, cement and 
 furniture was very acceptable — and near by lay the hulk of 
 a schooner — all evidences that the Potomac flotilla had been 
 met on many occasions by the enterprise and dash of the 
 Confederate navy, and which its superior advantages had not 
 been able to circumvent or overcome. The batteriesbuilt by the 
 Confederate naval oflScers. Capt. Lynch, Lieuts. Lewis, Read 
 and Thorburn, were described by those officers of the U. S. army 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 107 
 
 who entered them after evacuation, "as perfect gems of engi- 
 neering skill," but which ceased to be any longer of use or 
 value, through the movements of the army which protected and 
 ■defended their rear. They yielded to the force of military, 
 not naval, events. 
 
 On April 20th, 1861, the form and position for a water 
 battery on Gloucester Point, on York River, was selected, 
 which would cover all the channel-way with its line of fire, 
 and to mount thirty-one guns ; the faces bearing on the 
 channel were arranged for five and nine guns, respectively; the 
 fifteen intermediate guns were to be arranged on the arc of a 
 circle, of about 120 degrees. The lines of fire would cross 
 the channel so near, that that part of the battery was to be 
 armed with eight -inch howitzers, while the faces were to be 
 provided with eight-inch columbiads. All the high ground in 
 rear of the battery was intended to be covered with a large 
 field-work for the protection of the battery. On the Yorktown 
 site a very good position for a six-gun battery was selected 
 near the river bluff. J. J. Clarke was left by Col. Andrew 
 Talcott in charge of the work. 
 
 Col. Wm. B. Taliafero was appointed colonel of Virginia 
 volunteers, and on May 3d was assigned to the command of the 
 troops he could collect at Gloucester Point, where Capt. W. C. 
 "Whittle, of the Virginia navy, was then constructing the bat- 
 tery. On the 7th, the day Gen. Taliafero assumed command 
 at Gloucester Point, Col. Dimick, in command of Fortress 
 Monroe, was informed " by Flag-officer Pendergrast that a 
 three-gun battery had been discovered by him at Gloucester 
 Point, and that the steamer Yankee exchanged several shots 
 with it; but as there was one eight -inch gun in the battery, 
 and those of the steamer were of much shorter range, her com- 
 mander hauled off."' The facts are, that the guns in battery 
 were six-pounder guns, and complaint being made of a waste 
 of ammunition in firing at the Yankee so far off, Capt. Whittle 
 disclaimed all authority for the firing, and Gen. Taliafero on 
 the 8th of May urged Gen. Lee to order to that point some 
 effective sea-coast guns. At that date there were six nine-inch 
 guns at the river, and the next day three thirty-two-pounders 
 arrived at West Point, but the Yankee was driven off by six- 
 pounder guns. ^ Gen. Lee, on May 11, urged that it was very 
 important that the Gloucester Point battery be pushed forward 
 as fast as possible, and that all labor necessary for its speedy 
 completion be devoted to it. On the same day, Gen. Taliafero 
 wrote to Gen. Lee that the defences had greatly improved, two 
 heavy nine-inch guns being in position on the water battery, 
 and two more of the same kind of guns ready to be placed in 
 battery; that two companies of infantry and one of artillery 
 had been mustered into service, and that with the company of 
 
 1 Off. Doc., Vol. II., p. 27. 2 Off. Bee, Vol. II., p. 821. 
 
108 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 cavalry he hdd the means to prevent a landing from boats. 
 May 14th the water battery was armed with three nine-inch 
 guns, and were being instructed in the working of the guns 
 by Commander T. J. Page, of the Virginia navy. Major 
 George W. Randolph, of the Richmond Howitzer Battalion, 
 on June 18th, wrote to Gen. Lee, that "there are in York- 
 town, besides the field pieces of my battalion, four columbiads 
 on the water battery, two brass twelve-pounders, one twelve- 
 pounder navy howitzer and two iron six - pounders," and, 
 after calling attention to the extended lines of defence and 
 the necessity for more large guns, added, "that Capt. 
 Ingraham, the Chief of the Naval Bureau of Ordnance, 
 can supply us with eight thirty - two - pounders of twenty- 
 seven hundred-weight, and four forty-two-pounder carron- 
 ades with navy carriages. * * * Capt. Ingraham can also 
 furnish us four boats, capable of transporting 400 or 500 men, 
 which will be very useful in preserving the communications 
 between Yorktown and Gloucester Point. Two of the guns 
 are at Gloucester Point, and two at West Point; but Capt. 
 Whittle authorizes me to say that they are not ready for them 
 at either place, and that he should prefer seeing them mounted 
 at Yorktown." There had been sent to Gloucester Point eight 
 nine-inch guns; two thirty-two-pounders of fifty-seven hun- 
 dred-weight; three thirty-two- pounders of thirty -three hun- 
 dred-weight; one thirty-two pounder of twenty-seven hundred- 
 weight, which constituted its battery on June 25th. The 
 defences were incomplete and liable to be taken by parties land- 
 ing below the batteries on the Gloucester side, and carrying or 
 turning them; to prevent which. Gen. Magruder, on July 9th, 
 called on Capt. Whittle, at West Point, to send down the two 
 thirty -two-pounders at that point and for a regiment of infantry, 
 to enable Col. Crump to hold the Point against any ordinary 
 force that could be brought in boats to assail it. The ease 
 with which the enemy could land a large force below Glou- 
 cester Point, and take the land and water defences in their rear, 
 kept Gen. Lee " anxious for the safety of that position"; for, 
 if the Point was once in the possession of the enemy, the navi- 
 gation of York River to West Point would be open, as Glou- 
 cester Point commanded Yorktown; and his letters to Gen. 
 Magruder, in the month of July, show how urgently he pressed 
 the commanding oflScer on the peninsula to complete the earth- 
 works for the defence of Gloucester Point. 
 
 In reference to the relative rank of navy and army oflScers, 
 Gen. Lee addressed the following order to the oflScers at Glou- 
 cester Point, for the regulation of all mixed commands : 
 
 " As there are no sailors in the service, it is impossible to serve river 
 batteries by them, and artillery companies must perform this duty. 
 Naval officers, from their experience and familiarity with the peculiar 
 duties connected with naval batteries, their management, construction, 
 etc, are eminently fitted for the command of such batteries, and are most 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 109 
 
 appropriately placed in command of them. In a war such as this, unan- 
 imity and hearty co-operation should be the rule. Petty jealousies about 
 slight shades of relative command, and bickering about trivial matters, 
 are entLrely out of place and highly improper, and, when carried so far as 
 to interfere with the effectiveness of a command, become both criminal and 
 contemptible. Within the ordinary limits of a letter it is impossible to pro- 
 vide for every contingency that may arise in a command which is not cen- 
 tred in a single individual. It is therefore hoped that mutual concessions 
 wUl be made, and that the good of the service will be the only aim of all." 
 
 With that circular an order was transmitted to Col. Pey- 
 ton, at Yorktown, that the naval officer assigned to naval 
 batteries would command all troops when in the battery, 
 either for drill, instruction or fighting, but that in camp the 
 officer of the particular command would have charge of the 
 troops', but must make no order that would impede the naval 
 officer in the proper discharge of his duties. 
 
 Commander James L. Henderson, of the navy, in command 
 of the naval batteries at Gloucester Point, was retained by Gen. 
 Magruder several weeks after the order detaching him, while 
 awaiting the arrival of Lieut. Chas. M. Fauntleroy, and the re- 
 peated letters of Gen. Magruder for Lieut. Fauntleroy's services 
 show the high appreciation in which that officer was held. 
 
 Complaint was made by Gen. Magruder that the gun-car- 
 riages of the naval batteries, having been made of green pine, 
 had given indications of breaking down; that their manner of 
 construction prevented their being elevated sufficiently to ex- 
 plode a fifteen-second fuse ; that carriages of good pattern prom- 
 ised by the Navy Department had never been sent; and that 
 the depth of water at the mouth of York River being ample for 
 the largest ships, the defences were liable to assault, while the 
 guns in battery on their present carriages could not reajjh 
 the ships. Capt. George Minor, Chief of the Naval Ordnance 
 Bureau, immediately had other and proper carriages made and 
 replaced the defective ones. 
 
 The subject of building gunboats on the upper waters of 
 York River was brought to the attention of the Virginia State 
 authorities as early as May 11th, prior to that State joining 
 the Confederacy, by Capt. Wm. C. Whittle, then commanding 
 defences in York River. In a letter of that date to Capt. S, 
 Barron, then in the Virginia Office of Detail and Equipment, 
 Capt. Whittle urged that "an energetic naval constructor" be 
 at once directed to commence, on the Pamunkey River, the 
 construction of one or more steam-propeller boats, to carry 
 each two eleven-inch shell guns, and to be manned by eighty to 
 one hundred men; that much timber suitable to such boats was 
 already cut, and an inexhaustible supply was standing every- 
 where in the surrounding forests. And, again, September 24th, 
 Capt. Whittle renewed the request, and sent Gabriel F. Miller, 
 a constructor from Matthews County, to Capt. F. Buchanan, 
 then in charge of the 0. S. Office of Orders and Detail, as a 
 man every way reliable and fully competent, and ready to 
 
110 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 undertake at once the construction, at West Point, of a steam- 
 propeller gunboat— that the timber could be had on the Pa- 
 munkey River hard by. Capt. Whittle urged that such vessels, 
 so valuable then, would be the true foundation for a navy com- 
 posed of vessels of 800 or 1,000 tons, and manned by 100 men 
 each, such as the river trade in Virginia waters could supply. 
 The suggestions were unheeded by both the State and Confed- 
 erate authorities. It was the opinion of Capt. Whittle that a fleet 
 of these small gunboats, secure behind the batteries at Yorktown 
 and Gloucester Point, sallying forth when occasion offered, and 
 intercepting every unarmed boat and vessel that approached 
 Fortress Monroe, would have compelled the enemy to convoy all 
 supplies to the fort, or have starved the fort into surrender. That 
 convoy service would have weakened the blockading squad- 
 rons, as well as the expeditions to Southern waters, and those 
 boats, in conjunction with the army, would have made an im- 
 portant diversion, probably fruitful in many important captures. 
 
 As late as January 23d, 1863, General Magruder wrote to 
 the War Department that the work at Gloucester Point was 
 not half finished; that the works at Yorktown, though trebled 
 in strength in the last two months, were still unfinished, both 
 as regards the protection of the men against the enemy's 
 shells, guns and mortars at sea, as well as his attacks by land. 
 
 The victory of the Virginia in Hampton Roads, on March 
 9th, created such consternation in all military and naval cir- 
 cles that intelligence of every kind was eagerly caught at by 
 the Federal oflBcers. The " contraband " was a prolific source 
 of information. One of these was received on board the 
 Wachusett, April 13th, of whom Mr. I. S. Missroon says : " He 
 is not intelligent "; but, notwithstanding, he communicated 
 tlfat Gen. Magruder had asked for and expected the Merri- 
 niac (Virginia) to come to the York River; that "the battery 
 at Gloucester Point is commanded by Jeff Page, late of the 
 U. S. navy, a good ofiicer; Richard Page, also formerly of the 
 navy, in command of the upper works at Gloucester; that they 
 are very sanguine of sinking vessels, and have practiced their 
 firing, which is very accurate; says Page (Jeff) can kill a dog 
 a mile. He knows the roads and creeks. I will send his p. m. 
 If you want him, telegraph. Would it not be well to com- 
 municate to Flag-officer Magruder's expectation of the Merri- 
 mac coming here ? It can do no harm."' 
 
 The naval batteries at Gloucester Point and Yorktown, 
 though incomplete and imperfect, had served their purpose 
 fully, holding the enemy's fleet in check, barring their way 
 up that river to the rear of the Confederate army on the pe- 
 ninsula, and were abandoned, not to the U. S. navy, but to 
 the exigencies of the C. S. army, which, retiring beyond the 
 Chickahominy River, rendered the batteries useless. 
 
 1 Off. Bee, Vol. XI., Part in„ p. 99. 
 
CHAPTER V I. 
 CAPTUEES IN VIRGINIA WATEES. 
 
 ABOUT the middle of June, 1861, Lieut. H. H. Lewis, of 
 the C. S. navy, while visiting the Potomac Eiver at Aguia 
 Creek with Gen. Holmes, observed 1he steamer St. Nicho- 
 las, of Baltimore, approach without challenge or inquiry 
 the U.S. steamer Pawnee, range alongside without question from 
 the Pawnee, and put provisions and other articles on board. 
 There was neither stoppage or delay of the St. Nicholas before 
 reaching the side of the Pawnee. Interested at this unusual 
 proceeding in actual war, Lieut. Lewis called Gen. Holmes' 
 attention to the matter, and finding from repeated observation 
 that the same unchallenged intercourse took place, Lieut. Lewis 
 formed a plan upon that fact for the capture of the Pawnee, 
 by first seizing the St. Nicholas lower down the river, putting 
 upon her a force of naval officers and a detachment of infantry, 
 and steaming, as was usual, alongside of the Pawnee, board 
 and overpower her crew. Appealing to Gen. Holmes for 
 a detail of 300 men from a Tennessee regiment which had 
 many Western steamboat-men in its ranks, Lieut. Lewis met 
 with a refusal by Gen. Holmes, who regarded the risk too 
 great for him to assume the responsibility. He was referred 
 to the Secretary of War, and on his way to Eichmond met 
 Capt. M. F. Maury, of the navy, at Fredericksburg, to whom 
 he explained the plan of capture. Capt. Maury, approving 
 heartily of the plan, returned with Lieut. Lewis to Eichmond, 
 and laid the plan before Mr. Mallory, who entered warmly 
 into the enterprise, and talked it over with the Secretary of 
 War, L. P. Walker. That officer, under date of June 25th, 
 wrote to Gen. Holmes: "You are authorized to co-operate 
 with Lieut. Lewis, C. S. navy, with any part of the force under 
 your command, as you may deem advisable, in the operations 
 which he has explained to this department, and with which 
 you are acquainted." To this letter Gen. Holmes suggested 
 that he be ordered to make the detail, and Mr. Mallory wrote 
 to the Secretary of War: "Gen. Holmes suggests that instead of 
 
 ail) 
 
113 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 obtaining volunteers from him, you order the Tennessee regi- 
 ment to the duty required in our joint machinations against 
 the 'peace and dignity' of Abraham and the Pawnee, and 
 that a line from you to Col. Bate would ' enthuse ' them, etc. 
 Capt. Maury calls on you, at my request, to attend to this. 
 Our commander, Lewis of the navy, will command the party 
 afloat, and will succeed." Secretary Walker immediately 
 wrote to Gen. Holmes, June 27th : "If you deem the sugges- 
 tions of Commander Lewis feasible, you are authorized to de- 
 tail 500 troops for the purpose of co-operating with him. In 
 doing this it will be proper to select from the liflferent regi- 
 ments under your command. If, however, you do not concur 
 with Commander Lewis in the feasibility of the undertaking, 
 it will be proper for you to send a detachment of troops to Cone 
 Eiver to support him in the event he should find it necessary to 
 run in at that point. " To this letter Gen.Holmes replied to Secre- 
 tary Walker, June 37th : "In answer to yours relative to co- 
 operating with Commander Lewis, Confederate navy, I have 
 respectfully to say that I did not feel justified in ordering vol- 
 unteer troops on an expedition so fraught with ruinous con- 
 sequences if it failed, and the success of which required that 
 so many contingencies should be efifectually accomplished. I 
 referred the matter to the colonels of regiments, and they de- 
 clined to volunteer their men."' 
 
 Foiled in an enterprise which he considered both feasible 
 and gallant, Lieut. Lewis proceeded to duty on the lower 
 Rappahannock, where in a few days after he was surprised by 
 a visit from Capt. George N. Hollins, of the C. S. navy, and Col. 
 Thomas, who informed him that they were on their way to 
 Baltimore to seize the St. Nicholas, run her into Cone River, 
 and turn her over to his command. Returning immediately 
 to Fredericksburg, Lieut. Lewis found there several naval 
 officers and a part of the first Tennessee regiment under Col. 
 Bate, and embarking on the steamer Virginia, they landed at 
 Monasteon on the Rappahannock, and marched that evening 
 across to Cone River, where, at three o'clock the next morn- 
 ing, the St. Nicholas arrived. 
 
 Such was the inception of the earliest and not the least 
 bold and daring exploit of individual coolness, pluck and 
 dash of the war — the capture of the steamer St. Nicholas on 
 the Potomac River, on the morning of Saturday, June 39th, 
 1861. Events had already shaped themselves into a state of 
 actual war. Maryland, though still in the Union, was, in the sen- 
 timent of a very large portion of her people, in thorough accord 
 with the people of the seceded States. A similarity of institu- 
 tions and a long association of trade, business, and social in- 
 timacy united and bound her people and her interests with 
 those of the people of the South. In the counties of that State 
 
 I Off. Bee, Vol. n., p. 949, 963. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 113 
 
 in the peninsula between thebay and the Potomac, were the 
 homes of the bulk of her slave-holding people, and every feel- 
 ing of interest and of sympathy were warmest and strongest 
 for the people of the Confederate States. 
 
 In St. Mary's County resided the Hon. Richard Thomas, 
 one of Maryland's most honored citizens, who for many years 
 had enjoyed the confidence and regard of her people, and who 
 had presided for several sessions over the Maryland Senate. 
 A large slave-holder, and thoroughly Southern in every prin- 
 ciple of politics and every personal sympathy, his children 
 had been educated and instructed in those principles of govern- 
 ment which had obtained complete ascendancy over all the 
 slave-holding States. Among his sons was Richard Thomas, 
 whose sympathies were thoroughly enlisted with the South. 
 Bold, brave, intelligent, and ardently desiring to signalize his 
 advent in the South with an exploit which would serve to illus- 
 trate the spirit and purpose with which the sons of Maryland 
 espoused the Southern cause, Richard Thomas planned and 
 executed the capture of the steamer St. Nicholas with all that 
 indifference as to the odds that might be against success which 
 existed all over the South at the beginning of the war. Fully 
 aware that the success of his attempt would add very much to 
 the strength of the Confederacy on the waters of the Chesa- 
 peake Bay, he was not indifferent to the fact that, if unsuc- 
 cessful, the very recklessness of the effort would illustrate 
 that spirit of individual heroism so necessary in every contest 
 between unequal forces. 
 
 That the expedition was not one of inconsiderate rashness 
 is shown by the precautions taken to hold the steamer after 
 capture. Col. Thomas visited Richmond, where he made 
 known to Gov. Letcher his plans and purposes, and arranged 
 to have a detachment of troops on the Virginia shore, together 
 with naval officers, to take charge of the steamer. To that end, 
 a detachment from Col. Bate's (1st) Tennessee regiment, then 
 near Fredericksburg, was ordered to take position on the Po- 
 tomac in the neighborhood of Cone River, and to be in position 
 on the morning of June 39th, the day the St. Nicholas was regu- 
 larly due at the ports on the Maryland shore. In company 
 with the infantry, Lieuts. H. H. Lewis, Robert D. Minor, 
 C. C. Simms, of the C. S. navy, Lieut. Thorburn of the Vir- 
 ginia navy, and fifteen sailors from the steamer Yorktown, 
 were also dispatched from Richmond to lend assistance. The 
 infantry and the naval force were promptly in place, having 
 marched across the peninsula of the northern neck, and arrived 
 almost simultaneously with the captured steamer. 
 
 These preliminary precautions taken and arranged. Col. 
 Thomas repaired to Baltimore and gathered together the very 
 few men in whom he could confide. These were necessarily 
 very few in number, though very determined in purpose and 
 fully resolved to succeed; no contemporaneous account states 
 
114 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the exact number of " passengers " that started in the boat. 
 On Friday evening, June 28th, the St. Nicholas, a side-wheel 
 steamboat of about 1,300 tons, regularly plying between Balti- 
 more and Georgetown, D.C., touching at regular points on the 
 Potomac, received on board a very quiet, demure, rather passe 
 lady, with a French accent and rather masculine features; but 
 reserved in deportment, and rather uneasy as to the time the 
 boat would reach Washington. In all other respects the 
 " French lady's " behavior attracted no attention. The " pas- 
 sengers," booked for different stopping-places, dispersed them- 
 selves about the boat, holding but little conversation among 
 themselves and none whatever with the French lady. The 
 officers of the boat observed nothing peculiar in the conduct 
 of any of the passengers, and certainly nothing in that of 
 the "lady." The boat proceeded on her course, with no oc- 
 currence worthy of note, until the landing at Point Lookout 
 was made, when two more " passengers" came aboard, one of 
 these an " elderly-looking " man. With nothing to attract at- 
 tention, that " elderly -looking " passenger took his position on 
 deck in rear of the ladies' cabin, giving apparently more at- 
 tention to the weather, the water, or the skies, than to the 
 boat or her passengers. 
 
 Upon casting-off from the wharf at Point Lookout, the 
 St. Nicholas headed up stream for Washington, and when a 
 mile or so from the wharf there might be seen climbing over 
 the deck rail, immediately above the window of the cabin to 
 which the "French lady" had retired, an active and deter- 
 mined man, clad in Zouave uniform and fully armed with 
 sword and revolvers. The " French lady " had doffed her wig, 
 her curls, her petticoats, and donned the uniform of the 
 Zouave and was ready for action. Exchanging a few hurried 
 words with the "elderly passenger," he, too, was suddenly 
 changed into Capt. George N. Hollins, formerly of the U. S. 
 navy, but having resigned his commission in that service 
 now about to assume the command of the St. Nicholas in the 
 service of the Confederate States. The few hurried words ex- 
 changed, both officers repaired below decks, where further 
 transformations were immediately made among twenty-five 
 "passengers," who now appeared as Zouaves, armed and de- 
 termined to have and to hold the steamer. Surprised and 
 astounded, the officers and crew of the boat found that resist- 
 ance would be unavailing, and quietly yielded possession of 
 the boat. The real passengers on the boat, though greatly 
 alarmed by the unexpected turn which had been given to 
 affairs aboard, were quieted with the assurances of safety and 
 respect. The St. Mary's (Md.) Beacon, of July 6th, 1861, says: 
 
 " Throughout the whole night not a single act of rudeness was per* 
 petrated, all the passengers being treated with the greatest civility. Tm 
 ladies were told by the commander that they were in the hands of South- 
 ern gentlemen, and would be treated as his own sisters. Whatever- 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 115 
 
 opinions may be entertained of the capture itself, no one who was present 
 on that eventful night can say aught but in praise of the gentlemanly 
 deportment of all concerned." 
 
 A passenger on board the St. Nicholas, who witnessed 
 Col. Thomas' appearance on deck, and his conversation with 
 Capt. Hollins, "suspected nothing of the truth, supposing that 
 a government boat was boarding her for the purpose of in- 
 quiry." So quiet was the execution of this well-considered 
 and arranged plan of capture that every man knew his duty, 
 the moment for his appearance, and the exact part he was to 
 take. 
 
 Such was the account given of this exploit in the Union 
 papers of that day; but Col. Alexander, one of Col. Thomas' 
 men, and who was subsequently captured and confined in Fort 
 McHenry with Thomas, gives a somewhat different version. 
 He says: 
 
 " The detail that accomplished the capture of the St. Nicholas got on 
 in small groups at different landings as ordinary passengers. When I got 
 aboard^ the first person I saw in the cabin was Col. Thomas, who was of 
 small stature, dressed as a lady, carrying on an animated conversation 
 with a Federal oflBcer. He spoke French fluently and was passing him- 
 self off as a French lady. It was from this circumstance that the nick- 
 name was afterward given him. It was amusing to note how admirably 
 he performed his part, tossing a fan about and putting on all the airs of 
 an animated French woman, much to the enjoyment of the Federal ofBcer 
 with whom he was conversing. Our whole force was by this time aboard, 
 known to each other by private signals. Thomas, when he saw that 
 everything was ready for the imeuie, excused himself from his companion 
 and retired to his state-room. We all knew that the time had now arrived 
 for action, and we gathered together awaiting the reappearance of Thomas, 
 It was but a few moments when, with a shout, he sprang from his state- 
 room in the dress of a Zouave, armed with cutlass and pistol. The balance 
 of us made a rush to the state-room, where our arms were concealed, and 
 likewise secured pistols and cutlasses. In a few moments we overpowered 
 the passengers and crew, secured them below thehatches, and the boat was 
 ours. We then proceeded immediately to the rendezvous w here we expected 
 to take aboard oiir infantry reinforcements, but owing to the long delay 
 before they arrived word of our movements got abroad, and the enemy 
 were placed on their guard. Had our infantry regiment been at the ap- 
 pointed place in time, the Pawiiee certainly, and perhaps the entire Poto- 
 mac fleet, would have been captured." 
 
 Immediately after the capture of the steamer, all lights 
 upon her were extinguished, and her head was turned to the 
 Virginia shore, where she arrived at 3:30 in the morning, and 
 stopped at the wharf at Cone River, where she was boarded 
 by the oflBcers of the C. S. navy, and the Tennessee infantry 
 appeared for her protection. Embarking a portion of the in- 
 fantry, the Bt. Nicholas, now under command of Capt. Hollins, 
 headed up the Potomac in search of the U. S. steamerPatf;nee,the 
 capture of which was contemplated by surprise and boarding; 
 but, not finding the Pawnee, the steamer rounded and stood 
 down the river for the bay. Between Smith's Point and 
 the mouth of the Rappahannock River, Capt. Hollins met the 
 
116 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 schooner Margaret, from Alexandria (Va.) to New York, 
 whose mate, Mr. E. Case, gave to the N. Y. Times the follow- 
 ing account: 
 
 " On Saturday, the 29th day of June, we passed Smith's Point, at the 
 mouth of the Potomac; we saw the steamer St. Nicholas come out of a 
 river on the Virginia shore, called Cone River. She passed us, and paid 
 no attention to us, we thinking all the while it was rather strange for her 
 to be sailing down the bay, as it wasout of her course. Her object, we soon 
 found out, was to seize the brig Monticello and the schooner Mary Pierce, 
 which were bound up the bay as we were going out. 
 
 "In a few minutes the St. Nicholas headed up the bay again; she 
 came up and passed us, then turned again and bore down on us. Capt. 
 HoUins hailed us, and asked what schooner it was. We told him the 
 schooner Margaret, He then inquired what it was loaded with, and we 
 told him. He then sung out that we were a prize to the Southern Con- 
 federacy. The St. Nicholas was then run close alongside; then about 
 twenty-five armed men jumped on board, and drove all hands on board 
 the steamer. When I got on deck, and before they drove me into the 
 hold, 1 looked around me, and who should I see but the traitor, Capt. 
 Thomas Skinner, formerly master of the steamer Jamestown! 
 
 " They then took the schooner in tow, and took us up the Rappa- 
 hannock River as far as the depth of the water would permit. That night 
 they came again alongside, and coaled the St. Nicholas from our cargo. 
 Next morning we started for Fredericksburg, and took the Mary Pierce in 
 tow, and towed her within fifteen miles of the town. At dark, on the SOth, 
 we came alongside of the dock; they kept us on board all night. The next 
 morning early we were marched out, closely guarded by soldiers, and 
 were placed on board the cars for Richmond, not having eaten anything 
 worth speaking of for twenty -four hours." 
 
 The vessels then captured by Capt. HoUins with the St 
 Nicholas were: 
 
 Brig Monticello, from Brazil, bound to Baltimore, with 3,500 bags of 
 coffee. '■ 
 
 Schooner Mary Pierce, from Boston, bound to Washington City, with 
 260 tons of ice. 
 
 Schooner Margaret, from Alexandria, bound to Staten Island, with 
 270 tons of coal. 
 
 Lieutenant Simms, C. S. navy, was put in charge of the 
 Monticello; Lieut. Robert D. Minor, C. S. navy, in charge of 
 the Mary Pierce; and Lieut. Thorburn, of the Virginia navy, 
 in charge of the Margaret. 
 
 The people in the Confederacy needed coflfee, ice and coal, 
 their government needed the steamer and the vessels, and 
 it is not surprising that the bold officers and brave men who 
 brought in supplies so much needed should have been loudly 
 praised and profusely complimented. On the Monticello were 
 found a number of bags containing the mails and dispatches 
 from the United States squadron in Brazil, from which the 
 movements of the ships in that squadron were learned by the 
 Confederate government. The ice captured was sold in 
 Fredericksburg for $8,000. Col. Thomas repaired to Richmond, 
 
 ^ The MonticeUo, after being taken up the Eap- after the coffee had been taken out, and permitted 
 pahannock River, was released by her captors to return to Baltimore, where she was owned. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 117 
 
 where every attention and compliment awaited and were lav- 
 ishly bestowed upon him. The State of Virginia, by Governor 
 Letcher, on July 1st, commissioned him, under the name of 
 Eichard Thomas Zarvona, a colonel in the volunteer forces of 
 the State. During his visit, his friends insisted on seeing him 
 in his costume of the " French lady," as he appeared on the 
 steamer St. Nicholas. To gratify them, he left the room, 
 promising to return promptly, provided the company was not 
 enlarged, as the joke was to be strictly private. Unfortunately, 
 the circle was shortly after disturbed by the entrance of a 
 strange lady, for whom, however, room was made, and to 
 whom a seat was tendered with customary Virginia gallantry. 
 The rest of the companj^ broke up into knots, leaving the 
 stranger to herself, and discussing in whispers the propriety 
 of keeping the colonel out until a favorable opportunity pre- 
 sented itself. Suddenly their embarrassment was relieved by 
 the action of the lady, who, lifting her skirts to a "modest 
 height, displayed a soldier's uniform and end of a cutlass. 
 The effect may be imagined ! 
 
 The capture of the St. Nicholas illustrates the difficulty 
 which the United States authorities encountered at the begin- 
 ning of the war in preventing communication across the 
 Potomac between the sympathizing Marylanders and their 
 compatriots in Virginia. Chas. Worthington, the Baltimore 
 agent of the steamer St. Nicholas, writing to the Secretary of 
 the Navy, July 1st, after describing how the steamer had been 
 spirited away, gives at length the precautions he had taken 
 with Capt. Ward to prevent any such occurrence : "The ar- 
 rangement," says Mr. Worthington, "we made was mutually 
 satisfactory, and he promised to meet her (the steamer) every 
 Saturday morning at the mouth of the Potomac, and give her 
 a pass to proceed on her trip. But, alas ! he is no more " — 
 Col. Thomas had timed his enterprise so well that he slipped 
 through the unguarded door of the mouth of the Potomac, and 
 accomplished effectually his daring exploit. 
 
 At the session of the Confederate States District Court in 
 Richmond, February 3d, 1863, in the admiralty case of George 
 N. Hollins et al. against the steamer St. Nicholas, her cargo, 
 tackle and apparel, the marshal reported that he had placed 
 the amount of the sale of the vessel, etc. ($18,934.73), in bank 
 to the credit of the case. 
 
 The St. Nicholas was burned at Fredericksburg in 1862, 
 when that city was evacuated, along with many other vessels. ^ 
 
 ^^0 'oUowing is the list of Tessels destroyed valued at $1,600; Vecapolis, valued at $700; 
 
 at that place by the Confederate military au- Mary Pierce, owned by E "W. Adams and L. B. 
 
 thoritiea previous to the evacuation of the town: Bddens, Fredericksburg, Va., valued at $5,600; 
 
 Steamer Fir^m'a,Bteamer,S'tJVMAoia!.sohooner Helen, Capt. Solomon Phillips. Essex Company, 
 
 ■May, owned by McOonkey, Parr & Co., Balti- valued at $2,000; W.J. Faitani, valued at $1,600; 
 
 ^o™, Md ; A. Henry Armstrong, valued at Anglo-Saxon, owned by Segars & Perkins, Mid- 
 
 $46,000; schooner Ada, owned by Samuel G. dlesex Company, valued at $1,600; Dazzling Orb, 
 
 Miles, ot Baltimore, valued at $3,600; schooner Fredericksburg, Va, valued at $600; Ptdala, 
 
 Nm-mern Light, valued at $2,000; Reindeer, owned owned by A. Williams and B. Walker, Lancaster 
 
 by Capt. W. 0. Moore, Middlesex County, Va., County, Va., valued at $1,600; James Henry, 
 
118 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Col. Zarvona, prompted by his success, if not spirited bj 
 the praise and flattery it elicited, determined to return to 
 Baltimore, and possibly with the purpose of accomplishing 
 another daring feat. In spite of all persuasion, and against 
 the advice of friends — indeed, against the application of force 
 on the part of some of his admirers — he set out in a schooner in 
 July for Maryland, and landed at Fair Haven, in the Bay. 
 
 On July 4th, certain parties were seen inspecting the steamer 
 Columbia, of the same line as the St. Nicholas, while lying at 
 Fardy's ship-yard, near Federal Hill, Baltimore. They went 
 aboard and inquired of Capt. Harper what was her speed, how- 
 much coal was on board, and whether she could be chartered. 
 The steamer Logan, of the Baltimore and Fredericksburg line, 
 and the steamer Virginia, were already in the possession of 
 the Confederates; the steamer William Selden, of the Balti- 
 more Steam Packet Company, was being used by the Confed- 
 erates in Norfolk harbor. These captures had made the 
 Union authorities more vigilant and suspicious. It was also 
 reported to the authorities in Baltimore that several parties 
 had left the city on the Monday night preceding, in omni- 
 buses, and it was presumed that their purpose was to co-oper- 
 ate with Col. Zarvona, whose arrival at Fair Haven, in Anne 
 Arundel County, had also been reported. To effect the capture 
 of the "French lady" and her whole party, an expedition 
 was arranged by Provost Marshal Kenly, and placed under 
 command of Lieut. Thomas H. Carmichael and John Horner, 
 of Baltimore. The steamer Chester, according to one con- 
 temporaneous authority, and a sloop, according to another, 
 was equipped at Fort McHenry with an armament of two 
 twenty -four-pounders, an artillery company, an infantry com- 
 pany, and a posse of police officers. Proceeding to Fair Haven, 
 the officers arrested Neale Green, a noted barber, doing busi- 
 ness on Pratt Street, Baltimore, on the charge of having been 
 engaged in the assault on the 6th Massachusetts regiment 
 on the 19th of April; and with Green in charge the officers 
 returned to Baltimore on September 19th, 1861, on board the 
 steamer Mary Washington, while the Chester proceeded down 
 the bay in search of the schooner which brought Col. Zar- 
 vona to Fair Haven. The Baltimore American, of July 9th, 
 has the following account of the capture of Col. Zarvona: 
 
 "Shortly after leaving, the lieutenant entered into conversation with 
 a number of passengers, and ascertained that Capt. Kirwan, with the en- 
 gineer and another officer of the steamer jSi. Nicholas, as well as others 
 
 owned by Capts. MuUin and Dickinson, Ricli- $2,600; Zmcj/ iZenn, owned by a citizen of Glou- 
 
 mond County, Va., valued at $400; J. Warner, cester County, Va , valued at $600; fliawofte 
 
 Lancaster County, Va., valued at $225; Active, owned by Mr. Garland Kichardson, valued at 
 
 Capt. Henry Taylor, Richmond County, Ya., $2,000; sloop Amelhysl, owned by Capt Charles 
 
 valued at $2,200; Sea Breeze, owned by Miles, Gutberidge, Fredericksburg, valued at $900; in- 
 
 of Baltimore, Orabb & Sanger, Bichmond, Va., eluding the value of the Virginia and St, iVicA- 
 
 valued at $2,000; Mary Mitter, owned by G. olas. 
 
 Burgess, of Northumberland County, Va., and In connection with the burning of bridges ana 
 
 Miller.of Middlesex County, Va., valued at $4,000; vessels, from $16,000 to $20,000 worth of cotton 
 
 JVcmnie Shrevel, owned by E. Mann, valued at was also burned. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 119 
 
 -who had been taken prisoners -when the steamer was seized by Thomas, 
 the 'French lady,' and his party, had been released by them and was re- 
 turning to this city on tlae Mary Washington. The officers also ascer- 
 tained that among the passengers on board were seven or eight of the cap- 
 tors, with Capt. Thomas himself, who, doubtless exhilarated by the success 
 attending their first achievement, were disposed to make another venture, 
 probably on the steamer ColumMa or some other steamer plying on the 
 Staryland rivers. 
 
 " As soon as satisfactory information on this point was obtained and 
 «aeh one of the party recognized beyond doubt, Lieut. Carmiohael directed 
 Capt. Mason L. Weems, the commander of the Mary Washington, to pro- 
 ceed, on reaching this harbor, to land the passengers at Port McHenry. 
 The direction was given while the steamer was at Tknnapolis. Shortly 
 after, while Lieut. Carmichael and Mr. Horner were in the ladies' cabin, 
 they were approached by Thomas, who desired to know by what authority 
 the order had been given for the steamer to touch at Port McHenry. The 
 lieutenant informed him that it was through authority vested in him by 
 Col. Kenly, Provost Marshal of Baltimore. On hearing this, Thomas 
 drew his pistol, and calling his men around him, threatened to seize and 
 throw Carmichael and Horner overboard. The latter drew their revolvers 
 and defied the other party to proceed to execute their threats. The ut- 
 most confusion prevailed in the cabin for a short time, the female passen- 
 gers running out screaming, but the other male passengers stood up with 
 Carmichael and Horner, and compelled Thomas and his companions to 
 remain quiet. Matters thus stood on the boat until the steamer ap- 
 proached the fort wharf, when the Ueutenant went up and informed Gen. 
 Banks of his important capture. 
 
 "The General instantly ordered out a company of infantry, who 
 marched to the steamboat and secured all the accused excepting Thomas, 
 for whom search was made for an hour and a half. He was then found 
 concealed in the drawer of a bureau in the ladies' cabin, in the aft part 
 of the boat. At first it was apprehended that Thomas would make a 
 desperate resistance, but he disclaimed any such design, alleging that he 
 was too weak to resist. He and the other prisoners were then marched 
 to the fort and placed in confinement." 
 
 The arrest created a " tremendous excitement '' m Balti- 
 more, where Col. Thomas was well known, and had many- 
 friends among the best families in the city. On his person was 
 found his commission as colonel in the volunteer forces of 
 "Virginia;' but that did not protect him from treatment such 
 as a pirate would have received. His imprisonment, upon 
 becoming known at Richmond, was firmly protested against, 
 and measures of retaliation adopted, which arrested all pro- 
 ceedings against him on the charge of piracy, but did not 
 
 1 The following are copies of papers found on be af&xed, this second day of July, eighteen 
 
 Col. Thomas at the time of his arrest at Fort hundred and sixty-oue. 
 
 McHenry; John Letchek. 
 
 " The Commonwealth of Virginia to Richard 
 
 Thomas Zarvona, greeting : City of Richmond, Vieginia, To Wit : 
 
 Know you, that from special trust and confi- This day appeared before me, Joseph Mayo, 
 
 dence reposed in your fidelity, courage and Mayor of the City of Richmond, Richard Thomas 
 
 good conduct, our Governor, in pursuance of Zarvona, and qualified to the within commission 
 
 the authority vested in him by an Ordinance of by taking the oath prescribed by law. 
 
 the Convention of the State of Virginia, doth Given under my hand this 2d day of July, 
 
 commission you a colonel in the Active Volun- A.D. 1861. 
 
 leer forces of the State, to rank as such from the Joseph Mayo, Mayor. 
 
 ^™'day of July, eighteen hundred and sixty- 
 
 In testimony whereof, I have hereunto 
 signed my name, as Governor, and 
 caused the seal of the Commonwealth to Zouaves, to pass at vi\\\,free, over the roads and 
 
 one. Executive Department. ' ) 
 
 ( —^ 1 In testimony whereof, I have hereunto Richmond, July 3, 1861. f 
 
 j !■. s. j signed my name, as Governor, and Permit Col. R. T. Zarvona, of the Potomac 
 
120 THE CONFEDEKA.TE STATES NAVY. 
 
 secure the treatment due to him as a prisoner-of-war. He was 
 confined in Fort McHenry for several months, during which he 
 made several ineffectual efforts to escape, and was, early in 
 1862, transferred to Fort Lafayette. During his imprisonment 
 reports were circulated that his health had been impaired, and 
 that his mental condition indicated cruelty in the treatment 
 he had received. These reports caused the U. S. Senate to 
 direct the Committee on Military Affairs of the Senate to inquire 
 into and report as to the truths of those reports. Senator Wil- 
 son reported, February 16th, 1863, that : 
 
 " Richard Thomas Zarvona was committed to this fort on December 
 3d, 1861, and was allowed the same privileges as the other prisoners until 
 the 3d March, 1862, on which date he was placed in close confinement by 
 order of the Secretary of War, dated 28th day of February, 1862. Aftet 
 that date he was not allowed to leave his room except to go to the water- 
 closet — which is situated on the sea wall — in charge of a member of the 
 guard, of which privilege he took advantage on the night of the 81st of 
 April, 1862, and attempted to escape by j umping overboard and swimming 
 to the Long Island shore. Since that time he has not been out of his 
 room except to see his mother, who visited him in October last by per- 
 mission of the Secretary of War. 
 
 " The room in which he is confined, is one of those intended for quar- 
 ters, 25 feet long and fifteen feet wide, with nine windows, one of which 
 is closed, because it opens upon the court where the other prisoners exer- 
 cise. The room is the same which Senator Wall, with some others, occu- 
 pied while confined here. He is permitted to supply himself, through the 
 commanding officer of the post, with anything he may wish in the way 
 of food (in addition to the regular ration which is issued to him) and 
 clothing. He is not permitted the use of papers or books, as he has taken 
 advantage of these privileges to communicate to parties outside. 
 
 " As regards Thomas' health. Acting Assistant Surgeon W. H. Studley, 
 of the fort, under date of February 2d, says : ' I have this day examined 
 Col. Richard Thomas Zarvona, Confederate States army, and found that 
 his health is generally good, according to his own admission. That it is 
 better than when he entered the fort. In reference to his mental con- 
 dition, I find him sound and rational, but somewhat eccentric in some of 
 his ideas, and yet not more so than in thousands who may be said to be 
 born with a certain turn of character. Therefore, in my opinion, I should 
 deem his peculiarities perfectly consistent with sanity of mind.' 
 
 "The report of Assistant Adjt. Gen. D. D. Townsend, to the Secre- 
 tary of War, dated February 10th, says: Col. Richard Thomas, alias Rich- 
 ard Thomas Zarvona, was captured on board the steamer Mary Washing- 
 ton, near Annapolis, February 7th, 1861, and confined at Fort McHenry, 
 Baltimore, Maryland. He was recognized on the steamer as a man 
 who headed a party which captured the steamer St. Nicholas, 
 plying between Baltimore and the Potomac, and was indicted by the 
 Grrand Jury of Maryland District for the offence and for treason. When 
 
 rivers of this Commonwealth upon his own cer- amount would be duly honored by Messrs. R. H. 
 tiflcate, and upon like certiflcato pass his men Maury & Co., of Richmond, 
 and baggage. July U, 1861, Asst. Adj. Gen. Kobert Williams 
 All officers, civil and military, will respect at Fort McHenry, reported by direction of Major 
 him, and give him such facilities as he may re- Geu. Banks, " that the schooner Georffiaria, 
 quire, in their power to afford. owned by Thomas and his party, and with which 
 By order, a portion of them had been lying in wait for the 
 8. Bassett Neuoh, capture of other steamers from Baltimore, has 
 Aide-de-Camp to Governor of Virginia, been taken possession of, and is now at the dock 
 Approved : John Letchek." of this port, having been run aground and de- 
 He also had with him a letter of credit on a sorted by her crew. No capture of rebels was 
 Baltimore bouse for the sum of $1,000, declar- made on board of her."— Q^crai Records, Series 
 ing that the check of Col. Zarvona to that 1, Vol. II., p. 749. 
 
COMMANDER JOHN TAYLOR WOOD, 
 
 CONFEDERATE STATES KAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 121 
 
 search was made for him on the Mm-y Washington, he was found dressed 
 in female apparel, and concealed in a bureau in one of the state-rooms. 
 Gen. Dix, in his report of February 30th, 1862, thinks he should be treated 
 as a ' pirate and a spy.' There are four witnesses against him as to the first 
 crime, who were at Port McHenry the last of September. The evidence 
 of the second charge consists in his being taken in disguise as a female, 
 with a commission of Colonel ' in the active volunteer forces ' of Virginia 
 upon his person at the time. In consequence of the report made in his 
 case, he has not been placed in the list of prisoners-of-war, taut is held 
 confined at Fort Lafayette." 
 
 There was no truth in the statement that Col. Zarvona 
 was " dressed in female apparel." 
 
 Such feats of resolution and daring inspire a whole people 
 with admiration, and create that spirit of enthusiasm which 
 takes no reckoning of the odds against success. Col. Zarvona 
 may have been eccentric, every man that acts outside of the 
 dull line of other men is set down as eccentric; but the cool- 
 ness and resolution with which he faced danger, and the in- 
 domitable energy with which he executed his enterprise, show 
 that he was well fitted to lead in a desperate undertaking. 
 Some idea of the resources of this young man may be formed 
 from the novel means by which he tried to effect escape. With 
 a number of tin cans securely corked and tied around his 
 waist, he threw himself into the water and swam boldly from 
 Fort Lafayette toward the Long Island shore; but being dis- 
 covered by the sentinel, a boat was sent after him and he was 
 recaptured and brought back to the fort. He continued to 
 languish in the gloomy cell at Fort Lafayette for two years — 
 an object of admiration and pity to every man and woman in 
 the South. His imprisonment was reported to be rigorous in 
 the extreme, and his confinement close and severe. His re- 
 peated efforts to escape may have rendered these measures 
 necessary — but their report caused retaliation to be instituted 
 in Richmond, by the confinement at hard labor in the Peniten- 
 tiary of two Federal officers, and the announcement of the pur- 
 pose to mete out to them whatever might befall Col. Zarvona. 
 In response to a resolution, adopted by the Virginia House of 
 Delegates on the 23d of January, 1863, in relation to the efforts 
 made by Governor Letcher to obtain the release of Col. Zar- 
 vona, the Governor said that "at the time of his capture. Col. 
 Zarvona was acting under orders from me, and was employed 
 on secret service for the accomplishment of an object re- 
 garded as one of the first importance to the interests of the 
 State and the Confederacy." In response to this communica- 
 tion, the Legislature, on March 28th, 1863, adopted a resolution 
 authorizing and directing the Governor to transfer the prison- 
 ers capturied by the State Line to the Confederate government, 
 except those held as hostages for Col. Zarvona and others. 
 These acts of retaliation procured the release of Col. Zarvona, 
 and he was exchanged and returned to Richmond in April, 
 1863. That one so conspicuous in the earliest period of the 
 
132 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 war for coolness and courage should have played no further 
 part, is remarkable, but not the less a fact. ' 
 
 On Wednesday night, Aug. 19th, 1863, Lieut. John Taylor 
 Wood, C. S. navy, left Richmond in command of a party num- 
 bering sixty men; the inception, organization and destination 
 of the expedition were so well concealed that the first intima- 
 tion received in Richmond of the expedition was the informa- 
 tion of its complete success. '' 
 
 The United States Chesapeake flotilla, commanded by Capt. 
 Craven, was chiefly engaged in arresting intercourse between 
 the United States and the Confederate States along the waters 
 of that bay. To that end armed steamers were kept cruising 
 off the mouths of rivers and creeks, and at the mouth of the 
 Rappahannock the steamers Satellite and Reliance were doing 
 duty in August, 1863. These steamers carried, on the former, 
 one thirty -two-pounder smooth-bore gun and one twelve- 
 pounder howitzer; and the latter mounted one thirty -pounder 
 Parrott and one twenty-four-pounder howitzer, each with a 
 crew of forty men. As they lay off Stingray Point, at the 
 mouth of the Rappahannock, they offered a temptation which 
 to the courage, dash and enterprise of Lieut. Wood was too 
 inviting to be resisted. 
 
 The point of departure, the lower end of Middlesex County, 
 "Va., was reached, and embarking in four small boats Lieut. 
 Wood's command pulled steadily and swiftly for the two 
 vessels. 
 
 The challenge of the watches on board had scarcely died 
 away on the midnight air before the boarders were clambering 
 up the sides of the two vessels, cutting their way through the 
 hammock netting, which had been triced up in anticipation of 
 attack, driving the crews below and mastering the prizes. 
 Three minutes finished the work. The assault was so quickly 
 made that the crews had no opportunity to use their heavy 
 guns, and the fighting was entirely hand-to-hand, in which 
 Lieut. Hoge, Midshipman H. S. Cooke, and three men were 
 wounded, and Capt. Waters of the Reliance, with eight others, 
 were severely wounded and two killed. This affair, so bril- 
 liant in conception and execution, was described in the Wash- 
 ington City Evening Star by N. H. Stavey, Paymaster's Clerk 
 of the Satellite, who was wounded in the fight. He said: 
 
 1 Col. Thomas had originally intended to emit and drill, and wait for the release of its 
 
 raise a regiment of Maryland Zouaves, and the colonel from imprisonment; but, 'ming to the 
 
 first company was organized in Richmond on great length of time he was confined, the scheme 
 
 July 4th, 1861, by the election of the following of organizing a regiment of Zouaves was ahan- 
 
 offlcers ; William Walters, Baltimore, Captain; doned, and the company of Maryland Zouavea 
 
 G-. W. Alexander, First Lieutenant; John W. was soon after consolidated with other Confed- 
 
 Torech, Second Lieutenant; F. M. Parsons, Jr., erate commands and performed gallant servioe 
 
 Third Lieutenant; Chaa. Simms, Orderly Ser- throughout the war. 
 geant; Charles Hemling, Second Sergeant; F. 
 
 DufBn, Third Sergeant; J. L. Quinn, Fourth 2 Lieut. Wood with a boat's crew of thirteen 
 
 Sergeant; John D. Mitchell, First Corporal; men, on the night of October 7th, 1862, boarded, 
 
 William Uncle, Second Corporal; John H. Eus- captured and burned the steamer iiVancw.E/nwe. 
 
 Bicli, Third Coi-poral; William A. Ryan, Fourth which was lying at anchor off Lower Cedar 
 
 Corporal. The company was ordered to Tap- Point in the Potomac River. The captain and 
 
 pahannock on the Rappahannock Kiver, to re- crew were sent prisoners to Richmond. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 123 
 
 "The attacking party numbered sixty -eight men, mostly sailors be- 
 longing to the New Merrimac, at Richmond, with some of Wheat's bat- 
 talion, and approached in four boats, each containing about seventeen 
 men, the two boats which approached the Satellite being in command of 
 Col. Wood, an aide and relative to Jeff. Davis, and the two who boarded 
 the Reliance, in charge of Lieut. Hoge, of the Merrimac. Both of these 
 officers, we believe, formerly were attached to our navy. 
 
 " At the time of the attack (twelve o'clock Saturday night) it was dark 
 and a heavy sea was running. The assailants were not discovered on the 
 Satellite until nearly to the boat, when the officer ran below to call the ex- 
 ecutive officer, and by the time he returned the vessel was boarded and 
 the crew were in a fight with the rebels, which lasted some ten or fifteen 
 
 minutes, during which Thomas Damon, a fireman, and Lawson, who 
 
 ■originally came from the rebel army, were killed, and Ensign R. Sommers 
 received two cutlass wounds on the left arm, and was shot through the 
 neck ; N. H. Stavey, Paymaster's Steward, shot in the arm ; Wm. Bing- 
 ham, Master-at-Arms, Samuel Chin (colored', and two others, slightly. 
 The fight on board the Satellite is represented to have been desperate, and 
 several of the rebels were wounded ; but the crews were obliged to give 
 way. It is said that the Captain of the Satellite (Robinson > behaved in a 
 very cowardly manner when he came on deck in his underclothes. Find- 
 ing the crew in a desperate hand-to-hand encounter with the rebels, he 
 med out, "For God's sake, don't shoot. I surrender." 
 
 " The party which boarded the Reliance, Acting Ensign Walters, also 
 was resisted, the officers and men fighting desperately, but were obliged 
 to succumb to this attack ; Lieut. Hoge was either killed or wounded, and 
 Ensign Walters was shot through the stomach, the ball commg out at 
 the hip. After Mr. Walters was wounded he crawled into his pilot-house 
 and blew his whistle for help, not being aware that the Satellite had been 
 already taken. Mr. McCauly, the engineer of the Reliance, when he found 
 his boat in possession of the rebels, put his engines out of gear, rendering 
 them useless. 
 
 " After they captured both boats the rebels proceeded with them to 
 TJrbana, where the officers and crews were put on shore, and they put out 
 :with the steamers again for the mouth of the river, where they lay all day 
 Sunday ; but on Sunday night they went to the Eastern Shore and cap- 
 tured three schooners, one a large coaler, from Philadelphia, which they 
 took up to Drbana; and after burning one of them, went, as they said, to 
 Port Royal, where they would remove the machinery and destroy the 
 boats.'' 
 
 Immediately upon securing the two steamers, the boats in 
 ■which Lieut. Wood had made the attack were made last 
 astern, everything was hauled taut on board, ropes coiled up, 
 and guns prepared for a fight. Lieut. Wood was on board the 
 Satellite, and Lieut. Francis L. Hoge being wounded, Lieut. 
 Wm. E. Hudgins, the second officer in command, was put in 
 charge of the Reliance. He was ordered to follow close after 
 the Satellite, which was to be taken up the river by Pilot 
 Moore. The engineers, Messrs. Bowman and Tennent, soon 
 got up steam, and reported the vessels ready to move. 
 
 Lieut. Hoge was the first to reach the deck of the Eeliance, 
 and fighting his way forward with great gallantry, was struck 
 in the neck by a pistol ball, and fell upon the deck. Midship- 
 man Cooke, though hit by two balls, continued to direct the 
 fight until the enemy surrendered. Lieut. Hudgins took com- 
 mand of the Eeliance, and just as the first gray streak of day 
 appeared in the East the Satellite moved out, followed closely 
 
124 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 by Lieut. Hudgins. The run up occupied some three hours, 
 and a little after sunrise we dropped the anchors off Urbana. 
 The first thing was to get the wounded and prisoners ashore. 
 Midshipman Matt. P. Goodwyn had charge of this, and ia a 
 short time all were landed and delivered into the hands of the 
 cavalry of Col. T. L. Rosser, who had co-operated with the ex- 
 pedition, and was ready to take charge of the prisoners to 
 Richmond. 
 
 When captured, the Federal steamers had but a few hours 
 supply of coal, and the Currituck, their companion-steamer, 
 had gone for coal for the little squadron. Lieut. Wood,however, 
 determined to make the supply on hand serve his purpose, and 
 expecting resistance from the Currituck, Col. Rosser detailed 
 Capt. Clay's company of sharp-shooters to assist on the Satel- 
 lite. Capt. Fendall Gregory and Lieut. Nunn, of Rosser's regi- 
 ment, also volunteered. 
 
 Owing to the diflBculty of making and keeping up steam, 
 on the Reliance, Lieut. Hudgins was unable to accompany 
 Lieut. Wood in his cruise over the waters of the Chesapeake 
 Bay, and the Satellite, on Sunday night, went out alone, and 
 reached the mouth of the river at eleven o'clock. The sea was 
 quite high, with a strong southeasterly wind, and every pros- 
 pect of an approaching storm. Having so little coal, it was 
 impossible to go far; but Lieut. Wood started boldly up the 
 bay to see what there was afloat. The waves were every mo- 
 ment getting higher and the Satellite creaked and groaned in 
 every seam, and ran heavily against the sea, as if trying to 
 commit suicide at the chagrin of capture. Although much 
 indisposed, Pilot Moore managed her admirably, and kept her 
 well against the storm. After cruising awhile up the bay, her 
 course was turned towards the eastern shore. Some few sails 
 were seen looming up through the dark, but they were small 
 and hardly worth the time when larger game was expected. 
 At one o'clock the sea was very high, and about all the Satellite 
 could stand. It would have availed little then to have made 
 out a sail, for the sea was too rough for boarding, and small 
 boats would probably have swamped in such weather. At two 
 o'clock the Satellite turned back, and a little before day made 
 Stingray Point. Fearing the Currituck might have returned 
 during the night and dropped into the anchorage, Lieut. Wood 
 sent up a signal light; but it was not answered, and the Satel- 
 lite ran safely inside. 
 
 In the gray of Monday morning the steamer ran some five 
 miles up the river, and came to anchor near Gray's Point. 
 Being out all night, as well as the two nights previous, every- 
 body was much exhausted, and, as soon as the anchor dropped 
 over the side, nearly all dropped to sleep upon the deck. Having^ 
 suffered severely from sea-sickness during the ni^ht, the 
 cavalry men were a forlorn-looking set, and it was pitiful to 
 see their pale, uneasy faces. 
 
THE CONrBDEKATE STATES NAVY. 125 
 
 Nothing of importance occurred during the day. The sea 
 still ran high, and the wind increased in strength. About 
 night three sails made their appearance in the bay, all beat- 
 ing down upon the starboard tack directly towards the Satel- 
 lite. Lieut. Wood made out towards them, and for an hour 
 or two chased the larger of the two down towards Grwin's^ 
 Island and the mouth of the Piankatank. About nine o'clock* 
 she was overhauled, and proved to be the schooner Oolden 
 Rod, laden with coals from Baltimore, and bound for Maine. 
 The other two sail (schooners both) had anchored just inside 
 the point, and these were picked up upon the return. They 
 were the Two Brothers and the Coquette, anchor-sweepers, from 
 Philadelphia. Both had a number of very fine anchors and 
 cables on board. Taking the three in tow, the Satellite ran 
 up to Urbana again, and let go anchors. As the Reliance had 
 but a few bushels of coal left, she was sent up to Port Royal 
 that morning, but after the capture of the Golden Rod she was 
 ordered to return. 
 
 Eunning the Satellite alongside the schooner, Lieut. Wood 
 took on board coal to last a day or two, and prepared to run 
 down the river. The schooners were made ready for burning, 
 and instructions left with Lieut. Hudgins to take charge of 
 them and apply the match should the enemy appear before 
 the return of the Satellite. 
 
 Remaining but a few hours of Tuesday at Urbana, for 
 the purpose of ministering to the wounded in the fight, Lieut. 
 Wood again ran down the river and laid under lee of the land, 
 some two miles from the bay, waiting patiently for "some- 
 thing to turn up." The sea seemed to be higher than before, 
 and the white foam caps flashed in the light, and the heavy 
 breakers dashed upon the beach with their continuous, sad- 
 dening roar. It was too much for the Satellite — the elements 
 were against her. From a picket it was ascertained that the 
 Currituck had arrived off the Piankatank, communicated with 
 the shore, and afterwards steamed rapidly in the direction of 
 Portress Monroe. It was evident, then, she was aware of the 
 nature of Lieut. Wood's exploit, and had gone for aid. Sure 
 enough, later in the evening, the black smoke-stacks of three 
 large gunboats became visible in the distance. 
 
 Had the weather been favorable, Lieut. Wood intended to 
 have run out before the steamers came up; but the pilots de- 
 cided the sea was too rough for the engines. This being the 
 case, Lieut. Wood had the choice of an unequal fight or a re- 
 treat up the river. The odds were too great for the former, 
 and the Satellite headed for Urbana. 
 
 Lieut. Hudgins had returned with the Reliance and was 
 coaling alongside the captured schooner, and the Satellite was 
 quickly moored close to the Reliance. The storm continuing 
 with great violence put an end to all movements by either 
 side, and when Wednesday morning broke clear and cold the 
 
126 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 river was very rough. However, a pilot was obtained from 
 the shore and preparations were made to run up to Port Royal, 
 where the steamers and the prizes could be dismantled. The 
 larger schooner drew eleven feet of water, and this the pilot 
 thought too much to be gotten up without difficulty; so at day- 
 light she was fired. Taking the other two prizes in tow the 
 Satellite started on, pilot Moore bringing up the Reliance close 
 behind. After a few miles he brought her alongside the Satel- 
 lite, and the two then worked together, making quite good 
 time against the strong ebb-tide and the high headwind. 
 
 The Confederate nag was flying from the Satellite, and 
 from some old bunting on board the officers of the Reliance 
 improvised a small flag of the new pattern — the white ground 
 with battle-flag union. The advance caused considerable ex- 
 citement on the route: the people did not know what to make 
 of it. Some stared in mute astonishment, others thought it a 
 trick of the Yankees, others again greeted the little fleet with 
 enthusiastic cheers. 
 
 Upon arrival at Port Royal, where was stationed some 
 Confederate artillery, the approaching fleet was hailed and 
 warned not to approach the shore. But a boat dispatched 
 from the vessels explained their true character and changed a 
 hostile aspect into pleasant and welcoming shouts. 
 
 Early on Thursday, Lieut. Wood reported to the officer in 
 command at Port Royal, where a detachment of Confederate 
 cavalry and artillery had been protecting a foraging train. 
 The Federal troops were at King George C. H., some fifteen 
 miles distance, and from which an attack might be expected 
 as soon as the news of the arrival of the captured steamers 
 was made known. After two days' hard work, there was 
 nothing left upon the Satellite and the Reliance, and their 
 guns were on shore and in battery to resist any approach of 
 the enemy. 
 
 This bold and unexampled expedition was particularly an- 
 noying to the administration of the Federal Navy Department. 
 It had occurred in the very track of their comrounication be- 
 tween Washington and McClellan's base of operations. It 
 was liable to repetition, and the captured vessels offered the 
 means of greater expedition among the many vessels sailing 
 on the Chesapeake Bay. The Currituck, as anticipated by 
 Lieut. Wood, did report his exploit to the gunboat Meigs, and 
 an expedition for their recapture started, but returned empty- 
 handed. 
 
 In the meantime Lieut. Wood had arrived at Port Royal 
 and was securing the fruits of his enterprise. Pour wagons 
 were set to work transporting the cargo and other captured 
 material to Milford Station, on the R. F. and P. R. R. Lieut. 
 Wood went to Richmond to procure more transportation, 
 leaving Lieut. Hudgins in command. To Washington the 
 report was carried "by Capt. Bates, of Gen. Sickles' staff, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 127 
 
 that information had been received at the headquarters of the 
 Third Army Corps that Gen. Kilpatrick succeeded in sinking 
 the recently captured gunboats Reliance and Satellite, on the 
 Rappahannock, twelve miles below Fredericksburg." 
 
 Nothing of the kind occurred; the Federal cavalry did at- 
 tack and did attempt to destroy the vessels, but was driven off 
 by Col. Hardwick with an Alabama regiment that happened 
 to be in Port Royal protecting a foraging train. Everything 
 valuable was taken from the captured steamers, and on Fri- 
 day they were burned by Lieut. Wood. Gen. Kilpatrick's 
 attack was on Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning pre- 
 ceding. It accomplished nothing whatever toward the de- 
 struction of the Satellite and Reliance, which were burned on 
 Friday, by the order of Lieut. Wood, because they could not be 
 of any further service to the Confederacy. The expedition 
 was a most brilliant success, illustrating the dash and enter- 
 prise of the C. S. navy, and a mortifying blow upon the 
 U. S. Chesapeake flotilla, as well as securing valuable material 
 for the navy and the army of the Confederacy. In its moral 
 effect it aroused enthusiasm and kept alive the spirit of resistT 
 ance, teaching the lesson that amid reverses there was still 
 the chance of victory and the hope of success. 
 
 The capture of these two steamers was investigated by a 
 U. S. Naval Court of Inquiry, which reported that it was the 
 result of a complete surprise, and by order of Secretary Welles 
 the officers commanding the steamers were dismissed the 
 service. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 HAMPTON KOADS. 
 
 THE magnificent estuary of Hampton Roads, lying behind 
 the guns of Fortress Monroe and the Rip Raps, receives 
 the waters of the James River, which flow immediately 
 past Richmond; while on the Elizabeth River, its other 
 principal tributary, the greatest naval station and ship and 
 ordnance yard of the United States is located. The central 
 position of this great harbor, almost equally distant from the 
 north and from the south portion of the Atlantic sea-board, 
 made its possession and control of the greatest importance to 
 both sections of the Union. And while the storm of war was 
 gathering, and yet had not taken positive shape, both parties 
 — at least Virginia and the United States — kept the possession 
 of this harbor constantly in view. The report that the guns 
 of Fortress Monroe had been turned "landward" produced 
 very great excitement in the Virginia Convention, even after 
 resolutions looking to secession had been overwhelmingly 
 defeated; and, if the report had not been contradicted, would 
 have precipitated action quite as decided as did Mr. Lincoln's 
 proclamation calling for 75, 000 troops. While this anxiety about 
 the possession of the Roads was very great, neither Virginia 
 nor the United States seemed disposed to disturb the uncer- 
 tain calm of public affairs by open efforts to secure the pos- 
 session of the harbor; but both seemed to tacitly submit to the 
 status quo in the hope that events might yet be so shaped as 
 to avoid collision. But while President Lincoln and Mr. Seward 
 were endeavoring to prevent a collision in Charleston, and to 
 preserve their pledged word with South Carolina that the situa- 
 tion should not be changed, it was a part of the secret purpose 
 of the war wing of the Republican party, headed by Secretaries 
 Welles and Stanton, not only to precipitate a collision in 
 Charleston Harbor but to provoke a like assault at Norfolk. 
 
 To that end, before Sumter was assaulted, and while the 
 Virginia Convention was anxiously holding the State to her 
 moorings in the Union, against the efforts of the secession 
 
 (128) 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 129 
 
 minority, Mr. Welles addressed his order of April 10th to Capt. 
 C. S. McOauley, commandant of the navy-yard at Norfolk, 
 to prepare the steamer Merrimac for sea, and to dispatch her 
 to Philadelphia. The right of the government to control the 
 movements of its war-ships is undeniable, but the prudence 
 of changing the situation of affairs at Norfolk, just after the 
 State Convention had refused to secede, can only be com- 
 mended as a sequence to Mr. Welles' purpose to force Virginia 
 into hostile action, as he was about to compel South Carolina 
 to assault Sumter. The expedition of Capt. Fox to Charles- 
 ton Harbor, and the letters of the Secretary to Capt. McCau- 
 ley, of the 10th, 11th, and 12th of April, are not only contem- 
 poraneous, but they are important parts in the scheme to 
 preserve the unity of the Eepublican party by involving the 
 country in civil war. Hoping and believing that the bad 
 faith involved in dispatching the Fox expedition to Charles- 
 ton would light the fires of strife, Mr. Welles determined to 
 force Virginia to declare her position, and no better device 
 could have been selected than that of changing the peaceful 
 situation of affairs at Norfolk. In furtherance of that scheme 
 he dispatched, on the 14th of April, Engineer Isherwood to 
 Norfolk with orders to take charge of the Merrimac, repair her 
 machinery, and remove her to Philadelphia. The condition 
 of her machinery was such that she could have been removed 
 on the 18th, but Capt. McCauley, anxious not to assume the 
 responsibility of provoking the State of Virginia into seces- 
 sion, refused on the 16th to permit the frigate to be removed. 
 Secretary Welles, knowing that the Fox expedition had re- 
 sulted in collision, wrote to Capt. McCauley on the 16th April 
 that "no time should be lost in getting her (the Merrimac' s) 
 armament on board," and in placing that vessel and the others 
 capable of being removed, with the public property, ordnance, 
 stores, etc., " beyond the reach of seizing "; and confident that 
 he had fired the train of civil war, he concluded his letter of 
 the 16th with instructions that " the vessels and stores under 
 your charge you will defend at any hazard, repelling by force, 
 if necessary, any and all attempts to seize them, whether by 
 mob violence, organized effort, or any assumed authority." 
 The Cumberland frigate had been ordered to Vera Cruz be- 
 fore Mr. Welles' scheme for provoking assault by South Caro- 
 lina had been worked through the Cabinet of Mr. Lincoln; 
 but, after the fall of Sumter, the Cumberland's departure 
 ■was rendered " inexpedient " by "a state of things" which 
 Mr. Welles had brought about; so, on the 16th April, he 
 ordered Capt. Pendergrast, of the Cumberland, not to depart 
 for the Gulf, because "events of recent occurence, and the 
 threatening attitude of affairs in some parts of our country, 
 call for the exercise of great vigilance and energy at Norfolk." 
 _ Affairs at Norfolk were not managedby Secretary Welles 
 with the same success which had crowned his expedition under 
 
130 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Capt. Fox to Sumter, where, to use the language of the Secre- 
 tary's panygerist, Chaplain Boynton, it was "very important 
 that the rebels should strike the first blow in the conflict.'" 
 
 A timidity, both moral and physical, existed among the 
 Federal officers at the Norfolk navy-yard, which prevented 
 any fixity of purpose or any resolution of action. Whether 
 to fly from, the yard with the ships, or stay and defend both, 
 yard and ships, was a very difiicult question to decide, and, 
 whichever way determined, involved the most serious conse- 
 quences. Those officers found themselves on the very verge 
 of war, not with a foreign nation, but with their fellow- 
 citizens — their friends and relatives — with States in the 
 Union under one political theory, and out of the Union under 
 another. The moral embarrassments that surrounded them 
 involved no suspicion of their loyalty, and their gallantry 
 before and after prevents any question of their courage on 
 that occasion. 
 
 Governor Letcher, of Virginia, on the 18th of April, after 
 the passage of the Ordinance of Secession, ordered Major Gen. 
 William B. Taliaferro, of the State Militia, to "forthwith 
 take command of the State troops which are now or may be 
 assembled at the city of Norfolk," to which city he was ordered 
 to depart instantly; and on the same day, Robert B. Pegramand 
 Catesby Ap R. Jones were appointed captains in the navy, and 
 Capt. Pegram was ordered " to proceed to Norfolk and there 
 assume command of the' naval station, with authority to or- 
 ganize naval defences, enroll and enlist seamen and marines, 
 and temporarily to appoint warrant officers, and to do and 
 perform whatever may be necessary to preserve and protect 
 the property of the commonwealth and of the citizens of 
 Virginia," and he was further directed to cooperate with the 
 land forces under Gen. Taliaferro. 
 
 Under these orders, Gen. Taliaferro, with Capt. Henry 
 Heth and Major Nat. Tyler of his staff, and Capts. Pegram 
 and Jones, repaired to Norfolk, arriving on the night of the 
 18th. The situation of affairs, both Federal and State, at Nor- 
 folk, on the morning of the 19th of April, was that the Federal 
 authorities had there "the U. S. frigate Cumberland, twenty- 
 four guns, fully manned, ready for sea, and under orders for 
 Vera Cruz ; the brig Dolphin, four guns, fully manned, and 
 ready for sea; the sloop Germantown, twenty-two guns, fully 
 
 1 Of Chaplain Boynton's History of the relations with a party who had given him »n 
 
 Navy during the Rebellion, Admiral Porter easy office, in order that he might have time to 
 
 Bays ; " He received his information from that devote himself solely to writing his Naval 
 
 (the Navy Department) sourco, and naturally Histoi-y. Many oiEcers of the navy say it is 
 
 followed it as that to be put in hie history, only a history of the Naval Department." It 
 
 whereas a historian should leave nothing un- ' is not surprising that a book written under 
 
 done to obtain a true statement of aflairs. Mr. such inspiration should have been not only 
 
 Boynton, while writing his history, held an ap- unjust and partial in United States naval 
 
 pointment under the Navy Department, which matters, but foul - mouthed with , 
 
 he could only hold as long as hia writings were toward Confederate affairs. Its reliability is 
 
 acceptable to its chief; * * * where articles clouded with suspicion of its motives, and 
 
 were prepared for his book, he could not very its statements poisoned with the malice of it* 
 
 well reject or revise them without severing his patron. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 131 
 
 manned, ready for sea; the sloop Plymouth, twenty-two guns, 
 ready for sea; the marines of the navy-yard, and the guards 
 of the frigate Earitan, sixty guns, in ordinary; the frigate 
 Columbia, fifty guns, in ordinary; the frigate United States, 
 fifty guns, in ordinary ; the steam-frigate Merrimac, forty 
 guns, under repairs; the ship of the line Delaware, seventy - 
 four guns, in ordinary; the ship of the line Columbus, seventy- 
 four guns, in ordinary, and the ship of the line Pennsylvania, 
 120 guns, "receiving-ship" — all lying at the yard or in the 
 stream. The yard was walled around with a high brick inclos- 
 ure, and protected by the Elizabeth River, and there were over 
 800 marines and sailors with officers. 
 
 On the side of Virginia the situation was : that of Gen. Talia- 
 ferro with his staff ; Capt. Heth and Major Tyler, two volun- 
 teer companies — ^the Blues of Norfolk and the Grays of Ports- 
 mouth — and Capts. Pegram and Jones of the navy. These 
 were the only troops in Norfolk, until after the evacuation of 
 the navy-yard and the departure of the Federal ships. 
 
 Whatever information naay have been received by Capt. 
 McOauley on "Friday, the 19th of April," about Virginia state 
 troops arriving at Portsmouth and Norfolk in numbers from 
 Richmond, Petersburg, and the neighborhood, had its only 
 foundation in the ruse de guerre practiced by Wm. Mahone, 
 President of the Norfolk and Petersburg Railroad, by run- 
 ning empty cars up the railroad a few miles, where they re- 
 ceived some citizens from the neighborhood, and then return- 
 ing to the city, with every man yelling with all his migjht, and 
 thereby creating the desired impression of large reinforce- 
 ments pouring into the city. 
 
 It was not until Saturday night, the 20th, that the first re- 
 inforcements arrived from Petersbiirg, numbering about 400 
 men; on Sunday the Richmond Grays, and on Monday three 
 companies from Georgia arrived, and after that troops con- 
 tinued to arrive until the post was fully garrisoned. At the 
 evacuation of the yard, the State force was only the two vol- 
 unteer companies in Norfolk and Portsmouth — the aggregate 
 of which was outnumbered by the command on board any one 
 of the U. S. ships in the navy. The batteries spoken of by 
 Commander McCauley as being thrown up opposite the navy- 
 yard, and which he said " were distinctly seen from the mast- 
 head of the Cumberland, though screened from sight below 
 by the intervening trees " — had no existence then, nor at any 
 other tinae. Gen. Taliaferro, having no means at his command 
 with which to oppose the passage of the ships from the navy- 
 yard, relied largely upon the demoralization existing in the 
 yard, for the effect of his promise " that to save the effusion 
 of blood, he would permit the Cumberland to leave the port un- 
 molested, if the destruction of property should be discontinued." 
 The reply of Com. Paulding "that any act of violation on 
 their part would devolve upon them the consequences" — 
 
133 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 was received by Gen. Taliaferro as a Parthian arrow shot b' 
 a flying foe; and having literally no force of any kind tha 
 could molest ships-of-war, he was forced to see the fly 
 ing squadron escape. The obstructions placed in the channel 
 of Elizabeth River were not so placed as to prevent the men 
 of -war from escaping — for it was not desirable to shut up ii 
 Elizabeth River so formidable a force of armed ships as thai 
 floated on her waters. Those obstructions were a part of th( 
 intimidation mode of assault which Mr. Mahone carried ou 
 on land, and the old hulks in the water — designed only t( 
 threaten the closing of the river — and the capture of th< 
 ships by the large land force that was represented as arriving 
 on the noisy but empty cars. At the same time, an opening 
 was left, which Lieut. Murray found — a golden bridge for a 
 flying foe — through which ships which could not be capturec 
 might escape. 
 
 Capt. McCauley's report shows that on the 30th he was in^ 
 formed by Col. Heth, Gen. Taliaferro's aide-de-camp, thai 
 there were no batteries being constructed, and Lieut. Selfridge, 
 of the Cumberland, confirmed the statement. The State had 
 seceded but three days before, and Gen. Taliaferro had been in 
 Norfolk but two days, so that under ordinary circumstances the 
 Federal officers would have realized the impossibility of there 
 being any formidable force threatening the yard. These oflS- 
 cers were demoralized by the political situation, and did not 
 understand how to make war on a State, and were not prompt 
 to commence hostilities on Virginia cities, as long as the ad- 
 ministration at Washington had not declared war. Even 
 the naval critic will find extenuation and apology for these 
 gallant and brave men, who found themselves confronted 
 with the appalling horror of being the first to commence 
 civil war. 
 
 The Norfolk navy-yard, which fell into the hands of Vir- 
 ginia on the 20th April, was three-quarters of a mile long and 
 a quarter mile wide. It was by far the most extensive ana val- 
 uable one in the United States. It had a granite dry dock like 
 that at Charlestown, Mass. The yard was covered with ma- 
 chine shops, houses for officers, and store-houses of various 
 kinds. It was provided with two ship-houses complete, and 
 one unfinished ; marine barracks, sail loft, riggers' loft, gun- 
 ners' loft, shops for carpenters and machinists, and a large 
 amount of tools and machinery, besides great quantities of 
 materials, provisions, and ammunition of every description. 
 There were 1,198 guns of all kinds captured with the yard, of 
 which fifty-two were nine-inch Dahlgren guns. Lying at the 
 yard was the Merrimac, worth $1,300,000; the Plymouth sm 
 Germantown, twenty -two guns each ; and the Dolphin, four 
 guns — all efficient vessels. The old Pennsylvania was in com- 
 mission as a receiving-ship; and the Delaware, eighty-four; 
 Columbus, eighty guns ; and the Columbia and Baritaui fifty 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 133 
 
 guns each, were lying in ordinary at the yard, and the ship-of- 
 the-Hne New York was on the stocks. The Cumber land, Cototoio- 
 dore Pendergrast, lay in a position that commanded completely 
 the cities of Norfolk and Portsmouth. The total property was 
 estimated by the U. S. Navy Department at $9,760,181. 
 
 Immediately upon the withdrawal of the U. S. ships, the 
 citizens broke into the yard and began the work of saving prop- 
 erty. The magnificent dry-dock was found mined and con- 
 taining twenty barrels of powder, the train to which had 
 failed, from some cause unknown, to ignite the mine, and the 
 dry dock was saved. The ships that were scuttled and fired 
 were saved from total destruction by sinking, the ship-houses 
 and much other valuable property were destroyed, but a vast 
 amount of property of inestimable value to the Confederate 
 States was saved. On Monday morning, Lieut. C. F. M. Spotts- 
 wood raised the flag of Virginia over the yard, and the State 
 assumed authority over all the property. 
 
 The report of Williarn H. Peters, made to the Governor 
 of Virginia, of an inventory of property captured at the fall 
 of the Norfolk navy-yard, makes the following statement: 
 
 "It is difficult to estimate the value of property destroyed on the 
 night of April 30th, 1861, when the Federal forces, having previously fired 
 the navy-yard, evacuated it. The extensive row of buildings on the north 
 front of the yard, containing large quantities of manufactured articles 
 and valuable material — such as pivot gun-carriages, several full suites of 
 sails for frigates and sloops of -war, a very large number of hammocks and 
 bags, and immense quantities of canvas, cordage, etc., etc., were, with 
 their contents, entirely destroyed. Ship-houses A and B, which were 
 very large wooden structures, the former containing the line-of-battle 
 shipiVJsio York, on the stocks, were also totally destroyed. So, also, were 
 the buildings used as barracks ; the latter, however, were of but little value. " 
 
 The report gives the following account of the attempt to 
 destroy the dry dock: 
 
 " The dry dock did not escape attention. Twenty -six barrels of pow- 
 der (a quantity sufficient to have destroyed the dock and every building 
 at the south end of the yard) were found disturbed in the culvert on its 
 north side, and across the head of the dock. These barrels were con- 
 nected by a train, continuing on to the inner steps at the bottom of the 
 dock, where it is supposed slow matches were placed for ignition at a pre- 
 arranged moment. The plan, however, was happily discovered in time 
 to frustrate it. Lieut. C. F. M. Spottswood, of the navy, to whom the 
 discovery was reported early on the morning of the 21st, promptly 
 directed the opening of the gates, when the dock was flooded, and thus 
 saved from destruction." 
 
 The number of guns in the yard is not stated, but the fol- 
 lowing general remarks are made: 
 
 , "Many heavy cannon were spiked, and for the time rendered useless; 
 out they have since been restored. Some had their trunnions broken off. 
 -Ihe small arms (of which there were in the yard 1,329 carbines, 274 rifled 
 iwiskets, 950 naval pistols, and 337 Colt's revolvers) were in part carried 
 on in the frigate Cumberland, and the remainder broken and thrown 
 overboard. 
 
134 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " I had purposed offering some remarks upon the vast importance to 
 Virginia, and to the entire South, of the timely acquisition of this exten- 
 sive naval depot, with its immense supplies of munitions of war, and to 
 notice briefly the damaging effects of its loss to the government at Wash- 
 ington; but I deem it unnecessary, since the presence at almost every ex- 
 posed point on the whole southern coast, and at the numerous inland 
 intrenched camps in the several States, of heavy pieces of ordnance, with 
 their equipments and fixed ammunition, all supplied from this establish- 
 ment, fully attests the one, while the unwillingness of the enemy to at- 
 tempt demonstrations at any point, from which he is obviously deterred 
 hy the knowledge of its well-fortified condition, abundantly proves the 
 other — especially when it is considered that both he and we are wholly 
 indebted for our means of resistance to his loss and our acquisition of the 
 Oosport navy-yard." 
 
 To the report there are appended elaborate tabular esti- 
 mates of the value of the property seized. The worth of the 
 land is given as follows: 
 
 Navy -yard, proper, containing eighty-six acres . . $246,000 00 
 
 St. Helena, containing thirty -eight acres . . 12,000 00 
 
 Naval hospital, containing 100 acres . . . 20,000 00 
 
 Fort Norfolk, containing six acres ... . 10,000 00 
 
 Total .... .... $288,000 00 
 
 The estimates of the improvements are: 
 
 Improvements at navy-yard 2,944,800 00 
 
 Improvements at St. Helena 8,300 00 
 
 Improvements at naval hospital 622,800 00 
 
 Improvements at naval magazine 136,580 68 
 
 Improvements at other points 236,000 00 
 
 Total $3,938,480 68 
 
 The worth of the vessels partially destroyed is thus esti- 
 mated: 
 
 Merrimac, steam-frigate $225,000 00 
 
 Plymouth, first-class sloop . . ... 40,000 00 
 
 Germantown, first-class sloop 25,000 00 
 
 Pennsylvania, line-of-battle ship . ... 6,000 00 
 
 Delaware, line-of-battle ship 10,000 00 
 
 Columbus, line-of-battle ship 10,000 00 
 
 Columbia, frigate 5,000 00 
 
 Dolphin, brig . 1,000 00 
 
 Powder boat 800 00 
 
 Water tank 100 00 
 
 United States 10,000 00 
 
 Total $332,900 00 
 
 The value of the steam-engines and other apparatus is es- 
 timated at $250,076. The following is a recapitulation: 
 
 Value of territory $288,000 00 
 
 Value of buildings and other improvements . . 3,938,480 68 
 
 Value of vessels 332,900 00 
 
 Value of engines, machinery, etc 250,676 00 
 
 Total $4,810,056 68 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 135 
 
 Gen. Taliaferro's appearance at Norfolk, as commanding 
 officer of the Virginia forces, made it apparent to the people of 
 that city, as well as to the officers of the navy-yard, that the Con- 
 vention had passed the Ordinance of Secession. From that mo- 
 ment the intensest excitement prevailed, for upon the pru- 
 dence of the Virginia troops the safety of both Norfolk and 
 Portsmouth depended. The Federal naval force in Elizabeth 
 Eiver was known to be too formidable for attack, and yet any 
 imprudent or threatening preparations might invite severe 
 and destructive retaliation. The demoralization existing in 
 the navy-yard was well known in both cities, and was felt to 
 be rather a danger than an aid towards the capture of the 
 yard. The excitement which prevailed was by no means any 
 indication of a sentiment of opposition to the secession of the 
 State, and the statement made in the report of the Select Com- 
 mittee of the U. S. Senate, ' * * * <« ^^lat at least a majority 
 of the citizens of both Norfolk and Portsmouth were on the 
 side of the Union, and would have been warmly and openly 
 so had the government shown a strong hand and a timely de- 
 termination to defend itself," has no foundation whatever in 
 truth and fact. That "an election for Mayor was held in 
 Portsmouth a few days previous to the surrender, at which 
 the Union candidate was elected by an overwhelming ma- 
 jority," no more proves the disloyalty of the people of that 
 city to Virginia than the fact that the Virginia Convention, 
 but a few days before the fall of Sumter, refused by an over- 
 whelming majority to pass the Ordinance of Secession, estab- 
 lished the loyalty of the State to the Union. Both the election 
 in Portsmouth, and the defeat of secession in the Convention, 
 preceded the fall of Sumter and the proclamation of Mr. Lin- 
 coln, which revolutionized public sentiment throughout the 
 State. Neither is it true, as stated by that committee, that 
 "a voluntary military association, considerable in numbers 
 and influence, was formed in Norfolk for the exclusive pur- 
 pose of assisting in the defence of the yard against the insur- 
 gents." From the 17th to the 20th — three days — was too short a 
 period for the formation of a voluntary military organization, 
 and there were no " insurgents " or other persons threatening 
 the yard. The crowd that on the wharf jeered at the Pawnee as 
 she passed up on the evening of the 20th, the committee of the 
 Senate represents as cheering the steamer for her " deliverance 
 of them from the perils and dishonor of a war against that Union 
 which they loved." Many of that same crowd had, the night 
 before, labored with great zeal and industry in bringing the kegs 
 of powder from the U. S. magazine to the lighters which carried 
 it to Richmond; and if their loyalty to the Union had been 
 as intense as the committee represents, it would have con- 
 veyed information to the navy -yard of what was taking place. 
 
 1 Report Com., No. 27— 27th CongresB, 2a Sess. 
 
136 THE CONPEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The averment of the Senate Committee in their report 
 that "the officers of the yard were traitors in disguise, and 
 continued nominally in the service of the government only 
 that they might the more effectually compass their treason- 
 able designs," has foundation only in the violence of the par- 
 tisan passions of the committee. The officers alluded to were 
 Capt. John R. Tucker, Commander Robert G. Robb, Lieut. C. 
 F. M. Spottswood, and others, who, as long as the State (Vir- 
 ginia) remained in the Union, desired to preserve the peaceful 
 attitude of public affairs at Norfolk, and to that end, in per- 
 fect honesty of purpose, and with fidelity to their oaths as 
 United States officers, persuaded Capt. McCauley to do no act 
 which would further complicate the situation at Norfolk. Not 
 one of those officers would have surrendered the yard to any 
 mob, or failed to defend it against unauthorized demand; but 
 when the State of Virginia seceded from the Union, and as- 
 serted her right to the yard, a very different question was 
 presented. If the government at Washington would not de- 
 clare war against a State, was it reasonable to expect officers 
 of the navy to be quick to commence hostilities ? Capt. 
 McCauley was instructed by Secretary Welles, on April 10th, 
 that " it is desirable that no steps should be taken to give need- 
 less alarm, but it may be best to order most of the shipping to 
 sea or other stations"; and that as regarded the steamer Mer- 
 riinac, "in case of danger from unlawful attempts to take 
 possession of her, that she should be placed beyond their 
 reach." Such carefully worded orders left to that officer the 
 responsibility of determining what would be " unlawful at- 
 tempts." The naval officers had witnessed arsenals, forts, and 
 army surrendered to the demands of States throughout the 
 South without even demur or objection by either the execu- 
 tive or legislative authority of the United States; they had 
 seen the flag of the Union fired upon, and the Star of the 
 West driven from Charleston Harbor on the 8th of January, 
 and neither President Buchanan nor President Lincoln ac- 
 cepted the act as one of war, but both had submitted and 
 continued negotiations looking toward a peaceful determina- 
 tion of affairs. They had seen eight States secede from the 
 Union and organize a separate and independent government 
 without war, or even a preparation for hostilities by the United 
 States; It was not witnin the duty of naval officers to inter- 
 pret the proclamation of President Lincoln of April 15th, in re- 
 gard to "combinations too powerful to be suppressed by the 
 ordinary course of judicial proceedings," and calling on the 
 States for 75,000 troops to " disperse " the "persons composing 
 the combinations," as a declaration of war against the States. 
 And when on the 16th of April, the next day after the publi- 
 cation of that proclamation, Secretary Welles again wrote 
 to Capt. McCauley, without even mentioning that call for 
 troops, or intimating any purpose of the government to resist 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 137 
 
 the demands of States, he alluded to "mob violence, organ- 
 ized effort, or any assumed authority," he still avoided the 
 use of language which would prescribe the officers' duty in 
 the case of the State demanding possession of the navy -yard. 
 The carefully worded orders of Secretary Welles might well 
 have caused all the naval officers at Norfolk, whatever may 
 have been their political opinions on the right of secession, 
 to hesitate long before taking upon themselves the responsi- 
 bility of hostilities which the government of Washington 
 avoided, and to prefer destroying United States property to 
 assuming the duty of either refusing the demand of the State 
 of Virginia or of commencing hostilities. 
 
 It was the unauthorized act of some of the people of Nor- 
 folk which placed the first imperfect obstructions in the chan- 
 nel; and, subsequently to the evacuation, the old ship United 
 States was taken from the navy -yard by a tug and sunk at 
 the mouth of the river. ' 
 
 The burning of the navy-yard at Norfolk is almost a matter 
 of inheritance; our forefathers, in the Eevolution, burned the 
 first navy-yard, to prevent it from falling into the hands of 
 the British, the United States authorities again burned it, in 
 1861, to deprive the State of Virginia of its use, and the fol- 
 lowing year, for the third time, the yard was committed to the 
 flames by the Confederate army. 
 
 The connection of the State of Virginia with the navy-yard 
 begun after its evacuation by the Federal officers, by assigning 
 to its command Flag-officer French Forrest, who assumed com- 
 mand, about April 25th, over all naval property of every kind; 
 and at the same time Gen. Walter Gwynn superseded Gen. 
 Taliaferro in command of the land forces. Gen. Gwynn was 
 directed by Gen. Lee in exercising the command, to advise 
 with, and as far as practicable to act, in relation to naval 
 matters, in consonance with the views of the senior naval of- 
 ficer present ; and it was further suggested to him that the in- 
 terests of the State might be best served by employing naval 
 officers in the construction and service of water batteries. The 
 naval officers had laid out at Penner's Point a battery to mount 
 twelve guns ; and on Soller's Point had marked out lines for 
 three batteries of six guns each ; and they had prepared the 
 grounds in front of the naval hospital for mounting fourteen 
 guns on two faces, half of which, on April 37th, were ready for 
 service, with navy furnaces for heating shot. This work was 
 begun immediately after the evacuation, amid the greatest 
 confusion and excitement caused by the movements of the 
 Pawnee up and down Elizabeth River, as though meditating a 
 visit back to Norfolk. Three guns and carriages were hastily 
 
 1 It may be mentioned here, that Major ceed in cutting through her Bides, and that 
 
 Nat Tyler, in command of the party trying her final sinking was due to the suggesUona 
 
 to sink the old ship, broke and destroyed of an old sailor, to bore through from the 
 
 two whole boxes of axes and did not sue- inside. 
 
138 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 moved from the navy-yard, and mounted in rear of the ground 
 required to be broken for the battery ; 150 bales of cotton were 
 sent over by Major Tyler to make a temporary cover for the 
 men between the guns, should the Pawnee or Cumberland ven- 
 ture back toward Norfolk. No such attempt was made, and 
 the cotton was afterwards piled away to prevent its damage. 
 At Fort Norfolk, Col. Talcott mounted guns to bear on the 
 channel of Elizabeth Eiver, and constructed a battery of five 
 
 funs between the fort and the wharf. By moonlight, on Sun- 
 ay night. Col. Talcott and one assistant examined the ground 
 on Craney Island, and Monday morning labor commenced to 
 arrive from the plantations, until 120 working-men, with carts, 
 constructed a battery for twenty guns — which covered all the 
 channel-way from N. 58 W. to E. By the 27th April, batteries 
 to mount sixty-one guns were under construction, and were 
 soon after completed. Of these, fourteen were at the naval 
 hospital, twelve at Penner's Point, and twenty on Craney 
 Island ; at the same time, residents near Bushy Bluff began, 
 and soon completed, a battery for four guns ; at Seller's Point 
 a battery was afterwards erected. Capt. Dimmock, State 
 Colonel of Ordnance, suggested to Gen. Lee the necessity for 
 a laboratory to work upon all ammunition for the heavy 
 pieces for stationary batteries, and that Norfolk was the 
 most suitable place for the same, and that Capt. Minor, 
 of the navy, approved of this suggestion; but Norfolk was 
 not considered a safe place at that time for such a work, 
 and, on May 30th, Lieut. John M. Brooke, of the navy, acting 
 Aide-de-camp to Gen. Lee, instructed Gen. Gwynn to re- 
 move from Norfolk all "materials," etc., such as powder, 
 shot, cannon, pikes, and shells, as are not required for the 
 defence of that city. The pikes were to do service with 
 cavalry in the stead of sabres, of which there was a very great 
 deficiency. 
 
 Notwithstanding the seizure of the navy -yard at Norfolk, 
 commercial and hostile intercourse continued between Nor- 
 folk and Baltimore until April 30th, when Capt. Pendergrast, 
 flag-officer commanding home squadron, announced that he 
 had a sufficient naval force off Fortress Monroe for the pur- 
 pose of carrying out President Lincoln's Proclamation of 
 Blockade. Prom that date all communication, other than such 
 as was surreptitiously carried on, ceased between Virginia and 
 the United States. The Wm. Selden, of the Baltimore Steam 
 Packet Company, carrying the mails between Norfolk and Bal- 
 timore, having been allowed to pass in, notwithstanding an 
 official announcement of effective blockade, was seized at 
 Norfolk by the Confederate authorities. On May 1st, the 
 blockade of the James River commenced. 
 
 Commander Archibald B. Fairfax was put in charge of 
 the ordnance department of the navy-yard, and he immedi- 
 ately begun that important work of banding and rifling the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 139 
 
 -thirty-two-pounders of fifty-seven and sixty-three hundred- 
 weight. ' 
 
 These banded guns were regarded by Capt. W. H. 
 Parker as the ••'most important improvement made in our 
 ordnance during the war," and when placed on the small 
 steamer Harmony enabled her to place herself out of the 
 "range of the guns of the U. S. frigates in Hampton Eoads, 
 and yet succeeded in hitting her several times." It was 
 Capt. Fairfax that fitted out the Confederate vessels in 
 JSTorfolk. 
 
 Brig. Gen. Benjamin Huger, of the volunteer forces of 
 Virginia, was assigned to the command of the troops in and 
 around ISTorfolk, and relieved Gen. Gwynn on May 24th; and 
 on the 27th reported to Gen. Lee that the enemy from Fortress 
 Monroe had landed from seven steamers many troops at New- 
 port News, and that other steamers with troops had arrived at 
 Fortress Monroe. The movements were considered as threat- 
 ening the Nansemond River, which extends far back into the 
 •country on the south side of the James to the town of Suffolk, 
 where it is crossed by the Norfolk and Petersburg railroad. 
 The effect of that, or any other movement by which Suffolk 
 would be held, would have severed all communication between 
 Norfolk and Richmond, isolated the former city, and regained 
 the navy -yard for the United States. To guard against such a 
 movement. Gen. Lee diverted Georgia and North Carolina troops 
 from their march to Virginia to Norfolk, and ordered Lieut. 
 John M. Brooke, of the navy, to Petersburg, and thence to Zuni, 
 for the protection of the bridges and to observe the movements 
 •of the enemy — if any should be made to the south side of the 
 James. The battery erected at Jamestown by Gen. Magruder 
 was placed under the protection of the steamer, under the com- 
 mand of Capt. James Barron, on May 28th. The position of 
 ,the Federal detachment at Newport News, while threatening 
 to the State authorities, was itself exposed and liable to assault. 
 To that end. Col. Francis J. Thomas, commanding at Suffolk, 
 Virginia, two Maryland companies — a regiment from North 
 Carolina and two companies of cavalry — asked permission. 
 May 31st, of Gen. Lee, to cross the James River and strike a 
 blow and then retire : that he could bring a tug and a steam- 
 boat into Nansemond River, which could transport his com- 
 mand across. He wag ordered by Gen. Lee to get the boats 
 ready, but not to make the attack at once, unless completely 
 prepared for success. The reinforcement of the detachment 
 at Newport News postponed Col. Thomas' intended assault, 
 and induced Gen. Lee, June 18th, to order Lieut. R. R. Carter, 
 
 L Of these banded guns, Admiral Louis cylindrical ring, and so rifled in the bore as to 
 
 ■Goldsborough, TJ. S. N., -wrote to Mr. Secretary admit of the use of round shot and grape.as well 
 
 Welles : " His (the Confederate's) gun is the as shells, by the simple interposition of a junk 
 
 -thirty-t-wo pounder of fifty-seven and sixty-three -wad between the charge of powder and the shot 
 
 lundred-weight, beautifully fortified at the or stand of grape. His ordnance arrangements 
 
 l)reech-end by a long and massive wrought-iron throughout exhibit great skill and ingenuity." 
 
140 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 commanding the Confederate' steam-tender Teaser, to unite 
 with the batteries at Jamestown Island in defence of James 
 River, and to be employed in obtaining intelligence of the 
 movements of hostile vessels and the landing of troops on either 
 side of the river. 
 
 On May 30th, Flag-officer Forrest announced to Gen. Lee 
 that "we have the Merritnac up, and just hauling her into 
 the dry dock." By the 37th of June, the sloop-of-war German- 
 town was gotten afloat, and her fine battery of ten large guns 
 were recovered from the bottom of the river uninjured, 
 though a little rusty. The spars and rigging of the German- 
 town were burned off, but the hull was found uninjured ma- 
 terially; the Plymouth was being rapidly repaired, she was 
 the least injured of any of the vessels. The hull of the Herri- 
 mac was found not to be materially injured, and the machinery 
 was thought at that early review of the ship not to require any 
 very great repairs. On July the 25th, while there was no 
 work being done on the Merrimac, all the machine shops were 
 engaged, under Commodore Forrest, in repairing damages done 
 by the fire, and getting ready for work on the vessels. The 
 northern wall of the yard had been lined with many pieces of 
 heavy ordnance, and the defences of Norfolk were nearly 
 completed. 
 
 While the military and naval authorities at Norfolk were 
 putting the Elizabeth River in a state of defence to protect 
 Norfolk, Portsmouth, and the navy-yard from assault by the 
 U. S. forces, then assembling at Fortress Monroe, the James 
 River, which opened a practicable route to Richmond, was 
 also being prepared to prevent any ascent to the capital of the 
 State, and afterwards of the Confederate States. Gen. Lee, on 
 April 29th, ordered Col. Talcott to proceed up James River to 
 the vicinity of Burwell's Bay, and select the most suitable 
 point for the erection of a battery to prevent the ascent of the 
 river by the enemy, and, after laying-off the works, to leave 
 their completion to Lieut. C. Ap R. Jones of the Virginia navy, 
 and then to proceed to the mouth of the Appomattox or to old 
 Fort Powhatan, and select sites for defensive fortification to 
 be constructed under the supervision of Commander J. W. 
 Cooke. 
 
 The battery at Fort Powhatan was constructed, and placed 
 under the command of Capt. Harrison F. Cocke, who had re- 
 signed his commission in the U. S. navy; and Lieuts. John 
 Wilkinson and C. S. and George Noland, C. S. navy, were 
 attached to the battery, which was supported by several com- 
 panies of Virginia volunteers. It was situated a short distance 
 below City Point, and mounted six or eight forty -two-pound 
 guns on ships' carriages, which had been transported from the 
 Norfolk navy-yard. When the position was considered no 
 
 1 Theproclamationof Gren.LetcTierof JunoStli States the command of all the ofBcers, seanieu 
 transferred to the authorities of the Confederate and marines of the Provisional Navy of Virginia. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 141 
 
 longer tenable, the guns were removed, and Lieut. Wilkinson 
 was ordered to the command of a battery at Aquia Creek. 
 
 Col. J. B, Magruder, of the Provisional Army of Virginia, 
 was placed in command of the troops and military operations 
 on the peninsula on May 31st, with directions to take measures 
 for the safety of the batteries at Jamestown and Yorktown. 
 Gen. Lee, on June 15th, wrote to Governor Letcher, that for 
 the defence of James Kiver two batteries and two steamers 
 have been provided, mounting altogether forty guns, ranging 
 in calibre from thiry-two-pounders to eight and nine-inch 
 Columbiads ; that arrangements were also in progress for 
 mounting sixty guns of different weight in the defences 
 around Richmond, and a naval battery of six to twelve-pounder 
 howitzers was in progress of organization. The two steamers 
 mentioned by Gen. Lee were the Yorktown, late the Patrick 
 Henry, of the New York and Old Dominion Steamship Line, 
 and the Jamestown, of the same line, afterwards called the 
 Thomas Jefferson. 
 
 The naval defences of James River were placed under the 
 charge of Capt. George N. HoUins, C. S. navy, on July 10th, 
 1861, who was advised by Gen. Lee to push forward the 
 armaments as fast as possible, and to continue the examina- 
 tion of the river from Day's Point to Mulberry Point, with a 
 view of ascertaining the best methods of commanding its navi- 
 gation. The batteries at Mulberry Point and on the point 
 opposite, as well as interrupting, the navigation of Swash 
 Channel, was called to the attention of Capt. HoUins. Under 
 the advice of Lieut. Jones, of the navy, the defences at James- 
 town Island were strengthened by the erection of a battery 
 on the Point to command the entrance into the creek, and 
 armed with two thirty - two - pounder (fifty -seven hundred- 
 weight) guns. 
 
 The Patrick Henry, though not at all fitted for fighting, 
 had to be taken as the best that the State could do when she 
 seceded. By taking off her cabins, strengthening her decks, 
 Lieut. William Llewellyn Powell,' her executive oflBcer, was 
 able to make " her answer pretty well." Lieut. Powell is be- 
 lieved to have been the first oflBcer to fully comprehend the 
 necessity for shielding the ships with iron, and, urging this 
 improvement upon the Secretary of the Navy, he obtained 
 permission to make the experiment on the Patrick Henry. 
 One-inch iron plates were put abreast her boilers, extending a 
 foot, perhaps two, below the water-line, and ran a few feet 
 forward and abaft her engines and boilers. One inch, though 
 not much protection, was all the merchant-ship could bear; 
 and iron shields, in the form of a V, on the spar-deck forward 
 and abaft her engines, which, when fighting head or stern on, 
 afforded good protection from raking shots, as well as afforded 
 
 1 He resigned from the navy and died a brigadier-general at Eort Morgan before its fall. 
 
143 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 some protection to the walking-beam of that side-wheel 
 steamer. ' 
 
 The .Jamestown, the sister-ship of the Yorktown, became 
 the Thomas Jefferson, but was always known by the name of 
 the Jamestown. The Jamestown, the Patrick Henry and the 
 Teaser, a river tug mounting one gun, composed the C. S. 
 James Eiver squadron, which was under the command of 
 Capt. John R. Tucker. However much may have been hoped 
 for from this little fleet, its possibilities of usefulness were 
 limited more by the discretion and dash of the commander 
 than by the fighting power of the ships. The iron shield of the 
 Patrick Henry was a protection, but the vulnerability of the 
 ship was but little helped by the thin shield of iron over her 
 engines and boilers. Capt. Tucker, however, was not the man 
 to accept the excuse of the weakness of his fleet for not seek- 
 ing the enemy. So, on the 13th of September, he steamed down 
 to Newport News to feel the enemy and put a limit to gun- 
 boat excursions up James River. Off the point lay the tJ. S. 
 steamer Savannah, the U. S. sloop Cumberland, the U. S. 
 steamer Louisiana, and on the land the heavy batteries of 
 the enemy as well as a battery of light artillery on the banks 
 of the stream. Capt. Tucker had, on the 7th of the month, 
 taken position, at Gen. Magruder's request, off Mulberry 
 Island Point, where Harden's Point battery on the south closed 
 the river to the enemy. Of this naval skirmish there is no 
 report by Capt. Tucker, but the New York Herald correspond- 
 ent gives the following "facts": 
 
 " On the afternoon of Friday, the 13th inst., the Yorktown oame down 
 James River, and, choosing her distance, opened fire upon the fleet, the 
 shots striking near the Savannah, which ship returned her fire from her 
 large guns — the shot, however, falling a long way short. She also threw 
 shells from her lower-deck guns, which burst in the air not more than 
 one-third of the distance to the steamer. The Cumberland sloop-of-war 
 fired two or three times, but, finding the shot fell short, ceased firing. The 
 Sawyer gun in our battery on shore was fired too, but the shot struck 
 from a quarter to half a mile ahead of the steamer. In the meantime, 
 the U. 8. steamer ioMmana got underway and advanced about three- 
 quarters of a mile towards the YorMown and opened an effective fire 
 upon her, which was continued for more than an hour, the Yorktown di- 
 recting all her fire at the Louisana, none of the shot, however, striking 
 her, although several came very near. 
 
 "The iorfctown was finally forced to retire by a cross-fire from the 
 Louisiana and Lieut. Cooke's battery of light artillery, which had gone 
 up the bank of the river until the steamer was in range." 
 
 The gunboats from Newport News and Fortress Monroe, 
 together with armed tugs, had become annoying in the James 
 River, and Capt. Tucker, learning that they were in the habit 
 of ascending the river at night and withdrawing in the 
 morning, was induced to take the first favorable opportunity 
 to surprise and attack them. The morning of the 2d of De- 
 cember, being dark and suitable for the enterprise, he left his 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 143 
 
 anchorage, off Mulberry Island, at 4 A. M., and proceeded 
 cautiously down the river, all lights carefully concealed. At 
 early daylight he discovered four steamers anchored in line, 
 near the side of the frigates, but in supporting distance of 
 them and the battery at Newport News. He rounded-to at a 
 supposed distance of amile,and commenced the attack with his 
 port battery and pivot guns, which was returned by the steam- 
 ers and the battery on shore from rifled and other guns. Many 
 of the rifled shells came near aiid over the Patrick Henry, and 
 one struck her, going through the pilot-house and exploding 
 in the starboard hammock nettings, producing slight injury, 
 and wounding one of the pilots and a seaman very slightly 
 by the splinters. The engagement lasted two hours, when he 
 returned to his anchorage, the enemy evincing no disposition 
 to advance either during the engagement or afterwards. He 
 expended twenty-eight shells and thirteen solid shot, some of 
 which must have struck, but with what injury to the enemy 
 he was unable to say. At the request of Gen. Magruder, the 
 Patrick Henry and Jamestown remained between Mulberry 
 Point and Harden's Bluff batteries. 
 
 By Act of Congress of December 24th, conferring army 
 rank upon such officers of the navj'- as were commanding bat- 
 teries on shore. Commander R. F. Pinkney, commanding Fort 
 Norfolk, Commander Charles F. Mcintosh, commanding Fort 
 Nelson, and Commander W. L. Maury, commanding Sewell's, 
 were appointed lieutenant colonels; and Lieuts. George W. 
 Harrison, commanding Penner's Point battery, R. R. Carter, 
 commanding Pig Point battery, were appointed majors, and 
 B. P. Loyall, assigned to Roanoke Island, was appointed 
 captain. ' 
 
 The three batteries at Cedar Point, Barrel Point and 
 Pagan Creek, were in charge of Commander R. L. Page until 
 he was relieved and sent to Gloucester Point. Gen. Huger 
 says the 'batteries at Dog's Point and Harden's Bluff were 
 also under the command of naval officers. 
 
 The months of January and February, 1863, witnessed no 
 naval movements or engagements in the waters of Hampton 
 Roads and James River, but the time was used to strengthen 
 the defences on shore and to complete the work on the 
 Merrimac or Virginia. The correspondence of Union offi- 
 cers show very accurate information of the kind of change 
 being made in the Merrimac, as well as the progress towards 
 her completion. Gen. McClellan advised Gen. Wool, on Feb- 
 ruary 31st, that " the iron-clad steam monitor and a large frig- 
 ate will be at Hampton Roads within the time you specify"; 
 to which Gen. Wool replied, that " five days " was "the time 
 
 I Brevet Capt. J. S. Taylor, formerly a lleuten- promotion " as a moat valuable artillery officer." 
 
 ant in the U. S. navy, but who had not been ap- Another naval officer holdmg commiSBion in 
 
 pointed in the C. S. navy, but to a second lieu- the army, was Brevet Capt. Jas.E.Milligan, signal 
 
 tenancyinthearmy.wascommandiug Lambert's officer— he was in the revenue service, resigned. 
 
 Point battery. Gen.Huger recommended him tor and took service under the State of Virginia. 
 
144 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 stated when the MerrimcLc, Yorktown and Jamestown would 
 attack ISTewport News." The information received of the 
 Virginia by the U. S. Navy Department was such that Secre- 
 tary Welles wrote toCapt. John Marston, March 7th, to " send 
 the 8t. Lawrence, Congress and Cumberland immediately into 
 the Potomac River ; use steam to tow them up. I will also 
 try and send a couple of steamers from Baltimore to assist. 
 Let there be no delay." The order came too late. The 
 Virginia had done her work upon the Congress and Cumber- 
 land so eflf actually that their sailing days were over forever. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 THE FIRST IRON-CLAD. 
 
 THE honor of having planned a vessel so novel in form, 
 and so effective in battle, was early the subject of dis- 
 cussion in the Confederacy ; and ever since has remained 
 unsettled and disputed. In the March, 1884, number of 
 the Century, Lieut. John Taylor Wood, of the late C. S. navy, 
 awards the honor to "Lieut. (George) John M. Brooke, an ac- 
 complished officer of the old navy," who he says proposed to 
 Secretary Mallory to make and rebuild this ship (the Merri- 
 mac) as an iron-clad. His plans were approved, and orders 
 were given to carry them out." 
 
 Commander John M. Brooke testified before the Investi- 
 gating Committee of the Confederate Congress that: 
 
 "The Secretary and myself had conversed upon the subject of pro- 
 tecting ships with iron-cladding very frequently, and at last I proposed 
 to him a plan. That vpas early in June, 1861, just after the Secretary 
 came here from Montgomery. He approved of the plan, and I asked him 
 to send to Norfolk for some practical ship-builder to draw out a plan in 
 detail. He sent for one, and one of the employees of the yard, whose 
 opinion then I did not favor, except that I heard he was a regular con- 
 structor there, was sent up. He said he knew nothing of drafting, and al- 
 though he approved of the general plan, he could not make the drawing. 
 This was what I wanted done chiefly. He was here a few days, and com- 
 plained of being made sick by the water, and was therefore permitted to 
 return to Norfolk. I then determined to go on with the drawing myself, 
 but asked the Secretary to send for the naval constructor at Norfolk, and 
 naval engineer, so that they might be consulted in relation to the vessel. 
 They came up, and this constructor brought with him a model. I should 
 have said that the name of the constructor was J. L. Porter. This model 
 is now one of the models in the Secretary's room. It consisted of a shield 
 and hull, the extremities of the hull terminating with a shield, forming a 
 sort of box or scow upon which the shield was supported. The Secretary 
 directed the constructor, Chief Engineer Williamson, and myself to meet 
 him at my oflBce here. We met there and this model was examined by us 
 all, and the form of the shield was approved. It was considered a good 
 shield, and, for ordinary purposes, a good boat for harbor defence. The 
 Secretary then called the attention of Mr. Porter and Mr. Williamson to 
 the drawing, giving a general idea of the vessel I proposed. The differ- 
 ence between the model and my drawing consisted in the one I proposed, 
 
 10 (145) 
 
146 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 havipg the ends prolonged and shaped hke those of any fast vessel, and, 
 in order to protect them from the enemy, were to be submerged two feet 
 under water, so that nothing was to be seen afloat but the shield itself. 
 The object of having these parts of the vessel submerged was to gain 
 speed and to have buoyancy without exposing the hull, and to avoid in- 
 creasing the draft of water. Mr. Porter and Mr. Williamson, after look- 
 ing at the drawing, approved of it, and the Secretary directed us to get 
 up a vessel on that plan. Mr. Porter's shield and the one I proposed were 
 almost identical. Mr. Porter, being a draftsman, immediately drew a 
 plan of such a vessel of comparatively light draft. I think she was to 
 draw something over eight feet of water. Mr. Williamson and myself 
 went to look for engines. We went to the Tredegar Works and inquired 
 there, but there were no suitable engines to be had. Mr. Porter com- 
 pleted the draft and it is now in my office. Mr. Williamson subsequently 
 stated that the engines of the Merrimac. could be repaired and made 
 valualjle, but that they cotdd not be used well in any other vessel unless 
 she had equal draft of water, or nearly equal. Mr. Williamson proposed 
 to put the shield on the Merrimac. Mr. Porter and myself thought the 
 draft too great, but were nevertheless of the opinion that it was the best 
 thing that could be done, with our means; and Mr. Porter was ordered by 
 the Secretary to Norfolk to make the plan of the vessel in accordance 
 with the plan which we had approved, and which I mentioned before as 
 having been submitted to ,the Secretary. Mr. P. did so. He sent up 
 drawings which were after same general description as those he made be- 
 fore in accordance with my suggestion. Mr. Porter was directed to per- 
 form all the duties of constructor in connection with alteration of the 
 ship. Mr. WUliamson was directed to attend to the engines, and 1 was 
 directed to attend to having iron prepared at Bichmond for her, and the 
 work was then prosecuted with all the energy possible, in my opinion. It 
 was a difficult matter to get iron from Richmond to Norfolk, there being 
 over 700 tons of iron sent down in the course of her construction. After 
 the vessel was launched, Mr. Porter stated to me that he had accident- 
 ally omitted in her calculations some weights which were on board the 
 ship, in consequence of which she did not draw as much water when, 
 launched as he anticipated.'' 
 
 Secretary Mallory, in a report to the Confederate Congress, 
 of date March 29th, 1863, says: that on the 10th day of June, 
 1861, Lieut. John M. Brooke, C. S. N., was directed to aid the 
 department in designing an iron-clad war-vessel, and framing 
 the necessary specifications: 
 
 "He entered upon this duty at once, and a few days thereafter sub- 
 mitted to the department, as the results of his investigations, rough draw- 
 ings of a easemated vessel, with submerged ends and inclined iron-plated 
 sides. The ends of the vessel and the eaves of the casemate, according to his 
 plan, were to be submerged two feet; and a light bulwark or false bow 
 was designed to divide the water and prevent it from banking up on the 
 forward part of the shield with the vessel in motion, and also to serve as a 
 tank to regulate the ship's draft. His design was approved by the depart- 
 ment, and a practical mechanic was brought from Norfolk to aid in pre- 
 paring the drawings and specifications. 
 
 " This mechanic aided in the statement of details of timber, etc., but 
 was unable to make the drawings; and the department then ordered 
 Chief Engineer Wilhamson and Constructor Porter from the navy -yard 
 at Norfolk to Richmond, about the 28d of June, for consultation on the 
 same subject generally, and to aid in the work. 
 
 "Constructor Porter brought and submitted the model of a flat- 
 bottomed, light-draft propeller, easemated battery, with inclined iron- 
 covered sides and ends, which is deposited in the department. Mr. Porter 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 147 
 
 and Lieut. Brooke have adopted for their casemate a thickness of wood 
 and iron, and an angle of incHnation nearly identical. 
 
 " Mr. Williamson and Mr. Porter approved of the plan of having sub- 
 merged ends to obtain the requisite flotation and invu]nera;bility, and the 
 department adopted the design, and a clean drawing was prepared by Mr. 
 Porter of Lieut. Brooke's plan, which that officer then filed with the de- 
 partment. 
 
 '' The steam-frigate Merrimao had been burned and sunk, and her en- 
 gine greatly damaged by the enemy, and the department directed Mr. 
 Williamson, Lieut. Brooke and Mr. Porter to consider and report upon 
 the best mode of making her useful. The result of their investigations 
 was their recommendation of the submerged ends, and the inclined case- 
 mates for this vessel, which was adopted by the department." 
 
 The following is the report upon the Merrimac : 
 
 ' ' In obedience to your orders, we have carefully examined and considered 
 the various plans and propositions for constructing a shot-proof steam 
 battery, and respectfully report that, in our opinion, the steam-frigate 
 Merrimac, which is in such condition from the effects of fire as to be use- 
 less for any other purpose, without incurring very heavy expense in re- 
 building, etc., can be made an efficient vessel of that character, mounting 
 * * * heavy guns ; and from the further consideration that we cannot 
 procure a suitable engine and boilers for any other vessel without building 
 them, which would occupy too much time. It would appear that this is our 
 only chance to get a suitable vessel in a short time. The bottom of the hull, 
 boilers, and heavy and costly parts of the engine, being but little injured, 
 reduce the cost of construction to about one-third of the amount which 
 would be required to construct such a vessel anew. 
 
 "We cannot, without further examination, make an accurate estimate 
 of the cost of the proposed work, but think it will be about * * * the 
 most of which will be for labor, the materials being nearly all in the 
 navy -yard, except the iron plating to cover the shield. 
 
 " The plan to be adopted in the arrangement of the shield for glanc- 
 ing shot, mounting guns, arranging the hull, etc., and plating, to be in ac- 
 cordance with the plan submitted for the approval of the department. 
 "We are, with much respect, 
 
 " Your obedient servants, 
 
 " WILLIAM P. WILLIAMSON, 
 "Chief Engineer Confederate States Navy; 
 "JOHN M. BROOKE, 
 " Lieutenant Confederate States Navy; 
 "JOHN L. PORTER, 
 
 " Naval Constructor." 
 
 " Immediately upon the adoption of the plan, Mr. Porter was directed 
 to proceed with the constructor's duties. Mr. Williamson was charged 
 with the engineer's department, and to Mr. Brooke were assigned the 
 duties of attending to and preparing the iron and forwarding it from the 
 Tredegar Works, the experiments necessary to test the plates and to de- 
 termine their thickness, and devising heavy rifled ordnance for the ship, 
 with the detaUs pertaining to ordnance. 
 
 " These gentlemen labored zealously and effectively in their several 
 departments. Mr. Porter cut the ship down, submerged her ends, per- 
 formed all the duties of constructor, and originated all the interior ar- 
 rangements by which space has been economized, and he has exhibited 
 energy, ability and ingenuity. Mr. Williamson thoroughly overhauled 
 her engines, supplied deficiencies, and repaired defects, and improved 
 greatly the motive-power of the vessel. 
 
 " Mr. Brooke attended daily to the iron, constructed targets, ascer- 
 tained by actual tests the resistance offered by inclined planes of iron to 
 
148 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 heavy ordnance, and determined interesting and important facts in eon- 
 nectioh therewith, and which were of great importance in the construc- 
 tion of the ship ; devised and prepared the niodels and drawings of the 
 ship's heavy ordnance, being guns of a class never before made, and of ex- 
 traordinary power ami strength. 
 
 " It is deemed inexpedient to state the angle of inclination, the char- 
 acter of the plates upon the ship, the manner of preparing them, or the 
 number, calibre and weight of the guns; and many novel and interesting 
 features of her construction, which were experimentally determined, are 
 necessarily omitted. 
 
 " The novel plan of submerging the ends of the ship and the eaves of 
 the casement, however, is the peculiar and distinctive feature of the Vir- 
 ginia. It was never before adopted. The resistance of iron plates to 
 heavy ordnance, whether presented in vertical planes or at low angles of 
 inclination, had been investigated in England before the Virginia was 
 commenced, and Major Barnard, U. S. A., had referred to the subject in 
 his ' Sea-coast Defences.' 
 
 " We were without accurate data, however, and were compelled to 
 determine the inclination of the plates and their thickness and form by 
 actual experiment. 
 
 " The department has freely consulted the three excellent ofBcers re- 
 ferred to throughout the labors on the Virginia, and they have all exhib- 
 ited signal ability, energy and zeal.'' 
 
 To that report, and to articles in the Richmond Enquirer, 
 claiming for Lieut. Brooke the honor of the plan of theVirginia, 
 Naval Constructor John L. Porter, of the C. S. navy, imme- 
 diately replied, through the Enquirer, that the " greatest in- 
 justice " had been done to Engineer Williamson and himself 
 by both the report of Secretary Mallory and the article of the 
 Enquirer. Constructor Porter admits that Lieut. Brooke had 
 "made an attempt to get up a floating battery at the Navy 
 Department," and that the master ship-carpenter had been 
 sent for to come up and assist him, but asserts that after try- 
 ing for a week he failed to produce anything, and the master 
 returned to his duties at the yard. He adds, that Secretary 
 Mallory then sent for him to come to Richmond, at which time 
 he carried up the model of an iron-clad floating battery, with 
 the shield of the present Virginia on it, and before he ever 
 saw Lieut. Brooke; and that model was then at the Navy Depart- 
 ment. Constructor Porter says that the Secretary then ordered 
 the Board, whose report is embodied in Secretary Mallory's 
 report to Congress. As the report of that Board specifically 
 mentions having '"'carefully examined and considered the 
 various plans and propositions for constructing a shot-proof 
 steam battery," it would appear that other plans and proposi- 
 tions, as well as that of Constructor Porter's, had been ex- 
 amined and considered. To this suggestion Constructor Porter 
 replied: 
 
 " If it is intended to convey the idea that we (the Board) were to ex- 
 amine any plan of Lieut. Brooke, I never so understood it; neither did we 
 act in accordance with any such idea, as our report will show. The re- 
 port next refers to my model, which I carried up with me, the shield and 
 plan of which is carried out on the Virginia ; but the report seems to 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 149 
 
 have lost sight of the fact that the eaves and ends of my model were sub- 
 merged two feet, precisely like the present Virginia. The ship was cut 
 down on a straight line, fore and alt, to suit this arrangement, and the 
 shield was extended over her just as far as the space inside to work the 
 guns would admit of. "Where the shield stopped, a strong deck was put in 
 to finish out the ends, and plated over with iron, and a rough breakwater 
 built on it to throw off the water forward. The report next states, that 
 Mr. Porter approved of the plan of submerged ends, and made a clean 
 drawing of Lieut. Brooke's plan, which that officer then filed with the 
 department. How could I disapprove of my own model, which had sub- 
 merged ends two feet ? And the only drawing I ever made of the Virginia 
 was made in my office at this navy -yard, and which I presented to the de- 
 partment on the 11th day of July, just sixteen days after this Board 
 had adjourned, having been ordered to Richmond on other business. 
 This drawing and plan I considered my own and not Lieut. Brooke's. 80 
 soon as I presented this plan, the Secretary wrote the following order, when 
 everything was fresh in his mind concerning the whole matter : 
 
 "Navy Department, ( 
 " Richmond, July 11th, 1862. 5 
 " Flag-offlce.r F. Forrest : 
 
 " Sib : You will proceed with all practicable dispatch to make the 
 changes in the form of the Merrimac, and to build, equip, and fit her in all 
 respects according to the design and plans of the constructor and engineers, 
 Messrs. Porter and Williamson. 
 
 [Signed] " S. R. MALLORT, 
 
 " Secretary of the C. S. Navy.'' 
 
 " What, I would ask, could be more explicit than this letter, or what 
 words could have established .my claims any stronger if I had dictated 
 them. The concluding part of this report says : ' The novel plan of 
 submerging the ends of the ship and the eaves of the easement, however, 
 is the peculiar and distinctive feature of the Virginia.^ This may aU 
 be true ; but it is just what my model calls for ; and if Lieut. Brooke pre- 
 sented rough drawings to the department carrying out the same views it 
 may be called a singular coincidence. And here I would remark, that my 
 model was not calculated to have much speed,- but was intended for har- 
 bor defence only, and was of light draft, the eaves extending over the 
 entire length of the model, and submerged all around two feet, sides and 
 ends, and the line on which I cut the ship down was just in ac- 
 cordance with this ; but if Lieut. Brooke's ideas, which were submitted 
 to the Secretary in his rough drawings, had have been carried out, to cut 
 her ends down low enough to Isuild tanks on to regulate the draft of the 
 vessel, she would have been cut much lower than my plan required, for 
 all the water which now covers her ends would not alter her draft over 
 three inches, if confined in tanks. All the calculations of the weights 
 and displacements, and the line to cut the ship down, was determined by 
 myself, as well as her whole arrangements. That Lieut. Brooke may 
 have been of great assistance to the department in trying the necessary 
 experiments to determine the thickness of the iron, getting up her bat- 
 tery, and attending to the shipment of the iron, etc , I do not doubt, but 
 to claim for him the credit of designing the ship is a matter of too much 
 interest to me to give up. Engineer Williamson discharged his duties 
 with great success ; the engine performed beyond his most sanguine ex- 
 pectations, and these, with the Improvement of the propeller, has in- 
 creased her speed three miles per hour. 
 
 " The Confederacy is under many obligations to Secretary Mallory for 
 having approved the report of this Board in making the Merrimac a 
 bomb-proof ship. Her performance has changed the whole system of 
 naval defences so far as wooden ships are concerned. Europe, as well as 
 America, will have to begin anew ; and that nation which can produce 
 iron-clad ships with greatest rapidity will be the mistress of the seas. 
 
150 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " In this communication I disclaim any disrespect to the Secretary of 
 the Navy whatever ; he has not only been my friend in this government, 
 but was a true and serviceable one under the U. S. government, and has 
 rendered me many acts of kindness, for which I have always esteemed 
 him; but the present unpleasant controversy Involves a matter of so much 
 importance to me that I shall be excused for defending my claim not only 
 as the constructor but the originator of the plan of the Virginia. 
 
 "JOHN L. PORTER, 
 " Confederate States Navy Constructor." 
 
 After the ship had been in progress of construction, Sec- 
 retary Mallory wrote to Flag-officer Forrest, at the navy-yard, 
 urging the "utmost dispatch" in the construction of the ship, 
 and adds: 
 
 " Chief Engineer Williamson and Constructor Porter, severally in 
 charge of the two branches of this great v?ork, and for which they will- be 
 held specially responsible, will receive, therefore, every possible faeiUty at 
 the expense and delay of every other work on hand if necessary." 
 
 Mr. Porter continues: 
 
 " Of the great and skillful calculations of the displacement and weights 
 of timber aiid iron involved in the planning and construction of this great 
 piece of naval architecture, and of her present weights, with everything on 
 board, no other man than myself has, or ever had, any knowledge. If he 
 has, let him show it; for while pubUc opinion said she would never float, 
 no one, save myself, knew to the contrary, or what she was capable of 
 bearing. After the Merriman was in progress for some time, Lieut. 
 Brooke was constantly proposing alterations in her to the Secretary of 
 the Navy, and as constantly and firmly opposed by myself, which the Sec- 
 retary knows. 
 
 " To Engineer WilUamson, who had the exclusive control of the 
 machinery, great credit is due for having so improved the propeller and 
 engines as to improve the speed of the ship three knots per hour. 
 
 " I never thought for a moment that, after the many difBculties Ihad 
 to encounter in making these new and intricate arrangements for the 
 working of this novel kind of ship, that any one would attenxpt to rob me 
 of my just merits ; for, if there was any other man than myself who had 
 any responsibility about her success or failure, I never knew it, only so 
 far as the working of the machinery was concerned, for which Engineer 
 Williamson was alone responsible." 
 
 These extracts are from letters published in the Enquirer 
 on March the 8th, and March the 29th, 1862. In the Charleston 
 (S. C.) Mercury, of April the 8th, 1863, a private letter from 
 Constructor Porter says : 
 
 ' ' I received but little encouragement from any one while the Virginia 
 was progressing. Hundreds — I may say thousands — asserted she would 
 never float. Some said she would turn bottom-side up ; others said the 
 crew would suffocate ; and the most wise said the concussion and report 
 from the guns would deafen the men. Some said she would not steer; 
 •and public opinion generally about here said she would never come out of 
 the dock, lou have no idea what I have suffered in mind since I com- 
 menced her; but 1 knew what I was about, and persevered. Some of her 
 inboard arrangements are of the most intricate character, and have caused 
 me many sleepless nights in making them; but all have turned out right, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 151 
 
 and thanks are due to a kind Providence, whose blessings on my efforts I 
 iave many times invoked. 
 
 " I must say I was astonished at the success of the Virginia. She de- 
 stroyed the Cumberland in fifteen minutes, and in thjrty more the Con- 
 gress was captured. The Minnesota would have shared the same fate, 
 but she got aground, and the Virginia could not get at her.'' 
 
 President Davis, in his " Rise and Fall of the Confederate 
 Government," awards the honor to Lieut. Brooke ; Capt. Wm. 
 H. Parker, says that "it was claimed by Commander John 
 M. Brooke and by Naval Constructor John L. Porter," and that 
 Lieut. Wm. L. Powell was the first to appreciate the use of 
 iron in naval warfare and to advise its adoption, and that, " in 
 the case of the Merrimac, the originality consisted in the de- 
 signs and not the use of iron. " 
 
 Weighing carefully all the evidence, it appears at this time 
 that there was some similarity of plan between that offered 
 Tby Lieut. Brooke and the model exhibited by Constructor 
 Porter; but that the model, rather than the "rough draw- 
 ings," received the approval of the Board and adoption by the 
 department. That to Constructor Porter is due the honor of 
 the plan — the only really original thought or idea about the 
 ship ; — that to Engineer Williamson is due the credit of repair- 
 ing and adapting the engines of the Merrimac to the propul- 
 sion of the new Virginia, and that to Lieut. Brooke belongs the 
 lion or of providing the iron sheathing and the remarkable 
 battery by which her destructive work was accomplished. 
 
 That division of the honor does not by any means relieve 
 from responsibility for errors which arose from the divided 
 authority between the Naval Constructor at Norfolk and the 
 Bureau of Construction at Richmond. In consequence of this, 
 the calculations in the displacement of the ship proved erro- 
 neous, and Mr. Porter found himself 200 tons short, by 
 reason of calculating for a different suit of armor from that 
 which was finally ordered for the ship, after the experi- 
 ments made by the Ordnance Board on Jamestown Island. 
 This increased her already great draft of water, and even- 
 tually impaired her usefulness in action in Hampton Roads. 
 And yet so great was her buoyancy that it required a very 
 large amount of pig-iron as ballast to bring her down to the 
 proper depth, which would submerge her ends beneath the 
 water. Without a complete submergence of her hull, the Vir- 
 ginia would have been utterly worthless in action. 
 
 Her appearance in the water " was that of the roof of a 
 house. Saw off the top of a house at the eaves (supposing it 
 to have ordinary gable-ended shelving-sides roof), pass a 
 plane parallel to the first through the roof some feet beneath 
 the ridge, incline the gable-ends, put it in the water, and you 
 have the Merrimac as she appeared. When she was not in 
 action her people stood on the top of this roof, which was, in 
 fact, her spar-deck." 
 
152 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The Merrimac frigate, out of which the Virginia was con- 
 structed, was built at Charlestown in 1855, and was pierced for 
 forty guns, her last service in the U. S. navy had been with the 
 Pacific squadron; she had been the sister-ship of the Minne- 
 sota and the Boanoke, and was lying in Elizabeth Elver, oppo- 
 site the navy-yard, on the eventful night of April 20th, 1861, 
 when the navy yard was burned, and the vessels scuttled and 
 sunk. On April 25th, her battery was removed and dispatched 
 to batteries, on Sewell's Point and other places, for the 
 defence of Norfolk. On May 30th, the Merrimac was raised 
 and pulled into the dry dock. 
 
 The work of her transformation into the Virginia began 
 immediately by cutting her down to the old berth-deck, to 
 within three and a half feet of her light water-line. Both ends 
 for seventy feet were covered over, and when the ship was in 
 fighting trim were just awash. On the mid-ship section, for a 
 length of 170 feet, was erected, at an angle of forty-five 
 degrees, a roof of pitch-pine and oak, twenty-four inches 
 thick, extending from the water-line to a highth over the 
 gun-deck of seven feet. Both ends of this shielded roof 
 were rounded so that the pivot guns could be used as bow and 
 stern chasers or quartering. Over the gun-deck was a light 
 grating, making a promenade about twenty feet wide, and 
 nearly 170 long. 
 
 The iron plating which covered the wood-backing was 
 rolled at the Tredegar Iron Works at Richmond, and was 
 two inches thick. The underlayer being placed horizontal, 
 and the upper laid up and down — the two being four inches 
 thick — were bolted through the woodwork, and clinched inside. 
 The Virginia, thus armored, was further provided with a cast- 
 iron prow, which projected four feet, but imperfectly secured, 
 as the test of battle proved. Another defect was the unpro- 
 tected condition of her rudder and propeller. The pilot-house 
 was forward of the smoke-stack, and covered with the same 
 thickness of iron as her sides. The same motive-power of the 
 Merrimac propelled the Virginia, but it was so radically de- 
 fective that both engine and boilers had been condemned in 
 the last cruise of the Merrimac j and when to those defects are 
 added the injury sustained from the fire which burned and 
 the water in which she was sunk, it was not possible for the 
 limited resources at the command of the Confederate Bureau 
 of Construction to do more than repair. Every effort was 
 made to hasten the completion of the ship. Elag-oflScer For- 
 rest, on January 11th, 1862, expressed his high appreciation of 
 the voluntary offer of the " blacksmiths, finishers and strikers 
 to perform extra work gratuitously in order to expedite the 
 completion of the Merrimac."^ But notwithstanding every 
 
 1 The agreement of the blafkamiths, and agree to do any work that wUl expedite Gie comple- 
 strikers, and finishers, was as follows: " We, the tion of the Merrimac^ free of charge, aud continue 
 undersigned blacksmiths, finishers and strikers, on until eight o'clock every night ; or any other 
 
> "i,,, C ^ 
 
 ABMIBAL FEANKLIN BUCHANAN, 
 
 CONFEDEBATE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 153 
 
 exertion to finish the ship and to have her ready for action be- 
 fore McClellan's advance from Washington to the peninsula, 
 the unavoidable delay in preparing and transporting the plat- 
 ing from Richmond to the Norfolk navy-yard prevented an 
 earlier completion of the ship. The Tredegar Works at Eich- 
 mond were the only shops within the'Confederate lines where 
 plates of the kind required could be rolled, and their limited 
 resources were taxed in the preparation of every kind of war 
 material. It was impossible for the very few experienced 
 workmen who could be collected together, no matter how 
 ready and willing, to do more than was accomplished, both at 
 the Tredegar Works and at the navy-yard, to expedite the 
 transformation of the Merrimac into the Virginia. In many 
 instances the very tools required by the workmen had to be 
 improvised and made; not only was the ship to be radically 
 changed, but the Tredegar Works had also to be converted 
 from an ordinary iron workshop, for the manufacture of the 
 engines of locomotion in peaceful times, to those of destruction 
 and defence in the midst of a terrible and exacting war. There 
 were no patterns to follow in constructing this experimental 
 iron-clad; the theory, drawings and calculations of the con- 
 structor had to be verified as they proceeded, and errors, if 
 any, corrected as the work progressed. 
 
 And it is not the least remarkable fact in the history of 
 the experiment, that the Virginia and the Monitor should have 
 been so very much alike in their general outline and form. 
 The submerged hull and machinery and the protection of the 
 battery were the same in both vessels, the difference being only 
 in the round turret of the Monitor and roof -shaped casemate 
 of the Virginia. 
 
 The armament of the Virginia consisted of two seven- 
 inch rifled guns, heavily reinforced around the breech with 
 three-inch steel bands shrunk on; these were the first heavy 
 guns so made, and were the work of Lieut. Brooke, and 
 they were the bow and stern guns of the battery; there were 
 also two six-inch guns of the same make, and six nine-inch 
 smooth-bore broadside — ten guns in all. There was no 
 Armstrong gun, as so often asserted, on the ship. Her en- 
 tire battery was the work of Lieut. Brooke. 
 
 work that will advance the interests of the Hodges, Alex. DaviB, Thomas Guy, Smith &uy. 
 
 Southern Confederacy. Michael Conner, Wm. Perry, Patrick Shanasy, 
 
 BLACKSMITH8 AND STEiKEES. Lawson Etheredge, Joshua Daily, Jas. Morand, 
 
 James A. Farmer M. S.; Chas. Snead, let Miles Foreman, Jos. West Thos. Powell, Wm. 
 
 Poreman;Wm.T. Butt, 2d Foreman; Pat. Parts, Shephard, Jno. CuiTan, Opie Jordan, Wiley 
 
 Jno, West, Jno. Oain, Jas. Watfleld, H. Tatem, Howard. 
 
 Wilson Guy, MUes Foreman, Hugh Minter, Jno. finishebs. 
 
 Green, Thos. Bloxom, Jas. Mitchell, Joseph Jno. B Rooke, Elias Bridges, Anderson Gwinn, 
 
 Kiokets, Thos. Franklin, Jas. Patterson, Wm. John Stoakes, E. H. Brown. Harvey Barnes, 
 
 Gray, Jno. Moody, Hillory Hopkins, E. Wood- Lemuel Leary, William Jones, John Rhea, Wil- 
 
 ward, H. Reynolds, Sduthey Rew, Julius Morion, liam Leary, John Wilder Frederick Bowen, 
 
 Jos. Askew, Anthony Butt, Thos. Bourke, Wm. Charles Sturdivant. Jesse Kay, William Shipp, 
 
 Hosier, David Wilkine, Jas. Wilbem. Wm. Bey- William Pebworth, Lawrence Herbert, T. I. 
 
 naids, Walter Wilkins, Thos. Kerby, Samuel Rooke, Calder Sherwood, George Collier, Henry 
 
 Davenport, Jas. Larkin, Lewis Ewer, Jno. Davis, Hopkins, Gteorge Bear, Walter Thornton, Edward 
 
 Jas. Watson, Sr., James Flemming, Samuel Walker, Thomas Dunn." 
 
15^ 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Snchw as the Virginia; her defects were many and of a most 
 serious character. She was absolutely dependent for her move- 
 ment on her defective machinery; for this once out of order, she 
 became helpless, while hurtful to her assailant only when her 
 assailant came within the range of her battery. Her great draft 
 of water rendered her action dependent on the tides, and menaced 
 her helplessness should she move out of the narrow channel 
 where the water was deep enough for her. Her ram was useless 
 against a vessel drawing less water, which, by retiring into 
 
 THE VIRGINIA (MEEEIMAC) IN DEY-DOCK, AFTEK BEING ARMORED. 
 
 shoal water, reduced the action to a duel of heavy guns, where 
 
 the stoutness of iron sides would carry off the palm of victory. 
 
 The officers assigned to the Virginia, February, 1862, were: 
 
 Flapr-officer, Capt. Franklin Buchanan;* Lieutenant, Catesby Ap R 
 Jones; Executive and Ordnance Officers, Charles C. Simms, R. I). Minor 
 (flag), Hunter Davidson, John Taylor Wood, J. R, Egglesion and Walter 
 Butt: Midshipmen, R. C. Foute, H. H. Marmaduke, H. B. Littlepage, 
 W. J. Craig, J. C. Long and L. M. Rootes; Paymaster, James Semple; 
 
 1 Franklin Buchanan was bom in Baltimore, 
 Md., on the llth of Septemher, 1800. He was a 
 grandson of Governor McKean, of Pennsylvania, 
 and a brother of Paymaster Buchanan, who was 
 in the V. S. ship Congress when she was destroyed 
 in the fight with the Virginia. When a youth, 
 Franlilin Buchanan resided in Pennsylvania, 
 from which State he was appointed a midship- 
 man. He entered the U. 8. navy on the 28th of 
 Januaiy^lBlS; became a lieutenant January 13th, 
 1825; master commander, September 8th, 1841; 
 first superintendent of the Annapolis Naval 
 Academy, 1845-7; captain, September 14th, 
 1856. On the 19th of April. 1861, when the Sixth 
 Massachusetts regiment was attacked on Its pas- 
 sage through Baltimore, Capt, Buchanan was 
 in charge of the navy-yard at Washington. He 
 immediately resigned his commission, but find- 
 ing that Maryland did not secede, petitioned 
 to recall his resignation, but was refused. 
 On the 6th of September, 1861, he entered the 
 
 service of the C. S. navy, and was assigned to 
 duty as Chief of Orders and Details. He was 
 ordered to the command of the Virginia on 
 February 24th, 1862, and after she had been cut 
 loose from her moorings and was on her way 
 down the harbor, Capt. Buchanan called " all 
 hands to muster," and delivered the following 
 spirited address to the crew: " Men, the eyes of 
 your country are upon you. You are fighting for 
 your rights — ^your liberties— your wives and chil- 
 dren. You must not be content with only doing 
 your duty, but do more than your duty I Those 
 ships " (pointing to the Union fleet) "must he 
 taken, and you shall not complain that I do not 
 take you close enough. Go to your guns !" How 
 well the officers and gallant crew of thafmonster 
 of the deep" performed their whole duty, the fol- 
 lowing pages will tell. When Capt. Buchanan 
 was severely wounded and taken below, a feftl- 
 ing of deep sadness pervaded the entire crew, 
 but they soon raUied when Lieut. George Minor, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 155 
 
 Surgeon, Din-widdin Phillips; Assistant Surgeon, Algernon S. Garnett; 
 Captain of Marines, Reuben Thorn; Engineers: H. A. Ramsay, Acting 
 Ohief; Assistants, John W. Tynan, Loudon Campbell, Benj. Herring, 
 C. A. Jack and R. 'Wright: Boatswain, Charles H. Hasker; Gunner, C. B. 
 Oliver; Carpenter, Hugh Lindsey: Clerk, Arthur Sinclair, Jr. ; Volunteer 
 Aide, Lieut. Douglas Forrest, C. S. army; Capt. Kevil, commanding de- 
 tachment of Norfolk United Artillery; Signal Corps, Sergeant Tabb. 
 
 Flag-officer Buchanan was ordered February 24th, 1863, to 
 the command of the naval defences of the James River, and 
 to hoist his flag on the Virginia, or any other vessel of the 
 squadron, which was to consist of the Virginia, the Patrick 
 Henry, the Jamestown, the Teaser, the Ealeigh, and the Beau- 
 fort. Secretary Mallory in his order added •. 
 
 " The Virginia is a novelty in naval construction, is untried, and her 
 powers unknown ; and hence the department will not give specific orders 
 as to her attack upon the enemy. Her powers as a ram are regarded as 
 very formidable, and it is hoped you will be able to test them. Like the 
 bayonet charge of infantry, this mode of attack, while the most destruc- 
 tive, will commend itself to you in the present scarcity of ammunition. 
 It is one also that may be rendered destructive at night against the 
 enemy at anchor. Even without guns the ship would, it is believed, be 
 formidable as a ram. 
 
 '•Could you pass Old Point and make a dashing cruise in the Poto- 
 mac as far as Washington, its effect upon the public mind would be im- 
 portant to our cause. 
 
 " The condition of our country, and the painful reverses we have just 
 suffered, demand onr utmost exertions ; and convinced as I am that the 
 opportunity and the means for striking a decisive blow for our navy are 
 now, for the first time, presented, I congratulate you upon it, and know 
 that your judgment and gallantry will meet all just expectations. 
 
 "Action, prompt and successful just now, would be of serious import- 
 ance to our cause." 
 
 Of officers there were an ample supply, and they were 
 among the best and bravest, the most skillful and experienced, 
 which the navy of the United States had turned out. \But the 
 ■crew that was to work and fight this new kind of man-of- 
 war, where were they to come from ? There had been no 
 
 liimself woundecl and sent below, appeared on County, Maryland. He was the organizer and 
 ■deck and delivered to tlienx tlie following mes- founder of the Naval Academy at Annapolis: he 
 sage from the flag-offlcer: "Tell Mr. Jones to co-operated in landing the troops at Vera Cruz, 
 fight the ship to the last. Tell the men that lam under Gen. Scott, and was one of the leading 
 not mortally wounded, and hope to be with spirits of the navy there at the capture of San 
 them very soon." The cheers that greeted the Juan d'UUoa; was among the first to step foot 
 delivery of this message, it is said, resounded on the soil of Japan in the expedition of Com- 
 far above the cannon's roar, and every man was modore Perry, which opened the ports of that 
 ■again quickly at his post, dealing death and erst forbidden land to the world at large, but 
 clestrucfcion with their heavy guns. Congress with especial kindness to our own country — 
 was in session when the engagement took place, and later was honored by a grateful President 
 and shortly thereafter passed a bill creating the with the position of commandant of the navy- 
 grade of admiral in the navy, to which position yard at Washington, overlooking the entire 
 Buchanan was nominated by the President and affairs of the naval establishment of the coun- 
 ■conflrmed by the Senate on August 2l8t, 1862. try; and still later he was called by the warm 
 He commanded the Confederate fleet in Mobile impulses of his Maryland brethren to be the 
 Bay in August, 1864, on board of the iron-clad President of the Maryland Agricultural Col- 
 Temtessee, where he was wounded and defeated lege — in all of which positions he not only 
 "by Admiral Farragut and taken prisoner. After acquitted himself with credit and honor, but 
 ■the war he was president of the Maryland Agri- left a legacy of discipline and order and gentle- 
 ■cultural College. He died in May, 1874, at manly bearing that leaves its impress to the 
 ■"TheKest," his splendid resic^ance in Talbot present hour. 
 
156 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 merchant marine at the South to supply experienced sailors, 
 and but few of the sailors of the U. S. navy were in Southern 
 ports when the rupture of the Union occurred. To meet that 
 pressing exigency, Lieut. Wood visited Gen. Magruder's army 
 at Yorktown, and from a New Orleans regiment selected 
 eighty sailors out of 300 volunteers who had seen service 
 in the ships that visited New Orleans; these with a few 
 seamen from Norfolk who had escaped from the Confed- 
 erate flotilla in Pamlico Sound at the fall of Roanoke 
 Island, and with other volunteers from the army, a crew 
 of 300 men was formed, which proved to be " as gallant and 
 trusty a body of men as any one could wish to command, 
 not only in battle, but in reverse and retreat." 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE NAVAL BATTLE IN HAMPTON ROADS. 
 
 THE first Confederate iron-clad, so unlike in every respect 
 to any other afloat, the oflacers and men strangers to 
 each other and new to every part of the ship, was im- 
 mediately launched from the dock into battle, and from 
 what was supposed to be an experimental trial of sailing and 
 floating capacity into the fiercest fight of modern times. Dis- 
 charging workmen as the Virginia moved out into the chan- 
 nel, Plag-oflicer Buchanan turned her prow into waters swarm- 
 ing with enemies, and covered with the line-of -battle ships 
 that had never lowered their flag to an enemy. Immediately 
 her defects became apparent; not more than five knots an hour 
 could be got out of her, and she obeyed her rudder so reluc- 
 tantly that from thirty to forty minutes were required to turn 
 her. Her draft of twenty -two feet confined her to a narrow 
 channel, and deprived her of every advantage attainable by 
 manoeuvring. But, in that unmanageable water-logged vessel, 
 Capt. Buchanan, on the 8th of March, 1862, steamed slowly down 
 Elizabeth River, accompanied by the steam-tugs Beaufort, 
 Lieut. Commanding W. H. Parker, a.nd.th.e Raleigh. Lieut. Com- 
 manding J. W. Alexander, to make her " trial trip " a trial of 
 battle. The movement was hailed with huzzas from citizens 
 and soldiers, from wharves and batteries; but silently, and with- 
 out response, the gallant ship and her escorts, followed by Com- 
 mander Forrest and staff, plowed their way toward the enemy. 
 Down the deep channel of the Elizabeth River, passing Con- 
 federate batteries at Craney Island and on the right bank, the 
 Vitginia and her escort reached Hampton Roads at Sewell's 
 Point. At Fortress Monroe lay the Minnesota, 40 guns ; the 
 Boanoke, 40 guns, and the ;S^. Lawrence, 50 guns ; together 
 with the gunboat Dragon, the gunboat Mystic, the gunboat 
 Whitehall, ' the gunboat Oregon, which was destroyed by a 
 shell ; the gunboat Zouave, which was seriously damaged and 
 
 1 The Whitehall had three killed, and was burned by a shell from a Confederate gunboat. 
 
 (157) 
 
168 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 forced to retire from action, and the Cambridge. At Newport 
 News, riding at anchor, was the Cumberland, 30 guns, and the 
 Congress, 50 guns. In addition to this formidable battery of 
 guns afloat must be added the batteries at Newport News and 
 the guns on the land side of Fortress Monroe, and the great 
 gun in position at the Rip-raps. Notwithstanding the informa- 
 tion which leaked through the lines as to the progress that was 
 making upon the Virginia at the navy-yard, her appearance, 
 if not unexpected, was at least unprepared for. The Congress 
 and the Cumberland lay at anchor off Newport News, with 
 boats hanging to lower booms, washed clothes flying in the 
 wind from the rigging, and no indication whatever of prepa- 
 ration or readiness for battle, until the Virginia was within 
 three-quarters of a mile, when every man was astir, boats 
 were dropped astern^ booms got alongside, and the ships were 
 cleared for action. 
 
 Into that circle of great guns from line-of-battle ships, 
 shore batteries, and gunboats, whose concentrated fire could 
 be directed to almost any position in ' the Road, Captain 
 Buchanan led his little fleet, comprised of the Virginia, 10 
 guns; the Beaufort, 1 gun; and the Raleigh, 1 gun; when in 
 action to be reinforced by the Patrick Henry, 12 guns. Com- 
 mander John R. Tucker; the Jamestown, Lieut. Command- 
 ing J. N. Barney, 3 guns; the gunboat Teaser, Lieut. Command- 
 ing W. A. Webb, 1 gun. Total, 27 guns, against an armament 
 of over 300 guns, of which 100 could be brought into action 
 at every moment, and on every point. 
 
 At Sewell's Point, Capt. Buchanan turned the Virginia, 
 with the gunboat escort, towards Newport News, to engage the 
 "frigates Cumberland and Congress, gunboats and shore bat- 
 teries.'" Reserving fire until within less than a mile, Lieut. 
 Charles C. Simms, with the forward pivot gun of the Virginia, 
 opened the engagement with the Cumberland, and the action 
 became general almost immediately. To reach her selected 
 foe the Virginia had to pass the Congress, to which she gave 
 a broadside, and received an equally liberal compliment. From 
 the Cumberland, the Congress, the gunboats and shore batter- 
 ies, there was now poured upon the Virginia and her little 
 escort the concentrated fire of 100 heavy guns at short 
 range. _ Standing on, the Virginia brought her ramming 
 
 Eowers into action, and struck the Cumberland under the star- 
 oard f orechannels, delivering the fire of her bow pivot gun at 
 the very moment of crushing through the sides of the Cumber- 
 land. The destruction was very great, "killing ten men at gun 
 No. 1, among whom was Master's Mate John Harrington, and 
 cutting off both arms and legs of Quarter Gunner Wood. As 
 the Merrimac rounded-to and came up, she again raked the 
 Cumberland with heavy fire. At this fire sixteen men at gun 
 
 1 Report of Flag-ofBoer Franklin Buchanan; date, March 27th, 1862. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 159 
 
 No. 10 were killed or wounded, and all were subsequently car- 
 ried down in the sinking ship. ' 
 
 The blow, hardly perceptible on the Virginia, had been re- 
 ceived by the Cumberland nearly at right angles. Heading up 
 stream, to turn the gallant but very slow-moving ship, enabled 
 Lieut. Wood to bring the after pivot gun into action, which 
 was turned upon the Congress just as she slipped her anchor, 
 loosed her bow topsail, and run up her jib, to effect escape. 
 
 The effort was unavailing; the Congress grounded, and 
 the Virginia, at a distance of 200 yards, ridfdled her sides. Not- 
 withstanding that the hole in the side of the Cumberland was 
 " big enough to drive a horse and cart through," Lieut. Morris 
 continued as gallant a fight as the records of any navy offer; 
 slowly sinking, deck after deck was submerged, the forward 
 magazine drowned, the after magazine was used to fight the 
 ten-inch gun; but in thirty-five minutes the ship canted to 
 port, and her gallant officers and men delivered their parting 
 fire and immediately leaped into the water, and the Cumber- 
 land sank with the " American flag flying at the peak."^ 
 
 Before the waters of Hampton Roads had closed over the 
 Cumberland, the dark smoke of the Jamestown squadron was 
 seen, as the ships and boats hurried under press of steam to 
 the scene of battle. Dashing past the Federal shore batteries, 
 Capt. John R. Tucker led the van in the Patrick Henry, closely 
 followed by the Jamestown, Lieut. Commanding Barney, and 
 the little Teaser, Lieut. Webb, puflSng with all the energy of a 
 short-winded tug. Making a gallant run past the batteries, they 
 " were exposed to a heavy fire. Their escape was miraculous, 
 as they were under a galling fire of solid shot, shell, grape and 
 canister, a number of which passed through the vessels with- 
 out doing any serious injury, except to the Patrick Henry, 
 through whose boiler a shot passed, scalding to death four 
 persons and wounding others. Lieut. Commanding Barney 
 promptly obeyed a signal to tow her out of the action. As 
 soon as damages were repaired, the Patrick Henry returned 
 to her station and continued to perform good service during 
 the remainder of that day and the following." 
 
 The part taken by the little James River squadron is not 
 the least remarkable part of that great fight. It was lost sight 
 
 1 Moore'a Rehellian, Record, Vol. IV., p. 273. The Owmberland was commanded by Capt Ead- 
 
 cliffe, who was detailed to attend a Court of In- 
 
 2 OFFICERS OF THE " CUMEEELAND." quiry on board the flag-ship Roanoke. When 
 
 The following is a list of the ofi&cere onboard the fight commenced he mounted a horse and 
 the Cumberland during the fight :— First Lieut. rode rapidly to Newport News, but only reached 
 George Morris, commanding; Second Lieut, there in time to find his vessel sinking. 
 F. O. Selfridge; Sailing Master, Mr. Stivlaon; Commandant William Smith had previously 
 Chaplain, Rev. Mr. Leinhardt.. drowned; Boat- commanded the Cumberkmd,\miviBs detached 
 swain, Edward Bell; Gunner, Eugene Mack; and ordered to the command of the Sabine, of 
 Carpenter, William L. Leighton; Sailmaker. the Galf blockading fleet. While waiting trans- 
 David Bruce; Master's Mate, John Harrington, portation ho remained on board the Oumber- 
 
 killed; Master's Mate, Wyman; Master's land, and as a volunteer gave valuable assist- 
 
 Mate, ©"Neil; Paymaster's Clerk, Hugh ance. Lieut. Morris, who, by the absence 
 
 Knott; Acting Master, Bandall; Acting of Capt. Eadcliffe, was in command, by the 
 
 Master, Kennison; Master Smith, Victor general testimony of his brother officers did 
 
 M. Smith; Marine OfScer, Charles M. Hayward. his duty in the most gallant manner. 
 
160 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of in the battle of the iron-clad giants, but in the days of oak 
 walls would have been recorded with honorable mention 
 among the acts of bravery and seamanship which illustrate 
 a navy. Capt. Pendergrast, of the Congress, reported that: 
 " In the meantime the Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson, 
 rebel steamers, approached us from up the James River, firing 
 with precision, and doing us great damage. Our two stern 
 guns were our only means of defence. These were soon dis- 
 abled, one being dismounted, and the other having its muzzle 
 knocked away. The men were knocked away from them with 
 great rapidity, and slaughtered by the terrible fire of the 
 enemy." 
 
 Capt. Wm. Watson, of the gunboat Dragon, reports that: 
 
 "Arriving at the Minnesota, took position and opened fire on the 
 Torktown and Jamestown. Kept it up until dark, when ■we received orders 
 to cease firing, and lay by the ship until morning. At 3 A. M. tried to 
 tow the Minnesota off' the bottom, and succeeded only to ground in an- 
 other and more exposed place. Made fast for the night. Second day, at 
 8 A. M., we were ordered to take up position as best we could, and opened 
 fire on the Yorktown and Jamestown with good effect ; could plainly see 
 our shells bursting on the enemy. At 12 M. received orders to go alongside 
 of the Minnesota, and be ready to assist in towing her off. Made fast on 
 the port side, being in direct line of the Merrimao''s batteries. At the 
 same moment received two shots from her, one taking effect in the boUer, 
 blowing up the vessel, together with the captain and three men; seriously 
 wounding Charles J. Preese ; badly scalding Ben. 8. Hungerford, and 
 breaking the legs of — McDonald, which will have to be amputated. Re- 
 ceived orders to get on board the Minnesota. Vessel on fire. Shortly after 
 received orders to get bags and hammocks on board of the Whitehall." 
 
 Capt. Balsir, of the gunboat Whitehall, reported that, 
 " although her heavy batteries had no effect on the iron mon- 
 ster Virginia, still the rebel steamers Yorktown and James- 
 town will remember the accurate gunnery of the Whitehall 
 for some time to come." Capt. Van Brunt, of the Minnesota, 
 reported that, " at 4 P. M., the Merrimac, Virginia, Jamestown 
 and Patrick Henry bore down on my vessel. Very fortunately, 
 the iron battery drew too much water to come within a mile 
 of us. She took a position on my starboard bow, but did not 
 fire with accuracy, and only one shot passed through the ship's 
 bow. The other two steamers took their position on my port 
 bow and stern and their fire did most damage in killing and 
 wounding men, inasmuch as they fired with rifled guns; but 
 with the heavy gun that I could bring to bear upon them, I 
 drove them off, one of them apparently in a crippled state." 
 
 Mrs. Susan Archer Weiss, an eye-witness, describes "the 
 saucy Teaser " as follows: " By this time the Jamestown and 
 Patrick Henry had joined the Merrimac, taking a position 
 which concealed her from our view. We were told afterward 
 b}' Federal officers that the little Teaser (commanded by Capt. 
 Webb) pushed her way in between the Patrick Henry and 
 Jamestown, and advancing close to the shore fired her one gun 
 
THK CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 161 
 
 in face of the battery of sixty guns. Probably her insignifi- 
 cance saved her, for now every shot seemed concentrated upon 
 the Merrimac, and the air and the very ground where we 
 stood seemed trembling with the roar of shot and shells. So 
 dense was the smoke that We could discern nothing except 
 that the Confederate vessels were constantly shifting their 
 position in front of the fleet, which was now lying close in 
 shore." 
 
 While the battle between the Virginia and the Federal 
 ships at Newport News was in progress, the small fry of Capt. 
 Buchanan's squadron — the Roanoke and the Baleigh — gal- 
 lantly attacked the Congress, "killing and wounding many of 
 her crew." Witnessing the easy destruction of the Cumber- 
 land, Lieut. Pendergrast, upon whom the coramand of the 
 Congress devolved on the death of Lieut. Joseph B. Smith, set 
 her fore and top sails, and, with the assistance of the gunboat 
 Zouave, drew the vessel ashore, where it was impossible, on 
 account of her draft, for the Virginia to ram her to pieces. 
 The movement was necessary, for Capt. Buchanan says: 
 
 "Having sunk the Ctomberland, I turned our attention to the Con- 
 gress. We were some time in getting our proper position, in consequence 
 of the shoalness of the water, and the great difficulty of managing the 
 ship when in or near the mud. To succeed in my object, I was obUged to 
 run the ship a short distance above the batteries on James River in order 
 to wind her. During all the time her keel was in the mud, of course she 
 moved but slowly. Thus we were subjected twice to the heavy guns of 
 all the batteries in passing up and down the river, but it could not be 
 avoided. We silenced several of the batteries, and did much injury on 
 shore. A large transport steamer alongside the wharf was blown up, one 
 schooner sunk, and another captured and sent to Norfolk. The loss of 
 life on shore we have no means of ascertaining." 
 
 But there was no escape for the Congress even in shoal 
 water, for "at half -past two the Merrimac took a position 
 astern of us at a distance of 150 yards, and raked us fore and 
 aft with shells, while one of the smaller steamers kept up a fire 
 on our starboard quarter."' 
 
 The movement of the Virginia to get into position for at- 
 tacking the Congress was mistaken for retreat, and was loudly 
 cheered by the gunners and crew of the frigate; but their mis- 
 take was corrected, when, in a few moments, from her raking 
 position the Virginia opened on the Congress, carrying car- 
 nage, havoc and dismay through the ship, and causing a white 
 flag to be displayed at the gaff, half-mast and main. 
 
 The report of Lieut. Pendergrast says: 
 
 " Seeing that our men were being killed without the prospect of any 
 relief from the Minnesota, which vessel had run ashore in attempting to 
 get up to us from Hampton Roads, not being able to. get a single gun to 
 bear upon the enemy, and the ship being on fire in several places, upon 
 consultation with Commander Wm. Smith we deemed it proper to haul 
 
 1 Eeport of LiBut. Pendergrast. 
 11 
 
162 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 down our colors without any further loss of life on our part. We were 
 soon boarded by an officer of the Merrimau, who said he would take 
 charge of the ship. He left shortly afterwards, and a small tug came 
 alongside, whose captain demanded that we should surrender and get out 
 of the ship, as he intended to burn her immediately. A sharp fire with 
 muskets and artillery was maintained from our troops ashore upon the 
 tug, having the effect of driving her off. 
 
 " The Merrimao again opened fire on us, although we had a peak to 
 show that we were out of action. 
 
 "After having fired several shells into us, she left us and engaged the 
 Minnesota and the shore batteries; after which. Lieutenant Pendergrast 
 states, the wounded were taken ashore in small boats, the ship having 
 been on fire from the beginning of the action from hot shot fired by the 
 Merrimac.''' 
 
 Upon this point there is a difference of report as well as of 
 opinion. Capt. Buchanan says that, on seeing the white flag, 
 
 " Our fire immediately ceased, and a signal was made for Xha Beaufort 
 to come within had. I then ordered Lieut. Commanding Parker to take 
 possession of the Congress, secure the officers as prisoners, allow the crew 
 to land, and burn the ship. He ran alongside^ received her flag and sur- 
 render from Commander Wm. Smith and Lieut. Pendergrast, with the 
 side-arms of those officers. They delivered themselves as prisoners-of-war 
 on board the Beaufort, and afterwards were permitted, at their own re- 
 quest, to return to the Congress, to assist in removing the wounded to the 
 Beaufort. They never returned, and I submit to the decision of the de- 
 partment whether they are not our prisoners. While the Beaufort anA. 
 Raleigh were alongside the Congress, and the surrender of that vessel had 
 been received from the commander, she having two white flags flying, 
 hoisted by her own people, a heavy fire was opened upon them from the 
 shore and from the Congress, killing some valuable officers and men. 
 Under this fire the steamers left the Congress; but, as I was not informed 
 that any injury had been sustained by those vessels at that time, Lieut. 
 Commanding Parker having failed to report to me, I took it for granted 
 that my order to him to burn her had been executed, and waited some 
 minutes to see the smoke ascending from her hatches. During this delay 
 we were still subjected to the heavy fire from the batteries, which was 
 always promptly returned." 
 
 It is probably true, as suggested by Admiral Porter, * that 
 the garrison at Newport News did not comprehend the state of 
 affairs on the Congress when it opened fire on that ship, and 
 the Beaufort and the Raleigh, which were engaged in remov- 
 ing the Federal wounded from the burning Congress. But 
 Admiral Porter errs in saying that, "although the white flag 
 was still flying, the Merrimac {Virginia) opened fire on the Con- 
 gress. This certainly would have been inhuman, since the'crew 
 of the Congress were not responsible for the acts of the troops 
 on shore." Capt. Buchanan's report gives full explanation : 
 
 " The steam-frigates Minnesota and Roanoke, and the sailing frigate 
 St.Lawrence, had previously been reported as coming from Old Point; but, 
 as I was determined that the Congress should not again fall into the hands 
 of the enemy, I remarked to that gaUant young officer. Flag Lieut. Minor, 
 ' That ship must be burned.' He promptly volunteered to take a boat and 
 
 • The Naval Hist, of the Civil War, p. 125. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 163 
 
 burn her, and the Teaser, Lieut. Commanding Webb, was ordered to cover 
 the boat. Lieut. Minor had scarcely reached within fifty yards of the 
 Congress when a deadly fire was opened upon him, wounding him severely 
 and several of his men. On witnessing this vile treachery, I instantly re- 
 called the boat and ordered the Congress to be destroyed by hot shot and 
 incendiary shell. About this period I was disabled, and transferred the 
 command of the ship to that gallant, intelligent officer, Lieut. Catesby 
 Jones, with orders to fight her as long as the men could stand to their 
 guns." 
 
 In the effort to remove the wounded from the Congress, 
 Lieut. Taylor and Midshipman Hutter of the Raleigh had been 
 killed, notwithstanding the white flag floated from the masts 
 of the Congress. This flre from the shore batteries killed and 
 wounded a number of Federal men on the Congress, and be- 
 came so hot and destructive as to compel the Beaufort and the 
 Raleigh to retire with only thirty wounded prisoners, and to 
 leave the rest to share the fate of the burning ship, in which 
 over 150 perished. The inhumanity which Admiral Porter 
 imagined to exist in the conduct of Capt. Buchanan, flnds its 
 actual existence in the rash and absurd folly of the shore 
 batteries attempting defence of the Congress at a time when 
 she was on fire, had surrendered, and her wounded were being 
 removed. It was this unnecessary slaughter of friend as well 
 as foe that Capt. Buchanan regarded as "vile treachery," to 
 be punished by burning the ship, which, having surrendered, 
 was yet being defended by shore batteries. 
 
 Very great indignation was felt and expressed by the Con- 
 federates that their kindness to the captured officers of the 
 Congress should have been availed of by them to escape, after 
 surrendering their swords and themselves as prisoners-of-war, 
 Lieut. Wood, having been ordered by Commander Buchanan to 
 go alongside the Congress to " take the officers and wounded 
 men prisoners, to permit the others to escape, and then to 
 burn the ship," promptly placed the Beaufort alongside the 
 burning frigate, and sent an officer to direct the commander 
 of the Congress to come to him. In a few minutes, Lieut. 
 Austin Pendergrast came down the side of the Congress, ac- 
 companied by Capt. William Smith, who was acting as a vol- 
 unteer. "These two officers," Lieut. Wood says, "landed 
 on the hurricane deck of the Beaufort where I was, and sur- 
 rendered the ship. As they were without side-arms, I thought 
 it proper to request them to return to their ship and get them. 
 This they did, though Pendergrast delivered to me a ship's 
 cutlass instead of the regulation sword. I now told Pender- 
 grast my orders, and asked him to get his officers and 
 wounded men on board as quickly as possible, as I wanted to 
 burn the ship. He said there were sixty wounded men on 
 board the frigate, and begged me not to burn the vessel. I 
 told him my orders were peremptory. While we were 
 engaged in this conversation, the wounded men were being 
 lowered into the Beaufort, and just then the Raleigh came 
 
164 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 alongside. Lieut. Taylor came on board and said that Capt. 
 Alexander had sent him to me for orders. I directed him to 
 take the Raleigh to the starboard side of the Congress and 
 assist in getting off the wounded men. I had scarcely given 
 him the order when a tremendous fire was opened on us from 
 the shore by a regiment of soldiers — Medical Director Shippen 
 says it was the Twentieth Indiana. At the first discharge 
 every man on the deck of the Beaufort, save Capt. Smith and 
 Lieut. Pendergrast, was either killed or wounded. Four 
 bullets passed through my clothing, one of which carried off 
 my cap cover and eye-glass, and another slightly wounded me 
 on the knee. Lieut. Pendergrast now begged me to hoist the 
 white flag, saying that all his wounded men would be killed. 
 I called his attention to the fact that they were firing on the 
 white flag, which was flying at his mainmast-head, directly 
 over our heads. I said I would not hoist it on the Beaufort; 
 in fact, I did not feel authorized to do so without consulting 
 Commander Buchanan. I said,' Tell your men to stop firing.' 
 He replied, ' They are a lot of volunteers, and I have no control 
 over them.' This was evident. The lieutenant then requested 
 permission to go on board the Congress with Capt. Smith, and 
 assist in getting the wounded down. This I assented to. 
 Capt. Smith and Lieut. Pendergrast did not return, but escaped 
 to shore; and, after surrendering themselves prisoners-of-war, 
 took advantage of the permission given for the humane pur- 
 pose of saving their wounded, and violated their implied 
 parole and escaped." 
 
 It must be said that the Congress, not having hauled her 
 colors down, as is usual in naval warfare, the right to continue 
 fire until the colors are struck is not altered by flying the 
 white flag. That does not of itself constitute a surrender — it 
 implies a parley, during which firing ceases temporarily, to as- 
 certain the object of the white fiag. Under these circumstances 
 were Capt. Smith and Lieut. Pendergrast prisoners-of-war, 
 and were they justified in escaping, or if they escaped from 
 the burning ship to save their lives, were they not in military 
 honor and custom bound to have returned to their captors? 
 Their position was not the same as that of Capt. Semmes at the 
 sinking of the Alabama. Smith and Pendergrast had been in 
 the actual possession of their captor, and on board his ship, and 
 had surrendered their swords in token of their capture. Capt. 
 Semmes never was within the power of Capt.Winslow of the 
 Kearsarge. From the deck of the Beaufort, Smith and Pender- 
 grast were permitted to go to the Congress for a specific pur- 
 pose of helping to save their own wounded men. Capt. 
 Semmes leaped into the ocean, preferring the risk of drowning 
 to capture by Capt. Winslow. The officers of the Congress had 
 come on board the ship of their captor, and surrendered their 
 swords, and the opportunity to escape, which they embraced, 
 was extended to them in the office of humanity, but was taken 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 165 
 
 advantage of by them to the discredit of the honor of Ameri- 
 can sailors. 
 
 In the fight between the Virginia and the Congress and 
 the Cumberland, the former received no material injury ex- 
 cept the loss of ram in the side of the Cumberland, and the 
 breaking off the muzzle of two of the broadside guns. Her 
 armor was not the least damaged, as the balls that struck 
 glanced off, " having no more effect than peas from a pop-gun," 
 though she was the focus upon which the fire of more than 
 100 heavy guns was concentrated for over three hours. But 
 everything outside was swept away by the fire to which she 
 was exposed. One anchor, the smokestack, and steampipes, 
 stanchions, railings, boat-davits, and flag-staff were all shot 
 away, and finally a boarding pike bore her colors in triumph 
 out of the fight. Her loss was two killed and eight wounded, 
 among the latter Capt. Buchanan, so seriously as to be dom- 
 pelled to transfer the command to Lieut. Jones, and, with 
 Lieut. Minor, to be carried the next day to the naval hospi- 
 tal at Norfolk. The loss in the Confederate fleet aggregated 
 in killed and wounded twenty-one. 
 
 The Minnesota, the Eoanoke, and the 8t. Lawrence, upon 
 seeing the approach of the Confederate fleet from Norfolk, 
 were not slow to get underway. Each of these ships grounded 
 before coming within short range — the Minnesota so firmly 
 as not to be got afioat for four tides; the Roanoke grounded 
 also, but was soon gotten off with the assistance of tugs, 
 which towed her round; and the St. Lawrence in tow of the 
 Cambridge, passed the Roanoke, but she also grounded, but 
 was gotten off; " after which," Capt. Purviance reported, "a 
 powerful broadside from the spar and gun decks of the St. 
 Lawrence, then distant about half a mile, thrown into the 
 Merrimac, induced her to withdraw, whether from necessity 
 or discretion, is not known." The parting broadside of the 
 St. Lawrence was merely coincident with the withdrawal of 
 the Virginia. Capt. Buchanan says : 
 
 " The ships from Old Point opened their fire upon us. The Min^iesota 
 grounded in the north oliannel, where, unfortunately, the shoalness of the 
 channel prevented our approach. We continued, however, to fire upon 
 her until the pilots declared that it was no longer safe to remain in that 
 position, and we accordingly returned by the south channel (the middle 
 ground being necessarily between the Virginia and Minnesota, and the St. 
 Lawrence and the Roanoke having retreated under the guns of Old Point), 
 and again had an opportunity of opening upon the Minnesota, receiving 
 her heavy fire in return; and shortly afterwards upon the 8t. Lawrence, 
 from which vessel we also received several broadsides." 
 
 The St. Lawrence carried off a token from the Virginia — 
 "one of her projectiles of formidable dimensions." Capt. Pur- 
 viance says: 
 
 " An eighty-pound shell penetrated the starboard quarter about four 
 inches above the water-line, passed through the pantry of the ward-room. 
 
166 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 and into the state-room of the assistant surgeon on the port side, com- 
 pletely demolishing the bulkhead, and then struck a strong iron bar which 
 secured the bull's-eye of the port. It returned into the ward-room, ex- 
 pended. It fortunately did not explode, and no person was injured. The 
 damage done by this shot proved the power of the projectiles, which she 
 employed, and readily explained the quick destruction of our wooden and 
 antiquated frigates. Our position at this time was one of some anxiety." 
 
 The St. Lawrence was gotten off by the gunboat Young 
 America. The ship's carpenter of the Minnesota reported the 
 damage done to that frigate as follows : 
 
 "Port side received one shell on after-quarter at the water-line, which 
 cut through the planking; one shell between main and mizzen rigging, 
 below air-port-line, which passed through chief engineer's state-room, 
 crossing and tearing up the deck over the cock-pit, and striking the clamp 
 and knee in carpenter's state-room, where it exploded, carrying away the 
 beam clamp and knee, and completely demolishing the bulkheads, setting 
 fire to the same and ripping up the deck. One shell passed through ham- 
 mock netting abaft of main rigging, striking the spar deck on starboard 
 side, cutting through four planks, then ricochetting, carrying away trunk 
 and axle of gun-carriage, and wounding water-ways. Two shells passed 
 through No. 8 port, carrying away planking, timbers and deck clamps, 
 and splintering several beams and castings. One shell passed through 
 forward part of No. 6 port, carrying away planking timber and upper sill. 
 One shell under fore-rigging, which cut away sheet cable, penetrating 
 planking timber and splintering deck clamps. One shell on starboard side 
 cai-ried away hammock nettings and gangway boards. There are several 
 wounds on port side received from fragments of exploding shell. One 
 shell passed through the mainmast fourteen feet above deck, cutting away 
 one-third of the mast and bursting some of the iron bands. One shell 
 struck the spar deck in starboard gangway, cutting it up. One passed 
 from port to starboard gangway, forward of mainmast, where it exploded, 
 wounding two boats." 
 
 Darkness had closed over the water, and put an end to 
 further fighting for that day. The Confederate fleet steamed 
 proudly and triumphantly back to its anchorage, having 
 sent a thrill of joyful enthusiasm throughout the length and 
 breadth of the Confederate States, dismay and disgrace all 
 over the United States, and revolutionized naval construction 
 throughout the world. From that anchorage, and by the 
 blaze of the burning Congress, the crews of the Confederate 
 vessels saw waving from the masts of the sunken Cumberland 
 the flag of the United States, and heard the booming of the 
 guns of the burning Congress, until her magazine, exploding, 
 scattered over the waters of the Roads the fragments of the 
 frigate ; the stranded Minnesota lying riddled, the Boanoke, 
 St. Lawrence, Mystic, and other gunboats, huddled under the 
 guns of Fortress Monroe, and no flag but the Stars and Bars 
 ■waving in defiance over all the waters of the Hampton 
 Roads. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 THE VIRGINIA (MEREIMAC) AND MONITOR. 
 
 AT daybreak on Sunday, March 9th, 1862, the positions of 
 the various vessels in Hampton Roads were as follows: 
 Off Sewell's Point lay the Confederate fleet: iheVirginia, 
 the Patrick Henry, the Jamestown, the gfunboats Raleigh 
 and Teaser. Off Newport News the masts of the Cumberland 
 rose above the waters of Hampton Roads, and the floating 
 debris of the Congress told the story of the battle of the 8th. 
 In the north channel, hard and fast aground, lay the Minne- 
 sota, with her sides well riddled, while, close beside, the queer- 
 looking Monitor guarded the stranded frigate. Towards Fort- 
 ress Monroe, the Roanoke, the St. Lawrence, and the many gun- 
 boats of the Federal fleet kept at a respectful distance from the 
 dreaded Virginia. The central figure in the picture was un- 
 qiiestionably the Monitor, of whose construction and reputed 
 prowess full particulars had been received by the Confederate 
 authorities. Whatever her merits might prove, the fact that 
 she was iron-clad was sufficient, after the previous day's expe- 
 rience, to make her visit inopportune and undesired to the 
 victors of the night before. Beside the towering frigate, the 
 little Monitor presented the appearance of a pigmy beside a 
 giant. A " tin can upon a shingle," or a " cheese box on a 
 plank," were the familiar similes that greeted her appearance. 
 But though small and insignificant in appearance, she was 
 known to be the product of American inventive genius, of 
 American energy, industry and enterprise. The officers who 
 were to engage her in battle were too familiar with the re- 
 sources, the energy, and the skill of Northern enterprise to 
 doubt her prowess or to expect an easy victory. But whatever 
 she might prove herself to be, she was there, watching and 
 guarding the prize of yesterday's victory, and must be fought, 
 let the result be what it would. Lieut. Jones, commanding the 
 Virginia, was not the man to decline any contest after yester- 
 day's triumph — still less to retire before testing the endurance 
 and capabilities of that last product of Yankee invention. 
 
 (167) 
 
168 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Without waiting longer than necessary for an early breakfast 
 — about eight and a quarter o'clock, the Virginia led the way 
 to the second trial of strength and endurance, followed by the 
 Patrick Henry, the Jamestown, the Raleigh and the Teaser, 
 and steamed straight for the Minnesota. The battle was to be 
 fought below the " middle ground" — in the deeper channel of 
 the lower Roads, nearer to Fortress Monroe and the Rip-raps, 
 and immediately off the Confederate Battery at Sewell's Point. 
 Moving very slowly, the Virginia made straight as the chan- 
 nel would permit for the Minnesota and the Monitor, and 
 opened fire from her bow pivot gun, and, closing the distance, 
 delivered her starboard broadside at shorter range. The Monitor 
 promptly accepted the challenge and stood boldly for the Vir- 
 ginia, passing her and delivering the fire of her eleven-inch 
 gun directly upon the armored side of the Virginia. Both 
 vessels turned and approached each other — the Monitor firing 
 with the greatest deliberation at intervals of seven or eight 
 minutes, and the Virginia oftener from her greater number of 
 guns. It was soon apparent to both commanding officers that 
 each had found a foeman worthy of his ship, and that the test 
 was to be the strength of their country's iron rather than of 
 the seamanship or courage of her sailors. The poetry of a 
 naval battle was not there; it was simply a game of enormous 
 iron bolts hurled upon thick iron plates from iron guns of here- 
 tofore unknown dimensions. The contest was not between 
 ships, but between metal monsters with impenetrable sides. 
 
 The Virginia was working badly, the Monitor beautifully. 
 The damage to the smokestack of the Virginia in the fight of 
 the day before impeded the making of steam, and Chief En- 
 gineer Ramsay reported great difiiculty in obtaining the nec- 
 essary draft for his boilers. In addition to this, the great 
 draft of the Virginia caused her to touch bottom and drag 
 in the mud. Her twenty-three feet of draft confined her to 
 a narrow channel, while the Monitor's twelve - feet draft 
 enabled her to take any position she desired. The Monitor 
 was the better boat — more obedient to her helm, more easily 
 turned, and equally invulnerable, but not without apparent 
 embarrassments. Her pilot-house, immediately in front of 
 her turret, impeded the fire of her guns; and her commander, 
 shut off in the pilot-house from her executive oiBBcer in the 
 turret, had to pass his order through speaking-tubes, which 
 were broken early in the action, and afterward by two lands- 
 men, who were so unfamiliar with the technical communica- 
 tions that they were often misunderstood." Nevertheless, the 
 Monitor was the superior ship in all the essentials necessary 
 in action. It was not long before the experience of battle 
 showed to Lieut. Jones the impossibility of perforating the tur- 
 ret, and he directed his fire upon the pilot-house with better 
 results, and soon a shell from the Virginia " struck the for- 
 ward side of the pilot-house, directly in the sight-hole or slit, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 169 
 
 and exploded, cracking the second iron-log, and partly lifting 
 the top, left an opening. Worden was standing immediately 
 behind this spot, and received in his face the force of the blow, 
 which partly stunned him, filling his eyes with powder and 
 utterly blinded him," ' and the command devolved on Lieut. 
 S. D. Greene. 
 
 Two hours of hard blows from the Virginia had made no 
 impression on the Monitor, and the same amount of pounding 
 had done no greater injury to the Virginia ; and the battle 
 continued at close quarters for some time, at less than fifty 
 yards, without apparent damage to either side. ^ Under these 
 circumstances, Lieut. Jones determined to try the same 
 engine of destruction that the day before had broken through 
 the wooden walls of the Cumberland; and, if not able to break 
 in the sides of the Monitor, to run her down, or to fasten on 
 to her and board her. Owing to the defective stearing-gear 
 of the Virginia, this required nearly an hour of manoeuvring 
 for position, which was mistaken by observers for retreat, or 
 evidence of damage inflicted; and when at last the oppor- 
 tunity offered, there was not room enough for the ship to get 
 that headway which might have crushed the Monitor with the 
 weight, if not by the blow, of the Virginia; so, when the ships 
 came together, the agile, swift-turning Monitor eluded the 
 blow, which amounted to nothing more than a small indenta- 
 tion. The ram of the Virginia had been broken off in the 
 Cumberland, but it is very doubtful if under any headway 
 that the Virginia could have acquired in that narrow channel 
 of the Roads, any prow would have done material damage to 
 the Monitor. Neither was it found practicable to board the 
 Monitor, as was intended by Lieut. Jones, as she dropped 
 astern before the boarders could get on board. 
 
 During this duel, from nine to eleven o'clock, between the 
 iron-clads, the Yorktovm and Jamestown participated, and re- 
 ceived the fire of the Monitor and Minnesota. The latter vessel 
 had received from the steamer Bancocas 100 solid shot, which 
 she used against the Virginia, but with no perceptible injury 
 to her iron sides. The Virginia used shells exclusively, the 
 only solid shot that she carried being of large windage for 
 use as hot shot; but as the solid Shot from the Monitor and 
 Minnesota did not injure the four-inch iron sides of the Vir- 
 ginia, it is not probable that solid shot from the guns of the 
 Virginia would have done any more injury upon the nine- 
 inch iron bulwarks of the Monitor. In the close contact of 
 less than forty yards, the rapid firing of both ships enveloped 
 them in dense clouds of smoke, almost totally concealing^ the 
 contestants, from which they would emerge in their evolutions 
 to receive the cheers of their respective friends, with their flags 
 flying, to indicate that no victory had been won by either side. 
 
 1 Commanders. D Greene, in Cfenteri/, March, 2 Greene and Wood, in the Century, March, 
 
 1885: p. 761. 1885. 
 
170 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 As the ships steamed round each other for position, the Vir- 
 ginia would turn her guns upon the stranded Minnesota and 
 endeavor to destroy her. One of these shots took effect in the 
 steamer Dragon, lying alongside the frigate, and exploded her 
 boiler. 
 
 In the ineffectual effort of the Virginia to ram the 
 Monitor, the latter delivered two shots from her eleven-inch 
 guns directly and squarely upon the armored sides of the 
 former, the effect of which was to knock down all the crews 
 of the after-guns, and the concussion producing bleeding from 
 nose and ears; the impact of these solid shots forced in the 
 wooden backing of the shield two or three inches, and if such 
 shots had been repeated at the same spot might have broken 
 through and penetrated into the ship. 
 
 The battle raged almost continuously for four hours, and 
 about 12 M. terminated without material damage to either ship, 
 and certainly without decisive victory for either flag. So far as 
 damage done can indicate success, the Virginia could claim 
 the palm of victory. She had sunk the Cumberland, burned 
 the Congress, riddled the Minnesota, destroyed the Dragon, 
 burned the Whitehall, injured the Roanoke and St. Lawrence, ' 
 and left her mark upon the Monitor. More than thirty 
 prisoners had been captured, and over 250 of her enemies 
 killed and wounded. Not a vessel of the Confederate squadron 
 had been disabled, or even seriously injured. The Patrick 
 Henry was compelled to haul out of the fight of the first day 
 for a few hours to repair damage, but was at her post during 
 all of the second day's fight ; the clean sweep made of every- 
 thing outside of the Virginia, and the loss of flag-staff and of 
 one mast in the fleet, was the total damage done the Confed- 
 erate ships. 
 
 Whether the Monitor or the Virginia first withdrew from 
 action is yet unsettled. Lieut. Jones says: "At length the. 
 Monitor withdrew over the middle ground where we could not 
 follow, but always maintaining a position to protect the Min- 
 nesota,"' which was the objective of Lieut. Jones' fight on the 
 9th. " To run our ship ashore on a falling tide would have 
 been ruin. We waited her return for an hour; and at 2 P. M. 
 
 1 Chief Engineer Allan C. Stiners of the well into her oak. She will not try that again. 
 
 Monitor reported, March 9th, 1862 : " We were She gave us a tremendous thump, hut did not 
 
 struck twenty -two times, pilot, house twice. Injure us in the least. We are just able to find 
 
 turret nine times, side armor eight times, deck the point of contact. 
 
 three times. The only vulnerable point was the "The turret is a splendid structure. I don't 
 
 pilot-house. One of your great logs (nine by think much ol .the shield, but the pendulums 
 
 twelve inches thick) is broken in two. The shot are fine things, though I cannot tell you how 
 
 struck just outside of where the captain had his they would stand the shot, as they were not 
 
 flye, and it has disabled him by destroying his hit. 
 
 left eye, and temporarily bhnding the other. "You were very correct in your estimate of 
 
 The log is not quite in two, but is broken and the effect of shot upon the man on the inside of 
 
 pressed inwards one and a half inches. [The the turret when it was struck near him. Three 
 
 ' log ' alluded to is made of wrought iron of the men were knocked down, of whom I was one ; 
 
 best material.] She tried to run us down and the other two had to be carried below; but I was 
 
 fiinkua. as she did the (TMm&eHaTui yesterday, but not disabled at all, andtlie others recovered 
 
 she got the worst of it. Her bow passed over before the battle was over." 
 ■our deck, and our sharp upper edge side cut 
 
 through the light iron shoe upon hor stern, and 2 Century, March^ 1885, p. 744. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 171 
 
 steamed to Sewell's Point, and thence to the dock-yard at 
 Norfolk, our crew thoroughly worn out from the two fights." 
 Although there is no doubt that the Monitor first retired — for 
 Capt. Van Brunt, commanding the Minnesota, so states in his 
 official report — "the battle was a drawn one, so far as the two 
 vessels engaged were concerned. But in its general results 
 the advantage was with the Monitor." On the other hand. 
 Commander Greene,' after explaining the reasons for the 
 Monitor retiring temporarily from action, immediately after 
 the wounding of Capt. Worden, says: "During this time 
 the Merrimac, which was leaking badly, had started in the 
 direction of the Elizabeth River, and on taking my station in 
 the pilot-house and turning the vessel's head in the direction 
 ■of the Merrimac, I saw that she was already in retreat. A 
 few shots were fired at the retiring vessel and she continued 
 on to Norfolk. I returned with the Monitor to the side of the 
 Minnesota." 
 
 A more disinterested observer of the fight than Lieut. 
 ■Green, and yet one quite as likely to be as observant of all 
 that transpired between the two iron-clads, was Commander 
 Van Brunt, of the Minnesota. The destruction of that frig- 
 ate was the prime object of Lieut. Jones, and the Monitor 
 was the only barrier that interposed between the destroyer of 
 the Cumberland and the Congress, and the stranded frigate. 
 The voluntary testimony of a witness whose opportunity of 
 observation was the best, whose interests were antagonistic 
 to the Virginia, and whose motives were anything than par- 
 tial to his enemy, ought to receive greater weight than that 
 of Lieut. Green shut up in the pilot-house, excited by the 
 ■contest, and personally and professionally interested in the 
 result of the fight. The official report of Commander Van 
 Brunt on this point is as follows: 
 
 " By the time she had fired her third sheU the little Monitor'haA come 
 down upon her, placing herself between us, and compelled her to change 
 her position; in doing which she grounded, and again I poured into her 
 .all the guns which could be brought to bear upon her. As soon as she got 
 ■off she stood down the bay, the little battery chasing her with all speed, 
 when suddenly the Merrimac turned around and ran f uU speed into her 
 -antagonist. For a moment I was anxious, but instantly I saw a shot 
 plunge into the iron roof of the Merrimac, which surely must have dam 
 aged her, for some time after the rebels concentrated their whole battery 
 upon the tower and pilot-house of the Monitor, and soon after the latter 
 stood down for Portress Monroe, and we thought it probable she had ex- 
 hausted her supply of ammunition or sustained some injury. Soon after 
 the Merrimac and the two other steamers headed for my ship, and I then 
 felt to the fullest extent my condition. I was hard and immovably 
 aground, and they could take position under my stern and rake me. I had 
 expended most of my sohd shot, my ship was badly crippled, and my 
 ofBcers and men were worn out with fatigue; but even in this extreme 
 dilemma I determined never to give up the ship to the rebels, and after 
 consulting my officers, I ordered every preparation to be made to destroy 
 
 1 Omtury, March, 1885, p. 760. 
 
173 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the ship after all hope was gone to save her. On ascending the poop deck 
 I observed that the enemy's vessels had changed their course and were 
 heading for Oraney Island." 
 
 We have italicized the word "latter" to call attention to 
 the statement of Commander Van Brunt, that it was the 
 Monitor which " stood down for Fortress Monroe"- — her house' 
 of refuge, and her place of safety. Upon seeing the Monitor 
 standing down for Fortress Monroe, he realized that the 
 
 THE " MEERIMAC " IN PHOFILE. 
 
 destruction of his own ship was now possible, and he prepared 
 himself to destroy her, when to his surprise he observed the 
 Virginia to have changed her course for Craney Island. 
 
 Commander Foxhall Parker, in a paper read before the Naval 
 Institute on "The Monitor and the Merrimac," perpetuates errors 
 in regard to the fight, which repeated publications have ex- 
 posed, and which he ought to have avoided. After describing 
 the wounding of Capt. Worden, and Lieut. Green's assuming 
 command, and bringing the Monitor back into action, Com- 
 mander Parker continues : "as the Monitor turned, however, 
 so did the Merrimac, and, to the surprise of all not on board 
 of her, she steamed at full speed for Norfolk, * * * wholly 
 
 THE " MONITOH " IN PBOFELE, 
 
 leaving the battle-field, and seeking shelter under the rebel 
 batteries, thus byall the laws of war acknowledging herself 
 vanquished." It is only necessary, in refutation of that state- 
 ment, to refer to the above extract from the report of Com- 
 mander Van Brunt, "whose officers and crews. Commander 
 Parker says, were anxious spectators, as we may well conceive, 
 of this novel combat, upon whose issue the fate of their own 
 ship depended." The statement of an ofiicer as deeply inter- 
 ested in the result of the conflict as Capt. Van Brunt was, and 
 an eye-witness of the scene, will outweigh with history the 
 fancy sketch of one who wrote to please the popular prejudice 
 rather than to relate the facts as they actually occurred. 
 
 Capt. W, H. Parker, of the C. S. N., who commanded the 
 Beaufort in both battles, wrote under date. College Station, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 173 
 
 Prince George County, Md., February 9th, 1875, to Com- 
 mander Catesby ap R. Jones, that: 
 
 " The 5eaM/or< and Raleigh -vr eve canal boats running on the Albe- 
 marle Canal and Sound. Armament — one rifled thirty -two -pounder 
 (banded). The Beaufort had also one twenty-four-pounder carronade. 
 Crew and officers about thirty- five men. I perfectly understand that your 
 narrative was intended to give an account of the proceedings of the 
 Virginia only. It is truthful and correct, and such is the universal 
 opinion. All I wanted was to show that I was not in command of a mere 
 Tug boat on that eventful day. If I had seen your MS. before you pub- 
 lished it, I don't know that I could have suggested anything you have not 
 said. I think your account is just what it should be, and reflects credit 
 upon you. In my opinion it will kill Worden's claim without any further 
 testimony. Foxhall [a brother of W. H. Parker] tells me he wrote his 
 narrative from Worderi's notes and at his request. No doubt Worden put 
 it out as a 'feeler.' When Foxhall (last month) showed me Worden's 
 printed petition (for prize money) I said, ' Well ! Fox -I thought well of 
 Worden and am sorry he has put his name to a lie !' I think Fox regrets 
 having written his article. I had a letter from Selfridge (a lieutenant on 
 the Cumberland) on the subject. He wanted to know if the Cumberland 
 was not entitled to as much credit (if any) as the Monitor. I answered 
 him 'just about as much.' Major John Lee, of Washington, has written 
 also. I referred him to your account, and told him Worden's assertions 
 were hardly worthy a serious denial. Dr. Pinkney swears Worden shall 
 not get the milUon he asks for, and indeed he has brought a hornet's nest 
 about his ears. If I had any hope that honor and truth would ever again 
 be valued in this country I should say Worden would live to regret his 
 action. .. y^^y t^^jy y^^g^ ^^ ^^ ^ PAUK^^." 
 
 Prof. Soley says : " Seeing the Monitor draw off, Van 
 Brunt, under the supposition that his protector was disabled 
 and had left him, prepared for the worst, and made ready to 
 destroy his ship. But, at this point, the Merrimac withdrew to 
 Norfolk. As she moved off. Green fired at her twice, or at 
 most three times. He then returned to the Minnesota, and re- 
 mained by her until she got afloat. To have followed the 
 Merrimac under the batteries of Se well's Point would have 
 been running a greater risk than the circumstances would 
 warrant, considering the important interests in Hampton 
 Eoads, of which the Monitor afforded the sole protection." But 
 if the Virginia had been defeated by the Monitor, and was in 
 retreat to Norfolk, was it not the imperative duty of the com- 
 mander of the Monitor to have followed the Virginia and 
 destroyed her, or disabled her further, and would not that 
 destruction have been the best and most complete protection to 
 all the "important interests " at Hampton Roads ?' 
 
 1 In a letter to the New York Graphw, in 1879, up to Newport News to look out for the Virginia. 
 Commodore John Marston, V. 8. N., claims the Oapt. Worden cheerfully acijmeBced, and the re- 
 credit of saving the country by disobeying suit is known. "Where," asks the Commodore, 
 orders. At the time of the arrival of the Monitor ' ' would the ITnited States at this moment have 
 in Hampton Roads, the Commodore was in com- been if I had not disobeyed my orders 1 There 
 mand at that point, and says he had an impera- was nothing to prevent the Merrimac going to 
 tive order to send the Monitor to Washington. Philadelphia, New York, or Boston, and the fall 
 The Virginia having already come down, sunk of either of those cities would have been the 
 the Oumierland and burned the Congress, the signal for Europe, but especially for Eng- 
 Commodore resolved to disregard the order, at land, to acknowledge the independence of the 
 the risk of his commission, and send the Monitor South.' ' 
 
174 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 In a report made on this battle by Lieut, (afterward Ad- 
 miral) Worden, he says : 
 
 " The Merrimao having been thus checked in her career of destruc- 
 tion, and driven back crippled and discomfited, the question arises, 
 should she have been followed in her retreat to Norfolk ? That such a 
 course would commend itself very temptingly to the gallantry of an 
 officer and be difficult to resist, is undeniable ; yet I am convinced that 
 under the condition of affairs then existing at Hampton Roads, and the 
 great interests at stake there, all of which were entirely dependent upon 
 the Monitor, good judgment and sound discretion forbade it. It must be 
 remembered that the pdot-house of the Monitor was situated well forward 
 in her bows, and that it was considerably damaged. In following in the 
 wake of the enemy it would have been necessary, in order to fire clear of 
 the pilot-house, to have made broad ' yaw.s ' to starboard or port, involv- 
 ing, in the excitement of such a chase, the very serious danger of ground- 
 ing in the narrow portions of the channel and near some of the enemy's 
 batteries, whence it would have been very difficult to extricate her; pos- 
 sibly involving her loss. Such a danger her commanding officer would 
 not, in my judgment, have been justified in encountering, for her loss 
 would have left the vital interests in all the waters of the Chesapeake at 
 the mercy of future attacks of the Merrimao. Had there been another 
 iron-clad in reserve at that point to guard those interests, the question 
 would have presented a different aspect, which would not only have jus- 
 tified him in following, but perhaps made it his imperative duty to do so. 
 
 " The fact that the battle with the Merrimao was not more decided 
 and prompt was due to the want of knowledge of the endurance of 
 the eleven-inch Dahlgren guns with which the Monitor was armed, and 
 which had not been fully tested. Just before leaving New York, I received 
 a peremptory order from the Bureau of Ordnance to use only the pre- 
 scribed service charge, viz., fifteen pounds, and I did not feel justified in 
 violating those instructions at the risk of bursting one of the guuss, which, 
 placed as they were in turret, would almost entirely have disabled the 
 vessel. Had I been able to have used thirty-pound charges, which experience 
 has since shown the guns capable of enduring, there is little doubt in my 
 mind that the contest would have been shorter and the result more de- 
 cided. Further, the crew had been but a few days on board, the we;ither 
 bad, the mechanics at work on her up to the moment of sailing, and suffi- 
 cient opportunity had not been afforded to practice them properly at the 
 guns, the mode of manipulating which was entirely novel." 
 
 Are these reasons satisfactory, if the Virginia was be- 
 lieved to have been defeated, crippled and discomfited? 
 Were the channels too narrow for the Monitor, drawing only 
 twelve feet ? And what was the fleet then floating the flag of 
 the United States in Hampton Roads and guarding those in- 
 terests ? There were in Hampton Roads, besides the Monitor, 
 2 guns, the Roanoke. 40 guns; the Minnesota, 48 guns; the St. 
 Lawrence, 50 guns; Brandywine, 50 guns; Cambridge, 5 guns; 
 Mount Vernou. 3 guns; Mystic, 4 guns; Mount Washington, 4 
 guns; Braziliera, G guns; S. R. Spaulding, 3 guns; Young 
 America, 2 guns; Delaware, 3 guns, and Charles Phelps, 1 gun. 
 —Total, 220 guns. Surely, a fleet strong enough to protect the 
 interests in Hampton Roads from a '"crippled and discomfited" 
 vessel of iO guns, which they said retreated to dry dock ! The 
 Congress, 50 guns; Cumberland, 24 guns; Whitehall, 2 guns; 
 Dragon and Zouave, each 1 gun, had been destroyed; but, with 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 175 
 
 the exception of the Minnesota, all the above were afloat and 
 quite able to protect the Roads from the James River squadron. 
 But if the Monitor was the victor on the memorable 9th 
 of March, and the Virginia was "crippled and discomfited" 
 and forced to fly to Norfolk, what necessity was there for the 
 following order ? 
 
 " Navy Department, March 10th, 1862. 
 
 "It is directed by the President that the Monitor be not too much ex- 
 posed, and that in no event eball any attempt be made to proceed with 
 her unattended to Norfolk. If vessels can be procured and loaded with 
 stone and sunk in the channel, it is important that it should be done. 
 
 " The San Jacinto and Dakota have sailed from Boston to Hampton 
 Koads, and the Sabine, in tow of Baltic and a tug from New York. Gun- 
 boats will be ordered forthwith. Would it not be well to detain the Min- 
 nesota until other vessels arrive ? 
 
 " Captain G. V. Fox, " Gideon Welles. 
 
 ^'Assistant Secretary of the Naviy, Fortress Monroe^ 
 
 These preparations for a stone blockade against the Vir- 
 ginia look like precautionary measures against another such 
 victory over the Virginia. 
 
 There are other official records, cotemporaneous with the 
 fight, which show that the Federal authorities did not believe 
 the Virginia defeated or disabled. Assistant Secretary Fox 
 wrote to Secretary Welles, March 8th, 1863, 9 P.M., that "nearly 
 all here are of the opinion that the Merrimac is disabled. I 
 was the nearest person to her, outside of the Monitor, and I 
 am of opinion she is not seriously injured." Assistant Secre- 
 tary of War, P. H. Watson, on March 9th, wrote to Henry B. 
 Fen wick, of New York, that: 
 
 " The Jferri'mac, an armor-clad vessel belonging to the rebels, issued 
 from Norfolk yesterday, and captured several of the United States block- 
 ading vessels, and threatens to sweep our whole flotilla from Chesapeake 
 Bay. Under these circumstances, it is of the last importance to capture 
 or destroy the Merrimac, and the whole wealth and power of the United 
 States will be at command for that purpose. As this movement was an- 
 ticipated, and the subject of discussion between you and myself last De- 
 cember, you have, no doubt, thought of various modes by which it could 
 be met and overcome most promptly. The Secretary of War desires you 
 quietly to call a meeting of from three to nine persons, at your discretion, 
 of the best judgment in naval engineering and warfare, to meet imme- 
 diately at your father's house, or some other convenient and suitable 
 place, and to sit as a committee to devise the best plan of speedily accom- 
 plishing the capture or destruction of the Merrimac. 1 would suggest the 
 name of Abram S. Hewitt as a member of the committee. You will 
 bear in mind that every hour's delay to destroy the Merrimac may result 
 in incalculable damage to the United States, and that the plan or plans 
 for her destruction should be submitted at the earliest hour practicable 
 for the approval of this department, to the end that their execution may 
 not be unnecessarily delayed a moment. To enable you to communicate 
 hourly with this department, the Telegraphic Company is directed to 
 transmit all messages from you at the expense of the government. Ac- 
 knowledge this dispatch the moment you receive it. Spare no pains or 
 expense to get the committee together immediately. Act with the utmost 
 energy. You and each member of the committee will consider this whole 
 matter confidential." 
 
176 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Evidently the War Department at Washington did not 
 believe the fiction that the Virginia had been defeated, dis- 
 comfited and disabled. On the same day, Gen. McClellan tele- 
 graphed to the commanding officers at Fort Delaware, Fort 
 Mifflin, Fort Trumbull, New York Harbor, Newport, R. L, 
 Boston and Portland, Me., thdt "the rebel iron-clad steamer 
 Merrimac has destroyed two of our frigates near Fort Monroe, 
 and finally retired last night to Craney Island. She may suc- 
 ceed in passing the batteries and go to sea. It is necessary 
 that you place your fort in the best possible condition for de- 
 fence, and do your best to stop her should she endeavor to run 
 by. Anything that can be effected in the way of temporary 
 batteries should be done at once." From Baltimore, Gen. Dix 
 telegraphed Col. Warren, commanding Fort Federal Hill: "She 
 (the Merrimac) may pass Fort Monroe and come here. You 
 will make the same arrangements which would be necessary 
 if we were in the presence of an enemy." Secretary Stanton 
 telegraphed the Governors of New York and Massachusetts, 
 that "the opinion of the naval commanders here is that the 
 Merrimac will not venture to sea, but they advise that imme- 
 diate preparations be made to guard against the danger to our 
 ports, by large timber rafts protected by batteries. They re- 
 gard timber rafts, guarded by batteries, as the best protection 
 for temporary purposes." Com. Dahlgren, at Washington, 
 telegraphed Gen. Hooker, "the ilf errimac got out of harbor, 
 and had j)retty much used up our ships at Hampton Roads. It 
 is impossible to say what she may attempt ; but, as a proper 
 precaution, it is proposed to be ready to block the channel of 
 this river in the event of an attempt to enter it. By direction 
 of the President, it has been agreed on by Gen. McClellan, 
 Gen. Meigs, and myself, the Secretary of War present, to fill 
 some canal-boats and other crafts, and tow them down near 
 the place where it would be advisable to sink them. I wish 
 you would, therefore, send up some steamers to tow them 
 down. You have, no doubt, received my dispatch to send 
 some fast vessel to observe the mouth of the Potomac. Let 
 this duty be well looked to." Com. Dahlgren urged upon 
 the President the necessity of blocking the Potomac, and to 
 Gen. McClellan wrote : "I am making arrangements to place 
 an eleven-inch gun and some ten-inch mortars on Giesborough 
 Point, and that the steamer Sophia will leave G Street wharf in 
 ten minutes, having in tow eight canal -boats loaded with suffi- 
 cient stone to sink them; another steamer with eight more 
 will leave in the course of the night." These are but a por- 
 tion of the official records which show the fright and con- 
 sternation produced by the Virginia, which, it was alleged, 
 had been defeated, discomfited and disabled. "The perform- 
 ances of the Merrimac," says Gen. McClellan, " placed a new 
 aspect upon everything, and may probably change my whole 
 plan of campaign just on the eve of execution." On March 
 
LIEUTENANT COMMANDER WILLIAM HARWAB PARKER, 
 
 CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 177 
 
 9th, Assistan , Secretary Fox wrote to Secretary Welles, " the 
 performan'-e of the Monitor to-day against the Merrimac 
 shows a slight superiority in favor of the Monitor. She is an 
 ugly customer, and it is too good luck to believe we are yet 
 clear of hei " The steamer Commodore was directed to be 
 held for a assenger to recall Gen. Burnside from the North 
 Carolina '' and, and Secretary Welles ordered the Oneida, 
 and " an^ essels you aave, ^o be sent to Hampton Roads. 
 "Send th>. Wachusett to Hampton Roads; have the work on 
 the other gunboats carried on day and night with all force pos- 
 sible to ' 1 i; on them, and when ready send them to Hamp- 
 ton RoaJ ." "If Chocura and Penobscot have not sailed, 
 send them to Hampton Roads as soon as steam can be gotten 
 up; also .'■he Marblehead, or any other gunboat ready." To 
 Commode re Hiram Paulding, commandant at the New York 
 Navy Ya- d, he telegraphed March 17th: " Send what gunboats 
 you h-- v., the yard to Hampton Roads at once." To Capt. 
 Wm. . Hudson, commandant at the Boston Navy Yard, he 
 telegrap. d at the same time: " Send what gunboats you have 
 at the js d to Hampton Roads at once." And as Secretary 
 Welles w, ,s in despair crying for gunboats to be sent to Hamp- 
 ton Roads, Dahlgren and Meigs were running canal boats 
 loaded with stone down the Potomac. 
 
 " The possibility of theMerrimac appearing again paralyzes 
 the moven^ents of this army by whatever route is adopted," 
 was the opmion of Gen. Barnard expressed to Assistant Secre- 
 tary Fox; and if the Virginia had been turned towards Fort- 
 ress Monror , Meigs and Dahlgren would have filled the Potomac 
 brimfuU of stone; while McClellan and Wool relied on filling 
 the channel between Craney Island and Se well's Point as the 
 surest means of sealing up the terrible Virginia; and " to take 
 the battery at Sewell's Point, it would require the Monitor. 
 Neither of us (Wool and Goldsborough) think it would do to use 
 the Monitor for that service, lest she should become crippled. 
 She is ou only hope against the Merrimac." It was actually 
 proposed by Secretary Stanton to let the destruction of the 
 Merrima^ out by contract, and to that end John Tucker, Assist- 
 ant Seer .tary of War, wrote to Com. Vanderbilt, New York, 
 March 15th, 1863: "The Secretary of War directs me to ask 
 "you for what sum you will contract to destroy the Merrimac, 
 or prevent her from coming out from Norfolk — you to sink or 
 destroy her if she gets out — answer by telegraph, as there is no 
 time to be lost." To which Mr. Vanderbilt replied that he 
 could " make no satisfactory reply to the inquiry made of him, 
 but will be in Washington on Monday next to confer with the 
 department."' 
 
 In the meantime, Com. Vanderbilt presented the steamer 
 Vanderhilt to the government, and on March 30th, Secretary 
 
 1 Off. B, '., Series 1, Vol. IX. p. 15-31. 
 1 
 
178 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Stanton wrote to him at New York: "The President desires to 
 turn to the utmost account your patriotic and generous gift to 
 the government of the great steamship Vanderbilt, and to use 
 and. employ that ship for protection and defence against the 
 rebel iron-clad ship Merrimac."^ Two days afterward, on the 
 22d, Secretary Stanton wrote to Major Gen. John E. Wool, com- 
 manding at Fortress Monroe : ' ' The steamship Vanderbilt sailed 
 from New York last night for Fortress Monroe. She has been 
 given to tho. War Department and accepted by the President, 
 and is designed to serve and be employed under the instruc- 
 tions of this Department for the convoy and protection of gov- 
 ernment transports at Fortress Monroe and especially for the 
 destruction of the Merrimac."^ Secretary Stanton, on the 
 27th, gave Cornelius Vanderbilt a letter of introduction to Gen. 
 Wool and he proceeded to Fortress Monroe to "aid in the de- 
 struction of the Merrimac." He also placed at his disposal, 
 beside his own steamer (the Vanderbilt), which had arrived 
 at Fortress Monroe, the steamer Matamora. ^ Assistant Sec- 
 retary of War P. H. Watson, writing from Cherrystone, Va., 
 on March 28th, 1862, to Hon. E. M. Stanton, Secretary of 
 War, said: "Yesterday afternoon I visited the Vanderbilt, 
 and found her preparations are far advanced and that she 
 is at any moment ready for action. Her steam is kept con- 
 stantly up. There are seven steamers here, all ready to act 
 as rams, with more or less efficiency, but by their combined 
 operations abundantly able to destroy the Merrimac. In my 
 judgment it is impossible for the Merrimac to come down to 
 Fortress Monroe without being sunk by the rams. She can run 
 up James River; she can attack Newport News, and do what 
 she pleases above Fortress Monroe, as the channel above is too 
 narrow and crooked to admit of the steam rams being worked 
 against her with effect ; but while remaining up there out of 
 our reach she can do us no harm. Commodore Goldsborough 
 is fully awake to the importance of destroying the Merrimac, 
 and has a clear comprehension of the manner in which that 
 can best be done with the means at his command. I think he 
 will do his duty both skillfully and bravely, and I have no 
 doubt with success. Mr. Vanderbilt fully approves Commo- 
 dore Goldsborough's plan of battle, and desires the steamer 
 Vanderbilt to remain under Goldsborough's command.* I 
 have directed her so to remain until otherwise ordered by you. 
 The large ^uns are not made available as they ought to be. 
 The fifteen-inch gun is not yet ready to be used with any effici- 
 ency, although it is mounted upon a carriage. It is important 
 to have the great gun made available immediately for defence 
 against the Merrimac."^ On April 7th, 1862, Gen. McClellan 
 
 1 OJftcial Records, Seriea 1, Vol. XI. Part in. 4 Gen. 'Wool had turned the Vanderbilt over to 
 p. 26. The italics are oura. Flag-of&cer GoldBborough on March 24th, which 
 
 „ ,, ., n„ met with the disapproval of Secretary Stanton on 
 
 2 2bid, p. 20. tbe int.— Off. Bee. Ser. 1, Vol. XI. PartHI. p.«. 
 
 3 Ibid. p. 43. 5 Ibid, p. 46. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 179 
 
 in despair, wrote to Gen. Wool : "I wish the Merrimac would 
 come out, so that we could get our gunboats up the James 
 River;" and Commodore GoTdsborough, in reply, said: "I 
 dare not leave the Merrimac and consorts unguarded. Were 
 she out of the way everything I have here should be at work 
 in your behalf ; but as things stand you must not count upon 
 my sending any more vessels to aid your operations than those 
 I mentioned to you.'" Gen. Wool on April 11th, in a letter 
 to Secretary Stanton, said: "The Merrimac, Jamestown, 
 Yorktown, and several gunboats and tugs appeared between 
 Newport News and Sewell's Point. The only damage done us 
 is the capture of three small vessels, one empty, one loaded 
 with hay, and the other loaded, it is said, with coal. * * No 
 effort was made to prevent the capture."* At 5 p. m., in the 
 same afternoon, Gen. Wool telegraphed to the Secretary: 
 "Merrimac came down toward the Monitor and Stevens. The 
 latter fired four or five rounds and the Merrimac one round, 
 when she, with her consorts, returned to Craney Island."' 
 
 Flag-officer Goldsborough, in a letter to Mr. Lincoln, on May 
 9th, said : " On the Merrimac' s appearance outside of the wrecks 
 [at Sewell's Point], the Monitor had orders to fall back into 
 fair channel way, and only to engage her seriously in such a 
 position that this ship [the Minnesota'], together with the mer- 
 chant vessels intended for the purpose, could run her down. 
 If an opportunity presented itself, the other vessels were not 
 to hesitate to run her down, and the Baltimore, an unarmed 
 steamer of light draught, high speed, and with a curved bow, 
 was kept in the direction of the Monitor expressly to throw 
 herself across the Merrimac, either forward or aft of her plated 
 house. But the Merrimac did not engage the Monitor, nor did 
 she place herself where she could have been assailed by our 
 ram vessels to any advantage, or where there was any pros- 
 pect whatever of getting at her."* 
 
 It was probably fortunate that the ships fitted up for the 
 purpose of running the Virginia down did not make a serious 
 attempt. Their own destruction, instead of that of the 
 Virginia, would most likely have been the consequence. 
 
 ^Off.Bec. Ser. 1, Vol. XI. Partm. pp. 77, 80. mandedbyO.S. naval officers, said: "Theircan- 
 
 non are managed and served witli surprising ac- 
 
 2 Ibid, pp. 88, 89. curacy, exceeding anything I have heretofore 
 
 known, and there is every indication of a most 
 
 8 Mi p. 89. J. S. Miasroon, of the WachmM, determined resistance." Ibid,, p. 123. Speali- 
 
 writing to Gen. McOlellan, on April Uth, 1862, ing of tlie gallant and efficient services rendered 
 
 said he had received intelligence from a " con- by some of the naval officers under his com- 
 
 trahand" who was "jioi intelligent," and who mand. Major Gen. J. B. Magruder, in his of- 
 
 came on board from Gloucester, in a canoe, flcial report of operations on the Peninsula, 
 
 "that the batterv at Gloucester Point is com- under date of May 3d, 1862, says: "Thatac- 
 
 manded by Jeff Page, late of the TJ. S. navy, a oomplished officer, Capt. Thomas Jefferson Page 
 
 good officer; Richard Page, also formerly of of the navy, successfully applied the resources 
 
 navy, in command of one of the upper works at of his genius and lipe experience to the defence 
 
 Gloucester; that they are very sanguine of sink- of Gloucester Point. My thanks are due to Capt. 
 
 ing vessels, and have practiced their firing, Chatard of the navy, for valuable services as 
 
 Tfhich is very accurate; says Page ( Jefl) can kill inspector of batteries, and to Lieut. Col. Noland, 
 
 a dog at a mile." /ftid, p. 99. This same officer, late of the navy, the efficient Commander of the 
 
 on April 23d, writing to Commodore Golds- batteries at Mulberry Island Point." 
 borough about the batteries in the neighboi*- 
 
 hood of Yorktown, wiiich were nearly all com- ^ Ibid, p. 155. 
 
180 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 In further corroboration and explanation of the stone 
 blockade of the Potomac, and of the extraordinary proposi- 
 tion of the U. S. Secretary of War to contract with Vanderbilt 
 for the destruction of the Virginia, ex-Secretary Welles wrote 
 to the Philadelphia Times, of December 3d, 1877, as follows: 
 
 " On the evening of that memorable Sunday I received from Dahl- 
 gren, who was in command of the navy-yard, a message, stating that he, 
 and all the force he could command, were employed in loading and pre- 
 paring the boats which had been sent to the yard. He supposed by my 
 order and with my approval, although he had received no word from me. 
 I replied that I had purchased no boats, given no orders, and that if I 
 rightly apprehended the object and intention of the work in which he 
 was engaged, I did not approve it. When I called on the President the 
 next morning Stanton was already there, stating some grievance, and, as 
 I entered, he turned to me and inquired my reason for countermanding 
 his orders. He proceeded to state that he had directed the purchase of 
 all the boats that could be procured in Washington, Georgetown and 
 Alexandria, which were being laden with stone and earth, under the 
 direction of Col. Meigs and Dahlgren, with a view of sinking them at 
 Kettle Bottom Shoals, some fifty miles or more below, in order to prevent 
 the ascension of the Merrimao. That whUe the officers whom he had de 
 tailed, he supposed with my approval, were actively engaged, they had 
 been suddenly stopped by an order from me to Dahlgren. He was still 
 complaining when Dahlgren, and I believe Meigs also, came in, and I then 
 learned that great preparations had been made to prooiire a fleet of boats, 
 which were to be sunk at Kettle Bottom, to protect Washington. I 
 objected, and said I would rather expend money to remove obstacles than 
 to impede navigation; that the navy had labored through the fall and 
 winter to keep open this avenue to the ocean; that the army had not 
 driven the rebels from the Virginia shore, nor assisted us in this work, 
 though they had been greatly benefitted by our efforts in the transporta- 
 tion of their supplies, forage, etc.; that to our shame there was but a 
 single railroad track to the capital, though we had here ah army of more 
 than 100,000 to feed, and that 1 should not consent to take any of the naval 
 appropriation to cut off water communication, unless so ordered by the 
 President ; butshouldprotestagainstobstruetingthechannelof theriver. 
 Our conversation was very earnest, and the President attentively Hstened, 
 but with an evident inclination to guard in every way against the Merri- 
 Ttiac, but yet unwilling to interrupt ocean communication, so essential to 
 Washington. Giving the interview a pleasant turn, he said it was evident i 
 
 that Mars not only wanted exclusive control of military operations (Stan- 
 ton had manifested much dissatisfaction with McClellan as General-in- 
 chief), but that he wanted a navy, and had begun to improvise one. 
 Having already got his fleet, the President thought he might as well be 
 permitted to finish his work, but he must not destroy communication 
 on the Potomac or cripple Neptune. The boats purchased might be 
 loaded and sent down the river, but not sunk in the channel until it was 
 known the Merrimao had entered the river or was on its way hither. ^i 
 
 Whatever expense was incurred must be defrayed by the War Depart- !j 
 
 ment. With this understanding Dahlgren was authorized fo supervise \' 
 
 and assist Stanton's squadron. 
 
 " In addition to his fleet of canal boats, scowboats and other craft, ! 
 
 Cornelius Vanderbilt, who owned several large steamers, a man of well- 
 known energy and enterprise, was invited by Stanton to Washington for 
 consultation and advice. He was informed that the egress of the Merri- 
 mao must be prevented, and the vessel destroyed whenever she appeared ; ; 
 that the War Department did not rely upon the Monitor, but proposed . j* 
 to stop and destroy her independent of the navy, and that he had more ,1 
 confidence in the capability, suggestions and prowess of individuals like. ' 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 181 
 
 Vanderbilt, who depended on their own resources, than on naval officers, 
 who were circumscribed by their education and trained to a particular 
 service. He concluded by asking the great steamboat chief if he could in 
 any way destroy or overcome the Merrimac. 
 
 " Gratified with the summons, and complimented by the confidence 
 expressed in his superior ability by the Secretary of War, "Vanderbilt re- 
 sponded that he could destroy the Merrimac, and was ready to do so, but 
 he wanted the Monitor out of the way, and must be permitted to do the 
 work subject to no control of naval officers or any interference from them 
 or from naval vessels. If they would all get out of the way he would run 
 down the Merrimac with his big ship ' Vanderbilt.^ The employment of 
 this great ship corresponded with Stanton's ideas of power and force. He 
 was delighted, and went with Vanderbilt to the President, who assented 
 to the scheme, but was unwilhng to dispense with the Monitor, which had 
 done so well, and suggested that an encounter of the large wooden steamer 
 with the armored ship might result in the destruction of the Vanderbilt 
 instead of the Merrimac. In that event a good sale would be made of the 
 Vanderbilt, and the government might be compelled to pay largely for 
 the experiment without being benefitted. Vanderbilt replied that he 
 would take the risk; that he was anxious to assist the government; that 
 he had already offered his vessel to the Secretary of the Navy on his own 
 terms, and would have given her to him, but the Secretary wouldn't take 
 her; he would make a present of her to the President, requiring, however, 
 that the engineers and employees on board should be retained at present 
 wages. Pleased with the suggestion that the Merrimac might be run 
 down, and thus a double security provided against her, not only the Van- 
 derbilt, but the Baltic, and one or two other large merchant steamers, were 
 chartered and stationed in Hampton Roads." 
 
 Mr. Welles is a competent witness in favor of the Virginia's 
 victory, though it must be confessed that he ceases to be en- 
 tirely reliable when he comes to relate subsequent events. 
 Continuing his narrative, he says : 
 
 " These immense vessels, lofty and grand, were anchored near Fortress 
 Monroe, where they remained for two months, at no small expense, await- 
 ing the appearance of the Merrimac, but no opportunity occurred to run 
 her down; that vessel, in her conflict with the Monitor, sustained serious 
 injury, and her officers, dreading more the novel craft which she had en- 
 countered on the 9th of March than the large wooden steamers, never 
 again descended Elizabeth River to the Roads.'' 
 
 Indisputable evidence exists to contradict the statement 
 of Mr. Welles that the Virginia " never again descended Eliza- 
 beth River to the Roads," in the established facts that she 
 captured prizes from under the guns of the Monitor, Vander- 
 bilt, and the forts, that she drove off the fleet from Sewell's 
 Point, and repeatedly offered battle in the Roads. The Hon- 
 orable Secretary seems, in 1877, to have forgotten a letter he 
 wrote of date November 7th, 1874, to Gr. V. Fox, in relation to 
 this same fight. That letter was as follows : 
 
 "Habtfobd, Nov. 7th, 1874. 
 "My Dear Sib: Your favor of the 3d inst., in the Catesby Jones nar- 
 rative, I duly received and read with interest. You ask me whether you 
 had better give it to the press. I see no objection, if his name goes with 
 it. . Of course, his statement is tinged with his feelings and views, for 
 which allowance will be made. But he is a man of character, and pre- 
 sents the case as he understands it. I am always glad to read the 
 
182 THE CONFEDERATE STATES KAVY. 
 
 statements of reliable men among the secessionists, and they are often 
 quite as truthful as representations and histories on our side. 
 
 " Truly yours, GIDEON Wbli/ES. 
 
 "G. V. Fox, Boston." 
 
 In 1876, ex- Assistant Secretary of the Navy Gr. V. Fox 
 prepared an account of the Monitor for an encyclopsedia in 
 which he gave a short and fair description of the fight in 
 Hampton Roads. The proof sheets Mr. Pox sent to Com- 
 mander Catesby Jones, who immediately wrote to Mr. Fox 
 the following letter: 
 
 "Nb-w York, June 20th, 1876. 
 
 " Mt Dear Fox: Tour Monitor article has been forwarded to me 
 from Selma. Thanks for it. It is by far the fairest Northern account 
 of the fight that I have seen. There are, however, some errors which I 
 will mention, knowing how desirous you are that it shall be a true history. 
 
 " You say the Merrimac ' was armed with an approved broadside 
 battery of rifled guns.' 
 
 " Each broadside consisted of three smooth-bore guns and but one 
 rifle gun. 
 
 Of the first day's fight, you say: 'By five o'clock the battle was 
 over.' 
 
 " It continued at least one and a half hours later. "We fought until 
 it was so dark that we could not see to point the guns with accuracy. We 
 did not leave the vicinity of the Congress until after the pilots had sevei-al 
 times urged me to seek an anchorage, and, in fact, did not leave until 
 they would not be responsible if we did not. 
 
 " Of the second day's fight you say: 'Once whilst the vessels were 
 thus separated, the Merrimao fired three shells at the Minnesota.'' Do 
 you refer to the time when the Monitor ran into shoal water to hoist up 
 shot as stated by Worden ? And again you say: ' When near noon the 
 Jfowitor hauled off.' * * * This movement laid open the .Mijmew^a to 
 another attack from the Merrimac, but her commander did not, as previ- 
 ously, avail himself of it.' You also say that ' the Merrimao fired torty- 
 six shells at the Monitor and four at the Minnesota.'' 
 
 "The unavoidable inference being, that we only fired at the Minne- 
 sota when the Monitor had hauled off, but this is very erroneous. We fre- 
 quently fired at the Minnesota whilst we were fighting the Monitor, and 
 we actually fired more shell at the wooden vessel on the second day than 
 we did at the iron-clad. I had intended to have incorporated in my nar- 
 rative the exact expenditure of powder and shell, but lost it, and as the 
 gunner's memory was entirely at fault, I did not allude to the matter at 
 all. 
 
 " On the first day you say ' It was full sea there at 1.56 P. M., and 
 ■whilst the Cumberland was ' riding ' to the last of the fiood the Merrimac 
 ran into her.' 
 
 " When we ran into the Cumberland, she had canted with her head 
 toward the Newport News side, so that on approaching her, we did not 
 have to change our course in order to give her a fair blow. 
 
 " On the second day you say we passed the bar ' at meridian three 
 hours before high water.' Are you not mistaken as to the time of high 
 water ? I think you must be. If not, the pilots misled me. We only de- 
 termined to leave when we did, because they said if we did not, we could 
 not leave until the next day. The tide was running flood when the fight 
 commenced. I wanted to fight the Minnesota with our starboard battery, 
 two of the guns on the port side being disabled, but owing to the flood- 
 tide we had to keep the vessel's head down stream, and fire at the Minne- 
 sota with the port battery. We certainly would not have returned to 
 Norfolk had I nave supposed it wanted three hours of high water. My 
 impression too is that it was ebb tide when we arrived at the Navy Yard 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 183 
 
 which would not have been the case if you are right. The pilots were 
 very cautious, and would not consent to move the vessel except under the 
 most favorable conditions of tide, etc. 
 
 "As all Confederate accounts called our vessel the '■Virginia,' it would 
 have been well to have mentioned it, or, at the next centennial the two 
 names may be believed to refer to different vessels. 
 
 ' ' Tou incorrectly state that we lightened one inch for twenty -four tons 
 consumption, it should be for fifteen tons ; but the prow and anchor being 
 lost from the bows caused her to come up much more forward than aft. 
 
 " You say we were ' under repairs ' more than a month. It did not 
 require that length of time to repair her. We were endeavoring to com- 
 plete her, but could not. She never was completed. 
 
 " My name is incorrect. 
 
 "I have written hurriedly amid interruptions, but believe I have no 
 more to say. Address, etc. 
 
 "Catesbt ap E. Jonbs. 
 
 "G. V. Fox, Boston.' 
 
 To this criticism ex-Secretary Fox replied as foUow^s : 
 
 "Boston, Aug. 2d, 1876. 
 
 " Mt Dear Commander : I received both of your letters. When your 
 first arrived I had packed up my things for the Beach and could not 
 reply, by authority, to your criticisms. I am not keeping house and 
 when I leave the hotel 1 give up my rooms and stow away my things. 
 However I will do the best I can, taking up your remarks seriatim. 
 
 "'Approved battery of rifle guns.' I gave the battery at first as 
 you sent it, and should have left out ' rifle guns ' or put in rifle and smooth 
 tore. ' By five o'clock the battle was over,' I have not been able to obtain 
 xmiformity upon this point, and will seek more light. The number of 
 shot fired by the Merrimac I feel sure you gave me, but cannot get your 
 letters before fall. See Van Brunt's rejport, and the different officers' re- 
 ports of the Minnesota. If you can give me any more authentic proof 
 upon this sub,iect, should Uke it. The high tides are from the Coast Sur- 
 vey office, taken actually on that day at Old Point, and computed for 
 !<■. News and Norfolk, therefore you must have rammed the Cumberland 
 before 1.56 P. m., immediately after which the Congress surrendered. I 
 ^ave three hours to finishing her. I never wrote your name as it is printed. 
 I will put it M. and Virginia. The histories all use Merrimac. I could 
 not get a proof until it was printed, and now the first edition is out, but it 
 will be foUowed immediately by another which I shall be happy to cor- 
 rect where I can see any way to do so- My account differs from all North- 
 €m accounts as well as the Count de Paris', but it accords with the views 
 I stated to Mr. Lincoln and Gen. McCleUan after I had witnessed the con- 
 test. 
 
 " The exact truth about all these matters is what I am seeking for, 
 the source is immaterial. ■ Where there is a conflict I must use the best 
 judgment I possess to endeavor to reconcile them. The log-books I found 
 not to be of much use. Give me all your criticisms at your leisure and I 
 will investigate each one carefully. 
 
 "Tours truly, 
 
 "G. V. Fox." 
 
 "Boston, Aug. 3d, 1876. 
 "Dear Commander : Capt. Selfridge, who was a lieutenant onboard 
 the Cumberland, writes me that the Merrimac struck the Cumberland 
 three times, the last one being the mortal blow. Is that so ? 
 " I wrote you yesterday. 
 
 "Yours truly, 
 
 " G. V. Fox." 
 
184 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Later in 1876, on December 23d, Mr. Fox again wrote to 
 Commander Jones as follows : 
 
 " Boston, Dec. 23d, 1876. 
 
 "Dear Commander: I have yours of the 19th inst. When I was in 
 New York the other day, I called at the Cyclopsedia ofiBee, and they told 
 me that any corrections I wish to make could be inserted whenever they 
 printed another edition, which happened every year almost. They con- 
 fined me to the same space, because they print say 500 copies to an edition, 
 then sell those and are ready to use the same plates for another 500. They 
 insert corrections by cutting out a space of metal and inserting another. 
 I have all your letters and other correspondence tied up in a bundle, and 
 whatever fact you send me I will look into it and correct it unless the 
 weight of evidence on the other side throws it into a doubt. 
 
 " With regard to the displacement and rise per ton, I got the figures 
 from old John Lenthal. I enclose the article. You can go over it very 
 carefully at your leisure and send me the facts as they seemed to you. 
 
 " If we divest ourselves of passion, and meet the political difficulty 
 with the calmness and good judgment I witnessed at Columbia, S. C, 
 where the provocation to fling discretion to the winds is greater than any 
 State has hitherto been subjected to, then we shall pull through. If we 
 lived in a hereditary form of government, and were subjected to the 
 wrongs which now threaten us, an appeal to arms would be the proper 
 course, but the multipUcity of our elections enable us to overthrow a 
 government after a while, no matter how much cheating goes on. The 
 South are setting our people a great example, and winning esteem from 
 the North in spite of prejudice. 
 
 " Whichever party makes a blunder by forcing matters in the next 
 three months will disappear from history. The experiment of an appeal 
 to force, to remedy political troubles, has not resulted satisfactorily to 
 any section or to our common country. A happy Christmas to you and 
 Mrs. J. 
 
 " Sincerely, 
 
 " G. V. Fox." 
 
 _ It will be seen from the above letter that the Encyclopaedia 
 article on the Monitor was subject to repeated emendations 
 and alterations. When it appeared first in 1874, its publication 
 drew from Mr. J. Ericsson the following letters of protest: 
 
 " New York, Nov. 24th, 1874. 
 
 "My Dear Sir: I am quite at a loss to understand why you have 
 opened a fresh discussion about the Monitor and Merrimao fight, so 
 happily disposed of by several patriotic writers, to the satisfaction of the 
 country— I may say to the satisfaction of the whole world. No one knows 
 better than yourself the shortcomings of that fight, ended at the moment 
 when the crew had become well trained and the machinery got in good 
 working order. Why 1 Because you had a miserable executive officer 
 who, instead of jumping into the pilot-house when Worden was blinded, 
 ran away with his impregnable vessel. The displacement of the top 
 plate of the pilot-house, which I had designed principally to keep out 
 spray in bad weather, was really an advantage by allowing fresh air to 
 enter the cramped iron-walled cabin — certainly that displacement offered 
 no excuse for discontinuing the fight, the revolving turret and the good 
 steering qualities of the Monitor rendering it unnecessary to fire over the 
 pilot-house. 
 
 ' ' Regarding the rebel statement before me, I can only say that if pub- 
 lished it will forever tarnish the lustre of your naval administration, and 
 amaze our people who have been told that the Merrimao was a terrible 
 ship, which but for the Monitor would have destroyed the Union fleet, 
 and burnt the Atlantic cities. 
 
COMMANDER CATESBY AP R. JONES. 
 CONFEDERATE STATES »AVT. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 185. 
 
 " In fact, that the Monitor had saved the country. Need I say that 
 Jones' statement -will be published in the professional journals of aU civ- 
 ilized countries, and call forth sneers and condemnation from a legion of 
 Monitor opponents. 
 
 M,'^-^?^"'' ^o"'^* Platen, and Alderspanes, the criticism and blame that 
 will be heaped upon them by the present king's party will be insupport- 
 able. How the changes will be rung on the statement of the Merrimac's 
 commanding officer that the Cumberland could have sunk his vessel (ad- 
 mitted to be 'unseaworthy,' the hull being covered by only one-inch 
 plating), yet the Monitor -^aa unable to inflict any damage, not a man on 
 board the Merrimac wounded or killed. But the unarmed Cumberland 
 destroyed two guns, killing and wounding several of the Merrimac's 
 crew. 
 
 " Again, the Monitor, wh,en challenged to come out, ' hugged the shore 
 under the guns of the fort.' Counter statements, even if believed, would 
 never be published. But I have said enough. Should the rebel state- 
 ment be published its effect will be more damaging than probably any 
 incident of my life. ^ ^ 
 
 " Please find your several documents enclosed, 
 
 "Yours truly, "J. Ebicsson. 
 
 " P. S. — The original written under strong emotion, being nearly un- 
 intelUgible, I forward the copy. 
 
 "Yours, "J.Ericsson." 
 
 " The rebel statement before " Mr. Ericsson, was the ac- 
 count of the fight between the Monitor and the Virginia^^xii- 
 ten by Commander Catesby ap R. Jones, and published in the 
 Southern Historical Society Papers, p. 65 to 75, No. 3-3, Vol. 
 XI., which is as follows : 
 
 " When on April 31st, 1861, the Virginians took possession of the 
 abandoned navy-yard at Norfolk, they found that the Merrimac had 
 been burnt and sunk. She was raised; and on June 33d following, the 
 Hon. 8. R. Mallory, Confederate Secretary of the Navy, ordered that she 
 should be converted into an iron-clad, on the plan proposed by Lieut. 
 John M. Brooke, C. S. N. 
 
 " The hull was 375 feet long. About 160 feet of the central T)ortion 
 was covered by a roof of wood and iron, inclining about thirty-six degrees. 
 The wood was two feet thick; it consisted of oak plank four inches by 
 twelve inches, laid up and down next the iron, and two courses of pine; 
 one longitudinal of eight inches thickness, the other twelve inches 
 thick. 
 
 " The intervening space on top was closed by permanent gratings of 
 two inch square iron two and one-half inches apart, leaving'openings for 
 four hatches, one near each end, and one forward and one abaft the 
 smoke-stack. The roof did not project beyond the hull. There was no 
 knuckle as in the Atlanta, Tennessee and our other iron clads of later and 
 improved construction. The ends of the shield were rounded. 
 
 "The armor was four inches thick. It was fastened to its wooden 
 backing by one and three-eighths inch bolts, countersunk and secured 
 by iron nuts and washers. The plates were eight inches wide. Those 
 first made were one inch thick, which was as thick as we could then punch 
 cold iron. We succeeded soon in punching two inches, and the remaining 
 plates, more than two-thirds, were two inches thick. They were rolled 
 and punched at the Tredegar Works, Eichmond. The outside course was 
 up and down, the next longitudinal. Joints were broken where there 
 were more than two courses. 
 
 " The hull, extending two feet below the roof, was plated with one- 
 inch iron; it was intended that it should have had three inches. 
 
186 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 "The prowwas of cast-iron, -wedge-shape, and weighed 1,500 pounds. 
 It was about two feet under water, and projected two leet from the stem; 
 it was not well fastened. 
 
 " The rudder and propeller were unprotected. 
 
 " The battery consisted of ten guns, four single-banded Brooke rifles, 
 and six nine-inch Dahlgren shell guns. Two of the rifles, bow and stern 
 pivots, were seven-inch, of 14,500 pounds; the other two were six four-inch 
 (thirty -two pounds caUbre), of 9,000 pounds, one on each broadside. The 
 nine-inch gun on each side nearest the furnaces was fitted for firing hot 
 shot. A few nine-inch shot, with extra windage, were cast for hot shot. 
 No other solid shot were on board during the fight. 
 
 "The engines were the same the vessel had whilst in the United 
 States navy. They were radically defective, and had been condemned 
 by the United States government. Some changes had been made, not- 
 withstanding which, the engineers reported that they were unreUable. 
 They performed very well during the fight, but afterwards failed several 
 times, once whilst under fire. 
 
 " There were many vexatious delays attending the fitting and equip- 
 ment of the ship. Most of them arose from the want of skilled labor, and 
 lack of proper tools and appliances. Transporting the iron from Rich- 
 mond also caused much delay ; the railroads were taxed to supply the 
 army. 
 
 " The crew, 320 in number, were obtained with great difficulty. With 
 few exceptions they were volunteers from the army; most of them were 
 landsmen. Their deficiencies were, as much as possible, overcome by the 
 zeal and intelligence of the officers; a Ust of them is appended. In the 
 fight one of the nine-inch guns was manned by a detachment of the Nor- 
 folk United Artillery. 
 
 " The vessel was by the Confederates called Virginia. She was put 
 in commission during the last week of February, but continued crowded 
 with mechanics until the eve of the fight. She was badly ventilated, very 
 uncomfortable, and very unhealthy. There was an average of fifty or 
 sixty at the hospital, in addition to the sick Ust on board. 
 
 " The Flag-officer, Franklin Buchanan, was detained in Richmond in 
 charge of an important bureau, from which he was only relieved a few 
 days before the fight. There was no captain; the ship was commissioned 
 and equipped by the executive and ordnance officer, who had reported 
 for duty in November. He had by special order selected her battery, and 
 was also made responsible for its efficiency. 
 
 "A trial was determined upon, although the vessel was in an incom- 
 plete condition. The lower part of the shield forward was only im- 
 mersed a few inches, instead of two feet as was intended; and there was 
 but one inch of iron on the hull. The port-shutters, etc., were im- 
 finished. 
 
 " The Virginia was imseaworthy, her engines were unreliable, and 
 her draft, over twenty- two feet, prevented her from going to Washing- 
 ton. Her field of operation was therefore restricted to the bay and its im- 
 mediate vicinity; there was no regular concerted movement with the 
 army. ' 
 
 " The frigates Congress and Cumberland, temptingly invited an at- 
 tack. It was fixed for Thursday night, March 6th, 1863 ; the pilots, of 
 whom there were five, having been previously consulted. The sides were 
 slushed, supposing that it would increase the tendency of the projectiles 
 to glance. AU prepara,tions were made, including lights at obstructions. 
 After dark the pilots declared that they could not pilot the ship during 
 the night. They had a high sense of their responsibility. In justice to 
 
 1 niere was. however, an informal under- in order that his command might be concen- 
 
 standing between Gen. Magmder, who com- trated near Hampton when our attack should 
 
 mandea the Confederate forces on the Penin- be made. The movement was prevented in 
 
 eula, a-nd the executive officer, to the effect tliat consequence of a large portion of the command 
 
 Gen. Magruder should be kept advised by us, having been detached just before the flght. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 187 
 
 them it should be stated that it was not easy to pilot a vessel of our great 
 draft under favorable circumstances, and that the diiflculties were much 
 increased by the absence of Ughts, buoys, etc., to which they had been 
 accustomed. 
 
 "The attack was postponed to Saturday, March 8th. The weather 
 was favorable. We left the navy-yard at 11 A. M., against the last half 
 of the flood tide, steamed down the river past our batteries, through the 
 obstructions, across Hampton Roads, to the mouth of James River, 
 where, off Newport News, lay at anchor the frigates Cumberland and 
 Congress, protected by strong batteries and gunboats. The action com- 
 menced about 3 p. M. by our firing the bow-gun ^ at the Cumberland, less 
 than a mile distant. A powerful fire was immediately concentrated upon 
 "US from all the batteries afloat and ashore. The frigates Minnesota, Roan- 
 oke and St. Lawrence with other vessels, were seen coming from Old Point. 
 We fired at the Congress on passing, but continued to head directly for 
 the Cumberland, which vessel we had determined to run into, and in less 
 than fifteen minutes from the firing of the first gun we rammed her just 
 forward of the starboard foe chains. There were heavy spars about her 
 bows, probably to ward off torpedoes, through which we had to break 
 before reaching the side of the ship, The noise of the crashing timbers 
 was distinctly heard above the din of battle. There was no sign of the 
 hole above water. It must have been large, as the ship soon commenced 
 to careen. The shock to us on striking was sUght. We immediately 
 backed the engines. The blow was not repeated. We here lost the prow, 
 and had the stem slightly twisted. The Cumberland^ fought her guns 
 gallantly as long as they were above water. She went down bravely, 
 with her colors flying. One of her shells struck the sill of the bow-port 
 and exploded; the fragments killed two and wounded a number. Our aft 
 nine-inch gun was loaded and ready for firing, when its muzzle was struck 
 by a shell, which broke it off and fired the gun. Another gun also had 
 its muzzle shot off ; it was broken so short that at each subsequent dis- 
 charge its port was set on fire. The damage to the armor was slight. 
 Their fire appeared to have been aimed at our ports. Had it been con- 
 centrated on the water-line we would have been seriously hurt, if not 
 sunk. Owing to the ebb-tide and our great draft we could not close with 
 the Congress without first going up stream, which was a tedious operation, 
 besides subjecting us twice to the full fire of the batteries, some of which 
 we sUenced. 
 
 " We were accompanied from the yard by the gunboats Beaufort, 
 Lieut. Commander W. H. Parker, and Raleigh, Lieut. Commander J. W. 
 Alexander. As soon as the firing was heard up James River, the Patrick 
 Henry, Commander John R. Tucker, Jamestown, Lieut. Commander 
 J. N. Barney, and the gunboat Teaser, Lieut. Commander W. A. Webb, 
 Tinder command of Capt. John R. Tucker, stood down the river, joming 
 us about four o'clock. All these vessels were gallantly fought and han- 
 dled, and rendered valuable and effective service. , , , ^ 
 
 "The prisoners from the Congress stated that when on board that 
 ship it was seen that we were standing up the river, that three cheers 
 were given under impression that we had quit the fight. They were soon 
 imdeceived. When they saw us heading down stream, fearing the fate of 
 the Cumberland, they slipped their cables, made sail, and ran ashore bows 
 on. We took a position off her quarter, about two cables' length distant, 
 and opened a deliberate fire. Very few of her guns bore on us, and they 
 were soon disabled. The other batteries continued to play on us, as <hd 
 the Minnesota, then aground about one and one-half miles off. The St. 
 Lawrence also opened on us shortly after. There was great havoc 
 on board the Congress. She was several times on fire. Her gallant 
 
 1 It kiUed and wounded ten men at the after 2 She was a sailing frigate of U^B tons 
 
 pivot gnn of the Cumberland. Tbe second shot mounting two ten-mch pivots and twenty-two 
 
 flred from the same gun killed and wounded nine-inoh guns. Her crew numbered 376; her 
 
 twelve men at her forward pivot gun. loss in killed and wounded was 121. 
 
188 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 commander, Lieat. Joseph B. Smitb, ' was struck in the breast by the frag- 
 ment of a shell and instantly^ killed. The carnage was frightful. Nothing^ 
 remained but to strike their colors, which they did. They hoisted the 
 white flag, half-masted, at the main and at the spanker gaff. TheSeau- 
 fort and Raleigh were ordered to burn her. They went alongside and 
 secured several of her officers and some twenty of her men as prisoners. 
 The officers urgently asked permission to assist their wounded out of the 
 ship. It was granted. They did not return. A sharp fire of musketry 
 from the shore killed some of the prisoners and forced the tugs to leave. 
 A boat was sent from, the Virginia to burn her, covered by the Teaser. 
 A fire was opened on them from the shore, and also from the Congress, 
 with both of her white flags flying, wounding Lieut. Minor and others. 
 We replied to this outrage upon the usages of civilized warfare by re- 
 opening on the Congress with hot shot and incendiary shell. Her crew 
 escaped by boats, as did that of the Cumberland. Canister and grape 
 would have prevented it; but in neither case was any attempt made to 
 stop them, though it has been otherwise stated, possibly from our firing 
 on the shore or at the Congress. 
 
 " We remained near the Congress to prevent her recapture. Had she 
 been retaken, it might have been said that the Flag-officer permitted it, 
 knowing that his brother'^ was an officer of that vessel. 
 
 "A 4istant and unsatisfactory fire was at times had at the Min- 
 nesota. The gunboats also engaged her. We fired canister and grape 
 occasionally in reply to musketry from the shore, which had become an- 
 noying. 
 
 " About this time the Flag-officer was badly wounded by a rifle-baU, 
 and had to be carried below. His bold daring and intrepid conduct won 
 the admiration of aU. on board. The Executive and Ordnance officer, 
 Lieut. Catesby Ap R. Jones, succeeded to the command. 
 
 "The action continued until dusk, when we were forced to seek an 
 anchorage. The Congress was riddled and on fire. A transport steamer 
 was blown up. A schooner was sunk and another captured. We had to 
 leave without making a serious attack on the Minnesota, though we fired 
 at her as we passed on the other side of the Middle Ground, and also at 
 the St. Lawrence.^ The latter frigate fired at us by broadsides, not a bad 
 plan for small calibres against iron-clads, if concentrated. It was too dark 
 to aim well. We anchored off oar batteries at Sewell's Point. The squad- 
 ron followed. 
 
 "The Congress^ continued to burn; 'she illuminated the heavens, 
 and varied the scene by the firing of her own guns and the flight of her 
 balls through the air,' until shortly after midnight, 'when her magazine 
 exploded, and a column of burning matter appeared high in the air, to be 
 followed by the stillness of death.' [Extract from report of General Mans- 
 field, U. 8. A.] One of the pilots chanced, about 11 p.m., to be looking 
 in the direction of the Congress, when there passed a strange looking 
 craft, brought out in bold relief by the brilliant hght of the burning 
 ship, which he at once proclaimed to be the Ericsson. We were therefore 
 not surprised in the morning to see the Monitor at anchor near the Min- 
 nesota. The latter ship was still aground. Some delay occurred from 
 sending our wounded out of the ship; we had but one serviceable boat 
 left. Admiral Buchanan was landed at Sewell's Point. 
 
 " At 8 A.M. we got under way, as did the Patrick Henry, Jamestown, 
 and Teaser. We stood towards the Minnesota and opened fire on her. 
 The pilots were to have placed us half-a-mile from her, but we were not at 
 
 1 His Bword was sent by flag of truce to his of the fourth lieutenant was also in the U. S. 
 father. Admiral Josfiph Smith. army. The father of one of the midshipmen 
 
 was in the U, S. navy, 
 
 ■\ °PI °^*'"' ""'^ attendants of civil ^Yar di- 3 ^ sailing frigate of fifty guus and 1,726 Ions, 
 
 vided famuies, was here illustrated. The Flag- o » .- o 
 
 officer's brother was paymaster of the Congress. -1 A sailing frigate of 1,867 tons, mounting fifty 
 
 The first and second lieutenants had each a guns. She had a crew of 434, of whom ther& 
 
 brother in the Umted States Army. The father were 120 killed and missing. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 189 
 
 any time nearer than a mile. The Monitor'^ commenced firing when 
 about a third of a mile distant. We soon approached, and were often 
 within a ship's length; once while passing we fired a broadside at her only 
 a few yards distant. She and her turret appeared to be under perfect 
 control. Her light draft enabled her to move about us at pleasure. She 
 once took position for a short time where we could not bring a gun to bear 
 on her. Another of her movements caused us great anxiety; she made 
 for our rudder and propeller, both of which could have been easily dis- 
 abled. We could only see her guns when they were discharged ; immedi- 
 ately afterward the turret revolved rapidly, and the guns were not again 
 seen until they were again flred. We wondered how proper aim could be 
 taken in the very short time the guns were in sight. The Virginia, however, 
 was a large target, and generally so near that the Monitor's shot did not 
 often miss. It did not appear to us that our shell had any effect upon 
 the Monitor. We had no solid shot; musketry was flred at the look-out 
 holes. In spite of all the care of our pilots we ran ashore, where we re- 
 mained over fifteen minutes. The Patrick Henry and Jamestown, with 
 great risk to themselves, started to our assistance. The Monitor and Min- 
 nesota were in full play on us. A small rifle-gun on board the Minnesota, 
 or on the steamer alongside of hei-, was flred with remarkable precision. 
 
 " When we saw that our fire made no impression on the Monitor, we 
 determined to run into her if possible. We found it a very diflBcult feat 
 to do. Our great length and draft, in a comparatively narrow channel, 
 with but little water to spare, made us sluggish in our movements, and 
 hard to steer and turn. When the opportunity presented all steam was 
 put on; there was not, however, sufficient time to gather full headway 
 before striking. The blow was given with the broad wooden stem, the 
 iron prow having been lost the day before. The Monitor received the 
 blow in such a manner as to weaken its effect, and the damage was to her 
 trifling. Shortly after an alarming leak in the bows was reported. It, 
 however, did not long continue. 
 
 "Whilst contending with the Monitor, we received the fire of the 
 Minnesota, ^ which we never failed to return whenever our guns could be 
 brought to bear. We set her on flre and did her serious injury, though 
 much less than we then supposed. Generally the distance was too great 
 for effective firing. We blew up a steamer alongside of her. 
 
 " The fight had continued over three hours. To us the J/bwito?* ap- 
 peared unharmed. We were thei-efore surprised to see her run off into 
 shoal water where our great draft would not permit us to follow, and 
 where our shell could not reach her. The loss of our prow and anchor, 
 and consumption of coal, water, etc., had lightened us so that the lower 
 part of the forward end of the shield was awash. 
 
 " We for some time awaited the return of the Monitor to the Roads. 
 After consultation it was decided that we should proceed to the navy - 
 yard, in order that the vessel should be brought down in the water and 
 completed. The pilots said if we did not then leave, that we could not 
 pass the bar until noon of the next day. We therefore at 12 M. quit 
 the Roads and stood for Norfolk. Had there been any sign of the 
 Monitor^s willingness to renew the contest, we would have remained to 
 fight her. We left her in the shoal water to which she had withdrawn 
 and which she did not leave until after we had crossed the bar on our 
 way to Norfolk. , „ , -, . j. 
 
 "The official report says: 'Our loss is two killed and mneteen 
 wounded. The stem is twisted and the ship leaks; we have lost the 
 prow, starboard anchor, and all the boats; the armor is somewhat dam- 
 aged, the steam-pipe and smoke-stack both riddled, the muzzles of the 
 
 1 She was 173 feet long and forty-one feetwide. 2 she was a screw steam frigate of 3,200 tons. 
 
 She had a revolving circular iron turret eight mounting forty-three guns of eight, nine and 
 
 inches thick, nine feet high and twenty feet in- ten-inch calibre. She flred 145 ten-inch, 34» 
 
 aide diameter, in which were two eleven-inch nine-inch, and thirty-four eighi^inch shot and 
 
 guns. Her draft was ten feet, less than half that shell, and 6,667 pounds of powder. Herdraft 
 
 of the Yirginia was about the same as the Virginia. 
 
190 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 two gans shot away; the colors were hoisted to the smoke-stack, and 
 several times cut down from it.' None were killed or wounded in the 
 fight with the Monitor. The only damage she did was to the armor. 
 She fired forty-one shots. We were enabled to receive most of them 
 obliquely. The effect of a shot striking obliquely on the shield was to 
 break all the iron, and sometimes to displace several feet of the outside 
 course; the wooden backing would not be broken through. When a 
 shot struck directly at right angles, the wood would also be broken 
 through, but not displaced. Generally the shot were much scattered; 
 in three instances two or more struck near the same place, in each case 
 causing more of the iron to be displaced, and the wood to bulge inside. 
 A few struck near the water-line. The shield was never pierced; though 
 it was evident that two shots striking in the same place would have 
 made a large hole through everything. 
 
 "The ship was docked; a prow of steel and wrought iron put on, and 
 a course of two-inch iron on the huU below the roof extending in length 
 180 feet. Want of time and material prevented its completion. The 
 damage to the armor was repaired; wrought iron port-shutters were fitted, 
 etc. The rifle guns were supplied with bolts of wroug:ht and chilled iron. 
 The ship was brought a foot deeper in the water, making her draft 23 feet. 
 
 " Commodore Josiah Tatnall relieved Admiral Buchanan in com- 
 mand. On the 11th of April he took the Virginia down to Hampton 
 Roads, expecting to ha ve a desperate encounter with the Monitor. Greatly 
 to our surprise, the Monitor refused to fight us. She closely hugged the 
 shore under the guns of the fort, with her steam up. Hoping to provoke 
 her to come out, the Jamestown^ was sent in, and captured several prizes, 
 but the Monitor woxild not budge. It was proposed to take the vessel to 
 York River, but it was decided in Richmond that she should remain near 
 Norfolk for its protection. 
 
 "Commodore Tatnall commanded the Virginia forty-five days, of 
 which time there were only thirteen days that she was not in dock or in 
 the hands of the navy -yard. Yet he succeeded in impressing the enemy 
 that we were resvdy for active service. It was evident that the enemy very 
 much overrated^ our power and efficiency. The South also had the same 
 exaggerated idea of the vessel. 
 
 " On the 8th of May a squadron, including the Monitor, bombarded 
 our batteries at Sewell's Point. We immediately left the yard for the 
 Roads. As we drew near, the Monitor and her consorts ceased bombard- 
 ing, and retreated under the guns of the forts, keeping beyond the range 
 of our guns. Men-of-war from below the forts, and vessels expressly fit- 
 ted for running us down, joined the other vessels between the forts. It 
 looked as if the fleet was about to make a fierce onslaught upon us. But 
 we were again to be disappointed. The Monitor and the other vessels did 
 not venture to meet us, although we advanced until projectiles from the 
 Rip-raps feU more than half a mile beyond us. Our object, however, was 
 accomplished; we had put an end to the bombardment, and we returned 
 to our buoy. 
 
 " Norfolk was evacuated on the 10th of May. In order that the ship 
 might be carried up the James River, we commenced to lighten her, but 
 ceased on the pilots saying they could not take her up. Her shield was 
 then out of water ; we were not in fighting condition. We therefore 
 ran her ashore in the bight of Craney Island, landed the crew, and set the 
 vessel on fire. The magazine exploded about half-past four on tlie morn- 
 ing of the 11th 'of May, 1863. The crew arrived at Drury's Bluff the 
 next day, and assisted in defeating the Monitor, Galena and other vessels 
 on the 15th of May. 
 
 " Commodore Tatnall was tried by court-martial tor destroying the 
 Virginia, and was ' honorably acquitted ' of all the charges. The court 
 
 1 FrenchandEnglishmen-of-warwerepreeent. 2Someof the Noi'them papers estimated her 
 
 TlJe latter cheered our gunboat as she passed to be equivaleut to an army corps, 
 with the prizes. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 191 
 
 stated the facts, and their motives for acquitting him. Some of them are 
 as follows : ' That after the evacuation of Norfolii, Westover on James 
 River became the most suitable position for her to occupy ; that while in 
 theactof lightening her for the purpose of taking her up to that point, 
 the pilots for the first time declared their inability to take her up. That 
 when lightened she was made vulnerabletotheattacksof the enemy. The 
 only alternative, in the opinion of the court, was to abandon and burn the 
 ship then and there, which, in the judgment of the court, was deliberately 
 and wisely done.' " 
 
 List of officers of the 0. S. iron-clad Virginia, March 8th, 
 1S62: 
 
 Pla^-offlcer, FrankUn Buchanan ; Lieutenants, Catesby Ap R. Jones 
 (Executive, and Ordnance oflaeer), Charles C. Sims, R. D. Minor (flagi. 
 Hunter Davidson, J. Taylor Wood, J. R. Eggleston, and Walter Butt ; 
 Midshipmen, Foute, Marmaduke, Littlepage, Craig, Long, and Roots; 
 Paymaster, James Semple; Surgeon, Dinwiddle PhiUips; Assistant Sur- 
 geon, Algernon S. Garnett; Captain of Marines, Reuben Thom; Engineers, 
 H. A. Ramsey, Acting-Chief; Assistants, Tynan, Campbell, Herring, Jack 
 and White; Boatswain, Hasker; Gunner, Oliver; Carpenter, Lindsey; 
 Clerk, Arthur Sinclair, Jr.; Volunteer Aide, Lieutenant Douglass Forrest, 
 C. S. A.; Captain Kevil, commanding detachment of Norfolk United 
 ArtUlery; Signal Corps, Sergant Tabb. 
 
 The following letter from Commander Jones to the Hon. 
 A. H. Stephens was intended to set history right from the 
 errors into which even Vice-President Stephens has fallen: 
 
 " Selma, AiiABAMA, Dec. 21st, 1875. 
 
 " Dear Sib: A few days since my attention was called to that portion 
 of your history of the United States that relates to the contest between 
 the Virginia and Monitor. You will excuse the Commander of the Vir- 
 ginia for saying that you have done her scant justice. Your history states 
 that ' the Monitor attacked the Virginia and so damaged her that she 
 was compelled to retire to her moorings.' This conveys an erroneous im- 
 pression. The Virginia did not return to Norfolk until after the Monitor 
 had put an end to the fight by running off into shoal water beyond the 
 reach of our guns. 
 
 " I would refer you to a detailed account of the fight giving some 
 facts not previously made known. It was written by me, at the request 
 of the Southern Historical Society, and published in the December (1874 1 
 number of the Southern Magazine of Baltimore. It has been endorsed by 
 all of our officers that I have seen or heard from who participated In the 
 fight or witnessed it. 
 
 "In regard to the Monitor''s running into shoal water, it is admitted 
 by Admiral Worden, ia his official report and in an article published last 
 year by Commander Parker, U. S. navy, which was written at the request 
 of Worden and after consulting with him. I enclose a copy of a letter 
 from Ericsson, the inventor and builder of the Monitor, with the under- 
 standing that it is not to be published, as the writer never supposed that 
 I would see it. It was sent to me by G. V. Fox, Assistant Secretary of 
 the U. S. navy during the war, to whom it was addressed. It fully sus- 
 tains my narrative. 
 
 "If you have not seen my article, I can send it to you with Parker's and 
 other Northern versions of the fight. 
 
 "Your prominence in the Confederacy and your able vindication of it 
 since the war has endeared you to the whole South. And no one from our 
 section is as well known or as highly esteemed in the North as yourself. 
 Full credit will be given to your history. It is even more taught in the 
 
192 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 schools here. I must therefore ask that you make a change in your ac- 
 count of the fight between the Virginia and Monitor. 
 
 "The above has been written to you as a historian, I would now, 
 in connection with the same fight, write you as a member of Con- 
 gress. 
 
 " Parker's article mentioned above was very generally published and 
 commented upon by the Northern press. I have understood it was written 
 to pave the way for a preposterous claim made by Admiral W. for prize- 
 money. Strange to say, he succeeded at the last session in obtaining favor- 
 able reports from the Naval Committees of the Senate and House. Each 
 of them introduced a bill to give as prize-money a sum equal in amount to 
 the value of the Virginia, not less than a $1,000,000. 
 
 " Further action in Congress was prevented, I am told, by the oppor- 
 tune publication of my narrative. 
 
 " The law of prize is that a vessel capturing one of equal or superior 
 force is entitled to the value of the captured vessel. And whan the vessel 
 is sunk, as in the case of the Kearsage and Alabama, it is customary for 
 Congress to grant a sum to be divided as prize-money. I have not seen 
 Worden's petition, and am at loss to know upon what ground he asks for 
 prize-money. He certainly did not capture or sink ,the Virginia. The 
 fight continued for over three hours, and though he commanded the bet- 
 ter vessel, he was the first to quit the fight. In my testimony before Com- 
 mander Tatnall's court-martial, I said that the Monitor ought to have 
 sunk the Virginia in fifteen minutes. In my narrative I refrain from ex- 
 pressing any opinion as to lack of skill on the part of the Monitor, but it 
 may be inferred from the facts I give. I would call your attention to an 
 article in the November ('74) number of the Southern Magazine of Balti- 
 more, in reply to Commander Parker, by Col. Morris, who witnessed the 
 fight. He dwells upon the only material point of difference in the official 
 reports. I have written in regard to Worden's claim for prize-money as it 
 is probable that he would again petition Congress. 
 
 "I was pleased to hear that your health had improved, and hoping 
 that it may now be quite restored, 
 
 " I am with respect and esteem, 
 "Tours truly, 
 
 " Catbsby ap R. Jones. 
 " Hon. Alex. H. Stephens, 
 
 " Crawfordsville, ffa." 
 
 During the winter of 1864^5, Capt. Wm. F. Lynch, C. S. 
 navy, v^as detailed by the Navy Department to write a report 
 on the battles and combats fought or participated in by the 
 Confederate States navy. Commodore Lynch wrote to Flag- 
 officer Tucker, then commanding the C. S. naval forces at 
 Charleston, for information in relation to the battle of Hamp- 
 ton Roads, and the subsequent repulse of the U. S. squadron 
 at Drury's Bluff; Flag-officer John R. Tucker having, as Com- 
 mander Tucker of C. S. S. Patrick Henry, been present at both 
 of these engagements. Commander James H. Rochelle was 
 at the same time executive officer of the Patrick Henry. When 
 Flag-officer Tucker received Capt. Lynch's letter, Lieut. Ro- 
 chelle was in command of the Confederate iron-clad Palmetto 
 State, at Charleston, and Flag-officer Tucker requested him 
 to give his recollection of the principal events connected with 
 the Patrick Henry. In compliance with this request Lieut. 
 Com. Rochelle prepared and sent to Flag-officer Tucker the 
 following able and interesting letter: 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 193 
 
 " CONFEDBRATK STEAMSHIP ' PALMBTTO STATB,' ) 
 
 " CHABLESTOlir, S. C, January SOth, 1865. ) 
 " Flag-offloer John R. Tucker, 
 
 " Commanding Afloat at Charleston, 8. C. 
 " Dear Sib : I am glad to learn from you that Commodore Lynch has 
 been directed by the department to prepare a narrative of the memorable 
 and gallant deeds of the Confederate navy ; judging from the former works 
 of the Commodore, I think we may congratulate ourselves that the navy 
 has fallen into good hands, and feel confidence that the proposed book 
 will not only be a valuable contribution to the history of this giant war, 
 but also a pleasant addition to the literature of the day. Hitherto there has 
 been no effort made to popularize the navy, our oflcers, trained in an illus- 
 trious and exclusive service, have looked with a feeling akin to contempt 
 on both the praise and blame of the periodical press ; hence the only records 
 of the navy are to be found in dry and terse ofBcial dispatches, exceedingly 
 uninteresting to unprofessional readers, and unintelligible to the great 
 mass of the people. Let us hope that the forthcoming work will be popular 
 with the people, remove many of the prejudices against our service, and 
 assist the present generation to the just conclusion that the Confederate 
 navy has done well its part, notwithstanding the a;lmost complete lack in 
 the Confederate States of all the necessary constituents of naval strength. 
 Among the naval events that Commodore Lynch will be called upon to re- 
 late, the career of the Confederate steamship Patrick Henry will, perhaps, 
 claim a prominent place, and if you think there is anything in this letter 
 which will aid the Commodore to a fuller understanding of the services of 
 that vessel, you are quite at liberty to send it to him. 
 
 "The Patrick Henry, a side-wheel steamer of beautiful model and of 
 about fourteen hundred tons burthen, was called the Torktown before 
 the war, and was one of a line of steamers running between Richmond 
 and New York. She was considered a fast boat, and deserved the reputa- 
 tion. When the Commonwealth of Virginia seceded from the Union this 
 vessel was, fortunately, in James River. She was seized by the State, 
 and the Governor and Council determined to fit her out as a man-of-war. 
 She was taken up to the wharf at Rocketts, Richmond, and the com- 
 mand conferred upon Commander John Randolph Tucker, late an oflBcer 
 of the U. S. navy, who had resigned his commission in that service in con- 
 sequence of the secession of Virginia, his native State. Naval Construc- 
 tor Joseph Pearce, with a number of mechanics from the Norfolk navy- 
 yard, commenced the necessary alterations, and in a short time the passen- 
 ger steamer Torktown was converted into the very creditable man-of-war 
 stea,mer Patrick Henry, of 10 guns and 150 officers and men.i The ves- 
 sel being properly equipped, so far as the limited resources at hand could 
 be used, proceeded down James River and took a position off Mulberry 
 Island, on which point rested the right of the Army of the Peninsula 
 under Magruder. It was dull work laying at anchor off Mulberry Island; 
 the oEBcer and crew very rarely went on shore, the steamer being kept 
 always with banked fires, and prepared to repel an attack which might 
 have been made at any moment, the Federal batteries at Newport News 
 and the guard vessels stationed there, the Congress, Cumberland, and 
 several gunboats being plainly in sight. After a while the monotony 
 became so irksome that Commander Tucker took the Patrick Henry down 
 the river to within long range of the Federal squadron and opened on 
 them with his two heavy guns with the hope of inducing a single gun- 
 boat to ascend the river and engage vessel to vessel. The challenge was 
 not accepted, and the enemy having moved a field battery of rifled guns 
 up the bank of the river, and taken a secure position from which they 
 
 1 At the battle of Hampton Eoads the officers Siirgeon, John T Mason; Paymaster Thomas 
 of the Patrick Henry were, as well as can be re- R. Ware; Passed Aesiatont Surgeon, Frederick 
 membered at the present (18871 time, Com- Qarretson; Acting Master, Lewis Parish; t.ieat- 
 mander John Randolph Tucker, commanding; of Marines, R. H. Henderson; Midshipmen. 
 Lieut. James Henry EocheUe, Executive officer; John Tyler Walker. A. M. Mason, M. P. Good- 
 Lieut. Wm. Sharp, Lieut. Francis LyeU Hoge; wyn. 
 13 
 
194 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 opened an annoying fire, the vessel was steamed slowly back to her station 
 off Mulberry Island. The Northern papers stated that in this little affair, 
 which took place on September 13tn, 1861, the fire of the Patrick Henry 
 did considerable damage to the frigate Congress. About this time intel- 
 ligence was received that one or two of the Federal gunboats came up the 
 river every night on picket duty and anchored about a mile and-a-half 
 above their squadron at NewpDrt News. Here was a chance; so on the 
 night of the 1st of December, 1861, the Patrick Henry again went down 
 the river, keeping a sharp look-out for the expected picket boat. Not a 
 sign of a vessel was seen, and when day broke there were the Federal 
 squadron and batteries looming up against the dawn with all the gun- 
 boats quietly at anchor near the larger vessels. As the Patrick Henry 
 could not have returned unseen. Commander Tucker opened fire. The 
 Federals were evidently taken by surprise, and it was some minutes be- 
 fore they repUed to the fire. They soon got to their guns, however, and 
 the sun as it rose was greeted with a roar of artillery that shook the win- 
 dows in Norfolk and roused the people of that then gay city from their 
 slumbers at a most inconvenient hour. 
 
 " The Federal fire was well directed, and one officer and several men 
 were wounded on board the Patrick Henry. One gunboat in particular, 
 eonunanded by Lieut. H. K. Davenport, was noted for the precision with, 
 which she used her rifled guns. The old sailing-master of the Patrick 
 Henry, a seaiuan of sixty winters and many gales, was much pleased with 
 the manner in which Davenport used his guns. He said to some one 
 standing near him, 'look at that black, ugly little craft yonder, well, 
 whenever you see a puff of smoke go up from her, look out, for^ as sure as 
 you are born, there will be a blue pigeon about.' The skirnush having 
 continued for an hour or more, and nothing to be gained by prolonging 
 it, the Patrick Henry returned to her usual anchorage. 
 
 " In February, 1862, the ladies of Charles City, a county bordering 
 on James river, desired to present to the Patrick Henry a flag which they 
 had made for her, as an evidence of their confidence in the vessel, and 
 their appreciation of the services she had done them by keeping maraud- 
 ing expeditions from ascending the river to pillage, plunder, and perhaps 
 destroy the famous old country seats that are to be found on its banks. 
 But the flag was destined never to be presented, such stirring times were 
 at hand that the few hours necessary for the ceremony could not be 
 spared. The iron-clad Virginia was about to make an attack upon the 
 Federal batteries and vessels at Newport News, and the Patrick Henry 
 was ordered to participate in the battle. 
 
 " The day before the attack was to be made, the Patrick Henry was 
 moved down to Day's Neck, and an anchorage taken, from which any ves- 
 sel coming out from Norfolk could be seen. 
 
 " The 8th of March, 1862, was a bright, placid, beautiful day, more 
 like a May than a March day. All eyes on board the Patrick Henry 
 were watching for the Virginia. About one o'clock in the after- 
 noon she came steaming out from behind Craney Island, attended by 
 her satellites — the gunboats Beaufort and Raleigh. Grand, and strong, 
 and confident, a Hercules of the waters, she moved straight upon the 
 enemy. 
 
 "It was not necessary to 'call all hands up anchor' on board the 
 Patrick Henry, the anchor was 'raised with a run,' and under a full head 
 of steam the vessel sped on her way to aid her powerful friend. ^ 
 
 The PafrtcA; Henry wasriggedasabrifiantiDe; came the schoolship of the Naval Academy in. 
 
 square yarda to the foremast and fore-and-aft 1863, her square-rigged foremast was replaced, 
 
 sails alone for the mainmast. At Norfolk, when so that the midshipmen could be exercised in 
 
 she was about to be employed in running by the reefing and furling and such other exercises as 
 
 batteries of Newport News at night, it was were practicable on board a vessel in harbor, 
 
 thought beet to take both of her masts out, in A bowsprit was also put in and rooms or cabins 
 
 order to make her less liable to be discovered by were erected on the hurricane-tleck, as appears 
 
 the enemy. Signal poles, carrying no sails, in the engraving in the chapter on the Naval 
 
 were esUiblished in their place. When she be- Academy to be found elsewhere. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 195 
 
 " The Confederate vessels in James River formed ' in line ahead ' ^s 
 they approached the batteries at Newport News. The Patrick Henry, 
 10, Commander Tucker, leading ; next came the Jamestown, 2, Lieut. Com. 
 Barney ; and next the Teaser, 2, Lieut. Com. "Webb. The Virginia vesidheA 
 the scene of action first ; amidst the iron hail which fell harmlessly on her 
 armor, she ran into and sank the Cumberland ; a hearty cheer from the 
 James River vessels greeted her success. But there was no time to give 
 up to exultation, the long line of the Newport News batteries were close 
 at hand, and in order to reach the naval combat it was necessary to pass 
 them. The guns of the PairecA; ITewrj;'^ were elevated for a range of 800 
 yards, that being the distance at which the pilots expected to pass the 
 batteries. 
 
 " And now the hush which preceded the shock of battle settled aUke 
 on Federal and Confederate. Through the embrasures of the Federal 
 batteries glimpses could be caught of the men at their guns, but not a 
 sound came from them. As the Patrick Henry ranged up abreast of the first 
 battery she delivered her flre, and the flash from her guns had scarcely 
 vanished when the Federal works were wrapped in smoke, and their pro- 
 jectiles came hissing through the air. The first shots from the Patrick 
 Henry went over the batteries, her guns having been elevated for a range 
 of 800 yards, consequently she was passing the batteries at less than that 
 distance, and to this circumstance is to be attributed her not having been 
 sunk or disabled by them. The enemy supposed she would pass as far 
 from them as the channel would allow, and had elevated their guns for 
 that range ; the vessel passing closer than they thought she would, their 
 shot for the most part passed over her. She was struck, however, several 
 times during the passage ; one shot passed through the crew of No. 3 gun, 
 wounding two men and killing one, a volunteer from the army, who had 
 come on board to serve only for the fight. His last words as he feU were, 
 'Never mind me, boys.' 
 
 " Having passed the batteries with less damage than was expected, the 
 Patrick Henry became engaged in the thick of the fight : whilst the for- 
 ward guns were engaging one enemy, the after-guns were firing at another. 
 The situation of the Confederate wooden vessels at this time seemed des- 
 perate. The Newport News batteries were on one side ; on the other, 
 the frigates Minnesota, St. Lawrence and Roanoke were coming up from 
 Old Point Comfort, and in front the beach was lined with field batteries 
 and sharpshooters. Fortunately for the Confederate wooden vessels, the 
 Minnesota, St. Lawrence and Roanoke grounded, and the smaller vessels 
 which accompanied them, warned by the fate of the Cumberland, returned 
 to Old Point. The Minnesota, though aground, was near enough to take 
 part in the action, and opened a heavy flre on the Confederate squadron. 
 
 "About this time Flag-ofilcer Buchanan hailed the Patrick Henry, 
 and directed Commander Tucker to burn the Congress, which vessel had 
 run ashore, hauled down her ensign, and hoisted a white flag. The gun- 
 boats Raleigh, Beaufort and Teaser had attempted to burn her, but had 
 been driven off by a heavy artillery and infantry flre from the Federal 
 troops on the beach. The pilots of the Patrick Henry declared that that 
 vessel could not get alongside the Congress in consequence of an inter- 
 vening shoal. This determined Commander Tucker^ to approach the 
 
 1 When the Patrick Henry was first put in com- « The name of my dear and deeply-lamented 
 
 mission, her battery consisted of ten medium friend. Admiral John Randolph Tucker, has 
 
 32-ponnder8 in broadside, one 10-inch sheU gun been necessarily so frequently mentioned m 
 
 pivoted forward, and one 8-inoll solid shot gun this letter as commander of the Patrwk Henry, 
 
 pivoted aft. The 8-inch solid shot gun was that it will not be out of place to say a few 
 
 the most effective gun on board, and did good words as to his career. ,., , ^ 
 
 service both at the battle of Hampton Eoads During the course of his honorable and event- 
 
 and the repulse of the Federal squadron at ful life Admiral Tucker served m three navies, 
 
 Drury's Bluff. The captain of this gun was an rendering gallant, faithful and importentserv- 
 
 exoellent seaman gunner, named Smith. He ice.s to esush of them, but probably the most 
 
 was promoted to boatswain, and served under brilliant, if not the most impoitant. of all his 
 
 Commander Bochelle on board of the FalmetU) services was rendered whilst he oomnianded the 
 
 Slate at Charleston, S. C. Patruk Henry. Bom in Alexandria, Va., m the 
 
196 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Congress as near as the shoal would permit, and then to send his boats and 
 burn her; the boats were prepared for the service, and the boats' crews 
 and officers to command them held ready, whilst the vessel was steaming 
 into the Congress. This movement of the Patrick Henry placed her in 
 the most imminent peril; she was brought under the continuous and con- 
 centrated fire of three points; on her port-quarter were the batteries of 
 Newport News, on her port-bow were the field-batteries and sharpshooters 
 on the beach, and on her starboard-bow the Minnesota. It soon became 
 evident that no wooden vessel could long float under such a fire; several 
 shots struck the hull; a piece was shot out of the walking beam; as the 
 sponge of the after-pivot gun was being Inserted in the piece, the handle 
 was cut in two by a shot. * * * Half in prayer and half in despair at be- 
 ing unable to perform his duty, the sponger exclaimed, ' Oh, Lord ! how 
 is the gun to be sponged ? ' and he was much relieved when the quarter- 
 gunner of his division handed him a spare sponge. This state of things 
 could not last long; a rifled shot from the field batteries penetrated the 
 steam-chest, the engine-room and flre-room were filled with steam, five or 
 six of the firemen were scalded to death, the engineers were driven up on 
 deck, and the engines stopped working. The vessel was enveloped in a 
 cloud of escaped steam, and the enemy, seeing that some disaster to the 
 engines or boilers had occurred, increased his fire. At this moment, no 
 one knew what had happened, the general impression being that the 
 boiler had exploded; and it is an unmistakable evidence of the courage 
 and discipline of the crew that the fire from the Patrick Henry did not 
 slacken, but went on as regularly as before the damage. As the vessel 
 was drifting towards the enemy the jib was hoisted to pay her head 
 around, and the Jamestown, Lieut. Commanding Barney, gallantly and 
 promptly came to her assistance, and towed her from her perilous posi- 
 tion. The engineers soon got one boiler to work— the other was so badly 
 damaged that they were unable to repair it at the time — and with the 
 steam of one boiler alone, the Patrick Henry returned to the conflict. 
 Night, however, soon closed in, and as in the darkness it was impossible 
 to distinguish friend from foe, hostilities ceased, the victory of this day 
 being without dispute with the Confederates. 
 
 "During the battle the shores of the Confederate side of the ' Roads ' 
 were lined with spectators from Norfolk and the adjacent camps, who 
 seemed greatly to enjoy the ' historical piece ' that was enacted before 
 them. 
 
 year 1812, he entered the navy of the United manded, with the commission of rear-admiral. 
 
 States as a midshipman in 1826, and made his the combined fleets of the two republics. His 
 
 first cruise in the frigate Brandywine. In 1837 he last service was the exploration and surrey of 
 
 was promoted to the rank of lieuteiiaut, aud in the upper Amazon and its tributaries, beinp; 
 
 1866 to that of commander. During the Mexican President of the Peruvian Hydrographio Oom- 
 
 war he commanded the bomb-brig Stramboh. In mission of the Amazon. 
 
 1861, when commanded so to do by the Virginia He died of disease of the heaii;, at his resi- 
 
 Convention, he resigned his commission in the dence in Petersburg. Virginia, on the I2th of 
 
 U. 8. navy and entered the Confederate service, June, 1883, and was buried by the side ot his 
 
 with the rank of commander. He commanded wife, in the cemetery at Norfolk, 
 
 the C 8. steamer Patrick Henry at the naval con- It would require a volume to do anything like 
 
 ilict in Hampton Beads; and at Drury'e Bluflf, justice to the character and career of this most 
 
 having landed his crew and mounted the prin- noble and gallant man. His firmness on all oc- 
 
 cipal guns of his vessel on the bluff, he materially casions of duty was of proof, though no one 
 
 aided in repulsing the Federal squadron. Soon was more gentle in the ordinary intercourse of 
 
 after the battle of Drury's Bluflf he was pro- private life. None served with him without 
 
 moted to the rank of captain, and ordered to feeling that he was a man fitted for high desti- 
 
 'Charleston, where he commanded the Oonfeder- nies, for he was of a nature, an experience, and 
 
 ■ate naval forces as flag-officer of the station. a professional skill, well calculated to command 
 
 When Charleston was evacuated he returned to respect and inspire confidence. In the course 
 
 Drury's Bluff, which station be commanded of my life I have had many opportunities of 
 
 until Bichmond was evacuated, when he re- hearing character discussed among sea officers; 
 
 ported with his command to Gen. Lee. His serv few escape criticism of some sort or oUier for 
 
 ices in the civil war ended at Sailor's Creek, their professional acts, and fewer still as men, 
 
 where, after a most gallant resistance, he sur- yet I do not remember a single instance ia 
 
 rendered to Gen. Keifer; who some yeara after which I have ever heard a whisper of com- 
 
 the close of the war returned him his sword. plaint against the professional or private con- 
 
 During the war between the Eepublics of duct of John Randolph Tucker. J. H, B., 
 
 Peru and ChiU and Spain, Admiral Tucker com- 1886. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 197 
 
 "The night after the battle the Confederate squadron anchored under 
 Se-well's Point, at the mouth of the harbor of Norfolk. There was little 
 time for sleep that night, for the conflict was to be renewed the next 
 morning, and it was necessary to make many repairs and preparations. 
 Soon after midnight a column of Are ascended in the darkness, followed 
 by a terrific explosion. The Federal frigate Congress, which had been on 
 fire all the evening, had blown up, the fire having reached her magazine. 
 
 "At the first peep of dawn, on the 9th of March, the Confederate 
 squadron was under way, it having been determined to destroy the Min- 
 nesota, that frigate being still aground near Newport News. As the day- 
 light increased the Minnesota was discovered in her old position, but the 
 Minnesota was not the only thing to attract attention; close alongside of 
 her there lay such a craft as the eyes of a seaman does not delight in; an 
 immense shingle floating on the water, with a gigantic cheese-box rising 
 from its centre; no sails, no wheels, no smoke-stack, no guns, at least, none 
 that could be seen. What could it be ? On board the Patrick Henry 
 many were the surmises as to the strange craft; some thought it a water 
 tank sent to supply the Minnesota with water; others that it was a float- 
 ing magazine replenishing her exhausted stock of" ammunition, but few 
 were of the opinion that it was the Monitor, which the JNorthern papers 
 had been boasting about for a long time. 
 
 " All doubts about the stranger were soon dispelled; as the Virginia 
 steamed down vipont\ie Minnesota the cheese-box and shingle steamed out 
 to meet her. It was, indeed, the Monitor, and then and there commenced 
 the first combat that had ever taken place between iron-clads. ' 
 
 " The Patrick Henry and the other Confederate wooden vessels took 
 little part in the events of the day, except to fire one shot at the Monitor,a,t 
 very long range, as she passed and repassed at one time during her manoeu- 
 vering with the Virginia. At onetime fheVirginia did not seem to move, 
 and apprehensions were entertained that she had got aground or that 
 some part of her machinery was damaged. Signal flags were run up on 
 board of her, but the flags did not blow out clear, and it was some min- 
 utes before the signal officer of the Patrick Henry could make out the 
 numbers. At length he reported the signal to be, as well as he was able 
 to read it, ' disabled my propeller is." 
 
 " No wooden vessel could have floated twenty minutes under the fire 
 that the Virginia was then undergoing from the Monitor and the Min- 
 nesota, but if her propeller was disabled it was necessary to attempt to 
 tow her back to the cover of the Confederate batteries. So the Patrick 
 Henry and Jamestown started to make the attempt, but they had gone 
 only a short distance when the Virginia was seen to move and her pro- 
 peller to turn, showing that she required no assistance. That evening all 
 the Confederate vessels went into the harbor of Norfolk. 
 
 " Flag-offlcer Tatnall having relieved Flag-offlcer Buchanan, who had 
 been seriously wounded in the first day's fight in Hami)ton Roads, and 
 all the vessels having been refitted, on the 13th of April the squadron 
 again sailed out to meet the enemy. In case the Virginia should not be 
 able to capture or destroy the Monitor, the gunboats Beaufort and Raleigh 
 and two small steamers were assigned the duty of carrying the Monitor 
 by boarding.* The squadron steamed about in Hampton Roads for two 
 
 1 The combat between the Virginia and the « Some years after the conclusion of the war 
 
 Monitor was an indecisive action so far as those I showed a copy of this letter to my friend, 
 
 two vessels were oonoemed; at least such was Capt. Catesby ap Roger Jones, who was m oom- 
 
 my opinion after witnessing the fight from the mand of the rirginia during the fight with the 
 
 distance of about a mile. Both vessels were Monitor. Capt. Jones informed me that the 
 
 skillfully and gallantly fought, and neither signal ofttcer of the fWricfc flenry did not read 
 
 could claim a victory over the other. If the the Virginia's signal correctly; I forget what 
 
 ManOar had been silenced, the Minnesota would Capt. Joues said the signal was, but it did not 
 
 have been destroyed, and probably much other indicate that the Virginia was in distress, or 
 
 damage done to the Federal forces. If the that she desired assistance. J. H. K., 1886. 
 
 Virginia had been defeated, the city of Norfolk i,. . . 
 
 would have been at the mercy of the Monitor. ' One of these small steamers wa« the tender 
 
 J H R 1886 of the Norfolk navy-yard. Slie was manned for 
 
198 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 days in succession, and tlie Jamestown captured two of the Federal trans- 
 ports, but the Monitor did not leave her anchorage at Fortress Monroe. ' 
 * * * * * 
 
 " I ain, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "J. H. ROCHEl/LE, 
 
 ''Lieut. Com. Confederate Iron-clad ' Palmetto State.'' ^'' 
 
 "When the Federal squadron entered James River, t\\& Patrick Henry 
 ran up to Drewry's Bluff, and her ofBcers and crew aided materially in 
 
 5etting that position ready for defence. The Confederate steamship 
 ame^ozon was sunk to complete the obstructions of the river, her guns 
 having been previously landed and placed in battery on the Bluff. One 
 solid shot eight-inch gun and two rifled 32-pounders were landed from the 
 Patrick Henry, mounted in pits dug in the brow of the Bluff, and manned 
 by the officers and crew of the vessel. 
 
 " On the 15th of May, 1862, the Federal squadron, consisting of the 
 Galena, Monitor, Naugatuck, Port Royal, and Aroostook, made the well- 
 known attack on the Confederate batteries at Drewry's Bluff, which was the 
 only defensible position between the squadron and Richmond. '1 he Galena 
 and the Monitor were the only vessels which engaged the batteries at 
 effective range. The Galena was managed with great skill and daring. 
 She steamed to about 800 yards of the batteries, and opened with much 
 precision a most damaging fire. After a hot action of about four hours 
 d uration, the Federal squadron was beaten off, and steamed away down the 
 river. The guns on the Bluff were worked by the officers and crews of the 
 Patrick Henry, Jamestown, Virginia, and a battalion of artillery. The 
 most effective gun on the Bluff was the Patrick Henry^s eight-inch solid 
 shot gun ; the working of this gun was personally directed by Capt. John 
 R. Tucker, and the execution done by it was pianifest. 
 
 "After the action at Drewry's Bluff, the Patrick Henry's officers and 
 crew were permanently attached to the naval batteries at that place. The 
 vessel herself became the schoolship of the Confederate States naval 
 school, and was destroyed when Richmond was evacuated by the Confed- 
 erates, to prevent her falling into the hands of the enemy."— J.H.R., 1886." 
 
 A writer in The United Service Magazine for November, 
 
 1880, says : 
 
 " The first grand naval triumph of the South was the victory achieved 
 by the iron-clad Virginia, in the memorable battle of Hampton Roads, 
 on the 8th of March, 1861. An event interesting not only for the imme- 
 diate issues involved, but as introducing a new element in naval warfare, 
 and inaugurating a revolution in the means and methods of future en- 
 counters." 
 
 Then, after a graphic and correct account of the battles of 
 the 8th and 9th, in which the palm of victory is awarded to 
 the Virginia, the writer concludes : 
 
 " The Virginia came out of the conflict a historical ship. In all future 
 narratives of naval war she will loom up conspicuously as having deter- 
 mined a new line of development in naval forces, leading to a complete 
 revolution in the naval systems of the whole world, as well as those of 
 
 tbe occasion by officers and men of the Pat- federate authorities determined npon the evacn- 
 
 rick Henry, imder the command of the execu- ation of Norfolk, the Patrick Henry was em- 
 
 tive officer of that vessel, and was christened ployed to remove whatpublic property could be 
 
 by the men Patrick Henry Junior. 3. H. R., saved from the navy-yard to Richmond. The 
 
 1^86, hulls of several uncompleted vessels were towed 
 
 past the Federal batteries at Newport News. 
 
 1 The conclusion of this letter has been lost. The running past the batteries was always done 
 
 It went on to relate the services of the Patrick in the middle of the night, moonless nights 
 
 Henry up to the date of the letter. These sei'v- being chosen; so tar as we ever knew, we were 
 
 ices may be briefly recounted: When the Con- not once discovered by the enemy. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 199 
 
 coast and harbor defences. The triumph of that vessel was a brilliant 
 one, but short-lived." 
 
 " J. H. C," in the Oct. number of The United Service, says: 
 
 " The victory (on the 8th) of the Virginia had been most brilliant. 
 She had almost unaided destroyed two large ships of war, with a loss of 
 several hundred men, and driven off the rest of the fleet. Her own loss 
 "Was scarcely enough to set off her triumph. She had shown a wondering 
 world that wooden vessels could not stand for an instant against the iron- 
 clads, and now the world looked on, curious to see her prowess against a 
 foeman of her own class." 
 
 And after describing the battle of the 9th as one of which 
 "both sides claimed the victory, and, indeed, its honors 
 seem to be evenly divided," relates the scheme of destroying 
 the Virginia by running her down with immense wooden 
 steamers — adds : 
 
 " Another occasion was sought on the 8th of May, when a portion of 
 the Union fleet, including the Monitor, bombarded the battery at Sewell's 
 Point. This brought the Virginia upon the scene, but no good oppor- 
 tunity occurred to run her down. In fact, the scheme was impracticable; 
 and it was probably fortunate that the ships fitted up for the purpose did 
 not make a serious attempt. Their own destruction instead of that of 
 the iron-clad would most Ukely have been the consequence." 
 
 These oflBcial records, and private documents and state- 
 ments, ought to dispose of all claim to a victory over the Vir- 
 ginia, as they reveal a state of consternation and dismay in 
 Washington not surpassed even by that caused by the first 
 battle of Bull Run. 
 
 At the second session of the Forty- third Congress, the fic- 
 tion of a victory of the Monitor over the Virginia, on the 9th of 
 March, 1862, was made the subject of an application by the oflEi- 
 cers and crew of the U. S. stearaev Monitor, who participated in 
 the action in Hampton Roads, for the payment to them by the 
 United States of the actual value of theVirginia and her arma- 
 ment "at the date of said action, not exceeding $300,000, to be 
 distributed in lieu of the bounty provided by Section 4, 635 of 
 the Revised Statutes of the United States, and in proportion 
 fixed by law in cases where the capturing or destroying vessel 
 was acting independently of the commanding officer of a fleet, 
 squadron, or division, and 'for the appropriation of $200,000." 
 The memorial or application was referred, in the House of Rep- 
 resentatives, to the Committee on Naval Affairs, but no action 
 was taken on it until January 9, 1883, when it was again pre- 
 sented to the House of Representatives with like reference. A 
 report was submitted by the Committee, recommending the 
 passage of the bill, but it failed to become a law. At the second 
 session of the Forty-seventh Congress, the memorial was again 
 made the subject of two bills, Senate Bill No. 369, and House 
 Bill No. 3,840, for an appropriation of $300,000 for distribution 
 among the officers and crew of the Monitor, not as prize-money 
 for the capture or destruction of the Virginia, for the facts 
 
200 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 were too baldly patent to warrant any such claim, but because 
 the Monitor had been "in the action with the rebel iron-clad 
 Merrimac" on that day. But the "statement of the reasons 
 for making such a grant of prize-money," claimed that reward 
 "for damage to the Confederate iron-clad Merrimac, March 
 9th, 1862, and her subsequent destruction." The facts were, 
 however, too patent and potent, and both bills failed to pass. 
 The subject was renewed at the first session of the Forty- 
 eighth Congress, and in the House of Representatives it was 
 again referred to the Committee on Naval Affairs. 
 
 Mr. Ballentine, from the Committee on Naval Affairs, to 
 whom the House Bill No. 244, had been referred, in 1884, sub- 
 mitted a very interesting and strong adverse report. It said: 
 
 " The memoralists claim that the Monitor so disabled the Merrimac as 
 to make her destruction necessary, and, further, that she prevented the 
 Merrimac from going below Old Point, thus saving Baltimore and Wash- 
 ington from capture, and even New York City from menace. The testi- 
 mony which has been set out at length does not, in the opinion of the 
 Committee, sustain either of these opinions, but quite the contrary. It 
 is only necessary to refer to the full description of the Merrimac to show 
 that, without greatly lightening her, which could not have been done 
 without impairing her power to fight, and exposing her to the projectiles 
 which would have been hurled against her, had she ventured outside of 
 Cape Henry, she would have inevitably foundered. 
 
 " On the other point, all of the evidence leads as clearly to the opinion 
 that the Monitor, after her engagement with the Merrim,ac on the 9th of 
 March, declined again to engage her, though offered the opportunity, and 
 that so great doubt existed with the U. S. naval and military authorities 
 as to the power of the Monitor to successfully meet the Merrimac, that 
 orders were given to her commander by the President not to bring on an 
 engagement.^ 
 
 "It also appears that the Merrimac so far from being seriously in- 
 jured, was enabled after the engagement to protect the approaches to 
 Norfolk and Richmond until after the evacuation of Norfolk. If, then, it 
 be proven that the destruction of the Merrimac was not the result of in- 
 juries inflicted by the Monitor, which we assume to be true, what claim 
 have the memorialists for compensation ? It is not pretended that they 
 are entitled to compensation in the nature of jjrize-money. The act of 
 June 30, 1864, sec. 10 (Vol. 13, page 309), provides for the payment of 
 bounty money to the officers and crew of the U. S. naval vessels, who 
 sink or otherwise destroy vessels of the enemy in engagements, or which 
 it may be necessary (for the captors) to destroy in consequence of injuries 
 received in action ; but the case presented does not, in our opinion, come 
 within the meaning of the statute. * * Officers of the navy are entitled to 
 prize-money when they capture or destroy property, provided it is in a hne 
 where the law of capture applies, but not otherwise. On the destruction 
 of a vessel, the price of that vessel may be awarded as prize money 
 
 1 In support of its statement, the Committee that the Department can easily obstruct the 
 
 quote many of the extracts heretofore given channel of Norfolk, so as to prevent the exit 
 
 by us, and the following letter addressed to the of the Merrimac. provided the army will carry 
 
 Secretary of the Navy by Adjt. Gen. L. Thomafi, Sewell's Point batteries in which duty the 
 
 under date of March 13th, 1862: " I am directed navy wiU give great aflsistance." They also 
 
 by the Secretary of War to say that he places at mention the fact that in a council of war, 
 
 your disposal any transports or coal vessels at held at Fairfax Court House, March 13th, 
 
 Fortress Monroe, for the purpose of closing the 1862, present Gens. Keyes, Heintzleman, Mc- 
 
 ohannel of the Elizabeth River to prevent the Dowell and Sumner, at which it was decided 
 
 Merrimac from again coming out " They also that Gen. McClellan's plan to attack Richmond 
 
 submitted a letter from Secretary Welles to the by York River should be adopted, provided. 
 
 Secretary of War, under date of March 13th, in first. " that the enemy's vessel Merriraac can be 
 
 which he said : "I have the honor to suggest neutralised." 
 
CAPTAIN J. R. TUCKEK, 
 
 CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 301 
 
 under the nile, but where the enemy's vessel is not destroyed, no such 
 rule obtains, and never has obtained, in this or any other civilized coun- 
 try. It is claimed that this money should be awarded the petitioners on 
 the ground that the Monitor saved from destruction Washington, Balti- 
 more and other large cities of the North, and also saved from destruction 
 the vessels which were in the harbor. The question presented by the 
 memorialists is not one of the saving of New "xork or Washington, or of 
 the vessels which were in Hampton Roads for the presumed purpose of 
 making battle and protecting the U. S. forts and property ; but the ques- 
 tion is, was there any destruction of the Merrimac by the Monitor, or such 
 a destruction as to bring this application within the purview and mean- 
 ing of the law ? If the answer to this be in the affirmative, it is singular 
 that the officers and crew of the Jfowitor have not long since received their 
 money. * * * We assume that the proof shows that the only serious 
 damage sustained by the Merrimac was inflicted by the Cumberland, and 
 that the Merrimac went back to Norfolk when her adversaries were out 
 of her reach; and they being in shoal water, and she, on account of the 
 
 freat depth of water which she drew, unable to attack them, went into 
 oek for repairs, and again came out and offered battle, which was re- 
 fused; and that eventually on the evacuation of Norfolk by the Confed- 
 erate forces, she was destroyed by her officers and crew, to prevent her fall- 
 ing into the hands of the Union forces, and that, therefore, her destruc- 
 tion was not the result of her engagement with the Monitor, and that if 
 the proof shows this state of facts to exist that the claim of the petition- 
 ers in this memorial ought not to be allowed.'" 
 
 From the testimony submitted by the Committee, they 
 add, "we feel assured that neither Gen. Magruder, nor any 
 of his superiors had the slightest apprehension of any dam- 
 age to be feared from the Monitor. So far from this, their 
 dispatches show^ that they felt full confidence that the Vir- 
 ginia (or Merrimac) was master of the situation in the waters 
 from Norfolk to Hampton Eoads. * * The testimony shows 
 clearly, that the only serious injury received by the Merri- 
 mac was from the Cumberland; and this official testimony 
 is fully sustained by affidavits made by Capt. Catesby Jones, 
 White, and Littlepage, and the statement of the latter was 
 made here in Washington, when the question was up, and 
 when all the surroundings seemed to favor the claim of the 
 petitioners."^ 
 
 1 In Biipport of these points the committee " To the Editor of The Post (Washington, D. C). 
 submitted considerable testimony, among which "From the article which appeared in the col- 
 was an extract from the of&cial report of Brig. umns of 2%c Post this morning, I learn that the 
 Gen. Joseph E. F. Mansfield of the engagement, of&cers and men of the Monitor have memorial- 
 made to Gen. John E. Wool, bearing date March ized Congress for prize-money for the disabling 
 12, 1862, in which he says : " Our ships were of the Merrimac by that vessel. As there is not 
 perfectly harmless against the Merrimac, as an ofl&cer or man who was on the Monitor on 
 their broadsides produced no material effect on that memorable occasion who does not know 
 her." that the Monitor did not disable the Merrimac. 
 
 I cannot conceive upon what grounds the claim 
 
 2 " On March 10. P. H. Watson, Assistant Sec- for prize-money is made. It reminds me of 
 retary of War. telegraphed to Henry B. Ren- the old sailor, who whenever he heard others 
 wick, New York City, and advises tiiat three speaking of fine horses, would always tell of 
 large and swift steamers be fitted up to run the remarkable traits of his own horse. He 
 down and destroy the Merrimac." If the vessel told it so often that he actually believed he had 
 had been destroyed the day before, there was a horse, and when the ship went into Vera 
 no necessity for this. ' Cniz he bought a fine Mexican saddle for it. 
 
 The statement that the Merrimac was disabled 
 ' The statement of Midshipman H. B. Little- and driven from Hampton Eoads into Norfolk 
 page, referred to, who was a midshipman on is entirely incorrect and absurd. It only con- 
 board of the Virginia during the engagement in vinces me that I. K. G., like many others who 
 Hampton Boads. and up to the time of her de- have written upon this subject, was not there, 
 struotion, was as follows; Thei/onitorwasneitherthedlrectnortheremote 
 
202 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 In conclusion the Committee add: '' From the above men- 
 tioned facts, we think it clearly appears (1) that the Monitor, 
 after her engagement with the Merrimac, on the 9th of March, 
 never again dared encounter her, though offered frequent op- 
 portunities; (2) that so much doubt existed in the minds of the 
 Federal authorities as to her power to meet the Merrimac, that 
 orders were given her commander, not to fight her voluntarily; 
 that the Merrimac, so far from being seriously injured in her 
 engagement, efficiently protected the approaches to Norfolk 
 and Richmond until Norfolk was evacuated; that the Merrimac 
 could not have gotten to Washington, or Baltimore, in her 
 n ormal condition ; that she could not have gone to sea at all ; that 
 although she could have run by the Federal fleet and Old Point 
 (barring torpedoes in the channel), and threatened McClellan's 
 base at Yorktown, in exceptionally good weather, yet would 
 have had to leave the James River open. * * Holding to these 
 views, we respectfully report adversely to the passage of the 
 bill." 
 
 While the subject was being discussed in Congress, Lieut, 
 Commander William H. Parker, C. S. N., who commanded the 
 Beaufort in the Hampton Roads engagements, sent to the Nor- 
 folk Landmark the following interesting statement of the 
 question : 
 
 " NoKFOLK, Va., Dee. 11, 1883. 
 "7b the Editor of the ''Landmark'*: 
 
 " The claim of the crew of the U. S. steamer Monitor for prize-money 
 for the destruction of the Confederate vessel Virginia (Merrimac)^ has 
 naturaUy called forth many letters from those engaged in the naval oper- 
 ations in Hampton Roads from March 8, 1863, to May 6, 1863. 
 
 cause of the destruction of the Merrimac. If favorable, the Merrimac returned to Norfolk, 
 
 prize-mjoney is to be awarded, let it be given where she was docked. She was then thor- 
 
 to the gallant oflacere and crew of the Cumber- oughly overhauled and equipped for fighting 
 
 land, which went down with her colors flying an iron-clad. A prow of steel and wrought iron 
 
 after doing nearly all the damage sustained by was put on. Bolts of wrought-iron and chilled- 
 
 the Merrimac on the 8th and 9th of March, iron were supplied for the rifle guns, and other 
 
 1862. The broadside fired by the Cumberland preparations made especially for the Monitor. 
 
 just as the Merrimac rammed her, cut one of They were such as to make all on the Merrimac 
 
 the Merrimac's guns off at the trunnions, the feel confidRnt that we would either make a 
 
 muzzle of another, tore up the carriage of her prize of or destroy the Monitor when we met 
 
 bow pivot gun, swept away her anchors, boats again. On the 11th of April, all being ready for 
 
 and howitzers, riddled her smoke-stack and the expected fray, the Merrimac again went to 
 
 «team-pipe, and killed and wounded nineteen Hampton Roads. The Monitor was laying at our 
 
 men. moorings, at the mouth of the Ehzabeth Biver, 
 
 "The next day in the fight with the Monitor publishing to the world that she was blockading 
 
 the Merrimac did not have a man killed or the Merrimac. Greatly to our surprise she re- 
 
 wonnded, nor a gun disabled. The only dam- fused to fight us, and as we approached, she 
 
 age sustained by her worth mentioning was by gracefully retired, and closely hugged the shore 
 
 ramming the Monitor with her wooden stem, \mder the guns of Fortress Monroe. As if to 
 
 her cast-iron bow having been wrenched off provoke her to combat, the Jamestown was sent 
 
 the day before in the Cumberland. This prob- in, and she captured several prizes, in which the 
 
 ably saved the Monitor from a similar fate. 'Tis Monitor seemed to acquiesce, as she offered no 
 
 true the Monitor struck us some powerful blows resistance. French and English men-of-war 
 
 with her eleven-inch guns when only a few feet were present; the latter cheered and dipped 
 
 from U8,but not one of her shots penetrated our their flags as the Jamestown passed with the 
 
 armor. If instead of scattering her shot over prizes. 
 
 our shield she had concentrated them upon " On the 6th of May, when the Merrimac had 
 
 some particular spot, a breach might have been returned to Norfolk for supplies, a squadron 
 
 made. When the Merrimac left Hampton Eoads consisting of the Monitor, Naugatitck and Galena 
 
 for Norfolk, the 3/onitor had passed over the bar (iron-clads , and five large men-of-war, com-r 
 
 and hauled off into shoal water, where we could menced to bombard our batteries at Sewell's 
 
 not reach her -the Merrimac's draft being over Point, The Merrimac immediately left Norfolk 
 
 twenty-two feet, and hers only about ten. As for the scene of conflict. As she approached 
 
 there was nothing more to fight, the tide being the squadron at full speed the Vanderbilt, one 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 203 
 
 "I commanded the Beaufort in the battles of the 8th and 9th of 
 March, and in the operations tinder Commodore Tatnall, to which I shall 
 allude. In fact, I may say I commanded a consort of the Merrimac from 
 the time she was put in commission until she was blown up. I, therefore, 
 profess to be familiar with her history. 
 
 " The battle of March 8th I propose describing at some future day. 
 In order to show more particularly what part the wooden vessels took in 
 that memorable engagement. The battle of March 9th * * * that be- 
 tween the Monitor and Merrimac — has been fully described by Capt. 
 Catesby Jones, her commander, and by other of her ojficers. I do not 
 propose here to repeat it; but there are some points in relation to the 
 operations subsequent to that engagement which have either been unno- 
 ticed, or but lightly touched upon. These points are in my judgment so 
 Important, and bear so immediately upon the claim of the Monitor for 
 prize-money, that I venture to submit the following: 
 
 "I. After the battle of the 9th of March, the Jferrimac went into dock 
 to replace the prow, or ram, which had been lost in sinking the Cumber- 
 land, to exchange some of her guns, and tomakesomesmallrepairstoher 
 a,rmor and machinery On the 11th of April, Commodore Tatnall, who 
 had succeeded Commodore Buchanan in the command, went down with 
 his entire squadron, consisting of the Merrimac, Patrick Henry, James- 
 town, Teaser, Beaufort and Raleigh, to offer battle to the Federal fleet 
 then lying in Hampton Koads or below Old Point. Three merchant ves- 
 sels were run on shore by their masters between Newport News and Old 
 Point, and were partially abandoned. The Jamestown and Raleigh towed 
 them off almost under the guns of Old Point and the Federal fleet. Their 
 flags were hauled down and hoisted Union down under the Confederate 
 flag as a defiance to induce the fleet to attempt to retake them. The fleet, 
 under Flag-offlcer Goldsborough, consisted of a large number of wooden 
 vessels, some of them very heavy frigates, the Monitor, the Naugatuck (a 
 small iron-clad), and even the VariderMlt, a powerful steamer specially 
 prepared ' to run down and sink the Merrimac.'' 
 
 "An English and a French man-of-war were present in the Roads and 
 went up to Newport News, evidently to witness the serious engagement, 
 which we, at least, expected. Their crews repeatedly waved their hats and 
 handkerchiefs to our vessels as we passed and repassed them during the day. 
 
 " The Merrimac, with her consorts, held possession of the roads, and 
 defied the enemy to battle during the entire day, and for several days 
 after * * the Federal fleet lying m the same position below Old Point. 
 Towards sunset of the first day the Merrimac fired a single gun at the 
 enemy ; it was immediately replied to by the Naugatuck, lying, I think, 
 inside Hampton Bar. 
 
 " I do not know what Commodore Tatnall thought about attacking 
 the Federal fleet as it stood, nor do I know what his instructions were, 
 but I do know that our officers generally believed that torpedoes had 
 
 of tlie fastest steamers then afloat, which we gage of battle offered her by the i/erWmac daily 
 imderstood had been fitted with a prow espec- since the 11th of Apnl. 
 iaJly for ramming ns, joined the other ships. " Wherefore doth she claim prize-money ? 
 We regarded the attack as an invitation to come " In stating the above facts, I do not wish to 
 out, and we expected a most desperate en- detract one iota from the just deserts of the 
 counter. Much to the disappointment of our brave oflficers and men of the Monitor. They did 
 Commodore, and greatly to the relief of many their whole duty, but not more gallantly than 
 others besides myself, as soon as the Meriimm their less fortunate comrades on the Cumber- 
 came within range, they seemed to conclude land. Congress, Minnesota, and other ships in the 
 that Sewell's Point was not worth fighting about. Roads, and are therefore no more entitled to 
 aad all hurried below the guns of Fortress Mon- prize-money. Those on the Jlferriroac by no 
 roe and the Bip-raps. The Merrimac pursued means regarded the Monitor as a lion in her 
 at full speed until she came well under the fire path. Having served on the Merrimac from the 
 of the latter fort, when she retired to her moor- time work was first begun upon her untal ttie 
 ings at the mouth of the river. After the evac- night of her destruction, in justice to all con- 
 nation of Norfolk the Merrimac was taken above cemed, and that honor inay be done to whom 
 Craney Island and blown up on the T 1th of May. honor is due, I simply desire the facts to be 
 The Jfonitor was then up the James Biver, having known. T,^^T„„«r-«. 
 gone up the day before, and was probably more x. i, o, ."■ ■UHLEi'iOE. 
 than fifty miles away. She had refused the "Washihgton, Feb. 21. 
 
204 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 been placed in the channel between Old Point and the Rip-raps ; indeed, 
 •we supposed that to be the reason why Flag-officer Goldsborough declined 
 to fight us in the Roads; moreover, fighting the entire fleet, Monitor, 
 Naugatuok, Vanderbilt, and all in the Roads, was one thing, and fighting 
 the same under the guns of Old Point and the Rip-raps, was another. 
 
 " II. The Merrimao remained for some days in this position, offering 
 battle, and protecting the approaches to Norfolk and Richmond, and 
 then went up to the navy-yard to water. I think it was on the 8th day 
 of May that Flag-officer Goldsborough took advantage of her absence to 
 bombard Sewell's Point with a number of his vessels— the Monitor, Galena, 
 aud Naugatuck included — all three iron-clads. When the fact was known 
 in Norfolk, the Merrimao cast off from her moorings and steamed down to 
 take a hand in the fight. As soon as her smoke was seen the entire fleet 
 fled, and again took refuge below the guns of Old Point, where the Merri- 
 mac declined to pursue, for reasons satisfactory to her gallant commander. 
 
 "III. From this time, until the 10th of May, the Merrimac maintained 
 the same attitude. On that day she was blown up by her commander in 
 consequence of the evacuation of Norfolk by the Confederates. Then, 
 and not till then, Commodore John Rodgers was sent up the James River 
 with the &alena, Monitor and. Naugatuck, all iron-clads, to attack Drewry's 
 Bluff or Fort Darling, and make an attempt on Richmond. 
 
 "IV. The above facts go to show what Flag-officer Goldsborough 
 thought of the Merrimac, and in citing them, I wish it to be understood 
 that I intend to cast no imputations upon him and his gallant officers. I 
 have been told by some of them that he had positive orders from hisgov- 
 emment not to attack the Merrimac; and I believe it to be the case. * * * 
 
 " V. The memorial claims that the Monitor not only whipped the 
 Merrimac on the 9th of March, but that she ever after prevented her 
 from going below Old Point; and thus saved Baltimore, Washington, and 
 even New York ! ! ! The answer to this is, that the Merrimac could not 
 have gone to Baltimore or Washington without lightening her so much 
 that she would no longer have been an iron-clad : that is, she would have 
 risen in the water so as to expose her unarmored sides. As to her going 
 outside of Cape Henry it was impossible ; she would have foundered. She 
 could not have lived in Hampton Roads in a moderate gale. 
 
 " I served in the Palmetto State at Charleston, a similarly constructed 
 vessel, but better sea-boat, and infinitely more buoyant, and have seen 
 the time when we had to leave the outer harbor and take refuge in. the 
 inner in only a moderate blow ! 
 
 " VI. From the above-mentioned facts I think it clearly appears (1.) 
 that the Monitor, after her engagement with the Merrimao on the 9th of 
 March, never again dared encounter her, though offered frequent oppor- 
 tunities ; (2.) that so much doubt existed in the minds of the Federal 
 authorities as to her power to meet the Merrimac, that orders were given 
 her commander not to fight her voluntarily; (3.) that the Monitor newer 
 ventured above Old Point from the 9th of March until after the destruc- 
 tion of the Merrimao by her own crew, save on the occasion above re- 
 ferred to; (4.) that the Merrimac, so far from being seriously injured in 
 her enga!gement, efficiently protected the approaches to Norfolk and 
 Richmond until Norfolk was evacuated; (5.) that the Merrimac could not 
 have gotten to Washington or Baltimore in her normal condition; (6.) 
 that she could not have gone to sea at all ; (7. ) that, although she could 
 have run by the Federal fleet at Old Point (barring torpedoes in the chan- 
 nel) and threatened McClellan's base at Yorktown, in exceptionally good 
 weather, yet would have had to leave the James Biver open. 
 
 " VII. For the truth of the very important facts mentioned in sec- 
 tions 1., II. and III., I am willing to abide by the log-book of the Monitor, 
 the dispatches of Flag-offlcer Goldsborough, or the testimony of Com- 
 mander Dana Greene, U. 8. navy, who was the gallant and efficient execu- 
 tive officer of the Monitor from the day she left New York until she foun- 
 dered off Cape Hatteras. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 305 
 
 "VIII. In conclusion T would like to say, and I do so most cheerfully, 
 that the Monitor made her appearance in Hampton Roads at a critical 
 time— the night of the 8th of March, 1863— and although an untried ves- 
 sel, of a new and peculiar construction, did on the next day what the 
 whole Federal fleet present declined to do— she fought the Merrimao. 
 
 " If the claim for a reward was put upon this ground alone, no one 
 would be more gratified to see it granted her gallant crew than myself : 
 but to claim prize-money on the ground that the Monitor defeated and 
 permanently disabled the Merrimao, thus saving Washington and New 
 York, etc., is in view of the facts cited, in my humble opinion, prepos- 
 terous. " Very respectfully, etc., „ ^^ g Pabkeb."^ 
 
 The history of the fight between the Monitor and the Vi?-- 
 ginia established the fact beyond controversy that the Vir- 
 ginia sustained no more damage from the Monitor than the 
 latter received from the former, and that all the damage 
 received by the Virginia was on the 8th of March, in her action 
 with the Cumberland, Congress, Minnesota, and other wooden 
 vessels, and that her "subsequent destruction" was the work 
 of her own officers and crew, in consequence of military 
 operations on land, and distant many miles from the waters of 
 Hampton Eoads. McClellan turned the flank of the Virginia 
 away up on the peninsula, and exposed her base at Yorktown 
 to capture, and she was no longer able to supply her necessi- 
 ties, repair her engines, and keep herself afloat. The Monitor 
 and the other men-of-war in Hampton Roads had neither 
 part nor lot in the destruction of the Virginia. 
 
 Prof. Soley, in his effort to reason out a victory for the 
 Monitor, says : 
 
 " But assuming for the moment that the Merrimao was left in posses- 
 sion of the field, why did she not continue her operations ? The retreat 
 of the Monitor would have left matters in precisely the situation in which 
 the Merrimao supposed them to be when she came out in the morning. It 
 is to be presumed that her object was to destroy the Minnesota. The 
 Monitor had prevented her for four hours from doing this; now, however, 
 if the Monitor had retreated, why did she not attack the frigate ? 
 
 " Instead of continuing the fight, the Merrimao steamed to Norfolk. 
 Jones gives as his reason for returning that he believed the Monitor to be 
 entirely disabled. What ground he had for forming such a belief does not 
 appear. It has also been suggested that his pilots led him to suppose that 
 delay would prevent him from crossing the bar. But what need had he to 
 cross 1 The bar was a mile above Sewell's Point; he had anchored safely 
 the night before under the battery, and after destroying the Minnesota, 
 supposing that the Monitor had disappeared— he could do the same again, 
 and go up to Norfolk at his leisure. If, however, his injuries were so great 
 that he was compelled to lose no time in returning to Norfolk, it would 
 seem that, instead of his having defeated the Monitor, the Monitor had de- 
 feated him. In truth, the claim that the Merrimao was victorious is singu- 
 larly bold, in view of the fact, that half an hour after the last shot was 
 fired the Minnesota was lying aground in the very spot she had occu- 
 pied in the morning, the Monitor was lying alongside her, neither of them 
 materially injured, and the supposed victor was standing as fast as possi- 
 ble to Elizabeth River, in order to cross the bar before ebb-tide." 
 
 It is one thing to win a victory, and another thing to reap 
 the entire fruits of that victory, and many a victory has 
 
 ■^'She JIferrimac was christened the Virginia f erred In this article to give her the name she was 
 by the Confederate authorities; but I have pre- best known by.— W. H. P. 
 
206 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 been complete of which the full fruitage was lost. That the 
 first battle of Bull Run was a complete victory is generally 
 admitted, but the fruits were lost by unavoidable and unfore- 
 seen circumstances. The fruits of Lee's victory over Burn- 
 side at Fredericksburg were barred against him by the Rap- 
 pahannock River, and so the " middle ground " of Hampton 
 Roads, impassable to the Virginia, prevented her from com- 
 pleting her victory by destroying the Minnesota. The Con- 
 federate army was damaged verj"^ greatly both at Manassas 
 and at Fredericksburg, but no writer has claimed for McDowell 
 and Burnside victories in those battles because their armies 
 were not totally destroyed. It was not the bar a mile above 
 Sewell's Point that the pilots advised Jones about, but the 
 "middle ground" which interposed between the Minnesota 
 and the Virginia. They were unwilling to be responsible for 
 the ship if she attempted to cross that "middle ground," or 
 hazard further fighting in her position, on an ebb-tide. Lieut. 
 Wood says: "At length the Monitor withdrew over the mid- 
 dle ground, where we could not follow, but always maintain- 
 ing a position to protect the Minnesota. To have run our 
 ship ashore on a falling tide would have been ruin. We waited 
 her return for an hour, and at about 2 P. M. steamed to 
 Sewell's Point." These are the badges of defeat upon which 
 the Confederates claim that the Virginia compelled the Moni- 
 tor to withdraw from the fight. And when to these is added 
 the fact, now brought out by Lieut. Greene, that the Navy De- 
 partment, hj positive orders, forbid the Monitor to engage the 
 Virginia unless in defence, the conclusion is irresistible that 
 in the first great battle of the iron-clads the Confederate ship 
 and navy won the laurels of victory. In this claim we detract 
 nothing from the valor, seamanship and gallantry with which 
 Worden handled and fought the Merrimac. Until blinded by 
 the casualty of battle, he fought his ship with a gallantry only 
 equalled by Lieut. Jones; and, whefi the command devolved 
 on Greene, it was no want of courage that caused him to with- 
 draw from the " middle ground," but the prudence of a 
 thoughtful sailor that would take account of damage, and 
 ascertain the true condition of his ship, the command of which 
 had so suddenly descended to him. 
 
 The affidavit of a deserter, one James Byers, who stole the 
 steam-tug J. B. White, and fled from Norfolk to Newport 
 News, has been repeatedly used by Federal writers and in 
 public documents published by Congress, to establish the 
 claim of very great injury done the Virginia by the Monitor. 
 That affidavit, quoted by the Committee of the Senate when 
 considering the bill for prize money to the officers and crew 
 of the Monitor, recites: 
 
 " The Merrimac came back into the river badly disabled, and almost 
 in a sinking condition. Tugs had to be used to get her into the dry dock 
 at the navy-yard, the crew pumping and bailing water with all their 
 
THE CONFEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 307 
 
 might to keep her afloat. I saw her in the dock at Norfolk next day, was 
 on board of her, and made a personal examination of the ship. The effect 
 of the Monitor's guns upon the Merrimac was terrible. Her plated sides 
 were broken in, the iron plating rent and broken, the massive timbers of 
 her sides crushed; and the officers themselves stated that she could not 
 have withstood the effect of the Monitor's guns any longer, and that they 
 barely escaped in time from her." 
 
 The sworn statement of a deserter, made to ingratiate him- 
 self with his new-found friends, will not receive credence from 
 impartial history, but the following letter from Lieut. Green 
 of the Monitor, coming from an honorable source, is entitled 
 to every respect: 
 
 "United States Steamer Monitor, ) 
 "Hampton Roads, March 12th, 1863. \ 
 
 "On Sunday last we met the Merrimac at 9.15 A. M., and, after a 
 hard fight of four hours, drove her back to Norfolk. Our noble and gal- 
 lant captain was wounded near the close of the fight, and I was called to 
 take command of the vessel. . Up to that time I had fired every gun my- 
 self, and have the satisfaction of knowing that I put five shots of 170 
 pounds straight through this infernal machine, and wounded her 
 captain. 
 
 " Lieut. T. O. Selfridge (Lieut. Jaffers has since taken command)is at 
 present in command, and as soon as the Merrimac makes her appearance 
 we are going to lay this battery alongside of her and stay there until one 
 or the other sinks. 
 
 " Our vessel is a complete success, and we are not materially damaged. 
 We received twenty-one shots.'' 
 
 It was simply impossible for Lieut. Green, shut up in the 
 turret of the Monitor, with no look-out, except the port-holes 
 when open for firing, to have seen the effect of his shots, and 
 when he says he "put five shots of 170 pounds straight 
 through this infernal machine and wounded her captain," he 
 drew largely upon his imagination, for he really did neither. 
 Nor is there any truth in the remark made on page 13 of 
 the " Statement " accompanying Senate Bill 369, Forty-seventh 
 Congress, first session, that : " Finally, however, a shot from 
 the Monitor, whose guns had been depressed for that purpose, 
 struck the Merrimac on her only vulnerable part, the junction 
 of the casemate with the side of the ship, causing a leak, 
 which induced her officers to abandon the contest." No such 
 shot struck the Virginia, and consequently there was no leak- 
 ing from the effect of the shot, and no abandonment of the con- 
 test from that cause. 
 
 The Virginia was leaking, not from injury inflicted by 
 the Monitor, but from that received in the battle of the 8th, 
 when she rammed the Cumberland to the bottom, for in doing 
 that splendid feat she twisted off her ram, which caused her 
 to leak ; and Boatswain Hasker, of the Virginia, explains 
 that leak was further opened when the Virginia rammed the 
 Monitor, "which leak," he adds, "was stopped partially by 
 shoving a bale of oakum against the stem apron "; and again, 
 "in consequence of our stem being twisted, we were leaking 
 
208 THE CONWEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 badly, and only had time to steam to Norfolk, and get in the 
 dry dock by high-water." 
 
 Whatever process of reasoning Federal writers may adopt 
 to satisfy themselves that the Monitor defeated the Virginia, 
 to make good their claim they must go further and explain 
 why the Monitor, if the victor in the first fight, never again 
 came out of shoal water to engage the Virginia; but that her 
 gallant and brave crew of oflBcers and men submitted to the 
 deep humiliation of seeing three Federal transports captured 
 in Hampton Roads, and dragged around the arena with the 
 flags Union down, in the presence of the French and English 
 cruisers, as will presently appear. 
 
 Capt. Buchanan and Lieut. Jones both bore testimony to 
 the skill and bravery of all the officers under their command 
 in the actions of both days: 
 
 "To that brave and intelligent oflBcer, Lieut. Catesby Jones, the ex- 
 ecutive and ordnance officer of the Virginia," says Capt. Buchanan in his 
 official report, " I am greatly indebted for the success achieved. His con- 
 stant attendance to his duties in the equipment of the ship; his intelli- 
 gence in the instruction of ordnance to the ere w, as proved by the accuracy 
 and effect of their fire — some of the guns having been personally directed 
 by him — his tact and management in the government of raw recruits, his 
 general knowledge of the executive duties of a man-of war, together with 
 his high-toned bearing, were all eminently conspicuous, and had their 
 fruits in the admirable efficiency of the Virginia. If conduct such as his 
 — and I do not know that I have used adequate language in describing it 
 — entitles an officer to promotion, I see in the case of Lieut. Jones one in 
 all respects worthy of it. As flag officer, I am entitled to some one to 
 perform the duties of flag-captain, and I should be proud to have Lieut. 
 Jones ordered to the Virginia as lieutenant commandant, if it be not the 
 intention of the department to bestow upon him a higher rank. 
 
 "Lieut. Simms fully sustained his well-earned reputation. He fired 
 the first gun, and when the command devolved upon Lieut. Jones, in 
 consequence of my disability, he was ordered to perform the duties 
 of executive officer. Lieut. Jones has expressed to me his satisfaction 
 in having had the services of so experienced, energetic, and zealous an 
 officer. 
 
 "Lieut. Davidson fought his guns with great precision. The muzzle 
 of one of them was soon shot away ; he continued, however, to fire it, 
 though the wood-work around the port became ignited at each discharge. 
 His buoyant and cheerful bearing and voice were contagious and inspir- 
 ing. 
 
 "Lieut. Wood handled his pivot gun admirably, and the executive 
 officer testifies to his valuable suggestions during the action. His zeal and 
 industry in drilling the crew contributed materially to our success. 
 
 "Lieut. Eggleston served his hot shot and shell with judgment and 
 effect; and his bearing was deliberate, and exerted a happy influence pn 
 his division. 
 
 " Lieut. Butt fought his gun with activity, and during the action was 
 gay and smiling. 
 
 " The Marine Corps was well represented by Capt. Thom, who-^ie tran- 
 quil mien gave evidence that the hottest fire was no novelty to him. One 
 of his guns was served effectively and creditably by a detachment of 
 the United Artillery of Norfolk, under the the command of Capt. KeviU. 
 The muzzle of their gun was struck by a shell from the enemy, which 
 broke off a piece of the gun, but they continued to fire as if it was unin- 
 jured. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 209 
 
 " While the Virginia was thus engaged in getting her position for at- 
 tacking the Congress, the prisoners state it was believed on board that 
 ship that we hadhauled off; the men left their guns and gave three cheers. 
 They were soon sadly undeceived, for a few minutes after we opened upon 
 her again, she having run on shore in shoal water. The carnage, havoc 
 and dismay caused by our fire compelled them to haul down their colors, 
 and to hoist a white flag at their gaff and half-mast, and another at the 
 main. The crew instantly took to their boats and landed. 
 
 "Midshipmen Foute, Marmaduke, Littlepage, Craig and Long ren- 
 dered valuable services. Their conduct would have been creditable to older 
 heads, and gave great promise of future usefulness. Midshipman Marma- 
 duke, though receiving several painful wounds early in the action, man- 
 fully fought his gun until the close. He is now at the hospital. 
 
 "Paymaster Semple volunteered for any service, and was assigned to 
 the command of the powder division, an important and complicated duty, 
 -which could not have been better performed. 
 
 " Surgeon Phillips and Assistant Surgeon Garnett were prompt and 
 attentive in the discharge of their duties ; their kind and considerate care 
 ■of the wounded, and the skill and ability displayed in the treatment, won 
 for them the esteem and gratitude of all who came under their charge, 
 and justly entitled them to the confidence of officers and crew. I beg 
 leave to call the attention of the department to the case of Dr. Garnett. 
 He stands deservedly high in his profession, is at the head of the list of 
 assistant surgeons, and there being a vacancy, in consequence of the re- 
 ■cent death of Surgeon BlacknaU, I should be much gratified if Dr. Gar- 
 nett could be promoted to it. 
 
 "The engines and machinery, upon which so much depended, per- 
 formed much better than was expected. This is due to the intelligence, 
 ■experience and coolness of Acting Chief Engineer Ramsay. Hisefforiis 
 were ably seconded by his assistants, Tynan, Campbell, Herring, and Jack 
 "White. As Mr. Ramsay is only acting chief engineer, I respectfully recom- 
 mend his promotion to the rank of chief ; and would also ask that Second 
 Assistant Engineer Campbell may be promoted to first assistant — ^he hav- 
 ing performed the duties of that grade during the engagement. 
 
 "The forward officers. Boatswain Hasker, Gunner Oliver and Car- 
 penter Lindsey, discharged well all the duties required of them. The 
 boatswain had charge of a gun and fought it well. The gunner was in- 
 defatigable in his efforts ; his experience and exertions as a gunner have 
 contributed very materially to the efficiency of the battery. 
 
 " Acting Master Parrish was assisted in piloting the ship by Pilots 
 "Wright, Williams, Clark and Cunningham. They were necessarily much 
 exposed. 
 
 "It is now due that I should mention my personal staff. To that 
 gallant young officer. Flag Lieut. Minor, I am much indebted for his 
 promptness in the execution of signals, for renewing the flag-staffs when 
 shot away — being thereby greatly exposed — for his watchfulness in keep- 
 ing the Confederate flag up ; his alacrity in conveying my orders to the 
 different divisions, and for his general cool and gallant bearing. 
 
 " My aide, Acting Midshipman Rootes, of the navy, Lieut. Forrest, of 
 the army, who served as a volunteer aide, and my clerk, Mr. Arthur St. 
 CJlair, Jr., are entitled to my thanks for the activity with which my orders 
 were conveyed to the different parts of the ship. During the hottest of 
 the fight, they were always at their posts giving evidence of their cool- 
 ness. Having referred to the good conduct of the officers in the flag-ship 
 immediately under my notice, I come now to a no less pleasing task when 
 I attempt to mark my approbation of the bearing of those serving in the 
 other vessels of the squadron. 
 
 " Commander John R. Tucker, of the Patrick Henry, and Lieut. Com- 
 manding J. N. Barney, of the Jamestown, and W. A. Webb, of the Teaser, 
 deserve great praise for their gallant conduct throughout the engagement. 
 Their judgment in selecting their positions for attacking the enemy was 
 
210 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 good: their constant fire was destructive, and contributed much to the 
 success of the day. The ' general order,' under which the squadron went 
 into action, required that, in the absence of all signals, each commanding 
 officer was to exercise his own judgment and discretion in doing all the 
 damage he could to the enemy, and to sink before surrendering. From 
 the bearing of those officers, on the 8th, I am fully satisfied that that 
 order would have been carried out. 
 
 " Commander Tucker speaks highly of all under him, and desires par- 
 ticularly to notice that Lieut. Col. Cadwallader St. George Noland, com- 
 manding the post at Mulberry Island, on hearing of the deficiency in the 
 complement of the Patrick Henry, promptly offered the services of ten of 
 his men as volunteers for the occasion, one of whom, Geo. E. Webb, of the 
 ' Greenville Guards,' Commander Tucker regrets to say, was killed. 
 
 " Lieut. Commanding Barney reports ' every officer and man on board 
 of the ship performed his whole duty, evincing a courage and fearlessness 
 worthy of the cause for which we are fighting.' 
 
 "Lieut. Commanding Webb specially notices the coolness displayed 
 by Acting Master Face and Third Assistant Engineer Quinn, when facing 
 the heavy fire of artillery and musketry from the shore, whilst the 
 Teaser was standing in to cover the boat in which, as previously stated, 
 Lieut. Minor had gone to burn the Congress. Several of his men were 
 badly wounded. 
 
 "The Raleigh, early in the action, had her gun-carriage disabled, 
 which compelled her to withdraw. As soon as he had repaired damages 
 as well as he could, Lieut. Commanding Alexander resumed his position 
 in the line. He sustained himself gallantly during the remainder of the 
 day and speaks highly of all under his command. That evening he was 
 ordered to Norfolk for repairs. 
 
 "The Beaufort, Lieut. Commanding Parker, was in close contact with 
 the enemy frequently during the day, and all on board behaved gallantly. 
 
 "Lieut. Commanding Parker expresses his warmest thanks to his 
 officers and men for their coolness. Acting Midshipman Foreman, who 
 accompanied him as volunteer aide. Midshipmen Mallory and Newton, 
 Captain's Clerk Bain and Mr. Gray, pilot, are all specially mentioned by 
 him."' 
 
 Capt. Buchanan was immediately promoted to be Admiral 
 of the C. S. navy, and in consequence of his wound was tem- 
 porarily relieved from the command, and Commander Josiah 
 Tatnall, on March 25th, 1862, was ordered to assume command 
 of the naval defences of the waters of Virginia, and to hoist 
 his flag on board the Virginia, with the same vessels compos- 
 ing the fleet. 
 
 As soon as the news of the battles in Hampton Roads 
 reached Savannah, Capt. Tatnall wrote, March 12th, 1862, to 
 Capt. Buchanan: 
 
 " Mt dear Buchanan : The reports from Norfolk have kept us in a 
 state of hopeful but painful anxiety in regard to your unexampled combat 
 off Newport News, until the accounts of last evening reported the result, 
 and the return of the ships to Norfolk. I congratulate you, my dear 
 friend, with all my heart and soul, on the glory you have gained for the 
 Confederacy and yourself. The whole affair is unexampled, and will carry 
 
 1 On the 16th of April, 1862, the Confederate are due and are hereby tendered to the officers 
 
 Congress passed the following " Resolution of and crews of the Patrick Henry, Jamestown, 
 
 thaiQcs to the officers and crews of the ' Patrick Teaser, and other vessels engaged, for their 
 
 Henry,' ' Jamestown,' ' Teaser,' amd other vessels, gallant conduct and bearing in the naval 
 
 for gallant conduct : combat and brilliant victory on the waters 
 
 " Resolved by the Congress of the Confederate of James River, on the 8th and 9th of March, 
 
 States of America, That the thanks of Congress 1862." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 211 
 
 your name to every corner of the Christian world, and be on the tongue 
 of every man that deals in salt water. That which I admire most in the 
 whole affair is the bold confidence with which jon undertook an untried 
 thing. To have faltered, or to have doubted, might have been fatal ; but 
 you proved yourself (as the old navy always esteemed you) a man not of 
 doubt or faltering when you had undertaken an adventure. If your 
 wound be severe, I shall regret it; but if it be not so, your friends will not 
 find fault, as it crowns your worth. 
 
 " I hope Congress will make you Admiral, and put you at the head of 
 the navy. Ton have my vote for it, from my very heart, and I am sure 
 all your seniors will cry ' Amen.' You don't know how much you have 
 aided in removing the gloom which recent military events had cast over 
 us. Do let some friend at your bedside write me one line to teU me the 
 nature of your wound. God bless you, my dear Buchanan." 
 
 Evidently, neither Buchanan nor Tatnall knew that the 
 Virginia had been defeated, as alleged, and had retreated to 
 Norfolk. 
 
 Commander Tatnall assumed command on the 39th of 
 March, and on April 1st received from Secretary Mallory the 
 information and suggestion contained in the following letter : 
 
 " The inclosed note, sent to me by a friend from Baltimore, will inform 
 you of some interesting points about the Monitor. This vessel has 
 achieved a high reputation by her recent combat with the Virginia ; and 
 the enemy, no less than our own people, look forward to a renewal of it 
 as a matter of course, and with very deep interest. I confess to a very 
 deep interest in your success over her, for I am fully convinced that the 
 result of such a victory may save millions of money, and perhaps thou- 
 sands of lives ; and hence I cannot avoid communicating to you matters 
 relating to the Monitor which perhaps may have but little influence in 
 determining the mode of assailing her. 
 
 "The Scientific American, in a recent number, publishes a neat wood- 
 cut of the vessel and gives some data of her construction. She has, I per- 
 ceive, two four-sided ventilators, about three feet diameter, and three feet 
 high, which, it is alleged, slide down even with the deck when in action. 
 But little preparation to resist boarders exists, it would seem ; and a wet 
 sail thrown over her pilot-house would effectually close the steersman's 
 eyes. Her grated turret, her smokestack, ventilators, and air-holes invite 
 attack with inflammables and combustibles; and it would seem that twenty 
 men thus provided, once upon her deck, as her turret is but nine feet high, 
 might drive every man out of her. 
 
 " Tou wUl leave with your ship and fleet to attack the enemy when 
 In your judgment it may seem best, and 1 need not add that I have every 
 confidence that you will accomplish all that any man with such means can. 
 
 ' ' Please telegraph me when you will probably leave ; and to avoid the 
 
 leaky telegraph, you can say ' Captain Smith wiU leave here on at 
 
 o'clock.' Good, fearless pilots are all-important, and I suggest that before 
 you sail you confront them with the chart. Their refusal to place the 
 Virginia closer than one mile to the Minnesota, notwithstanding Bu- 
 chanan's earnest appeals, induces me to say this." 
 
 The Confederate Secretary of the Navy could not have 
 regarded the Virginia as defeated by the Monitor when 
 urging another attack as soon as possible. " Do not hesitate," 
 wrote Secretary Mallory on April 4th, " or wait for orders, 
 but strike, when, how and where your judgment may dictate. 
 Take her (the Virginia) out of the dock when you deem best, 
 and this point is left entirely to your decision." 
 
213 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 From the 11th of March to the 4th of April the Virginia 
 was in the dry dock undergoing repairs, and, indeed, trying to 
 get completed, as originally designed. While in the dock her 
 hull was partially covered with two-inch iron plates, four feet 
 below her shield, for a distance of 180 feet; a new and heavier 
 ram was more strongly secured at her bow; the damage done 
 to her armor was repaired and wrought-iron shutters were in 
 part fitted to her ports, and rifled guns, supplied with steel- 
 pointed shot, were provided for her bow and stern guns. 
 These changes, and another 100 tons of pig iron in her fan- 
 tails, increased her draft, and, while improving her powers of 
 attack and defence, yet retarded her speed to about four knots 
 an hour. 
 
 Flag-officer Tatnall, on April 4th, sent the following dis- 
 patch to Secretary Mallory: " The Virginia is at this moment 
 going out of the dock, and I shall drop down into the Roads to- 
 morrow and act against the enemy accordingto circumstances," 
 and he expressed his regret that he could not fit the remainder 
 of the iron covers for the ports, or render, for want of time, 
 four of the six originally fitted available in action, and he 
 added: " The abilitj' to close our ports while loading would be 
 (particularly in close action with the Monitor) of great advan- 
 tage; for, if it be found that both vessels are impenetrable to 
 shot, the contest will be narrowed to the dismounting of guns, 
 and while ours will be exposed the whole time, hers will be 
 exposed but about one-sixth of the time.'' Capt. Buchanan 
 advised Tatnall most earnestly not to engage the Monitor 
 without port covers, because, he said, that two of her guns had 
 been disabled, and all the wounds incurred had been by shots 
 through the ports. In that opinion Lieut. Jones also coincided; 
 and it became even more necessary should an attempt be made 
 to pass Fortress Monroe; in that event, open ports would ex- 
 pose the battery to the danger of being dismounted by the 
 shots from the heavy guns in the fort and on the Rip-raps. 
 In addition to these serious drawbacks, Engineer Ramsay, on 
 April 5th, called attention to the utter unreliability of the en- 
 gines of the Virginia. Mr. Ramsay had been in the Merrimac 
 during her last cruise, was familiar with the bad working of 
 her engines, and now urged upon Flag-officer Tatnall, that, as 
 the engines never having been reliable, they were now not to 
 be depended upon, adding: " At the time I was ordered to the 
 vessel I was informed that it was not the intention to take the 
 ship where a delay, occasioned by a derangement in the 
 machinery, would endanger her safety"; and he further said: 
 "The engines of this ship are not disconnected, and one can- 
 not be worked alone. As long as the vacuum of the forward 
 engine holds good, the engines might be run by working the 
 a,fter-engine high pressure; but as the vacuum of either engine 
 is at all times precarious, and, if the vacuum of the forward 
 engine should fail, the engines would stop. Using one engine 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 213 
 
 high pressure would also require a great deal of steam, which 
 the boilers cannot generate for any length of time." 
 
 These embarrassing difficulties delayed the departure until 
 April 11th. The day previous, Tatnall informed the depart- 
 ment at Richmond, that it was his purpose to attack the 
 enemy's transports lying above the forts near Hampton Roads, 
 and not only to throw down the gage of battle, but add to it 
 the insult of actual injury, and thus compel the Monitor to ac- 
 cept battle on the old ground. It was Tatnall's conviction that 
 the Monitor, then lying off Hampton Creek, would certainly 
 come to the protection of the transports ; and with this impres- 
 sion he wrote to Secretary Mallory: " I shall not notice her (the 
 Monitor) until she closes with me, but direct my fire on the 
 transports. There must be, however, a combat with the 
 Monuor." 
 
 From first assuming command. Flag-officer Tatnall was 
 aware that his ship was not equal to public expectation, and that 
 it was hardly probable that he would find in Hampton Roads the 
 opportunity that his gallant friend Buchanan had so gloriously 
 embraced. To run the gauntlet between Fortress Monroe and 
 the Rip-raps was to open the way to Norfolk for the Monitor, 
 as well as to hazard the safety of the Virginia with her open 
 ports, and yet he wrote that he saw " no chance for me but to 
 pass the fort and strike elsewhere, and that if the Virginia was 
 needed at Yorktown, where McClellan's army was intrenched 
 and his transports around him, the Virginia would "at once 
 attempt " the passage of the fort. 
 
 With these high purposes, the Virginia and the gunboats 
 steamed down to the Roads on the morning of April 11th. 
 The Fortress Monroe correspondent of the New York Herald 
 witnessed the movement, and sent the following account: 
 
 " The alarm gun was fired at twenty minutes past seven o'clock, and, 
 as soon as the appearance of the Merrimac was generally known, the 
 docks, beach, ramparts of the fortress, and other points commanding a 
 view, were crowded with spectators. 
 
 "The Merrimac, after showing herself beyond Sewell's Point, ap- 
 peared to be heading this way. She did not long continue on this course, 
 however, but turned towards the James River, followed by six other gun- 
 boats, which had come round the point in her company. Of the latter, 
 the Jamestown and the Patrick Henry were recognized. Among the 
 others were supposed to be the Raleigh and Teaser. 
 
 "Arriving at a point about halfway between Sewell's Point and 
 Newport News Point, and near the place where the French war-vessels 
 Gassendi and Catinet, and the English steamer Rinaldo, had placed them- 
 selves early in the morning, the whole fleet came to a stop, while the 
 Jamestown, followed at some distance by the Patrick Henry and a small 
 tug, continued on her course. 
 
 ' 'The intention of the Jamestown was not at first perceived. As she came 
 around, leaving Newport News on her left, it was seen that her object 
 was to capture-two brigs and a schooner which were anchored near the 
 shore, about two mUes from the point. "^ This was done without the 
 
 1 The foUowiEg were the vessels alluded to : of Providence., and schooner CaUiarim; T. Djx, 
 Brig Marcus, of Stockton, N. J.; brig Saboali, of Aocomac. The two brigs were loaded with 
 
314 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 slightest difficulty, and the assistance of the small tug being rendered, the 
 three prizes were taken off under the rebel flag. 
 
 " The whole affair was concluded in less than half an hour, and the 
 Jamestown, having rejoined the fleet, was ordered to tow the prizes to 
 Craney Island. Taking one brig in tow astern, and the others alongside, 
 she moved slowly away. 
 
 "Slightly alarmed at this bold dash, quite a number of schooners in 
 the upper harbor availed themselves of a favorable wind and sailed. 
 
 "Up to this time (2 P. M.)the rebel fleet have remained in the position 
 in which they first placed themselves, and nothing more has been done 
 The tide is now out, and probably no new movement will be made for 
 some hours. If the Merrimac should then see fit to pay us a visit she will 
 be appropriately welcomed." 
 
 The N. Y. Herald of April 15th, commenting upon the af- 
 fair of the 11th, says: 
 
 " The public are very justly indignant at the conduct of our navy in 
 Hampton Koads on Friday last. The Confederate fleet, headed by the 
 Merrimac, came down to Craney Island, and one of the Confederate gun- 
 boats very coolly captured three Union vessels. The Monitor, the Stevens 
 battery, the Octarora, and the other Union vessels-of-war, took no appar- 
 ent notice of this proceeding. Not one of the vessels there even moved 
 towards the Merrimac. From all appearance, the Confederate fleet might 
 have captured every vessel in the Roads without resistance, so long as the 
 Merrimac kept her position off Craney Island. 
 
 " Among the spectators of this national disgrace were representatives 
 of the French and English navies. They must have formed a very high 
 opinion of our navy from this sample. Excelling the Confederate fleet in 
 the number and efficiency of our vessels, we yet waited for an attack, and 
 submitted even to the capture of the unarmed vessels we were there to 
 defend rather than make the first assault. Was it want of force that 
 caused this remarkable inaction ? Look at our ships in Hampton Roads, 
 and, from the Minnesota to the Monitor, we challenge the world to show 
 us finer war-vessels. Was it cowardice, then t Look at our brave sailors, 
 and remember what they have done for the Union, and their cowardice 
 seems impossible. No ; it was red tape which anchored our gallant ships, 
 and kept them from attacking the enemy ; it was red tape which tied tne 
 hands of our brave sailors, and restrained them from victory. The 
 wretched imbecility of the management of the Navy Department has 
 paralyzed the best sailors and the best navy of the world." 
 
 Again the N. Y. Herald, of April 13th, says that, "at four 
 o'clock in the afternoon (of the 11th), the Merrimac fired three 
 shots in the direction of Hampton Creek, as a challenge to our 
 fleet to come out and fight. The Monitor, meantime, continued 
 at her usual anchorage, and as for the Vanderbilt, and the rest 
 who were to run the Merrimac down, we have no account of 
 their presence. Where were they ? It is no wonder that 
 ' the bold impudence of the manoeuvres of the rebel fleet, con- 
 trasted with the apparent apathy of our fleet, excited surprise 
 and indignation' among the spectators." 
 
 hay— one of them having stalls for the accom- between Oraney Island and Norfolk, and the 
 
 modation of herses The schooner was not prisoners taken off by the steamer Raleigh and 
 
 loaded. carried to the navy-yard about two o'clock and 
 
 The crewa of these vessels were made prison- placed in safe keeping, 
 era, with the exceptlen of a portion of the crew The prisoners numbered thirteen in all — 
 
 of one of the brigs, who escaped to Oamp Ham- eleven white men and two negroes. The latter, 
 
 iiton by means of their small boats. The ves- as also three of the white men, were from the 
 
 sela were brought up and anchored in the river eastern shore of Virginia. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 215 
 
 The "sauve qui pent" was given by the signal-gun of the 
 Minnesota when the Virginia made her appearance^ and the 
 race for safety is thus described by the Herald's Fortress Mon- 
 roe correspondent: 
 
 " The large fleet of Union schooner transports -which was anchored in 
 the Roads, on seeing the rebel fleet, slipped their moorings, and, favored 
 by wind and tide, were soon out of harm's way. Many of those in Hamp- 
 ton Cove, restricted by the narrow and serpentine channels, not being able 
 to get out of the way by themselves, were assisted by the steam-tugs, of 
 which there are a number here. The little Monitor, which has been 
 anxiously awaiting the reappearance of the Merrimao, on seeing the 
 latter approach, got ready for action by clearing her decks, lowering her 
 smoke and steam pipes, slipping her anchor, and in less than ten minutes 
 was ready for action. The orders from Flag-officer Goldsborough were, 
 however, to act strictly on the defensive, and to give battle only when the 
 rebel craft should approach a given point." 
 
 Another correspondent adds, that "the events of this morn- 
 ing are much commented upon, and have caused a considerable 
 feeling of irritation and some humiliation," that "the cap- 
 ture was affected almost under the bows of the French and 
 English cruisers, and we may be sure, that our national pres- 
 tige was not increased in their eyes by what they saw." Lieut. 
 Greene, in his article in the Century of March, 1885, does not 
 mention this bold defiance by the Virginia, but says: " For the 
 next two months we lay at Hampton Eoads. Twice the Mer- 
 rimac came out of the Elizabeth River, but did not attack." It 
 was Tatnall's expectation that the Monitor would come into 
 water deep enough to be attacked, and, while he would not 
 liave declined a duel at long range, he expected the same gal- 
 lantry from Lieut. Selfridge that had been shown by Capt. 
 Worden, who had advanced to the attack the moment the 
 Minnesota was threatened. But the Monitor now witnessed, 
 without an effort to prevent, the capture and carrying off of 
 three transports, if not from under its guns, certainly from 
 within the range of its artillery. As Lieut. Barney of the 
 Jamestown towed his captures,' with the U. S. flags hoisted 
 Union down to taunt their protectors, and induce them to come 
 up and endeavor to retake them, and dragged them under 
 the stern of the English corvette Binaldo, Capt. Hewitt, he 
 was enthusiastically cheered. 
 
 It was not for the capture of transports that Tatnall 
 steamed to Hampton Roads; that capture was made to provoke 
 the Monitor into deep water, where his new mode of attack by 
 boarding could be attempted. To that end Tatnall had deter- 
 mined to surround the Monitor with the Confederate fleet — 
 and with their crews divided each into three parties to have 
 boarded the Monitor. Numbers one in each vessel were 
 charged with covering the ventilators after having thrown 
 into them ignited combustibles that would suffocate; numbers 
 
 1 Parker's RecoUectioni of a Naval Officer, p. 274. 
 
216 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 two of each party were to wedge the turret; while numbers 
 three were to cover the pilot-house and blind the steersman. 
 Accurate and secret information had been acquired in regard to 
 the Monitor, and while Tatnall was prepared to sacrifice largely 
 of his command he felt confident of capturing the Monitor 
 if once he could grapple her. And while Lieut. Greene has said 
 that the Monitor's commander was prepared for such an at- 
 tempt, and that it would have failed, a demonstration of its 
 failure in actual conflict was, perhaps, prevented by the Moni- 
 tor declining battle. It is due to Lieut. Greene to quote his 
 reason for not accepting the challenge : " We, on our side, had 
 received positive orders not to attack in the comparatively 
 shoal waters above Hampton Roads, where the Union fleet 
 could not manoeuvre." The reason of the order might have 
 applied to the Virginia with her draft of twenty-three feet, but 
 did not apply to the Monitor with a draft of twelve feet. More- 
 over, before the Virginia had been felt, the Monitor accepted 
 battle in the same ' ' comparatively shoal waters," why then 
 was it ordered to decline fight in the same waters ? The reason 
 for the restraining order is to be found in the stubborn fact, 
 that, notwithstanding all the clamor of victory for the Moni- 
 tor, the Virginia was believed at Washington to have received 
 no material injury, and while her defective machinery was not 
 known, the authorities at the Federal capital did not repose 
 confidence in the ability of the Monitor to prevent the advent of 
 the Confederate ram at Washington. Secretary Welles re- 
 lated what took place at a Cabinet meeting called after the fight 
 in Hampton Roads, at which he reports Mr. Stanton as saying: 
 
 " 'The Merrimac will change the whole character of the war; she will 
 destroy, seriatim, every naval vessel; she will lay all cities on the sea-board 
 under contribution. I shall immediately recall Burnside ; Port Royal 
 must be abandoned. I will notify the governors and municipal authori- 
 ties in the North to take instant measures to protect their harbors.' He 
 had no doubt, he said, that the Merrimac was at this moment on her way 
 to Washington ; and looking out of the window, which commanded a view 
 of the Potomac for many miles, ' not unlikely we shall have a shell or 
 cannon ball from one of her guns in the White House before we leave this 
 room.' Mr. Seward, usually buoyant and self-reliant, overwhelmed with 
 the intelligence, listened in responsive sympathy to Stanton, and was 
 greatly depressed, as, indeed, were all the members.'' 
 
 Evidently the Cabinet of Mr. Lincoln did not believe the 
 Virginia had been defeated by the Monitor, and they there- 
 fore positively ordered the Monitor to remain in shoal waters, 
 and to avoid another fight. It was owing to the apprehensions 
 of the Cabinet at Washington, and not the prudence of Lieut. 
 Jeffers, that " the capture of these vessels almost within gun- 
 shot of the Monitor did not effect her movements," as Tatnall 
 reported on April 12th, when he " moored the Virginia to the 
 buoy off Sewell's Point in sight of the enemy's ships." 
 
 Notwithstanding Tatnall knew that the Monitor in Hamp- 
 ton Roads was the superior ship, and possessed great advantages 
 
CAPTAIN JOSIAH TATNALL 
 
 CONFEDEBATE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY., 217 
 
 over tlie Virginia, he boldly invited another trial, and was 
 greatly disappointed when the invitation was declined. On 
 the 21st of April he advised the Navy Department, that 
 "the enemy's vessels of light draft can go from Fortress 
 Monroe to Newport News, a distance of but six miles, with 
 impunity." At that writing he had sent into James River, by 
 the enemy's batteries at Newport News, the Patrick Henry, the 
 Jamestown, Raleigh, Beaufort and Teaser, and was alone in 
 Hampton Roads, The chart of the Roads shows that nine to 
 ten feet of water can be carried near the land, and inside 
 Hampton Bar, from Fortress Monroe to Newport News, and 
 by that route the enemy's gunboats and light-draft vessels 
 could pass into James River, and that consequently the navi- 
 gation of James River by the light - draft vessels of the 
 enemy could not be prevented by the Virginia unless that 
 vessel was permanently placed at the mouth of James River. 
 In such a position Norfolk was open to the Monitor; for, if Tat- 
 nall was ready when ordered to run between Fortress Monroe 
 and the Rip -raps with the Virginia, he felt that the batteries 
 at Craney Island and Sewell's Point could not protect Norfolk 
 from the Monitor. 
 
 As it was, the Virginia was mistress of Hampton Roads, 
 for he said, " the enemy's great fleet of war-vessels and trans- 
 ports, with a few exceptions of small transports, is not in 
 Hampton Roads, but in Chesapeake Bay, below the forts, so that 
 to reach them I must pass the forts." Why the Virginia did 
 not pass the forts into the Chesapeake Bay is explained in the 
 same dispatch, because that movement involved the abandon- 
 ment of Norfolk, and the risk of losing the ship by attempting 
 the passage without the means of closing her ports, and also 
 because, " I have the best authority (a French officer of rank) 
 that obstructions of some kind have been placed in the chan- 
 nel, probably in the centre, and from thence to the Rip-raps, 
 so as to compel me, if made aware of them, to pass close to the 
 guns of Fortress Monroe." Thus, the Monitor was not only 
 ordered to stay in shoal water and to avoid a fight, but the 
 Virginia was barred out of the Chesapeake Bay by obstruc- 
 tions between Fortress Monroe and the Rip-raps. 
 
 On the 8th and 9th of March the C. S. fleet had success- 
 fully encountered, defied and beaten a force equal to 2,890 men 
 and 230 guns as follows : 
 
 Men. Cfuns, 
 
 Congress (burnt) . .... . 480 50 
 
 Cumberland (sunk) . .... . 360 23 
 
 Minnesota (riddled) . . 550 40 
 
 Roanoke (scared off) . 550 40 
 
 St. Lawrence (peppered). . 480 50 
 
 Gunboats (two or three disabled) ..... 120 6 
 
 Ports (silenced) . . 200 20 
 
 Ericsson 150 3 
 
 Total 2,890 230 
 
318 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 From the 11th of March to the 11th of April, the morale 
 of her victory kept the enemy close under the guns of For- 
 tress Monroe, even while the Virginia lie in the dock at the 
 navy -yard undergoing repairs. From the 11th of April to the 
 11th of May, she steamed over the waters of Hampton Roads,, 
 capturing transports, defying the enemy, and not one of them 
 dare dispute the supremacy she had conquered. 
 
 Upon these facts Admiral Porter ' attempts to throw doubt. 
 The following account of the afEair of the 8th of May is copied 
 in his History: 
 
 "On the 8th of May, the Merrimac again appeared, and found the 
 Monitor, Galena and Naugatuck, and a number of heavy ships, shelling 
 the works at Sewell's Point ; but on the appearance of the iron-clad they 
 all returned below Fortress Monroe. Tatnall stood direct for the Moni- 
 tor, which retreated with the other vessels, the Merrimac and consorts 
 following close down to the Rip-raps, where shot passed over the ship and 
 a mile beyond. Tatnall remained for some hours in the Roads, until finally, 
 in disgust, he gave an order to Lieut. Jones to fire a gun to windward and 
 take the ship back to her buoy." 
 
 This, Admiral Porter says, is a " Confederate" account, 
 which he finds does not agree with the following extract from 
 Admiral Goldsborough's report: 
 
 " By direction of the President, our vessels shelled Se well's Point, yes- 
 terday, mainly with a view to see the practicability of landing a body of 
 troops thereabouts. The Merrimao came out, but was even more cautious 
 than ever. The Monitor was kept well in advance, and so that the Mer- 
 rimac could have engaged her without difficulty had she been so disposed; 
 but she declined to do so, and soon returned and anchored at Sewell's 
 Point." 
 
 Admiral Porter admits that the capture of the trans- 
 ports " was a humiliation and should not have been suffered, 
 but prevented at all hazards." According to either of the 
 above accounts of the affair of the 8th, an opportunity to 
 wipe out that " humiliation" was offered by the Virginia and 
 declined by the Monitor; and when Admiral Goldsborough's 
 report is read with the remark of Lieut. Greene, that the oflBcer 
 commanding the Monitor, " that he had received positive 
 orders not to attack;" the " Confederate account " has more of 
 the appearance of truth than that from Admiral Goldsborough. 
 Lieut. Commander Wm. Harwar Parker, an officer in the 
 Confederate fleet, sustains the " Confederate account."'' 
 
 " On the 8th of May," he says, " only two days before we 
 evacuated Norfolk, while the Merrimac was at the navy-yard, 
 Flag-officer Goldsborough took advantage of her absence to 
 come above Old Point with the Monitor and a number of other 
 vessels, and bombard Sewell's Point. When the news was 
 telegraphed to Norfolk the Merrimac cast off her fasts and 
 steamed down the harbor. As soon as her smoke was seen, the 
 entire Federal fleet fled below Old Point again, and was 
 
 1 Naval History of the Civil War, p. 132. 2 Becollections qf a Naval Officer, p. 276. 
 
THE CONPEDERATi; STATES NAVY. 319 
 
 pursued by the Merrimac until under the guns of Fortress 
 Monroe. There is no doubt about the fact of this." If 
 Admiral Porter really sought for something "on record" to 
 substantiate the " Confederate account," he overlooked the 
 "Recollections of a Naval Officer," by Lieut. W. H. Parker, 
 where will be found, on page 377, a refutation of the very ex- 
 tract from Admiral Goldsborough. Lieut. Wood confirms 
 this statement in every particular given above of the defi- 
 ance, on the 8th of May, by the Virginia, and the retreat of 
 the U. S. squadron. 
 
 The New York Herald's Fortress Monroe correspondent, 
 Tinder date of May 8th, describes the movement against 
 SeweU's Point, by the Naugatuck (the Stevens' Battery), the 
 Monitor, the Dacotah, the frigate 8an Jacinto, gunboat Semi- 
 nole, and the Minnesota, and the cannonade from 13 to 3 P. M., 
 when 
 
 "A dense smoke was seen in the direction of Norfolk, and in a few 
 minutes the rebel battery Merrimac hove in sight. The flag-ofHoerthere- 
 iipon signalized our vessels to withdraw, which command was obeyed, 
 and our vessels, in returning, gave the rebel works parting salutes with 
 their iron hail. The Monitor, with the others, took up the retrograde move- 
 ment, the evident intention being, no doubt, to coax the Merrimac into 
 deep water, where a fair fight might be had. The Merrimac came steam- 
 ing down the Elizabeth River very rapidly, the black smoke coming out 
 of her pipe, showing they were using tar or some other combustible ma- 
 terial in their boiler furnaces to accelerate her speed. At ten minutes 
 past three the flag-ship Minnesota, and by twenty minutes past three the 
 Merrimac, had attained a position at a point about two miles west of 
 Sewell's Point, covering the rebel works there. Our wooden vessels had 
 then reached a point within two miles of the fort. The Monitor remained 
 at a point about a mile astern of her consorts, and within a mile of her 
 adversary. The Merrimac suddenly stopped, it being apparent that she 
 "was merely acting on the defensive. She turned around and got her bow 
 ieaded for Norfolk, and, subsequently, backed down half a mile ; the 
 Monitor all this time remained stationary, and, although the vessels were 
 "within easy range, not a shot was exchanged at her, the apparent design of 
 the commanders of the opposing vBssels being not to fire, except at close 
 quarters. At forty-flve minutes past three, the Merrimac started in the 
 ■direction of Norfolk, closely followed by the Monitor, the San Jacinto, 
 and the other vessels of the fleet, who appeared determined to have 
 another dash at the rebel works. Shortly after four o'clock, the Merri- 
 mac stopped off the north end of Craney Island ; our vessels also stopped, 
 the antagonists eyeing each other with the deepest interest. By this 
 time the Arago, Vanderbilt and Illinois, which were to take a part in any 
 subsequent action should the rebel craft give them a chance, came steam- 
 ing up the Roads until they reached a point between the Rip-raps and 
 the fortress ; here they were signalized by the flag-oflBcer to return, as the 
 Merrimac was not likely to leave her cover under Craney Island. The flag- 
 ship Minnesota also wore around and returned to her anchorage. The re- 
 sult of the engagement so far was practically nil, as the rebel batteries 
 replied with more celerity when our vessels retired than they did at the 
 flrst of the engagement. All our vessels came out of the fight unscathed, 
 and not a man on our side was hurt. At 5:30 P. M., the Monitor and all 
 the vessels returned to their anchorage." 
 
 Is there not abundant " record" evidence in all these pub- 
 lished accounts to establish the fact that the Monitor retired 
 
330 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 before the Virginia on the 8th of May, 1863? Finally, Flag- 
 officer Tatnall's official letter of May 14th confirms the truth 
 of the "Confederate account " in every particular, as follows : 
 
 " We found six of the enemy's vessels, including the iron-clad steam- 
 ers Monitor and Naugatuck, shelling the battery (Sewell's Point). We 
 passed the battery and stood directly for the enemy for the purpose of en- 
 gaging him, and I thought an action certain, particularly as the Min- 
 nesota and Vanderbilt, which were anchored below Fortress Monroe, got 
 imderway and stood up to that point, apparently with the intention of 
 joining their squadron in the Roads. Before, however, we got within gun- 
 shot the enemy ceased firing and retired with all speed under the protec- 
 tion of the guns of the fortress, followed by the Virginia, until the shells 
 from the Rip-raps passed over her." 
 
 And Lieut. Parker (W. H.) says: " A little after sunset, 
 as she (the Virginia) was slowly turning in the channel for 
 the last time that day, she fired a single shot in the direction 
 of Fortress Monroe. It was promptly replied to by the Nau- 
 gatuck. I have reason to recollect this shot from the Nauga- 
 tuck, for it was the first from the long-range guns I had seen. 
 I was talking to Hunter Davidson, who was near me on the 
 vessel, when we heard the (vhistling of this shot, which drop- 
 ped in the water between us. Much surprised, I sent for my 
 chart and found the distance to be 3J miles. Long-range guns 
 were then just coming into use, and caused Bill Arp afterwards 
 to exclaim: ' Blamed if they wasn't shooting at me before I 
 knew they were in the country.'" ' Flag-officer Goldsborough, 
 in a dispatch dated 9th May, gives the following reason for the 
 Monitor retiring on the day before, when the Virginia offered 
 battle. He says: 
 
 " The Monitor had orders to fall back into fair channel-way, and 
 only to engage her seriously, in such a position, that this ship, together 
 with the merchant vessels intended for the purpose, could run her down, 
 if an opportunity presented itself. The other vessels were not to hesitate 
 to run her down, and the Baltimore, an unarmed steamer of light draft, 
 high speed, and with a curved bow, was kept in the direction of the Moni- 
 tor expressly to throw herself across the Merrimac, either forward or aft 
 of her plated house ; but the Merrimac did not engage the Monitor, nor 
 did she place herself where she could have been assailed by our ram ves- 
 sels to any advantage, or where there was any prospect whatever of get- 
 ting at her." 
 
 In other words, the Virginia, though offering battle to 
 the Monitor, did not offer the other vessels, namely, the Nau- 
 gatuck, Minnesota, Vanderbilt, and three others, together with 
 the Baltimore, "with a curved bow," the opportunity to run her 
 down. The Monitor, dry-nursed by a whole fleet of Federal 
 ships, so as not to be " too much exposed," as President Lincoln 
 directed, and falling back into a fair channel- way to escape 
 the Virginia, is argued to have won a victory by the Senate 
 Committee in the following extract: 
 
 " Thus it conclusively appears that the Monitor remained constantly 
 ready to confront her powerful antagonist had the latter been disposed 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 231 
 
 for the conflict. But her injuries were too severe, and the chastisement 
 she had received at the hands of the little iron raft too fresh in the minds 
 of her masters, to induce a repetition of the encounter of the 9th of 
 March ; and, notwithstanding the fact that the gallant and skillful Wor- 
 den was then on a bed of pain, far from the battle-ground, helpless and 
 disabled from the honorable wounds received by him in the engagement, 
 and no longer directed her movements, it appears that the Merrimao took. 
 good care to Iteep out of the range of the Monitor's guns by whomsoever 
 they might have been directed." 
 
 The forty -five days of glorious, gallant defiance of the 
 whole Federal fleet at Fortress Monroe by Flag-officer Tat- 
 nall in the Virginia were drawing to a close. Thirteen of those 
 days the Virginia had passed in the dry dock, but on every one 
 of the other thirty-two days she had carried her colors in open 
 defiance of the largest and best-appointed fleet that ever bore 
 the flag of the United States. The punishment she inflicted 
 cannot be concealed, but the defiance she offered has been 
 misrepresented and misstated, and the terror she excited is a 
 matter of history. But her days were drawing to a close. 
 Confederate military exigency on land, not the Federal naval 
 supremacy in Hampton Roads, was the cause of her destruction. 
 Without Norfolk in which to coal and repair, the Virginia could 
 not maintain herself a week in the Roads; with Norfolk open to 
 her, she had successfully defied and defeated all the naval power 
 of the Federal Union. But when the military authorities, whether 
 wisely or unwisely, abandoned and evacuated Norfolk, there 
 was nothing else for Tatnall to do but to destroy the Virginia, 
 and prevent her falling into the hands of the Federal forces. 
 
 Whatever criticism may be passed upon the haste, as well 
 as the necessity, for evacuating Norfolk, none whatever can be 
 made upon Flag-officer Tatnall's action in regard to the Virginia. 
 
 The destruction of the Virginia on the 11th of May, 1862, 
 was the most distressing occurrence of the war up to that time. ' 
 The people, ignorant of her defects, but having witnessed her 
 prowess, and gone wild over her triumphs, believed her capable, 
 not only of whipping any enemy, but of steaming in any waters. 
 Restless under seeing the ship in Hampton Roads, they urged 
 through the press, " on to Yorktown," " on to Washington," "on 
 to New York." When, therefore, the news flashed over the 
 country that the gallant vessel, which had done so much, and of 
 which so much more was expected, had been destroyed, the 
 public indignation knew no bounds, the wildest clamor broke 
 forth, and the manifestations of public dissatisfaction were so 
 great and outspoken, that Flag-officer Tatnall asked, in the 
 following letter to Secretary Mallory, that a Court of Inquiry 
 might investigate the cause of the destruction of the Virginia : 
 
 " Richmond, May 14th, 1863. 
 "Sir— In detailing to you the circumstances which caused the de- 
 struction of the C. S. steamer Virginia, and her movements a few days 
 
 1 On May 11th Gen. MoClellan telegraphed to the bottom of my heart upon the destruction of 
 Secretary Stanton: "I congratulate you from the ^errimac." 
 
322 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 previous to that event, I begin with your telegraphic despatches to me of 
 the 4th and 5th insts., directing me to take such a position in the James 
 River as would entirely prevent the enemy's ascending it. 
 
 " Gen. Huger, commanding at Norfolk, on learning that I had re- 
 ceived this order, called on me and declared that its execution would 
 oblige him to abandon immediately his forts on Craney Island and Sew- 
 ell's Point, and their guns, to the enemy. I informed him that, as the 
 order was imperative, I must execute it, but suggested that he should, 
 telegraph you and state the consequences. He did so, and on the 5th 
 inst. you telegraphed me to endeavor to afford protection to Norfolk as 
 well as the James Biver, which replaced me in my original position. I 
 then arranged with the General that he should notify me when his prepara- 
 tions for the evacuation of Norfolk were sufficiently advanced to enable- 
 him to act independently. 
 
 "On the 7th inst., Commodore Hollins reached Norfolk with orders 
 from you to consult with me and such officers as I might select in regard 
 to the best disposition to be made of the Virginia under the present as- 
 pect of things. 
 
 "We had arranged the conference for the next day, the 8th ; but on 
 that day, before the hour appointed, the enemy attacked the Sewell's 
 Point battery, and I left immediately with the Virginia to defend it. 
 
 " We found six of the enemy's vessels, including the iron-clad steam- 
 ers Monitor and Naugatuck, shelling the battery. We passed the battery, 
 and stood directly for the enemy for the purpose of engaging him, and I 
 thought an action certain, particularly as the Minnesota and Vanderbilt, 
 which were anchored below Fortress Monroe, got underway, and stood up 
 to that point, apparently with the intention of joining their squadron in 
 the Roads. Before, however, we got within gunshot, the enemy ceased 
 firing, and retired with all speed, under the protection of the guns of the 
 fortress, followed by the Virginia, until the shells from the Rip-raps 
 passed over her. 
 
 " The Virginia was then placed at her moorings near Sewell's Point, 
 and I returned to Norfolk to hold the conference referred to. 
 
 "It was held on the 9th, and the ofQcers present were Col. Anderson 
 and Capt. , of the army, selected by Gen. Huger, who was too un- 
 well to attend himself, and of the navy, myself, Commodore Hollins, and 
 Capts. Sterrett and Lee, Commander Richard L. Jones, and Lieuts. Ap. 
 Catesby Jones and J. Pembroke Jones. 
 
 " The opinion was unanimous that the Virginia was then employed 
 to the best advantage, and that she should continue for the present to 
 protect Norfolk, and thus afford time to remove the public property. 
 
 "On the next day, at 10 A. M., we observed from the Virginia that 
 the flag was not flying on the Sewell's Point battery, and that it appeared 
 to have been abandoned. I dispatched Lieutenant J. P. Jones, the Flag 
 Lieutenant, to Craney Island, where the Confederate flag was still flying, 
 and he there learned that a large force of the enemy had landed on the 
 Bay shore, and were rapidly marching on Norfolk, that the Sewell's 
 Point battery was abandoned, and our troops were retreating. I then 
 dispatched the same officer to Norfolk, to confer with Gen. Huger and 
 Capt. Lee. He found the navy -yard in flames, and that all the oificers had 
 left by railroad. On reaching Norfolk, he found that Gen. Huger and all 
 the officers of the army had also left ; that the enemy were within half a 
 mile of the city, and that the mayor was treating for its surrender. 
 
 " On returning to the ship, he found that Craney Island and all the 
 other batteries on the river had been abandoned. 
 
 "It was now seven o'clock in the evening, and this unexpected confirma- 
 tion rendered prompt measures necessary for the safety of the Virginia. 
 
 " The pilots had assured me that they could take the ship, with a 
 draft of eighteen feet, to within forty miles of Richmond. 
 
 "This, the chief pilot, Mr. Parrish, and his chief assistant, Mr. 
 Wright, had asserted again and again ; and on the afternoon of the 7th, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 233 
 
 in my cabin, in the presence of Commodore Hollins and Capt. Sterrett, in 
 reply to a question of mine, they both emphatically declared their ability 
 to do so. 
 
 "Confiding in these assurances, and, after consulting with the first 
 and flag lieutenants, and learning that officers generally thought it the 
 most judicious course, I determined to lighten the ship at once, and run 
 up the river for the protection of Richmond. 
 
 "All hands having been called on deck,I stated to them the condition of 
 things, and my hope that by getting up the river before the enemy could 
 be made aware of our designs, we might capture his vessels which had 
 ascended it, and render efficient aid in the defence of Richmond ; but that 
 to effect this would require all their energy in lightening the ship. They 
 replied with three cheers, and went to work at once. The pilots were on 
 deck and heard this address to the crew. 
 
 "Being quite unwell I had retired to bed. Between one and two 
 o'clock in the morning the first lieutenant reported to me that, after the 
 crew had worked for five or six hours and lifted the ship so as to render 
 her unfit for action, the pilots had declared their inability to carry eigh- 
 teen feet above the Jamestown Flats, up to which point the shore, on 
 each side, was occupied by the enemy. 
 
 " On demanding from the chief pilot, Mr. Parrish, an explanation of 
 this palpable deception, he replied, that eighteen feet could be carried 
 after the prevalence of easterly winds, and that the winds for the last two 
 days had been westerly. 
 
 " I had no time to lose. The ship was not in a condition for battle, 
 even with an enemy of equal force, and their force was overwhelming. I 
 therefore determined, with the concurrence of the first and flag lieuten- 
 ants, to save the crew for future service by landing them at Craney Island, 
 the only road for retreat open to us, and to destroy the ship to prevent 
 her falling into the hands of the enemy. I may add that, although not 
 formally consulted, the course was approved by every commissioned offi- 
 cer in the ship. There was no dissenting opinion. The ship was accord- 
 ingly put on shore as near the mainland, in the vicinity of Craney TsHnd, 
 as possible, and the crew landed. She was then fired, and after bur ling 
 fiercely fore and aft for upwards of an hour blew up a little before five on 
 the morning of the 11th. 
 
 "We marched for Suffolk, twenty-two miles, and reached it in the 
 evening, and from thence came by railroad to this city. 
 
 " It will be asked what motives the pilots could have had to deceive 
 me. The only imaginable one is that they wished to avoid going into 
 battle. 
 
 " Had the ship not been lifted, so as to render her unfit for action, a 
 desperate contestmust have ensued with a force against us too great to jus- 
 tify much hope of success, and, as battle is not their occupation, they 
 adopted this deceitful course to avoid it. I cannot imagine another 
 motive, for I had seen no reason to mistrust their good faith to the Con- 
 federacy. 
 
 " My acknowledgments are due to the First Lieut. Ap. Catesby .Jones, 
 for his untiring exertions, and for the aid he rendered me in all things. 
 The details, firing for the ship and landing the crew, were left to him, and 
 everything was conducted in the most perfect order. 
 
 "To the other officers of the ship, generally, I am thankful for the 
 great zeal they displayed throughout. 
 
 " The Virginia no longer exists, but 300 brave and skillful officers and 
 seamen are saved to the Confederacy. 
 
 " I presume that a Court of Inquiry will be ordered to examine into 
 all the circumstances I have narrated, and I earnestly solicit it. Public 
 opinion will never be put right without it. I am, sir, with great respect, 
 your obedient servant, "JosiAH Tatnall, 
 
 " Flag-officer Commanding. 
 "Hon. S. R. Mallobt, Secretary of the Navy." 
 
224 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The request for a Court of Inquiry was promptly com- 
 plied with, and the members detailed, and, strangely enough, 
 was composed of three officers who had been applicants for 
 the command of the Virginia, and to whom Tatnall had been 
 preferred by the department. The officers of the Court of In- 
 quiry were Flag-officers Forrest, Ingraham and Capt. Lynch. 
 The special matter before them was, " to investigate and in- 
 quire into the destruction of the steamer Virginia, express an 
 opinion as to the necessity of destroying her, and state par- 
 ticularly whether any and what disposition could have been 
 made of that vessel." 
 
 The Court of Inquiry found, in its opinion, that, first, the 
 destruction of the Virginia was unnecessary ; second, that 
 the Virginia could, with a little more lessening of draft, have 
 been taken up James River to Hog Island, and there she 
 would have prevented the larger vessels of the enemy and the 
 transports from ascending ; and there, the court was of 
 opinion, she could have been supplied, and then could have 
 been taken into consideration the expediency or practicability 
 of striking a last blow at the enemy or destroying her. The 
 conclusions of the Court of Inquiry, while not in terms con- 
 demnatory of Flag-officer Tatnall, were so to all intents and 
 purposes, and excited marked astonishment throughout all 
 military and naval circles, as well as among the intelligent 
 portion of the people. Nevertheless, a portion of the press con- 
 tinued to assail the gallant Tatnall with epithet and innuendo, 
 until some of the officers of the Virginia entered their protest 
 with the Navy Department against the approval of the finding 
 of the Court of Inquiry, alleging that, after being lightened 
 sufficiently to ascend James River, the Virginia "was com- 
 paratively helpless against iron-clad vessels, and would ha"*^e 
 fallen an easy prey to the enemy," and, without discussing the 
 points made by the Court of Inquiry, unqualifiedly indorsed 
 the action of Flag-officer Tatnall. The whole question arising 
 out of the situation and condition of the Virginia was clearly 
 and forcibly presented in the Richmond (Va ) Enquirer by an 
 officer of the Virginia, and, as far as one so deeply interested 
 could be relied on, fully exonerated Flag-officer Tatnall. 
 
 "Junk 23d, 1863. 
 "Tb the Editors of the Enquirer: 
 
 " Gentlemen — Much has been said and written about the destruction 
 of the Virginia, and the late Court of Inquiry has expressed the opinion 
 'that it was unnecessary at the time and i)lace it occurred;' that the ves- 
 sel might have been 'taken to Hog Island in James River, and there pre- 
 vented the passage of the enemy's gunboats and transports up the river.' 
 In all that I have seen and heard against the matter, there has not 
 occurred one idea worthy the consideration of an intelligent naval officer; 
 and although the times are troubled with weighty matters, requiring the 
 public to look to the future and not to the past, I propose to investigate 
 the subject before us now, that it may not fester in the minds of those 
 ignorant of naval matters, and become an incurable national sore. There 
 are but three conceivable things that could apparently have been done 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 325 
 
 with the Virginia, viz. : to take her a certain distance up James River, to 
 remain in Hampton Roads, or to pass Old Point. Before discussing them, 
 let me say that the Virginia drew twenty-two feet six inches water, was 
 318 feet long, her sides, incUned at a horizontal angle of about thirty-five 
 degrees, extended below the surface of the water, and her gun-deck ports 
 only five feet above it. First, in order to have taken the vessel to Hog 
 Island, she had to be lightened to twenty feet. This draft would have 
 brought her inclined armor above the water, and left about two-fifths of 
 her perpendicular sides aft covered only by one inch of iron for two feet 
 In depth, exposing her magazine to every weU-depressed shot at close 
 quarters, and her after ' stern post,' which, if broken, would have destroyed 
 her propeller and rudder. 
 
 " The best position of Hog Island, which the Virginia could have 
 taken, is thirty-nve miles above Newport News, and the shoalest water 
 occurs about four miles above Newport News, where the river is nearly 
 six miles wide. Had the vessel got aground here, which is highly proba- 
 ble, as her helm had no command of her when her keel was near the bot- 
 tom, she would, at low tide, have been an easy prey to any of the enemy's 
 vessels. Being very sharp under water, with a deep keel, she would have 
 keeled over, exposing her naked sides, and rendering her battery useless. 
 But suppose she got to Hog Island safely, where the narrowest part of 
 the river is about two miles wide. The Galena (iron-clad), the Aroostook, 
 and Port Royal, all armed with heavy eleven-inch guns, had gone up the 
 river two days before the evacuation of Norfolk. The Monitor and Nau- 
 gatuck (iron-clad) could have passed a half-mile from the Virginia in per- 
 fect safety; and these vessels are exactly those, and no others, that made 
 the attack at Drury's Bluff. They could have remained in the river, 
 received their ammunition and provisions from Gren. McCleUan, and their 
 water anywhere. What ' gunboats,' then, would the Virginia have 
 'prevented from going up James River'? 
 
 " Gen. McCleUan has been suppUed by way of the York River. There 
 was no reason why any transports should go up James River; and to 
 this day, six weeks having elapsed, we have no reUable information 
 that one of the enemy' s transports has come up the river ! Then what 
 ' transports ' would the Virginia have ' prevented from going up James 
 River '? If she could not have done either of these things, as, in the opin- 
 ion of the Court of Inquiry she should have done, what use was she at 
 Hog Island ? It must be seen that a vessel of the importance of the Vir- 
 ginia would have been surrounded by the enemy's pickets, night and 
 day; therefore she could never have obtained water or supplies of any 
 kind. To have attempted her destruction at Hog Island would have 
 been, as at any other place but the one where she was destroyed, to give 
 her to the enemy, because she had about 340 souls on board, and but two 
 small boats, each capable of holding about twenty people; and is it to be 
 supposed that the enemy were so fooUsh as to permit more than one 
 landing to be made without exacting a pledge that the vessel should not 
 be destroyed ? Oh, no ! The Virginia had no means of making rafts 
 while she could fight her guns. Hence the Court of Inquiry expected 
 300 men to stand on her decks, see the match touched to the magazine, 
 and be blown into eternity, or jump overboard and be washed into it, as 
 only one out of about forty could swim, the crew having been transferred 
 from the army, with very few seamen among them. 
 
 " Secondly. To remain in Hampton Roads would have been to do 
 nothing,but filially surrender the vessel to the enemy. She couldhave incon- 
 venienced them by stopping their water communication with Norfolk, but 
 Suffolk and ' Ocean View ' beach would have been suflBcient landings for 
 them. There was nothing in the Roads to fight, unless they played Don 
 Quixote and charged Old Point with about as much effect as he did the 
 windmills, occasionally feeling a slight reaction from the Lincoln gun 
 480-lb. shot. Now, if she could not blockade James River at Hog Island, 
 she could not do it at the mouth, where it is five miles wide. But we have 
 
 IS 
 
336 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 seen that the Virginia had inclined sides, with her gun-deck ports only- 
 five feet above the water, hence, whenever the wind blew fresh it raised a 
 sea that washed into the ship and would soon have sunk her ; for a ves- 
 sel of that buUd, with her greatest bearings below the surface of the 
 water, will go down very rapidly. Now this might have occurred any 
 night when too dark to see where to go. On one occasion the ship had to 
 return to Norfolk when ofC Craney Island because there was too much sea 
 in the Roads. 
 
 ' ' Thirdly. The Virginia could only have passed Old Point and gone to 
 York River, or any of the Chesapeake's tributaries, in the smoothest 
 weather. If she got to York River she could have done nothing still; for, 
 many hours before her arrival there, the enemy's vessels would have known 
 it from Old Point, and gone into the numerous bends and creeks where 
 the Virginia could never have reached them. She could not have laid 
 in the narrow channel between Gloucester Point and Yorktownand block- 
 aded the river, for, if not sunk by the sea in a few days, she would have 
 been by the enemy's heavy, long, big rifle bolts from the heights above, 
 without being able to elevate her guns and return the fire. As to going 
 up Chesapeake Bay, or following the enemy's vessels, that would have 
 been madness. The ship was not seaworthy. What vessel would have 
 stopped and fought her under favorable circumstances ? Will the Court 
 of Inquiry tell us where that 'final blow' could have been 'struck at the 
 enemy'? 
 
 "Now, Messrs. Editors, the Examiner of this morning, speaking of 
 the Court of Inquiry, gives vent to some very unkind remarks regarding 
 the officers of the Virginia. It should have recollected that the opinion 
 of a Court of Inquiry is not a final decision; but that, when the exigencies 
 of the service will permit it, a court-martial has to take up the case. 
 
 "The latter court may be composed of thirteen members, the former 
 of three, and until the 'finding' of the court-martial is promulgated, 
 would it not be proper for those interested to take an intelligent view of 
 the facts in the matter, and not be blindly pricked into a position from 
 which they will be ashamed, perhaps, to recede ? 
 
 " There was no panic, precipitation, or even haste in the destruction 
 of the Virginia ; no step was ever taken with more deUberation and cool- 
 ness. How nonsensical to suppose that the officers who had served their 
 country a life-time, and the brave crew who had stood by the old ship 
 since her first conception, through all the fatiguing delays to her comple- 
 tion, when many doubted her success, and who fought the battle of New- 
 port News, and thrice since had seen the enemy's vessels fly before them, 
 should have been panic-stricken by hearing that the enemy had sur- 
 rounded them on shore ! What harm could have been done the ship from 
 the shore ? None, except to prevent landing. No, it is hardly sensible to 
 suppose that the officers were afraid of the enemy, but they were afraid 
 of ms getting the ship, or to the certainty of having to destroy their own 
 lives to prevent it, which the country hardly expected of them under the 
 circumstances. 
 
 "I think it is clearly shown by the foregoing facts, that, had any 
 other disposal been made of the ship, she would finally have fallen into 
 the enemy's hands without having done our cause any service before- 
 hand. Her great draft of water, extreme length, unwieldiness, and unsea- 
 worthiness, rendered her the most difficult of vessels to manage, ghe 
 was of no service but in deep, smooth water. Deep water is constantly 
 rough ; if not, it must be too narrow for the Virginia to have worked in. 
 She was intended only for the defence of Norfolk harbor ; but, after 
 fighting the battle of Newport News, the public mind magnified her to a 
 power which it was supposed could lay the Northern ports under contribu- 
 tion. The officers were not called upon to disabuse them of this highly 
 fiattering idea, until now, in their own defence. But, because they have 
 to do it as a defence, an intelligent reader will not believe they were fairly 
 arraigned for trial. I have been writing this article under the supposition 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 227 
 
 that the officers -were responsible for the destruction of the vessel, be- 
 cause the Court of Inquiry has committed an act of supererogation in 
 thus charging them. But the Virginia had a flag-officer in command, 
 and a braver, truer man never trod under his country's flag. His 
 feeble health has not, in the slightest degree, impaired his judgment, 
 and every step he took in command of that ship proved the fact. He 
 it was whom the Court of Inquiry had to deal with. They had only 
 to state whether the act was necessary or not, and the facts lead- 
 ing to it, and the commander was responsible. Who ever thinks of 
 investigating a defeat or a retreat, and charging the officers with 
 their opinions or advice asked by the general commanding ? A man 
 ih any responsible position is expected to inform himself before taking 
 any step, but no one asks or cares where he got his information. He 
 is put tnere to judge. You might as well hold the lawyers responsible 
 for the 'decision of a jury,' a court, or judges. They deliver the ver- 
 dict, and it is executed. The captain gives the order, and the ship is 
 destroyed. 
 
 "Now, I deny that there is one single word in all the evidence before 
 the Court of Inquiry to show that the officers were panic-stricken, or that 
 they were actuated by any other sense than a clear, deliberate under- 
 standing of the awful necessity of the occasion. They were perfectly 
 aware how high the ship was held in the public estimation, and of the 
 outburst of indignation that would meet her unexpected destruction, be- 
 cause the public may be very good judges of military matters ; but it re- 
 quires a fife-time to become a seaman and a judge of nautical affairs. 
 Never was a commander forced by his own country into a more painful 
 position ; but, with a high moral courage worthy of the man, he coolly 
 and calmly gave the order to destroy his ship. It took nearly four hours 
 to accomplish it, proving there was no panic or precipi^ncy. The small 
 arms and sufficient ammunition were all saved ; the men were formed in 
 military order, and marched to Suffolk, twenty-two miles, after ten hours 
 of the most arduous labor, and made a narrow escape from capture by 
 the enemy, who, it was expected, would cat them off as they passed near 
 Portsmouth. 
 
 "For myself I am not only satisfied that the destruction of the Vir 
 ginia was necessary, 'at the time and place it occurred,' but I assert that 
 iher destruction at the time saved the city of Richmond. Moral effect is 
 a much more active agent in our affairs than the people are yet accus- 
 tomed to recognize, and it is now generally conceded that the victory of 
 Manassas has done us more harm than good. The Southern people are 
 high-spirited and determined when aroused, but they are fond of ease 
 and pleasure, and will seek them whenever to be found. Hence, after 
 victory come demoralization and a 'laying back ' upon our laurels, whilst 
 the wary foe, nerved to madness, prepares for revenge. The people had 
 trusted that the existence of the Virginia insured our blockade of James 
 River ; and although the gallant and energetic officers of the Patrich 
 Henry and Jamestown were working hard at Drury's Bluff, yet the 
 means at their command were insufficient to render the position impass- 
 able by the time the enemy's gunboats could have come up. Suddenly it 
 bursts upon the public ear, ' The Virginia is destroyed !' Then came ' hot 
 haste,' and munitions of war and things that could assist the barricade 
 were hurried night and day to the Bluff. The officers and crew of the 
 Virginia having pushed through to Richmond; traveling unceasingly, 
 worn out, and broken down, were sent immediately down-; and ankle deep 
 in mud, exposed to unceasing rain for three days, without provisions or a 
 change of clothing, they assisted, day and night, in mounting heavy 
 guns and placing obstructions to the enemy's passage of the river. The 
 last gun was not quite ready for action when the burst of the enemy's 
 shell over their heads told that the strife was at hand. It did come, and 
 how gallantly the little navy maintained its reputation on that day the 
 good citizens of Richmond may be willing to acknowledge ; and perhaps 
 
338 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 they may sometimes think that some of these men were not 'panic-stricken 
 when they destroyed the Virginia. 
 
 "In conclusion, Messrs. Editors, I say that the destruction of the 
 Virginia required the exercise of a moral courage which will outUve the 
 late Court of Inquiry and the inconsiderate editorials of the press. I am 
 proud to have been one of her crew from beginning to end, but the 
 proudest moments, in connection with her, were those in which I saw the 
 flames burst from her hatches, and felt that the enemy's tread would 
 never pollute her decks. Ray." 
 
 As soon as the finding of the Court of Inquiry was made 
 known, Flag-officer Tatnall demanded a court-martial, which 
 was immediately ordered, and convened on the 5th of July, 
 1863, and was composed of the following officers: 
 
 Captains: Lawrence Rousseau, Franklin Buchanan, Sidney S. Lee 
 and George N. HoUins; Commanders: Robert G. Robb, Murray Mason, 
 Eben Farrand, A. B. Fairfax, M. F. Maury and George Minor; Lieuten- 
 ants: W. L. Maury and Robert B. Pegram; Judge Advocate: Robert Ould. 
 
 The defence of Flag-officer Tatnall, read before the court, 
 is the true and circumstantial history of the cause and man- 
 ner of the destruction of the Virginia. 
 
 '■'■Mr. President and &entlemen: 
 
 "After serving fifty years with unblemished reputation, you may well 
 imagine the concern I feel at being arraigned Ijefore yoa on charges 
 affecting my judgment and conduct in the face of the enemy. 
 
 " It is known to the court that this trial grew out of the finding of a 
 Court of Inquiry convened to inquire into the facts attending the destruc- 
 tion of the steamer Virginia whilst under my command in Hampton 
 Roads ' on the 11th of May last,' with instructions to report their opinion 
 as to the necessity of destroying her, and particularly ' whether any and 
 what other disposition could have been made of the vessel; ' and that the 
 Court of Inquiry, upon the evidence of much the same witnesses that you 
 have heard, reported that she ought not to have been destroyed at the 
 time and place she was. That I, having been instructed (Norfolk being 
 evacuated) to prevent the enemy from ascending the James River, the 
 ship, with very little more, if any, lightening of draft, with her iron sheath- 
 ing still extending three feet under water, could have been taken up to 
 Hog Island, in James River (where the channel is narrow); could there 
 have prevented the larger transports and vessels of the enemy from as- 
 cending ; and that such disposition should have been made of her ; and if 
 it should be ascertained that her provisions could not be replenished 
 when those on board were exhausted, then the proper time would have 
 arrived to take into consideration the expediency or practicability of 
 striking a last blow at the enemy, or destroying her. 
 
 "The substance of the finding of the Court of Inquiry, so far, may 
 probably be embraced in the first charge and specification of ' culpably ' 
 destroying the ship in Hampton Roads, ' when, with the draft to which 
 she had been, or might have been reduced, she could have been carried 
 up James River to a place of usefulness, free from immediate danger.' 
 
 " But there is a further part of the finding of the Court of Inquiry 
 (and the most injurious of all to myself), which is not, as it seems, clearly, 
 although such is avowed by the Judge Advocate to have been his inten- 
 tions, embraced in the charge before the court. I have applied to the 
 Secretary of the Navy to have it made the subject of specific charge, but 
 was informed by that officer that he had referred the matter to the Judge 
 Advocate, who expresses the opinion that it is substantially so embraced. 
 In that point of view I may refer to it. It is as follows : ' In conclusion, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 239 
 
 the court are of the opinion that the evacuation of Norfolk, the destruc- 
 tion of the navy -yard and other public property, added to the hasty re- 
 treat of the military under Gen. Huger, leaving the batteries unmanned 
 and unprotected, no doubt conspired to produce in the minds of the officers 
 of the Virginia the necessity of her destruction at the time, as, in their 
 opinion, the only means left of preventing her from falling into the hands 
 of the enemy ; and seems to have precluded the consideration of the possi- 
 bility of getting her up James River to the point or points indicated. ' The 
 innuendo here is not to be misunderstood. It implied that the destruc- 
 tion of the ship was the effect of panic on the part of those engaged in it. 
 
 " Nothing could be more blighting to the honor and reputation of an 
 officer than this imputation, if sustained ; and in this connection I desire 
 to remind the court of the healing scope and efficacy of the judgment 
 they have the power to pronounce, if the proof in the case shall appear 
 to entitle me to it. The court may not only pronounce a dry verdict of 
 acquittal, but it may do more. ' Trial before courts-martial (says De- 
 hart, p. 180) must often involve the investigation of divers particulars, 
 under various and distinct charges. Circumstances which are embodied in 
 the charges, and upon which constructive guilt is charged, are necessarily 
 dependent upon motive, by which the degree of criminality is determined. 
 
 "'It consequently rests with the court to ascertain this particular 
 degree, and declare it by their finding, and the verdict may be special, as 
 it is not necessary that it be general, as to the guilt or innocence of the 
 prisoner.' And again (p. 182), ' Court;s-martial have at times stated the 
 motives of acquittal, and given an opinion of the conduct of the accused at 
 
 " Now I respectfully and confidently invoke— nay, claim — of this 
 enlightened body of military men the fullest inquiry into and report of 
 my motives and conduct in regard to the destruction of the Virginia ; and 
 am fully prepared to stand or fall by its award. 
 
 " It will be perceived that the first charge of 'culpable ' destruction 
 of the Virginia is by no means narrowed by the first specification of cul- 
 pably, and without sufficient reason for so doing, destroying, by fire, the 
 steamer Virginia. 
 
 " It is as broad and undefined as the charge itself, involving all the 
 circumstances in which I was placed, as respects every possible use to 
 which the ship could have been devoted at any time previous to her de- 
 struction. This would seem to invite an allusion to the events which pre- 
 ceded the contemplated evacuation of Norfolk; after which, it will be seen 
 I was left no alternative but to attempt to defend James River. 
 
 "When, on the 25th of March last, I was ordered to the defence of 
 the waters of Virginia, and to hoist my flag on the steamer Virginia, I 
 could scarcely be supposed insensible to the peril of reputation to which 
 I became exposed from the extraordinary and extravagant expectations 
 in the public mind, founded on ignorance of the character of the ship, 
 and the recent brilliant success of Commodore Buchanan under the cir- 
 cumstances which could not again be looked for.' The frigates of the 
 enemy were incautiously at anchor in Hampton Roads, and the oppor- 
 tunity was seized by that gallant officer with a judgment and promptness 
 which insured the glorious result which, while it could not exalt him too 
 highly in public estimation, unfortunately produced a false estimate of 
 the ship, dangerous to the reputation of his successor. From the day of 
 his success to the evacuation of Norfolk, I do not think that a single 
 vessel of the enemy has anchored in Hampton Roads, excepting a few gun- 
 boats and small transports lying either under the guns of the forts or on 
 flats unapproachable by the Virginia. 
 
 "Yet, for the very brief space of time when the ship was out of 
 dock, or not in the hands of the yard, but under my command (thirteen 
 days out of forty-five), the court will, I may be permitted to say, perceive 
 in the evidence no signs of indisposition on my part to make her as an- 
 noying and destructive as possible to the enemy. 
 
230 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " Aware that Hampton Roads furnished me no field for important 
 operations, I early turned my thoughts to passing the forts and striking 
 unexpectedly at some distant point, say New York, or Port Royal and 
 Savannah, and in a letter of the 10th of April to the Secretary I con- 
 veyed my views as follows : 
 
 " ' I have been aware from the first that my command is dangerous to 
 my reputation, from the expectation of the public, founded on the suc- 
 cess of Commodore Buchanan, and I have looked to a different field from 
 his to satisfy them. 
 
 " ' I shall never find in Hampton Roads the opportunity my gallant 
 friend found. 
 
 '"There is no chance for me but to pass the forts and strike else- 
 where, and I shall be gratified by your authority to do so as soon as the 
 ship shall be in a suitable condition.' 
 
 " It will be perceived that this letter was written under the influence 
 of expectations of improvement in the condition of the ship, created by 
 the letters received by me from the Secretary of the Navy, informing me 
 of her weak points, and the changes in her armor which were then in 
 progress. How much these expectations were disappointed is made mani- 
 fest from the evidence. Even the designed improvements were not fully 
 effected, and at no time did the Virginia attain the power and capacity 
 of a sea-going vessel, or exceed the measure of usefulness originally 
 designed for her — that of harbor defence. 
 
 When, in compliance with the Secretary's order, I consulted Com- 
 modore Buchanan on the character and power of the ship, he expressed 
 the distinct opinion then, as he has testified here, that she was unsea- 
 worthy, and he informed me then that she was not sufficiently buoyant, 
 and that in a common sea she would founder. 
 
 " Her construction was such that the moment the sea struck her the 
 water would rush into her ports. 
 
 " Mr. Porter, the naval constructor of the ship, has testified that he 
 informed me he had reported to the Secretary of the Navy that the ship 
 could not go to sea with safety. And such were the radical defects of her 
 engines, as greatly to retard and interfere with her operations even in the 
 smooth waters of Elizabeth City and Hampton Roads. 
 
 " The oflBcial report of Acting Chief Engineer Ramsay, of the 5th of 
 May (made part of your record), is in this point so important as to chal- 
 lenge special attention. 
 
 " Moreover, it is in evidence that on five trips made from Norfolk to 
 Hampton, a distance of but ten miles, the engines failed twice, obliging 
 me, on one occasion, to return to Norfolk to repair them; and on another, 
 making it necessary to work one of her engines at high pressure, ' just 
 managing (to use the words of the chief engineer in his report of the 5th 
 of May to Lieut. Catesby Jones) to reach her anchorage at Norfolk.' 
 Under these untoward circumstances, I was mortified beyond measure by 
 frequent suggestions, not only from unofficial but high oiflcial sources, 
 of important services to be performed by the Virginia, founded on the 
 most exaggerated ideas of her quaUties, among them the feasibility of 
 passing the forts and going into York River to assist the military opera- 
 tions at the peninsula. 
 
 "It was while these conceptions formed the subject of anxious reflec- 
 tions with me that the chief engineer volunteered his report to me of the 
 5th of May, in which he enters particularly and at length into the subject 
 of the ship's capacity. He says, as to her engines, ' that from present and 
 past experience he is of opinion that they cannot be relied on; that in the 
 two years' cruise of the Merrimac they were continually breaking down 
 when least expected, and the ship had to be sailed under canvas the greater 
 part of the cruise; that the engines gave out the day before, as he had 
 already reported, after running only a few hours, and, as he could not 
 insure their working any length of time, he deemed it his duty to report, 
 etc. ; that at the time he was ordered to the vessel, he was informed that 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 231 
 
 it was not the intention to take the ship where a delay, occasioned by a de- 
 rangement in the machinery, would endanger her safety, and that she 
 would always he accessible to the navy-yard for repairs, which was the 
 reason why he had deferred this report,' etc. He adds : 'Each time that 
 we have gone down, I have had to make repairs, which could not have 
 been done aboard ship very well, or, if done at all, would have required a 
 great deal of time.' 
 
 " The pilots, too — my only source of information as to the feasibility 
 of carrying the ship past the forts into York River — report in writing 
 substantially (their report is of record) that they could not, with any 
 probability of success, take the ship there by night, and that it would re- 
 quire a clear day ; that they must see the land, and that if it should come 
 on to blow, or the weather be thick, there was no harbor in which they 
 could place her. They say: ' If the lights, light-boats and buoys, which 
 were found necessary for the navigation of the channel, still existed, there 
 would be no trouble in reaching York River, except so far as the enemy 
 may have obstructed the way, for there is plenty of water. If the 
 weather were smooth and clear, and the lead and compass could be relied 
 on, we could still take the Virginia to Yorktown. But the lights, Ught- 
 boats and buoys having been removed, the compasses of the ship being 
 almost useless from local attraction, and the lead equally so by the fire of 
 the enemy, we have serious doubts as to our ability to carry the draft of 
 twenty-three feet with any reasonable prospect of success.' 
 
 "And the 'extensive flats,' say they, 'inside of York River, on both 
 sides, offer a safe retreat to a large fleet from the Are of a vessel of this 
 draft ; and all vessels in Poquosin River, or at anchor off Shipping Point, 
 are not to be approached by the Virginia nearer than four miles.' 
 
 " That the enemjr had obstructed the way was plain to view, from 
 the unusual manner in which they used the channel between the forts ; 
 that they had done so most effectually may he safely inferred from the 
 resources of material and skill at their commandj and their known in- 
 dustry in their use. To have attempted to pass this obstructed channel 
 in open day, in full Are of both forts, and all their men-of-war, some 
 twenty in number, including the Monitor and other iron vessels and 
 steamers fitted for the express purpose of running her down (see the testi- 
 mony of Lieut. Catesby Jones), would indeed have merited the epithet 
 of foUy, which, in the opinion of that gallant officer, the effort would 
 have deserved. 
 
 " Thus it will be seen that I was in command of a ship that could not 
 go to sea, nor even into Chesapeake Bay, without great hazard (and that 
 without reference to the enemy), and that with a great draft of water, in 
 narrow channels, she was in a great degree trammeled by pilots not re- 
 liable, as is clearly shown by the record and the Secretary's letters to me 
 of the 1st and 8th of April, on file, thus depriving me of the privilege of 
 manoeuvring her freely, and by my own judgment. 
 
 '_' I had nothing left me but to be patient, to attempt what I thought 
 was in the compass of the ship's power, and to carry out the orders of 
 the Secretary of the Navy. 
 
 "During the short time she was not in dock, or in the hands of the 
 navy-yard (some thirteen days), it is proved that she went down to the 
 Roads and offered fight to the Monitor. 
 
 "She covered the gunboats at that time while they made prizes. She 
 showed herself several times at Sewell's Point, giving the enemy the im- 
 pression she was ready for any service. On one occasion she drove the 
 enemy off from bombarding SeweU's Point. She also kept the Roads clear 
 of the enemy's men-of-war. 
 
 " From a letter from the Secretary of the Navy, of the 9th of April, 
 inclosing one from Gen. Lee of the same date, suggesting operations in 
 the direction of Yorktown, I extract the following paragraph : 
 
 " ' I regard the Virginia as of the first importance to the safety of 
 Norfolk, and hence, though the suggestion of Gen. Lee of a dash at the 
 
333 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 enemy on York River holds out temptation to go at him at once, it should 
 not be made if Norfolli is to be thereby exposed to capture.' 
 
 " From another letter from the Secretary, of the 13th of April, the 
 following is also extracted: 
 
 " ' No immediate necessity for your leaving the Roads exists, and con- 
 curring with you in the opinion you express, that were the Virginia to 
 pass the forts Norfolk would be in danger of immediate capture, you will 
 not subject it to this hazard without the sanction of this department.' 
 
 " This sanction was never given. I will only add, in this connection, 
 as evidence of my willingness to undertake, under these adverse circum- 
 stances and embarrassments, any hazardous enterprise which the govern- 
 ment might deem of public service, an extract from my reply to the Sec- 
 cretary's letter of the 8th of AprU : 
 
 " ' If the presence of the Virginia at Torktown be deemed at Richmond 
 of such paramount importance as to call for the passage of the forts at all 
 hazards, I shall, on hearing from you by telegraph to that effect, attempt 
 it at all hazards.' 
 
 " And again, in a letter of the 30th of April, I wrote : 
 
 " ' I am prepared to run any hazard with her (the shipl, under the 
 advice and direction of the department, but, in view of your instructions 
 to me, am not prepared to abandon Norfolk and Hampton Roads for a 
 distant field of action, and for an object of very doubtful attainment.' 
 
 " The foregoing imperfect recital covers the events of my campaign 
 occurring before the evacuation of Norfolk. I rely on it to vindicate the 
 propriety of my motives and conduct previous to that event. As the 
 specification that ' the ship,' at the draft to which she was or might have 
 been reduced, could have been carried up James River to a place of use- 
 fulness, free from immediate danger, is designed, as the Judge Advocate 
 avows, to conform with the part of the finding of the Court of Inquiry, 
 already stated, that she should have been carried to Hog Island, in James 
 River, and in her lightened condition employed there as a war vessel, it 
 would seem that a comparison of the prudence and wisdom of that 
 course with the course actually pursued, will exhaust this part of the 
 subject, and leave the court under no difficulty of decision between the 
 two. 
 
 " Now, that the Virginia could have been fought as a war vessel any- 
 where after being lightened to twenty -six feet six inches, by which her 
 knuckle was exposed, rests upon no opinion, military or unmilitary, that 
 has ever been expressed, except that of the Court of Inquiry. On the con- 
 trary, the testimony is unanimous the other way, including that of Mr. 
 Porter, the naval constructor, and that her iron sheathing when so light- 
 ened, though it did extend three feet six inches below the water (it is omit- 
 ted from the finding that a considerable portion of It was only one inch 
 thick, its original thickness, the additional covering, with two additional 
 inches, not extending the whole way), would not have protected her. 
 
 "Then, as to the eligibility of Hog Island as a place of retreat, it is 
 unanimously condemned by every military opinion which has been ex- 
 pressed upon it ■ and it is not a little remarkable that in the proceedings 
 of the Court of Inquiry no military opinion is asked at all on this point. 
 
 " It rests on the opinion of Pilots Parrish and Wright alone. Thej/ 
 told the court the ship could have been lightened at Hog Island with the 
 same facility as where she was lightened, and that she could have pro- 
 tected the riverj because the enemy would have to pass in close reach of 
 her guns ; that is, we were bound to lighten her some to get her up to Hog 
 Island. 
 
 " She could protect the river as well at Hog Island, as the enemy's 
 vessels would have to pass her in 400 yards, within range of her guns, 
 and that was so clearly demonstrative of the superior eligibility of 
 Hog Island as the place of resort, that the court thinks nothing could 
 have blinded our eyes to it but the evacuation of Norfolk, the destruction 
 of the navy -yard and other public property, added to the hasty retreat of 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 233 
 
 the military under Gen. Huger, leaving the batteries unmanned and un- 
 protected, no doubt conspiring to produce in the minds of the officers of 
 the Virginia the necessity of her destruction at the time, as in their 
 opinion the only means left of preventing her from falling into the hands 
 of the enemy, and seeming to have precluded the consideration of the 
 possibility of getting up James River to the point or points indicated. 
 Comment here is surely unnecessary. Nor can it be necessary to dwell on 
 the alternative presented by the Court of Inquiry, of destroying the ship 
 at Hog Island, or, in her then exposed condition, ' making a last dash at 
 the enemy,'' consisting of twenty sail, including the Minnesota, the Moni- 
 tor, and three other iron-clad steamers, the ram Vanderbilt and others ; 
 or should we, after passing through them, have gone down to Cape 
 Henry, rounded the Horse Shoe— the lighter vessels of the enemy, draw- 
 ing sixteen feet, the while passing the swash channel and reaching York- 
 town hours before us — and come to Torktown only to find the enemy's 
 vessels placed in safety above us, and then, with boats lost and provisions 
 consumed, have hoisted a flag of distress, or a flag of truce, and sur- 
 rendered at discretion ? A glance at the evidence will show that the idea 
 of carrying the ship to Hog Island, and keeping her there for defence, if 
 ever conceived, could only have been dismissed as vain and futile. 
 " Lieut. Catesby Jones says : 
 
 " ' I think it ought not to have been done, because the enemy was in 
 possession of the batteries above Hog Island. 
 
 " ' The Galena and other gunboats were also up the river. There had 
 been batteries of our own opposite Hog Island, which commanded the 
 anchorage which the Virginia would have to have taken, and if there 
 were no guns there the enemy could easily have placed them there. 
 
 " ' The ship, with her inclined armor above the water, which at that 
 place we could have had no means of bringing below the water, was not 
 in a condition to contend against such batteries and the gunboats. 
 
 " ' She would necessarily have to have been at anchor, and could not 
 change her position. 
 
 " ' We did not have much water on board, and, as the water at Hog 
 Island was not fresh, we could not have stayed there long. 
 
 " ' The proper place in James River to which the steamer should be 
 taken up was a matter of discussion between Commodore Tatnall and 
 myself, and he was of opinion she could be taken up to Westover, which 
 was above the enemy's batteries, in communication with Richmond, and 
 where there was a good position for batteries on shore to assist us in pro- 
 tecting the river.' 
 
 " Again he says, speaking of the feasibility of sinking her to her 
 original draft at Hog Island : 
 
 " ' She could not, by any means in our power, have been sunk to her 
 depth of twenty-three feet, and she be preserved as a steamer of war. I 
 think there was water enough to sink her to twenty three feet at Hog 
 Island; but of this I am not certain. If we had put water in her it would 
 have put out the fires, and drowned the magazine and shell-room, and any 
 idea of aid from the shore in sinking her was forbidden ; for, to say nothing^ 
 of the hostile occupation of both shores, we had only two small boats to 
 the ship, carrying fifteen men each in smooth water.' Surely this is 
 sufficient. 
 
 "It only remains to consider briefly the course actually adopted ; 
 whether it was prudent or culpable, either in its conception or in its at- 
 tempted execution, under the circumstances. 
 
 " The plan of taking the ship up to a narrow part of James River, and 
 there assuming a defensive point, was by no means a sudden thought with 
 me, dictated by the hasty and unexpected evacuation of Norfolk. 
 
 "After the determination to retreat from Torktown, and, as a conse- 
 quence of that measure to evacuate Norfolk, whereby both banks of the 
 James would necessarily fall into the hands of the enemy, it had occurred 
 to me as the best means of defending the river to which I had been 
 
234 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 specially ordered, and had been communicated to the gallant officers near 
 me, who shared my confidence and counsel. 
 
 " The attempt was precipitated, it is true, by the unexpected advance 
 of the enemy on Norfolk. 
 
 " The last orders I received from the Secretary of the Navy in regard 
 to the Virginia were by telegraph on the 5th and 6th of May, four days 
 before the abandonment of Norfolk. 
 
 "The effect of both was to direct me to protect Norfolk as well as 
 James River, and if possible to prevent the enemy from ascending it. As 
 to this, it may be here remarked, as I had signified to the Secretary my in- 
 abihty, with the five vessels under my command, to prevent this, I wrote 
 him on the 31st of April that his gunboats could go from the forts to 
 Newport News, a distance of six miles, with perfect impunity; and that, to 
 prevent misconstruction, I wished it understood that I could not prevent 
 it, or their army from crossing, except so far as the force of steamers I had 
 placed in the river could do so 
 
 " On the 9th of May, the day before evacuation, a conference of 
 ■officers of the armjr and navy was held, by the suggestion of the Secretary 
 of the Navy (in which Commodore HoUins, a member of the court, par- 
 ticipated), in which it was decided that the Virginia should remain at 
 Sewell's Point, to cover Norfolk, until after the evacuation. Commodore 
 Hollins has testified to what has occurred in that conference. 
 
 " He says that it was expected, in the last resort, the ship would be 
 taken up James River to a point of safety for herself, and to protect 
 Richmond ; and when asked where he was to have gone to find such a 
 place, he answered, ' I do not know anything further than what the pilots 
 said — up to Harrison's bar'; and when asked, if I had not been able to 
 take her up there what disposition I was expected to make of her, he re- 
 plied, that he did not take that into consideration at the time, as he 
 thought it was a thing which could be done, from what the pilots said ; 
 and it is in proof that on the 9th, the day before the unexpected evacu- 
 ation on the 10th, I consulted with Capt. Lee, the commandant at the 
 navy-yard, as to the best mode of taking her up without a loss of ballast, 
 and with a view to having the use of her ballast after we got up. 
 
 " We arranged that I would take the two empty water tanks, two large 
 floats, and two launches, and not thinking that the enemy would be in 
 Norfolk the next day, I prepared to return to the navy -yard for all these 
 things. My plan was to place the ship in a narrow part of the river, in 
 fresh water, above the batteries of the enemy on either shore (both being 
 in their hands), in easy communication with Richmond, whence her sup- 
 plies might be drawn, and with the shore, where batteries of our own might 
 protect and co-operate with her, and material might be obtained to sink 
 her to the required draft, and there to defend the river. What might 
 have been the effect if the plan had succeeded (particularly in the present 
 attitude of the opposing armies) must be left to conjecture; at all events, 
 it was the best course that suggested itseK in trying and difficult circum- 
 stances, and I have not yet been taught by any criticism that it has en- 
 countered that a better could be devised. 
 
 "The plan, however, in its execution, necessarily depended on two 
 oonditlons— the one, that the ship could be lightened to eighteen feet 
 draft; the other, that with that draft she could be carried as high up as 
 the plan required. 
 
 " It is said the first of these conditions was impossible, and that I did 
 not take the requisite means to inform myself that it was so. 
 
 "I have to reply, that the Secretary of the Navy, in his letter of 
 March 25th, assigning me to the ship and advising me whom to consult 
 about her, says: 
 
 " 'Tour Flag-officer, Lieut. Jones, is said to have fought the ship gal- 
 lantly, and he is thoroughly informed about her.'' 
 
 "Constructor Porter bears the same testimony to Lieut. Jones' 
 thorough information about her, and that officer was not only then of 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 335 
 
 opinion, but swears to his belief now, that she could be lightened to eighteen 
 feet; and this was one main source of information on which I relied. 
 
 " To the constructor, Mr. Porter, I applied through Paymaster Sem- 
 ple for information on the subject, who swears positively that he obtained 
 the constructor's written report, that the ship could be lightened to even 
 seventeen feet, and would have stability to that draft in James River. 
 Now, whether Mr. Semple misunderstood Mr. Porter or not, there can be 
 no doubt of the nature of the reply communicated to me through a relia- 
 ble source, upon which, in the nature of things, having no knowledge of 
 my own, I was obliged to rely. Nor will the positive and reliable testi- 
 mony thus given be much shaken by Mr. Porter's flippant answer to the 
 question why he did not give full information — 'That I never spent a 
 thought on the subject — I was busy — I supposed the officers all knew 
 what they were about, and I gave all the information that was asked of me. ' 
 
 " It will be recollected he was apprised of themeditated disposition of 
 the ship, and had been asked for written official information on the subject. 
 
 " Then, could the ship be carried to Harrison's Bar with eighteen ifeet, 
 and did I resort to the proper source of information on the point whether 
 she could be or not ? 
 
 " I had been early warned against the pilots, yet with no charts acces- 
 sible, and none of the officers having any knowledge of the sounding of 
 the river, on what else could I rely? 
 
 " As early as the 8th of April the Secretary writes to me: 
 
 " ' Tou are very much in the hands of your pilots. I am convinced 
 they might have placed the ship nearer to the Minnesota in the late en- 
 gagement than they did, and that they erred from a high sense of their 
 responsibiUty only.' 
 
 "But there is ground for the belief that a much darker stain is at- 
 tached to their conduct. 
 
 " It is significant that the statements of a number of witnesses, em- 
 barked in a common business, on an important inquiry, should be found 
 altogether so wholly destitute of the traces of sincerity and truth; and 
 when it appears that an object was to be obtained by such means, it is 
 hard to resist the conclusion of complicity and combination to attain it. 
 That object would seem to have been the destruction of the ship rather 
 than to go with her beyond the forts or up James River, in the presence 
 of the enemy's fleet. 
 
 " For without proceeding with the dissection of so much tergiversa- 
 tion and falsehood, 'experimentumin cor pore vile,' it is proved as irrefrag- 
 ably as anything can be established by human testimony, that when the 
 destination of the ship seemed to be past the forts and up York River, 
 they were pressing in their representations to all the officers who have 
 testified, that they could carry the ship up to Harrison's Bar with eigh- 
 teen feet of water ; and when that project seemed to be abandoned, and 
 the prospect was that the ship, when lightened to that draft, would be 
 carried up James River, perhaps into the presence of the enemy, they per- 
 mitted, nay, encouraged, the lightening to proceed in their presence, until 
 she became helpless, and then surprised her officers with the declaration 
 that they were unable to carry her up at the draft of eighteen feet, to 
 which it was proposed to reduce her, in the then present state of winds 
 and tides, a. qualification which they had never before expressed. 
 
 "And they now here falsely declare that, by the general understand- 
 ing of the officers, the ceasing to lighten the ship was owing to the dis- 
 covery that she could not be reduced to eig:hteen feet, when it is estab- 
 lished beyond doubt or cavil that no such impression prevailed among 
 them, and that it was owing simply and solely to their own sudden and un- 
 expected announcement that she could not ascend the river with that draft. 
 
 "They are convicted, too, by several unimpeachable witnesses, of the 
 declaration (in the teeth of their disclaimer here, after it was known that 
 the attempt would be made to ascend the river, the enemy's fleet having 
 gone up), that nothing remained to do but to abandon the ship and 
 
336 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 destroy her; one of them expressing to one witness his opinion of the hard- 
 ship that they — the pilots — with dependent families, should be exposed 
 to the dangers probably to be encountered in the ship. 
 
 "He must be a savage jud^e, indeed, who would visit me with a pen- 
 alty for the fraudulent impositions practiced on me by these men. 
 
 " The attempt to ascend the river (frustrated by the treachery to 
 which I have alluded, and resulting in the ship's destruction), was un- 
 doubtedly hastened beyond expectation. 
 
 " On the 9th it was supposed that the evacuation and removal of the 
 public property would occupy a week or more, during which I was to 
 cover the evacuation, and, so far as might be, prevent the enemy's ascent. 
 
 " On the 10th, information of our design having been traitorously 
 conveyed to the enemy, he was in full march in force on Norfolk. The 
 city, navy-yard, and batteries were abandoned, and the naval and mili- 
 tary force had retired. 
 
 "Nothing remained but still, nnder increased embarrassments, to 
 prosecute my original design. It was defeated by no fault of mine, but it 
 is shown beyond dispute that from the oflBcers who commanded and su- 
 perintended the lightening of the ship, to the crew who went to the work 
 with a cheer — in the work itself, in the destruction of the ship, in the 
 landing and retreat of the crew, aU was order, deliberation and energy. 
 And any assumption to the contrary is not only unsupported, hut is in 
 the teeth of everything that has been proved in any stage of this cause. 
 
 ' ' There is a charge of ' improvident conduct ' in lightening the steamer 
 at the bight of Craney Island, instead of taking her up James River, and 
 there lightening her when the necessity for doing so arose, and to the ex- 
 tent of that necessity. 
 
 "It is easily disposed of. The ascent, to be successful, required that 
 the lightening of the ship should have been done, not in, but out of, the 
 presence of the enemy — a result which could more probably be attained 
 by lightening her at once, where she was, instead of being probably com- 
 pelled in the ascent to carry out the design in his sight. Other reasons 
 might be given, but this seems sufficient. 
 
 " Again, some question has been made as to the place where the ship 
 was abandoned and destroyed. The best information I could get recom- 
 mended that as the easiest place of retreat. It is in proof, by the Secre- 
 tary of War, that the danger was, when both shores became open to the 
 enemy, that he would pass his forces over to the south side and intercept 
 retreat by the southern bank. 
 
 "In that view time was precious, — the landing should be effected at 
 once. The result was, that the retreat of the crew was successful, and in 
 thirty -six hours' time they had reached Drewry's Bluff, ready to co-op- 
 erate, as they did, in the gallant defence made at that place. 
 
 " Thus perished the Virginia! and with her many high-flown hopes 
 of naval supremacy and success. That denunciation, loud and deep, 
 should follow in the wake of such an event might be expected from the 
 excited mass who on occasions of vast pubUc exigency make their wishes 
 the measure of their expectations, and recognize in public men no cri- 
 terion of merit but perfect success. But he who worthily aspires to apart 
 in great and serious affairs must be unawed by the clamor, looking to the 
 right-judging few for a present support, and patiently waiting for the 
 calmer time when reflection shall assume a general sway, and by the 
 judgment of all, fuU justice, though tardy, will be done to his character, 
 motives and conduct. inj„„„„„j.f„ii„ „„\,„n.i.„A 
 
 "Respectfully submitted, ,ij tatnali "* 
 
 1 The testimony of two of the lieutenants of beat disposition that could have been made of 
 
 the Virginia — J. T, Wood and Charles King — her. 
 
 was not taken by the court-martial, owing to The testimony and witnesses before the conrt- 
 
 their unavoidable absence. They had testified, martial and Court of Inquiry were the same, ex- 
 
 liowever, before the Court of Inquiry that they cepting that the Secretary of War and Surgeon 
 
 approved of the effort to take the ship up the Phillips did not testify before the Court of In- 
 
 James Eiver, and that her destruction was the quiry Flag-officer TaiiiaU. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 237 
 
 The testimony of the witnesses and the statements of 
 parties being all before the court, it was cleared for delibera- 
 tion. After mature consideration the court unanimously 
 found as follows : 
 
 " That the first spisciflcation of the first charge is not proved. 
 
 " That the second specification of the first charge is not proved. 
 
 " And that the accused is not guilty of the first charge. 
 
 " That the first specification of the second charge is not proved. 
 
 " That the second specification of the second charge is not proved. 
 
 " And that the accused is not guilty of the second charge. 
 
 " That the specification of the third charge is not proved. 
 
 " And that the accused is not guilty of the third charge. 
 
 "The court do further find that the accused had, while in command 
 of the Virginia, and previous to the evacuation of Norfolk, thrown down 
 the gage of battle to the enemy's fleet in Hampton Roads, and that the 
 enemy had dechned to take it up; that the day before Norfolk was evac- 
 uated, a consultation, at the instance of the Secretary of the Navy, was 
 held by a joint commission of the navy and army officers as to the best 
 disposition to be made of the ship ; that the accused was in favor of pass- 
 ing Fortress Monroe and taking the ship into York River, or of running 
 before Savannah with her ; that in this he was overruled by the council, 
 who advised that he should remain on this side of Fortress Monroe for 
 the protection of Norfolk and Richmond ; and that, in accordance with 
 this advice, he proceeded to regulate her movements ; that after the 
 evacuation of Norfolk, Westover, on James River, became the most suit- 
 able position for her to occupy ; that, while in the act of lightening her 
 for the purpose of taking her up to that point, the pilots, for the first 
 time, declared their inability to take her up, even though her draft 
 should be reduced to its minimum of eighteen feet; that by the evacua- 
 tion of Norfolk and the abandonment of our forts below Westover, both 
 banks of the James River, below that point, were virtually given up to 
 the enemy; that the ship being thus cut off from Norfolk and Richmond, 
 was deprived of all outward sources of supply, save those of the most 
 precarious and uncertain character ; that her store of provisions would 
 not last for more than three weeks ; that, when lightened, she was made 
 vulnerable to the attacks of the enemy ; and that, after having been 
 lightened, there was no available means of bringing her down to her 
 proper draft and fighting trim ; and that she had but two small boats, 
 each capable of landing not more than fifteen or eighteen men at a time, 
 even in smooth water. 
 
 "Such being the facts and circumstances under the influence of 
 which the Virginia found herself after the evacuation of Norfolk, it was, 
 in the opinion of the court, only necessary for the enemy to continue to 
 refuse battle, as he had done since it was first offered by Capt. Tatnall early 
 in April, and thenceforward to keep a strict watch about the Virginia, 
 in order, when her provisions were exhausted, to make her his prize, and 
 her crew his prisoners. 
 
 " Being thus situated, the only alternative, in the opinion of the 
 court, was to abandon and bum the ship then and there ; which, in the 
 judgment of the court, was deUberately and wisely done by order of the 
 accused. 
 
 " Wherefore, the court do award to the said Capt. Josiah Tatnall an 
 honorable acquittal. 
 
 "L. Rosseau, Captain. " Franklin Buchanan, Captain. 
 
 "Geo. N. Hollins, Captain. "Robert G. Robb, Commander. 
 "M. Mason, Commander. " Eben Farrand, Commander. 
 
 " A. B. Fairfax, Commander. " M. F. Maury, Commander. 
 "George Minor, Commander. " Wm. L. Maury, Lieutenant. 
 "R. B. Pegram, Lieutenant. "Robert Ould, Judge Advocate." 
 
238 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Such was the end of theVirginia, a vessel constructed out 
 of the burned and scuttled remains of the Merri?nac, planned 
 and fashioned crudely because of the limited resources of the 
 Confederacy, armed with the banded guns, the work of Lieut. 
 J. M. Brooke, manned with a crew of soldiers collected from 
 regiments and a few sailors that remained in Norfolk after 
 the evacuation, but commanded by the ablest, and bravest, 
 and most skillful officers of the C. S. navy. She was a prodigy 
 and a nondescript in naval construction. In her short career 
 she not only inflicted immense loss on her enemy, defied the best 
 production of unrestricted American genius, but revolution- 
 ized naval construction throughout the world. From her per- 
 formance was given the first glimpses of the new system of 
 naval warfare that was opening upon all navies; and she 
 taught the nations that the end of wooden fighting-ships had 
 come. The shots that sounded on her four-inch armament 
 were heard and heeded in Europe, and England, France, and 
 continental powers learned that no weapon of offence or de- 
 fence was left to them, so efficient as a large armor-clad and 
 very swift ram. Even in her weakness from over-draft and 
 inefficient motive power, the Virginia carried the lesson, 
 " that armor-plated floating batteries are the cheapest 
 and most effectual protection to coasts and harbors," and in 
 her short but glorious career she prefigured that of the Con- 
 federacy itself — brilliant in courage and endurance, but want- 
 ing greatly in those weightier matters which constitute a 
 great and powerful nation. 
 
 The military movements of the armies on the peninsula, 
 by which Gen. Joseph E. Johnston retired from the Yorktown 
 lines to the west side of the Chickahominy, caused the order 
 for the evacuation of Norfolk. The military necessity it is 
 not our purpose to discuss; it put an end to all naval oper- 
 ations in Hampton Roads, and the little Confederate 
 fleet, withdrawing up James River, took station behind the 
 fortifications at Drdwry's and Chapin's Bluffs. Norfolk was 
 evacuated by the Confederates, the navy-yard and ships were 
 burned, and Gen. Wool marched into the empty fortifications. 
 
 The loss of the navy-yard was a very great diminution of 
 Confederate naval resources, while the destruction of the Vir- 
 ginia was equal almost to the loss of an army of many thou- 
 sand men. Indeed, the official records show that she was far 
 more feared at Washington than Gen. Lee's army, and that 
 the terror excited by her exploits reached to every Atlantic 
 city. 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 MISSISSIPPI RIVER FROM CAIRO TO VICKSBURG. 
 
 THE Mississippi River and its tributaries — that "inland 
 sea," to which the Supreme Court of the United States 
 extended maritime jurisdiction, because of its "two 
 thousands of miles of public navigable waters, including 
 lakes and rivers, in which there is no tide " — was too impor- 
 tant to the great Northwest for its outlet to the ocean to be 
 controlled by any power foreign to the United States. 
 
 The erection of batteries near Vicksburg by the State of 
 Mississippi, in December and January, 1861, caused great ex- 
 citement throughout the Northwest. " There was a good deal 
 of fierce talk on both sides," said the N. Y. Herald of January 
 38th, 1861: 
 
 " And some Western governors drew ensanguined pictures of possible 
 difficulties to take place among the canebrakes and woodyards of the 
 Mississippi. It appears, however, that these batteries were temporary 
 affairs, built to prevent the reinforcement of the forts at points below 
 Vicksburg, more especially those at New Orleans. The Louisiana Con- 
 vention made haste to declare that the navigation of the river should be 
 free to all ' friendly States and powers. ' The governor of Mississippi 
 recommends that the ' most prompt and efficient measures be adopted to 
 make known to the people of the Northwestern States that peaceful 
 commerce on the Mississippi River wUl neither be interrupted nor an- 
 noyed by the people of Mississippi.' "We agree with the governor in the 
 statement that ' this will preserve peace between the South and the North- 
 west, if it can be preserved.' * * * We regard the course of Louisiana 
 and Mississippi upon the matter of the river navigation as being not only 
 very important in a commercial point of view, but likewise a very cheer- 
 ing sign that our political affairs are not in such a bad way as to be 
 altogether hopeless. Let Chicago rejoice and Wall Street be comforted. 
 Trade, ' the calm health of nations,' wiU still flow unrestricted from the 
 FaUs of St. Anthony to the Delta of the Mississippi." 
 
 Notwithstanding these ass.urances of free navigation by 
 Louisiana and Mississippi, as well as by the first acts of the 
 Confederate Congress: "That the peaceful navigation of the 
 Mississippi River is hereby declared free to the citizens of any 
 State upon its borders, or upon the borders of its navigable 
 
 (239) 
 
240 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 ■tributaries,"' the great northwestern section of the United 
 States was unwilling to accept, as a concession from a foreign 
 power, a right so essential and indispensable to the prosperity 
 and progress of its peoples. If there had been no sentiment 
 of union to rouse the spirit of war for its preservation, this 
 right of freely navigating without let or hindrance, without 
 permission or question, the Mississippi, from its source to the 
 Gulf, would have involved the two republics in war before 
 the lapse of a single decade. 
 
 The Louisville Journal of Jan. 34th, 1861, had the follow- 
 ing indignant protest against the blockade of the Mississippi 
 River: 
 
 " Itappears that the respectable Kentucky secessionist who informed 
 us that the cannon placed at Vicksburg by the order of the governor 
 were withdrawn from the Mississippi shore on Tuesday of last week was 
 mistaken. The battery still frowns from the bank, compelling all descend- 
 ing boats to come up to, undergo a formal search, and pay wharfage, 
 although they have no business in the port. And now, as we learn from 
 telegraphic dispatches, a battery of sixteen thirty-two pounders has been 
 planted upon the Memphis bluff to bring boats to there as they are 
 brought to at Vicksburg. This really seems almost incredible. It is hard 
 to bring ourselves to believe that the people of Mem.phis, always deemed 
 so loyal, can tolerate any such a high-handed proceeding, such a wrong 
 and insult to aU the States that use the Mississippi River for purposes of 
 navigation. Much as we dislike violence in all its forms, we should sup- 
 pose that the Memphis population, in spite of the Minute Men, or any 
 other organization, secret or open, would rise up in their wrath and tum- 
 ble the obstructing battery into the river. We wonder whether batteries 
 are to be planted at all the ports of all the States on the Lower Missis- 
 sippi for overhauling all descending boats, examining their cargoes with 
 an eye to seizure or confiscation, and enforcing the payment of wharfage. 
 If so, how long before the river cities will either break up the navigation 
 to which they owe their existence and on which they depend for its con- 
 tinuance, or else bring upon themselves and their States the armed hosts 
 of the States that shall feel themselves aggrieved ? 
 
 " The Louisiana State Convention is very careful to stipulate for the 
 free navigation of the Mississippi. Yesterday the following resolution 
 was reported to the Convention, to be added to the ordinance of secession: 
 
 " 'We, the people of Louisiana, recognize the right of free navigation 
 of the Mississippi River and tributaries by all friendly States bordering 
 thereon ; we also recognize the right of the ingress and egress of the 
 mouths of the Mississippi by all friendly States and Powers, and hereby 
 declare our willingness to enter into stipulations to guarantee the exer- 
 cise of those rights.' " 
 
 As if to force the Southern States, against their wish and 
 purpose, to prevent the free navigation of the Mississippi 
 River, the U. S. Surveyor of the Customs at Louisville, Ky., 
 May 8th, was instructed to prevent the shipment of arms, 
 ammunition and provisions to the seceded States, including 
 Tennessee, North Carolina and Arkansas, and to intercept 
 such shipments passing by or going through Louisville. 
 
 The administration at Washington thus took the first steps 
 to interrupt the free navigation of the Mississippi. It was 
 
 » Approved, Feb. 2eth, 1861. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 241 
 
 "by successive steps against the interests and the purposes of 
 "the Southern States that from one act to another, by one provo- 
 cation and another, the two sections did exactly what was 
 against their material interest, because of their fears of injury 
 hy the authorities of each section. But commercial inter- 
 course was not wholly interrupted by the Proclamation of Mr. 
 Lincoln, of April 19th. 
 
 The Cairo correspondence of the Cincinnati Commercial, 
 of May 25th, says: 
 
 " Somewhat singular is the manner in which matters are being con- 
 ducted at the different porta in relation to articles destined South. A 
 few days since, the Surveyor of the Port at St. Louis permitted the 
 steamer Falls City to clear with some 10,000 or 15,000 barrels of lime for 
 New Orleans. Upon her arrival here, as you are aware, she was stopped, 
 and the lime taken off. Yesterday a flatboat loaded with the same arti- 
 cle arrived from Louisville. She underwent an examination by the au- 
 thorities at Evansville, and was allowed to pass. This lime was also 
 stopped here. The orders upon this subject must be general and consist- 
 ent". This peculiar execution of them should be remedied, so that the 
 great inconvenience and consequent dissatisfaction might be avoided, 
 and the object of the blockade more easily and speedily accomplished. 
 Considerable anxiety is manifested here in relation to the steamer Prince 
 of Wales. It is thought that she has been seized at Memphis, as an article 
 in yesterday's Avalanche, in speaking of the seizure of the Sovereign, and 
 the expected arrival of the Prince, sounded somewhat of rapaciousness. 
 
 " The steamship Catawba was seized at New Orleans, April 35th, 1861, 
 by a number of citizens under Capt. Shirens,on their own responsibility ; she 
 was released afterwards by orders from Governor Moore, who had received 
 instructions from the Confederate government prohibiting and disap- 
 proving of any obstruction to commerce in Southern ports. The Collec- 
 tor of New Orleans was notified to the same effect. Orders were also sent 
 to the Collector at Galveston, to raise the embargo at that port — general 
 government alone having such power. The Catawba sailed for New York, 
 full of freight and passengers. She was owned principally in New Orleans 
 and Mobile. She was only seized on the ground of expediency and not out 
 of retaliation. 
 
 " Governor Moore, in reply to a dispatch relative to the seizure of 
 boats and Southern property "in the Ohio River, was instructed by the 
 government at Montgomery to wait till the reports were confirmed, and 
 then only to retaliate by seizing property belonging to citizens of Ohio." 
 
 When war became inevitable by the assault on Sumter, 
 Attorney General Bates, on April 17th, wrote to James B. Eads 
 "to hold himself in readiness to aid the U. S. government with 
 his information and experience of the Mississippi as to the 
 best manner of recapturing and holding the navigation of 
 all "Western waters. On the 39th of April, Mr. Eads ' sub- 
 mitted a plan of operations with a description of the kinds 
 of gunboats suitable for operations on "Western rivers. The 
 plan, approved by Commodore Paulding, was intrusted to 
 Capt. John Rodgers to be put in execution. After further 
 consultation with Mr. Eads, tne Conestoga, Taylor and Lexing- 
 ton, powerful freight and passenger Ohio River steamboats, 
 "were altered at Cincinnati and converted into gunboats. While 
 
 1 lAfe of Admiral Foote, p. 164. 
 16 
 
343 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 these boats were not iron-plated they were protected by oak 
 bulwarks from musket balls. ' 
 
 Mr. Eads became the successful bidder for the seven gun- 
 boats, advertised for construction by the U. S. quartermaster 
 in July. These gunboats were each of 600 tons, and drew six 
 feet water, and carried thirteen guns each. They were built 
 very strong, and plated with two-and-a-half-inch iron, and 
 could steam nine miles per hour. Their form and dimensions 
 gave very great steadiness, and the accuracy of the fire of 
 their guns was almost equal to those on land batteries. These 
 seven boats were the DeKalb, Carondelet, Cincinnati, Louis- 
 ville, Mound City, Cairo, and Pittsburg. The Benton was 
 added later; she became the flag-ship of Admiral Foote, who, 
 in September, 1861, assumed command in Mississippi waters. 
 This was a powerful squadron, aggregating a tonnage of 5,000, 
 heavily armored, fully equij)ped, and mounting 157 large guns, 
 without which all the armies of the great West would not 
 have been able to have regained and held the navigation of 
 the Mississippi River. 
 
 The efforts of Secretary Mallory to organize a fleet on the 
 Mississippi River were necessarily confined to adapting river 
 craft to war purposes. While the immense resources of the 
 United States were able in 100 days to put afioat, armed and 
 equipped, the fleet of gunboats on the Mississippi River, the 
 Confederate Navy Department was confined to altering steam- 
 boats; and even that work was hindered and delayed by want 
 of skilled workmen, scarcity of material at ports, and embar- 
 rassments from defection and deficient transportation. 
 
 New Orleans and Memphis were the only points on the 
 Mississippi River in the least adapted to ship-building or re- 
 pairing. At the latter city, the Tennessee and Arkansas were 
 put under contract for completion by December 34th, 1861. 
 
 The secession of Tennessee and her adoption of the Con- 
 federate Constitution enabled the Confederate authorities to 
 
 1 The first active service of the Lexington was On the arrival of the Cheney at Columbus, on 
 to seize the W. B. Terry, at Faducah, Ky., Aug. Thursday, the 1st of August, as she landed 
 25th, 1861; and thatact, called for by no conduct, she "was boarded, the captain, clerk and other 
 hostile or injurious, to the United States, or any olficers arrested — the short space of twenty min- 
 citizene thereof, provoked to capture by Ken- utes being allowed them to get ashore. Col. 
 tuckiaus of the steamer Samuel Orre, belonging Hunt then took command of the boat, bringing 
 to Evansville, Ind., and worth, with her cargo, her down the Mississippi River to the head- 
 $25,000. Thue, one uncalled for outrage led to quarters of Gen. G. J. Pillow, to whom he re- 
 others, and on the 28th of July, Col. A. A. Hunt, ported the prize. Gen. Pillow then ordered Col. 
 Capt. G. B. Massey and Lieut. W. H. Branham, Hunt, with the packet, to Memphis to report to 
 left the city of Mobile for the purpose of cap- Maj. Gen. Polk. 
 
 turing the packet Cheney. On their arrival at As she left for Columbus a shout arose from a 
 Columbus, Ky., they found her running under large assemblage on the leveo. At Hickman she 
 the orders and signals of Gen. Prentiss. There was presented with a Confederate flag, and 
 being some doubt as to where she belonged, three hearty ch^rs for the success of the advent- 
 Col, Hunt sent Capt. Massey to Cairo, with in- urers were given. As she progressed down the 
 Btructions to remain there until he could ascer- river, salutes were fired, and other demon- 
 tain her proper ownership. On the return of strations of joy were manifested. At Randolph, 
 Capt. Massey, it was rendered certain that she Capt. Tom Demmons, of the Woodruff guard, 
 belonged to the enemy. Col. Hunt, having been was detailed with a detachment of his men to 
 informed that the packet carried United States guard her to Memphis. 
 
 troops secreted upon her, made known the She arrived at the wharf with a large V. S. flag 
 
 object of his expedition to a few reliable flying beneath a handsome Southern banner, 
 
 friends in Columbus, and received the aid of The Cheney was worth probably $25,000, and 
 
 T. W. Doughty, S. W. Rennich and W. Gray, was a capital prize. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 243 
 
 occupy and fortify Memphis, Eandolph, Fort Pillow, and 
 Island No. 10. The neutral position of Kentucky compelled 
 the Confederates to construct their defences of the Cumber- 
 land and Tennessee Rivers within the borders of Tennessee, 
 but as near as possible to the Kentucky line. Fort Donelson 
 on the west side of the Cumberland, and Fort Henry on the 
 east side of the Tennessee, prolonged the defensive line of the 
 Confederates from Island No. 10 to the eastward. The forti- 
 fied points closed the Mississippi, the Cumberland and the 
 Tennessee Rivers. 
 
 About the 1st of September the United States land forces 
 occupied the point of land immediately opposite the town of 
 Columbus, Ky., and indicated most unmistakably a purpose 
 to possess and fortify the town itself. The demonstration of 
 such a purpose was promptly met by Gen. Polk, who, notwith- 
 standing the neutrality of Kentucky, felt bound to defend his 
 lines, and that Columbus offered the best position to that end. 
 " The necessity justifies the action," was President Davis' tele- 
 gram of September 4th, and the " profound gratification" of 
 the citizens of Columbus expressed to Gen. Polk was but the 
 partial expression of the sentiment of the great majority of 
 the people of Kentucky. 
 
 Almost simultaneously with the occupation of Columbus, 
 Ky., by the Confederates, Paducah was seized by the U. S. 
 forces. This occupation of Columbus, Ky., and the extension 
 of the advance lines of military defence to Bowling Green, 
 Ky., constituted a position which could not be turned, but 
 which when once broken would have to be abandoned 
 throughout its whole length. Columbus on the Mississippi 
 River, defended by its batteries, was also protected by the Con- 
 federate fleet of Flag-officer HoUins, consisting of the McRae 
 (flag-ship), the General Polk, the Ivy, the Jackson, the float- 
 ing battery (the Pelican dry dock of New Orleans), to which, 
 in January and February, the Pontchartrain, the Maurepas, 
 and the Livingston were added. 
 
 The destruction of records, and the deaths of officers, ren- 
 der it a difficult matter to ascertain with exact accuracy what 
 Confederate vessels composed HoUins' fleet. Capt. Mitchell, ^ 
 enumerated the Polk, the Ivy, the McRae, the Jackson, the 
 floating battery of New Orleans, the Calhoun, and says that in 
 January and February the Pontchartrain, the Maurepas and 
 Livingston were added. Commodore HoUins, the better au- 
 thority, because commanding the fleet, before the same Com- 
 mittee,* enumerated the McBae, the Livingston, the Maure- 
 pas, Polk, and the Ivy; and in reply to the question, " Did you 
 not have the Manassas at one time ?" replied, "She came part 
 of the way up, but she was sent back again, having ran 
 aground and injured herself." Lieut. C. W. Read, executive 
 
 1 Testimony before Investigating Committee 2 Testimony before Investigating Committee 
 
 of Congress, p. 38. of Congress, p. 17. 
 
344 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 officer of the McBae,' enumerates at Columbus the Manas- 
 sas (1 gun), McBae (8), Polk (5), Jackson (2), and Calhoun (2,), 
 and says that the Pontchartrain and Ivy, Maurepas and Liv- 
 ingston were added. 
 
 These were converted river boats, and the very great dif- 
 ference between a gunboat and a steamboat with a gun on it 
 must be borne in mind when reading of Confederate crafts 
 on interior waters in the early days of the war. The desultory 
 operations of the enemy's flotilla, making reconnoissances, and 
 hunting out masked batteries on river-banks, offered no op- 
 portunity for important actions on either side, and while 
 Lieut. S. L. Phelps, U. S. N., commanding the U. S. steamer 
 Conestoga, reported that, on Sept. 10th, 1861, while reconnoi- 
 tering Lucas' Bend with the Conestoga and the Lexington — 
 
 " Two steamers of the enemy came up from Columbus, one of them 
 the gunboat Yankee, opened fire upon us, but I found our guns could not 
 reach them where they lay below the batteries. At about ten o'clock I 
 again dropped down with this vessel, determined to try a shot at the rebel 
 gunboat. The first shot must have struck her on the ricochet, as it 
 touched the water close alongside, and she at once started down stream." 
 
 This observation of a picket-boat is not even reported in 
 Confederate accounts. " 
 
 By the commencement of the year 1863, the Federal 
 flotilla had been increased by the following iroi}-plated gun- 
 boats, built and fitted for war purposes: The Benton (flag- 
 steamer), the Carondelet, the Essex, the Louisville, the Mound 
 City, the Cincinnati, the Cairo, the Pittsburg, and the St. 
 Louis — carrying each ten heavy guns, ' all under command of 
 Flag-officer Andrew H. Foote. This fleet of twelve vessels — 
 nine of which were iron-plated — was opposed to the Confeder- 
 ate fleet of Flag-officer Hollins — of old steamboats, which, on 
 Feb. 38th, numbered five boats, which could bring but twenty 
 guns to bear upon an enemy;* these boats were shielded with 
 iron to protect the machinery only, and which " looked very 
 much like a cow-catcher," but offered no protection to the 
 hull of the boats. 
 
 Flag-officer Hollins had been in command of the naval 
 station at New Orleans from August 1st, 1861, having then 
 superseded Captain Eosseau — and was relieved of the com- 
 mand of the naval station by Commander Wm. C. Whittle, 
 in February, 1863, when he proceeded up the river with the fleet 
 
 1 B<iminiscences of the ConfederaU States Navy — son" to devise a "plan of escape " by means of 
 S. Hist. Soc. : Paper, Vol. — , No. — , p. 336. pretended dispatclies for U. 8. headquarters. 
 
 Neither was the ram Manassas at that or any 
 
 2 Admiral Walke, Naval Scemss, p. 30, gives to other time at ColumbiiB— the whole story was a 
 it a very great importance, and makes the Con- amard put upon the credulous admiral, for 
 federate steamer to have " on board their which he is now responsible, without the least 
 'President' Jeff.' Davis, and Gen. Jeff. Thomp- authority to establish its truth. 
 
 son. Gen. Polk, and others of like renown." As 3 Porter's Histam of Ike Nam, and Walker's 
 
 President Davis was in Richmond, Va., on that Naval Scenes - ■•■"'•'n -^^^ „„^^lo 
 day, andwasnotat Columbus at any time during 
 
 its occupancy by the Confederates, there was no * Testimony of Oapt. Hollins before Investiga- 
 
 occasion for " the cool and crafty Jeff. Thomp- ting Committee, p. 64. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 245 
 
 above enumerated, which by changes of one kind and another 
 was reduced to the McBae, the Polk, the Livingston, the Mau- 
 repas and the Ivy. In his examination before the Investiga- 
 ting Committee Capt. Hollins was asked: "Were all these 
 boats iron-plated ?" His reply was: " Only in their bow — they 
 looked very much like a cow-catcher. This was intended, not 
 to guard the men at all, but as a protection to the machinery." 
 * * * " You stated that you had four boats with nine guns 
 and one with but two, making thirty -eight altogether. I un- 
 derstood you to say, you could bring forty guns to bear upon 
 the enemy?" "I stated I could bring twenty guns to bear 
 upon the enemy going down." 
 
 The fall of Forts Henry and Donelson broke the Confed- 
 erate line near the centre, and permitting the ascent of the 
 Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers to the interior of the State 
 of Tennessee and up to the boundary of Alabama, compelled 
 the evacuation of Columbus, and a re-alignment from Island 
 No. 10, which became the advance Confederate post on the 
 Mississippi River. This island is situated at the turn of a long 
 bend in the river fifty-five nailes below Cairo, and is, by its 
 situation, a very defensible position, which was made so strong 
 and formidable by land defences as to deter the enemy for 
 weeks from attempting to run its blockade. Being inaccess- 
 ible to assault by land forces, its batteries, for many miles 
 along the shores, held the river and completely sealed the 
 navigation. The swift current of the Mississippi and the 
 sharp turn of the river at the bend rendered the movements 
 of tne enemy's iron-clads very difiicult and hazardous. Any 
 injury to their motive-power or steering apparatus would ren- 
 der the injured boat an easy capture, since the current would 
 swiftly carry it under the Confederate batteries, whose seventy 
 guns, scattered in separate batteries along the river-banks 
 and on the island, would soon have destroyed even the iron- 
 clads. The gallant conduct of Commander H. "Walker, of the 
 U. S. steamer Carondelet, running the blockade of Island 
 No. 10 on the night of April 4th, and which was followed by 
 Commander Thompson in the Pittsburg on the night of April 
 6th, enabled Gen. Pope to transport his army across the river 
 to the Tennessee bank, and this movement, taking the bat- 
 teries in rear, compelled the evacuation of Island No. 10. ' 
 
 1 The floating battery, at Island No. 10, was ponding to- the port sill on a ship, in its appear- 
 under the command of Lieut. S. W. Averett, ance and uses. AU the guna on its starboard, 
 formerly of the IT. S. navy. This battery was or in-shore side, for both ends went down, had 
 the Pelican dry dock of Algiers, opposite New been transferred to shore batteries, while six 
 Orleans, and was without motive power of any were left on board of her on her port side, which 
 kind. It floated, that was all, and, when hauled faced the river and the enemy's flotilla. While, 
 by some other boat, could be moved as desired; above the island, on the left of the Confederate 
 at other times it drifted, unless anchored or worts, the battery was the most exposed, of all 
 tied up. The pumping engine in her hold the defences, to the enemy's fire during the 
 enabled her to be lowered or raised in the long bombardment. She could be reached by 
 water, and a slanting cover of timbers, sur- the enemy's fire across the low bank of sand, 
 mounted by a coating of sheet-iron, erected which caused the bend in the river above the 
 over her, protected her pumping engine from island, and was thus exposed to mortar shells 
 shot and shell. Her deck was flush, without and shot from rifled cannon, whose range was 
 bulwarks, except a single sill around it, corres- superior to that of any of the guns on the battery. 
 
246 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Lieut. Read says that " one day we received information 
 that the tin-clad U. S. steamer Carondelet was ferrymg the 
 men of Gen. Pope's army over to a point above Tiptonville, 
 and the general commanding at No. 10 urged Capt. Hollms 
 to attack the gunboat with his fleet; for, if the enemy got pos- 
 session of Tiptonville and the road by which supplies were 
 sent to No. 10, the evacuation or capture of that place was 
 certain. Capt. HoUins declined to comply with the request of 
 the general, saying, that as the Carondelet was iron-clad, and 
 his fleet were all wooden boats, he did not think he could suc- 
 cessfully combat her. Lieuts. Dunnington, Fry and Carter, 
 of the gunboats Ponchartrain, Maurepas and Polk, begged 
 Commodore HoUins to allow them to attack the enemy's gun- 
 boat, but the old commodore was firm in his decision to remain 
 inactive. The three gunboats mounted together seventeen 
 guns, eight and nine-inch smooth-bores and six and seven- 
 inch rifles." 
 
 The incident narrated by Lieut. Read is disingenuously 
 stated, in that it omits to mention that the Pittsburg, an iron- 
 clad steamer, followed the Carondelet below Island No. 10, 
 and was within easy call at Tiptonville; that the two iron- 
 clads carried eighteen heavy guns, in ca.semate, and were pro- 
 tected throughout their hull and armament with iron, while 
 their powers as rams were greatly superior to that of any of 
 Hollins' fleet. With that explanation, the inactivity of Capt. 
 HoUins to sacrifice the only Confederate vessels on the upper 
 Mississippi will not appear so strange to the reader as it does to 
 Lieut. Read. 
 
 The fall of Island No. 10 opened the Mississippi to the 
 enemy down to Fort Pillow, where, on April 14th, Flag-officer 
 
 even when fired with the highest charges, her men armed with small arms, the defences of 
 either at extreme elevation or on ricochet. the south end and mainland, until every gun had 
 During the last ten days of the hombardment, been abandoned. She was then scuttled, but, 
 the battery was the target of nearly every shot. drifting on a bar, was captured by the enemy. 
 A long, flat boat, used as quarters for the Peli- It has been intimated that the floating battery 
 can Guards, moored between the battery and the was abandoned without giving notice to the 
 bank, was sunk; one of the battery's guns was of&cers on the island, but the most reliable evi- 
 wrecked by a rifle shot, and her sides perforated dence exists of the error of the statement, and 
 by mortar shells and rifle ahote, until she leaked that Lieut. Averett did not leave the floating 
 BO badly that she careened to the port aide until battery until advised by Lieut. Williamson, of 
 the water washed over her deck, and almost the First Alabama Regiment, that he had sent 
 touched the muzzles of her guns. In that trying information to the officers on the island, 
 predicament, her gallant commander kept his Lieut. Col. Joseph Barbiere, in his interesting 
 post, sometimes on the top of her roof or over work on " Scraps from the prison table atCamp 
 the pumps, and always endeavoring to so use Chase and Johnson's Island," says: 
 his guns as to reach the enemy — while hurrying " We have omitted the floating battery in our 
 forward repairs, and endeavoring, by all means mention of the guns. This impromptu afiair 
 known to a skillful officer, to maintain the bat- was commanded by Capt. Averitt, formerly of 
 fery at the post assigned to her. Compelled, by the U. S. navy, an officer of nerve and intelU- 
 her disabled condition, to drop down the river gence. He had four guns. This, with the 
 out of range, the battery was pumped out, and, battery of the Southern G-uards, and the five 
 besides other damage, there was found two ver- brass pieces of the Point Coupe Artillery, two 
 tical holes, about three feet in length, below her small mortars, more ornamental than other- 
 water line, caused by mortar shells. All dam- wise, make a grand total of fifty-three guns, the 
 ages being repaired during that day and night, great portion of which were of light metal. The 
 the battery was reported early the next day enemy report the capture of 120. We sur- 
 ready to take any position to which Gen. rendered not exceeding 2,600 men ; the enemy 
 Machall would assign her, and have her towed report 7,000. They publish the capture of seven 
 to any station he might select. She was taken generals ; we had one, and two acting brigadiers, 
 to the south end of the island, where she re- If there is any glory in such a capture, the bom- 
 niained, and, protected by her batteries, and by bastic Pope is welcome to it." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 247 
 
 Foote says: " Five rebel gunboats rounded the point below us, 
 when the gunboats, the Benton in advance, immediately got 
 underway and proceeded in pursuit; and when within long 
 range opened upon the rebels, followed by the Carondelet, Cin- 
 cinnati, and other boats. After an exchange of some twenty 
 shots, the rebel boats rapidly steamed down the river, and 
 kept beyond our range until they reached the batteries of Fort 
 Pillow, a distance of more than thirty miles." Such skirmishes 
 as the above find no record in Confederate reports — Capt. 
 HoUins, before the Committee of the Confederate Congress, 
 merely remarking that " at New Madrid we were engaged off 
 and on for nearly seventeen days — night and day."' On the 
 day that the above skirmish is reported to have taken place, 
 Capt. Hollins received from Capt. Whittle, at New Orleans, a 
 dispatch that the enemy was in force at the mouth of the river, 
 and begged him to come down, as his services were needed 
 there. 
 
 On receipt of that telegram, Capt. Hollins proceeded im- 
 mediately to New Orleans, having first advised the Navy De- 
 partment of his call, and the urgency that demanded his 
 presence there, as he was the officer commanding the defences 
 afloat of the Mississippi River. Lieut. Read, in his " Remi- 
 niscences," again overdraws the facts of this correspondence 
 when he says: 
 
 " Commodore Hollins telegraphed to the Secretary of the 
 Navy for permission to go with all the vessels of his fleet to 
 the assistance of the forts below New Orleans. The Secretary 
 replied to Commodore Hollins to remain where he was, and to 
 ' harass the enemy as much as possible.' The Commodore 
 answered, that as all the enemy's gunboats on the upper Mis- 
 sissippi were iron-clad, while those on the lower river were 
 wood, like our own, he was of opinion that he could be of 
 more service with his fleet below New Orleans than at Fort 
 Pillow. Without waiting to hear further from the depart- 
 ment, the Commodore started down the river on the Ivy." 
 
 Mr. Mallory's reply to Capt. Hollins' dispatch was that : 
 " Your dispatch received yesterday proposed to abandon 
 opposition to the enemy's descent of the river by your fleet, 
 and to carry your fleet to the mouth of the river. This 
 proposition is totally inadmissible ; every effort that nautical 
 skill, invention and courage can put forth must be made to 
 oppose the enemy's descent of the river, and at every hazard. 
 You inform me that you have gone to New Orleans at the 
 urgent request of Capt. Whittle. You will, therefore, send 
 these orders to the senior in command of your squadron, by 
 telegraph. The Louisiana must join your squadron at the 
 earliest practicable moment." That telegram was dated 
 April 11th, and was sent to Hollins in New Orleans, and 
 
 1 Page 48. 
 
248 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 received by him there, and he received no other orders. The 
 command of the fleet at Fort Pillow devolved on Commander 
 Pinkney. Between the judgment of Capt. HoUins and that 
 of Secretary Mallory, as to the nature of the defence of 
 New Orleans, the reader cannot fail, by the light of facts now 
 existing, to see that HoUins' idea of strengthening the fleet 
 below New Orleans was correct, while that of Secretary 
 Mallory would, as late as April 10th, have further depleted 
 that defence by sending the Louisiana up the river to resist 
 the fleet of Capt. Davis rather than down to the forts to meet 
 that of Admiral Farragut. Mr. Mallory's opinion that New 
 Orleans' danger was from above and not from below, was 
 fixed until the very sound of the enemy's guns above the forts 
 caused him to realize his great error. 
 
 The command of HoUins' little fleet devolved on Com- 
 mander Pinkney at Fort Pillow. The McBae, in obedience to 
 Capt. HoUins' order, proceeded to New Orleans — the Ivy 
 had carried the commodore ; and when Fort Pillow was evac- 
 uated the fleet was scattered, the Maurepas and Pontchartrain 
 going up White River, ' where, under the gallant lieutenants, 
 Joseph Fry and Dunnington, they rendered eflBcient service — 
 the Livingston and Polk to the Yazoo River, where they were 
 most ingloriously but effectually burned. 
 
 Capt. HoUins entertained a firm conviction that his 
 little fleet, united with that at the forts and aided by the 
 forts and all the appliances there, could have driven Admiral 
 Farragut out of the river. That opinion he expressed before 
 the Court of Inquiry to the effect that: 
 
 " I had often passed the Yankee batteries, and knew they could pass 
 ours, and I was anxious that my squadron, which was up the river, 
 should toe ordered down to resist Farragut, feeling satisfied that I could 
 have out him off. I should have fought him to the greatest advantage. 
 Farragut's ships would have been exposed— bow foremost — to my broad- 
 sides, and the sides of his vessels to the fire of the forts ; had he exposed 
 the stern of his vessels to the fire of the forts, they would have been 
 sunk in a short time." 
 
 That opinion is characterized by a writer in the United 
 Service Magazine as " braggardism," but Farragut seems to 
 have held the same opinion as to the advantage of coming 
 down stream as against fighting up, and against the current. 
 In a letter of June 3d, to Secretary Welles, he points out the 
 very advantages which HoUins claimed for his proposition, 
 saying: 
 
 " Few gunboats, although they have heavy batteries, are nearly all so 
 damaged that they are certainly not in a condition to contend with iron- 
 clad rams coming down upon them with the current, as are those of the 
 upper Mississippi, which are built for the purpose, are iron-clad, and are 
 designed to contend with the enemy's gunboats coming up against the 
 current." 
 
 1 Lieut. C. W. Bead. 
 
CAPTAIN GEORGE N. HOLLINS, 
 
 CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 349 
 
 It was the advantage of fighting with the current, and 
 against vessels struggling against the current, that induced 
 Capt. HoUins to add: 
 
 " Had my squadron been at the mouth of the river, I could have kept 
 the enemy from crossing the bar ; their heavier ships had to be lightened 
 very greatly; their armament, etc., taken out before they could be got 
 over: I could then have whipped their smaller craft with my squadron, 
 and have prevented their larger ones getting over, if it had not been in 
 my power to have destroyed them." 
 
 Upon his arrival at New Orleans, the brave old fighting 
 sailor received a telegram from Secretary Mallory, calling him 
 to Richmond to sit on a court-martial, and thus one of the 
 best and bravest of the Confederate naval officers was re- 
 moved from the scene of war to be a member of a court to try 
 Commodore Tatnall for destroying the Virginia. 
 
 The scattering and destroying of the C. S. fleet at Fort 
 Pillow left the defence of the river to the Montgomery flotilla. 
 
 While this River Defence expedition was no part of the 
 C. S. navy, but was under the command of the general of the 
 army in the Mississippi Department, and control of the War 
 Department, yet its history is necessary to a full understand- 
 ing of Mississippi River defences. 
 
 On January loth, 1863, in obedience to a telegram from 
 Secretary of War Benjamin, Gen. Lovell seized fourteen 
 steamers at New Orleans; they were the Mexico, Texas, Ori- 
 zaba, Charles Morgan, Florida, Arizona, William Heines, 
 Atlantic, Austin, Magorda, Matagorda, William H. Webb, 
 Anglo-Saxon, and Anglo-Norman. In announcing this seizure. 
 Gen. Lovell called the attention of the Richmond authorities to 
 
 " Capt. Higgins, who lately resigned (from the navy), with a view of 
 fitting out some of these vessels for war purposes under State authority. 
 This seizure puts an end to his business. He is an officer of the old navy, 
 of experience, skill, and high reputation as a bold and efficient officer. 
 His services would be of great value in assisting to fit out a fleet here, and 
 in fighting it afterwards." 
 
 This broad hint to the authorities was of no avail, because 
 Mr. Benjamin, in his reply, informed Gen. Lovell of the pas- 
 sage by the Confederate Congress of laws Nos. 344 and 350, ' 
 and that these vessels were 
 
 " ' Not to be a part of the navy, for the acts intended a service on the 
 rivers, and will be composed of the steamboat-men of the Western waters.' 
 The expedition was to be 'subject to the general command of the military 
 chief of the department where it may be ordered to operate, but the 
 boats will be commanded by steamboat captains and manned b;^ steam- 
 boat crews, who will be armed with such weapons as the captains may 
 choose, and the boats will be fitted out as the respective captains may de- 
 sire. The intention and design are to strengthen the vessels with iron 
 
 1 Approved January 9tli, 1862, for floating retary of War or Secretary of the Navy, as he 
 
 defences for the Western waters, by which shall direct, and authorizing the President to 
 
 $1,000,000 was appropriated, to be expended appoint officers of the regular navy to the com- 
 
 at the discretion of the President by the Sec- mand. 
 
250 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 casing at the bows, and to use them at high speed to run do-wn, or run 
 over and sinli, if possible, the gunboats and mortar rafts prepared by the 
 enemy for attack at our river defences. These gunboats and mortar rafts 
 have been so far protected by iron plates and by their peculiar construc- 
 tion as to offer, in the judgment of the President and of Congress, but 
 small chances of our being able to arrest their descent of the river by 
 shot or shell, while, at the same time, their weight, their unwieldy con- 
 struction and their slow movement, together with the fact that they 
 show very little surface above the water-line, render them peculiarly lia- 
 ble to the mode of attack devised by the enterprising captains who have 
 undertaken to effect their destruction byrunning them down, If provided 
 with swift and heavy steamers, so strengthened and protected at the bows 
 as to allow them to rush on the descending boats without being sunk at 
 the first fire. 
 
 " Capts. Montgomery and Townsend have been selected by the Presi- 
 dent as two of those who are to command these boats. Twelve other 
 captains will be found by them and recommended to the President for 
 appointment. Each captain will ship his own crew, fit up his own boat, 
 and get ready within the shortest possible delay. It is not proposed to 
 rely on cannon, which these men are not skilled in using, nor on fire-arms. 
 The men will be armed with cutlasses. On each boat, however, there will 
 be one heavy gun, to be used in case the stern of any of the gunboats 
 should be exposed to fire, for they are entirely unprotected behind; and, 
 if attempting to escape by flight, would be very vulnerable by shot from 
 a pursuing vessel. 
 
 " I give you these details as furnishing a mere outline of the general 
 plan to be worked out by the brave and energetic men who have under- 
 taken it. Prompt and vigorous preparation is indispensable." 
 
 The above fourteen vessels were appraised by a Board con- 
 sisting of Messrs. Bogart. Stephenson, Frost, Grinnel, Milliken 
 and Naval Constructor Porter at $900,000, but the sale was made 
 for $563,000. Gen. Lovell urged that the captains in charge of 
 this expedition should recommend to the President some com- 
 petent person to have general control of the fleet in fitting it 
 out, and making general rules for its control and management; 
 and added, prophetically, that "fourteen Mississippi captains 
 and pilots would never agree about anything after they once 
 get under way." 
 
 The River Defence expedition was not fully organized be- 
 fore Gen. Lovell called the attention of the War Department 
 to " considerable dissatisfaction " which had been expressed at 
 some of the captains appointed by Montgomery and Townsend. 
 The list of captains as appointed by Montgomery and Town- 
 send was : Capts. John A. Stephenson, Isaac Hooper, Burdett 
 Paris, John H. Burke, James Beverly Smith, James C. Delancy, 
 Joseph Davis McCoy. William H. H. Leonard, James Henry 
 Hart, George WillhoUand Phillips, William W. Lamb, and 
 Joseph A. Sturtevant. 
 
 The fleet was fitted out at an enormous expense in con- 
 sequence of the rise in price of every article to over 300 per 
 cent.; the fitting out, provisioning, and coaling the fourteen 
 ships costing to April 16th over $800,000 — which, in addition to 
 the $563,000 which were paid for the steamers and other ex- 
 penses, made the total outlay over the $1,500,000 appropriated. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 251 
 
 To the high prices paid for every article must be added the in- 
 crease of cost arising from the fact noted by Gen. Lovell that 
 "the river pilots (Montgomery and Townsend), who are at the 
 head of the fleet, are men of limited ideas — no system and no 
 administrative capacity whatever." The fleet never impressed 
 Oen. Lovell with any conviction of usefulness — who advised 
 the Secretary that he feared "that their powers of execution 
 will prove much less than have been anticipated, in that unless 
 some competent person of education, system, and brains is put 
 over each division of the fleet, it will, in my judgment, prove 
 an utter failure. No code of laws or penalties has been 
 established, and it is diflHcult to decide how deserters from the 
 fleet are to be tried and punished. There is little or no discipline 
 or subordination, too much ' steamboat,' and too little of the 
 * man-of-war,' to be very effective," and he expressed the 
 opinion that for this fleet to compensate for the outlay some 
 good head ought to be placed in charge of it. That was never 
 done, and this expensive fleet totally failed to render any 
 appreciable service whatever to the public defence. 
 
 The evacuation of Columbus, Ky., before the fleet was 
 completed, rendered its primarjr object — the destruction of the 
 enemy's fleet at Cairo — impossible, and the breaking by the 
 flood of the raft at the forts below New Orleans rendered it 
 impossible for Gen. Lovell to put guns on the boats of the fleet, 
 and compelled him to keep six of the steamers at New Orleans. 
 
 This anomalous, inefficient, useless and expensive expedi- 
 tion was planned and gotten up by the pilots, Montgomery and 
 Townsend, and urged upon Congress by the whole Mississippi 
 delegation and by Gen. Polk. 
 
 When the time for action came, "the River Defence fleet 
 proved a failure, for the very reasons set forth in my (Gen. 
 Lovell) letter to the department of April 15th — unable to govern 
 themselves, and unwilling to be governed by others, their 
 almost total want of system, vigilance, and discipline rendered 
 them nearly useless and helpless when finally dashed upon 
 suddenly on a dark night." 
 
 It will be seen, when the flght at the forts comes to be con- 
 sidered, that Gen. Duncan could get no intelligent obedience 
 to his orders from Capt. Stephenson, and that the fire boats in 
 charge of Capt. Stephenson were so handled that, instead of 
 burning the enemy's boats, they set fire to the forts' wharves, 
 lighting up the defences of the forts and obscuring the position 
 of the enemy, so that Gen. Duncan took the fire boats out of the 
 control of Capt. Stephenson and turned them over to Lieut. 
 Renshaw, C. S. N.j and Com. Mitchell of the navy bears 
 emphatic testimony to Stephenson's positive refusal during the 
 flght at the forts to receive orders himself or allow any of the 
 River Defence vessels to obey any order from a naval officer, 
 asserting that all the officers and crews of the River Defence 
 fleet " had entered the service with the distinct understanding 
 
252 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 or condition that they were not to be placed under the orders 
 of naval officers"; and Com. Mitchell further testified before 
 the Court of Inquiry that he was " not aware that the River 
 Defence fleet did any service in resisting the enemy; if they 
 did, it did not come under my (his) observation, nor has it in 
 any way been brought to my notice; that four of the vessels 
 were destroyed by the enemy or set on fire and abandoned 
 by their own crew; that the Resolute was run ashore and 
 abandoned by her officers and crew, and was burned by order of 
 Com. Mitchell, and that the Defiance was discovered abandoned, 
 having escaped without any material damage."' The respon- 
 sibility for this senseless and abortive River Defence fleet rests 
 neither with the Confederate Navy Department, nor with any 
 naval officer. 
 
 It was from this River Defence expedition that Flag-officer 
 Davis, U. S. N., won the laurels of the "first naval engagement 
 of the war, pure and simple, where the squadrons of both sides 
 were pitted against each other."* The engagement alluded to 
 was the first battle of Fort Pillow, on May 10th, 1862. The Con- 
 federate boats engaged were the General Bragg, commanded 
 by Capt. W. H. H. Leonard; the General Stirling Price, First 
 Officer J. E. Hawthorne; the Sumter, Capt. W. W. Lamb; the 
 General Van Dorn, Capt. Isaac D. Falkerson; the General Jeff. 
 Thompson, Capt. J. H. Burke; the Colonel Lovell, Capt. J. C. 
 Delancy; the General Beauregard, Capt. J. H. Hunt. ^ 
 
 The "log" of the Price, from New Orleans to Memphis, 
 written by L. F. Delisdemier, the purser of that vessel, gives 
 the following particulars of her cruise up the Mississippi, and 
 the first naval engagement of the war: 
 
 " Tuesday, MarohZStfi, 1862.— Left New Orleans at 9 P. M., with the 
 following officers : J. H. Townsend, captain ; T. E. Henthorn, first officer; 
 L. F. Delisdemier, purser ; George L. Richardson, second officer ; WUliam 
 Branden, chief engineer ; J. H. Probees, assistant engineer. 
 
 " March 38i^.— Laid up last night, on account of fog ; left Red River 
 at 10 A. M. ; passed the General Bragg to-day. 
 
 " Saturday, 29th. - Arrived at Vieksburg at 4 p.m. , and found the Bragg 
 had stopped here; left at 5:30 p.m. ; found no iron there. Weatherpleasant. 
 
 "Monday, 31st— Arrived at Eunice at 8 P. M. Informed the railroad 
 agent that we wanted some iron. He said he had none. Our captain 
 then told him he would have to tear up his track, and set the men at it, 
 and soon had some three miles torn up and ready to carry on board. 
 
 " Thursday, April 3d.— Left Eunice yesterday afternoon, after getting 
 on board all the iron that we wanted to finish the Price and Van Dorn. Ar- 
 rived at Memphis at 3 p.m. -found the Bragg had arrived yesterday after- 
 noon. At 4 p.m. the Van Bom came up. Capt. Townsend, being senior 
 captain, set all available men at work to finish the boats as soon as possible. 
 
 " Friday, April lli/i.— Weather rainy. Received order to leave Fort 
 Pillow. Grot two pilots to-day, viz. : W. W. Hayden and Oscar Postall. 
 Left Memphis at 6:30 p. m. 
 
 "Saturday, April 13<^.- Arrived at the fort, and reported to the 
 General at 6 :30 A. M., and then dropped down to coal. Orders were sent 
 
 1 Off. Record, Vol. VI. s it wUl be obeerved from the names of these, 
 
 veseelB that the C. S. navy was permanently ex- 
 ' Porter, p. 166. eluded from all connection with this expedition. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 353 
 
 down for us to escort the transport Lockland up the river on a foraging 
 expedition. We started at 5 p. m.; left orders for the Van Born to follow 
 us. Those of HoUins' fleet went up ahead of us ; passed them at 11 p. m. 
 at anchor near Island No. 25. As soon as we rounded the bend saw a 
 United States transport and gave her chase. She either heard us or saw 
 our smoke, and started up the river. We chased her about eight miles, 
 when she met the Federal fleet at the mouth of the Obion River. 
 
 "■ Sunday, IZth, 1 A. M.— Sent a note to Capt. Huger, flag-ofiicer on 
 the McRea, notifp'ng him of the presence of the enemy. At 5 A. m. re- 
 ceived his answer that he would be along after daylight; 8:30, the look- 
 outs report the fleet coming up; dropped out into the stream and formed 
 in Une of battle, and stood up to meet the enemy; and when within three 
 Ttiiles of us, the U. S. gunboat Benton opened on us; her shot feU short. 
 The C. S. gunboat Maurepas replied to her from a nine-inch Dahlgren, 
 also falling short. The Federals now showed their whole fleet, consisting 
 of eleven gunboats and eight mortars. So Capt. Huger, knowing it to 
 "be foUy to contend with them, left us alone with them. We then rounded 
 to, and waited until the enemy came within two miles, and let them have 
 the contents of our stern guns, and then we went after the balance of the 
 fleet. The Yankees followed us, and kept up a running flre, but without 
 any damage. We arrived at the fort at 11:30, and reported the fleet com- 
 ing down. The guns were immediately manned, and all waited for the 
 appearance of the fleet. At half -past two they made their appearance, but 
 only exchanged a few shots, rounded to, and went up the river about six 
 miles. 
 
 "■^ Monday, the X^th. — This morning, the Federals opened flre on the 
 fort, and every fifteen minutes they gave three shells. The bombardment 
 was kept up till 9 p. M. A scouting party from our boat and the Yan 
 Born, under command of First officer T. E. Henthorn, went out this morn- 
 lag on the Arkansas shore, and went within six hundred yards of the 
 Federal fleet, and report them forming in line of battle and dropping down 
 stream, stern foremost. 10 p. M. — No demonstration made by fleet as yet. 
 
 '■'■ April Xhtli, i'Mestfa^/.— First-ofiBcer T. E. Henthorn, with a party of 
 thirteen men and officers from the River Defence fleet, have gone out 
 again this morning. The bombardment was renewed at an early hour 
 this morning, and has been kept up at regular intervals of ten minutes. 
 They have three mortar boats in position, at the distance of three and 
 a half miles, and lay around a point opposite the forts. 10 p. m. — The 
 flring ceased at 8 P. M. The scouting party have just returned; report 
 three men captured at Mr. Lamies', by Federal mounted infantry; were 
 chased by a party, but made their escape. 
 
 " Wednesday, Voth April.— yjeat down to Mr. Lamies', and moved 
 him and family on board of steamer transport Charm, and sent them be- 
 low, under convoy of the Bragg. A party of fifty 'Feds.' came down 
 last night, to capture one of our boats, but not finding us, they returned 
 at daylight. This morning a party of U. S. soldiers appearing in sight, 
 gave them a few rounds of grape. Scouts report fifteen men kUled and 
 wounded; burnt ninety bales unginned cotton, and thirty bales of 
 cotton. 
 
 " April llth. — Went down and moved Mr. Morgan to a place of safety. 
 
 " Thursday, May 8f7i.— The bombardment has been kept up day by 
 day, but no damage done ; loss : two kiUed. This morning the Sumter, 
 Bragg, and Van Born were ordered to go up and cut out the mortar floats. 
 Arrived at the fleld where they had been posted, but found they had been 
 moved up the fleet. The Sumter remained there until 9 A. M. ; the Fed- 
 erals firing a few shot at her, but did not come down, and commenced a 
 furious bombardment, throwing over two hundred and fifty shells, but 
 most of them fell short. 
 
 '^ Saturday, May 10th.— AgreesMy to the decision of the council of 
 war, held yesterday, the fleet left their moorings at 7 a. m., and the sev- 
 eral positions in line of battle, as follows : The Bragg, Sumter, Sterling 
 
364 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Price, Van Born, Jeff. Thompson, General Lovell, Beauregard, a.nd.Idttle 
 Rebel. On rounding the point, the Federal fleet was plainly visible m 
 ' Bulletin Bar,' with the exception of the Cincinnati, who had come down 
 as a protection to the mortar, hut made (as soon as we appeared) for the 
 balance of the fleet. According to orders, the Sragg immediately gave 
 her chase, and soon overtook her, striking her a violent blow on the lar- 
 board bow, dismounting one of her forward guns and slewing her round. 
 The Cincinnati fired a broadside into the Bragg, one shot going through 
 her, kiUing a cook. The Price next in turn started for her, and at the 
 same time delivering an effective fire at the mortar, silencing it. The Cin- 
 cinnati kept a running fire as the Price kept away from her, soon over- 
 taking her, and struck her aft a little starboard of midships, carrying 
 away her rudder and stern-post, disabling her; the Sumter came soon after, 
 and also struck her, and she then lifted on the bar and sunk. The Van 
 Born in the meantime had come up. Those of the Federal fleet 
 came down to the assistance of the Cincinnati, and surrounded the Van 
 Born, who made a sudden dash at the Mount City, striking her amidships, 
 driving in her hull about six feet, causing her to leak badly; but as the 
 Federal gunboats are all built in water-tight compartments, it was some 
 time before she sank; she was able to make the bank. The U. S. gun- 
 boat Pittsburg was disabled, by getting between the fires of the two fleets. 
 The fiLTing between both fleets was rapid and heavy, and our boats were 
 struck several times, doing some damage to the cabins, but only one was 
 damaged in the hull, and that was the General Price, who received a shell 
 (128 pounds) between wind and water, catting off the supply pipes and 
 causing her to leak. As the 'Feds.' had drawn off into shoal water, 
 where we could not reach them. Commodore J. E. Montgomery signaled 
 the fleet to retire, which was done in good order, all dropping down 
 stream, below the guns of the fort. The total loss was two killed; but 
 several firemen were wounded with splinters, and one man had his arm 
 broken. The only damage was to the upper works of the Van Bom and 
 Price, with the exception of damage done the Price as reported.- As soon as 
 we arrived at Fulton, commenced to repair damages. 
 
 " Sunday, llth.—AW damages on our boats repaired, and all ready for 
 another engagement with the enemy. At 4 P. M. scouts came in from 
 Osceola, report the loss of the enemy to be three boats sunk, and several 
 killed and wounded. The enemy are hard at work raising their boats. 
 The lAttle Rebel went up on a reconnoissance to-day. On her appear- 
 ance, the Yankees took their mortar floats and started up the river. 
 
 " Tuesday, June ^d. — The bombardment has been kept up, but no 
 damage done to the fort. Second officer John C. Bawson, and a party 
 of seven men, went after ice and were captured. At 3:30 P. M. two gun- 
 boats and three rams came down to cut out the Jeff. Thompson, but the 
 fort opened on them, and they retired. The C. 8. fleet then went up to 
 the fort, and were actively employed in taking on shot and shell, and 
 commissary stores, as the fort is to be evacuated. 
 
 " Wednesday, June 4th, 1868. — The fort being completely demolished, 
 the fleet started down the river. At Kandolph, the Van Born got 
 aground, and had to send men in the woods to cut spars and spar her off. 
 
 '^ June 5th. — Arrived at Memphis at 1 P. M. 9 P. m. all were aroused 
 by the report of a cannon, and a rush was made to find out the cause, 
 and found the General Lovell out in the stream dropping down. AU 
 then dropped out in the stream, in line of battle, but the "Feds." not 
 making their appearance, returned to our anchorage. The tug Gordon 
 Grant, was sent up as a picket boat, but grounded, and had to be burnt. 
 
 The ofiScial accounts of the fight, which will be found in 
 the notes, show that the victory, if any, belonged to the River 
 Defence service of the Confederate States; that so far as injury 
 inflicted either to vessels or crew can measure the result, the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 255 
 
 TJ. S. flotilla suffered the loss of the Cincinnati and the Mound 
 City) and that the losses were greater in Capt. Davis' fleet 
 than in that of Capt. Montgomery/ The contemporaneous 
 accounts in the newsi)apers are now seen to have been so full 
 of errors, if not of misrepresentations, that they are utterly 
 unreliable, while the oflBcial report of Gen. W, K. Strong from 
 Cairo to Major Gen. Halleck was hardly more veracious than 
 Falstaff's fight with the men in buckram. Admiral Porter is 
 
 1 Report of Capt. J. E. Montgomery, Off. Rec, 
 Vol. X., p. 888. 
 
 Flag-boat Little Rebel, 1 
 Fort Billow, Tenn., May llth, 1862. ( 
 Sir: I have the honor to report an engage- 
 ment with the Federal gunboats at Plum Point, 
 four miles above Fort Pillow, May 10th. 
 
 Having previously arranged with my officers 
 the order of attack, our boats left their moor- 
 ings at 6 A. M., and proceeding up the river, 
 passed round a sharp point, which brought us 
 in full view of the enemy's fleet, numbering 
 eight gunboats, and twelve mortar boats. 
 
 The Federal gunboat Oarondelet [should be 
 the Gindnnatil was lying nearest us, guarding a 
 mortar boat that was shelling the Fort. The 
 General Bragg,CsL-pt. Leonard, dashed at her; she 
 firing her heavy guns and retreating towards a 
 bar where the depth of water would not be suf- 
 ficient for our boats to foUow. The Bragg con- 
 tinued boldly on under fire of nearly the whole 
 fleet, and stiiick her a violent blow that stopped 
 her further flight, then rounded down the river 
 under a broadside fire, and drifted until her 
 tiller-rope, that had got out of order, could be re- 
 adjusted. A few moments after the Bragg struck 
 her blow, the General Sterling Price, Flag-officer 
 J. £. Hawthorne, ran into the same boat, a little 
 aft of her starboard midship, carrying away her 
 rudder, stern-post, and a large piece of her 
 stem. This threw the Carondelet's [Cincinnati] 
 stem to the Sumter, Capt. W. W. Lamb, who 
 struck her, running at the utmost speed of his 
 boat. 
 
 The General Van Dom, Capt. Isaac D. Fulker- 
 son, running according to orders, in rear of the 
 Price and Sumter, directed his attention to the 
 Mound City, at the time pouring broadsides into 
 the Price and Sumter. As the Van Dom ;pro- 
 ceeded, by skillful shots from her thirty-two 
 poimder, W. G. Kendall, gunner, silenced a 
 mortar boat that was filling the air with its ter- 
 rible missiles. Hie Van Dom, still holding on 
 the Mound City's midship, in the act of striking, 
 the Mound City sheered, and the Van Dom struck 
 her a glancing blow, making a hole four feet 
 deep in her starboard forward quarter, evi- 
 denced by splinters left on the iron bow of the 
 Van Dom. At this juncture the Van Dom was 
 above four of the enemy's boats. 
 
 As our remaining boats, the Jefferson Thompson, 
 Capt. J. H. Burke, the Colonel Lovell, Capt. J. C. 
 Delancy, and the General Beauregard, Capt. J. H. 
 Hart, were entering boldly into tiie contest in 
 their prescribed order, I perceived from the 
 flag-boat that the enemy's boats were taking po- 
 sition where the water was too shallow for our 
 boats to follow them, and as our cannon were 
 far inferior to theirs, both In number and size, 
 I signalled our boats to fall back, which was ac- 
 complished with a coolness that deserves the 
 highest commendation. 
 
 I am happy to inform you. while exposed to 
 close quarters to a most terrific flre for thirty 
 minutes, our boats, although struck repeatedly, 
 sustained no serious injury. 
 
 Our casualties were two killed and one 
 wounded — arm broken. 
 
 Gen, M. Jeff. Thompson was on board the Gen- 
 eral Bragg, his officers and men were divided 
 among the boats. They were all at their posts 
 ready to do good service should an occasion 
 offer. 
 
 To my officers and men I am highly in- 
 debted for their courage and promptness in ex- 
 ecuting all orders. 
 
 On the llth instant I went, on the Little 
 Rebel, in full view of the enemy's fleet. Saw the 
 Carondelet [the Cincinnati] sunk near the shore, 
 ^nd the Mound City sunk on the bar. 
 
 * * * J. E. MONTGOMERT, 
 
 Senior Captain, 
 C&mmanding River Defence Service. 
 To Gen. G. T. Beatjhegard. 
 On the same day. Gen. M. Jeff. Thompson re- 
 ported to Gen. Beauregard, confirming in every 
 particular Capt. Mon^omery's account of the 
 battle. 
 
 The First Report of Capt. Davis, commanding 
 the U. S. flotilla, was as follows: 
 
 United States Flagship Benton, J 
 Above Fort Pillow, Mississippi Riveb, [ 
 May 10th, via Cairo, May llth. ) 
 Hon. Gideon Welles, Secretary of tke Navy: 
 
 The naval engagement for which the rebels 
 have been prepaiing took place this morning. 
 The rebel fleet, consisting of eight iron-clad 
 gunboats, four of which were fitted with rams, 
 came up handsomely. The action lasted one 
 hour. Two of the rebel gunboats were blovm up 
 . and one swrik, when the enemy retired precipi- 
 tately under the guns of the fort. Only six ves- 
 sels of my squadron were engaged. The Cin- 
 cinnati sustained some injury from the rams, 
 but will be in fighting condition to-morrow. 
 Capt. Stembel distinguished himself. He is se- 
 riously wounded. The Benton is uninjured- Mor- 
 tar boat No. 16, in charge of Second Master 
 Gregory, behaved with great spirit. 
 
 The rebel squadron is supposed to be com- 
 manded by Commodore Hollins. 
 
 C. H. Davis, Captain, 
 Commanding Western plotiila, 
 Mississippi River pro tern. 
 The second report was : 
 
 United States Flag Steamer Benton, > 
 Off Fort Pillow, May llth. J 
 H&n. Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy : 
 
 Sir— I have the honor to inform the depart- 
 ment that yesterday morning, a little after seven 
 o'clock, the rebel squadron, consisting of eight 
 iron-clad steamers — four of them, I believe, 
 fitted as rams — came around the point at the 
 bend above Fort Pillow, and steamed gallantly 
 up the river, fully prepared for a regular engage- 
 ment. 
 
 The vessels of this squadron were lying at the 
 time tied up to the bank of the river— three on 
 the eastern and four on the western side— and 
 (as they were transferred to me by Flag-officer 
 
356 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 but little more correct in his account:' " although the Confed- 
 erate vessels made great holes in the Mound City and the 
 Cincinnati, and were considerably damaged theraselves [they 
 sustained no injury whatever] , they all succeeded in escaping. 
 The Cincinnati, after proceeding some distance up the river, 
 sunk near the Tennessee side. The Cairo assisted the Mound 
 City to the first island above the scene of action, where she 
 also sunk"; and he adds that the "small list of casualties for 
 such a desperate brush would seem to indicate rather indifferent 
 gunnery practice on the part of the Federals, who, with their 
 heavy ordnance, ought to have swept the enemy from the face 
 of the water, as his vessels were of wood and lightly built. 
 The attack on the Federal vessels was, however, by a new 
 method; for this was the first time ramming had been practiced 
 on this river during the war, and the Cincinnati and Mound 
 City had been put hors de combat almost at the beginning 
 of the action. The Confederate commander-in-chief was not 
 accustomed to command vessels en masse, and does not seem 
 to have understood the necessity of concert of action." Each 
 Confederate vessel seems to have been fighting on her " own 
 hook." And yet he asserts that " Flag-ofiicer Davis had the 
 satisfaction of winning the first naval squadron fight." A 
 little more of that kind of satisfaction would have left Com- 
 modore Davis without a vessel. That this "victory" of May 
 11th was not entirely satisfactory to Commodore Davis appears 
 from a dispatch to Secretary Stanton from Col. Chas. Ellet, Jr., 
 commanding the U. S. ram flotilla at Fort Pillow, on June 4th, 
 in which it is stated that, 
 
 " While the strength of the rebel batteries seems to be greatly over- 
 rated, their fleet of rams and gunboats is much larger than mine. It con- 
 sists of eight [?] gunboats, -which usually lie just below the fort, and four 
 [?] others at Randolph, a few miles further down. Commodore Davis will 
 not join me in a movement against them, nor contribute a gunboat to my 
 expedition, nor allow any of his men to volunteer, so as to stimulate the 
 
 Poote) ready for action. Moat of the vessels Commander Walke informs me that he fired a 
 
 were prompt in obeying the signal to follow the fifty-pound rifle shot through the boilers of the 
 
 motions of the commander-in-chief. third of the enemy's gunboats, of the Western 
 
 The leading vessels of the rebel squadron line, and rendered her for the time being 
 
 made directly for mortar boat No. 16, which was helpless. 
 
 for a moment unprotected. Acting Master The action lasted during the better part of on 
 
 Gregory and his crew behaved with great spirit hour, and took place at the closest quarters, 
 
 during the action; he fired his mortar eleven The enemy finally retreated, with haste, below 
 
 times at the enemy, reducing the charge and the guns of Fort Pillow. 
 
 {liminishing the elevation. I have to call the especial attention of the de- 
 Commander Stembel, in the gunboat Oincin- partment to the gallantry and good conduct ex- 
 'nati, which was the leading vesselin the line on hiblted by Commander Stembel and Kilty, and 
 that side of the river, followed immediately by Lieut. Commanding S. L. Phelps. 
 Commander Kilty, in the Mound City, hastened I regret to say, that Commander Stembel, 
 to the support of the mortar boats, and were re- Fourth Master Reynolds, and one of the seamen 
 peatedly struck by the enemy's rams, at the of the OincmnaU, and one of the Mound City, 
 same time that they disabled the enemy and were severely wounded. The other accidents of 
 drove him away. the day were slight. 
 
 The two leading vessels of the enemy's line I have the honor to be your most obedient 
 
 were successively encountered by this ship. servant. 
 
 The boilers, or steam chest, of one of them was C. H. Davis, 
 
 exploded by our shot, and both of them were Captain Commanding Mississippi Flotiha pro 
 
 disabled. They, as well as the first vessel tem." 
 encountered by the CiTtcinnati, drifted down the 
 
 '*™'^- ' Histary of the Navy, p. 166. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 257 
 
 pride and emulation of my own. I shall therefore first weed out some bad 
 material and then go without him." 
 
 Premising that, instead of twelve gunboats, Capt. Mont- 
 gomery's fleet consisted of only seven; six of which carried two 
 guns, and one carried four, making a total of sixteen guns; 
 the reluctance of Commodore Davis to risk his flotilla was an 
 inheritance handed down to him by Flag-officer Foote, who 
 on March 13th wrote to Secretary Welles : "I shall be very 
 cautious, as I appreciate the vast responsibility of keeping our 
 flotilla from falling into the rebels' hands, as it would turn the 
 tide against us"; and again on the 30th: "Were we to attempt 
 to attack these heavy batteries with the gunboats, or attempt 
 to run the blockade and fail, as I have already stated in a 
 former communication, the rivers above us — Mississippi, Ohio 
 and Cumberland — would be greatly exposed, not only frustrat- 
 ing the grand object of the expedition, but exposing our towns 
 and cities bordering on those rivers." These considerations, 
 like those that operated to keep the Monitor out of reach of the 
 Virginia in Hampton Roads after the first fight, were con- 
 clusive with Commodore Davis, after his experience with the 
 rams on May 10th, to take no risks in such expedition as that 
 proposed by Col. EUet, Jr. 
 
 Brig. Gen. Villepigue, in obedience to orders from Gen. 
 Beauregard, evacuated Fort Pillow on June 4th, and that 
 opened the river to Memphis; below which the River De- 
 fence expedition of Capt. Montgomery had retired to obtain 
 coal. 
 
 On the morning of the 6th of June, the Federal fleet of gun- 
 hoats. Commodore Davis, at Memphis, commanding, consisted 
 of the flag-ship Benton, Lieut. Commanding S. L. Phelps; the 
 Louisville, Commander B. M. Dove; the Carondelet, Comman- 
 der Henry Walke; the Cairo, Lieut. Corrimanding N. C. Bryant; 
 and the St. Louis, Lieut. Commanding Wilson McGunnegle, 
 and the ram fleet of Col. Ellet, Jr., of the Queen of the West, 
 "the Monarch, the Lancaster, and the Switzerland, iron-shod, 
 and especially constructed, as to draft and power, for oper- 
 ation by ramming. This ram fleet, like that of Montgomery, 
 was independent of the navy, and not under command or obe- 
 dient to the orders of naval officers. The combined fleets of 
 the enemy numbered in all nine vessels, while that of Mont- 
 gomery numbered eight vessels; but the inequality in number 
 of guns was as eighty-four to fourteen, and, in the character 
 and adaptability to fighting, the odds were also greatly in 
 favor of the Federal fleet. To that disparity must also be ad- 
 ded the morale and experience of educated naval and army 
 officers, and the esprit de corps of both United States services 
 as against the total want of both in Montgomery and the 
 other Mississippi pilots who had been improvised into officers 
 afloat, without any of the essential characteristics, except that 
 of personal courage. 
 
 17 
 
258 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 As the battle of Memphis was a fight more particularlj 
 between the ram fleets, its particulars are best derived from 
 the commanders of those fleets. The movements of the United 
 States ram fleet, given by Col. Ellet, Jr., were, that: 
 
 " Approaching Memphis, the gunboats were in advance. I had re- 
 ceived no notice that a fight was expected, but was informed, on landing 
 within eight miles of Memphis, that the enemy's gunboats had retreated 
 down the river. My first information of the presence of the enemy was a 
 shot which passed over my boat. I had four of my most powerful rams 
 in the advance in any emergency. The others were towing the barges. 
 On advancing to the attack I expected of course to be followed by the 
 Monarch, the Lancaster, and the Switzerland. The Monarch came in 
 gallantly. Some of the officers of the Lancaster, which now held the next 
 place in the line, became excited and confused, but the engineers behaved 
 well. The pilot erred in signals and ran the boat ashore and disabled 
 her rudder. The captain of the Switzerland construed the general signal 
 order to keep half a mile in the rear of the Lancaster to mean that he 
 was to keep half a mile behind her in the engagement, and therefore 
 failed to participate. Hence the whole brunt of the fight fell upon the 
 Queen and the Monarch. Had either the Queen or the Switzerland fol- 
 lowed as the Monarch did, the rebel gunboat Van Dorn would not have 
 escaped, and my flag -ship would not have been disabled. Three of 
 the rebel rams and gunboats which were struck by my two rams sank out- 
 right and were lost. The &en. Price was but slightly injured, and I pro- 
 pose to add her to my fleet. " 
 
 At daylight of the morning of June 6th, Montgomery 
 moved up the river to engage the enemy — in ignorance 
 of the presence of the combined fleets — while the gun- 
 boats were firing at long range. The United States ram fleet 
 accepted the challenge, and, advancing ahead of the Federal 
 gunboats, steamed rapidly to the front, and gallantly engaged 
 the Gen. Lovell, which the Queen of the West struck with a 
 crushing blow amidship, breaking through her timbers, and 
 almost instantly filling her with water; she drifted and sunk 
 on the Tennessee shore. The Queen, recovering from her 
 shock with the Lovell, was rammed by the Beauregard, and 
 so much injured that she, too, floated to the Arkansas shore. 
 Boats from the shore were instantly pushed out to rescue the 
 drowning crew, but received a heavy and well-directed fire 
 from the sharp-shooters on the rams, by which many were 
 killed and wounded. Plag-officer Davis, in his report, says, 
 that while the rams were engaged, " the firing from our gun- 
 boats was continuous and well-directed. The Gen. Beaure- 
 gard and the Little Rebel were struck in the boilers and blown 
 up." The gunboats were too far off for accurate observation. 
 The Beauregard, rushing at the United States ram Monarch, 
 missed her object and ran into the Price, tearing off her 
 wheel-house and disabling her so that she floated out of the 
 fight and sunk on the Arkansas shore. The Lovell and the 
 Price, thus destroyed, reduced Montgomery's fleet to five. 
 The Little Rebel next came in for her coup de grace, by a 
 heavy shell from the gunboats striking her near the water- 
 line, and, exploding among her machmery, gave her pilot 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 259 
 
 time only to turn her head to the shore, where the current 
 drifted her, and she sank. Capt. Montgomery and Capt. 
 Fowler escaping ashore, saved themselves and part of the 
 crew in the swanips on the Arkansas side. The Bragg and the 
 Sumter and the Jeff. Thompson continued the hopeless fight — 
 backing down stream, followed by rams and gunboats. The 
 Van Dorn, having a most valuable cargo of powder and other 
 munitions of war, and seeing the hopelessness of the contest, 
 steamed rapidly to Vicksburg, where she arrived in safety. 
 The Bragg and the Sumter, though run ashore, were captured 
 before they could be destroyed, and the Jeff. Thompson was 
 blown up by her officers. Thus, six of the River Defence fleet 
 were destroyed in its second battle with the enemy. No list 
 of Confederate casualties is now obtainable. Capt. Cable, of 
 the Lovell, perished, and Col. Ellet, of the United States ram 
 fleet, died in a few days of wounds received in the battle. 
 
 Capt. J. Henry Hart, who commanded the steamer Beau- 
 regard, gives the following interesting account of the fight at 
 Memphis: 
 
 " Our gunboat flotilla arrived at Memphis on the evening of the 5th 
 of June, 1863, to await the arrival of the Federal fleet, which came down 
 about nine o'clock of the same evering, and laid on ' Paddy's Hen and 
 Chickens,' in sight of Memphis. On being informed of this, our commo- 
 dore sent up a smaU tug, in charge of Capt. Bennett, as a picket. By 
 some mismanagement she got aground on the foot of the island, and she 
 could not be got oflE with her own power; consequently the torch was ap- 
 
 Elifed, and she was left to her fate m flames. Nothing more of importance 
 appened during the night, but the general understanding with all the 
 fleet was, that we would not make a stand. 
 
 "After daylight, on the morning of the 6th, we could see by the move- 
 ments of the enemy that they were making preparations to come down, 
 for the heavens were one solid cloud of black smoke. In the meantime 
 we were not idle in making preparations to back out in the stream, which 
 we did, one after another, until our whole fleet, eight in number, were 
 drawn in line of battle. It was here we received the first intelligence 
 that we were going to make a stand. The enemy was now in full view, 
 coming down in line of battle. The following boats were sent up to draw 
 the Federal gunboats off of the bar: General M. Jeff. Thompson, Sumter, 
 General Beauregard, and Colonel Lovell, from the fact that they had 
 sixty-four pound guns mounted on their bows. The fire was opened by 
 the Thompson, but not until she had fired three rounds did the enemy 
 make any reply. The fire on the Federal side was opened by the fiag- 
 ship Benton. The fight now became general. Brisk firing from both 
 sides was the order of the day. It was while the battle was raging with 
 intense fury, between our rams and the Federal gunboats, that their 
 rams made their appearance; first came the Queen of the West, which 
 made a bee-line for the Colonel Lovell, which tried to back out of the way, 
 but in so doing got in such a position as to show her opponent a broad- 
 side, when she ran into her and sunk her immediately, in water to her 
 hurricane deck, in the channel of the river. Life-boats were Immediately 
 dispatched from the Little Rebel, to assist her crew in getting ashore. 
 Before the Queen of the West could regain her position, the Confederate 
 ram Sumter struck her in midships, sending her ashore, during the bal- 
 ance of the engagement. Next came the Switzerland, bearing down on 
 the Sumter. The Beauregard next in turn singled out the Switzerland 
 for her antagonist. The Federal ram, seeing her intention, drew off from 
 
260 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the Sumter, and headed down on the Beauregard; they struck head on, 
 but glanced, placing the Switzerland hors de combat, knocking down her 
 bridge-tree, when she had to go ashore, where she threw out her sharp- 
 shooters as pickets. Next came the Federal ram Monarch, in chase of 
 the Jeff. Thompson, she at the same time rounding to, head up stream, 
 followed by the Monarch: here the General Price was put under a heavy 
 head of steam, to overtake the Monarch, which she did, striking her a 
 heavy blow in the starboard quarter, driving in her hull, and rounding 
 her to, after which she stopped to back around and give her another 
 blow; but, unfortunately, the Beauregard had made a dash at the Mon^ 
 arch, and missed her object, and striking the Price on the port-side, com- 
 pletely disabUng her. During this, with only one wheel left, she managed 
 to get ashore, but too late for the crew to make their escape; disabled as 
 she was, the enemy kept up a constant fire into her; for humanity's sake 
 the "stars and bars "were hauled down. It was about this time the 
 Beauregard got headed up again to meet another of her adversaries, 
 when a shell was shot into her hull and burst, damaging her boilers and 
 hull; killed one engineer, and wounding three others, and scalding three 
 firemen. She was unfit for duty, floated down the river about one-fourth 
 of a mile, and sunk in twenty feet water, face to the enemy, and colors 
 flying. It was about this time the Little Rebel naade a dash at one of the 
 rams; but before she could reach her received a shot in her boilers, when 
 she kept her course into the shore, where all but three made their escape. 
 In the meantime, the Sumter had been run ashore, and crew all escaped; 
 also the Thompson was run ashore, and burned to the water's edge. The 
 General Bragg stood off and looked at the fight, likewise the GeiieralEarl 
 Van Dorn; neither offering any assistance. The Bragg, in attempting to 
 round to, to make good her retreat, was run into by one of the Federal 
 rams, which drove in her side. The crew of the Bragg nearly all made 
 their escape in yawls and life-boats. The Van Born, handling much bet- 
 ter than the Bragg, was fortunate in making good her escape. Thus 
 ended one of the hottest naval engagements ever fought in the Missis- 
 sippi. 
 
 "The following is a list of the principal oflicers, as far as we can as- 
 certain: 
 
 "Sari Tan Born — Captain, Isaac Fulkerson; Purser, Charles Rey- 
 nolds; First Officer, John W. Jordan; Second OfBoer, John Mardis; Chief 
 Engineer, William Hurst; First Assistant Engineer, John Swift, William 
 Camon and William Molloy. 
 
 " General Sterling Price— Captain, Thomas E. Henthorn; Purser, L. 
 F. Delisdeimer; First Officer, N. J. Henthorn; Second Officer, George L. 
 Richardson; Chief Engineer, William Brauden; First Assistant Engineers, 
 William Orin, W. W. Hayden and Oscar Postall. 
 
 "General Beauregard — Captain, J. Henry Hart; Purser, J. C. 
 Haynes; First Officer, R. D. Court; Second Officer, .John Rawson; Chief 
 Engineer, Joseph Swift; First Assistant, Edward Connolly; Pilot, J.Pope 
 Altram. 
 
 " General Bragg— Captedn, W. H. H. Leonard; Purser, William Riply; 
 First and Second Officers, names unknown; Chief Engineer, John Porter; 
 First Assistant Engineer, Henry Sisson ; Pilot, James Russel. 
 
 " Sumter— CapisLin, Wallace W. Lamb; Purser, John Wilbanks; First 
 Officer, Lemuel Murray; Second Officer, name unknown; Chief Engineer, 
 Robert T. Patterson; First Assistant Engineer, John Ramsey; Pilots, 
 Thad Siederburg and Moses Gray. 
 
 •'Little Rebel— Captain, J. White Fowler; Purser, Charles Smedly; 
 First Officer, James Wall; Second Officer, name unknown ; Chief Engineer, 
 Gus Mann; First Assistant Engineer, William Reeder; Pilots, Newton Pue 
 and John Bernard. 
 
 " General M. Jeff. Thornpson—CaptsiiQ, John Burk; Purser, James 
 Bissell; First Officer, Louis Camfield; Second Officer, Henry Moore; Chief 
 Engineer, Thomas Mitchell; Pilots, Barney Arnold and Daniel Thomas. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 261 
 
 " General Lomll—Cwptain, Jameg C. Dellaney; Purser, Hardy; First 
 Officer, Thomas Johnson; Pilot, William Cable. 
 
 "Commodore of the fleet, J. E. Montgomery. 
 
 "The Federal fleet consisted of sixteen mortar-boats, six rams, and 
 eight gunboats, besides any number of tugs and transports." 
 
 Col. EUet's dispatch to Secretary of War Stanton is as 
 follows: 
 
 " Opposite Memphis, June 6th, ma Cairo, June 8th. 
 " To Hon. E. M. Stanton, Secretary of War: 
 
 " The rebel gunboats made a stand early this morning opposite Mem- 
 phis, and opened a vigorous flre upon our gunboats, which was returned 
 with equal spirit. I ordered the Queen, my flag-ship, to pass between 
 the gunboats and move down ahead of them upon the two rams of the 
 enemy, which first boldly stood their ground. 
 
 "Lieut. Col. EUet, in the Monarch, of which Capt. Dry den is First 
 Master, followed gallantly. The rebel rams endeavored to back down 
 stream, and then to turn and run, but the movement was fatal to them. 
 The Quee7i struck one of them fairly, and for a few minutes was fast to 
 the wreck. After separating, the rebel steamer sunk. My steamer, the 
 Queen, was then herself struck by another rebel steamer and disabled, 
 but, though damaged, can be repaired. A pistol-shot wound in the leg 
 deprived me of the power to witness the remainder of the flght. 
 
 '^ The Monarch also passed ahead of our gunboats, and went most 
 gallantly into action. She first struck the rebel boat that struck my flag- 
 ship and sunk the rebel. She was then struck by one of the rebel rams, 
 but not injured. She then pushed on and struck the Beauregard and 
 burst open her side. Simultaneously, the Beauregard was struck in the 
 boiler by a shot from one of our gunboats. 
 
 " The Monarch then pushed at the gunboat Little Rebel, the rebel 
 flag-ship, and having but Uttle headway pushed her before her, the rebel 
 commodore and crew escaping. The Monarch then finding the Beaure- 
 gard sinking, took her in tow until she sank in shoal water. Then, in 
 compliance with the request of Commander Davis, Lieut. Col. Ellet dis- 
 patched the Monarch and the Sioitzerland in pursuit of the one remain- 
 ing gunboat and some transports which had escaped the gunboats. 
 
 " Two of my rams have gone below. 
 
 " I cannot too much praise the conduct of the pilots and engineers 
 and military guard of the Monarch and Queen, the brave conduct of 
 Capt. Dryden, or the heroic bearing of Lieut. Col. Ellet. I will name all 
 parties to you in a special report. I am myself the only person in my 
 fleet who was disabled. 
 
 [Signed] Charles Ellet, 
 
 " Col. Commanding Ram Fleef'' 
 
 This dispatch vsras also sent to the Federal War Depart- 
 ment : 
 
 " Opposite Memphis, June 6th, via Cairo, 8th. 
 "fibw. Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War: 
 
 " It is proper and due to the brave men on the Queen and the Mon- 
 arch to say to you briefly that two of the rebel steamers were sunk out- 
 right and immediately by the shock of my two rams, one with a large 
 amount of cotton, etc., on board was disabled by accidental collision with 
 the Queen, and secured by her crew, after I was personally disabled. 
 
 "Another, which was also hit by a shot from the gunboats, was sunk 
 by the Monarch, and towed to shoal water by that boat. Still another, 
 also injured by the flre of our gunboats, was pushed in to the shore and 
 secured by the Monarch. Of the gunboats I can only say that they bore 
 themselves, as our navy always does, bravely and well. 
 
 [Signed] Chas. Ellet, Jb., 
 
 " Col. Commanding Ram Fleet." 
 
262 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 This battle between the ram fleets on the Mississippi very 
 nearly destroyed the River Defence expedition, and demon- 
 strated the folly which conceived and executed a plan of 
 defence expensive and inefficient, and which, intrusted to men 
 incapable of commanding because unwilling to obey, was 
 certain to meet with an early and ruinous defeat. 
 
 Neither the Navy Department nor any naval officer was 
 at any time identified with this fleet, and, as whatever it 
 accomplished belongs to those commanding it, so the responsi- 
 bility for its failure, destruction and expense rest on the C. S. 
 War Department, 
 
 The city of Memphis, being without defences of any kind, 
 was surrendered to the Federal authorities, and the Mississippi 
 from Cairo to Yicksburg was open to navigation by Federal 
 gunboats; but its banks, infested with guerrilla bands, still 
 rendered its use too hazardous for trade and business. ^ 
 
 1 On tiie morning of the 6th of June, Brig. " I Baw a large portion of the engagement 
 
 Gen. M. Jeff. Thompson and Capt. Montgomery from the river bank, and am sorry to say that in 
 
 were given by Gen. Beauregard joint command my opinion many of our men were handled 
 
 of the River Defence. It proved a very short badly, as the plan of battle was very faulty, 
 
 and a very ineflBcient defence — for at 12:30 A. M. The enemy's rams (Col. Ellet's fleet) did most of 
 
 on the 6th, after receiving Gen. Beauregard's the execution, and were handled more adroitly 
 
 dispatch. Gen. Thompson reports, June 7th, than ours; I think, however, entirely owing to 
 
 that he "immediately wrote a note to the the fact that the guns and sharp-shooters of the 
 
 Commodore ( Montgomery ), asking what I enemy were constantly employed, while we 
 
 should do to co-operate with him. He requested were almoet without either. The Colonel Lovell 
 
 two companies of artillery to be sent aboard at was bo injured that she sank in the middle of 
 
 daybreak (all of my men were at the depot the river; her captain, Jas. Delancy, and a uum- 
 
 awaiting transportation to Grenada). I at once ber of others, swam ashore. The Beauregard 
 
 ordered the companies to hold themselves in and Price were running at the JftmarcA (Yankee) 
 
 readineaa. At the dawn of day I was awakened from opposite sides, when the Monardi passed 
 
 with the information that the enemy were from between them, and the Beauregard ran 
 
 actually in sight of Memphis. I hurried on into the Price, knocking off her wheel-house, 
 
 board to consult with Montgomery. He in- and entirely disabling her. Both were run to 
 
 atructed me ta hurry my men to Fort Pickering the Arkansas shore and abandoned. The LUUe 
 
 Landing, and sent a tug to bring them up to the Rebel, commodore's flag-boat, was run a.shore 
 
 gunboats, which were advancing to attack the and abandoned after she had been completely 
 
 enemy. I hastened my men to the place indi- riddled, and I am satisfied the commodore was 
 
 cated, but before we reaehed it our boats had killed. The battle continued down the river, 
 
 been either destroyed or driven below Fort out of sight of Memphis, and it is reported that 
 
 Pickering, and I marched back to the depot to only two of our boats, the Bragg and Van Dom, 
 
 come to this place (Grenada) to await orders. escaped." 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 BUILDING A NAVY AT NEW OELEANS., 
 
 AMONG the earliest acts of the C. S. Navy Department, 
 March 17th, 1861, for the increase of the navy, was the 
 appointment of a commission, consisting of Commander 
 L. Rousseau,CommanderE.Farrand,and Lieut. Robert T. 
 Chapman, to purchase and contract for building the ten gun- 
 boats authorized by Acts of Congress, March 15th and August 
 19th, 1861, which were to be ship-rigged propellers of 1,000 tons 
 burden, capable of carrying at least one ten-inch and four 
 eight-inch guns. These vessels were to be of light draft and 
 great speed. The commission entered upon its duties early 
 in April, 1861, at New Orleans, and at Algiers opposite, where 
 there were several ship-yards which had been formerly largely 
 engaged in building and repairing river craft of all descrip- 
 tions; but no war vessel had ever been built at New Orleans. 
 The commission did not find at New Orleans one vessel 
 suitable for war purposes, but upon instructions from the 
 Secretary it examined and purchased the Hahanna and the 
 Marquis de la Hahanna, the former becoming the Sumter and 
 the latter the McBae. Instructions for building vessels were 
 given to Commander Rousseau, at New Orleans, on March 37th, 
 and upon his report, after examination on April 32d, the steam- 
 propeller Florida was purchased and fitted up for service 
 on the lakes. An ineffectual effort was made to purchase a 
 steamer offered for sale by HoUingsworth & Co., of Wilming- 
 ton, Del., but the vessel failed to reach New Orleans. The 
 Star of the West, captured in Texas, was used as a receiving- 
 ship, as she was not adapted to war purposes. Commander Rous- 
 seau, after a thorough examination of all the facilities at New 
 Orleans for rolling iron plates, ascertained and reported that it 
 was not possible to roll plates from 2| to 5 inches in thickness 
 in any shop in New Orleans. His examination of the steamer 
 Miramon was not favorable; but on the 9th of May he pur- 
 chased the steamer Yankee, which was afterwards called the 
 Jackson, and fitted her out, and with the McRae sent them 
 
264 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 up the river to Columbus, Ky. In Federal accounts of up- 
 river operations this vessel is always styled the Yankee. 
 
 On the 21st of May, 1861, Congress enacted a law, amend- 
 ing the tenth section of the act, recognizing a state of war 
 with the United States; so that, in addition to the bounty 
 therein mentioned, the government of the Confederate States 
 would pay to the cruisers of any private armed vessel com- 
 missioned under said act twenty per cent, on the value of such 
 vessel belonging to the enemy as may be destroyed by such 
 private armed vessel. Under that act, the ram Manassas was 
 built at New Orleans by private subscription; but after Com- 
 modore HoUins' successful clearing of the enemy's fleet from 
 the mouth of the Mississippi River, on the 12th of October, 
 1861, the Manassas was purchased by the C. S. government. 
 
 THE " MANASSAS. 
 
 The Manassas was constructed out of the Enoch Train, 
 built in Boston, in 1855, by J. O. Curtis. Her correct dimen- 
 sions were: Length on deck, 128 feet; breadth of beam, 26 
 feet; depth of hold, 12 feet 6 inches; depth of hold to spar 
 deck, 12 feet 6 inches; draft of water, when loaded, 11 feet; 
 387 tons burden. Her frame, when built, was of white oak, 
 and cross-fastened with iron and tree-nails. Her engine was 
 of the inclined description, with two cylinders 36 inches in 
 diameter, and a stroke of piston of 2 feet 8 inches. She was a 
 propeller. Her machinery was constructed by Harrison 
 Loring, of Boston; Capt. John A. Stephenson, a commission 
 merchant of New Orleans, undertook the conversion of the 
 Enoch Train. She was built up with massive beams, seventeen 
 inches in thickness, making a solid bow of twenty feet, and 
 fastening them in the most substantial manner. Over this 
 impenetrable mass was a complete covering of iron plates, 
 riveted together, and fitted in such a way as to render her 
 bomb-proof. Her only entrance was through a trap-door in 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 265 
 
 her back, and her port cover sprang back as the gun was 
 withdrawn. Her shape above water was nearly that of 
 half a sharply pointed egg - shell, so that a shot would 
 glance from her no matter where it struck. Her back was 
 formed of twelve-inch oak, covered with one-and-a-half-inch 
 bar-iron. She had two chimneys so arranged as to slide 
 down in time of action. The pilot-house was in the stern of 
 the boat. She was worked by a powerful propeller, but could 
 not stem a strong current. She carried only one gun, a sixty- 
 eight-pounder, in her bow. To prevent boarding, the engine 
 was provided with pumps for ejecting steam and scalding 
 water from the boiler over the whole surface. Such was the 
 craft which in the earliest days of the war the enterprising 
 people of New Orleans, without aid from city, State or Con- 
 federacy, contrived, and which proved not only, as Capt. 
 HoUins said, the " most troublesome vessel of them all " at 
 the fight at the passage of the forts, but which cleared the 
 river in October, ].861, of the blockading fleet. 
 
 In the interval between March 17tn, 1861, and Feliruary 
 1st, 1863, the utmost efforts of the Navy Department were 
 made to put afloat a naval force competent to meet that being 
 prepared at St. Louis by the United States. To that end, river 
 boats were purchased and converted, not into gunboats, but 
 into steamboats with guns on them. They were side- wheel 
 steamboats of light draft, and though substantially built for 
 commercial uses, were too frail to withstand the effect of 
 heavy ordnance. They had no rails and no breast-works, but 
 were pierced for eight or nine guns. Their armament was old 
 navy smooth-bore forty-two-pounders, with a rifle thirty-two- 
 pounder to each boat. 
 
 The movements of the enemy's fleet down the river com- 
 pelled Commodore HoUins, in December, 1861, to take his im- 
 provised fleet of steamboats up the river. This was composed 
 of the General Polk, the Ivy, the Livingston, the Maurepas, 
 the McRae and the Manassas, which last was, as we have 
 stated, sheathed with one and one-half inches of iron. In 
 January and February, 1862, the Bienville, Ponchartrain and 
 Carondelet were completed, all of which were also converted 
 river boats. The Livingston, built by Hughes & Co., under 
 contract with the Secretary of the Navy, had more of the pre- 
 tensions of a gunboat than any of the others; she was com- 
 pleted on the keel of a ferry or tow-boat, laid before hostilities 
 began, and was more substantially constructed than her 
 consorts. 
 
 The floating batteries New Orleans and Memphis, the 
 gunboats Mobile and the Leger, in Berwick's Bay, the St. 
 Mary's and the Calhoun, with twenty-six fire-boats, were all 
 prepared, and, as far as they were capable of being adapted to 
 war purposes, were completed in less than nine months at 
 New Orleans alone. 
 
266 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The character and strength of the enemy's fleet on the 
 upper and lower Mississippi having been fully reported to 
 the Confederate Navy Department, a more e£Eective means of 
 defending the river from these threatened attacks was sub- 
 mitted to and approved by Capts. Ingraham and Collins, 
 Lieut. Brooke, and Naval Constructor Pierce, and for that 
 purpose $800,000 was appropriated by the Act of Congress of 
 July 30th, 1861. 
 
 The construction of the Louisiana by E. C. Murray was be- 
 gun in New Orleans on October 15th, 1861. The blockade of the 
 river having begun prior to that date, the timber had to be pro- 
 cured from Lake Ponchartrain and from the forests along the 
 New Orleans and Jackson Railroad. There was used in her con- 
 struction 1,700,000 feet. The engines of the steamer Ingomar 
 
 THE "LOUISIANA. 
 
 were bought and transferred to the Louisiana, but it required 
 two months for their removal by Leeds & Co. The contractor 
 used 500 tons of railroad iron in the vessel. Delays of construc- 
 tion were frequent, in consequence of strikes among the hands 
 for higher wages, from having to wait for iron, and from alter- 
 ation in the port-holes. Mr. Murray, the contractor, had been 
 a practical ship-builder for twenty years, and had built over 
 120 boats — steamers and sailing-vessels; but with all possible 
 diligence on his part, it was not within his power to complete 
 the boat earlier than thirty daj^s before the fall of New Or- 
 leans. It was a practical impossibility to have completed the 
 boat earlier than she was launched, while other vessels were 
 building at New Orleans, and the blockade of the river pre- 
 vented the receipt of timber and iron from abroad. The gun- 
 boat Livingston was under construction at that time in the 
 yard of John Hughes & Co., but was not iron-shielded. The 
 Bienville and Carondelet — the former built by Hughes & Co., 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 267 
 
 and the latter by Naval Constructor Sidney D. Porter — were 
 also being at this time built in New Orleans yards. The Liv- 
 ingston was completed February 1st, 1863, the Bienville April 
 5th, 1862, and the Carondelet March 16th, 1862, the first in 
 seven months, the second in six months; and in November, 
 1861, Mr. Mallory had at New Orleans, under construction, a 
 iieet consisting of the floating battery New Orleans, 20 guns, 
 the floating battery Memphis, 18 guns; the gunboat (incom- 
 plete) to carry 6 guns; the gunboat Qrotesque, afterwards the 
 Maurepas, 6 guns; the Lizzie Simmons, afterwards the Pon- 
 chartrain, 6 guns; the Bienville and Carondelet (incomplete) 
 each to carry 6 guns; the Pickens and the Morgan, each 3 
 guns, and the two iron-clads, the Louisiana and the Missis- 
 sippi, each, when complete, to mount 16 guns. When the 
 Federal fleet reached New Orleans, Capt. Porter, U. S. N., 
 wrote to Senator Grimes, of Iowa, that of the naval vessels 
 constructed at New Orleans, " the best one I saw floating 
 by me was a dry dock turned into a floating battery, mount- 
 ing 16 guns, and the entire engine, which was to propel it, 
 herihetically sealed by a thick iron turret against shot. She 
 was sunk, but floated down to Southwest Pass, and is now 
 aground on the bar and can be easily raised." 
 
 The failure to complete at New Orleans the iron-clad 
 steamer Mississippi was a matter of much discussion and 
 of crimination against the Navy Department. Of that ves- 
 sel, Commodore HoUins stated before the joint committee 
 that " she was the greatest vessel in the world. I don't sup- 
 pose there was ever such a vessel built." Of the same 
 tenor was the testimony of Capt. Sinclair, C. S. N. : "She 
 was entirely a new conception, and a remarkably fine ves- 
 sel, and very formidable, in my opinion. I am satisfied that 
 she could have, as I stated before, kept that river clear 
 against the blockade. That vessel, as I have said, was 
 entirely a new conception. She was a ship that was most 
 creditable to the country, as far as my judgment goes." 
 Capt. Porter, U. S. N., in his letter of May 6th, 1861, to Sen- 
 ator Grimes, bore testimony to the strength of the Missis- 
 sippi, by saying: 
 
 "In New Orleans our naval oflBcers found the most splendid speci- 
 men of a floating battery the world has ever seen (a sea-going affair, 
 and had she been finished and succeeded in getting to sea, the whole 
 American navy would have been destroyed. She was 6,000 tons, 370 feet 
 long, 60 feet beam; had four engines, three propellers, four inches (and in 
 some places more) of iron, and would steam eleven knots an hour. She 
 <!Ost Mr. MaUory & Co. $3,000,000." 
 
 The projectors of the Mississippi were the Messrs. Nel- 
 son and Asa F. Tift. These gentlemen were brothers, the 
 former a citizen of Georgia, and the latter a citizen of Flor- 
 ida, who had been a member of the Convention of that 
 State which passed the Ordinance of Secession, which Mr. 
 
208 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Tift signed, and for this his property in that State, at Key 
 West, had been seized by the authorities of the United 
 States, and Mr. Tift removed to Georgia, to the estate of his 
 brother. These unimportant facts are stated because super- 
 servicable Confederates, like the Hon. Henry S. Foote, of Mis- 
 sissippi, who abandoned the Confederacy in the hour of its 
 supreme trial, and made his individual peace with Mr. Lin- 
 coln, endeavored by insinuation and innuendo to impeach the 
 loyalty of the Messrs. Tift to the Confederate cause. 
 
 At the breaking out of the war, Mr. N. Tift considered 
 that the weakest point of the Confederacy, as well as the strong- 
 est point of the United States, was on the water, where the 
 greatest deficiency of the Confederacy existed, and where the 
 supreme necessity existed for maintaining, at least, the ability 
 to hold communication with foreign nations, and there the 
 enemy possessed the means and the skill of inflicting the most 
 serious injury to our means of defence both on water and 
 land. To contribute all that was in his power towards the 
 public defence, he set his mind to considering the best means 
 of attack and defence which the Confederates could make, in 
 their then situation of almost utter destitution of mechanics 
 skilled in naval architecture, as well as of the means of build- 
 ing the ships. To supply necessities, and overcome obstacles, 
 Mr. Tift saw that it was necessary to work the abundant pine 
 timber into vessels by the ordinary house -carpenter. And 
 that, if war -vessels made of green pine timber could be 
 shielded with iron, the " Confederate States would have 
 taken a very important step in equalizing the conditions of 
 war with the United States. To that end he applied his mind, 
 and perfected the model of the Mississippi. Having sub- 
 mitted his design to the judgment of his brother, they both 
 went to Richmond, where the model, which had been exam- 
 ined and approved in Savannah by Commander Tatnall, and in 
 Charleston by prominent naval officers, was submitted to the 
 examination of Mr. Mallory. The Messrs. Tift asked no com- 
 pensation for their model, did not seek fortune by contracting 
 to build the ship, but tendered their services to the govern- 
 ment without compensation to superintend the building of the 
 vessel. 
 
 The model of the Mississippi was the adaptation of 
 straight timber to her construction, in a new and simple form, 
 upon which the ordinary house-carpenter could work, and by 
 which strength and efficiency could be obtained, rather than 
 the old lines of curved frames, crooks and knees, peculiar to 
 the old style of naval architecture. The model avoided the 
 necessity of employing skilled ship-carpenters and joiners, of 
 which there were very few in any of the ports of the Confed- 
 erate States. All surfaces of the Mississippi were flat, or in 
 straight lines, except the four corners which connected the two 
 ends of the ship with her sides. There was to be no frame; 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 269 
 
 but the work was solid for the required thickness, which was 
 three feet, and to be covered with three-inch iron plates. The 
 model first submitted to the Navjr Department was during 
 construction lengthened in the middle division 30 feet, by 
 which two sets of 8 boilers, each 42 inches in diameter, and 
 30 feet long, gave the necessary steam to work 3 engines 36 
 inches in diameter, 2 feet stroke shelf valves, with 3 pro- 
 pellers 11 feet in diameter, on wrought-iron shafts. 
 
 The Mississippi was 260 feet long, 58 feet extreme breadth, 
 15 feet depth of hold, about the same size as the U. S. 
 steamers Colorado and Boanoke. The Algerine News Boy, of 
 December 30th, gives the following items : 
 
 "The bottom of this gunboat is twenty-two inches thick, in solid 
 planks, soUdly bolted and calked, and its walls two feet solid in thickness, 
 with numerous thick keelsons to brace it. 
 
 " The hold will be fourteen feet in depth, and on its summit will be 
 placed the battery, composed of several heavy rifled and shell guns, all 
 under casemates. 
 
 "Above this is a cupola, which will contain various conveniences, 
 and be surmounted with another battery, and a shooting-gallery for 
 sharp-shooters. 
 
 "The vessel is to be strengthened by iron bolts through and through, 
 and be plated over with three-inch iron. She will be drawn by three pro- 
 pellers, worked by powerful engines. Another such a gunboat will imme- 
 diately follow this one. Near by is another just begun, still larger, which 
 will combine the breadth of the floating battery with some of the advan- 
 tages of a self-propelled boat." 
 
 Much difficulty was experienced in procuring a first-class 
 designer, and after trying several who failed to satisfy the 
 projectors of the ship, E. M. Ivens and Chief Engineer 
 Warner completed the designs, and Acting Naval Constructor 
 Pierce was appointed superintendent ; and on September, 
 35th, 1861, the preparation of the ship-yard was commenced 
 on the east side of the river, immediately above the corpo- 
 rate limits of the city, and within the corporate lines of 
 Jefferson City, on the property of Mr. Millandon, who ten- 
 dered its use without charge. There Constructor Pierce com- 
 menced his preparations for building on the 38th of September. 
 In thirty days he made the body, and put the fioors in the 
 ship; in two months the sides had risen three feet high; in 
 110 days the wood- work was completed. This extraordinary 
 dispatch was owing to the peculiar plan of construction. 
 
 Before the Investigating Committee of the Confederate Con - 
 gross, E. C. Murray, a practical ship-builder of twenty years and 
 the contractor for building the Louisiana, testified that: 
 
 "I think the vessel was built in less time than any vessel of her 
 tonnage and character, and requiring the same amount of work and 
 materials, on this continent. That vessel required no less than 10,000,- 
 000 feet of lumber, and, I suppose, about 1,000 tons of iron, including the 
 false works, blockways, etc. I do not think that amount of materials 
 were ever put together on this continent within the time occupied in 
 her construction. I knew many of our naval vessels requiring much less 
 
370 THB CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY 
 
 material than were employed in the Mississippi, that took about six or 
 twelve months in their construction. She was built with rapidity, and 
 had at all times as many men at work upon her as could work to advan- 
 tage. She had, in fact, many times more men at work upon her than 
 could conveniently work. They worked on nights and Sundays upon her, 
 as I did upon the Louisiana, at least for a large portion of the time." 
 
 Contracts for every part of the steam machinery were 
 made immediatelv with the Messrs. Jackson & Co., of the 
 Patterson Iron Works, at New Orleans, to be completed in 
 ninety days. There was not a foundry and hammer in the 
 Confederacy capable of making the wrought-iron shafts for 
 the vessel. Three of these shafts were required; that for 
 the middle to be fifty feet long, and those on the sides each 
 forty feet long, and all nine inches in diameter. The middle 
 shaft was fitted up at the Tredegar Works in Eichmond and 
 did not reach N"ew Orleans until April 9th, at which time one 
 of the side-shafts was at Leeds & Co.'s, and the third shaft 
 was just forged and would not be ready for nine or ten days. 
 New Orleans fell on April 24th; Capt. Whittle was informed 
 that the Mississippi would be ready for her guns on April 23d, 
 and ready for service on the 1st of May; the plating was going^ 
 on as fast as possible, but it would require from twelve to 
 fourteen days to completely shield the ship with iron. 
 
 It was not the purpose of the projectors to launch the ship 
 until the shafts and propellers had been put in, but Capt. 
 Mitchell and Capt. Sinclair having given their opinion that 
 the enemy might pass the forts at any moment, the Missis- 
 sippi was launched on the 19th of April with her iron on be- 
 low the surface of the gun-decks, and the remaining iron was 
 being rapidly put on ; the furnace work was completed and all 
 the machinery on board; the wood-work was entirely; done, 
 and two weeks of more time would have seen the Mississippi 
 fully completed, equipped and commissioned. 
 
 When the Federal fleet passed the forts, the Mississippi 
 in her unfinished state could neither fight nor run away, and 
 Commander Sinclair, who was in charge of her, made every 
 effort to obtain boats to tow the vessel up the river. To that 
 end he employed the St. Charles and the Peytona, which, after 
 an unaccountable delay of nearly twelve hours, was unable to 
 move the ship up stream on account of the current, there being a 
 freshet at the time which made the current even stronger than 
 usual. After the whole night spent in fruitlessly trying to move 
 the ship up stream, and finding that they were losing ground 
 and floating down towards the approaching enemy, the Mis- 
 sissippi was committed to the flames and burned to the water's 
 edge, and sunk in the river. 
 
 Commander Arthur Sinclair testified before the Court of 
 Inquiry, that 
 
 " The Mississippi mi^ht doubtless have been launched and towed up 
 the river many days previous to the enemy's passing the forts, and there 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 271 
 
 finally completed ; but her completion would have been greatly retarded, 
 as all the workshops, material, workmen — in fact, the whole naval estab- 
 lishment — would have had to be transferred from New Orleans to the 
 place of transfer, and there was no place of safety above, that I know of, 
 short of Fort Pillow, and all above on the river was then menaced by the 
 enemy. Her completion was a momentous affair, and, therefore, the 
 work was prosecuted up to the last moment with all the energy in our 
 power. I received no orders from the commander of the station. Com- 
 mander Whittle, under whose orders -I was, or from the Navy Depart- 
 ment, to remove her until the morning of April 24th, the day upon which 
 the enemy passed the forts. On that day Commander Whittle sent for 
 and informed me that the enemy had passed the batteries, and were 
 coming up, at the same time directing me to take the ship up the river, 
 if possible, to som.e place of safety, but not to let her fall into the hands 
 of the enemy. I immediately sent orders to the steamers engaged by the 
 Messrs. Tift to proceed at once up to the ship-yard for the purpose of 
 taking the ship in tow. The officers sent by me upon this duty returned, 
 and informed me that the steamers referred to had been detained by 
 order of Gen. Lovell. I called myself upon Col. Lovell, the general being 
 out of his office upon business, and obtained from him the release of two 
 of the three which were engaged for this purpose, the Peytona and the 
 St. Charles. Although directed to proceed at once, they did not reach the 
 ship-yard until late in the evening. The captains of these boats showed 
 every disposition — in fact, determination— to thwart me in my wishes, and, 
 to accomplish my ends, I had, with my own officers, to lash and secure 
 them alongside, and furnished one of them, the steamer St. Charles, with 
 an engineer, as the captain said he had only one. I finally succeeded in 
 getting off, but found, after many hours of hard tugging against a power- 
 ful current, that I could not succeed. Assistance was promised me by 
 Col. Baggs (or Biggs) of the Safety Committee, but none was received. 
 Still unwilling to give up the ship, I went myself back to the city in the 
 Peytona, and urged the aid of the steamers, but in vain. Every variety 
 of excuse was offered by their captains, and no disposition manifested to 
 help me; in fact, a fixed determination not to move in the matter. 
 While thus negotiating, the enemy hove in sight, and I at once started 
 back for the ship, four miles above, intending to fire her; but the officer in 
 charge, Lieut. Waddell, anticipated me, and applied the torch. After re- 
 maining in the stream until the ship was nearly consumed, I held a 
 council of war with my officers, and it was determined to return to the 
 city and offer our services to Gen. Lovell. I was on my way back when I 
 met Lieut. McCorkle, of the navy, who informed me that the enemy were 
 off Canal Street, and that Gen. Lovell had marched his troops out. I 
 then proceeded up the river with my officers to Vicksburg. I will also 
 state that the assistance of several steamers, which passed up the river, 
 while engaged in towing the Mississippi, was asked and refused. I also 
 engaged the services of navy workmen to accompany me up in the ship to 
 try and finish her, and put on board, while awaiting the arrival of the 
 steamers, much of the material for her completion. Some was afterwards 
 put aboard the steamer St. Charles before firing the ship, and taken up 
 to Vicksburg and saved 
 
 " The Mississippi was launched on Saturday, April 19th, and burned 
 the Friday following. In this connection, I would state that on my 
 arrival at New Orleans there was a great desire upon the part of many 
 persons expressed that the ship should be launched. The Tifts objected, 
 and I agreed with them that to launch her in her then condition would 
 cause much delay in shipping her propellers, and involve the expense of 
 building the box or dry dock for that purpose, of which I have already 
 spoken; but, finding the attack about to be commenced, 1 recommended 
 her being launched to her builders, the Tifts, in which Commander 
 Mitchell joined me: the suggestion was heeded, but not until many days 
 after, for reasons which they assigned; * * » if the Mississippi had 
 
272 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 been completed, and with her armament and men on board, she alone 
 could have held the river against the entire Federal fleet coming up from 
 below; and she would have been the most formidable ship that I ever 
 knew or heard of— very creditable to her projectors, builders and country." 
 
 Admiral Porter remarks in his Kaval History, that if New 
 Orleans had " been left three months longer to perfect its de- 
 fences and finish its work of offence, our wooden fleet would 
 have been driven North, and the entire Southern coast would 
 have been sealed against us. The blockade would have been 
 raised, and the independence of the South recognized by the 
 powers of Europe"; that "truly the Queen City of the South 
 was doing her share of building rams to annihilate our navy 
 and commerce, but where were our rams that should have 
 been built by the North, which boasted of its great skill and 
 resources ? These should have been ready to sally out within 
 three months after the war began, to drive the Louisiana, 
 Manassas, Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, Albemarle and 
 others back to their holes, or crush them like so many egg- 
 shells." The Mississippi was raised by the Federal authori- 
 ties, and sent to Brooklyn navy-yard. 
 
 Admiral Farragut's experience of the Confederate gun- 
 boats constructed out of frail river craft was sufficient for 
 him to say that " the rebel gunboats cannot stand before ours; 
 but what they dignify by the name of iron-clad rams is an 
 article entirely different, and, had they succeeded in getting 
 any one of those on the Mississippi finished before our arrival, 
 it would have proved a most formidable adversary"; and that 
 
 " We have destroyed, or made the enemy destroy, three of the most 
 formidable rams in the country. Arthur Sinclair declared that the Mu- 
 sissippi (ram) which he was to comiuand was far superior to the Merri- 
 mac. But we were too quick for them. Her machinery was not in work- 
 ing order, and when I sent after her they set her on fire, and she floated 
 past us, formidable even in her expiring flames. Mitchell commanded 
 the other as flag-offlcer. Poor Charlie Mcintosh was her captain, and is 
 now going on shore in a dreadful condition. It is not thought he wiE live, 
 but he has a good constitution, and that will do a great deal for him. 
 
 " Their fleet has suffered very much in this affair, both in reputa- 
 tion and in vessels. We destroyed them all, some fourteen or fifteen, and 
 many lives were lost." 
 
 While this work of building ships and converting old 
 steamboats into vessels - of - war was going on, there were 
 naval expeditions undertaken from New Orleans, which 
 served to keep alive the spirit of naval enterprise and to teach 
 those lessons which can only be learned in time of war. 
 
 While the McRae was being fitted out, her officers were 
 impatient to be about some duty other than that which held 
 them down in New Orleans. Capt. Higgins, formerly of the 
 U. S. navy, but at that time acting as aid to Gen. Twiggs, 
 undertook to capture the launches of the enemy prowling and 
 marauding in the Mississippi Sound; and obtaining volunteers 
 from Lieut. Thomas B. Huger, of the McRae, started with two 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 273 
 
 lake steamers, armed with one thirty-two pounder, one eight- 
 inch gun, and two howitzers. The steamer Oregon, commanded 
 by Capt. A. L. Myers, and the steamer Swaim, by Lieut. A. F. 
 Warley, C. S. N., proceeding to Bay St. Louis, and filling 
 bags with sand, they left the bay at nine o'clock on July 6th 
 for the cruising-ground of the enemy, the Swaim taking tlie 
 mainland or side passage, and the Oregon the outside, and 
 proceeded to Ship Island Pass. 
 
 Finding no enemy in sight, the Oregon proceeded to sea 
 from Ship Island, and soon saw two vessels and gave chase. 
 They proved to be two Confederate fishing - smacks. The 
 Oregon then returned to Ship Island, and Capt. Higgins, who 
 was in command of the expedition, deemed it advisable to take 
 possession of Ship Island. Accordingly he signalled the Swaim 
 to come to and go alongside of the island. The Oregon then 
 came alongside the Swaim, and both proceeded to disembark 
 the men and munitions of war, provisions, etc. After the 
 disembarkation the guns on the boats were put in battery, 
 and protected by sand-bags. 
 
 The Swaim was left at the island while the Oregon pro- 
 ceeded to New Orleans, via Pass Christian, for the purpose of 
 sending a dispatch to Gen. Twiggs to send forward reinforce- 
 ments of ammunition and men. There she was ordered to take 
 on board guns, gun-carriages, and munitions to reinforce Ship 
 Island — Major Twiggs, and Capt. Higgins and Major Smith, 
 using every possible effort to get everything in readiness. 
 The steamer Orey Cloud was also taken into requisition, and 
 was loaded and got underway, also well armed. The Oregon 
 followed the same night with provisions, and proceeded directly 
 to Ship Island. 
 
 On Tuesday morning, when within eight miles of the fort 
 on Ship Island, Capt. Myers saw a large U. S. steamer 
 and a tender lying off about two miles outside the island. At 
 this moment the troops at the sand batteries opened fire on the 
 steamer, which was immediately returned, and the battle 
 commenced in good earnest. The Orey Cloud coming up 
 slowly, the Oregon took off her ammunition and proceeded at 
 once to the scene of action. Major Smith directing the Grey 
 Cloud to follow at a safe distance. 
 
 Having arrived at the island, Capt. Myers proceeded at 
 once in his yawl, with Major Smith, with a load of shell and 
 powder, being received with cheers by Capt. Thorn, of the C. S. 
 marines, and the sailors and soldiers, who at once carried the 
 supplies to the batteries. The enemy had fired some thirty 
 odd rounds of shell and round shot, which sank in the sand, 
 and were used by our sailors in returning fire. The explosion 
 of the enemy's shells did no other damage than slightly to 
 injure one man in the leg. 
 
 The steamers immediately commenced landing their guns 
 and provisions, during which time the enemy again opened 
 
374 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 fire, the shot falling short, but being returned with great eflfect. 
 It is supposed that the attacking steamer, the Massachusetts, 
 was hulled three times, and a shell was seen to explode over 
 her decks, which, it was supposed, did some damage, as she 
 immediately hauled off and put for the Chandeleur Islands, a 
 distance of twelve miles. 
 
 After taking possession .of the island, Capt. Higgins de- 
 tailed the following oflficers, with the marines and sailors, to 
 hold and defend it : Lieut. Warley, commanding; Lieut. R. T. 
 Thorn, of the marines; Surgeon Lynah and the midshipmen. 
 After the enemy had retired, the steamer Swaim arrived with 
 Lieut. Col. H. W. Allen, of the Fourth Regiment, from Missis- 
 sippi City, with three companies, who set to work fortifying 
 the island. 
 
 The proclamation of blockade, issued by Mr. Lincoln on 
 the 19th of April, 1861, was put in force for the Mississippi 
 River in June following, when the Powhatan, Lieut. D. D. 
 Porter, took station off the Southwest Pass; and the Brooklyn, 
 Commander Charles Poor, off Pass a I'Outre. But the escape 
 of the Sumter from the latter pass soon called the attention of 
 the U. S. naval authorities to the necessity of a closer watch 
 over the many exits from New Orleans, and suggested the 
 holding of the "head of the passes" by a naval force. This 
 point, where the vast volume of the waters of the Mississippi 
 divides into three great outlets to the ocean, is distant sixteen 
 miles by the Southwest Pass, and fourteen miles by Pass a 
 rOutre,"from the bar. The river at the " head of the passes " 
 broadens into a bay two miles wide, and from the telegraph 
 station to the point of firm land, between Southwest and South 
 Passes, the distance is also two miles — so that there is wide 
 and deep water at the head — ample to float a fleet, and for 
 naval manoeuvres. To hold the "head of the passes" the 
 Federal authorities attempted to erect a battery on the point 
 of firm ground at the junction of the Southwest and South 
 Passes, but the movements of Captain Hollins, about to 
 be related, broke up the battery before it was more than 
 marked out. In that de6p and broad water, the Federal 
 squadron, consisting of the screw-steamer Richmond, twenty- 
 two nine-inch guns, Capt. John Pope; the Vincennes, sloop-of- 
 war, ten guns. Commander Robert Handy; the sloop Preble, 
 eleven guns, Commander Henry French, and the screw- 
 steamer Water Witch, four guns, Lieut. Francis Winslow, 
 arrived on the 13th of October, 1861. The squadron mounted 
 forty - seven guns, and, properly handled and commanded, 
 could have successfully met and destroyed the little Confed- 
 erate fleet which Capt. George N. Hollins had improvised. 
 The ships of Hollins' fleet were the McRae, whose defective 
 machinery had prevented her from following the Sumter to 
 sea, and changed her destination from a cruiser to a River 
 Defence craft, was at that time commanded by Lieut. Com. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 375 
 
 Joseph Fry, who after the war commanded the Virginius, 
 and met so sad a death in Cuba. The Ivy, the Tuscarora, the 
 Calhoun, the Jackson, and the ram Manassas, under Lieut. 
 Warley, and the unarmed tow-boat Watson, under Lieut. 
 Averett — the whole under command of Capt. HoUins. 
 
 In the early morn of the 13th of October, the U. S. S. Eich- 
 mond lay at anchor taking in coal from a schooner alongside. 
 The night was intensely dark, and it was almost impossible to 
 see twenty yards ahead. The Manassas put on a heavy head 
 of steam and dashed on in the direction where it was thought 
 the enemy were lying. Suddenly a large ship was discovered 
 only a length ahead, and, before Lieut. Warley could fire 
 the signal -rocket into her they went together with an aw- 
 ful crash! An appalling shriek was heard on board of the 
 Richmond, or the schooner, as the ram crushed into the Rich- 
 mond, and broke loose the schooner, the latter having acted as 
 a cushion, and breaking somewhat the force of the ram's 
 blow. Immediately, the Richmond fired a rocket, beat to 
 quarter, and poured a shower of iron hail on the dark waters 
 and into the still darker air. Though the force of the Man- 
 assas' blow broke in the side of the Richmond, it was not with- 
 out injury to her own machinery. This was raost inoppor- 
 tune and perilous; and the Richmond, soon observing that 
 something was wrong, began playing upon her with all the 
 power of her guns. Lieut. Warley found that only one engine 
 would work, and with that he began working his way out of 
 reach towards shore; but the shot fell thick and fast around, 
 and upon the " old turtle," and her fate seemed hanging on 
 a hair, when the brave little Tuscarora and the Watson' came 
 up with five barges on fire, and soon cut them adrift on the 
 stream. A ram and a fire-raft were too much for Capt. Pope's 
 nerves, and signalling *' danger" with a red light, he ordered 
 the Preble and the Vincennes to proceed down the Southwest 
 Pass, which they did, not standing on the order of their going. 
 His oflBcial report says: 
 
 " At this time three large fire-rafts, stretching across the river, were 
 rapidly nearing us, 'while several larger steamers and a bark -rigged -pro- 
 peller were seen astern of them. The squadron proceeded down the river 
 in the following order : First, the Preble; second, the Vincennes; third, 
 the Richmond; fourth, the Water P7tfc7i; with the prize schooner i^'roZic 
 in tow. When abreast of the pilot settlement, the pilot informed me that 
 he did not consider it safe to venture to turn this ship in the river, but 
 that he believed he could pass over the bar. I accordingly attempted to 
 pass over the bar with the squadron, but in the passage the Vincennes 
 
 1 "The Waisfm did not run aground as has shot and shells o\ the enemy's ships into their 
 
 been stated, did not suffer any mishap, made midst. The exvtdition was a complete success 
 
 no blunder, had no confusion, and made so so far as oper.ing the way to the sea from New 
 
 little noise as she steamed to lier position ' to Orleans was '.s object, but the of&cers of the 
 
 turn loose her fire-boats on the enemy's ships, ^ McRae were gi^atly disappointed, when it was 
 
 that the Confederate fleet above her in the river discovered thai iher machinery was so defective 
 
 supposed she had been disabled and was drift- as, in the judgn "nt of Plag-ofBcer HoUins. to 
 
 ing helplessly between the flames of her own render the steamei unflt for sea service. — Extract 
 
 iire-boats — one on either side — and under the from private letter oj Lieut. Averett. 
 
376 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 and Richmond grounded, while the Prehle went over clear. This occur- 
 red about eight o'clocli, and the enemy, who were now down the river 
 with the fire steamers, commenced firing at us, while we returned the fare 
 from our port battery and rifled gun on the poop— our shot, however, 
 faUing short of the enemy, while their sheH burst on all sides of us, and 
 several passed directly over the ship." 
 
 Capt. Hollins did not know what had been the result 
 of the firing, neither did the rest of the officers. It was 
 too dark to make observations, and he did not wish to risk 
 signals. So daylight was waited for impatiently. It came at 
 last, and presented the following picture: The enemy, some 
 miles down, heeling it for the open sea by way of the South- 
 west Pass. The Manassas close in shore, among the willows, 
 concealed as well as possible; the Tuscarora aground on the 
 bank, and the Watson not far off. The Tuscarora was soon 
 pulled off by the rest, and the fleet commenced a pursuit of 
 the retreating enemy. They soon came within range, and a 
 heavy cannonade began. The Richmond drew up on the out- 
 side, and the other vessels of the enemy soon got aground, but 
 near by, but were in a great measure protected by the Rich- 
 mond's guns. 
 
 The fight ended not with the return of light, for Pope 
 says: 
 
 "At half -past nine Commander Handy, of the Vinoennes, mistaking 
 my signal to the ships outside the bar to get underway for a signal to 
 him to abandon his ship, came on board the Riiihmond with all his ofB- 
 cers and a large number of the crew, the remainder having gone on board 
 the Water Witch. Capt. Handy before leaving his ship had placed a 
 lighted slow match at the magazine. Having waited a reasonable time 
 for an explosion, I directed Commander Handy to return to his ship with 
 his crew, to start his water, and, if necessary, at his own req[uest, to throw 
 overboard his small guns for the purpose of lightening his ship, and to 
 carry out his kedge with a cable to heave-off by. At 10 A. M. the enemy 
 ceased firing and withdrew up the river. Buring the engagement a shell 
 entered our quarter port, and one of the boats was stove by another 
 shell." 
 
 Cotemporaneous, but not official, accounts report Handy 
 >M appearing on the deck of the Richmond with the large flag 
 0^4® United States wrapped in folds around his person, ' and 
 repo^ikjng that he had put a slow match to the magazine of the 
 Vmcemt^ps. The Manassas drew off from the collision with 
 the Richin.ond without trouble, though she undoubtedly twisted 
 her prow badly when swayed to one side by the current, for it 
 was found broken and bent to one side. The balls which 
 struck her bountil^d off without effecting any damage, except 
 in one case, when -^ ball hit on the bluff of the bow and made 
 an ugly, though nc\serious, dent in the iron. 
 
 In the actual figiSt, the other Confederate vessels took no 
 part — their presence.^ however, and the fire-rafts added to the 
 enemy's demoraliza>lon, and they shared in the artillerv duel 
 
 1 Porter's Naval Htstonj Jai Soley's Blockade. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 277 
 
 at long range. The Confederates took great credit for this 
 gallant dash at the enemy; but it may well be asked, why, 
 after having done so much, they did not do more ? A demoral- 
 ized and retreating enemy, aground, and scrambling to get 
 over the bar, offered the opportunity of winning the fruits of 
 victory by following up the blow. All day Friday the ships 
 lay fast aground,and offered a fair opportunity to the victorious 
 Confederates, but they had steamed back to New Orleans. A 
 letter from on board the Richmond says : " On Saturday we 
 were glad to see the Mc Clellan coming in from sea with two rifled 
 Parrott guns for us. 'She made fast to us, and before midnight 
 we had the steamer South Carolina at anchor near us. On 
 Sunday the two steamers succeeding in towing our ship and 
 tYieVincennes off the bar, and here we are, all afloat, and ready 
 for any emergency." 
 
 Ko Confederate report, except newspaper accounts, of 
 this very gallant little affair is extant, if any was ever made. 
 But it is to be taken for granted that good and suflBcient 
 reasons moved so gallant a sailor as Capt. HoUins to abandon 
 the scene of action at the time he did. There were many half- 
 won victories by the Confederates in the war, both on land 
 and water, of which history can give no explanation — and this 
 one is not an exception. Heavy censure and unsparing ridicule 
 were visited upon the officers of the Federal fleet — greater than 
 they deserved — for they were new to the situation, and fresh 
 from that national fear of "masked batteries" — rams and fire 
 ships — all of which passed off as the experience of war in 
 reality increased. Unlimited praise was extended to Hollins 
 and his officers, without either the authorities or the public 
 stopping to inquire why he left the stranded fleet without at 
 least trying to destroy them. The war was young in the Fall 
 of 1861 — all its honors had been won by the Confederates; and 
 when the Bull Bun of the " Passes " was reported, " cowardice 
 and pusillanimity" were charged upon Captains Pope and 
 Handy, while Hollins, like Beauregard, was never required to 
 say why he did not follow the retreating foe. If historians of 
 the U. S. navy blush as they record the flight of their ships at 
 the " Passes," those of the Confederate navy must express an 
 almost equal dissatisfaction at the lack of results that the 
 victory brought. The blockade was not raised, as Capt. 
 Hollins claimed, for the Federal fleet remained off the mouths 
 of the " Passes " — and soon after returned and held the head of 
 the "Passes" until Farragut and his fleet recaptured the con- 
 trol of the river. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 MISSISSIPPI RIVER FROM THE GULF TO YICKSBURG. 
 
 THE movement by the Federal Administration at Wash- 
 ington, to open the Mississippi River, begun by Com. 
 Foote at Cairo, in the summer of 1861, was continued 
 from the Gulf by Admiral Parragut, in the spring of 
 1862. During the winter and early spring the largest and best 
 appointed fleet that ever flew the U. S. flag was organized, 
 and placed under the command of the boldest, ablest and most 
 enterprising officer in that service. In order to hold what 
 Farragut might capture, an army of 15,000 men, under Gen. 
 Butler, was dispatched in the wake of the admiral's squadron. 
 The combined fleet of men-of-war, mortar -schooners and 
 transports arrived on the 16th of April, below Forts Jack- 
 son and St. Philip, which guarded the river approach to New 
 Orleans. The Federal fleet, ^ consisting of 46 vessels, carry- 
 ing 348 guns and 21 mortars, anchored below; and on the 
 
 1 Vessels composing Farragut's fleet: 
 
 Flag-ship Harlford, twenty-flve guns, Capt. 
 Richard Wainwright; executive officer, Lieut. 
 J.S. Thornton. 
 
 Steam-sloop Brooklyn, twenty-four guns, Capt. 
 Thomas T. Craven; executive ofllcer, Lieut. R. B. 
 Lowry. 
 
 Steam-sloop Rickmot^, twenty-six guns, Capt. 
 James Aid en. 
 
 Steam-sloop Mississippi, twelve guns, Capt, M. 
 Smith; executive officer, Lieut. Dewey. 
 
 Steam-sloop Verona, ten guns, Capt. Chas. S. 
 Boggs. 
 
 Steam-sloop Pensacola, twenty-four guns, Capt. 
 Henry W. Morris ; executive officer, Lieut. 
 Francis Roe. 
 
 Steam-sloop Oneida, nine guns, Commander 8. 
 Phillips Lee; executive ofiicer, Lieut. Sicord. 
 
 Steam-sloop Iroqiwis, nine guns. Commander 
 John De Camp; executive officer, David B. 
 Harmony. 
 
 Gunboat Westfield, six guns, Capt. "William B. 
 Renshaw. 
 
 Gunboat Katdkdin, six guns, Lieut. Command- 
 ing George Preble. 
 
 Gunboat Pinola, five guns, Lieut, Command- 
 ing Crosby. 
 
 Gunboat Clifton, five guns. 
 
 Gunboat Cayuga, five guns, Lieut. Command- 
 ing Harrison. 
 
 Gunboat Itaska, five guns, Lieut. Commanding 
 C. H. B. Caldwell. 
 
 Gunboat ^enweftec, five guns, Lieut. Command- 
 ing Johu Russell. 
 
 Gunboat Kanawha, five guns, Lieut. Com- 
 manding John Febiger, 
 
 Gunboat Sciota, six guns. Lieut. Commanding 
 Edward Donaldson. 
 
 Gunboat Miami, six guns, Lieut. Commanding 
 A. D. HarroU. 
 
 Gunboat Owasco, five guns, Lieut. Commanding 
 John Guest. 
 
 Gunboat Winona, four guns, Lieut, Command- 
 ing Ed ward T.Nichols; executive officer, JohnG. 
 Walker. 
 
 Gunboat Wissakiclcon, five guns, Lieut. Com- 
 manding Albert N. Smith. 
 
 Gunboat Kineo, five guns, Lieut. Commanding 
 George H, Ransom. 
 
 Schooner Kittatinny, nine guns. Acting Vol- 
 unteer Lieut. Lamson. 
 
 Gunboat Harriet Lane, six guns, Lieut. Com- 
 manding J. M. Wainwright, with Commander 
 David D. Porter, who had twenty-one schooners, 
 composing "Porter's mortar fleet," each carry- 
 ing a heavy mortar, and two thirty-two guns. 
 
 (278) 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 279 
 
 morning of April 18th, comnienced the Dombardment of the 
 forts. ^ 
 
 At that time the defences of New Orleans consisted of 
 Forts Jackson and St. Philip, under Gen. Johnson K. Duncan, 
 the former fort naounting seventy-five guns, and the latter 
 fifty-three guns, both together manned by about 700 men. The 
 naval defence consisted of the C. S. steamer Louisiana, 16 
 guns, Capt. Charles F. Mcintosh; the ram Manassas, one 
 thirty-two-pounder, Lieut. A. F. Warley; the McRae, 7 guns, 
 Lieut. Thomas B. Huger; the Jackson, 2 guns, Lieut. F. B. 
 Renshaw; launch No. 6, Acting Master Fairbanks; launch No. 
 S, one howitzer, Acting Master Telford, the fleet under com- 
 mand of Commodore John K. Mitchell. Co-operating with 
 the fleet of Commodore Mitchell were two Louisiana State 
 gunboats: the Governor Moore, two thirty -two-pounder rifled 
 guns. Commander Beverley Kennon, C. S. N., and the Gen. 
 Quitman, Capt. Grant; in addition was the remnant of the 
 River Defence fleet of converted tow boats : the Warrior, 
 Capt. Stephenson; the Stonewall Jackson, Capt. Phillips; the 
 Resolute, Capt. Hooper; the Defiance, Capt. McCoy, and the 
 R. J. Breckenridge, all under command of Capt. John A. 
 Stephenson, and mounting from one to two guns each.'^ There 
 were also the following unarmed steamers, acting as tenders 
 and for towing purposes: the Phoenix, to the Manassas; the 
 W, Burton, Capt. Hammond, and the Landis, Capt. Davis, to the 
 Louisiana; also the Mosher, Capt. Sherman; the Belle Algerine, 
 the Star, Capt. La Place, and the Music, Capt. McClellan. 
 
 To a complete understanding of the effort of the Con- 
 federate navy in defence of the city of New Orleans, a full 
 
 1 Commander Beverley Kennon, in the Ccn^wry two-pounders; about forty were rifled twenty 
 
 Magazine for July, 1886, eaye : to eighty-pounders, nineteen werethirteen-inch 
 
 " The Navy Register of January, 1863, gives mortars, thirty were howitzers. To meet them 
 Flag-officer Farragut's seventeen veaaela 193 the Confederates had 128 guns of assorted sizes 
 guna, and Commander Porter's seven vessels, in the two forts, and forty-one on hoard their 
 «ixty-five guns. The frigate Colorado, being un- vessels. Of this number thirty-two only were 
 able to croas the bar, transferred April 11th her of recent manufacture and fully equipped. The 
 twenty-four-pounder howitzer to the Sciota ; on remainder were out of date by several years, 
 the 6th of April, four nine-inch guns to the and were commanded and manned, as a rule, by 
 Oneida and Iroquois; and, on April 9th, three inexperienced though brave men; 122 were old- 
 officers, 142 men, and her spar-deck battery of time thirty-two pounders. There were also 
 twenty eight-inch guns, for distribution in the three seven-inch and thirteen six-inch rifles, 
 :fleet. Add thirty-eight thirty-two pounders, and four brass field-pieces, eleven mortars {eight 
 nineteen thirteen-inch mortars on board the ten and one thirteen-inch), four eight-inch, four 
 'bombers,' and twenty-nine twelve-pounder nine-inch, and eight ten-inch guns; total, 169. 
 howitzers, one to each of twenty-four vessels. If I have erred, it is in not giving all the guns 
 the five larger ones having two, both in their on the United States ships, as the ^^'isier always 
 tops, and we find they had In all three hun- gives the least number mounted. Howitzers are 
 ^3red and sixty-nine guns of recent construction, , never included any more than pistols, but when 
 fully equipped with latest improvements, and mounted in a vessel's tops to bo fired at men on 
 commanded and handled by trained men. Ex- an exposed deck, as was the case with the 
 cepting one sailing ahlp and the mortar vessels. Federal ships in this action, they become for- 
 all of the guns were mounted on board steam- midable weapons.*' 
 era, the larger ones protecting their boilers and 
 
 ■engines by tricing up abreast them on their 2 it is necessary to mention the presence of the 
 
 outer sides their heavy chain cables, sixty links River Defence boats, but by reference to a former 
 
 of one of them weighing more than all the iron page where this expedition is described at length. 
 
 on the bows and elsewhere on all the Confederate it will beseenthattheirpresence wasmore of an 
 
 ■State and River Defence Fleet, numbering nine "embarrassment than an aid " in the action at 
 
 vessels, and all built of wood. In the above the forts. Admiral Porter in his Naval History 
 
 list of guns, about twenty-six were eleven-inch says: "Little assistance came to the fleet from 
 
 pivots; about 140 were nine-inch; about fifty- theemploymentof these boats, on account of thr- 
 
 four were eight-inch ; about sixty were thirty- insubordination of their division commander." 
 
380 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 account of the fighting condition of the vessels composing 
 the fleet of Commodore Mitchell is necessary. This is the 
 more required because northern writers have endeavored to 
 exalt the performances of the U. S. navy by magnifying the 
 fighting capacity of Confederate vessels. To that end Ad- 
 miral Porter, in a letter to Senator Grimes, of Iowa, of May 
 6th, 1862, from Ship Island, set the key-note by saying of the 
 Louisiana : 
 
 " That vessel was 4,000 tons, 370 feet long, and had sixteen heavy- 
 rifle guns, all made in Seoessia. She intended to take position that 
 night when she would have driven off all our fleet, for as a proof of 
 her invulnerability one of our heaviest ships laid within ten feet of 
 her and delivered her whole broadside, making no more impression on 
 her than if she was firing peas. The Louisiana's shot, on the contrary, 
 went through and through the above-mentioned sloop-of-war, as if she 
 was glass. 
 
 " The iron ram Manassas hit three vessels before her comman- 
 der ran her ashore and abandoned her. She has been a troublesome cus- 
 tomer all through." 
 
 The real condition of the Louisiana, as given by Lieut. 
 William C. Whittle, Jr., is that 
 
 "The Louisiana was in an entirely incomplete condition when she 
 was sent down from New Orleans, and Commodore WilUam C. Whittle, 
 the naval commander at New Orleans, only sent her down in that condi- 
 tion in obedience to positive orders from Richmond to do so, and against 
 his remonstrance and better judgment. Her guns were not mounted and 
 the machinery of her two propellers was not put together. The machin- 
 ery of her miserably conceived wheels, working in a ' well ' in her midship 
 section, one immediately forward of the other, was in working order, but 
 when she cast off her fasts at New Orleans on, I think, April 20th, 1862, 
 the wheels were started, but with them she went helplessly down the 
 stream, and tow-boats had to be called to take her to her destination. 
 That point was where she was afterwards destroyed, on the left bank of 
 the river, just above Port St. Philip, where she was tied up to the river 
 bank, with her bow down stream. Machinists and mechanics were taken 
 down in her and worked night and day to complete the work on the ma- 
 chinery, and to prepare the ship for service. 
 
 " Our gallant and efficient commander, the lamented Charles F. Mc- 
 intosh, aided by active, zealous and competent officers, bent all their en- 
 ergies to put the ship in a fighting condition, and by the time the Federal 
 fleet came up to run by the batteries, on April 24th, all the guns, except 
 I think two, were mounted. At that time the work on the machinery of 
 the propellers was far from completion and the vessel was, in that regard, 
 as helpless as when she went there. 
 
 " The port-holes for the guns were so miserably constructed as simply 
 to admit of the guns being run out, and were so small as not to admit of 
 training laterally or in elevation." 
 
 Commodore Mitchell testified before the Court of Inquiry 
 as to the number of vessels, their armament and condition, 
 
 that : 
 
 " The principal vessel of my command, the steamer Louisiana, 
 iron -clad, mounting sixteen guns, was without sufficient motive power 
 even to stem the current of the Mississippi without the aid of her two 
 tenders, the Landis and W. Burton. Her two propellers were not ready 
 
COMMANDER CHABLES F. MoINTOSH, C. S. N. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 381 
 
 for use, and were designed more to assist in steering than in the expec- 
 tation of adding to her speed, and her rudder had Uttle, if any, power to 
 control her movements. Most of her guns had to be dismantled, after 
 arriving at Fort St. Phihp, and shifted to pivots where they could be 
 worked, and one of them was not in position in the action of April 34th, be- 
 ing dismounted. The crew of the Louisiana, aided by the men from the Mc- 
 Rae, were employed constantly night and day, in arranging the battery for 
 action. The decks were thus, from this cause and the presence of numer- 
 ous mechanics employed in completing machinery for the propellers, the 
 ironing of the decks, and calking wheel-houses, much incumbered, and 
 being very cramped at best for room, prevented the proper exercise of the. 
 men at their guns. This condition of her motive power and battery ren - 
 dered her not only unfit for offensive operations against the enemy, but 
 also for defence, as, being immovable, her guns all around could only com- 
 mand about 40 degrees of the horizon, leaving 330 degrees of a circle on 
 which she could have been apijroached by an enemy without being able 
 to bring a gun to bear upon him. Her guns, from the small size of her 
 ports, could not be elevated more than 4 to 5 degrees, which with our best 
 guns would not have given a range probably of more than 2,000 yards. 
 The means for purchasing her anchors were inadequate, and it was utterl y 
 impossible to weigh them, when once they were let go, either from the 
 bow or stern, and, indeed, her steering apparatus prevented her being 
 anchored by the stern in the middle of the river, a position, under all the 
 circumstances, I should have preferred to being tied to the river bank, by 
 which more guns might have been used against the enemy, and the vessel 
 might have been warped or sprung, so as to bring some of her guns to 
 bear upon any given point. The quarters for the crew of the Louisiana 
 were wholly insufficient, and for her officers there were none at all, except 
 on the shield deck or roof, under a tented awning. Most of the officers 
 and crew had to live on board two tenders, which were also required as 
 tugs, without which the vessel could not be moved at all. The shield of 
 the Louisiana was effective, for none of the enemy's projectiles passed 
 through it ; but as it only extended to the water hne, a shot between 
 wind and water must have penetrated the perpendicular pine sides. In 
 addition to the Louisiana, the following vessels of the C. S. navy were 
 under my comipand at the forts, viz. : The steamer McRae, Lieut. Com. 
 Thomas B. Huger, with six light thirty-two pounder smooth-bore broad- 
 side guns, and one nine-inch shell gun pivoted amidships — total, seven; 
 the steamer Jackson, Lieut. Com. F. B. Renshaw, two pivoted smooth- 
 bore thirty -two pounders, one forward and one aft ; the iron-plated ram 
 Manassas, Lieut. Com. A. F. Warley, one thirty-two pounder in bow; 
 launch No. 3, Acting Master Telford, and one howitzer, twenty men; 
 launch No. 6, Acting Master Fairbanks, one howitzer and twenty men. 
 Also, the following converted sea steamers into Louisiana State gunboats, 
 with pine and cotton barricades to protect the machinery and boilers, 
 viz. : The &overnor Moore, Commander Beverley Kennon, two thirty -two- 
 pounder rifled guns : the General Quitman, Capt. Grant, two thirty -two- 
 pounder guns. All the above steamers, being converted vessels, were too 
 slightly built for war purposes. The following unarmed steamers belonged 
 
 to my command, viz. : The IPhcenix, Capt. , tender to the Manassas; 
 
 the W. Burton, Capt. Hammond, tender to fhe Louisiana, and the Landis, 
 Capt. Davis, tender to the Louisiana. The following-named steamers, 
 chartered by the army, were placed under my orders, viz. : The Mosher, 
 
 Capt. Sherman, a very small tug ; the Belle Algerine, Capt. , a 
 
 small tug ; the Star, Capt. La Place, used as a telegraph station, and the 
 Musio, Capt. McClellan, tender to the forts. The two former were in bad 
 condition, and were undergoing such repairs as could be made below pre- 
 vious to the 24th. On arriving below I delivered to Capt. Stephenson 
 written orders from Major Gen. M. Lovell, requiring him to place all the 
 Biver Defence gunboats under my orders, which consisted of the follow- 
 ing converted tow boats, viz.: 1st, the Warrior, under the immediate 
 
383 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 command of Capt. Stephenson ; 2d, the Stonewall Jackson, Capt. Philips; 
 3d, the Resolute, Capt. Hooper- 4th, the Defiance, Capt. McCoy, and 5th, the 
 
 General Lovell, . The B. J. Breokenridge , joined 
 
 the evening before the action. All of the above vessels mounted from 
 one to two pivot thirty-two pounders each, some of them rifled. Their 
 boilers and machinery were all more or less protected by thick double 
 pine barricades, filled in with compressed cotton, which, though not re- 
 garded as proof against heavy solid shot, shell, and incendiary projectiles, 
 would have been a protection against grape and canister, and ought to 
 have inspired those on board with sufficient confidence to use their boats 
 boldly as rams, for which they were in a good measure prepared with flat 
 bar iron casing around their bows. In thus using them their own safety 
 would be best consulted, as well as the best way of damaging the vessels 
 of the enemy." ^ 
 
 In the " Naval History of the Civil War," Admiral Porter 
 says : " The machinery (of the Louisiana) consisting of twin 
 screw engines, and central paddles, was unfinished, and her 
 inactivity at the time of the fight was due to that fact." With 
 that knowledge of the cause of the Louisiana's "inactivity," 
 Admiral Porter, in the Century for April, 1885, attempts to 
 cast an imputation upon Commodore Mitchell by saying: 
 
 "Fortunately for us. Commodore Mitchell was not equal to the occa- 
 sion, and the Louisiana remained tied up to the bank, where she could 
 not obstruct the river or throw the Union fleet into confusion while pass- 
 ing the forts." 
 
 On the 33d of April. Gen. Duncan wrote to Commodore 
 Mitchell : 
 
 " It is of vital importance that the present fire of the enemy should 
 be withdrawn from us, which you alone can do. This can be done in the 
 manner suggested this morning under the cover of our guns, while your 
 work on the boat can be carried on in safety and security. Our position is a 
 critical one, dependent entirely on the powers of endurance of our case- 
 mates, many of which have been completely shattered, and are crumb- 
 ling away by repeated shocks ; and, therefore, I respectfully but earnestly 
 again urge my suggestion of this morning on your notice. Our magazines 
 are also in danger." 
 
 Upon the receipt of that request Commodore Mitcnell 
 held a consultation with his oflBcers, and it was unanimously 
 and wisely determined that it would be unwise to comply with 
 Gen. Duncan's request, as Lieut. Whittle said : 
 
 "For the reason that it would place her under the fire of the whole 
 Federal fleet commanded by Admiral Farragut without its being in her 
 power to reach them by a single shot, in consequence of her ports not ad- 
 mitting of an elevation of more than five degrees, and, in addition, to the 
 terrific fire of Admiral Porter's mortar fleet, '2,800 shells in twenty-four 
 hours,' any one of which falling upon her unprotected upper deck would 
 have gone through her bottom and sunk her : under which combined fires 
 it would be impossible for any work to be done on our machinery, which 
 we so hoped to complete in time for service when the Federals should 
 come up." 
 
 Fair and just criticism of the conduct of officers on either 
 side of the late war, is proper, and useful to the avoidance of 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 283 
 
 errors and mistakes on future occasions, but the misrepresen- 
 tation and unprofessional innuendoes of Admiral Porter are 
 unworthy alike of an officer and of a historian. 
 
 It is not probable that Admiral Farragut would have 
 steamed on to New Orleans and left the Louisiana^ in his rear, 
 if he had not been aware that she was unable to move from 
 her position at the bank of the river, or if he had formed the 
 opinion of her fighting power which Admiral Porter expressed. 
 
 In aid of the forts and the fleets defending the passage of 
 the river there was a formidable obstruction placed between 
 Forts Jackson and St. Philip, consisting of heavy logs between 
 forty and sixty feet in length, lashed together by large chains 
 across the river under the logs, and fastened on both sides of 
 the river by planting very heavy anchors. There were also 
 about thirty anchors let into the bottom of the river. So pow- 
 erfully had this raft been built and fastened on both shores, 
 and so thoroughly had it been anchored, that it was believed 
 by those who constructed it that nothing save the giving 
 way of the bottom of the Mississippi itself could break it. It 
 was impossible for vessels to pass the forts while the raft 
 was across the river. It held three months, but was swept 
 away finally by the high water, the rapid current and the 
 drift. A steamer and men were constantly employed to at- 
 tend to the raft, and to keep away the drift, etc., which, how- 
 ever, it was found impossible to do. This raft cost not less 
 than $55,000. or $60,000, and had it not been for the un- 
 precedented high water, it is supposed that it would have an- 
 swered the purpose for which it was intended. 
 
 1 Wm. C. "Whittle, Jr., who was third lieuten- The novel conception, which proved entirely 
 
 ant on the Louisiana during the contest against inefficient, was that right in the centre section 
 
 Farragut's fleet in the Mississippi, sent to the of the vessel there was a large well, in which 
 
 Century the following statement concerning her worked the two wheels, one immediately for- 
 
 -armament : ward of the other. I suppose they were so 
 
 "The hull of the Louisiana was almost en- placed to be protected from the enemy's fire, 
 tirely submerged. Upon this were built her " The machinery of these two wheels was in 
 heavy upper works, intended to contain her order when my fattier. Commodore W. C. Whit- 
 battery, machinery, etc. This extended to tie, the naval commanding officer at New Or- 
 within about twenty-five feet of her stem and leans, against his better judgment, was corn- 
 stem, leaving a little deck forward and aft, pelled to send the vessel down to the forts, 
 nearly even with the water, and surrounded by The vessel left New Orleans on the 20th of 
 A slight bulwark. The structure on the huU April, I think. The work on the propellers 
 had its ends and sides inclined inward and up- was Incomplete, the machinists and mechanics 
 ward from the hull, at an angle of about for^- being still on board, and most of the guns were 
 five degrees, and covered with T railroad iron, not mounted. The centre wheels v/ete started, 
 the lower layer being firmly bolted to the wood- but were entirely inefficient, and, as we were 
 work, and the upper layer driven into it drifting helplessly down the stream, tow-boats 
 from the end so as to foi-m a nearly solid plate had to be called to take us down to the point, 
 and a somewhat smooth surface. This plating about half a mile above Fort St. Philip, on the 
 resisted the projectiles of Farragut's fleet mone left side of the river, where we tied up to the 
 of which perforated our side), although one of bank with our bow down stream. Thus, as 
 his largest ships lay across and touching our Farragut's fleet came up and passed, we could 
 stem and in that position fired her heavy guns. only use our bow-guns and the starboard broad- 
 Above this structure was an open deck which side. 
 
 was surrounded by a sheet-iron bulwark about " Moreover, the port-holes for our guns were 
 
 four feet high, which was intended as a protec- entirely faulty, not allowing room to train the 
 
 "tion against sharp-shooters and small arms, but guns either laterally or in elevation. I had 
 
 was entirely inefficient, as the death of our gal- practical experience of this fact, for I had im- 
 
 lant commander, Mcintosh, and those who fell mediate charge of the bow division when a ves- 
 
 around him, goes to prove. sel of Admiral Farragut's fleet got across our 
 
 " The plan for propelling the Louisiana was stem, and I could only fire through and through 
 
 novel and abortive. She had two propellers aft, her at point blank instead of depressing my 
 
 "Which we never bad an opportunity of testing. guns and sinking her." 
 
284 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 After the raft was carried away another obstruction was 
 placed across the river, as soon as possible, by anchoring small 
 vessels, and running chains from one to the other, after their 
 masts were removed. The men worked night and day to ac- 
 complish this. The obstruction thus made remained in posi- 
 tion until within two or three days of the fight, when it too was 
 carried away in a storm by fire vessels breaking adrift above it 
 and coming down against it, which they did with great violence, 
 the current being very rapid and the wind blowing very hard. 
 Vessels were immediately set to work to put this obstruction 
 in position again, but the enemy would not allow them to do 
 it, firing upon them whenever they attempted it. The obstruc- 
 tions between the forts cost not less than $100,000. 
 
 The mending of the obstruction was a work of diflSculty, 
 the breaking of it one of scarcely any labor; so that whether 
 Capt. Bell, when dispatched by Admiral Farragut, found his 
 work anticipated by the current, or was aided by defective 
 patching of the obstructions, is not material. A way was 
 open when the enemy's fleet moved up, on the morning of the 
 24th of April, 1863. The first division of the enemy's fleet, 
 consisting of eight gunboats, under command of Capt. Bailey, 
 moved through the obstruction, having Fort St. Philip for its 
 objective. The Cayuga, flag -ship of Bailey's division, in 
 fifteen minutes had run by both forts, and was above and 
 beyond the range of the guns of Fort St. Philip. Capt. Bailey 
 says he "encountered" the Montgomery flotilla, consisting 
 of eighteen gunboats, including the ram Manassas and the 
 iron battery Louisiana. As the "Montgomery flotilla" never 
 numbered but twelve vessels, and six had been destroyed a 
 month before at Memphis, there were but six of that flotilla at 
 the forts; so, instead of eighteen, Capt. Bailey encountered but 
 six, for that was all that were left of that flotilla. If that was 
 a "moment of anxiety to Capt. Bailey it could not have been 
 produced by the ' Montgomery flotilla,' for they immediately 
 left the scene of the fight, not standing on the order of their 
 going." Commander Beverley Kennon says: 
 
 " Suddenly two, then one Confederate ram darted through the smoke 
 from the right to the left bank of the river, passing close to all of us. 
 They missed the channel for New Orleans, grounded on and around the 
 point above, and close to Fort St. Philip; one was fired and deserted, and 
 blew up soon after, as we passed her; the others, the ram Defiance and 
 ram Mesoluie, were disabled and deserted." 
 
 At the report of the first gun on that morning, Lieut. 
 Warley, on the Manassas, and Commander Beverley Kennon 
 on the Governor Moore, started for the approaching fleet of 
 the enemy. The little tug-boat, the Belle Algerine, was fouled 
 and disabled, but cleared by the Governor Moore, which pressed 
 forward and, hampered for room to gather headway for ram- 
 ming, was compelled to make haste slowly, by moving under 
 the east bank to the bend above, and then to turn down 
 stream. From the bend. Commander Kennon witnessed the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 285 
 
 burning of the telegraph steamer Star, and the companion ship 
 of the Governor Moore, the Quitman, which had been set on 
 fire at their berths on the right bank by the enemy's fleet. 
 
 Once clear of the entanglement with the Louisiana, McEae 
 and the Manassas, and out of the cross-fire of the forts, the 
 Governor Moore encountered the Oneida and the Cayuga, on 
 her port beam. To the hail, "What ship is that?" Com. 
 Kennon replied, " the U. S. steamer Mississippi," which was 
 also a side-wheel steamer; but he could not deceive the com- 
 mander of the Oneida, whose reply was with a starboard 
 broadside at a few feet distance, while the Cayuga Avas not less 
 prompt with another broadside at a distance of thirty yards. 
 The Pensacola or the Brooklyn, the haze of the early morning 
 
 THE C. S, STEAMER "GOVERNOE MOOBE, 
 
 and the smoke of battle preventing the exact distinguish- 
 ing of vessels, poured in a charge of shrapnel from how- 
 itzers in her tops, which killed and wounded twelve men at 
 the guns. The Pinola, five guns, close on the port-quarter 
 of the Governor Moore, delivered a fire which killed five men. 
 This combined attack cut the Moore up very badly, but just 
 then, seeing a large two-masted steamer rushing up stream, 
 and recollecting that Gen. Lovell was on board the Doub- 
 loon, and but a short distance ahead, Com. Kennon moved 
 to engage the steamer, which proved to be the Varuna, 
 which he could see, while a dark background of woods par- 
 tially covered the Moore from observation. The chase for 
 a fight continued for several miles up the river; the Varuna 
 evidently mistaking the Moore for a Federal vessel until 
 Com. Kennon, at broad daylight, revealed his true character 
 by discharging a gun at the Varuna, which promptly ac- 
 cepted battle. At close quarters the two vessels continued 
 
386 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 to pour their shots into each other until, a fair opportunity 
 offering, Com. Kennon rammed the Varuna twice near the 
 starboard gangway — receiving her broadside at the very 
 instant of striking and sinking his enemy, which, as she 
 lay on the bank, was also rammed by the Stonewall Jack- 
 son. The Moore, having finished the Varuna, turned down 
 stream to meet the approaching ships of the enemy. The 
 Oneida had lost time by imperfect information and mis- 
 taken signals, and was not aware that the Varuna was ahead 
 up stream, until Commander Lee came upon the stranded 
 Varuna, and her triumphant foes. As the Moore came round 
 to head down stream, the Oneida fired a shower of heavy pro- 
 jectiles which crashed through the Moore, and swept her decks 
 already nearly without a working or a fighting force. The 
 Oneida's shots quickly disabled the Moore, and she was beached 
 just above the sunken Varuna. Such is the account given by 
 Kennon of the fight between the Varuna and the Moore, but 
 on the other hand, Capt. Boggs, of the Varuna, says: " While 
 still engaged with her [the Moore and not the Morgan, as Capt. 
 Boggs calls Com. Kennon's ship,] another rebel steamer, iron- 
 clad, ' with a prow under water, struck us in the port gangway, 
 doing considerable damage. She backed off for another blow, 
 and struck again in the same place, crashing in the side; but 
 by going ahead fast, the concussion drew our port around, and 
 I was able, with the port guns, to give her, while close along- 
 side, five eight-inch shells abaft her armor. This settled her, 
 and drove her ashore in flames." That could not have been 
 the Stonewall Jackson,iov that vessel escaped and was destroyed 
 thirteen miles above the forts, and out of gunshot of the 
 enemy; and as no other Confederate vessel was present, it is 
 probable that Com. Kennon's account of the disabling and 
 sinking the Varuna is the correct one. Capt. H. W. Morris, of 
 the Pensacola, in his report claims the credit of having fired 
 the shots that disabled the Moore. " The ram (the Moore) 
 after having struck the Varuna gunboat, and forced her to 
 run on shore to prevent sinking, advanced to attack this ship, 
 coming down on us right ahead. She was perceived by Lieut. 
 F. A. Roe, just in time to avoid her by sheering the ship, and 
 she passed close on our starboard side, receiving, as she went, 
 a broadside from us." It is proper to say that in the report of 
 the officers commanding the Cayuga, the Oneida, the Pinola, 
 and the Brooklyn, each claims to have been engaged with the 
 Governor. Moore. If all are correct, she sustained more of the 
 battle than all other Confederate vessels. 
 
 As soon as the enemy's approach was known the McBae 
 stood over towards the opposite side of the river, and was soon 
 engaged by the gunboat Iroquois, to which the McBae gave 
 first one and then the other broadside. Just at that moment 
 the McBae discovered a short distance astern two ships — one 
 
 ^ There was no iron-clad about the Moore or the Stonewall Jackson. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 287 
 
 on each quarter — coming rapidly up. Calling all hands to 
 quarters to repel boarders, which were expected from the 
 approaching steamer, Lieut. Commander Huger was much 
 surprised to see the enemy pass without firing a gun, having 
 mistaken the McRae for one of his own gunboats — but as the 
 McRae stood across the river, the enemy discovered his error 
 and opened with their starboard guns. Lieut. Read says : 
 
 " One of their shells striking us forward, and exploding in the sail- 
 room, set the ship on Are. The engine and deck pumps were immediately- 
 started, taut owing to the combustitale nature of the articles in the sail- 
 room, the flre burned fiercely. The sail-room was separated from the shell 
 lockers by a third bulkhead. The commander directed the ship to be run 
 close into the bank, and ordered me to inform him when the flre shoul d reach 
 the shell locker bulkhead. I repaired to the scene of flre, and succeeded 
 in smothering and extinguishing it. Two large ships and three gunboats 
 were now engaging us, at a distance of about 300 yards. "We backed off 
 the bank with the intention of dropping down near the forts, when the 
 Manassas came to our relief. She steered for the enemy's vessels, and as 
 soon as they discovered her, they started up the river. 
 
 "Just as we were backing off the bank, Lieut. Commanding T. B. Hu- 
 ger fell severely wounded. ^ I now directed the course of the vessel across 
 and up the river, flring the starboard guns as rapidly as possible, and, I 
 think, with much accuracy. We soon reached a position which furnished 
 a view of the river around the flrst bend above the forts, where I discov- 
 ered eleven of the enemy, and not deeming it prudent to engage a force 
 so vastly superior to my own, I determined to retire under the guns of the 
 forts. Having dropped a short distance, and getting into an eddy, I 
 thought it best to turn and steam down; as the ship was turning, the 
 tiller ropes parted. The ship was instantly stopped, and the engines re- 
 versed, but too late to avoid striking the bank. I endeavored to back her 
 oflf the shore, but could not succeed. One of the river fleet, called the 
 Resolute, had been run ashore early in the morning, just above where we 
 were now lying, and had a white flag flying. I sent Lieut. Arnold, with 
 ten men on board of her, with orders to haul down the white flag, and 
 fight her guns as long as possible. 
 
 "At 6:30 the enemy stood up the river — and as soon as our guns would 
 no longer bear we ceased firing. At 7 a tow-boat came up from the forts, 
 and hauled us off. 
 
 "The MoRae received three shots through her hull — all near the 
 water-line. Most of the enemy's shell passed over us; every stay was car- 
 ried away, and three-fourths of the shrouds. One shell passed through 
 the smoke-stack — also, a number of grape. 
 
 " The sides of the ship received a large number of grape and canister 
 which did not pass through. The enemy's firing upon the whole was very 
 bad." 
 
 The centre division of the Federal fleet, composed of the 
 Hartford, Brooklyn and Richmond, under Admiral Farragut, 
 followed the leading division through the obstructions, and, 
 
 1 Lieut. Thomas B. Huger, who died in New The Navy Register of 1&61 gave Lieut. Huger 
 
 Orleans on the 25th of April, 1862, from wounds sixteen years and three months of sea service, 
 
 received in the engagement with the TJ. S. fleet three years shore duty, and six years and six 
 
 on the day before, was a son of Dr. Benj. Huger, months imemployed. At the time he resigned 
 
 of Charleston. South Carolina. He belonged to from the XT. S. navy, he was First Lieutenant of 
 
 a family which has always borne honorable con- the steam sloop Iroquois, on the Mediterranean 
 
 nection with the history of the United States. Station, and was among the first to tender his 
 
 He was appointed in the navy as midshipman resignation. He was a brave and chivalric offi- 
 
 on the 5th of March. 1836, and made his first oer, and his death was lamented by his associ- 
 
 eruise in the ship-oif-the-line Nortk Carolina. ates in the C. S. navy. 
 
388 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 passing the forts, was met by the Confederate tug Mosher, 
 whose brave captain, Sherman, pushed a burmng raft along- 
 side the Hartford, under the very muzzles of her guns. The 
 flames quickly leaped up the sides and rigging, and the mizzen 
 shrouds were instantly afire. The disciphned crew responded 
 to the call for firemen, and the flames were soon extinguished. 
 This attack showed what might have been done if the material 
 wasted in rafts abandoned singly to the current had been ex- 
 pended in organized attack of several rafts at a time, con- 
 trolled by steam-power and launched at propitious moments. 
 This incident Admiral Farragut mentioned on the same day 
 in a letter to Capt. Porter, saying: " The ram (it was a tug- 
 boat) pushed a flre-raft on me, and, in trying to avoid it, I 
 ran the ship on shore. He again pushed the raft on me, and 
 set the ship on fire all along one side. I thought it was all up 
 with us, but we put it out and got off again, proceeding up the 
 river, fighting our way." Porter says: " The fire was a sharp 
 one; and, at times, rushing through the ports, would drive the 
 men back from the guns. Seeing this, Farragut called out: 
 ' Don't flinch from that fire, boys; there's a hotter fire than 
 that for those who don't do their duty! Give that rascally 
 little tug a shot, and don't let her get off with a whole coat.' " 
 Commander Albert Kautz, who was at this time lieutenant 
 on the Hartford, in a letter to the editor of the Century, thus 
 describes this memorable scene: 
 
 " No sooner had Farragut given the order ' Hard-a-port,' than the 
 current gave the ship a broad shear, and her hows went hard up on a 
 mud-bank. As the fire-raft came against the port side of the ship, it be- 
 came enveloped in flames. We were so near to the shore that from the 
 bowsprit we could reach the tops of the bushes, and such a short distance 
 above Fort St. Philip that we could distinctly hear the gunners in the case- 
 mates give their orders; and as they saw Farragut's flag at the mizzen, by 
 the bright light, they fired with frightful rapidity. Fortunately, they 
 did not make sufficient allowance for our close proximity, and the iron hail 
 passed over our bulwarks, doing but little damage. On the deck of the 
 ship it was as bright as noonday, but out over the majestic river, where 
 the smoke of many guns was intensified by that of the pine-knots of the 
 fire-rafts, it was dark as the blackest midnight. For a moment it looked 
 as though the flag-ship was indeed doomed, but the firemen were called 
 awaj', and, with the energy of despair, rushed aft to the quarter-deck. 
 The flames, like so many forked tongues of hissing serpents, were pierc- 
 ing the air in a frightful manner, that struck terror to all hearts. As I 
 crossed from the starboard to the port side of the deck, I passed close to 
 Farragut, who, as he looked forward and took in the situation, clasped 
 his hands high in air, and exclaimed, ' My God, is It to end in this way 1 ' 
 Fortunately, it was not to end as it at that instant seemed, for just then 
 Master's Mate Allen, with the hose in his hand, jumped into the mizzen 
 rigging, and the sheet of flame succumbed to a sheet of water. It was but 
 the dry paint on the ship's side that made the threatening flame, and it 
 went down before the fierce attack of the firemen as rapidly as it had 
 sprung up. As the flames died away, the engines were backed 'hard,' 
 and, as if providentially, the ram Manassan struck the ship a blow under 
 the counter, which shoved her stern in against the bank, causing her bow 
 to slip off. The ship was again free; and a loud, spontaneous cheer rent 
 the air as the crew rushed to their guns with renewed energy." 
 
LIEUTENANT THOMAS B. HUGEE, 
 
 CONFEDKRAIE STATES NAVY, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 389 
 
 The disagreement briefly stated in these extracts, was a 
 material matter in the responsibility which rested on the 
 officers of the Confederate army and navy, to whom was en- 
 trusted the defence of New Orleans. To a complete under- 
 standing of the situation and to ascertain the reasons of the 
 disagreement between the commanding officers in the forts 
 and afloat, the accompanying diagram will illustrate the posi- 
 tions taken by Commander Mitchell as well as that indicated 
 and desired by Gen. Duncan. 
 
 In his testimony before the Confederate Court of Inquiry 
 upon the fall of New Orleans, Gen. Duncan says, that on 
 April 33, " everything afloat, including the tow-boats and the 
 entire control of the fire barges, was turned over to Capt. 
 John K. Mitchell, C. S. navy," that : 
 
 " In an interview with Capt. Mitchell, on the morning of this date, I 
 learned that the motive power of the Louisiana was not likely to be com- 
 pleted within any reasonable time, and that in consequence it was not 
 within the range of probabilities that she could be regarded as an 
 aggressive steamer, or that she could be brought into the pending action 
 in that character. As an iron-clad invulnerable floating battery, with 
 sixteen guns of the heaviest caUbre, however, she was then as complete 
 as she would ever be. 
 
 "Fort Jackson had already undergone and was still subjected to a 
 terrible fire of thirteen-inch mortar-shells, which it was necessary to re- 
 lieve at once to prevent the disabling of all the best guns at the fort; and, 
 although Port St. Philip partially opened out the point of woods con- 
 ceaUng the enemy and gallantly attempted to dislodge him or draw his 
 flre, he nevertheless doggedly persisted in his one main object of battering 
 Fort Jackson. Under these circumstances I considered that the Louisi- 
 ana could only be regarded as a battery, and that her best possible posi- 
 tion would be below the raft, close in on the Fort St. Philip shore, where 
 her fire could dislodge the mortar-boats from behind the point of woods 
 and ^ive sufficient respite to Fort Jackson to repair in extenso. This 
 position (X on the accompanying diagram) would give us three direct 
 cross-fires upon the enemy's approaches and at the same time ensure the 
 Louisiana from a direct assault, as she would be immediately under the 
 guns of both forts. Accordingly, I earnestly and strongly urged these 
 views upon Capt. Mitchell in a letter of this date (copy lost), but without 
 avail, as will be seen' by his reply, attached as document D.^ 
 
 1 [Inclosuxe D.] these circumstances it would, in my estimation, 
 
 CoNFEDEKATE STATES Steamee " LOUISIANA,") be hazarding too much to place her under the 
 
 Off Foet Jaceson, La., April 22, 1862. ) fire of the enemy. Every eflfort is being made 
 
 Qenebal; I have the honor to acknowledge to prepare herfor the relief of Fort Jackson, the 
 
 the receipt of yours of this date, asking me to condition of which-is fully felt by me, and the 
 
 place tla& Louisiana in position below the raft very moment I can venture to face our enemy 
 
 this evening, if possible. This vessel was hurried with any reasonable chance of success, be as- 
 
 away from New Orleans before the steam power sured, general, I will do it, and trust that the 
 
 and batteries were ready for service, without a result will show you that I am now pursuing 
 
 crew, and in many other respects very incom- the right course. 
 
 plete, and this condition of things is but parti- I am, very respectfully, your obedient ser- 
 
 aUy remedied now. She is not yet prepared to vant, juo K. Mitchell, 
 
 ?f^»,«''Ih! w enemy. but shouldhe attempt Commanding C. S. Naval Forcea, lower 
 
 to pass the forts, we will do all we can to pre- w,-..i«fimii 
 
 Ihe wd-^«l^'i7^ -1?" *^^ P""^""" ?*"''' ^\*I G=™«*^ JOH^ON k!*Duhoa», 
 
 for^IhA? ,^t ^^t^^r*^"" J''""'t°,'""'^^'*'' ™i8''* Omnmanding Coast Defences, F«rt Jaekson. La. 
 
 rorce her mto action, inadequately prepared as „ „ ™ ^ , .i.. l ,. t.t o n 
 
 she is at this moment. ^ ' ' -^ p g__xiie Jackson, with Launch No. 3, will 
 
 We have now at work on board about fifty go »P *» ^^^ quarantine this afternoon to 
 
 mechanics, as well as her own crew and those watch the enemy, as suggested in your note 
 
 from other vessels, doing work essential to the til" morning. Respectfully, etc., 
 
 preparation of the vessel for battle. Under J. K. M. 
 19 
 
29U 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES KAVY. 
 
 "Being so deeply impressed myself with the importance of this posi- 
 tion for the Lousiana and of the necessity of prompt action in order to 
 ensure the success of the impending struggle, I again urged this subject 
 
 DIAGRAM OF BOMBAKDMKNT OP FORTS JACKSON AND ST. PHILIP, APRIL 16TH-19XH. 1862. 
 
 upon Capt. Mitchell, during the latter part of the same day, as absolutely 
 mdispensable and imperative to the safety of New Orleans and to the 
 control of the lower Mississippi. My efforts were ineffectual to get him 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 291 
 
 to move the boat from her original position above the forts. His reply is 
 attached, as document E, in which he is sustained by all the naval officers 
 present having the command of vessels. 
 
 " I also addressed him two other notes through the day — one in re- 
 gard to sending the flre barges against the enemy, and the other relative 
 to keeping a vigilant lookout from all his vessels, and askmg for co-oper- 
 ation should the enemy attempt to pass during the night. 
 
 " Bombardnient continued throughout the day and night, being at 
 times very heavy. During the day our fire was principally confined to 
 shelling the point of woods from both forts, and apparently with good 
 reeults, as the mortar flre was slackened toward evening. The casemates 
 were very much cut up by the enemy's flre, which was increased at night. 
 
 "There was little or no success in sending down flre barges as usual, 
 owing in j)art to the condition of the tow-boats Mosher, Mtisto and Belle 
 Algerine, in charge of the same, explained by attached document G. This 
 does not excuse the neglect, however, as there were six boats of the river 
 fleet available for this service, independent of those alluded to, and fire 
 barges were plentiful. 
 
 " April 33. — The day broke warm, clear and cloudless. No immediate 
 relief being looked for from our fleet, the entire command was turned out to 
 repair damages under a very heavy flre of the enemy. 
 
 " The bombardment continued without intermission throughout the 
 day, but slackened off about 13 m., at which hour there was every indi- 
 cation of an exhaustion on the part of the mortar flotilla; hence it be- 
 came evident that the tactics of the enemy would necessarily be changed 
 into an attack with broa Asides by his larger vessels. In consequence, 
 these views were laid before Capt. Mitchell, and he was again urged to 
 place the Louisiana at the point before mentioned, below the raft and 
 near the Fort St. Philip bank of the river, to meet the emergency. 
 (See attached document H.) Capt. Mitchell's reply is attached, in docu- 
 ments E, I, J, and K, wherein he positively declines again to assume the 
 only position which offered us every possible chance of success, and Capts. 
 [Chas. F.] Mcintosh, [Thomas B.] Huger, and Warley sustain Capt. 
 Mitchell in his views of the case. 
 
 "Just before sundown, under a very heavy mortar flre, the enemy 
 sent up a small boat, and a series of white flags were planted on the Fort 
 St. Philip bank of the river, commencing about 350 yards above the lone 
 tree upon that shore. (See diagram.) 
 
 "This confirmed my previous views of an early and different attack 
 from the usual mortar bombardment, especially as I presumed that these 
 flags indicated the positions to be taken up by the several vessels in their 
 new line of operations. 
 
 " As nothing was to be expected from the Louisiana after the corre- 
 spondence during the day, I could only inform Capt. Mitchell of this new 
 movement of the enemy (see attached document L), and particularly im- 
 press upon him the necessity of keeping the river well lit up with flre 
 barges, to act as an impediment to the enemy and assist the accuracy of 
 our fire in a night attack. 
 
 "Lieut. [Geo. 8.] Shryoek, C. S. N. (Capt. Mitchell's aide\ came on 
 shore about 9 p. m. to inform me that the Louisiana would be ready for 
 service by the next evening— the evening of the 34th. I informed him that 
 time was everything to us, and that to-morrow would in all probabiUty 
 prove too late. Lieut. Col. Higgins warmly seconded my opinion, 
 and warned Lieut. Shryoek that the final battle was imminent within a 
 few hours. 
 
 " In regard to lightingthe river, Lieut. Shryoek stated that flre barges 
 would be regularly sent down throughout the night every two hours, and 
 as none had been sent up to that hour (9:30 p. M.), he left, informing me 
 that this matter would be attended to as soon as he arrived on board. To 
 my utter surprise, not one single flre barge was sent down the river, not- 
 withstanding, at any hour of this night. It was impossible for us to send 
 
292 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 them down, as everything afloat had been turned over to Capt. Mitchell 
 by order of the major general commanding, and the fire barges and the 
 boats to tow them into the stream were exclusively under his control. In 
 consequence of this criminal neglect, the river remained in complete dark- 
 ness throughout the entire night. The bombardment continued all night 
 and grew furious toward morning." 
 
 The reply of Commander Mitchell, which is referred to by 
 Gen. Duncan as inclosure E, is accompanied, as he states, by 
 the concurring views of his subordinate officers as to the im- 
 practicability of placing the Louisiana at point X, in the dia- 
 gram; but he added, that through the labors of the mechanics 
 then at work on the Louisiana he hoped " that by to-morrow 
 night the motive power of the Louisiana will be ready, and 
 that in the meantime her battery will be in place and other 
 preparations will be completed so as to enable her to act 
 against the enemy. When ready you will be immediately 
 advised." 
 
 Though the darkness and smoke of battle prevented Gen. 
 Duncan from observing how the Louisiana was fought, he 
 was able, notwithstanding the obscuring media, to observe 
 the Defiance, the Manassas, the McRae, the Resolute, the 
 Warrior, and the enemy's fleet. The disappointment and 
 chagrin of defeat, it is probable, may have made Gen. Duncan 
 dissatisfied with the reasons of Commander Mitchell and his 
 officers for not complying with the request to take position in 
 the Louisiana below the forts, but in the light of all the facts 
 and circumstances now available, the refusal of Commander 
 Mitchell will be sustained by military and naval critics. That 
 " to-morrow " came heralded by the passage of the forts by 
 the enemy's fleet, and thus the opportunity was lost, cannot 
 be charged upon the conduct of Com. Mitchell, but must be 
 credited to the enterprise and dash of Farragut, who waited 
 not for the completion of the Confederate defences, but took 
 advantage of their incompleteness and steamed past the forts 
 and the fleet. The incompleteness of the Louisiana, and the 
 unfinished condition of the Mississippi, were due to circum- 
 stances, perhaps, beyond control of the Confederate Navy 
 Department, but there were defects of organization — in this, 
 that there were two separate and distinct organizations afloat — 
 one under the Secretary of War and the other under the 
 Secretary of the Navy, entirely independent of each other; 
 and, though cordially co-operating, yet doing so under differ- 
 ent and sometimes conflicting orders. 
 
 During the proceedings of the Court of Inquiry the Judge 
 Advocate raised the point that the court had no jurisdiction 
 to inquire into and pronounce upon the official conduct of the 
 naval officers in command at or near the forts, and after 
 hearing argument upon the point, the court directed that " the 
 order convening the court did not restrict its investigation to 
 the conduct of Major Gen. Mansfield Lovell and the troops 
 of his command except as to the mere evacuation of the city. 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 293 
 
 In relation to the capture of the city the words of the order 
 preclude the idea of such restriction, and they do not imply it 
 in respect to the defence. "It is required of the court, too, 
 in these matters, to examine into the attending facts and cir- 
 cumstances, without limit as to persons or arm of the serv- 
 ice" — so the witnesses were permitted to enter into naval as 
 well as army matters. In the Report of Facts the Court found 
 that: " Between Gen. Lovell and the naval officers on duty 
 in Department No. 1 there existed good feeling and a desire 
 to co-operate for the public defence." Gen. Lovell often sup- 
 
 Elied tne navy with guns and ammunition. During the bom- 
 ardment it was designed by Gens. Lovell and Duncan that 
 the Louisiana should be placed in a position from which they 
 thought she could enfilade and drive off the mortar-fleet of 
 the enemy, but this request was not complied with — Com. J. K. 
 Mitchell, commanding the defences afloat, alleging in reply, 
 that the Louisiana was without motive power, and in the posi- 
 tion indicated her guns could not be given sufficient elevation 
 to reach the enemy, while she would be in full range of his 
 mortar-fleet, and that her top-deck was flat and vulnerable. 
 These statements are proven to be true. He also added, as 
 his opinion, sustained by a council of naval officers, that "the 
 desired movement would result in the destruction of the ves- 
 sel by the enemy," and upon that flnding of facts, the opinion 
 of the court was that " the non-completion of the iron-clad 
 gunboats Louisiana and Mississippi made it impossible for the 
 navy to co-operate efficiently with Gen. Lovell." 
 
 The following is the finding and opinion of the Naval 
 Court of Inquiry into the official conduct of Commander 
 Mitchell: 
 
 " C. S. Navy Department, Richmond, Dec. 5, 1863. 
 " Finding and opinion of a Naval Court of Inquiry, convened in the 
 city of Richmond, Va., January 5, 1863, by virtue of the following pre- 
 cepts • 
 
 " C. S. Navy Department, 
 " Office of Orders and Detail, 
 
 " Richmond, December 34, 1863. 
 " Sir : By order of the Secretary of the Navy you are hereby ap- 
 pointed president of a court of inquiry to be convened in this city on the 
 5th of January next. 
 
 " Capt. S. S. Lee and Commander Robt. G. Robb have been ordered 
 to report to you and with you will compose the court. 
 
 " Mr. George Lee Brent will report to you as recorder. Tou will in- 
 quire into the whole ofiBcial conduct of Commander John K. Mitchell, 
 C. S. N., while in command of the steamer Louisiana and in charge of the 
 vessels of the Confederate navy at and below New Orleans and report the 
 same to this department, with your opinion whether the said oiHcer did 
 or did not do all in his power to sustain the honor of the flag and pre- 
 vent the enemy from ascending the Mississippi River, and if he did not to 
 what extent did he fail so to do. 
 
 " Respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 " F. Forrest, Chief of Bureau. 
 '^Flag-officer Samuel Barron, C. S. N., commanding, etc., James 
 River, Va.'''' 
 
 .\ 
 
394 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 FINDINa OF THE COURT. 
 
 "That Commander Mitchell assumed command of the Louisiana at 
 New Orleans on the 20th of April, 1862, and from that time until the de- 
 struction of the vessel only a period of eight days was embraced. 
 
 '' That the whole force under his command consisted of fhe Louisiana, 
 the McRae, the Manassas, the Jackson and one launch. 
 
 " That on the day he took command Capt. Mitchell descended the 
 River Mississippi in the Louisiana and took up a position on the left bank 
 of the river, about half a mile above Fort St. Philip. 
 
 " That on leaving New Orleans the machinery of the Louisiana was 
 incomplete, her motive power imperfect and her battery improperly 
 mounted. That she could not on a fair trial stem the current of the Mis- 
 sissippi with her own motive power aided by two steam tugs. 
 
 " That every exertion -was made by Commander Mitchell, the oflB- 
 cers and mechanics, to get the Louisiana in a proper state of efBciency 
 for defence of the passage of the river, and that the defects in mounting 
 the battery had been remedied and the battery served with efficiency, 
 with the exception of two guns out of place. It appears that a request, 
 or order, was sent by Gen. Duncan, commanding Fort Jackson, to Com- 
 mander Mitchell to change the position of the Louisiana to a point lower 
 down the stream, which, by a council of officers, was unanimously deemed 
 .impracticable, and to a certain extent impossible on account of the great 
 depth of water, and that such change of position would endanger the 
 safety of the Louisiana. That in the position Gen. Duncan desired the 
 Louisiana to assume she would have been in range of the mortar boats 
 of the enemy and perfectly helpless, inasmuch as she could not give her 
 guns more than five degrees elevation, not enough to reach the enemy. 
 That the best disposition possible was made of the vessels under the com- 
 mand of Commodore Mitchell to resist the passage of the enemy. 
 
 " That on the 24th of April the enemy appeared and his passage was 
 hotly contested by the Louisiana, the McRae and the Manassas. That 
 the JacUson was previously sent up the river to guard certain passes and 
 the launch down the river to signal the approach of the enemy, and that 
 they took no part in the fight. That every possible resistance was offered 
 by the vessels mentioned to the passage of the enemy up the river. 
 
 " That at no time was the Louisiana able to leave her moorings and 
 pursue the enemy, from want of sufficient motive power. That the inter- 
 val between the passage of the enemy and the destruction of the Louisi- 
 ana (four days) was employed in completing the machinery, to render her 
 more able to cope with the enemy, and that it was Commander Mitchell's 
 intention to make an attack when the ioitmawa was capable of doing so. 
 
 "That Commander Mitchell, when he heard that Gen. Duncan, in 
 command of Fort Jackson, had accepted the terms of surrender offered 
 the day before by Capt. Porter, U. S. N., remonstrated with Gen. Dun- 
 can against such a course, but was told it was too late, as a fiag of truce 
 boat had already been sent ; that the enemy appeared in overwhelming 
 force, and that at the time it was determined in council to destroy the 
 Louisiana the position of affairs was as follows : There were from ten to 
 fourteen large vessels of Flag-offlcer Farragut's fleet above the Louisiana 
 and the mortar fleet and gunboats of Capt. Porter were below. Two ves- 
 sels of the enemy, with white flags flying, were coming up the river in 
 sight to accept the surrender of Forts Jackson and St. Philip, which had 
 white flags in answer to them. That the Louisiana could not move from 
 "where she was moored to the bank, nor could she flre on the boats with 
 flags of truce flying, and in a short time the forts would be in the hands 
 of the enemy and the Louisiana between them. It was then unanimously 
 determined in a council of the officers to destroy the Louisiana, as it was 
 the only course left to prevent her from falling into the hands of the 
 enemy. This destruction was accordingly effected under the direction 
 and supervision of Commander Mitchell, in an orderly and deliberate 
 manner, and every precaution was taken to insure the safety of his men. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 295 
 
 OPINIOlf. 
 " And the court is of the opinion, from all the evidence adduced, that 
 Commander Mitchell did all in his power to sustain the honor of the flag 
 and to prevent the enemy from ascending the Mississippi River, and that 
 his conduct and bearing throughout the period of his service while in 
 command of the vessels of the navy for the defence of the Mississippi 
 River, under the trying and embarrassing circumstances under which he 
 was placed, was all that could be expected by the country and the naval 
 service of a capable and gallant ofQcer. 
 
 " 8. Barron, Flag-officer, 
 
 '■^President of the Court. 
 " Geo. Lbb Brent, Recorder.'''' 
 
 "Navy DbpArtmbnt, March 17th, 1863. 
 " Proceedings and finding approved. Office of Orders and Detail will 
 dissolve the court. 
 
 "8. R. Mallory, Secretary of the Navy.'' 
 
 "C. 8. Navy Department, 1 
 
 "Office of Orders and Detail, \ 
 " Richmond, March 18th, 1863. ) 
 " Flag-officer S'. Barron^ Commanding, etc. 
 
 "Sir— The Naval Court of Inquiry on Commander Mitchell, of which 
 you are the presiding officer, is hereby dissolved. The court convened in 
 this city on the 5th of January, and has been continued thus long in ses 
 sion awaiting the attendance of Gen. Mansfield Lovell and Lieut. Col. 
 Edward Higgins, "who were summoned to appear before it as witnesses 
 by orders from the War Department. Learning that one of these gentle- 
 men, Lieut. Col. Higgins, cannot be spared from his present command, 
 and that Gen. Lovell has made no answer to the summons from the War 
 Department, although they have been more than two months .since sum- 
 moned again and again, there is no course left but to dissolve the court, 
 which is done accordingly, and you will so inform the members and the 
 Judge Advocate. Ton will be pleased to have this letter, or a certified 
 copy, spread upon the records of the court. 
 
 "Respectfully your obedient servant, 
 
 "r. Forrest, Chief of Bureau. 
 " The foregoing is ordered to be published for the information of aU 
 whom it may concern. 
 
 "8. R. MAXiiORY, Beer etary of the Navy''' 
 
 The tug escaped from the Hartford, though afterwards 
 she was destroyed. The Brooklyn followed the Hartford 
 through the obstructions, but as soon as she appeared above 
 the forts was engaged hy the Manassas, Lieut. Com. A. F. 
 Warley, who made directly for the Brooklyn's starboard side, 
 which he struck twice but the Brooklyn's chain protection turned 
 the blows, which glanced from her side, and in the darkness 
 the Manassas passed astern of the Brooklyn and turned up the 
 river, where, near quarantine, the Mississippi turned and at- 
 tempted to run the Manassas down, but by a quick turn of the 
 helm, the ram escaped the blow, but ran ashore, where her in- 
 jection pipes were cut by her crew and she drifted afterwards 
 away from the bank and sank below the forts. The Manas- 
 sas proved herself to be the most troublesome ship in the Con- 
 federate fleet. At different times in that dark morning she 
 rammed the Brooklyn, the Hartford, and the Mississippi. 
 
296 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 A writer in the Army and Navy Journal, controverting- 
 the right of the crew of the Mississippi to bounty money for 
 her destruction, says: 
 
 " It is certainly true that the Mississippi destroyed the Manassas by 
 pouring a broadside into her, which punched several holes in her armor, 
 and set her on fire, so that her small crew were glad to run her on shore 
 and abandon her. I beUeve she afterwards drifted off, and, passing the 
 forts, occasioned something of a panic among the mortar schooners, who 
 took her for a live, and not a defenceless monster. The Mississippi, 
 however, was ordered to the duty of destroying her. She turned down 
 stream to meet her coming up, in consequence of an order from the Hart- 
 ford, and, going down, pressed the Kineo, Lieut. Com. Ransom, to assist 
 her. The meeting was witnessed by all, or nearly all, the fleet, and was 
 watched as one of the pretty things of that fight, being performed ia 
 broad dayhght. Why, then, should the Mississippi be singled out to re- 
 ceive bounty for the destruction of that rebel ram ?" 
 
 Who should have the money? is an unimportant question 
 to any but the recipient, but the facts upon which any money 
 
 THE BAM ' ' MANASSAS AS SHE APPEASED AFTER BKINO SET ON FIHE BT HEB COMMANDEE, 
 
 was awarded ought to have been first settled. Capt. Smith, 
 of the Mississippi, asserts having fired a broadside into the 
 Manassas, but did that broadside, which laid the foundation of 
 the claim for bounty, destroy the Manassas? That it did not is 
 established by Lieut. Read, who says that "at 8:30 we anchored 
 near the Louisiana, while we were aground the ram Manassas 
 was discovered floating helplessly down the river. I sent a boat 
 to her and ascertained that she was uninjured, but had her in- 
 jection pipes cut, and that it would be impossible to save her." 
 
 The whole Federal fleet, except the Itasca, Kennebec, 
 Winona and the mortar boats as they passed the forts, was 
 met by the Louisiana lashed to the shore, and able to use 
 but a part of her battery, yet receiving uninjured the broadside 
 of nearly every Federal vessel. 
 
 Admiral Farragut, convinced that the Louisiana tied to 
 the bank, however formidable she might be to an attacking 
 party, was harmless herself to assault, left her, and sailed 
 
COMMANDER JOHN K. MITCHELL. 
 
 CONFEDERATE STATES KAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 397 
 
 with his whole fleet that was above the forts, to New Orleans. 
 Around the Louisiana lay the McRae and the Resolute, with 
 the tender Landis. 
 
 William C. Whittle, Jr., third lieutenant of the Louisi- 
 ana, says: 
 
 " The Louisiana had used her guns against all of the Federal fleet as 
 they passed, and every man had fought bravely and well, and chafed un- 
 der their powerlessness from causes and defects beyond their efforts to 
 correct to do more. There she lay, with her little flag bravely flying, after 
 having resisted every projectile from Admiral Farragut's fleet. 
 
 " The guns used during the action on board the Louisiana were those 
 of the bow division, pointing down the river, and those of the starboard 
 broadside division, pointing across the river, the former consisting of two 
 nine-inch smooth-bore shell guns, and one seven-inch rifle, and the latter, 
 I think, one 32 pound rifle and two eight-inch smooth-bores. 
 
 " Of the bow division 1 had immediate command. I was the third 
 lieutenant. During the conflict, one of the largest of Admiral Farragut's 
 fleet, as if her steering gear was disarranged, was caught in the eddy cur- 
 rent and came right athwart our hawse, her starboard side nearly if not 
 actually touching our stem, with only the length of our short forward 
 deck outside of her armor between her side and our armor. In that posi- 
 tion we received her flre without any shot perforating, and the three guns 
 of my division were fired as fast as they could be loaded and discharged. 
 But here the abortively constructed port-holes prevented our depressing 
 our guns to sink her. 
 
 " It was at this time that our brave commander, Charles F. Mcintosh, 
 received his death wounds. ' When this vessel was placed in this position, 
 as if anticipating that she intended to try to board us, and chafing under 
 the forced inactivity of our vessel, he called away his men to repel the at- 
 tack and gallantly led them to the upper deck, when he was shot down, 
 as were numbers of his brave followers. A braver man or set of men never 
 gave up their Uves to any cause." 
 
 Statements and counterstatements, all differing and dis- 
 agreeing in language and purport have been made as to the 
 destruction of the Louisiana, and questions of honor raised 
 as to Commodore Mitchell's destroying the vessels while flags 
 of truce were flying over the forts and over the enemy's ves- 
 sels. As there existed no power of command on the part of 
 Gen. Duncan over the C. S. fleet which Commodore Mitchell 
 commanded, each officer was free to follow his own dictates 
 of duty. That Commodore Mitchell, in destroying the Louis- 
 iana, took caution that no injury should fall to the enemy's 
 fleet while under the flag of truce, is abundantly shown by 
 the sequel as well as proven by the statement of Lieut. Wm. 
 C. Whittle, Jr., who says : 
 
 " I think it was on April 27th that Commodore Mitchell was informed 
 by Gen. Duncan that he had received a demand from Admiral Porter to 
 surrender and offering terms of capitulation, and that he had perempto- 
 rily refused. Our work was still going on, night and day, on our machin- 
 ery. The next morning we were to test the efficiency of it. At daylight 
 a note from Gen. Duncan came off to say that during the night a portion 
 of his garrison had mutinied or deserted and that, not knowingthe extent 
 of the disaffection, he had determined to accept the terms offered by Porter. 
 
 1 Commander McIntoBh died on the 28th of April, 1862. 
 
298 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " Commodore Mitchell was, of course, astonished and, jumping into 
 a boat, went ashore and aslied if the note was genuine. The reply was 
 that it was. He learned that a portion of the garrison of Fort Jack- 
 son, from New Orleans, becoming uneasy about their families, had de- 
 serted. He remonstrated and urged that the garrison of St. Phihp was 
 true, as was the crew of the Louisiana, but he was told that it was too 
 late, as a messenger had been dispatched. 
 
 " Commodore Mitchell returned to the Louisiana. Admiral Porter's 
 fleet, led by the flagship, Harriet Lane, was then seen coming up under 
 a flag of truce, in reply to a flag of truce on Port Jackson. A consulta- 
 tion was called by Commodore Mitchell. The decision was, that with an 
 enemy above, an enemy below soon to be in possession of our forts, with 
 limited supplies, no reliable motive power, to destroy the vessel. 
 
 " An orderly but rapid transfer to the unarmed tender Landis -visls 
 made, and the magazines and charges in our guns were drowned as far as 
 practicable. Commodore Mitchell, laeuts. Wilkinson, Ward and I were the 
 last to leave the Louisiana, after firing her effectually. Commodore 
 Mitchell then called me to him and told me to go in a boat indicated to 
 Admiral Porter's flagship, then anchored off Fort Jackson, distant about 
 a mile, and say to him, with his comphments, that he had fired the Louisi- 
 ana and drowned, as far as he could, the magazines and charges in the 
 guns, but that she was secured to the bank with rope fasts, which 
 might burn, and as he was indisposed to do him any damage while 
 under a flag of truce, in answer to a similar flag from the forts, he notified 
 him in case his burning ship should drift down among his fleet. 
 
 " I started down in the boat, two men pulling. When I got about 
 one-third of the distance I felt the boat tremble and, looking around, 
 saw that the Louisiana had blown up at or near the spot where I left her. 
 I went on, however, and going alongside of the Harriet Lane was received 
 by my old Naval Academy schoolmate, Edward Lee, who was on deck. I 
 asked for Admiral Porter and was told that he was below. A mes- 
 senger was sent down to him. The reply came back that he was arrang- 
 ing the terms of capitulation of the forts. In a short time he came up. 
 1 delivered the message of Commodore Mitchell. 
 
 "He said, 'Where is th.& Louisiana V A strange question from one 
 who had been ' fairly shaken from his seat ' and whose flagship had been 
 ' thrown on her side.' I replied that she had been blown up." 
 
 Admiral Porter, in his " Naval History," takes no account 
 whatever of Lieut. Whittle having arrived on board the Har- 
 riet Lane, and advised the officer on deck of the purpose of 
 Commodore Mitchell to burn the Louisiana, but leaves the 
 reader to suppose that no intimation of the purpose to destroy 
 the Louisiana had been given, and continues — that he re- 
 marked — "this is sharp practice, but if you can stand the 
 explosion when it comes, we can. We will go on and finish the 
 capitulation." But unfortunately for this pretended indiffer- 
 ence to danger, the facts upset the probability of the remark 
 having been made. The Louisiana had blown up before the 
 officer reported below of her being on fire. The explosion took 
 
 Elace while Lieut. Whittle was rowing to the Harriet Lane, and 
 efore he had informed his old schoolmate Edward Lee, on the 
 deck of the Harriet Lane, of Commander Mitchell's message. 
 The shock which Porter, in the Century for April, 1885, says 
 " fairly shook us all from our seats, and threw the Harriet Lane 
 over on her side" — ought to have rendered his question to Lieut. 
 Whittle — "where is the Louisiana ?" totally unnecessary. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 299 
 
 In a letter to Admiral Farragut, Commander Mitchell 
 says: " Lieut. Whittle was. sent in a boat, with a flag of truce, 
 to inform Commander Porter that in firing the Louisiana, her 
 magazine had not been effectually drowned, and that, though 
 efforts were made to drown the charges in the guns, they may 
 not have succeeded. This information was given in consider- 
 ation of the negotiations then pending under flag of truce 
 between him and Fort Jackson; but while the message was 
 on its way the explosion took place — a fact that does not affect 
 the honorable purposes intended by it." 
 
 Commodore Mitchell was no part of Gen. Duncan's com- 
 mand, nor did the latter pretend to any power to include the 
 navy in the terms of his capitulation, but expressly disclaimed 
 all connection with or power over the navy. It was within 
 the province of Commodore Mitchell to continue the fight, 
 to surrender, or to destroy his ships and effect escape if pos- 
 sible. His consideration for the flag of truce between the 
 enemy and the forts will commend his conduct, while his 
 purpose to prevent the enemy from obtaining possession of 
 his ship will be endorsed and sustained by every principle 
 and precedent of naval warfare. The subsequent harsh treat- 
 ment of Commodore Mitchell and the oflScers of the Louisiana 
 resulted from the report which Porter made, but as soon as 
 the authorities at Washington ascertained from Commodore 
 Mitchell the truth and facts of the destruction, they were re- 
 leased from confinement and treated as prisoners of war. 
 
 Of the thirteen Confederate ships, the Governor Moore, 
 disabled and aground, was burned by her commander, Bev- 
 erley Kennon; the C. S. S. Jackson escaped to New Orleans; the 
 Manassas disabled, was destroyed by Lieut. Commander War- 
 ley; the Stonewall Jackson, of the Montgomery fiotilla, escaped 
 up the river and was destroyed by her oflBcers, thirteen miles 
 above the forts; the Quitman and the Star were abandoned 
 at the very opening of the fight and burned; the Warrior was 
 abandoned and burned on the Fort St. Philip side of the river; 
 to the north of her, on the other side of the river, the Brecken- 
 ridge (or Defiance) perished in the same ignoble manner — 
 having taken no part in the fight except escaping from it. 
 
 The Louisiana, the McBae, the Besolute, of the Mont- 
 gomery fiotilla (which was abandoned by her crew, and taken 
 possession of by Lieut Arnold and the men from the McBae, 
 and brought back into the fight), with the Burton and the 
 Landis, unarmed tenders, survived the fight, and for two days 
 maintained their positions above the forts. Nor did Capt. Por- 
 ter, who had with him the gunboats Itasca, the Winona, the 
 Kennebec, the Harriet Lane, the Westfield, the Miami, and 
 the mortar fleet, attempt their capture or even offer them 
 battle. 
 
 The fall of New Orleans, and the recovery of the control 
 and navigation of the Mississippi River, was due to the 
 
300 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 enterprise, sagacity and courage of Admiral Farragut and his 
 officers, aided by the concurrence of many circumstances, 
 which it was the duty and ought to have been the business 
 of the Confederate authorities, army and navy, to have pre- 
 vented and guarded against. Mr. Mallory wasted money 
 in trying to be economical, and delayed important matters 
 while he was hurrying them with all his energies. The mis- 
 taken conviction that the danger to New Orleans was from 
 up the river, rather than from the Gulf, was not only firmly 
 held, but was persisted in after it was known that Farragut 
 was in the Gulf, with the largest and best appointed fleet 
 that the United States had ever organized. As late as the 
 middle of April, and even when Farragut was working his 
 fleet over the bar at the mouth of the Mississippi, Mr. Mallory 
 retained the idea that the real danger which threatened New 
 Orleans was from the seven " tin-clad " gunboats of Flag-ofiicer 
 Davis, then up the river at Fort Pillow; and even after Com- 
 modore Whittle at New Orleans had recalled HoUins from up 
 the river to the defence of New Orleans against the fleet of 
 Farragut — Mr. Mallory still believing that the real attack was 
 to be from Davis rather than by Farragut, would have sent the 
 Louisiana up the river to meet Davis rather than down to the 
 forts to engage Farragut. Reliance for the safety of New 
 Orleans was placed upon Forts Jackson and St. Philip, notwith- 
 standing the advice and opinion of the ablest naval officers in 
 the Confederate service, given to the Naval Committee at 
 Montgomery, that steam vessels could run by the forts. In 
 that opinion Semmes, Rousseau, Bulloch, Hollins, Whittle and 
 others, not only concurred but urged that the safety of the city 
 could only be assured by defences afloat acting in co-operation 
 with the batteries of the forts. Yet every vessel that could 
 carry a gun was sent up the river, and the forts were left un- 
 aided for months to defend the approach to New Orleans. 
 The presence of the Louisiana, at the time Farragut appeared 
 before the forts, was due to the assumed authority of Com. 
 Mitchell, and in spite of the order of the Navy Department of 
 April 10th to send her as soon as completed to Fort Pillow. 
 The McRae and the Jackson were at the fight, because 
 Capt. Hollins had ordered them down the river when he 
 went to aid in the defence of the city, in response to Com- 
 modore Whittle's telegram, ' and these were in New Orleans, 
 
 1 Capt. William Conway Whittle was bom in the banks of Newfoundland, and in 1854 and 
 
 Norfolk, Va., in 1805, and was appointed a mid- 1855 the U. S. sloop Dale on the coast of Africa, 
 
 shipman in the U. S. navy May 10th, 1820. He He resigned from the V. 8. navy in 1861 upon 
 
 served in various positions and in every grade the secessionof Virginia, and was in the Virginia, 
 
 in the " old navy " from midshipman to com- navy. On June 11th, 1861, he was transferred 
 
 mander inclusive, and on a large number of to the C. S. navy. He commanded the naval 
 
 vessels, among which were the Ontario, Fairfield, defences on York River, Va., ajid the Confederate 
 
 Columbia, Brandywine and Ohio. He was in flotilla on the upper Mississippi, and the Naval 
 
 Florida during the Seminole disturbances, and Station at New Orleans. He honorably served 
 
 in the Mexican war he was wounded at the the Confederacy in various places and during 
 
 battle of the Tuspan, and afterwards com- the whole war. On October 23d, 1862, he was 
 
 manded the dispatch steamer Col. Harney. In promoted to Captain, to rank from February Stb. 
 
 1853 he commanded the tJ. S. sloop Decatur on 1862. He died in Virginia in 1878. 
 
CAPTAIN WILLIAM C. WHITTLE, C. S. N. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 301 
 
 against the judgment of Mr. Mallory. These facts are not re- 
 called with any purpose of sustaining the charge of ineflS- 
 ciency which was preferred against the Confederate Secretary 
 of the Navy, but to show how a mistaken view of the enemy's 
 purpose led to the weakening of the defences of the city, and 
 that that error was in spite of the advice and opinion of naval 
 officers. 
 
 The divided command at New Orleans, by which the army 
 and navy were responsible to no common authority, contrib- 
 uted to that want of concert which hindered and embarrassed 
 the fighting capacity of both arms when the hour came which 
 needed all the efforts of each. The confidence reposed in the 
 rams of Montgomery's flotilla, and in the capacity and courage 
 of their captains — men without education, without naval 
 training, with no esprit de corps — was repaid by almost in- 
 stant flight after the exhibition and display of acts of insub- 
 ordination criminal and contemptible. There is nothing 
 about the naval defence of New Orleans to which a Confede- 
 rate can look back without a feeling of disappointment, ex- 
 cept the magnificent courage and seamanship displayed by 
 Kennon in the Moore, by Huger and Read in the McRae, by 
 Warley in the Manassas, and by Mitchell and his officers in 
 the immovable Louisiana. 
 
 Having destroyed every vessel of the Confederate navy 
 below New Orleans, Admiral Farragut found himself before the 
 city, with his victorious ships, but even then the unconquera- 
 ble spirit of her people could not be made, even by threats 
 which Farragut would never have executed, to haul down 
 the flag of Louisiana from the staffs of the public buildings. 
 However much Farragut may have disappointed the people 
 of the South, by remaining in the navy of the United States, 
 there were about the old sailor those instincts and ideas 
 of a Southern man which must have often returned to him 
 and cost him much mental suffering. No man can shake 
 off in a moment all the associations and convictions of a life- 
 time, and turn at the prompting of self-interest against 
 the people among whom he was born, had been bred, 
 honored, promoted, and whom he loved and respected. Loy- 
 alty to the Union will not explain such a revolution in 
 a Southern man; and neither will the honors and applause 
 which follow success completely eradicate the quiet re- 
 bukes which conscience gives, nor completely hide the 
 blush that follows, when old friends turn away and refuse 
 to recognize the apostate. "It is a strange thought," he 
 wrote to his wife, " that I am here [in New OrleansT among 
 my relatives, and yet no one has dared to say ' I am happy to 
 see you.' " 
 
 His Southern birth was not forgotten at the North, and 
 notwithstanding his victories, his triumphs, and his apostasy 
 to the South had cut him off from the friends of his youth and 
 
302 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 manhood, and separated him from the associates of his early 
 naval training, Secretary Welles says:' 
 
 " That the last days of this brave, truthful, amiable, and exemplary- 
 man, for whom his countrymen had, and always will retain, a deep and 
 abiding affection and regard, should have been subjected to petty annoy- 
 ances from a few who were envious of his fame, or incapable of doing him 
 justice. Although honored and loved by his countrymen, and at thehead 
 of the navy, he does not appear to have had the confidence of those who 
 administered its affairs for the last eighteen months of his life, or to have 
 been consulted in matters which personally and officially interested and 
 legitimately belonged to him as naval chief." 
 
 It is the old story — they loved the treason, and they re- 
 warded with honors and prize-money the exploits of the apos- 
 tate son of the South, but they never took him wholly and 
 singly to their hearts. Secretary Welles continues: 
 
 " In various ways ignoble and ungenerous minds hastened to mortify 
 the great and unassuming naval chief. In derogation of his real rank and 
 position as chief and head of the navy, he was made port admiral or usher, 
 to wait upon and receive naval officers at New York, an employment whieh 
 self-respect and regard for the navy compelled him to decline. Among 
 other indignities was that of ordering the uniform and the flag of admiral, 
 which he had adopted when the Government created and conferred upon 
 him the office, to be changed and substituting therefor a different uniform 
 and another fla^, wholly unlike the coat he wore, and unlike the symbol of 
 rank which was identified with him, and which from the time the office was 
 created had floated above him. Farragut would neither change his coat 
 nor permit the tawdry substitute for the admiral's flag to wave over him. 
 On his special personal application, whichhe felt humiliated to make, the 
 Secretary of the Navy permitted him to be spared these indignities during 
 his life, but it was with the knowledge that the flag which he had earned 
 — the emblem he had chosen and prescribed as the symbol of highest 
 naval rank— was to be buried with him. It would be painful to dwell on 
 the many annoyances to which this brave and noble officer was subjected 
 during the last few months of his existence." 
 
 ^ Galaxy, December, 1671. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE RAMS "ARKANSAS," "QUEEN OF THE WEST," 
 "INDIANOLA," AND "WEBB." 
 
 THE immense preparations for building gunboats at St. 
 Louis and other Western cities, by the United States, 
 as heretofore explained, greatly alarmed the Legislature 
 of the State of Tennessee, which, by joint resolutions of 
 June Mth, 1861, called the attention of the Confederate Govern- 
 ment to the exposed and undefended condition of all Western 
 waters, and asked for an immediate appropriation of $250,000, 
 for their defence. These resolutions were laid before Con- 
 gress by a special message from President Davis on July 31st, 
 and the Act of August 34:th, making additional appropriations 
 for the navy, included a clause, "for the construction, equip- 
 ment and armament of two iron-clad gunboats for the defence 
 of the Mississippi River, and the city of Memphis, $160,000.'" 
 On the day of the approval of that act. Secretary Mallory en- 
 tered into a contract with John T. Shirley, of the city of Mem- 
 phis, "to construct and deliver to the Secretary of the Navy 
 of the Confederate States, on or before the 34th day of Decem- 
 ber, 1861, two vessels of the character and description provided 
 in the plans and specifications " of the Department. Heavy 
 penalties were imposed for delay beyond, and like amounts to 
 be paid for each day previous to, the 34th of December, were 
 embraced in the contract. 
 
 The two vessels were the rams Arkansas and Tennessee. The 
 constructor of the Arkansas was Prime Emmerson, of Memphis, 
 Tenn. It was necessary for the contractor to begin his work by 
 building two saw-mills, such as would saw long pine timber, 
 which was brought from a distance of 104 miles by railroad; 
 and in addition, the oak timber had to be prepared in five other 
 saw-mills, which were located from ten to twenty miles away. 
 
 _ 1 It is said that this sum was found totally were supplied tardily by the government, Capt. 
 inadequate, and in order to raise funds, wbic^ Shirley was compelled to sell his homestead. 
 
304 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The iron was purchased partly in Memphis and more largely 
 in Arkansas, on the other side of the Mississippi River, and 
 was altogether railroad iron. The bolts and spikes had to be 
 rolled on the Cumberland River, and the first lot of these was 
 seized by Confederate officers at Nashville, and taken and put 
 into an iron boat under construction at that city. This required 
 to have the spikes and bolts again rolled, and with increased 
 difficulty. The complement of iron was picked up at one place 
 and another in fifty and one hundred pound lots, wherever it 
 could be found. Very little success attended efforts to procure 
 ship-carpenters in New Orleans, St. Louis, Mobile, and Nash- 
 ville. Details of these carpenters from the army were refused 
 notwithstanding the efforts of the Secretary of the Navy. The 
 contract was for the completion of the vessels in four months 
 from August 34, 1861, but over seven months passed before 
 their completion. The successful passage of Columbus and 
 Island No. 10, by the enemy, opened the way down to Mem- 
 phis, and the passage of the Federal fleet of the forts below 
 New Orleans, it was then thought opened the way up to Mem- 
 phis, and hence the destruction of the Tennessee, and the re- 
 moval of the Arkansas to Greenwood, on the Yazoo River, 
 became a necessity. In the removal a barge laden with 400 
 bars of drilled railroad iron was sunk in the Yazoo, which com- 
 pelled a delay of several weeks before the barge was raised. 
 Every bar of iron required six holes to be drilled through, and 
 the steam machinery at Memphis for that purpose had to be 
 taken down and transported, and set up before the new iron 
 could be drilled. The Arkansas was removed to the Yazoo in 
 April, 1862, before the actual fall of Memphis. These boats 
 were commenced in October, and their construction carried on 
 together; the Tennessee's frame having been completed and the 
 planking on her; and the Arkansas had her wood- work entirely 
 completed, and her hull covered with iron nearly to the main 
 deck. The iroii for the Tennessee was on the Arkansas side of 
 the river, when, on the evening before the enemy arrived at 
 Memphis, the boat was burned. The failure to complete the 
 Tennessee was due to causes and circumstances beyond the 
 control of either the Secretary of the Navy or the contractor— 
 to the unprepared condition of the country for the speedy 
 completion of such ships. Those natural and unavoidable 
 impediments to speedy work were increased by the refusal 
 of Gen. Polk to detail the carpenters in his army to work 
 upon the rams. The Secretary wrote to him on December 
 24th, 1861, that: 
 
 " The completion of the iron-clad gunboat at Memphis, by Mr. Shirley . 
 is regarded as highly important to the defences of the Mississippi. 
 
 " One of them at Columbus would have enabled yon to complete the 
 annihilation of the enemy. 
 
 "Had I not supposed that every facUity for obtaining carpenters 
 from the army near Memphis would have been extended to the enterprise, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 305 
 
 I would not have felt authorized to have commenced their construction 
 then, as it was evident that ruinous delays must ensue, if deprived of the 
 opportunity to obtain mechanics in this way. 
 
 "These vessels wiD be armed with very heavy guns, and will be iron- 
 clad, and with such aid as mechanics under your command can afford, 
 they may be completed, I am assured, in sixty days. 
 
 " Now I ask, therefore, that you will extend to this department the 
 necessary aid." 
 
 The refusal of Gen. Polk is the more extraordinary and 
 unaccountable because he had particularly and emphatically 
 endorsed and recommended Mr. Shirley to the Navy Depart- 
 ment, as the contractor for these boats, and Gen. Polk ought 
 to have known, without Seqretary Mallory's statement, that 
 '•unless mechanics could be obtained from the forces un- 
 der your command, the completion of the vessels will be a 
 matter of uncertainty." That failure by Gen. Polk to comply 
 with the request of the Secretary caused the latter, on Janu- 
 ary 15th, to bring the matter to the attention of the Presi- 
 dent, who was then informed officially that: 
 
 "The two iron-clad ships being built at Memphis, and which 
 would be worth many regiments in defending the river, brogress very 
 ;slowly from the difllculty of procuring workmen : Gen. Polk, in com- 
 mand there, having declined to permit the contractor to have any from 
 his forces. 
 
 "I have the honor to ask, therefore, that such measures may be 
 adopted as will secure to- this department the services of such ship- 
 wrights, carpenters and joiners in the army as may be willing to work 
 for it in the construction of vessels." 
 
 On the 10th of April, 1863, Capt. HoUins, then in command 
 of the Upper Mississippi, telegraphed the Navy Department 
 "that three iron-clad gunboats of the enemy had passed Island 
 No. 10, and was advised by the Secretary of the Navy to " act 
 according to your best judgment — do not let the enemy get 
 the boats at Memphis;" and on the same day. Commander 
 McBlair, in command of the Arkansas, was advised by the 
 Secretary of the passage of Island No. 10 by the enemy's 
 fleet, and to "get your boat to New Orleans, and complete her 
 as soon as possible, if she is in danger at Memphis." But 
 on April 35th, Commander McBlair advised the Department 
 by telegraph that in consequence of the passage of the forts 
 below New Orleans by the enemy's fleet, that he would take 
 the Arkansas up the Yazoo Eiver, carrying the material for 
 completing the gunboat, and also carrying the engines of 
 the boat on the stocks, and that arrangements would be 
 made to destroy the Tennessee. Accordingly, on the approach 
 of the enemy's gunboats to Memphis the Tennessee, being on 
 the stocks, was burned, and the Arkansas towed down to the 
 mouth of the Yazoo and up that river to Yazoo City. Below 
 the city, batteries were speedily erected and armed, and a raft 
 was built across the river to protect the ram while being 
 finished from the gunboats of the enemy. 
 
306 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 On the 26th of May, 1862/ Lieut. Isaac N. Brown/ C. S. K, 
 received orders **to assume command of the Arkansas and 
 finish the vessel without regard to expenditure of men or 
 money." On the 28th this efficient officer took command at 
 Greenwood. He found the Arkansas surrounded by refugee 
 merchant steamers and four miles from dry land, Nothing 
 could be done at that place toward rendering the vessel effec- 
 tive. The barge which had brought down some of the railroad 
 iron intended for armor was sunk in the Yazoo River, the guns 
 and machinery lying on deck, and but one blacksmith's forge 
 and five carpenters were at work. The timber from which 
 the gun-carriages were subsequently made was still growing 
 in the woods. The outlook was certainly anything but en- 
 couraging. In two days time the barge was raised from the 
 bed of the river with the railroad iron, and the Arkansas taken 
 160 miles nearer the enemy to Yazoo City. Fourteen forges 
 and 200 carpenters were immediately employed, and divided 
 into day and night parties, were set to work upon the ram. Iron 
 armor was brought by wagons from the railroad, twenty -five 
 
 ^ Isaac N. Brown, son of Rev. Samuel Brown, 
 of the Presbyterian Cliurch, was born in Liv- 
 ingston County, Ky„ and appointed an officer 
 in the U. S. navy from Mississippi on the 15th 
 of May, 1834. He served five years on the West 
 India station and Gulf of Mexico, and performed 
 efficient service in the Seminole war on the 
 Florida coast in open boats, and also in the in- 
 terior. In 1840 he stood his examination at the 
 naval,8chool, then in Philadelphia, and passed 
 No. 1. He served in the Mexican War, first in 
 the Gull, and was present at the capture of Vera 
 Cruz. He was then transferred to the Pacific 
 coast, where he performed arduous service 
 during the remainder of the war. His service 
 afloat took him three times around Capes Horn 
 and Good Hope, including a voyage to Australia, 
 and going twice around the globe. For a time 
 he served on the Coast Survey, and also at the 
 U. S. Naval Observatory, then under the charge 
 of Commander M. F. Manry. He served one 
 cruise as Executive officer of the TJ. S. frigate 
 Sitsquekannah in the Mediterranean, and assisted 
 in the first attempt to lay the Atlantic cable. He 
 was the Executive officer of the U. S. frigate 
 Niagara when that vessel returned to their 
 homes the first Japanese Embassy to the United 
 States. On the return of the Niagara to Bos- 
 ton in 1861, Lieut. Brown finding two govern- 
 ments where the year previous he had left 
 but one, promptly resigned his commission 
 after having given twenty-seven years of his 
 hfe to the naval service of the United States. He 
 entered the service of the C. S. navy on June 
 G. 1861, with the rank of lieutenant, and was as- 
 signed for duty at the headquarters of the Army 
 ot the West, to aid in the defences of the Mis- 
 sissippi River. When Randolph, Fort Pillow and 
 Columbus were armed with heavy guns, Lieut. 
 Brown was sent to Nashville with instructions 
 to purchase and change into gunboats certain 
 river steamers for the defence of the Cumber- 
 land River. This work was entered into with 
 his accustomed vigor, but was interrupted by 
 the withdrawal of the Confederate forces from 
 the Cumberland as a line of defence. He was 
 then ordered to New Orleans to contract for 
 and superintend the construction of four iron- 
 clad gunboats. He was pushing this work at the 
 
 ship yards at Algiers, opposite New Orleans, 
 when that unfortunate city fell into the hands 
 of the enemy. Lieut. Brown proceeded to Vicks- 
 burg where he received on May 26th, 1862, a, 
 telegraphic order from the Navy Department to 
 assume command of the ^unbosA Arkansas. For 
 his gallant service on board of the Arkwnsas he 
 was promoted to the rank of Commander on 
 Augiist 26th, 1862. After her destruction, during 
 his absence on account ot sickness, he resumed, 
 command of her surviving officers and men, 
 and was engaged on shore duty in the batteries 
 at Port Hudson. In a short time most of the 
 officers were detached for service on the sea- 
 board, leaving Lieut. Brown with a small com- 
 mand with which he defended the defences oa 
 the Yazoo Biver, While engaged in this duty 
 he destroyed the Federal iron-clads DeKalb and 
 Cairo by torpedoes in the Yazoo. He was 
 then assigned by Lieut. Gen. Pemberton to the 
 command of a body of troops, and in conjunction 
 with an improvised cotton-clad squadron of 
 river steamers, materially aided in file repulse 
 of an expedition composed of 10,000 men, with 
 several iron-clads, under the command of Gen. 
 Bo^B, which made an attack on Fort Pemberton. 
 In this engagement a small detachment of the 
 crew of the Arkansas with a sixty-four-pounder 
 gun rendered the most effective service. After 
 the fall of Vicksburg Commander Brown was 
 ordered to the command of the C. S. iron-clad 
 Charleston, at Charleston, S. C, where he per- 
 formed good service in the defence of that heroic 
 city. After the fall of Chiirleston he was ap- 
 pointed to the command of all thenaval defences 
 west of the Mississippi, including the coast of 
 Louisiana and Texas. Before reaching his des- 
 tination, however, he received intelligence of 
 the cessation of hostilities. Returning on parole 
 to his plantation in Mississippi, without a dollar, 
 he overcame the diflficulties of his situation, and. 
 surrounded by his interesting family cultivated 
 it for the following twenty years. Half of this 
 time he was disfi-anchised, but on the restora- 
 tion of his citizenship he declined to take any 
 part in civil or political affairs. Commander 
 Brown is now [1887] a resident of Coreicana, 
 Texas, though still retaining his property in. 
 Mississippi. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 307 
 
 miles distant, drilling machines started, gun-carriages con- 
 tracted for, and the work energetically and intelligently 
 pushed. ' 
 
 While working thus assiduously on the ram, Lieut. 
 Brown ordered Lieut. Read to go down to Liverpool Land- 
 ing, and take measures to protect the Polk and the Liv- 
 ingston, of the Hollins fleet, which had taken refuge up the 
 Yazoo, from the enemy's gunboats. Lieut. Read's instruc- 
 tions were to protect the two gunboats with cotton, turn 
 their heads down the stream, keep steam up, and be prepared 
 to fight and ram any gunboat of the enemy that might present 
 itself on the river. But Commander Pinkney,then awaiting the 
 arrival of Capt. William F. Lynch, who was to take command 
 of all the naval forces in Western waters, determined to await 
 the arrival of Capt. Lynch, and would not for that reason as- 
 sent to the programme of operations designed by Lieut. Brown. 
 There remained nothing then to do but to push forward the 
 completion of the ram. Upon his arrival, Capt. Lynch in- 
 spected the ram, and dispatched to Secretary Mallory that 
 "the Arkansas is very inferior to the Merrimac in every 
 particular. The iron with which she is covered is worn and 
 indifferent, taken from a railroad track, and is poorly secured 
 to the vessel; boiler iron on stern and counter; her smoke-stack 
 is sheet iron."^ Nevertheless, Lieut. Brown completed the ram, 
 and armed her with ten guns: two eight-inch Columbiads 
 in the two forward or bow ports; two nine-inch Dahlgren shell 
 guns, two six-inch rifled, and two thirty-two pounders, smooth 
 bores in broadside, and two six-inch rifles astern. Her engines 
 were new, having been built at Memphis, and on the trial trip 
 had worked well; she had two propellers and separate engines. 
 
 1 Lieut. George W. Gift, a gallant officer of the take more apace than is necessary to recite all 
 Arlcajnsas, says: '* The ship was in a very incom- that was done and how it was done. It is 8uf&- 
 plete condition. The iron of her armor exten- cient to say that within five weeks from the day 
 ded only a foot, or a little more, above the water we arrived at Yazoo City, we had a man-of-war 
 line, and there was not a sufficiency of iron on (such as she was) from almost nothing — the 
 hand to finish the entire ship. Of.gune we had credit for all of which belongs to Isaac Newton 
 enough, hut were short four carriages. In the Brown, the commander of the vessel." — SmUhsm 
 matter of ammunition and outfit for the battery Hist. Society Papers, Vol. XIE., No. 5, May 1884. 
 we were also very deficient. It was fearfully Brig. Gen. M. L. Smith, who first assumed 
 discouraging, but Brown was undismayed. He command of Vicksburg and its defences, on the 
 summoned the planters from the neighborhood 12th of May, 1862, in obedience to orders from 
 and asked for laborers and their overseers. Major Gen. Lovell, in his official report, dated 
 Numbers of forges were sent in, and the work August, 1862, says: "As bearing immediately 
 commenced. The hoisting engine of the steam- upon the defence of this place, measures had 
 boat Capital was made to drive a number of also been taken to push the Arkansas to comple- 
 steam drills, whilst some dozen of hands were tion. It was reported the contractor had virtu- 
 doing similar work by hand. A temporary ally suspended work; that mechanics and work- 
 blacksmith shop was erected on the river bank, men were leaving; that supplies were wanting: 
 and the ringing of the hammer was incessant. finally, that a very considerable quantity of iron 
 Stevens went to Canton and got the four gun- prepared for covering her had been sunk in the 
 carriages. I have often been greatly amused Yazoo River. Steps were taken to promptly fur- 
 when thinking of this latter achievement. He nish mechanics and supphes, and beU-boat be- 
 made no drawing before his departure, not ing obtained and sent up to the spot, the pre- 
 knowing that he could find a party who would pared iron was soon recovered. It was consid- 
 nndertake the job. Being agreeably dlsap- ered fortunate that soon after this Capt. Brown 
 pointed in this latter respect, he wrote back for was assigned to the duty of completing the boat. 
 
 the dimensions of the guns. With two squares as after his assignment this important work gave 
 
 I made the measurements of the guns (all differ- me no further concern." 
 
 ent patterns) and sent on the data. In a week 
 
 or a little more, Stevens appeared with four ox * Lieut. C. W. Bead in So. Hist. Papers, Vol. I.. 
 
 teams and the carriages. However, it would No. 6, May 1876. 
 
308 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Her boilers were in the hold below the water line, and her 
 speed was about six knots in still water, or four miles an hour 
 when turned against the current of the river ; she drew four- 
 teen feet of water, and her full complement of officers and 
 men was about 200. The crew of the Arkansas was formed of 
 various detachments of men from lately burned gunboats, and 
 of sixty Missouri volunteers from Col. Jeflf. Thompson's com- 
 mand, who had never before been on board a gunboat, or seen 
 a heavy gun. They were under the command of Capts. Harris 
 and McDonald. It required all the zeal and ability of these 
 officers to get the crew trained at their guns during the two 
 days they were on board before the conflict with the enemy's 
 fleet. 
 
 The naval officers formerly belonged to the old navy, and 
 were young, ardent and skilled. The officers of the Arkan- 
 sas were : 
 
 Executive Officer, First Lieutenant Henry K. Stevens; Lieutenants, 
 John Grimball, A. I). Wharton, Charles W. Read, Alphonso Barbot, 
 George W. Gift; Surgeon, H. W. M. Washington; Assistant Surgeon, 
 Charles M. Morfit; Assistant Paymaster, Richard Taylor ; First Assistant 
 Engineer, George W. City; Second Assistant Engineer, E. Covert; Third 
 Assistant Engineers, William H. Jackson, E. H. Brown, James T. Do- 
 land, John S. Dupuy, James S. Gettis; Acting Masters, Samuel Milliken, 
 J. L. Phillips; Midshipmen, Richard H. Bacot, Dabney M. Scales, Clar- 
 ence W. Tyler; Master's Mate, J. A. Wilson; Gunner, T. B. Travers; 
 Pilots, J. H. Shaoklett, William Gilmore, James Brady and John Hodges. 
 
 The model of the Arkansas was a combination of the flat 
 bottomed boats of the West and the keel built steamers de- 
 signed for navigation in deep waters. Her bow was made 
 sharp, and her stem tapered, so as to permit the waters to close 
 readily behind her. In the centre of her hull she was very broad 
 and of great capacity, and for nearly eighty feet along the mid- 
 dle was almost flat bottomed. Her engines were low-pressure, 
 and her two propellers acted independently. It is said she 
 also had a steam hose apparatus by which she could repel 
 boarders — a novelty first introduced in naval warfare. The 
 iron mail of the Arkansas was of ordinary railway iron run- 
 ning horizontally, of a single thickness. The quarter and 
 stern had a thin coating of boiler iron. The wheel was within 
 the shield, but the top of the pilot-house, two feet above the 
 shield deck, and through which the pilot looked while steering, 
 was in an unfinished state, having bar-iron over it. The top 
 of the shield was flat and covered with inch bar-iron. The 
 constructor's design was to have made the shield of the " gun 
 box," as Commander Brown called his vessel, solid fore and 
 aft, with side batteries only, and with an iron beak for ram- 
 ming. This plan was somewhat changed by Commander 
 Brown, so far as to admit of two guns forward and two aft, 
 
 I It is said the militia went into the engage- peeled off, caused by constant exercise at the 
 ment with the skin of their hands and fingers tackles of the great guns. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 309 
 
 with three on each broadside. This gave her a battery of ten 
 guns, four of them mounted on railroad iron chassis, and the 
 six broadside guns on carriages constructed at Canton. Not- 
 withstanding the use of every available means, the Arkansas 
 could not be made available for service before it became nec- 
 essary, on account of the rapidly receding waters in the 
 Yazoo, to move the ram down the river, across Satartia 
 bar, below which there was deep water. This was on the 
 13th of July, six weeks after beginning work on the mere 
 hull at Greenwood. Lieut. C. W. Read was sent with one of 
 the pilots to sound the bar at Satartia. They found plenty 
 of water for the Arkansas, but the pilot reported that if the 
 river continued to fall as it had been doing for several days, 
 in five more days there would not be enough for the ram to 
 get down. The man who placed the obstructions in the river 
 said they could not be moved inside of a week. Lieut. 
 Brown instructed Lieuts. Grimball, Gift and Read to examine 
 the obstructions, and report if it was practicable to remove 
 them, so as to allow the Arkansas to pass through, and if 
 so, in what time the work could be done. The officers vis- 
 ited the rafts, and after a careful examination reported that 
 they could be removed in less than half an hour. 
 
 As soon as Lieut. Commander Brown received this informa- 
 tion, he decided to consult with Major Gen. Earl Van Dorn, 
 commanding the defences of Vicksburg, and who had received 
 authority from President Davis to use the Arkansas as part 
 of his force. Lieut. C. W. Read was dispatched to Vicksburg 
 to explain the position of the Arkansas, and to ask for instruc- 
 tions. He was also directed to reconnoitre the position of the 
 enemy's fleets above Vicksburg. Lieut. Read set out on his 
 mission, riding all night — some fifty miles — and arrived at the 
 general's headquarters about eight o'clock on the following 
 morning and delivered his message. Gen. Van Dorn wrote 
 a letter to Lieut. Brown in which he said that thirty-seven 
 vessels of the enemy were in sight from Vicksburg, and 
 " plenty more up the river,' but believed the Arkansas could 
 run past them. He therefore commanded Lieut. Brown to 
 take his vessel through the raft at Haines Bluff, and after 
 sinking the Confederate steamer Star of the West in the open- 
 ing of the obstructions, to go out of the Yazoo and attack 
 the upper fleet of the enemy, to the cover of the Vicksburg 
 batteries. 
 
 The Yazoo empties into an old channel of the Mississippi, 
 twelve miles above the city of Vicksburg, and this old channel 
 runs into the main river, three miles below the mouth of the 
 Yazoo. In order to reach the landing and get under cover 
 of the Confederate batteries on shore, it was necessary for 
 Commander Brown to pass his vessel by no less than forty of 
 the most formidable sloops, gunboats, rams and transports 
 then in the service of the U. S. navy. 
 
310 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The distance from Satartia bar to where the combined 
 fleets of Davis, Farragut, and Ellet were waiting the attack 
 of the Arkansas, was less than sixty miles of open river; but 
 as it was difficult to see why such an immense force should 
 not meet the assailant half-way, it was not without anxiety 
 that in the first twenty miles of the descent of the Yazoo the 
 discovery was made that (owing to the defects in the engine 
 and in the construction of the after-magazine) the steam had 
 dampened the powder, so as to render it unfit for use. Fortu- 
 nately the day was clear and the July sun very hot. The Ar- 
 kansas was moored to the bank and, though looking for the 
 enemy's approach at any moment, the powder was landed and 
 spread in the sun to dry. This occupied the greater part of 
 the 14th, and it was midnight before the ram reached Haines 
 Bluff, a few miles from the main river. Here the anchor was 
 let go until early dawn of the 15th of July, a memorable day, 
 on which Gen. Van Dorn truly says, Lieut. Brown " immortal- 
 ized his single vessel, himself, and the heroes under his com- 
 mand, by an achievement the most brilliant ever recorded 
 in naval annals." 
 
 On the night of the 14th, two deserters from the Arkansas 
 came on board the U. S. gunboat Essex, and stated that the 
 Arkansas meditated an attack on the Federal fleet either that 
 night or the following morning. Flag-officers Farragut and 
 Davis, who had joined their fleets on June 38th, above Vicks- 
 burg, did not believe the Confederates had sufficient resources 
 to build a formidable vessel in such an out-of-the-way place, 
 but moved by the persistency of the two deserters, they finally 
 decided on the following day to send an exploring expedition 
 up the Yazoo " to procure correct information concerning the 
 obstructions and defences of the river, and ascertain if possi- 
 ble the whereabouts of the ram Arkansas." 
 
 Soon after daylight on the morning of the 15th, Lieut. 
 Commander Brown ordered the anchors of the Arkansas to be 
 raised, and substituting an inferior vessel in place of the Star 
 of the West in the obstructions, proceeded down the Yazoo. 
 It was the intention to have made the attack on the Federal 
 fleet at daylight, but on starting from the temporary anchor- 
 age the ram ran aground and lost valuable time. At sunrise 
 three of the enemy's vessels were seen rapidly ascending Old 
 River. They were in a line abreast, the iron-clad Garondelet 
 of thirteen guns in the centre, the iron-clad ram Queen of the 
 West on the starboard, and the gunboat Tyler on the port side. 
 At this moment the commander of the Arkansas called the 
 officers around him on the shield, and addressed them in these 
 words : " Gentlemen, in seeking the combat as we now do, we 
 must win or perish. Should I fall, whoever succeeds to the 
 command will do so with the resolution to go through the 
 enemy's fleet, or go to the bottom. Should they carry us by 
 boarding, the Arkansas must be blown up, on no account must 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 311 
 
 she fall into the hands of the enemy. Go to your guns !" 
 Lieut. Gift says : 
 
 " Many of the men had stripped off their shirts and were bare to the 
 ■waists, with handkerchiefs bound round their heads, and some of the 
 officers had removed their coats and stood in their undershirts. The 
 decks had been thoroughly sanded to prevent slipping after the blood 
 should become plentiful, Tourniquets were served out to division officers 
 by the surgeons, with directions for use. The division tubs were filled 
 with water to drink ; fire buckets were in place ; cutlasses and pistols 
 strapped on ; rifles loaded and bayonets fixed ; spare breechings for the 
 guns, and other implements made ready. The magazines and shell-rooms 
 forward and aft were open, and the men inspected in their places. Before 
 getting under way, coffee (or an apology therefor) had been served to the 
 crew, and daylight found us a grim, determined set of fellows, grouped 
 about our guns, anxiously waiting to get sight of the enemy. 
 
 " Shortly after sunrise, the smoke from several steamers was dis- 
 covered by Capt. Brown, who with the First Lieut. Henry K. Stevens, ' 
 stood on a platform entirely exposed to the enemy's fire. This was the 
 signal for fresh girding up, last inspections and final arrangements for 
 battle. Lieut. John Grimball and myself divided the honor of command- 
 ing the eight-inch Columbiads. He fought the starboard and I the port 
 gun. Midshipman Dabney M. Scales was his lieutenant, and a youngster 
 named John Wilson, of Baltimore, was mine. Lieut. A. D. Wharton, of 
 Nashville, came next on the starboard broadside, with Midshipman R. H . 
 Bacot for his assistant. Lieut. Charles W. Read, of Mississippi, had the 
 two stern chasers, both rifles, to himself, and the remaining two guns on 
 the port side were under command of Lieut. Alphonso Barbot. Each 
 lieutenant had two guns. Grimball and myself had each a bow-chaser 
 and a broadside gun. The two Masters, John L. Phillips and Samuel 
 Milliken, were in charge of the two powder divisions. Stevens busied 
 himself passing about the ship, cool and smiling, giving advice here and 
 encouragement there. Our commander, Lieut. Isaac Newton Brown, 
 passed around the ship, and after making one of his sharp, pithy speeches, 
 returned to his post with glass In hand to get the first sight of the ap- 
 proaching enemy." 
 
 Just then the Carondelet, for which the Arkansas had 
 heen steadily standing, fired her bow guns, at short range, 
 wore round and accompanied by her consorts made for the 
 fleet six or eight miles below. The bow guns of the Arkan- 
 sas were now well served in the chase, whose superior speed, 
 so evident at the beginning of this running fight, soon slack- 
 ened under the effect of the Arkansas' raking fire. In the 
 meanwhile the latter experienced much annoyance from the 
 guns and small arms of the other vessels of the Federal 
 squadron, and from their attempts to gain positions for ram- 
 ming and raking astern; but whenever the Arkansas, leav- 
 ing the Carondelet, steered for them, as alternately and fre- 
 quently she had to do, they would return to their positions in 
 the line abreast with the Carondelet. In half an hour this 
 latter vessel, superior in guns and armor to the Arkansas, 
 was silenced and ran in among the willows, where her pur- 
 suer, owing to her great depth of water, not caring to follow, 
 left her, she no longer having the power or apparent disposition 
 
 ^ Afterwariis killed on boara steamer Cotton, in Bayou Teche, La. 
 
313 THE CONFEDEBATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 to offer further resistance, and if not actually surrendering, 
 showing no colors, nor having a man or oflficer in sight/ 
 The consort vessels, too, gave up the fight, abandoning their 
 chief, made their way, at a speed far surpassing that of the 
 Arkansas, for the shelter of their main fleet. 
 
 In justice to Commander Henry Walke, of the Carondelet, 
 we insert his official report of the action. He says: 
 
 "We had reached six miles up, -wlien -we discovered a formidable 
 looking ram guntooat, since proved to be the celebrated Arkansas. 
 The (^een of the West, Tyler and Carondelet at once proceeded down 
 the river to avoid being inevitably sunk, firing upon her with our stern, 
 and occasionally with our side guns. The enemy vigorously returned the 
 fire from her heavy bow guns as she pursued, and had greatly the advan- 
 tage of us from being thoroughly protected by iron. We had continued 
 the fight about one hour when the Arkansas came up, with the evident 
 intention of running us down. I avoided the blow, and as we passed ex- 
 changed broadsides at very close quarters. I endeavored to board her, 
 but she passed us too quickly, and I coald only fire our bow guns fairly at 
 her stern. Not a shot entered her, however, the shot easily glancing off 
 her invulnerable stern. 
 
 " At this moment our wheel ropes were cut off for a third time, and 
 we had to run the boat into shore. As she swung round, we gave the rebel 
 vigorous discharges from our bow and starboard guns. * * * We had 
 now received severe damages in our huU and maelunery, more than twenty 
 shots having entered the boat. In the engineer's department, three es- 
 cape pipes, the steam guage and two water pipes were cut away. In the 
 carpenter's department, nineteen beams were cut away, thirty timbers 
 damaged, and three boats rendered useless. Our deck pumps were cut 
 away also. We had some thirty killed, wounded and missing. 
 
 " When the escape pipes were cut away many of the hands jumped 
 into the water." 
 
 The following extract from the " log " of the gunboat 
 Tyler, gives a partial account of her engagement with the 
 Arkansas : 
 
 " At 4 A. M. got under way, ran alongside of the Lancaster and sent a 
 boat on board of her, which returned with a pilot. At five stood on up the 
 river, followed by the ram Queen of the West, the Carondelet being ahead. 
 Arrived at the mouth of the Yazoo River at forty-five minutes past five; 
 stood on up. At 7 A. M. discovered a steamer standing down the river, at 
 the distance of a mile, which proved to be the rebel Tum Arkansas, and im- 
 mediately opened fire on her with our bow guns,which was returned. The 
 Carondelet about a mile and a half astern, and the Queen of the Wes4 about 
 a quarter of a mile. 
 
 1 As the Arka/nsa^ passed the Carondelet lying short speech to Commander Henry Walke of 
 helpless and discomfited on the river bank, she the Garondelei, which he could have plainly 
 fired a broadside while almost touching her. heard had he been on deck. Notwithstanding 
 Commander Brown says: "No return fire came the contraiy statements of Commander Wallie, 
 from the Carondelet, save the working of her en- the truth was that the Carondelet had been 
 gines, no sound or sight of anything to indicate rendered by the lire of the Arkansas a help- 
 that a live man remained; nor any flag or signal less wreck. Indeed he ran away before being 
 flying to tell which side she belonged to." Lieut. shot at. 
 
 Brown was all this time on the shield of the Lieut. Bead says: " We had decreased onr 
 
 Arkansas, in full view, from his boots to the distance from the Gartmdeiei rapidly, and were 
 
 crown of his cap —within easy pistol range— and only 100 yards astern, our shot still raking 
 
 not a shot was fired at him. He even walked him, when he ceased firing and sheered into 
 
 to the after part of the shield, as his vessel the bank; our engines were stopped, and rang- 
 
 swung off from the Carondelet into deep water, ing up alongside with the muzzles of our guns 
 
 as the Arkansas was a veesel of more than twice touching him, we poured in a broadside of 
 
 her draft, and when near to her addressed a solid shot, when his colors came down. 
 
COMMANBER ISAAC N. BIIOWN, C. S. N. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 313 
 
 " We Commenced backing down the river, keeping up a iire 'with the 
 guns that could be brought to bear. Finding that she was gaining on us 
 rapidly, we rounded down stream, and stood for the Carondelet, which 
 vessel was standing down stream, and took a position on her port bow, 
 about one hundred yards distant, keeping up a continuous fire on the ram 
 from our stern gun, and an occasional flre from our broadside battery, 
 the Carondelet having already opened on the ram with her stern guns. 
 
 "About half-past seven the rebel ram closed with and struck the 
 Carondelet, and forced her against the left bank of the river, receiving a 
 discharge from her stern guns. Standing past her, she received the flre of 
 her broadside guns, and stood directly for us, at that time distant about 
 two hundred yards. 
 
 " We then stood down the river at all speed, and managed to keep the 
 ram from two hundred to three hundred yards distant from us, keeping 
 up a rapid flre from our stern gun and an occasional discharge from our 
 broadside batteries as we could bring them to bear, receiving the flre 
 of her two bow guns, and occasional discharges from her broadside bat- 
 teries. 
 
 " At half -past eight came within sight of the fleet; forty-flve minutes 
 past eight rounded to under the stern of the Essex, delivering a broad- 
 side at the rebel ram as she was standing down past the fleet. 
 
 " At this time the ram was receiving the fire of most all the vessels of 
 our flotilla." 
 
 The Tyler was a great deal cut up in the engagement, 
 fourteen shot having struck her, eleven of which penetrated 
 the vessel. During the last half hour of the engagement the 
 after part of the gunboat was full of steam, caused by the 
 escape pipe being cut. She had on board during the engage- 
 ment a detachment of the Fourth Wisconsin regiment, de- 
 tailed as sharpshooters. Her commander reported a loss of 
 eight killed and sixteen wounded. 
 
 The Tyler succeeded in reaching the Federal fleet nearly 
 half an hour in advance of the Arkansas, thus giving sufficient 
 time to prepare for the reception of the unwelcome visitor. 
 None of the vessels had much steam up, though all had fires 
 in their furnaces. Instantly the utmost efforts were made to 
 get the gunboats ready to manoeuvre in case the Arkansas 
 should really make an attack. 
 
 In this minor conflict with Commander Walke and his 
 consorts several casualties occurred among the officers and 
 crew of the Arkansas. Chief Pilot John Hodges, a man of much 
 worth, was mortally wounded at the wheel, and the wheel 
 partly shot away, and the Yazoo River pilot, J. H. Shacklett, 
 disabled and carried below. Lieut. Commander Brown, at his 
 station on the upper or shield deck, received a severe contu- 
 sion on the top of his head, and soon after was struck by a 
 Minie ball which grazed his left temple, causing him to fall 
 insensible through the hatchway to the gun-deck within the 
 shield. While being carried to the cockpit he regained con- 
 sciousness, sent his bearers to their guns, and resumed his 
 place on the shield. He escaped further wounds save slight 
 ones in the shoulder and right hand. Lieut. George W. Gift, 
 a brave son of Tennessee, received a wound in the arm from 
 a splinter. One of the crew, whose curiosity overcame his 
 
314 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 discretion, putting his head out of the port, while his gun was 
 run in for loading, had it cut cleanly off by a cannon ball. 
 Several others were slightly wounded. 
 
 The now alarming fact was reported by the executive officer 
 to the commander, that the temperature of the fire-room had 
 risen to 130 degrees, and that the firemen had to be relieved 
 every ten minutes, the steam which at the beginning of the 
 chase was at 130 pounds, had gone down more than one 
 half. Under this state of things, leaving out the original cal- 
 culation of slow speed, under full pressure, the use of the 
 Arkansas, as a ram, became hopeless, and the alternative of a 
 fight through the Federal fleet, with guns alone, had to be 
 accepted. 
 
 Lieut. Gift, in his interesting " story of the Arkansas," 
 says that : 
 
 " It is quite probable that they iCarondelet, Queen of the West, and 
 A. 0. Tyler] imagined we would take to our heels when we saw the odds 
 which were against us. They were mistaken. Owing to the fact that our 
 bow-ports were quite small, we could train our guns laterally very little; 
 and as our head was looking to the right of the enemy's line, we were 
 compelled to allow them to begin the action, which was quite agreeable, 
 as we had levelled all our guns with a spirit-level the day before, marked 
 the trunnions, and agreed that we would not fire until we were sure of hit- 
 ting an enemy direct, without elevation. The gunnery of the enemy was 
 excellent, and his rifle-bolts soon began to ring on our iron front, digging 
 into and warping up the bars, but not penetrating. Twice he struck 
 near my port, and still we could not "see" him. The first blood was 
 drawn from my division. An Irishman, with more curiosity than pru- 
 dence, stuck his head out the broadside port, and was killed by a heavy 
 rifle-bolt which had missed the ship. Stevens was with me at the time; 
 and fearing that the sight of the mangled corpse and blood might demor- 
 alize the gun s crew, sprang forward to throw the body out of the port, 
 and called upon the man nearest him to assist. "Oh I I can't dp it, 
 sir!" the poor fellow replied, "it's my brother." The body was thrown 
 overboard. This incident of the brother was related to me by Stevens 
 afterwards, for by that time I had enough to do ahead. As soon as we 
 could point straight for the enemy, with safety from grounding, the pilot 
 steered direct for the Tyler, and I got the first shot, with an eight-inch 
 shell, with five-second fuse. It struck him fair and square, killing a pilot 
 in its flight and bursting in the engine-room. She reported seventeen 
 killed and fourteen wounded, and I think this shell did the better part of 
 the day's work on her. Unfortunately, the gun recoiled off its chassis, 
 and I was out of the action for five or ten minutes. However, Grrimball 
 made up for it. He had the best gun captain — Kobert McCalla— in the ship, 
 and a superb crew, and his gun seemed to be continually going out and 
 recoiling in again. The broadside guns thus far were not engaged ; but 
 they were not to remain entirely idle. The 'mustang,' summoning courage, 
 shot up as though he would poke us gently in our starboard ribs. Capt. 
 Brown divined his intent, and gave notice in time. The starboard bat- 
 tery was trained sharp forward, and as the Queen ranged up, Scales gave 
 her the first shell, followed quick by Warton and Bacot. This settled the 
 account on that side. The Lieut. Col. had business down the river, 
 and straightway went to attend to it — that is to say, to quote Gwin 
 [Lieut. Commander of the Tyler], he ' fled inglorious! y.' This left us with 
 the Tyler, now getting pretty sick, and the Carondelet, to deal with. 
 
 " It was, I think, somewhere about this stage of the fight that a bolt 
 entered the pilot-house and mortally wounded John Hodges, Mississippi 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 315 
 
 pilot, and disabled Mr. Shacklett, Yazoo River pUot, and broke the for- 
 ward rim of the wheel. James Brady, the remaining Mississippi pilot, 
 took charge, however, and by his admirable judgment and coolness kept 
 the vessel in deep water until she got into the Mississippi, where he knew 
 what he was about. The fight had been an advance on our part; we had 
 never slowed the engines, but stood forward as though we held such small 
 fry In contempt. Gwiu handled and fought the Tyler with skill as long 
 as there was any hope; but he finally took to his heels, badly crippled, 
 and went after the 'mustang.' What Walke did in the Carondelet, in 
 tlie first part of the engagement, I am not competent to say, as I was 
 mounting my gun, but I think he was 'hacked' quite early, and did but 
 little. At any rate, when I came on the scene again (not more than ten 
 minutes had elapsed from the first gun), and ran out my gun, the Car- 
 ondelet was right ahead of us, distant about one hundred yards, and 
 paddUng down stream for dear life. Her armor had been pierced four 
 times by GrimbaU, and we were running after her to use our ram, having 
 the advantage of speed. Opposite to me a man was standing outside on 
 the port-sill loading the stern chaser. He was so near that I could readily 
 have recognized him had he been an acquaintance. I pointed the Colum- 
 biad for that port and pulled the lock-string. I have seen nothing of the 
 man or gun since. We were now using fifteen pound charges of powder 
 and solid shot, which latter were hastily made in Canton, and had very 
 little windage; so that I think we bored the fellow through and through 
 from end to end. It was an exceedingly good thing we had. If his stern 
 guns were not dismounted, the crews had deserted them, for they were not 
 used after my gun came into action the second time. I think I had hit 
 four times, and our beak was nearly up to him, when Brady discovered 
 that he was taking to shoal water with the hope of our grounding— we 
 drew four [eight] feet more water than she. Therefore, we sheered ofif, 
 and passed so close that it. would have been easy to have jumped on 
 board. Stevens passed rapidly along the port broadside, and saw the 
 guns depressed to their utmost, and bid us wait for a good chance and 
 fire down through his bottom. As we lapped up alongside, and almost 
 touching, we poured in our broadside, which went crashing and plunging 
 through his timbers and bottom. Although his four broadside guns— one 
 more than we had — were run out and ready, he did not fire them. We were 
 running near the left or Vicksburg side of the river (we are now in what is 
 called Old River), and, as soon as passed, we headed for the middle-of the 
 stream, which gave Read his first opportunity — and right well did he use 
 it. His rifles spoke' to the purpose, for the enemy hauled down his 
 colors. In an instant, Capt. Brown announced the fact from the deck, and 
 ordered the firing to cease; but the ship still swinging, gave Wharton and 
 the others a chance at her with the starboard guns before it was known 
 that he had surrendered. White flags now appeared at her ports, and the 
 news of our victory was known all over the ship in a moment. 
 
 " Talk about yelling and cheering; you should have heard it at the 
 moment on the deck of the Arkansas to have appreciated it. In fifteen 
 minutes, without being checked in our progress, we had thrashed three 
 of the enemy's vessels — one carrying arms as good as ours, and two more 
 guns than we, and one of the others was a famous ram, whilst the third, 
 though of but Uttle account, gave moral support to the others. It was 
 glorious. For it was the first and only square, fair, equal stand-up and 
 knock-down fight between the two navies in which the Confederates came 
 out first best. From the beginning our ship was handled with more pluck, 
 decision, and judgment than theirs (the Tyler excepted); our guns were 
 better fought and better served. Not an olfieer or man doubted the re- 
 sult from the beginning. We went in to win, and we won. We now 
 had no time to stop to secure our prize, as the enemy would be apprised 
 of our coming and swarm in the river like bees if we did not hurry. 
 These fellows we had beaten were but skirmishers of a main army. 
 Consequently we pushed down the river." 
 
316 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 On nearing the fleet, a line of men-of-war, seemingly in- 
 terminable, on the east side of the river, inside of that line a 
 moving mass of rams and iron-clads, on the west side an occa- 
 sional gunboat, and directly ahead, as if by bulk alone to bar 
 the way, a large ram and a double hull iron-clad flying the 
 flag of an admiral. The grand river was level with its banks, 
 and, as witnesses to the scene about to open and of the prelude 
 just described in Old River, lay the Union camp of many thou- 
 sand men of all arms, while numerous bomb vessels and an im- 
 mense fleet of transport steamers lay securely on the west bank 
 near the great host of auxiliaries to the naval investment of 
 Vicksburg. It was not time for the commander of the Arkansas 
 to count the hostile ships amidst which he was-taking his brave 
 comrades. There were in the Federal squadron at least six 
 iron-clads, each singly superior in armor, guns and speed to 
 the Arkansas; seven rams and ten sea-going ships of war 
 among which were some of superior force, the whole com- 
 manded by Rear Admirals Farragut and Davis, to say nothing 
 of the river defence fleet under Col. EUet. 3, 000 men, 300 heavy 
 guns, and a vast squadron of iron-clads, gunboats, frigates, etc., 
 against a solitary Confederate vessel of ten guns and 200 men. 
 
 The commander of the Arkansas had called his little ves- 
 sel a " box of guns," but as she slowly moved into the Federal 
 line of fire between the hours of seven and eight o'clock on 
 the morning of Tuesday, July 15th, 1862, she became a citadel 
 of flame. Passing grandly along within half a cable's length 
 of Farragut's line, the Arkansas received and returned the fire 
 of the entire fleet, and as the enemy closed in astern, from their 
 double inshore line, the Confederate guns at the same moment 
 were fired ahead, astern, port and starboard, dealing death at 
 every point of the compass. The rapid succession of broad- 
 sides, commingled with bursting shells, and the sharp hissings 
 of grape, shrapnell and Minie balls, all these, though the noise 
 of the cannonade was heard forty miles from the scene of 
 action, seemed slight to the oflScers and crew of the Arkansas 
 compared with the horrible din and constant concussion of 
 the missiles crushing against and through the side of their 
 vessel. The bright, clear morning was for a time so obscured 
 by smoke, that the red fiash from the cannon's mouth produced 
 the illusion of a nocturnal combat. Slowly the combat drifted 
 along the dreadful line, for now the breechings of the Ar- 
 kansas' boilers had been shot away and steam fell to twenty 
 pounds. The temperature in the shield around the guns rose 
 to 120 degrees, and the exhausted firemen coming from below 
 found little relief, save in the nearer excitement of the battle. 
 
 The first vessel encountered by the Arkansas was gunboat 
 No. 6 of Farragut's fleet, carrying one heavy eleven-inch 
 Dahlgren and two small twelve-pounders at the bow. This 
 boat received several shots from the Arkansas, and replied 
 vigorously with her big gun. Without stopping her engines. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 317 
 
 the Arkansas ran past No. 6, and next encountered the Louis- 
 ville, which gave her the full benefit of her broadside and bow 
 guns. The Arkansas had hj this time reached a position 
 where her shot were effective in every direction, and she used 
 all her guns at the same moment, firing at transports and gun- 
 boats indiscriminately. None of the boats were able to give 
 the Arkansas more than one or two broadsides before she was 
 out of reach. Most of the balls were thrown at short range, 
 but many of the solid projectiles glanced off, while the shells 
 were shivered into a thousand fragments by the force of the 
 concussion alone. The Benton, Louisville and Cincinnati 
 moved as speedily as they could turn in the river, and fol- 
 lowed closely upon the heels of the Arkansas. 
 
 As the Confederate ram passed the Hartford, Iroquois, 
 Bichmond, Sumter, Louisville, Oneida, Cincinnati, Sciota, 
 Wissahickon, Winona and Essex, she received a heavy broad- 
 side from each. Two of the enemy's eleven-inch solid shot, 
 however, crushed through the sides of the Arkansas, doing 
 fearful execution among her men. The iron on her port side, 
 though pierced but twice, had been so often struck with heavy 
 projectiles that it was very much loosened. A few more 
 heavy ^hots would have caused nearly all of it to have fallen 
 from the sides of the vessel. In many instances solid shot 
 seemed to flatten against her armor, while shells were scattered 
 into thousands of fragments. A shot from one of the boats, 
 at short range, is said to have struck at right angles upon 
 her side and rebounded, falling into the water close to the 
 vessel from which it was discharged. It is also said by those 
 who saw the engagement, that a flash of flre denoted the spot 
 where every ball struck, so terrible was the concussion and so 
 strong the resistance. 
 
 The Arkansas during her progress down the river put holes 
 in the Hartford, the Iroquois, Bichmond and Benton, and half 
 of the gunboats. Her iron prow was prominent to view ; but 
 she did not attempt to use it upon any of the boats after the 
 first attack. The U. S. ram Lancaster at one time started for 
 the Arkansas, intending to run her down; but before proceed- 
 ing far she received three shots from the bow guns of Grimball 
 and Grift, one of which severed her steam pipe, by which a num- 
 ber of her crew were scalded, three of them fatally. A daring 
 ram attacking astern, was blown off by the rifle guns of Read 
 and Scales. The iron-clad Benton, the flag-ship of Rear- Admiral 
 Davis, guarding the gorge through which led the way to Vicks- 
 burg, moved out of the way of the gallant Arkansas, and re- 
 ceived for her courtesy, through her stern ports, from their 
 very muzzles, the contents of the Arkansas' starboard guns. 
 The Federal line was now forced, and the Arkansas emerged 
 from the volcano of flame and smoke, from an hour's horizon- 
 tal iron hail of every description, from thirty -two to two 
 hundred-pounders, hurled by a fleet of about forty formidable 
 
318 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 war vessels, — shattered, bleeding, triumphant ! The brave 
 men from below, almost suffocated, hurried up on the shield- 
 deck and formed a group of hero faces around their com- 
 mander; just then a heavy rifle shell passed close over their 
 heads, — it was the last shot noticed, and in another half hour 
 they were welcomed by the patriotic shouts of the army at 
 Vicksburg — and the siege of that city was virtually raised ! 
 
 The enemy continued the pursuit until a shot from one of 
 the Confederate batteries on shore, thrown into their foremost 
 vessel, announced that the Arkansas was no longer alone in 
 the unequal contest. The enemy then hauled oflE their vessels 
 and returned to their anchorage up the river. 
 
 We cannot close this interesting story of the Arkansas, 
 without adding the graphic account of her passage through 
 the Federal fleet, written by Lieut. G. W. Gift, who was one of 
 her officers and an eye-witness to what he describes : 
 
 " We left the Oarondelet sinking and pursued the Tyler and Queen of 
 the West. Both were swifter vessels than the Arkansas, and in our efforts 
 to overtake them we worked off steam too rapidly and the result was 
 when we entered the Mississippi River they had gained sufficiently on us 
 to notify the fleets of Farragut and Davis of our approach, and that be- 
 fore we had coine in sight around th§ point. The result was instant and 
 rapid preparations by the squadrons for our reception. Steam was hur- 
 ried up on all the river vessels, and they weighed or sUpped anchor, and 
 took up such positions as would enable them to hit us and at the same 
 time keep away from our powerful beak, if possible. On coming in sight 
 of them the scene was one of intense interest. A dozen or more vessels 
 were steaming about in an uneasy, uncertain way, somewhat after the 
 manner of a brood of chickens on the approach of a hawk. Tugs, trans- 
 ports and hospital vessels were smoking up or trying to hide. The heavy 
 sloops-of-war and gunboats of Farragut's squadron were anchored in the 
 middle of the stream with fires out, but with batteries manned and ready 
 for battle. On the banks batteries of field artillery were run up and sev 
 eral thousands of soldiers prepared to shoot Minie balls into our ports 
 The 'mustang 'rams — the same that beat our 'mustang,' Montgomery, 
 in front of Memphis a short time before — were under way also, but they 
 did not come to the front too close, with a chap carrying guns and men 
 who knew how to handle them. I think I do not over-estimate the force 
 of the enemy when I say he had twenty pennants flying ; and we were 
 about to attack him in an unfinished and untried vessel, with engines 
 totally and entirely unreliable. As we stood down to them there was a 
 decided and painful pause. We were in range, but preferred to save our 
 strength and ammunition for a close grapple. One of my best men was 
 a tall, athletic young Irishman who had greatly distinguished himself 
 for zeal and courage half an hour before. Putting his eye to the gun he 
 peeped out ahead and saw the immense force assembled to oppose us. In 
 an instant he was overcome, and exclaimed : ' Holy mother, have mercy 
 on us ; we'll never get through there!' I had been watching the chang- 
 ing panorama ahead with many doubts and misgivings. A naif dozen I 
 would not have minded, but two dozen were rather more than we had 
 bargained for. But we had ventured too far to think of backing out; 
 through we must go. The first vessel which stood out to engage us was 
 ' No. 6 ' (Kineo), against which we had a particular grudge, inspired by 
 Read, who desired us all to handle roughly any seagoing vessel we should 
 see with ' No. 6 ' on her smoke-stack, as that vessel was engaging the 
 MuRde, above Forts Jackson and St. Philip when Lieut. Com. Huger was 
 killed. Read, who was first lieutenant under Capt. Huger, and devotedly 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 319 
 
 attached to him, saw the ' No. 6 ' by the flashes of the guns, and had ever 
 since treasured the hope of getting alongside the fellow some day. This 
 ' No. 6 ' came out hke a game-cocli, steamed to the front to talie the flre 
 of a great monster from which ' mustangs ' and river iron-clads were hid- 
 ing and fleeing. I sent mjr powder boy to Read with a message to come 
 forward, as his friend was in sight. He came leisurely and carelessly, 
 swinging a primer lanyard, and I think I have never looked at a person 
 displaying such remarkable coolness and self-possession. On observing 
 the number ahead his eye was as bright and his smile as genuine as if he 
 had been about to join a company of friends instead of enemies. We 
 were now getting close aboard ' Ko. 6,' and he sheered with his port helm 
 and unmuzzled his eleven-inch pivot gun charged with grape. It was 
 hastily pointed, and the charge fell too low to enter our ports, for which 
 it was intended. This broke the terrible quiet which hung over us Uke 
 a spell. Every man's nerves were strung up again, and we were ready 
 (or the second battle. With a sharp touch of the starboard helm Brady 
 showed me ' No. 6,' straight ahead, and I gave him a shell through and 
 through, and as we passed he got the port broadside. He did not follow 
 us up. These two shots opened the engagement. Soon we were a target 
 for a hundred or more guns, which poured in an unceasing and terrible 
 flre. Generals Breckeuridge, Van Dorn and others viewed the engage- 
 ment from the top of the court-house in Vicksburg, and were appalled at 
 the apparent rashness of attempting the passage. The flre of the en- 
 emy was almost unceasing, nor were we idle by any means. As we have 
 said before, every gun was fully manned, and wherever we looked, in 
 every direction, we saw gunboats. It was only necessary to load the guns 
 and flre and we hit. The rams were taking up a position to come out 
 and strike us as we passed. One of them, the Lancaster, was slowly mov- 
 ing across our path, and I heard Brady ask Capt. Brown if he should cut 
 the boat in two. The captain returned an affirmative answer, and the 
 game pilot steadied our ship for the ram. I had in a five-second shell, 
 which I wished to get rid of before we got to the iron-olads, and so set it 
 in motion. It struck his mud-drum, emptying the hot steam and water 
 into the small, barricaded engine-room, where the crew and a company of 
 sharp-shooters were seeking protection, about a hundred of whom were 
 killed. The poor fellows came pouring up the scuttles, tearing off their 
 shirts and leaping overboard as soon as they reached the air. But that 
 gave us no rest. The shot struck upon our sides as fast as sledge-ham- 
 mer blows. Capt. Brown was twice knocked off the platform, stunned, 
 his marine glass was broken in his hand, and he received a wound on his 
 temple ; but recovering himself, he gallantly — no, heroically — resumed 
 his place, and continued to direct the movements of his ship from a po- 
 sition entirely exposed to the fire of not only great guns, but thousands of 
 sharp-shooters, who were pattering the balls all around and about him. 
 The man of steel never flinched, but carried us straight and clear through. 
 I know that this great battle, and the great commander, have been ig- 
 nored by the sect which ruled the navy, but when the history of our corps 
 is written. Brown will rank first. Some one called out that the colors had 
 been shot away. It reached the ear of Midshipman Dabney M. Scales, 
 and in an instant the glorious fellow scrambled up the ladder which was 
 being swept by a hurricane of shot and shell, deliberately bent on the 
 colors again, knotted the halyards and hoisted them up, and when they 
 were again knocked away would have replaced them had not he been for- 
 bidden by the captain. Midshipman Clarence Tyler, aide to the cap- 
 tain, was wounded at his post alongside the captain We were passing 
 one of the large sloops-of-war when a heavy shot struck the side abreast 
 of my bow-gun. the concussion knocking over a man who was engaged 
 in taking a shot from the rack. He rubbed his hip, which had been hurt, 
 and said they would ' hardly strike twice in a place.' He was mistaken, 
 poor fellow, for immediately a shell entered the breach made by the shot, 
 and bedding itself in the cotton-bale lining on the inside of the bulwark 
 
320 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 proper, exploded with terrible effect. I found myself standing in a dense, 
 suffocating smoke, with my cap gone and hair and beard singed. The 
 smoke soon cleared away, and I found but one man (Quartermaster 
 Curtis) left. Sixteen were killed and wounded by that shell, and the ship 
 set on fire. Stevens, ever cool and thoughtful, ran to the engine-room 
 hatch, seized the hose and dragged it to the aperture. In a few moments 
 the fire was extinguished, without an alarm having been created. 
 
 " The Columbiad was fired but once after Its crew was disabled. By 
 the aid of an army captain (whose name, I am sorry to say, I have forgot- 
 ten', belonging to a Missouri battery, Curtis and myself succeeded in get- 
 ting a shot down the gun, with which we struck the Benton. The ill-luck 
 which befell the crew of the bow gun was soon to be followed by a similar 
 misfortune to the crew of my broadside gun. An eleven-inch shot broke 
 through immediately above the port, bringing with it a shower of iron 
 and wooden splinters, which struck down every man at the gun. My 
 Master's Mate, Mr. Wilson, was painfully wounded in the nose, and I had 
 my left arm smashed. Curtis was the only sound man in the division 
 when we mustered the crew at quarters, at Vicksburg. Nor did the mis- 
 chief of the last shot end with my poor gun's crew. It passed across the 
 deck, through the smoke-stack, and killed eight and wounded seven men 
 at Scales' gun. Fortunately, he was untouched himself, and afterward 
 did excellent service at Grrimball's Columbiad. Stationed on the ladder 
 leading to the berth-deck was a quartermaster named Eaton. He was as- 
 signed the duty of passing shells from the forward shell-room, and also 
 had a kind of superintendence over the boys who came for powder. Eaton 
 was a character. He had thick, rough, red hair, an immense muscular 
 frame, and a will and courage rarely encountered. Nothing daunted him, 
 and the hotter the fight, the fiercer grew Eaton. From his one eye he 
 glared furiously on all who seemed inclined to shirk, and his voice grew 
 louder and more distinct as the shot rattled and crashed upon our mail. 
 
 "At one instant you would hear him pass the word down the hatch: 
 " Nine-inch shell, five-second fuse. Here you are, my lad, with your rifle 
 shell: take it and go back, quick. What's the matter that you can't 
 get that gun out?" and, like a cat, he would spring from his place, and 
 throw his weight on the side tackle, and the gun was sure to go out. 
 " What are you doing here, wounded 1 W^ere are you hurt ? Go back 
 to your gun, or I'll murder you on the spot. Here's your nine-inch 
 shell. Mind, shipmate (to a wounded man), the ladder is bloody; don't 
 slip; let me help you.' 
 
 " I have thrown in this shght sketch to show that our men were 
 beginning to straggle, so badly were we cut up. But still the ship was 
 not disabled; seven guns were yet hammering away, and the engines 
 were intact. But steam was down to a terribly low ebb. The party 
 who fitted up the boilers had neglected to line the fire front with non- 
 conducting materials; the consequence was that when a heavy fire of 
 coal was put in the whole mass of iron about the boilers became red- 
 hot, and nearly roasted the firemen, who had also got a tub of ice-water 
 of which they drank freely. The result was that we had to hoist them 
 all out of the fire-room during the action, and Grimball headed a party 
 to supply their place. But I will not detain the reader. We got through, 
 hammered and battered though. Our smoke-stack resembled an im- 
 mense nutmeg-grater, so often had it been struck, and the sides of the 
 ship were spotted as if it had been peppered. A shot had broken our 
 cast-iron ram. Another had demolished a hawse-pipe. Our boats were 
 shot away and dragging. But all this was to be expected, and could 
 be repaired. Not so on the inside. A great heap of mangled and 
 ghastly slain lay on the gun-deck, with rivulets of blood runnmg away 
 from them. There was a poor fellow torn asunder, another mashed 
 fiat, whilst in the "slaughter-house" brains, hair and blood were all 
 about. Down below fifty or sixty wounded were groaning and complain- 
 ing, or courageously bearing their ills without a murmur. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 321 
 
 "All the army stood on the hills to see us round the pomt. The flag 
 had been set up on a temporary pole, and we went out to return the cheers 
 the soldiers gave us as we passed. The generals came on board to embrace 
 our captain, bloody, yet game." 
 
 As soon as the Arkansas came in view of the lower fleet 
 of the enemy a great commotion was noticed. Vessels were 
 running hither and thither as if expecting an immediate at- 
 tack. Presently flames burst out from one of the mortar- 
 boats lying hard aground, and in thirty minutes she had 
 burned to the water's edge. At the same time, several regi- 
 ments of infantry, camped on shore, piled up their commissary 
 stores, set them on fire, and fled to the transports, which 
 immediately went down stream, the remainder of the fleet 
 following until nearly out of sight, when seeing that the 
 Arkansas was not pursuing, came to a halt and returned to 
 its former anchorage. 
 
 The New York Herald, in its account of the engagement, 
 makes the following table of the total loss of the Federal 
 fleet and the number of shots received by each vessel : 
 
 ■ Killed. Wounded. Shots Received. 
 
 Carondelet 5 20 20 
 
 Tyler 8 16 14 
 
 Lancaster 18 10 1 
 
 Benton 1 3 6 
 
 Sumter 12 
 
 Champion 3 
 
 Dickey 3 
 
 Great Western 1 
 
 Farragut's Fleet 10 20 13 
 
 Total 43 69 73 
 
 It was ten minutes to nine o'clock in the morning, when 
 the Arkansas moored to the wharf at Vicksburg. Her smoke- 
 stack was riddled, and she was otherwise considerably dam- 
 aged. The scene which followed the landing of the Arkansas 
 was of the most thrilling character. Crowds in the city 
 rushed to the wharf frantic with joy. As Commander Brown 
 presented himself to view, the warm, fresh blood still trickling 
 down his furrowed cheeks from his wounded head, the 
 enthusiasm became irrepressible. All felt that the gratitude 
 of the country, and the admiration of the navy, were due to 
 Commander Brown and his brave officers and crew for their 
 most brilliant achievement. 
 
 Immediately upon his arrival at Vicksburg, Lieut. Brown 
 sent the following official dispatch to the Navy Department at 
 Richmond: 
 
 "Vicksburg, Miss., July 15, 1862. 
 'To Hon. S. B. Mallory : 
 
 "We engaged to-day from 6 to 8 a.m. with the enemy's fleet above Vicks- 
 burg, consisting: of four or more iron-clad vessels, two heavy sloops-of-war, 
 four gunboats,, and seven or eight rams. We drove one iron-clad vessel 
 ashore, with colors down and disabled, blew up a ram, burned one vessel, 
 
 21 
 
322 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 and damaged several others. Our smoke-stack was so shot to pieces that 
 we lost steam, and could not use our vessel as a ram. We were otherwise 
 out up, as we engaged at close quarters. Loss, ten killed, fifteen wounded, 
 and others with slight wounds. 
 
 " [Signed] Isaac N. Brown, 
 
 Lieut-Commanding." 
 
 In recognition of Lieut. Brown's successful feat of gal- 
 lantry, ranking among the most brilliant of the war, the follow- 
 ing tribute was paid him by the Confederate Government : 
 
 " CONI'BDEBATB STATBS OF AmBBICA, NAVT DEPARTMENT, ) 
 
 " BiCHMOND, August 4th, 1868. ) 
 ^^ Commander Isaac N. Brown, C.S.N. , commanding steam sloop Arkansas, 
 Vicksburg, Miss. : 
 " Sir: — Your ofiBcial report of the engagement of the 15th ultimo, 
 between the screw sloop Arkansas, under your command, and the ene- 
 my's fleet before Vicksburg, together with the details of the loss sustained 
 by your ship, have been this day received. 
 
 " Upon the receipt of your telegraphic dispatch, announcing this 
 achievement, the following response was made : 
 
 " Richmond, July 18, 1862. 
 ^'Lieut-Commanding Isaac N. Brown, C.S.lf., commanding the Arkansas, 
 Vicksburg, Miss.: 
 " Your telegram announcing the action between the sloop-of-war Ar- 
 kansas under your command, and the enemy's fleet before Vicksburg, 
 has been received, and I am requested by the President to express, in be- 
 half of the country, whose cause you have nobly sustained, his thanks to 
 yourself, your officers and crew. 
 
 "For gallant and meritorious conduct you are promoted, and made a 
 commander for the war. 
 
 " S. R. Malloby, Secretary of the Navy. 
 " A grateful country, while deploring the loss of the gallant dead who 
 fell upon this memorable occasion, will place their names upon the roll of 
 her heroes, and cherish them with respect and affection. 
 
 "You will please furnish the department with a perfect list of your 
 officers and crew, in order that their names may become known to the 
 country and the service which they have so signally served. 
 
 "I am, respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 " S. R. Mallory, Secretary of the Navy." 
 
 The War Department also received, at the same time, the 
 subjoined dispatch from Gen. Earl Van Dorn : 
 
 " Vicksburg, July 15. 
 
 " The sloop-of-war Arkansas, under cover of our batteries, ran glori- 
 ously through twelve or thirteen of the enemy's rams, gunboats and 
 sloops-of-war. 
 
 " Our loss is ten men killed, and fifteen wounded. Capt. Brown, her 
 commander and hero, was slightly wounded in the head. 
 
 " Smoke-stack of the Arkansas is riddled, otherwise she is not ma- 
 terially damaged, and can soon be repaired. 
 
 "Two of the enemy's boats struck their colors, and ran ashore to keep 
 from sinking. 
 
 "Many killed and wounded — glorious achievement for the navy, her 
 heroic commander, officers, and men. 
 
 " One mortar boat disabled and aground, is now burning up. All the 
 enemy's transports and all the vessels-of-war of lower fleet, except a sloop- 
 of-war, have gotten up steam and are off to escape from the Arkansas. 
 " Earl Van Dorn, Major General Commanding.'''' 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 323 
 
 In General Orders No. 51, under date of July 23d, Adju- 
 tant and Inspector General S. Cooper, by order of the Secre- 
 tary of War, paid the following compliment to the officers 
 and crew of the Arkansas : 
 
 "Lieutenant Brown and the oflBcers and crew of the Confederate 
 steamer Arkansas, by their heroic attack upon the Federal fleet before 
 Vieksburg, equalled the highest recorded examples of courage and skill. 
 They prove that the navy, when it regains its proper element, will be one 
 of the chief bulwarks of national defence, and that it is entitled to a high 
 place in the confidence and affection of the country." 
 
 Congress also passed the following joint resolution of 
 thanks to Lieut. I. N". Brown, and all under his command : 
 
 " JBesoZced, by the Congress of the Confederate States of America, 
 That the thanks of Congress are hereby cordially tendered to Lieut. Isaac 
 N. Brown, and aU under his command, for their signal exhibition of skiU 
 and gallantry on the fourteenth day of July last, on the Mississippi River, 
 near Vieksburg, in the brilliant and successful engagement of the sloop-of- 
 war Arkansas with the enemy's fleet. 
 
 "Approved Oct. 2, 1862." 
 
 It vfas "with deep mortification" that Admiral Farragut 
 announced to the Federal Naval Department the successful 
 achievement of the Arkansas; and Lieut. -Col. EUet command- 
 ing the steam-ram fleet, in a letter to Flag-officer Davis, of 
 the gunboat flotilla, said: "The continued existence of the 
 rebel gunboat Arkansas so near us is exercising a very per- 
 nicious influence upon the confidence of our crews, and even 
 upon the commanders of our boats." The Federal naval offi- 
 cers feared that the Arkansas would run down to New Or- 
 leans and capture that city. Immediately after she sought 
 shelter under cover of the upper batteries at Vieksburg, all 
 the commanders of the Federal fleet were called aboard of 
 Commodore Farragut's flag-ship, the steam sloop-of-war Hart- 
 ford, for consultation. A plan was immediately formed to 
 get the entire upper fleet between the Arkansas and New Or- 
 leans, and in passing, if possible, sink or capture the ram. An 
 eye-witness gives the following graphic description of Farra- 
 gut's fleet attempting to destroy the Confederate ram. 
 
 "The fleet of Commodore Davis accordingly took up a station at 
 about dark, and opened on the batteries to draw their fire. They suc- 
 ceeded admirably, and at an unexpected moment the fleet of large vessels 
 struck into the channel and descended the river. As each boat arrived 
 opposite the Arkansas she slackened and poured her broadside into her. 
 She answered as well as she could in such a storm of missiles, and put one 
 or two balls into our vessels, but her main occupation was to be still and 
 take it. Upwards of a hundred guns, some of them throwing ten-inch 
 shots, poured their deadly charges into her. Seven-inch steel -pointed 
 shot were fired into her. The firing was tremendous. The Sumter also 
 ran into her and tried to knock a hole in her hull, but seemingly might as 
 well have run into a rock. The batteries of course joined the engagement, 
 and poured shot into our vessels as well as they could in the darkness. 
 
 '■ The roar of guns was like an earthquake, and nothing more terrific 
 ever was conceived than this grand artillery duel by night. It lasted an 
 hour, and then our vessels passed below and took up their old anchorage. 
 
33i THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " In the morning messengers were despatched to see what damage 
 the Arkansas had sustained. By going up the opposite bank of the river, 
 she could be plainly seen. Two battles, such as no boat in the world ever 
 went throagh before, had failed to demolish her." 
 
 As the Federal ships and gunboats moved slowly down 
 stream, all the while throwing shot and shell by broadside at 
 the Confederate batteries, into Vicksburg, and at the Arkansas, 
 the ram returned the salutations most heartily. Amidst the 
 terrific booming of cannon and the bursting of shells, could 
 be heard the rattle of musketry from a brigade of infantry, 
 which poured volleys into the enemy's rigging and exposed 
 places. For near an hour and a half the roar was deafening 
 and incessant, and to add to the sublimity of the picture, two 
 houses in the city, soon after dark, caught on fire from the 
 shells, and lighted up everything far and wide. 
 
 During the furious bombardment, the Arkansas changed 
 her position a few hundred feet, having gotten under way to 
 fight to greater advantage, but found it impossible to generate 
 sufficient steam, owing to her smoke-stack being riddled. A 
 well-directed 225-pound wrought-iron bolt struck near the 
 water line of the Arkansas, passed through the port side into 
 the dispensary, on the berth-deck, opposite the engine-room, 
 mashed up all the drugs, etc., carried in an ugly lot of iron 
 fragments and splinters, passed over the engine-room, disa- 
 bling the engine, grazed the steam chimney, and lodged in 
 the opposite side of the ship, between the wood- work and the 
 iron plates. Several of the firemen and Charles Gilmore, one 
 of the pilots, were killed, and James Brady, who had stood at 
 the wheel while in Old River and in passing through the com- 
 bined fieets above Vicksburg, was wounded and knocked over- 
 board, and an engineer and several others were wounded. 
 Lieut. Stevens stopped the leak, while the bow guns and port 
 broadsides never ceased to pour into each passing vessel a con- 
 stant fire of shot and shell. The enemy's fleet passed so close 
 to the Arkansas that her shots could be distinctly heard crash- 
 ing through the sides of their ships, and the groans of their 
 wounded were also heard. With the exception of the destruc- 
 tive shot described, the Arkansas was not materially injured, 
 but brought five of her guns to bear on the passing vessels. 
 
 Lieut. Gift, describing the passage of Farragut's fleet be- 
 fore Vicksburg and the attempt of the enemy to destroy tlie 
 Arkansas, says: 
 
 " Our arrival at Vicksburg was hailed with delight by all the army. 
 The officers came on board to see the marks of the struggle, whilst squads 
 of eager privates collected on the bank to get a near view of the wonder- 
 ful craft which had just stood so much hammering. This attracted a 
 daring band of sharp-shooters to the other bank, and we were forced to 
 open with our heavy guns to disperse them, which was easily accom- 
 plished by half a dozen discharges. The enemy below showed decided 
 signs of demoralization. A mortar boat which had been allowed to get 
 aground was hastily set on fire and blown up. A sea-going vessel 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 325 
 
 (commanded by Craven"*, left to guard the transports, sprung her broadside 
 athwart the stream to be ready for an attack. Everything got up steam, 
 and Porter's flag-boat opened with a hundred-pounder Parrott gun in a 
 spiteful, angry fashion, throwing her shot over and beyond us. If we had 
 a smolie-stack, proper boiler fronts, good engines, a new crew, and many 
 other things, how we would have made a smash of those fellows ! But as 
 our smoke-staek was so riddled, the draft was destroyed, and as our en- 
 gines were troublesome, faulty affairs, and onr crew were nearly all killed, 
 wounded, or used up, we had to bide where we were, and see the chance 
 slip away from us. Read cast many longing glances down the river, and 
 I think would have been perfectly wilUng to undertake the task, broken 
 down as we were. But there is a limit to human endurance; we could do 
 no more, and we rested. During the day the telegraph informed Capt. 
 Brown that he had been promoted to the rank of commander, and we 
 were thanked from Richmond for our brilliant achievement. Our dead 
 were removed on shore for burial, and our wounded were taken to an army 
 hospital. As soon as we arrived at Vieksburg the detachment of soldiers 
 left us to rejoin their command, which reduced our force to a very low 
 ebb. As well as we could, we put the ship to rights, and the day wore 
 away. As soon as dark began to set in, it was evident that the enemy 
 meant mischief. 
 
 "Everything was under way, and soon the guns from the upper bat- 
 tery opened quick and sharp, to be repUed to by the broadsides of the 
 heavy ships coming down, the Richmond (Alden) leading. Our plucky 
 men were agaili at their quarters, and stea.m. was ready should we be com- 
 pelled to cast off and take our chances in the stream against both fleets. 
 About that time things looked pretty blue. It is true that we were under 
 the batteries at Vieksburg, but practically we had as well have been a 
 hundred miles from there. The guns were perched on the high hills; they 
 were not provided with sights, and if ever they hit anything it was an ac- 
 cident or the work of one of Brooke's rifles. ^ 
 
 "This we well knew, and stripped this time for what we supposed 
 would be a death struggle. The sea-going fleet of Farragut was to pass 
 down, drag out, and literally mob us; whilst the iron-clad squadron of 
 Davis was to keep the batteries engaged. Down they came, steaming 
 slowly and steadily, and seemed to be on the look-out for us. But they 
 had miscalculated their time. The darkness which partially shrouded 
 them from the view of the army gunners, completely shut us out from 
 their si^ht, inasmuch as our sides were the color of rust and we lay under 
 a red bank; consequently, the first notice they had of our whereabouts 
 came from our guns as they crossed our Une of Are, and then it was too 
 late to attempt to check up and undertake to grapple with us. They 
 came by singly, each to get punished, as our men were again feeling in 
 excellent spirits. The Hartford stood close in to the bank, and as we spit 
 out our broadside at her, she thundered back with an immense salvo. 
 Our bad luck had not left us. An eleven-inch shot pierced our side a few 
 inches above the water-hne," and passed through the engine-room, killing 
 two men outright (cutting them both in two) and wounding six or eight 
 others. The medicines of the ship were dashed into the engine-room, and 
 the debris from the bulkheads and splinters from the side enveloped the 
 machinery. The shot bedded itself so far in the opposite side that its posi- 
 tion could be told by the bulging protuberance outside. On account of my 
 disabled arm, I had turned over my division to Scales, and remained 
 with Capt. Brown on the platform. To be a spectator of such a scene was 
 intensely interesting and exciting. The great ships with their towering 
 spars came sweeping by, pouring out broadside after broadside, whilst 
 the batteries from the hills, the mortars from above and below, and the 
 iron-clads, kept the air alive with hurtling missiles and the darkness 
 Ughted up by burning fuses and bursting shells. On our gun-deck every 
 
 ' Not then In position at Vieksburg. 
 
326 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 man and oflBcer worked as though the fate of the nation hung on his in- 
 dividual efforts. Scales was very near, and I could hear his clear voice 
 continually. He coaxed and bullied alternately, and, finally, when he 
 saw his object in line, his voice rose as clear as a bell, and his ' ready! flreP 
 rang out Like a bugle note. The last vessel which passed us was that 
 commanded by Nichols ('Bricktop'), and she got one of our shots in her 
 out-board deUvery. He pivoted his eleven-inch gun to starboard, heeled 
 his vessel to keep the leak above water, and drifted past the batteries 
 without further damage. 
 
 "We had more dead and wounded, another hole through our armor 
 and heaps of splinters and rubbish. Three separate battles had been 
 fought, and we retired to anything but easy repose. One of our messmates 
 in the ward -room (a pilot) had asserted at supper that he would not again 
 pass through the ordeal of the morning for the whole world. His mangled 
 body, collected in pieces was now on the gun-deck; another had been sent 
 away to the hospital with a mortal hurt. The steerage mess was short 
 four or five members, whilst on the berth-deck many poor feUows would 
 never again range themselves about the mess-cloth. * * * * 
 The enemy now had a fleet above and below us, and though foiled and 
 angry, he made no immediate active effort to do us more harm, other than 
 to shell us incessantly by day, and once by night, with mortar shells. Half 
 a dozen or more thirteen -inch mortars kept missiles continually in the air, 
 directed at us. We were twice struck by fragments, otherwise the busi- 
 ness was very harmless." 
 
 On the morning after the passage of the Federal fleet be- 
 low Vicksburg, the enemy finding that the Arkansas was still 
 at her moorings, comparatively uninjured and with steam up, 
 opened on her all their mortar boats above and below the town, 
 throwing their huge thirteen-inch shells thick and fast around 
 her. As the mortar-shells fell with terrible force almost per- 
 pendicularly, and as the Arkansas was unprotected on upper 
 decks, boilers amidship, a magazine and shell-room at each 
 end, it was very evident that if she was struck by one of these 
 heavy shells, it would cause her destruction. Her moorings 
 were changed frequently to impair the enemy's range; but day 
 and night from the 16th to the 32d of July, the officers and 
 crew were exposed to the falling bombs. Quite a number ex- 
 ploded a few feet above decks, and sent their fragments into 
 the decks, and several burst so near under the water, as to 
 shake the vessel with earthquake force. ' 
 
 1 " When the Arkansas started down the Yazoo and were made aware of the danger of the 
 
 ber crew were seamen with the exception of mortar-sbell that fell continually around the 
 
 about fifty soldiers — volunteers from a Mis- ship, those volunteers found many pretexts 
 
 souri regiment. The seamen had been on the to go back to their commands; many took 
 
 Yazoo swamps some time, and in conseqtience the * shell fever,' and went to the hospital, 
 
 were troubled with chills and fever. Many had As a general thing, soldiers are not much 
 
 been killed, a large number wounded, and a use on board ship, particularly volunteers, 
 
 greater portion of the remainder sent to the who ar§ not accustomed to tiie discipline 
 
 hospital on the arrival at Vicksburg. The day and routine of a man-of-war. A scene that 
 
 after we reached the city the Missouri volun- occurred on board the Arkansas one day at 
 
 teers, who had agreed to serve only for the trip, Vicksburg is illustrative. We were engaged 
 
 went on shore and joined their command; so hauling the ship into a position near one of our 
 
 we were now veiy short-handed. Capt. Brown batteries; but having but few sailors to haul on 
 
 asked Gen. Van Doru to fill up our complement the wharf, we were progressing slowly, when 
 
 Irom the army, which he readily assented to do, Lieut. Stevens, the executive oflcer, came on 
 
 provided the men would volunteer, and make deck, and perceiving a crowd of volunteera sit- 
 
 application for transfer through proper chan- ting on deck playing cards, he said rather 
 
 nels. At first quite s number volunteered, bnt sharply: * Come, volunteers, that won't do; get 
 
 when they got on board and saw the shot-holes up feom there and give us a pull.' One of the 
 
 through the vessel's sides, and beard sailors' re- players looked up at Lieut. Stevens and replied: 
 
 ports of the terrible effect of shell and splinters, 'Oh! hell! we aint no deck hands;' and eyeing 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 337 
 
 Notwithstanding the immense hammering the Arkansas 
 received from the combined fleets of the enemy, in a few days 
 she was ready to assume the offensive. Upon one occasion, 
 while under the command of Capt. William F. Lynch, who 
 had relieved Commander Brown for a few hours, to enable 
 him to go ashore and take a dinner and a sound sleep, of 
 which he was in great need and which he had not had for rhore 
 than a week, the Arkansas left her moorings in front of Vicks- 
 burg, and proceeded up the river beyond the range of the bat- 
 teries with the intention of destroying the enemy's mortar 
 boats. Her appearance created the greatest excitement in the 
 enemy's fleet, and though the mortar boats were under the 
 protection of the Eads iron-clads, each of them superior in 
 arms and armament to the Arkansas, the boats were taken in 
 tow and run up the river at a speed far surpassing that of the 
 Confederate ram. As the Arkansas had but a limited supply 
 of coal, and there was 1,000 miles of open river ahead, the 
 pursuit was abandoned, and she returned to the city. On the 
 next day Commander Brown resumed his command, and in at- 
 tempting to ascend the river to drive off the Federal mortar 
 fleet, the starboard engine became disabled, and it was with 
 difficulty he could return to his moorings in front of the 
 •city. 
 
 On the 31st of July, Flag-officers Farragut, Davis, and W. D. 
 Porter held a council of war on board the Benton, at which 
 Commander Porter volunteered the service of the Essex to 
 make an effort to destroy the Arkansas, and the following 
 programme was agreed on : 
 
 " That on the morning of the 23d, precisely at four o'clock, the whole 
 available fleet under command of Flag-ofEicer Davis was to get under way, 
 •and when within range to bombard the upper batteries at Vicksburg ; the 
 lower fleet under Flag officer Farragut was to do the same, and attack 
 the lower batteries; the Essex was to push- on, strike the rebel ram, de- 
 liver her flre, and then fall behind the lower fleet." 
 
 In accordance with this plan Commodore Porter got under 
 way, passed the Benton, and proceeded down the river. 
 
 -the man sitting opposite to him, was heard to deck, the olficer remarked to the doctor that 
 
 ■say: ' I go you two better!' in a battle there was plenty to do, as the 
 
 " Both of our surgeons being sick, Capt. Brown wounded came down in a steady stream. The 
 
 telegraphed out into the interior of Mississippi ' medico ' looked a little incredulous; but a few 
 
 for medical volunteers. In a day or two a long, minutes afterwards, when he perceived the 
 
 slim doctor came in from Clinton; and as he road through which an eleven-inch shell had 
 
 was well recommended, Capt. Brown gave him come, his face lengthened perceptibly; and 
 
 an acting appointment as surgeon, and directed after awhile, when the big shell began to fall 
 
 Tiim to report to Lieut. Stevens for duty. It was around the vessel, he became rather nervous, 
 
 -early in the morning when he arrived; the ene- He would stand on the companion-ladder and 
 
 my had not commenced their daily pastime of watch the smoke rise from the mortar-vessels, 
 
 shelling us; the ship's decks had been cleanly and would wait until he heard the whizzing of 
 
 washed down, the awnings spread, and every- the shell through the air, when he would make 
 
 thing was neat and orderly. The doctor took a dive for his state-room. As soon as the shell 
 
 breakfast in i^e ward-room, and seemed de- fell he would go up and watch out for another, 
 
 lighted with the vessel generally. Before the Occasionally when a shell would explode close 
 
 regular call to morning inspection the officer of to us, or fall with a heavy splash alongside, he 
 
 the powder division started around below to would be heard to groan: 'Oh! Louisa and the 
 
 show the new medical officer his station during babes I' " — Beminiscemes of the O. S. Navy, by 
 
 -action,and the arrangement for disposing of the C. W. Bead, Southern Historical Society Papers. 
 
 wounded, etc., etc. In going along the berth- Vol. I. No. 6. May 1876. 
 
338 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 A more opportune moment to destroy the Arkansas could 
 not have been chosen, as many of her officers and all but 
 twenty-eight of her crew were ashore in the hospitals, and 
 she laid helpless at anchor with a disabled engine. 
 
 At daylight on the a3d of July, the iron-clad fleet above 
 Vicksburg dropped down and commenced firing rapidly at 
 the Confederate upper batteries. Farragut's fieet engaged 
 the lower batteries, and the mortar-vessels opened upon the 
 city and forts. The cannonading was tremendous, and fairly 
 shook the earth. In about half an hour after the firing had 
 begun, the large and formidable iron-clad ram, the Essex, 
 emerged from the smoke above and made directly for the 
 Arkansas. Commander Brown received the attack at anchor, 
 with a crew sufficient to work two guns, but with the aid of 
 his officers he was able to man all the guns which could be 
 brought to bear. When the muzzles of the guns of both ves- 
 sels were nearly touching each other, the broadside of the 
 Arkansas was exchanged for the bow guns of the Essex. As 
 the latter struck the Arkansas one of her ten-inch solid shots 
 struck the armor of the Arkansas a foot forward of the lar- 
 board forward port, cutting oflf the ends of the railroad iron 
 and driving the pieces forward diagonally across from for- 
 ward to aft, split upon the breech of the starboard after gun, 
 killing eight men and wounding six, half of the crew. The 
 Essex swung alongside of the Arkansas, when the latter gave 
 her a port broadside with guns depressed, which apparently 
 disabled the Essex, for she ceased firing and drifted down the 
 river. ' 
 
 Commander Porter, in his official report, says that as he 
 passed the Benton : 
 
 "Flag-offlcer Davis hailed me and 'wished me success.' I now- 
 pushed on, according to my understanding of the programme, and pre- 
 cisely at half- past four A. M. the enemy's upper batteries opened upon 
 me, but I heard no response at this time from our fleets. I arrived at the 
 ram, delivered my fire and struck her; the blow glanced, and I went high 
 on the river bank with the bows of the ship, where I lay ten minutes un- 
 der three batteries of heavy gfuns. I backed off and loaded up. The 
 enemy had drawn up three regiments of sharp-shooters and several batte- 
 ries of field pieces, ranging from six-pounders to twenty-four pounders. I 
 found it impossible under these circumstances to board tlie rebel boat, 
 though such was my original intention. After I dehvered my fire at but 
 five feet from the ram we distinctly heard the groans of her wounded and 
 saw her crew jumping overboard. At this time I began to look for aid 
 from the fleets, but without result. I ordered the pilots to get the Ms- 
 sex's head up stream, with the intention of holding on until the lower 
 fleet came up, and then make another attack on the ram. At this time 
 I was under the guns of three batteries, one of which was not over one 
 hundred feet off. A heavy ten-inch shot from the nearest battery struck 
 my forward casemate about five, feet from the deck, but fortunately did 
 not penetrate. A rifle seven and a half -inch shot from the same battery 
 
 1 In the engagement the two vessels were so ened and severely hurt by the powder which 
 cloBe to each other that several of the officers flashed through the ports of the Arkamas from 
 and crew of the Arkansas had their faces black- the guns of the Essex. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 329 
 
 struck the casemate about nine feet from the deck. It penetrated the 
 iron, hut did not get through, though so severe was the blow that it 
 stai'ted a four-inch plank two inches and eighteen feet long on the in- 
 side. A conical shell struck the casemate on the port side as we were 
 rounding to, penetrated the three-quarter-inch iron and came half way 
 through the wooden side. It exploded through, killing one man and 
 slightly wounding three. A small piece grazed my head, and another 
 piece tore the legs of the First Master's pantaloons. 
 
 "I had now been under fire for upwards of an hour, and thirty minutes 
 of the time from eighty -feet to one hundred yardsof some of the enemy's 
 heaviest batteries. I still looked for the arrival of the lower fleet, but saw 
 nothing of it. I held on for a short time longer, but the enemy began to 
 Are with such rapidity and we were so close that the flashes of his guns 
 through my gun-holes drove my men from the guns. At last, through the 
 smoke, I saw the lower fleet nearly three miles off, and still at anchor. See- 
 ing no hope of relief or assistance, I now concluded to run the gauntlet of 
 the enemy'slower forts and seek an anchorage below the fleet. I therefore 
 reluctantly gave the order to 'put her head down stream;'but I was de- 
 termined to be in no hurry. They had now plenty of time to prepare, and 
 so rapid was their Are that for half an hour the hull of this ship was com- 
 pletely enveloped in the heavy jets of water thrown over her by the 
 enemy's shot, shell and rifle balls. The department may have some idea of 
 the amount and number of shot, shell, plugs and rifle missiles thrown at 
 this vessel when they are now informed we were two hours and a-half under 
 fire of seventy heavy guns in battery, twenty field-pieces and three heavy 
 guns on board the ram. During that time this vessel was heavily struck 
 forty-two times, and only penetrated twice." 
 
 Soon after the Essex haKi encountered the Arkansas, the 
 ram Queen of the West, under the command of Lieut. -Col. Al- 
 fred E. EUet, commander of the steam-ram fleet, attempted to 
 run her down. The ram passed the batteries under a terrific 
 fire, and ran into the Arkansas, which made both vessels trem- 
 ble from stem to stern. The Arkansas seemed to shrink and 
 yield before the tremendous blow, and for a moment it was 
 thought her side would give way ; but she re-acted and the 
 ram fiew back from her, and, in moving toward her again, 
 ran into the river bank. The Queen of the West Reversed her 
 engines and ran on again so forcibly as to strain her own 
 works badly. By this time the Queen had been struck twenty 
 or twenty -five times. Her smoke-stack was perforated with 
 balls; one of her steam-pipes had been shot away ; in various 
 places large holes had been put through her sides and bow. 
 As she was seriously injured in her hull, and leaking, 
 and liable to be captured by the Confederates, Col. Ellet 
 determined if possible to effect his escape. As he passed 
 the Arkansas, the ram gave him a parting broadside which 
 nearly ended the career of the Queen. The Queen moved up 
 the river, and the Confederate batteries increased their fire. 
 Heavy shot and shell fell before, behind, and around her, and 
 every few seconds one would go tearing through her deck or 
 cabin. As she passed one of the upper batteries, a thirty-four 
 pound shot struck her in the rear, went through every one of 
 her larboard state-rooms, in which no person happened to be 
 at the time, into the captain's office, penetrating the iron safe, 
 
330 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 and passing out, shattered the wooden carriage of one of the 
 mounted brass pieces on the boiler deck, dismounting the gun, 
 and hitting it, left a deep indentation in the metal. 
 
 The Queen ran by the batteries through a terrible fire and 
 made her appearance above the bend in the river riddled with 
 shot. A correspondent of the New York Tribune said: 
 
 " The Queen presents a most dismantled and forlorn appearance, and 
 Is as nearly shot to pieces, for any vessel that ■will float, as can ■well be im- 
 agined. The many who have visited her since her terrible experience are 
 with difficulty persuaded that not one of her crew was killed or danger- 
 ously wounded. She has the semblance of a complete wreck, and it will 
 be necessary to send her North at once for repairs, though some think her 
 injury too great for remedy— that she is not worth the mending. 
 
 " Shells exploded in her cabin, shivering her furniture, crockery, and 
 state-rooms to pieces. The wardrobe of the crew was converted into rags, 
 and hardly a whole garment or a pair of boots or shoes can be fotind on 
 the boat. She is dented and damaged, and blackened and splintered, and 
 singed and shattered, as if she had passed through a score of the fiercest 
 battles, and presents as good an example of the amount of injury that 
 may be done to a boat without absolutely destroying her as it would be 
 convenient to present, or easy to discover in twelve months' service on 
 the flotilla." 
 
 Lieut. Gift, in his account of the engagement of the Ar- 
 kansas with the Essex and the Queen of the West, says : 
 
 "Our crew was fearfuUy used up oft the 15th. Daily we sent more 
 men to the hospital, suffering with malarious diseases, until we had not 
 in a week more than thirty seamen, ordinary seamen and landsmen, and 
 I think but four or five firemen. Many of the younger officers had also 
 succumbed; those of us who were left were used up also. We slept be- 
 low, with our clothes on, in an atmosphere so heated by the steam of the 
 engines as to keep one in a constant perspiration. No more men were to be 
 had. It was disheartening enough to see a ship which but a week before 
 was the pride of the country now almost deserted. On the morning of the 
 22d of July, a week after our arrival, as we awakened early in the morn- 
 ing by the drum calling us to quarters, great commotion was observed in 
 the fleet above. Everything seemed under way again, and it was evident 
 that we were soon to have another brush. On our decks were not men 
 enough to man two guns, and not firemen enough to keep steam up if we 
 were forced into the stream ! Rather a doleful outlook ! We were moored 
 to the bank, head up the river, as a matter of course. The fires under the 
 boilers were hastened, and every possible preparation made for resistance. 
 In a few minutes we observed the iron-clad steamer Bssex (' Bill Porter' 
 commanding) steaming around the point and steering for us. The upper 
 battery opened, but she did not reply. Grrimball unloosed his Columbiad, 
 but she did not stop. I followed, hitting her fair, but still she persevered 
 in sullen silence. Her plan was to run into and shove us aground, when 
 her consort, the §Meere of the West, was to follow and butt a hole in us; 
 and thus the dreaded ram was to be made way with. On she came like a 
 mad bull, nothing daunted or overawed. As soon as Capt. Brown got a 
 fair view of her, followed at a distance by the Queen, he divined her in- 
 tent, and seeing that she was as square across the bow as a flat boat or 
 scow, and we were as sharp as a wedge, he determined at once to foil her 
 tactics. Slacking off the hawser which held our head to the bank, he 
 went ahead on the starboard screw, and thus our sharp prow was turned 
 directly to her to hit against. This disconcerted the enemy and destroyed 
 his plan. A collision would surely cut hun down and leave us uninjured. 
 All this time we had not been idle spectators. The two Columbiads had 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 331 
 
 "been ringing on his front and piercing him every shot; to which he did 
 not reply until he found that the shoving game was out of the question; 
 then, and when not more than fifty yards distant, he triced up his three 
 bow port shutters and poured out his fire. A nine-inch shot struck our 
 armor a few inches forward of the unlucky forward port, and crawling 
 along the side entered. Seven men were killed outright and six wounded. 
 Splinters flew in all directions. In an instant the enemy was alongside, 
 and his momentum was so great that he ran aground a short distance 
 astern of us. As he passed we poured out our port broadside, and as 
 soon as the stern rifles could be cleared of the splinters and broken 
 stanchions and wood-work,which had been driven the whole length of the 
 gun box, we went ahead on our port screw and turned our stern guns on 
 him, every man — we had but seventeen left— and officer went to them. As 
 he passed he did not fire; nor did he whilst we were riddling him close 
 aboard. His only effort was to get away from us. He backed hard on 
 his engines and finally got off ; but getting a shot in his machinery just 
 as he got afloat, he was compelled to float down stream and join the lower 
 fleet, which he accomplished without damage from batteries on the hills. 
 He fired only the three shots mentioned. But our troubles were not over. 
 We had scarcely shook this fellow off before we were called to the other 
 end of the ship — we ran from one gun to another to get ready for a sec- 
 ond attack. The Queen was now close to us, evidently determined to ram 
 us. The guns had been fired and were now empty and inboard. Some- 
 how we got them loaded and run out, and by the time she commenced to 
 round to, I am not sure, but I think we struck her with the Columbiads 
 as she came down, but at all events the broadside was ready. Capt. 
 Brown adopted the plan of turning his head to her also, and thus received 
 her blow glancing. She came into us going at an enormous speed, prob- 
 ably fifteen mUes an hour, and I felt pretty sure that our hour had come. 
 I had hoped to blow her up with the thirty-two pounder as she passed, 
 hut the ^un being an old one, with an enlarged vent, the primer drew out 
 without Igniting the charge. One of the men— we had no regular gun's 
 crews then, every man was expected to do ten men's duty — replaced it 
 and struck it with a compressor lever; but too late, his boilers were 
 passed, and the shot went through his cylinder timbers without disabling 
 him. His blow, though glancing, was a heavy one. His prow, or beak, 
 made a hole through our side and caused the ship to careen, and roll 
 heavily ; but we all knew in an instant that no serious damage had been 
 done, and we redoubled our efforts to cripple him so that he could not 
 again attempt the experiment. As did the Ussex, so he ran into the bank 
 astern of us, and got the contents of the stern battery; but being more 
 Jiimble than she, was sooner off into deep water. Returning up stream 
 he got our broadside guns again, and we saw that he had no disposition 
 to engage us further. As he passed the line of fire of the bow guns he 
 got it again, and I distinctly recollect the handsomest shot I ever made 
 was the last at her. He was nearly a mile away, and I bowled at him 
 with the gun lying level. It ricoehetted four or five times before it drop- 
 ped into his stem. But it dropped there. As I have before said, the 
 Essex was drifting down stream unmanageable, and now would have 
 been our time to have ended her in sight of both squadrons, but we had 
 but seventeen men and they well-nigh exhausted. Beating off these two 
 vessels, under the circumstances, was the best achievement of the Ar- 
 kansas- That we were under the batteries of Vicksburg did not amount 
 to anything. I do not believe that either vessel was injured by an army 
 gun that day. We were left to our fate, and if we had been lost it would 
 have been no unusual or unexpected thing. The Essex used in one 
 of her guns that day projectiles that were probably never used before, 
 to wit : Marbles that boys used for playing. We picked up a hundred 
 unbroken ones on our forecastle. There were 'white-allies,' 'chinas,' 
 and some glass marbles. I wish the naval reader to understand that 
 the Essex did not return the fire as she lay alongside us, did not attempt 
 
332 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 to board, although he had a picked crew for that purpose, and fired but 
 three guns in the fight, and thereafter kept her ports closed. Brown, 
 no longer able to play the lion, assumed the role of the fox with con- 
 sununate skill." 
 
 Notwithstanding the terrific engagements the Arhansas 
 had passed through, in her combats with the two Federal 
 fleets on i\\e Mississippi Eiver, she was comparative!}^ unin- 
 jured, and on the following day, after her contest with the 
 Essex and Queen of the West, she was seen steaming up and 
 down the river in front of the batteries at Vicksburg in con- 
 tempt of all the efforts that had been made to destroy her. 
 
 The Federals held Baton Rouge, the capital pf Louisiana, 
 forty miles below the mouth of Red River, with a land force 
 of about 5,000 men, in connection with two powerful fleets. It 
 was a matter of great necessity for the Confederates that the 
 navigation of Red River should be opened as high as Vicks- 
 burg. Supplies, much needed, existed there, hard to be ob- 
 tained from any other quarter, and strong military reasons 
 demanded that the Confederates should hold the Mississippi 
 at two points, to facilitate communication and co-operation 
 between the military district of Mississippi and the trans- 
 Mississippi department. The capture of Baton Rouge, and 
 the forces of the Federals at that point, would open the Mis- 
 sissippi, secure the navigation of Red River, then in a state 
 of blockade, and also render easier the recapture of New Or- 
 leans. To this end Major Gen. Earl Van Dorn gave orders to 
 Gen. Breckenridge to move upon Baton Rouge. To ensure 
 success he also ordered the Arkansas to co-operate with the 
 land forces by a simultaneous attack from the river. In his 
 ofiicial report, he says: "All damages sustained by the Arkan- 
 sas from the fleets of the enemy had been repaired, and when 
 she left the wharf at Vicksburg for Baton Rouge, she was 
 deemed to be as formidable, in attack or defence, as when she 
 defied a fleet of forty vessels-of-war, many of them iron-clads." 
 
 With such effective means. Gen. Van Dorn deemed the 
 taking of Baton Rouge and the destruction or capture of the 
 enemy on the land and water the reasonable result of the ex- 
 pedition. By epidemic disease, the land force under Major Gen. 
 Breckenridge was reduced to less than twenty-flve hundred 
 effective men. The Arkansas, after passing Bayou Sara, within 
 a short distance of Baton Rouge, in ample time for joint action 
 at the appointed hour of attack, suddenly became unmanage- 
 able, from a failure in her machinery and engine, which all 
 the efforts of her engineers could not repair. The gallant 
 Breckenridge, advised by telegram every hour of her progress 
 toward Baton Rouge, and counting on her co-operation, at- 
 tacked the enemy with his whole effective force, drove the 
 Federals from all their positions, and forced them to seek pro- 
 tection under the cover of their gunboats. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 333 
 
 In his official report of operations at Vicksburg and Baton 
 Bouge, dated September 9th, 1863, Major Gen. Earl Van Dorn 
 says : "I think it due to the truth of history to correct the 
 error, industriously spread by the official reports of the enemy, 
 touching the destruction of the Arkansas. She was no trophy 
 won by the Essex, nor did she receive injury at Baton Rouge 
 from the hands of any of her adversaries. Lieut. Stevens, 
 her gallant commander, ' finding her unmanageable, moored 
 her to the shore. On the cautious approach of the enemy, 
 who kept at a respectful distance, he landed his crew, cut her 
 from her moorings, fired her with his own hands, and turned 
 her adrift down the river. With every gun shotted, our flag 
 floating from her bow, and not a man on board, the Arkansas 
 bore down upon the enemy, and gave him battle. Her guns 
 were discharged as the flames reached them, and when her 
 last shot was fired, the explosion of her magazine ended the 
 brief but glorious career of the Arkansas. ' It was beautiful,' 
 said Lieut. Stevens, while the tears stood in his eyes, ' to see 
 her, when abandoned by commander and crew, and dedicated 
 to sacrifice, fighting the battle on her own hook.' I trust that 
 the official report of Commander Lynch will do justice to the 
 courage, constancy and resolution of the officers and men, 
 who were the last crew of the Arkansas." 
 
 From a statement of Lieut. Read, of the Arkansas, it ap- 
 pears the ram steamed leisurely down the river from Vicks- 
 burg to within fifteen miles of Baton Rouge, when her star- 
 board engine broke down. Repairs were immediately begun, 
 and at eight o'clock were partially completed, though she was 
 not in a condition to encounter many of the Federal vessels 
 on account of the injury received. On rounding the point 
 near Baton Rouge, the starboard engine again broke down, 
 
 1 Important repairs were yet necessary to the ter for his decision to Capt. Wm. F. Lynch, the 
 «ngmeB of ihe.Arkansas, and to replacing and re- senior ofl&cer of the C. S. navy in the West, 
 fastening her shattered armor. While these who was at Jackson, Miss Ignorant or regard- 
 were under way. Commander Brown obtained leas of the condition of the Arkansas, Capt. 
 afurloughfrom the Navy Department until the Lynch ordered Lieut. Stevens to disobey .the 
 repairs were made and the Arkansas was ready instructions of Commander Brown and comply 
 for action. He proceeded to Grenada, Miss., with the request of Gen. Van Dom. In this 
 about six hours ride by rail from Vicksburg, way the Arkansas was placed under the com- 
 where his family had taken refuge. Immediately mand of Lieut. Stevens, with orders to run 
 upon his arrival he was taken severely iU, and 300 miles against time. When her engines 
 while unable, as he thought, to get out of bed, broke down within sight of Baton Kouge, 
 he received intelligence from Commander Ste- Lieut. Stevens, who was as humane as he 
 vens informing him that he had received in- was true and brave, finding that he could not 
 structious from Gen. Earl Van Dom to co-oper- bring a single gun to bear upon the approach- 
 ate ^vith Gen. Breckenridge in the attack on ing enemy, sent all his officers and crew 
 Baton Bouge. Commander Brown sent positive ashore over the bow, and remained alone to 
 orders to Lieut Stevens not to move his vessel set his ship on five. This he did so effectually 
 until he could join it, as the Arkamsas ytas not that he had to jump over the stern into the 
 ready for action. Commander Brown caused river, and save himself by swimming, and 
 himself to be taken to the depot, and being un- the Arkansas, whose decks had never been 
 able to sit up, was put in the maa car and laid pressed by the foot of an enemy, with colors 
 on the mail bags until he arrived at Jackson, flying was blown into the air. After the de- 
 Miss., 130 miles distant. At the latter place struction of the Arkansas, Commander Brown 
 Commander Brown heard that the Arkansashad joined the camp of Gen. Breckenridge at Baton 
 left Vicksburg four hours before, and was then Rouge, and passed a night in Lis tent, who 
 on her way to Baton Rouge. It appears that seeing he was still an invalid, that great and 
 Gen. Van Dorn was peremptory in his orders good man insisted on his taking his narrow 
 for the co-operation of the Arkansas, and Lieut. camp mattress, while he slept on the ground be- 
 Stevens being undecided, had referred the mat- side him. 
 
334 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 and the ram drifted ashore in sight of the city on the Arkansas; 
 side. Repairs were immediately hegun, and the ship got 
 afloat at five o'clock the same evening. The engineer reported 
 that the engines were unreliable.' It was determined to make 
 a trial trip up the river to ascertain the strength of the en- 
 gines, and the Arkansas proceeded some five hundred yards 
 when the engines again broke more seriously than ever. The 
 crew were engaged all night in repairs. On the following 
 morning at eight o'clock the lookouts reported the Federal 
 fleet coming up the river. The ram was moored head down 
 stream and cleared for action, and in this condition her oflB- 
 cers and crew determined to fight her to the last. At this mo- 
 ment the engineer reported the engines ready for service, and 
 that they would last half a day. The lines were cut, and the 
 Arkansas started for the Essex with the intention of running 
 her down. The ram proceeded about three hundred yards in 
 the direction of the Essex when the starboard engine again 
 suddenly stopped. The Arkansas was then steered for the 
 river bank, her stern down, the Essex pouring a hot fire into 
 her. In this condition the ram opened fire with her stern gun. 
 The Essex continued to advance, and when within four hun- 
 dred yards, the crew of the Arkansas were ordered ashore, 
 and the vessel cut adrift and set on fire. After all hands were 
 ashore the Essex fired upon the disabled vessel most furiously. 
 In an hour after her abandonment, as she was drifting down 
 upon the Essex, the fire communicated to her magazine, and 
 all that remained of the noble Arkansas was blown up. 
 
 Lieut. Gift in continuation of his narrative of the " story 
 of the Arkansas " says : ' 
 
 "Capt. Bro-wm -was sick in Grenada, and telegraphed Stevens not to 
 go down, as the machinery was not reliable. Application was made by 
 Gen. Van Dorn to Commodore Lynch, who gave the order to proceed 
 down the river as soon as possible. The vessel was hurriedly coaled and 
 provisioned, and men and officers hastened to join her. Capt. ^rown left 
 his bed to regain his ship, but arrived too late. He subsequently followed 
 down by rail and assumed command of the crew shortly after the destruc- 
 tion of the vessel. The reader must not construe any remark here to re- 
 flect on Stevens. Such is not my intention. He was a conscientious 
 Christian gentleman, a zealous and efficient officer. In the performance 
 of his duty he was thorough, consistent and patriotic. His courage was 
 of the truest and highest type; in the face of the enemy he knew nothing 
 but his duty, and always did it. Under this officer we left Vicksbuig 
 thirty hours before Gen. Breckinridge had arranged to make his attacks. 
 The short time allowed to arrive at the rendezvous made it imperative 
 that the vessel should be driven up to her best speed. This resulted in the 
 frequent disarrangements of the machinery and consequent stoppages to 
 key up and make repairs. Every delay required more speed thereafter in 
 order to meet our appointment. Another matter operated against us. 
 We had been compelled to leave behind, in the hospital, our chief engi- 
 neer, George W. City, who was worn out and broken down by excessive 
 watching and anxiety. His care and nursing had kept the machinery in 
 
 1 Southern Historical Society Papers for Jnnuary and February, Marcb, April and May, 18M. 
 Vol. XII. Nos. 1 and 2, 3, 4, 6. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 335 
 
 order up to the time of leaving. "We soon began to feel his loss. The en- 
 gineer in charge, a volunteer from the army, had recently joined us, and 
 though a young man ' of pluck and gallantry, and possessed of great 
 wUl and determination to make the engines work, yet he was unequal 
 to the task. He had never had anything to do with a screw vessel or 
 short-stroke engines, and, being zealous for the good repute of his de- 
 partment, drove the machinery beyond its powers of endurance. 
 
 "The reader may wonder why the machinery of a vessel of so much 
 importance should have been entrusted to a strange and inexperienced 
 person, and ask for an explanation. Were there not other engineers 
 than Mr. City in the navy, and, if so, where were they? There were 
 dozens of engineers of long experience and high standing at that time 
 in the navy, most of whom were idle at Richmond and other stations. 
 At or near the mouth of Ked River, the engines had grown so contrary 
 and required to be hammered so much that Stevens deemed it his duty 
 to call a council of war to determine whether it was proper to proceed 
 or return. The engineer was summoned, and gave it as his opinion that 
 the machinery would hold out, and upon that statement we determined 
 to go ahead. A few miles below Port Hudson, he demanded a stop- 
 page to key up and make aU things secure before going into action. 
 We landed at the right bank of the river, and I was dispatched with 
 Baoot to a house near by to get information. After a deal of trouble we 
 gained admittance, and learned that the naval force of the enemy at 
 Baton Rouge consisted of our particular enemy the JEssex, and one or two 
 small sea-going wooden gunboats. This was very satisfactory. We 
 learned, also, that Breckenridge was to attack at daylight; that his move- 
 ments had been known for several days on that side of the river; yet it 
 will be borne in mind that the important secret could not be entrusted to 
 high oflBcers of the navy until a few hours before they were to co-operate 
 in the movement. At dayUght we heard our gallant troops commence the 
 engagement. The rattle of the volleys of musketry, mixed with the deep 
 notes of artillery, informed us that we were behind, and soon came the un- 
 mistakable boom of heavy navy guns, which plainly told us that we were 
 wanted; that our ironsides should be receiving those missiles which were 
 now mowing down our infantry. In feverish haste our lines were cast oflf 
 and hauled aboard, and once more the good ship was driving toward the 
 enemy. Like a war-horse she seemed to scent the battle from afar, and 
 in point of speed outdid anything we had ever before witnessed. There 
 was a fatal error. Had she been nursed then by our young and over- zeal- 
 ous engineer she would have again made her mark in the day's fight. We 
 were in sight of Baton Rouge. The battle had ceased; our troops had 
 driven the enemjr to the edge of the water, captured his camps and his po- 
 sitions, and had in turn retired before the heavy broadsides of the Essex, 
 which lay_ moored abreast of the arsenal. Our officers and crews went to 
 quarters in high spirits, for once there was a chance to make the army 
 and country appreciate us. Baton Rouge is situated on a "reach "or 
 long, straight stretch of river, which extends three or four miles above 
 the town. We were nearly to the turn and about to enter the "reach;" 
 the crew had been mustered at quarters, divisions reported, and all the 
 minute preparations made for battle which have before been detailed, 
 when Stevens came on deck with Brady, the pilot, to take a final look 
 and determine upon what plan to adopt in his attack on the Essex. 1 1 
 was my watch, and we three stood together. Brady proposed that we rain 
 the Essex, and sink her where she lay, then back out and put ourselves 
 below the transports and wooden gunboats as soon as possible to cut off 
 their retreat. Stevens assented to the proposal and had just remarked 
 that we had better go to our stations, for we were in a hundred yards of 
 the turn, when the starboard engine stopped suddenly, arid, before the 
 man at the wheel could meet her with the helm, the ship ran hard and 
 
 ' I have forgotten his name. 
 
336 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 fast aground, jamming herself on to some old cj'press stumps that ■were 
 submerged. We were in full view from the position Gen. Breckenridge 
 had taken up to await our attack. All day long he remained in line of 
 battle prepared to move forward again, but in vain. On investigation it 
 was found that the engine was so badly out of order that several hours 
 must be consumed before we could again expect to move. There lay the 
 enemy in plain view, and we as helpless as a sheer hulk. Hundreds of 
 people had assembled to witness the fight. In fact, many ladies in car- 
 riages had come to see our triumph. They waved us on with smiles and 
 prayers, but we couldn't go. But Stevens was not the man to give up. A 
 quantity of railroad iron, which had been laid on deck loose, was thrown 
 overboard, and in a few hours we were afloat. The engineers had pulled 
 the engine to pieces and with files and chisels were as busy as bees, though 
 they had been up constantly then for the greater parts of the two preced- 
 ing nights. At dark it was reported to the commanding officer that the 
 vessel could be moved. In the meantime some coal had been secured (our 
 supply was getting short) and it was determined to run up stream a few 
 hundred yards, and take it in during the night, and be ready for hot work 
 in the morning. Therefore we started to move; but had not gone a hun- 
 dred yards before the same engine broke down again; thecrank pin (called 
 a " wrist" by Western engineers) of the rock-shaft broke in two. Fortu- 
 nately one of the engineers was a blacksmith, so the forge was setup and 
 another pin forged. But this with our improvised facilities used up the 
 whole night. Meantime the enemy became aware of our crippled condi- 
 tion, and at daylight moved up to the attack. The Essex led, and came 
 up very slowly, at a rate not to exceed two miles an hour. She had open- 
 ed on us before the last touch had been given to the pin, but it was fin- 
 ished and the parts thrown together. As the ship again started abead 
 Stevens remarked that we were brought to bay by a superior force, and 
 that he should fight it out as long as we would swhn. The battle for the 
 supremacy of the river was upon us, and we must meet the grave respon- 
 sibility as men and patriots. His plan was to go up the river a few hun- 
 dred yards and then turn on and dispatch the Essex, then give his atten 
 tion to the numerous force of wooden vessels which had been assem- 
 bled since the morning before. The pleasant sensation of again being 
 afloat and in possession of the power of locomotion, was hardl)[ experi- 
 enced before our last and final disaster came. The port engine this 
 time gave way, broke down and would not move. The engineer was 
 now in despair, he could do nothing, and so reported. The Essex was 
 coming up astern and firing upon us. We had run ashore and were a 
 hopeless, immovable mass. Read was returning the fire, but the two 
 ships were scarcely near enough for the shots to teU. We were not struck 
 by the Essex, nor do I think we struck her. An army force was reported 
 by a mounted ' home guard,' to be coming up the river to cut off our re- 
 treat. Stevens did not call a council of war, but himself assumed the re- 
 sponsibility of burning the ship. I recollect the look of anguish he gave 
 me, and the scalding tears which were running down his cheeks when he 
 announced his determination. Read kept firing at the Essex until Stevens 
 had set fire to the ward-room and cabin, then all jumped on shore, and in 
 a few moments the flames burst up the hatches. Loaded shells had been 
 placed at all the guns, which commenced exploding as soon as the flre 
 reached the gun-deck. This was the last of the Arkansas. " 
 
 The vyar has been over for more than twenty years, but the 
 errors in the bulletins of the fight are uncorrected even in the 
 histories written long after the excitement of the conflict has 
 passed away. Farragut's reports, as highly colored as a news- 
 paper correspondence, recur in Porter's history without even 
 a note of explanation to make plain the real facts, and W. D. 
 Porter's report that the Essex blew up the Arkansas finds a 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 337 
 
 place in the records of the war to continue the delusion. Ad- 
 miral Porter does indeed cast doubt on both reports, saying: 
 "The Arkansas was soon set on fire and totally destroyed — 
 whether from the shells of the Essex or by the Confederates 
 to escape capture, is not known. The Confederates claim that 
 one of her engines was disabled, and that she was destroyed 
 by them; but be that as it may, her destruction was due to the 
 presence of the Essex and her two consorts." And Admiral 
 Farragut' says: " Although Bill Porter did not destroy her, 
 he was the cause, and thought his shells did the work ! for 
 they would hardly have destroyed her unless he made the 
 attack. I insist that Porter is entitled to the credit of it." 
 
 The destruction of the Arkansas resulted from her dis- 
 abled condition, and from the impossibility of repairing her 
 engines anywhere on the Mississippi River. Admiral Porter 
 regards the statements of the Confederate officers destroying 
 the Arkansas as a " very unlikely story," and that " it is not 
 credible tha;t a vessel, which had run the gauntlet of the two 
 fleets under Farragut and Davis, at Vicksburg, inflicting great 
 injury in return, would avoid a conflict with the Essex (a ves- 
 sel of weaker hull and very much less speed), unless she had 
 been first so crippled by the Essex's guns that her commander 
 saw no hope of success." That is a conclusion which the facts 
 do not warrant; and as illogical as to say that " while Admiral 
 Farragut ' did not attach much importance to Confederate 
 rams,' he had seen enough of the performances of the Arkan- 
 sas to know that if properly managed she was the most for- 
 midable vessel on the Mississippi Eiver, and that there would 
 be no security against her while she floated." It is not true 
 that " the events that took place on board the ram, except 
 through vague reports, have never come to light." ■ Lieut. 
 Stevens' report, supplemented by the statements of Lieuten- 
 ants Gift and Read, and the prisoners mentioned by Flag- 
 offlcer Farragut in his report to the Secretary of the Navy, 
 dated August 10, 1862, ^ fully shows all that took place on the 
 ram, and that she was no trophy to the Essex's shells — for they 
 broke harmless on her armored sides, and inflicted no injury 
 on her hull, her armament, or her machinery. The inherent de- 
 fects of a badly constructed engine, built under circumstances 
 
 1 Life and Letters, p. 289. Ing been taken sick at Vicksburg,) with the in- 
 
 tention of making a combined attack with Gen. 
 
 2 Flag-ofi&cer Farragut in his report to Secre- Breckenridge upon Baton Kouge; but her port 
 tary Welles, on August 10th, ]862, says: engine broke down. They repaired it in the 
 
 " SiK: Since forwarding the reports of Lieuts. course of the day, and went out to meet the 
 
 Fairfax, Bansom, and Roe, we have picked up a Essex the next morning, when they saw her 
 
 numher'of prisoners from the ram Arkansas, all coming up; but the starboard engine gave way, 
 
 of whom I have catechised very closely. They and they ran her ashore, she being perfectly un- 
 
 agree very well respecting her exit from the manageable. 
 
 Yazoo, and her passing the fleets ; they also agree " They say that when the gunboats were seen 
 
 as to the number of killed and wounded on each coming up, and the Essex commenced firing, the 
 
 of these occasions, making in all eighteen killed captain set the ram on fire and told the crew to 
 
 and a large number of wounded. At Vicksburg run ashore. They also state that the gunboats 
 
 uiey plated the deck with iron, and fortified Webb and Music were sent for to tow her up the 
 
 her with cotton inside. She then came down in river, but they did not arrive, and neither of 
 
 command of Lieut. H. K. Stevens, (Brown hav- them had been seen. This is the statement." 
 22 
 
338 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 that could not be improved, disabled the Arkansas in the 
 very presence of her enemy, and rendered her destruction nec- 
 essary to prevent her becoming the trophy of battle. The let- 
 ter of S. L. Phelps to Admiral Foote, ' shows that "the Arkan- 
 sas fairly caught the vessels napping, and, coming upon them 
 so unexpectedly, was able to drive her furious, and, as it ac- 
 tually proved, destructive way through the fleet. The first at- 
 tempt of Farragut to destroy her was unsuccessful, doubtless 
 owing to the darkness; and the second attempt by Davis was 
 not followed up by a general attack of the lower fleet owing, 
 it would seem, to a misunderstanding. " This second attempt 
 Mr. Phelps pronounced "a fizzle;" and the epithet applies with 
 equal force to the attempt to claim for the Essex the honor of 
 destroying the Arkansas. " 
 
 The junction of the fleets of Admiral Farragut and Flag- 
 officer Davis, above Vicksburg, had been attained without 
 material loss, but not without some feelings of disappoint- 
 ment on the part of Farragut. In a letter of June 2d, 1862, he 
 expresses his feelings at what the Navy Department had re- 
 quired of him. ''The government appear to think we can do 
 anything. They expect me to navigate the Mississippi', nine 
 hundred miles, in the face of batteries, iron-clad rams, etc., 
 and yet, with all the iron-clad vessels they have North, they 
 could not get to Norfolk or Richmond. The iron-clad s, with 
 the exception of the Monitor, were all knocked to pieces. 
 Yet I am expected to take New Orleans, and go up and release 
 Foote from his perilous situation at Fort Pillow, when he is 
 backed by the army and has iron-clad boats built for the river 
 service, while our ships are to be periled by getting aground 
 and remaining there till next year; or, what is more likely, 
 be burned to prevent them falling into the enemy's hands. A 
 beautiful .prospect for the 'hero' of New Orleans."^ Every 
 vessel on the Mississippi, floating the Confederate flag below 
 Vicksburg, had been swept out of existence, and all that re- 
 mained above that city were scattered in rivers and bayous. 
 Of the fleet formerly under Hollins, thePoZA; and the Livingston 
 found a hiding-place up the Yazoo River, where they were 
 burned by Commander Pinkney, and the Van Dorn, of the 
 Montgomery flotilla, shared the same fate." 
 
 1 Life of Admiral Toote, p. 351. 3 Life of Farragut, p. 269. 
 
 2 Lieut. Commancler George M. Bausom, of * A Tazoo City correspondent of the JactBon 
 tlie U. S. gunboat Kineo, in his report to Flag- Mississippian, JiUy 12th, 1862, writes : 
 
 officer Farragut, on August 6th, 1862, aaye: "I "Two of the enemy's gunboats, or rather hay- 
 believe that she [the Arkansas] had suddenly plated rams, made a reconnoitering trip up the 
 become helpless by some failure of her en- Yazoo River as high as Liverpool yesterday, aud 
 gines; and seeing our approach, so formidable returned immediately on seeing the firepro- 
 to her in her crippled condition, doubtless duced by the burning of the gunboats Living- 
 they set her on fire and abandoned her. About ston, Polk and Van Dorn — the two former having 
 one o'clocii her magazine exploded, and the been burnt by order of Commodore Pinkney, 
 ram Arkajisas was extinct." chief in command — the Van Dorn catching fire 
 Flag-officer Farragut, in reporting this fact to from the other burning vessels, thus destroying 
 Secretary Welles, on August 7th, said: " It is one these three valuable boats, 
 of the happiest moments of my life that I am " Capt. Isaac N. Brown had procured 400 hales 
 enabled to inform the department of the de- of cotton and had it placed on the Livingston 
 fitruction of the ram Arkansas." and Polk, with a view of making fire-ships of 
 
THE CONPEDEKATE STATES NAVY. ^ 339 
 
 In March, 1863, Acting Rear Admiral David D. Porter 
 sent an expedition up the Yazoo Pass, under the command 
 of Lieut. Commander Watson Smith. Soon after entering 
 the Tallahatchie, Lieut. Smith was taken sick, and Lieut. 
 Commander James P. Foster took command. The expedition 
 was composed of the iron-clads DeKalb and Chillicothe, and 
 the steamers Battler and Lioness, with a large land force 
 under Gen. Quimby. It proceeded as far as Fort Pemberton 
 on the Tallahatchie River, which the gimboats engaged for 
 several days, but were finally repulsed by Commander Isaac 
 N. Brown, C. S. navy, and a small force of Confederates who 
 were defending it. Lieut. Commander Foster, in his official 
 report to Rear Admiral Porter, on April 13th, 1863, said: 
 
 " The first attack made on Fort Pemberton was on the 11th of March, 
 on a reeonnoisance, about 11 A. M., when five or six shots were exchanged, 
 doing little or no damage. On the afternoon of the same day the OMIU- 
 cothe again went down and opened fire on the fort. During the action 
 the Chillicothe had four men killed and fifteen wounded; after having a 
 whole gun's crew disabled the Chillicothe withdrew. 
 
 " On the 13th the Chillicothe and Baron DeKalb got under way at 
 11:30 A. M., and commenced the attack on Fort Pemberton, at 780 yards. 
 The Chillicothe remained in action one hour and thirty -eight minutes. 
 During this action she received forty -four shots ; and after expending nearly 
 all of her ammunition of five-inch and ten-inch shells, retired by order of 
 the commanding officer. On the retiring of the Chillicothe the fort ceased 
 firing, although the DeKalb remained, and kept firing slowly during the 
 remainder of the day. 
 
 " On the 18th we retired, believing the fort too strong for the forces 
 there engaged, and being short of ammunition. 
 
 "The day after leaving Fort Pemberton the Chillicothe, DeKalb, 
 light -drafts, etc., arrived before the fort again; and at the suggestion 
 of Gen. Quimby the Chillicothe took her old position before the fort, firing 
 three shots for the purpose of drawing the enemy's fire: failing in this, she 
 ■withdrew. We, along with those on shore, were under the impression that 
 the enemy blew up a torpedo just forward the Chillicothe'' s bow. 
 
 " We remained twelve days waiting for the army to do something; and 
 when General Quimby was ordered to withdraw his forces, we brought 
 up the rear." 
 
 On the 15tli of March, the enemy landed an eight-inch gun 
 from the gunboat Baron DeKalb, with a supply of ammuni- 
 tion, and placed it in battery on shore, with a crew to work it. 
 
 them, connecting them by a chain, and with ioua from the boats, assuring Pinckney that all 
 
 Bteam np to run head on and destroy any as- care should be taken of them; but he would not 
 
 cending boat. This design would have been allow anything to be carried ashore, preferring 
 
 carried out by Capt. Brown and his ofScers but that aU should be destroyed, 
 
 for the untimely and unnecessary sacrifice by "Capts. Brown and Carter just arrived at the 
 
 Commodore Pinkuey. Not only were these scene of this wanton destruction as the boats 
 
 "^^^^^le vessels thus needlessly destroyed, but were fired -too late to save them by their coun- 
 
 . also the clothing of the crew, provisions, small sels if they had been heeded, for both these 
 
 Iboats, small arms, chains and anchor from gentlemen condemned the act in unmeasured 
 
 « ill*''® ^'•tewas expected to supply herself. terms. 
 
 "All these vessels were moored to the shore " It is not known what becameof the commo- 
 
 and protected by batteries, only at the time dore after his ' brilliant ' performance, as Capt. 
 
 ueedmg men to man the guns to drive back the Brown sought to have an interview with him, 
 
 ^^y 8 vessels: but the gallant commodore's but could not do so. Nor is it known how much 
 
 whole thoughts seemed bent upon the destruc- the gallant chief saved of his personal effects, 
 
 tion rather than the piotection of the boats, and for he certainly saved nothing for his country— 
 
 ^ „ ^ ^an was sent to the guns ashore. but he did heroically manage to have taken 
 
 " Before the boats were fired a squad of mihtia- ashore, without injury, a pair of pet chickens 
 
 men offered their services to remove the provis- and a poodle dog." 
 
340 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 On the 19th, they took the gun on board from the shore bat- 
 tery, and retired with severe loss in both killed and wounded. 
 The DeKalb was considerably cut up, losing ten gun-deck 
 beams, having the wheel-house and steerage badly knocked to 
 pieces, and various other damages to the wooden parts of the 
 vessel. The Rattler was considerably damaged, and lost sev- 
 eral in killed and wounded. 
 
 The Federals reported that they caused the Confeder- 
 ates to sink the steamers Star of the West, Magnolia, and 
 Natchez. 
 
 On the 15th of May, 1863, Rear Admiral Porter came up 
 the Yazoo, with a formidable fleet of gunboats, to co-operate 
 with Gens. Grant and Sherman, in their siege of Vicksburg. 
 On the 18th, he put his fleet in communication with the Fede- 
 ral land force near Snyder's Bluflf, and sent them provisions 
 from below. In the meantime, the Confederates were evacu- 
 ating Haines' Bluff, which Lieut. Commander Walker, of the 
 DeKalb, found abandoned when he reached that point. The 
 works at Haines' Bluff were designed by C. S. navy officers, 
 and were very formidable. The fortifications and the rifle-pits 
 extended about a mile and a quarter. 
 
 Having blown up the magazines, and destroyed the works 
 generally. Acting Rear Admiral Porter started Commander 
 Walker up the Yazoo River, with sufficient force to destroy 
 all the Confederate property above the obstructions. In the 
 meanwhile, Gen. Grant was closely investing Vicksburg, 
 and had already in his possession the most commanding 
 points. 
 
 As the Federal gunboats approached Yazoo City, the Con- 
 federate navy-yard, and all pertaining to it, was burned by 
 Commander Isaac N. Brown, C. S. N., to prevent its falling 
 into the enemy's possession. The Federal vessels arrived at 
 Yazoo City, at 1 p. m. on the 21st of May, and were met by a 
 committee of citizens, who informed Commander Walker that 
 the place had been evacuated by the military and naval autho- 
 rities, and asked protection. Lieut. Commander Walker, of 
 the U. S. gunboat Baron DeKalb, in his report says: 
 
 "The vessels burned were the Mobile, a screw vessel, ready for her 
 planking, the Republic, which was being fitted out for a ram, and a vessel 
 on the stocks — a monster— 310 feet long and 70 feet beam. 
 
 "The navy-yard contained five saw and planing-mills, an extensive 
 machine shop, carpenter and blacksmith shops, and all the necessary fix- 
 tures for a large building and repairing yard, which with a very large 
 quantity of lumber were burned. I also burned a large saw-niiU above 
 the town. 
 
 " Most of the public stores had been removed; such as I found in town 
 were taken on board the vessels or destroyed." 
 
 After the return of the expedition under Lieut. Commander 
 Walker to Yazoo City, Acting Rear Admiral Porter sent him 
 up again, with instructions to capture transports, so as to 
 break up all transportation on the river. In his report, dated 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 341 
 
 June 1st, 1863, Lieut. Commander Walker from the "Mouth 
 of the Yazoo," said: 
 
 "I left this place on the morningof the 24th of May, with the DeEalb, 
 Forest Rose, Linden, Signal and Petrel. I pushed up the Yazoo as 
 speedily as possible for the purpose of capturing or destroying the ene- 
 my's transports in that river. The Signal knocked down her smoke- 
 stacks and returned the same night. Leaving the DeKalb, with orders 
 to come on as fast as possible, I pushed on with the Forest Rose, Lin- 
 den and Petrel, to within fifteen miles of Fort Pemberton, when I found 
 the steamers John Walsh, R. J. Loclcland, Golden Age and Scotland, sunk 
 on a bar, completely blockading it up. 
 
 "Failing in my efforts to make a passage through the blockade, I 
 flred them, destroying all but such parts of the hulls as were under water. 
 These steamers were fine boats, in good order, and if I had had the means 
 could have been raised and saved. I remained at that point during the 
 night, and next morning at daylight was attacked by a force of the enemy, 
 but after a sharp fire of a few minutes they beat a hasty retreat. Our only 
 loss was two men belonging to the Petrel, wounded. Bietuming down the 
 Yazoo, I burned a large saw-mill twenty-flve miles above Yazoo City. At 
 Yazoo City I landed and brought away a large quantity of bar, round, 
 and flat iron from the navy-yard. Arriving at the mouth of Big Sun- 
 flower, I proceeded up that river about 180 mUes, until stopped by shoal 
 water. At Indian Shoot I sent Volunteer Lieut. Brown, of the Forest 
 Rose, with boats through to Rolling Fork. He found a quantity of corn 
 belonging to the rebels, which he burned. At the mouth of Bayou 
 Quirer, hearing of steamers, I sent Lieut. Brown, with the boats of the 
 Forest Rose and Linden, up after them. After ascending ten miles he 
 burned the Bew Drop and Emma Rett. The Linden burnt the Argo in 
 a small bayou about seventy-five miles up Sunflower. 
 
 " I also found the Cotton Plant sunk in Lake George, with nothing 
 out of water but the tops of her smoke-stacks. 
 
 "At Gawin's Landing, on the Sunflower, I found and brought away 
 a cutter which was lost on the Deer Creek expedition. Returning, I ar- 
 rived- here last evening." 
 
 In July a naval and military expedition was sent to Yazoo 
 City to capture the Confederates who had re-occupied that 
 place. The army and navy made a combined attack on the 
 works which the Confederates abandoned. While the Federal 
 gunboat Baron DeKalb was moving slowly along she ran 
 foul of a torpedo planted in the river by Commander Isaac W. 
 Brown, C. S. N., which exploded and sunk her. Acting Rear 
 Admiral Porter says: " Many of the crew were bruised by the 
 concussion, which was severe, but no lives were lost. The 
 officers and men lost everything. She went down in fifteen 
 minutes." 
 
 At the retreat from Fort Pillow, the Maurepas, under Lieut. 
 Commander Fry, and Pontchartrain, under Lieut. Commander 
 John Dunnington, of HoUins' fleet, were sent up White Eiver. 
 
 The short service of the Maurepas is best told by the re- 
 port of her commanding oflBcer, Lieut. Fry: 
 
 "C. 8. Gunboat 'Maurepas,' ) 
 
 ^ "Des Arc, Ark., June 6th, 1863. ) 
 
 'General: I arrived at this place on the 23d ult., with a crew of 
 less than ten men, exclusive of my firemen and coal passers. It was abso- 
 lutely necessary, if I proposed doing anything besides frightening the 
 
343 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 enemy, that I should have the co-operation of a land force, which, despite 
 all my eflforts, I was unable to obtain. One or two companies of cavalry 
 would have sufBced if I could get no more; but the first colonel I could 
 hear from concluded I was under his command, and ordered me to stay 
 where I was until further orders. This order, of course, I disregarded; as, 
 according to my judgment, no man under therankof aBrigadier-Q-eneral 
 canpossibly form a correct judgment of the contingencies governing the 
 movements of a gunboat. 
 
 " Having armed a few citizens, I proceeded with them to act as sharp- 
 shooters up the river to Jacksonport. At Grand Glaze some 200 of the 
 enemy's cavalry preceded us ten minutes. The turns of the White River 
 resemble a bow-knot, and cavalry, and even infantry, by cutting across 
 points could keep ahead of us; and in ambuscade, could have killed every 
 man on board of us. We, however, never saw the enemy till we got near 
 Jacksonport, which place had been evacuatedin part in anticipation of 
 our arrival with a large land force. The enemy (Ninth Illinois Cavalry) 
 retreated in time across Black River. I fired about ten shots into the 
 woods in the direction of their flight. «**»*»* 
 
 " The gentlemen who volunteered their services to me rendered effi- 
 cient assistance in rolling out and burning the cotton. My crew destroyed 
 the sugar. The river had fallen so that we rubbed hard in getting up, 
 and was falling so rapidly that I had not a moment to spare. I barely 
 saved the boat as it was, and had to leave unbumed about 900 bales. 
 These were housed, and our party had determined to burn the house con- 
 taining them, but on the representation of a person who came to me and 
 said that it would burn the town, I prevented it. I learned subsequently 
 that it might have been destroyed without risk to the city. 
 
 " The citizens, in their enthusiasm, got some of my men drunk, and 
 my citizens in some instances left oft work to plunder. One got the Prov- 
 ost-Marshal's trunk, containing his commission, uniform, and some pa- 
 pers. I have the original book containing the oath of allegiance exacted 
 from the citizens as the price of their being at liberty and exempt from 
 plunderd) 
 
 "A man named Peoples rides a fine horse, goes heavily armed, and 
 pilots Federal scouts on foraging expeditions. At his nod one is spared 
 and another sacrificed. His house was close to the Federal camp. I 
 stopped at his place, burnt the house, corn-crib, etc., considering it im- 
 portant as a retaliatory measure. I have taken prisoners several per- 
 sons who have voluntarily taken the oath of allegiance, arrested sus- 
 picious persons, and caused the arrest of a traitor spy ndmed Lewis 
 Smith, who has served in our army, and was greatly trusted. I have 
 the Federal vouchers for his pay in my possession. The visit of my 
 boat will not be without its fruit. ******** 
 " Respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "Joseph Fry.'"^ 
 
 A Federal expedition was fitted out at Memphis, consist- 
 ing of the Mound City, St. Louis, Lexington, Conestoga, and 
 a number of transports, and was dispatched up White River 
 to the relief of Gen. Curtis. Resistance to such an expedition 
 by the Maurepas would have been futile, so her commander 
 sunk her and two wooden boats across the channel at St. 
 Charles, Ark., and placing the guns of the Maurepas in battery 
 on the heights, brought the Federal expedition to a halt, and 
 compelled an action, in which one of the shot from Fry's guns 
 penetrated the steam-chest of the Mound City, and the escap- 
 ing steam soon compelled her crew to take to the water. In 
 
 1 Life of Capt. Joseph Pry, p. 163. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 
 
 343 
 
 -contemporaneous accounts of this engagement, a very im- 
 probable story gained considerable circulation that Lieut. 
 Commander Fry had ordered his men to fire on the struggling 
 men in the water. The improbability that a man of Fry's 
 character could give such an order, is confirmed by its im- 
 possibility, on account of Fry being at least a quarter of a mile 
 further down the river when the gun was fired which exploded 
 the steam-chest of the Mound City. At the point below, Lieut. 
 F. M. Roby had command of one Parrott gun, and Lieut. Com- 
 mander Fry was with him. ' 
 
 Lieut. Fry's account of the affair^ is that " it had been re- 
 ported to him that the Federals were sending small boats 
 loaded with armed men from the gunboats below, with a view 
 of cutting off his retreat from the rear. Under these circum- 
 stances, Lieut. Roby, with five or six rifienaen, was stationed to 
 open fire on these boats, in order to interfere with their design 
 of cutting off his retreat. It was that, justifiable and proper 
 firing that was misrepresented as a shooting of drowning and 
 struggling men while in the water. His report from on board 
 the U. S. naval hospital ship Red Rover, to which he was car- 
 ried when captured and wounded, was : '^I sunk the Maure- 
 pas to close the channel on White River, to prevent the Fed- 
 eral gunboats (four in number) from ascending. I then landed 
 
 1 The following is the official report of Flag- 
 -of&cer Davis : 
 
 United States Flag Ship ' ' Benton," 1 
 Meiviphis, June 19, 1862. ) 
 
 Sm: The Conestoga, Lieut. Commanding G. W. 
 Blodgett, arrived here to-day from" White 
 Kiver. She brings information of the capture 
 of two batteries at St. Charles, eighty miles 
 from the mouth, the first of which mounted 
 four Parrott guns and tho second three forty- 
 iwo-pouiider rifled guns. Three gims, it is 
 understood, were taken from the gunboat 
 Mariposa, i.e.—Maurepas, which, after being 
 dismantled, was sunk. There is now but one 
 Kunboat remaining in White River, the Pont- 
 A^iarirain, mounting three or five guns, and hav- 
 ing her macliinery protected by iron and cotton. 
 
 The enemy has attempted to block up the 
 Tiver by driving piles and by sinking boats,but no 
 serious obstructions have yet been discovered. 
 
 The Conestoga will return to White River to- 
 night with reinforcements, accompanied by an 
 additional transport, laden with commissary 
 stores. 
 
 The victory of St. Charles, which has prob- 
 -ably given us the command of White River, 
 and secured our communication with Gen. Cur- 
 tie, will be unalloyed with regret but for the 
 fatal accident to the steam drum and heater of 
 theifownd Cii?/,mentionedin my telegraphic dis- 
 patch. Of the crew, consisting of one hundred 
 ■and seventy-five officers and men, eighty-two 
 have already died, forty-three were killed in the 
 water or drowned, and twenty-five are severely 
 wounded, and are now on board the hospital 
 Doat. Among the latter is Capt. Kilty. They 
 proTniee to do well. Three officers and twenty- 
 two men escaped uninjured. 
 
 After the explosion took place, the wounded 
 men were shot by the enemy while in the water, 
 and the boats of the Conestoga, Lexington and 
 At. Louis, which went to the assistance of the 
 
 scalded and drowning men of the Mound City, 
 were fired into, both with great guns and mus- 
 kete, and were disabled, and one of them forced 
 on shore to prevent sinking. 
 
 The forts were commanded by Lieut. Joseph 
 Fry. late of the U. S. N., who is now a prisoner 
 and wounded. 
 
 The department and the country will con- 
 trast these barbarities of a savage enemy with 
 the humane efforts made by our own people to 
 rescue the wounded and disabled, under simi- 
 lar circumstances, in the engagement of the 6th 
 inst . Several poor fellows, who expired shortly 
 after the engagement, expressed their willing- 
 ness to die when they were told that the victory 
 was ours. 
 
 1 have the honor to be, very respectfully, your 
 obedient servant, 
 
 C. H. Davis, 
 Flag-o^er Commanding Western Flotilla. 
 To Hon. Gideon Welles, 
 
 Secretary of the Navy. 
 
 2 A correspondent of the Baltimore Gazette con- 
 tributed the following brief account of Capt. 
 Joseph Fry, of the C. S. N., who afterwards 
 commanded the Virginitts : 
 
 '■ He was bom in Florida, and served many 
 years in the U. S. navy; from the latter he re- 
 signed to join the Confederacy, in which he held 
 the rank of lieutenant. As such he served on 
 the Mississippi, first under the command and on 
 the flagship of Commodore Hollins at New Or- 
 leans. After the fall of that city he had com- 
 mand of a small gunboat which the Federal 
 fleet drove into one of the smaller Western 
 rivers— the White, I think— and finding it im- 
 possible to save her. he sunk his boat, landed 
 his battery on a bluff, and opened a fire that 
 disabled one of his pursuers, and drove the re- 
 mainder off. The fleet, however, returned, and 
 throwing a body of some 500 marines in bis 
 
344 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 my crew, and assisted by Capt. Dunnington, with two guns 
 crew from the Pontchartrain, and some forty or fifty riflemen, 
 fought the gunboats, until a large land force in our rear com- 
 pelled me to retire up the bank of the river. I lost six or eight 
 of our men, and was the only officer captured or wounded that 
 I know of." 
 
 The report of Lieut. John W. Dunnington, C. S. N., of 
 the engagement at St. Charles, Arkansas, was as follows: 
 
 ''Confederate States Gunboat 'Pontchartrain,' \ 
 " Little Rock, Ark., June 21st, 186S. j 
 
 '* General: As tlie senior officer in command of the naval forces, in 
 the absence of Capt. Fry, C. S. N., I beg leave to submit the foUowing- 
 report of the engagement between our forces and the enemy's gunboats 
 at St. Charles, on the morning of the 17th instant: 
 
 "I reached St. Charles on Monday eveniag, 16th instant, about 6 
 p. M., with the men I carried with me to work the two rifled thirty-two- 
 pounder cannon, which I had previously placed there in battery. I found 
 our foi'ces there under arms. The smoke of the enemy's gunboats was 
 plainly seen from the blufif, and the pickets who had come in reported 
 two gunboats, one tug, and two transports below, advancing. Owing to 
 the unexpected approach of the enemy, Capt. Pry had not time to land 
 his guns, but immediatelj^. placed his vessel across the river above my 
 battery of rifled guns, and Intended to resist their progress. Finding the 
 enemy did not advance, after dark it was determined to sink the gunboat 
 Maurepas^ the transports Eliza 6?. and Mary Patterson^ in a hue across 
 the river. The sinking of the transports was entrusted to Capt. Leary. 
 
 rear, while some four or five steamers opened, 
 ou his front, made it hot for his two guns and 
 sixty or seventy men. Fighting all around to 
 the bitter end, Fry never did surrender, and the 
 first knowledge he had of the battle's finish was 
 when restored to consciouBnese in a Federal 
 hospital, when he found himself severely 
 wounded, in the shoulder, and learned that his 
 little band had been nearly all killed or wound- 
 ed before the bluff was taken. After be was 
 exchanged and was assigned to duty, his wound 
 breaking out afresh, compelled him reluctantly 
 to yield regular service, and, still suffering with 
 his shoulder and a semi-paralyzed arm, he un- 
 dertook the lighter duty of commanding a Con- 
 federate steamei', the Eugenie, in the blockade 
 running. In this steamer, one of the few sail- 
 ing regularly under the Confederate flag, Capt. 
 F17 proved himself a skillful, daring com- 
 mander, and was iiniformly succeasfuL On one 
 occasion the Eugenie, loaded with gunpowder, 
 grounded outside of Fort Fisher under the 
 guns of the blockading squadron, and when, in 
 view of the heavy cannonade which was 
 opened upon her, he was commanded from the 
 fort, from Wilmington, and finally from Rich- 
 mond, to abandon his boat and save his crew 
 from what was considered the inevitable explo- 
 sion. Fry positively refused to do so; stood by 
 his ship, lightened her, got a good tide, carried 
 her safely in — a measure of cool gallantry not 
 easily surpassed, as he was utterly defenceless, 
 cai-rying no armament. He simply stood the 
 chance of being blown up without the excite- 
 ment of battle to sustain his nerve, while, on the 
 other hand, the adjacent coast made escape easy. 
 " From this service Fry was withdrawn to 
 avipenntend the construction of torpedoes, and 
 for that piirpoae went to Scotland, where the 
 closing of the ports rendered his efforts fruit- 
 less. After the war I heard of him in New 
 
 Orleans, working on some patents for sav- 
 ing ships and curing timber, and very poor. Of 
 his connection with the Cubans I Imow noth- 
 ing, and can only suppose his poverty and natu- 
 ral love of adventure combined to bring about 
 his murder. Personally, he was a tall, well- 
 made, handsome man, with the most mesmeric 
 eyes I have ever seen, having great power of 
 control, both over himself and otiiers. His mind 
 was remarkably good and well cultivated. He 
 was a deep reader and thinker, fond of specula- 
 ting on abstruse subjects, and apt to be led by 
 his genius to extreme views. In disposition 
 he was sweet, but firm tempered; a true friend 
 and a strong enemy, not given, perhaps, to a 
 large circle, but very sociable and conversible 
 with his intimates, and, withal, as modest as 
 brave. 
 
 "As an old navid. oflQcer having personal ex- 
 perience of the laws of blockade, he both knew 
 the legal limits of his liability if captured, aud 
 trusted the flag he bore from protection from all 
 other penalties. Had the Virginius been a Cu- 
 ban privateer, as alleged, as such she would 
 have carried a battery, and Capt. Fry would 
 never have surrendered without resistance. 
 Had he borne a Cuban commission, three or 
 four shots over his steamer, within reach al- 
 most of Jamaica's coast, would never have 
 brought him to. The truth must he he com- 
 manded an American steamer, and believed 
 that the flag under which he had so long served, 
 which had conquered him, could and would in- 
 sure him at least civilized treatment." 
 
 Capt. Fry and fifty-three of his comrades 
 were cruelly murdered by the Cuban authoi'ities 
 on November 7th, 1873, and ninety-three more 
 were under sentence of immediate execution, 
 but were saved by the intercession of Sir 
 Lambton Lorraine of the British man-of-war 
 JS^iobe. 
 
COMMANDEK JOSEPH FRY, C. S. N. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 345 
 
 Capt. Fry, with his own crew, sank the Maurepas, remaining on decli 
 till the gun-deck was submerged. The blockading of the river was neces- 
 sarily so hastily done that no ballast or weight could be placed in the 
 transports. About daybreak the last vessel was sunk, and the river 
 blockaded temporarily. Supposing the enemy would make the attack at 
 early dayhght, one rifled Parrott gun and ammunition, in command of 
 Midshipman [P. M.] Robjr, was moved some 400 yards below the rifled 
 battery and placed in position. The sailors who manned the different 
 batteries were ordered to sleep within a few feet of their guns. Shortly after 
 daylight two rifled Parrott eight-pounder guns, that had been sent to 
 the rear for want of ammunition, were brought up and placed in position 
 near the guns commanded by Midshipman Eoby. These three guns 
 were manned by the crew from the Maurepas, and Captain Fry in person 
 superintended the fighting of them. One twelve-pounder howitzer from 
 the Maurepas, manned also by the crew, was sent down the river to assist 
 Capt. Williams in checking the enemy's advance by land. 
 
 " At 7 A. M. on the morning of the 17th, the pickets reported the en- 
 emy getting up steam. At 8:30 they had advanced up the river to our 
 lines, and two gunboats commenced throwing sheU, grape and canister 
 among our troops on the right bank of the river. They advanced very 
 slowly, attempting to find our heavy guns. "When they arrived abreast 
 of Capt. Fry's rifled guns, they opened on his battery very rapidly for 
 three-quarters of an hour, endeavoring to silence his guns. Failing to do 
 so, they slowly moved up the river until they came within point-blank 
 range of one of the rifled thirty-two-pounders. The leading gunboat 
 stopped to fight that gun; but, finding the gun still farther up was firing 
 at her, she moved up the river to get its position, and, in doing so, placed 
 herself between the two guns and in point-blank range. The other gun- 
 boat, in obedience to signal, 1 suppose, came abreast of the lower battery, 
 and opened a brisk Are upon us. About this stage of the action, 10 A. M., 
 Capt. Fry sent me word the enemy were landing a large force below. All 
 the available men that could be found were immediately sent to Capt. 
 WiUiams' assistance. At 10:30, a shot from the rifled thirty-two pounder 
 farthest up the river penetrated the leading gunboat, and either passed 
 through the boilers, steam-chest, or pipe, filling the entire vessel with 
 steam, and causingall that were not killed or scalded with steam to jump 
 into the river. The vessel was completely deserted, and drifted across the 
 stream into the bank, near Capt. Fry's battery. He immediately hailed, 
 and directed their flag hauled down. They failing to do so, although the 
 order was given by some of their own officers in hearing of our own peo- 
 ple, our own men were directed to shoot those in the water attempting to 
 escape. The two rifled guns were immediately directed to fire upon the 
 lower gunboat, which was still engaging us. She was struck several times, 
 and soon ceased firing, slowly dropping down the river, I think, materi- 
 ally damaged, as she made no effort to assist the boat we had blown up, 
 or save their friends in the river. Near 11:30, Capts. Fry and Williams 
 came to my battery and told me the enemy had completely surrounded 
 us; the battery of small rifled guns had been spiked, and our people were 
 in retreat. I trained one of the rifled guns to take a last shot at the en- 
 emy, and, as we flred, their infantry appeared over the brow of the hill, 
 about flfty yards distant, and opened on us with musketry. Capt. Fry then 
 proposed to make a stand with the sailors, and attempted to hold the 
 guns,'butthey were only armed with single-barreled pistols, which they 
 had flred at the enemy in the water. Nothing was now left but to save 
 all the men we could, and, as the enemy had us under a cross-fire the men 
 were ordered to retreat, the officers bringing up the rear, until scattered 
 in the woods. I had confined in single irons, at my battery, six prisoners, 
 captured by Capt. Fry at Little Red River. Deeming it inexpedient to 
 bring them -away, and as Capt. Fry told me he had no positive proof 
 against them, I left them for the enemy. The gallantry of Capts. Fry and 
 wilhams was so conspicuous as to cause general notice and remark. To 
 
346 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 my own officers and several of Capt Fry's who served with me, I am par- 
 ticularly indebted. Mr. William Smith tactingr master\ Mr. William 
 Barclay (engineer), Midshipman Roby, who commanded one of the guns, 
 Mr. W. L. Campbell, and Dr. Addison, of the Maurepas, acted with great 
 gallantry, and displayed a coolness and courage unsurpassed by any one 
 in the engagement. To Col. Belknap, one of the citizens of St. Charles, 
 we are all indebted for the untiring energy and zeal with which he assist- 
 ed before and during the action. He was always where he was needed, 
 encouraging the men and assisting the officers. I am unable to furnish a 
 list of killed and wounded, but do not think the numbers exceed three up 
 to the time of the retreat. For the operations of the infantry, I respect- 
 fully refer you to Capt. WilUams. I herewith inclose a rough sketch of 
 St. Charles and the surrounding country, including the position of our 
 batteries and that of the enemy's gunboats. 
 " I am, sir, with great respect, 
 
 "J. W. DUNNIIfGTOIf, 
 
 '■^Commanding Bunhoat ' Pontchartrain.^ 
 "MaJ. General Hindman, 
 
 "Commanding Trans-Mississippi IHstrict." 
 
 Capt. A. M. Williams, C. S. Engineers, made the following 
 report of the same engagement: 
 
 " Hbadquartebs Trans-Mississippi District, ) 
 LiTTi/E EocK, Ark., June 31st, 1863. j 
 " Sir : I have to report that on the evening of the 16th information 
 was brought me that the enemy's gunboats were advancing on Saint 
 Charles, which was soon substantiated by advance of our pickets, posted 
 down the river. We immediately made preparations to receive them, the 
 artillerymen keeping their positions at the guns during the night, and 
 my command being thrown out to prevent a surprise. We also, to pre- 
 vent the enemy's gunboats passing our position, under orders from Major 
 Gen. Hindman, scuttled the steamboats Eliza &. and Mary Patterson. 
 Capt. Fry, of the C. S. navy, who was in command at Saint Charles, 
 scuttled the gunboat Maurepas, thus forming an obstruction across the 
 river that could not be moved until our batteries were silenced. The 
 enemy, however, made no demonstrations during the night. On the 
 morning of the 17th, about 8:30 o'clock, two gunboats, two transports and 
 one tug appeared in sight and prepared to engage us. The men under 
 my command, consisting of detachments from Capts. Jones', Hearin's, 
 Smith's and Johnson's companies. Col. Pleasants' regiment, numbering 
 about thirty-five men, were, by order of Capt. Fry, deployed as sharp- 
 shooters, and posted along the river below the battery. At 9 A. M we en- 
 gaged the enemy's pickets and drove them in. The firing disclosed our 
 position to the gunboats, from which the enemy commenced a furious 
 fire of grape and shell, before which my men fell back to a more secure 
 position. At this time the enemy opened fire upon our light battery of 
 four guns, manned by the crew of the Maurepas, to which they replied 
 gallantly. At 10 A. m., the heavy battery under command of Capt. Dun- 
 nington, C. 8. N., opened fire on them, and soon blew up one of their 
 boats and silenced the other. When the explosion took place, the boat's 
 crew jumped into the water and into boats, to escape the scalding steam 
 that was pouring out of every hole and crevice. I immediately ordered 
 all the sharp-shooters that remained on the field, about twenty in number, 
 to the river bank to shoot them. Numbers of them were killed in the 
 water. At this time, about 11 o'clock, I discovered the enemy landing 
 below, and immediately ordered men to take possession of Col. Belknap's 
 house, for the purpose of holding them in check. When we reached the 
 top of the hill near the house, the enemy poured into us a furious fire of 
 musketry at a short distance. I at once made a reconnoissance of their 
 position in person, and ascertained that we were almost surrounded by a 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 347 
 
 force of several hundred men. I informed Capt. Fry of our situation and 
 was ordered by_ him to fall back to the battery, which I did with the few 
 men who remained with me. When we reached the battery the enemy 
 were on our front and right flank, and poured into uS a galling cross-fire of 
 musketry. Capt. Fry gave the orders to retreat, and immediately the 
 men scattered and ran the gauntlet of a heavy cross-flre for nearly half a 
 mile, the oflcers bringing up the rear. I cannot make an accurate report 
 of our loss, not knowing who have made their escape. It is, however, 
 very slight. The enemy's loss must have been very heavy. They admit 
 a loss of 140 killed, drowned and scalded. All our stores and artillery fell 
 into the hands of the enemy. I respectfully call your attention to the 
 coolness and intrepid bearing exhibited by Capt. Fry, our commander, 
 who, from disease, could not make his escape, and was, I understand, 
 severely wounded and taken prisoner. Capt. Dunnington in this en- 
 gagement hasproved to the world that the Federal gunboats are not in- 
 vulnerable. You are respectfully referred to his report for more minute in- 
 formation. I would also call your attention to the gallantry of a portion 
 of my command, some twenty in number, whose names I cannot give, and 
 particularly to the intrepid manner in which Privates [J. H.] Bruce and 
 [Gr. W.] Everett, of Capt. Hearin's company, behaved themselves. I take 
 great pleasure in acknowledging the services of Cols. Belknap and Finch, 
 and Messrs. Herman and Margins. The thanks of the'country are due 
 them for assistance rendered in encouraging and cheering the men, and 
 bringing them up. * * * 
 
 "I am, very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "A. M. Williams, Captain of Engineers. 
 " Colonel [R. C] Newton, Assistant Adjutant General." 
 
 Several days after this battle, the enemy having been re- 
 inforced by an additional gunboat and six transports, and 
 with a land force of about 4,000 men, made a demonstration 
 against Devall's Bluff. Intrenchments were thrown up and 
 three heavy guns from the Ponchartrain, manned by a por- 
 tion of her crew, were put in position. Obstructions were 
 also put in the channel to detain the enemy's vessels under 
 fire. A regiment and battalion of Arkansas infantry just 
 organized and armed, partly with shot-guns, sporting rifles, 
 and partly with pikes and lances, were sent to the bluff, 
 ■ together with three batteries of artillery, and with the Texas 
 regiment already there, were formed into a brigade, under 
 Brig. Gen. Allison Nelson. 
 
 Evidently alarmed by the resistance met at St. Charles, 
 Col. G. K Fitch, the Federal commander, moved very slowly 
 up stream, fired upon from both banks by Major Gen. T. C. 
 Hindman's cavalry, dismounted, and by citizens. At Claren- 
 don, twenty-five mites below Devall's Bluff, Col. Fitch landed 
 a regiment of infantry and moved it forward on the west side 
 to reconnoitre, escorted by the tug Tiger. After advancing 
 five miles it was compelled to retire with a loss of fifty-five in 
 killed and wounded. 
 
 On the 4th of January, 1863, Gen. McClernand determined 
 to make an attack on Fort Hindman, or Arkansas Post (as the 
 Federals called it), on the Arkansas River, and requested the 
 co-operation of the navy. Acting Rear Admiral Porter detailed 
 three iron-clads, the Louisville, Baron De Kalb and Cincinnati, 
 
348 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 with all the light draft gunboats in his Mississippi squadron. 
 Among the latter were the Battler, Black Hawk, Romeo, 
 Juliet, Marmora, Signal, Forest Rose, Glide and the ram 
 Monarch, Col. Charles EUet. The Federal naval forces were 
 under the command of Acting Rear Admiral David D. Porter 
 in person, and the troops were commanded by Gens. McCler- 
 nand and Sherman. 
 
 Fort Hindman, or Arkansas Post, as the Federals called 
 it, was a regular bastioned work, one hundred yards exterior 
 side, with a deep ditch some fifteen feet wide, and a parapet 
 eighteen feet high. It mounted eleven guns of various sizes. 
 The accompanying diagram gives an accurate plan of the work. 
 
 FLAN OF FOBT HINDMAN, OB ARKANSAS POST. 
 
 The fort was commanded by John W. Dunnington, colonel 
 commanding third brigade, and first lieutenant C. S. navy. In 
 the defence of the place he displayed the most conspicuous 
 gallantry, and before he surrendered, all his heavy guns were 
 broken by the Federal shot, and were lying about in fragments 
 on the ground. A large number of his killed and wounded 
 were lying in the ditches, and many of his brave garrison who 
 also belonged to the C. S. navy were sick in the hospital. After 
 the capture of Fort Hindman, and the officers and crew of the 
 C. S. gunboat Ponchartrain, the gunboat was sent to Little 
 Rock, where she was afterwards destroyed to prevent her from 
 falling into the hands of the enemy. 
 
 On the 9th of January, the Federal gunboats ascended 
 the Arkansas River, as high as Fort Hindman, when the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 349 
 
 army landed within about four miles of the fort. The Confed- 
 erates had thrown up heavy earthworks and extensive rifle- 
 pits all along the levee, and the fort itself was built close to 
 the river; the fort not being more than twenty yards from the 
 bank. While the Federal army was making a detour to sur- 
 round the fort, the iron-clads and gunboats moved up to the 
 attack. At 5:30 p. m. the Louisville, Baron DeKalb and Cin- 
 cinnati advanced to within 400 yards of the fort, which imme- 
 diately opened upon them, making some good shots, and in- 
 flicting considerable damage. Owing to the terrific fire and 
 superior guns of the enemy, in a short time the fort ceased 
 firing, nearly all the guns being disabled. At dark the Fede- 
 ral vessels dropped down the river and tied up to the bank. 
 Just before dark the light-draft iron-clad Battler passed 
 the fort and enfiladed it in the rear. In passing the fort, the 
 cabin works of the Battler were knocked to pieces and she 
 was raked from stem to stern in the hull. The Battler got 
 past the fort, but becoming entangled in the obstructions 
 placed in the river to impede the progress of the Federal gun- 
 boats, had to return. 
 
 During the night Lieut. Dunnington and his brave gar- 
 rison worked with great zeal to repair damages, preparatory 
 to the struggle which they anticipated would take place on 
 the following day, when the land forces of the enemy would 
 be in position to assault the fort. All the night of the 9th the 
 heavy strokes of the hammers of the Confederates could be 
 heard through the Federal fieet on the iron covering of their 
 casemates; at daylight, the tired garrison, having remained 
 up all night to repair their nearly denaolished fort, were pa- 
 tiently waiting for the Federal gunboats to renew the attack. 
 These were ordered to take position again not further than 
 fifty yards from the fort, and begin to fire as soon as possible. 
 The battle began, and soon became hot. In a short time all 
 the guns in the works were dismounted and silenced. The 
 Black Warrior having taken a regiment of infantry on board, 
 was run to the bank alongside the fort to board it. At the 
 same time a messenger was sent to Gen. Sherman informing 
 him of the condition of the fort, and that if he would send a 
 storming party from the land side, the navy would assault it 
 from the water. At this time the fort was a complete ruin 
 and surrounded on all sides by an overwhelming force. Lieut. 
 Dunnington and his brave set of navy ofiicers and men, how- 
 ever, had no thought of surrendering. Admiral Porter says: 
 "While waiting for Sherman's troops the Black Hawk laid 
 alongside the fort, her high upper works on a level with the 
 embrasures, while three boat guns on wheels, on the upper 
 deck, completely commanded the inside of the works, which 
 presented a dreadful scene of killed and wounded. A large 
 number of artillery horses had been killed in the fort, and the 
 shells and shrapnel had made sad havoc with the dead and 
 
350 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 dying men, mixed up with the killed and wounded animals. 
 It was a scene ever to be remembered. In the meantime, 
 while waiting for Sherman's assaulting party, all firing had 
 ceased on both sides and the victorious sailors were quietly 
 looking on at the dreadful havoc that had been made inside 
 the works, not anticipating that the enemy would make any 
 more resistance. Their colors had been shot away and had 
 not been hoisted again." 
 
 As the assaulting column of the soldiers of the enemy got 
 within twenty yards of Lieut. Dunnington and his garrison, 
 who were "concealed behind or underneath the buildings that 
 had been knocked down," they rose together and '-poured in a 
 withering volley from about four hundred and fifty muskets, 
 and nearly every bullet told." The enemy staggered at this 
 unexpected volley and retreated. At that moment white flags 
 were hoisted by several men contrary to orders and the Con- 
 federates laid down their arms and surrendered. Lieut. Com. 
 Dunnington sent for Admiral Porter and surrendered to him 
 in person. Gen. Churchill, Confederate commander of all the 
 forces around the fort, surrendered to Gen. McClernand. 
 
 Eear Admiral H. Walke, U. S. N., in his '' Naval Scenes and 
 Eeminiscences of the Civil War in the United States," says: 
 
 " As a prisoner of war, a few days after the battle, on his way up to 
 Cairo [Lieut. J. W. Dunnington, C. 8. N.,] said that he had no thought of 
 surrendering when he first heard that the white flag was raised on all their 
 flag-staffs by order of their commander-in-chief. He ordered it down from 
 his flag-staff, and hoisted the Confederate flag again and continued the 
 fight for some time after, even when he was told that their army had sur- 
 rendered, and declared that he would not strike his colors. On being in- 
 formed that all their works in the rear had surrendered to our army, and 
 that the consequences would be terrible to their troops if he persisted 
 in firing any longer, he surrendered to Admiral Porter." 
 
 The defence of Fort Hindman was one of the most gallant 
 events of the war. It was enfiladed from all sides by gun- 
 boats and rifled field-pieces, which not only destroyed the 
 houses and light work inside the fort, but also destroyed all 
 the guns and casemates. Admiral Porter says: "No fort 
 ever received a worse battering, and I know of no instance 
 on record where every gun in a fort was dismounted or de- 
 stroyed." The list of killed and wounded in the Confederate 
 navy garrison was very large; the list of officers captured 
 was as follows : 
 
 "John W. Bunnington, colonel commanding third brigade, and first 
 lieutenant C. S. navy, commanding naval forces; Joseph Preble, acting- 
 master C. 8. navy; 'Frank Ranger, acting master C. 8. navy; F. M. Boby, 
 first lieutenant and brigade ordnance ofncer and midshipman C. 8. navy; 
 N. M. Read, assistant surgeon C. 8. navy: W. 8. Campbell, major and 
 quartermaster third brigade and captain's clerk C. 8. navy; Howell 
 Quigley, second assistant engineer C. 8. navy; 8amuel 8uttioan, third 
 assistant engineer C. 8. navy; Joseph Nutter, masters mate C. 8. navy; 
 W. A. Lang, captain's steward C. 8. navy: George Elliott, boatswain's 
 mate; John McDonald, boatswain's mate; W. C. Fisher, master-at-arms; 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 351 
 
 Charles Lettig, quartermaster: John B. Hassett, quartermaster; Michael 
 Kemmett, quartermaster; John Shephard, quartermaster; P. J. Fitz- 
 patriek, purser's steward; James Hussey, surgeon's steward; Richard 
 Scott, gunner's mate; Charles Loewenberg, ship's cook: T. J. Jackson, 
 wardroom cook; Charles Crowley, seaman; Charles Williams, seaman; 
 Patrick Kelly, ordinary seaman; Pliney Cox, ordinary seaman; John Lee, 
 ordinary seaman; Henry Peters, landsman; Edward Walsh, first-class 
 iireman; George Dehman, flrst-olass fireman: John Fuller, coalheaver; 
 Aleck Martin, first-class boy; John Brown, first-class boy; Christopher 
 Kain, second-class boy; Michael Knackley, second-class boy; Samuel H. 
 Bink, captain, apting general; A. M. Williams, captain of engineers. 
 
 The enemy also lost heavily in killed and wounded. Lieut. 
 Com. John G. Walker, of the U. S. gunboat Baron DeKalh, 
 in his official report to Acting Rear Admiral Porter on Janu- 
 ary 12th says, that in the attack on the evening of the 10th 
 his vessel was struck several times : 
 
 " In the attack on the 11th, one of the ten-inch guns was struck in 
 the muzzle, and both gun and carriage destroyed; one thirty- two-pounder 
 carriage struck and destroyed; one of the iron plates on forward casemate 
 badly broken by shot; the wood-work about two of the ports badly torn 
 by shot, and one lower deck beam cut off by a plunging shot through the 
 deck. The other injuries, although considerable, can be repaired on 
 board in a few days. I lost two men killed and fifteen wounded; two 
 probably mortally, and several seriously. 
 
 " Before going into action, 1 covered the bow sides and pilot-house 
 with slush, which, I think, was of much assistance in turning the shot, 
 as the vessel was repeatedly struck by eight and nine-inch shot, at very 
 short range, and the iron was in no case penetrated. The loss was from 
 shot and shell entering the ports." 
 
 The DeKalh, Louisville, and Cincinnati each had several 
 men killed and wounded. 
 
 Early in January, 1863, Rear Admiral Porter gave orders 
 that the Federal ram Queen of the West, Capt. E. W. Suther- 
 land, should pass the Confederate batteries at Vicksburg, 
 destroy the steamboat City of Vicksburg, lying opposite the 
 city, and then run past the lower Confederate batteries. The 
 Queen of the West was one of the celebrated Union ram fleet 
 organized and equipped at Pittsburgh, Pa., by Col. Charles 
 Ellet. The fleet was at first established under the cognizance 
 of the Federal Secretary of War, and was under the control of 
 that department until about the beginning of 1863, when it 
 was transferred to the Navy Department and placed under the 
 control of Rear Admiral D. D. Porter. The fleet played an 
 important part in the operations of the United States forces 
 on the Mississippi River from and after the fall of Island No. 10. 
 
 The Queen of the West was a freight-boatj formerly in the 
 St. Louis, Cincinnati and New Orleans trade, and before she 
 was converted into a ram was considered a model of strength 
 and speed. When Col. Ellet, the originator of the ram fleet, who 
 died in consequence of wounds received in the naval conflict 
 at Memphis, was organizing this branch of the Union service, 
 
352 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the Queen of the West was one of the first boats selected. 
 She was strengthened as to her hull by heavy oak timbers, 
 and as to machinery by a bulwark of solid wood-work twenty- 
 four inches thick, extending from stem to stern, and so inclos- 
 ing the boilers and engines that they were considered safe 
 from shot and shell from guns of no heavier calibre than six 
 or twelve pounders. When she ran the batteries at Vicksburg 
 she was further strengthened by two rows of cotton bales, ex- 
 tending entirely around her, from the guards to the upper 
 deck. Her pilot-house was also similarly protected. To guard 
 against the effect of plunging-shot, there was a layer of cotton 
 bales upon the gun-deck. Eter armament consisted of a bow 
 gun, a large thirty-two-pounder rifled Parrott upon her main- 
 deck, one twenty-pounder rifled Parrott, and three twelve- 
 
 " QUEEIT OF THE WEST," CAPTUKED BY THE COIiFEDERATES, FEBRUAEY 4th, 1863. 
 
 pounder brass howitzers upon her gun-deck. Besides hep oflS- 
 cers and crew, she usually carried a detail of sharp-shooters. 
 
 The Queen of the West was first brought into prominence 
 in the naval engagement above Memphis on June 8th, 1862, 
 in which she took a very active part. When the Confederate 
 ram Arkansas made her first appearance in the Yazoo River, 
 previous to her run into the Mississippi, one of her opponents 
 was the ram Queen of the West. In the attempt to capture 
 the Arkansas before Vicksburg on the 22d of July, 1862, the 
 Queen of the West took a very important part. Duripg the 
 attack upon Vicksburg, in December following, she took an 
 active part in the affair with the Confederate battery at Haines 
 Bluflf, near the mouth of the Yazoo. 
 
 In compliance with the instructions of Rear- Admiral Porter, 
 on the morning of February 2d, 1863, the Queen of the West 
 having made all arrangements deemed necessary to insure her 
 safety, under the command of Col. Charles R. Ellet started 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 353 
 
 to pass the Confederate batteries at Vicksburg, and sink the 
 Confederate steamer lying before that city. Owing to the 
 delay caused by re-arranging her steering apparatus, she did 
 not reach the city until after sunrise, when the batteries opened 
 a heavy fire upon her all along the shore. In passing the 
 steamer Vicksburg, the Queen of the West attempted to destroy 
 her by ramming, but ran obliquely into her, which only staved 
 in a few of her deck planks near the guards and forced her 
 high into the mud. Several incendiary projectiles were at the 
 same time fired into the Vicksburg which set her on fire, but 
 was soon extinguished. At this moment one of the Confed- 
 erate shells set the cotton on fire near the starboard wheel of the 
 Queen of the West, while the discharge of her own gun ignited 
 that portion which was on the bow. The flames spread rapidly, 
 and the dense smoke rolling into the engine room nearly suf- 
 focated the engineers. Col. Ellet, knowing that if he attempted 
 to run again into the steamer Vicksburg, his ram would cer- 
 tainly be burned, ordered her to be headed down stream. 
 Every man was then put to extinguishing the fiames, which 
 after much exertion they accomplished by throwing the burn- 
 ing cotton overboard. 
 
 The Queen of the West passed the batteries without suffer- 
 ing any material injury, although she was struck twelve times, 
 and had one casemated gun dismounted and destroyed. Hav- 
 ing reached the mouth of the proposed canal below Vicksburg, 
 the Queen came to anchor, and Col. Ellet officially informed 
 Admiral Porter of his passage of the batteries. The remainder 
 of her crew having come on board she started on her advent- 
 urous cruise down the Mississippi River. Passing Warrenton, 
 under a heavy fire from the batteries at that point, she proceeded 
 to the mouth of Big Black River and Natchez, without creating 
 any excitement whatever. About fifteen miles below the 
 mouth of Red River the Queen captured the steamboat A. W. 
 Bak^r which had discharged her cargo at Port Hudson, and 
 was bound up Red River for another. Several Confederate 
 ofiBcers were seized on board of the steamer. While engaged in 
 plundering the steamboat another was announced coming 
 down the river. Leaving a guard on the A. W. Baker, Col. 
 Ellet captured the steamboat Mora loaded with military stores 
 for the Confederate forces at Port Hudson. Proceeding up the 
 Red River he captured the steamboat Berwick Bay, also 
 loaded with military supplies. The coal of the Queen of the 
 West running short, some of the captured stores were trans- 
 ferred to the ram and she steamed down the Red River and up 
 the Mississippi with her prizes. Finding that the progress of 
 the prizes was so slow, and knowing that he could not wait 
 to bring them up. Col. Ellet concluded to burn them. Thus 
 the Berwick Bay, the Moro and the Baker were destroyed. 
 
 The ram returned in safety to near the lower end of the 
 canal, where she was supplied with coal, which had run the 
 
 23 
 
354 THE CONFEDERATE. STATES NAVY. 
 
 batteries in a barge. The De Soto, a small steam ferry-boat, 
 having been captured by Gen. Blair's brigade, was turned over 
 to Col. EUet as tender to the Queen of the West. She was sur- 
 rounded with a bulwark of cotton bales and armed with a 
 thirty-two pounder rifle upon her bow. The two steamers 
 having received 20,000 bushels of coal, on February 10th, were 
 lashed together and moved down the river on another expedi- 
 tion. On the same evening, the Queen of the West, with her 
 tender, the De Soto, ran past the Confederate batteries at War- 
 renton without receiving a shot. She passed Natchez the fol- 
 lowing day, and anchored for the night at the mouth of Old 
 River, forty-five miles below. On Thursday, the 13th, she 
 cruised in the Atchafalaya, capturing and destroying a train 
 of army wagons, seventy barrels of beef, and an artillery 
 wagon containing baggage. Upon her return she was fired 
 into from the right bank of the Atchafalaya by the citizens. 
 On Friday morning the Queen again entered the Atchafalaya, 
 and in retaliation burned every house, barn, sugar-mill, and 
 negro quarters between the mouth of the river and Semmes- 
 port. At the latter place she captured a Confederate mail, 
 and first learned of the occupation of Berwick Bay and lower 
 Atchafalaya by Admiral Farragut. On Friday afternoon the 
 boats entered Red River, and anchored for the night at the 
 mouth of Black River. At ten on Saturday morning, the Queen 
 of the West captured the Confederate steamer Era No. 5, 
 laden with stores for the army at Little Rock. Col. EUet had 
 heard that a Confederate battery was in position eighty miles 
 from the mouth of Red River, at Gordon's Landing, and as 
 he approached it all his prisoners declared that he could easily 
 capture it. Finley Anderson, a correspondent of the New- 
 York Herald, was on board of the Queen of the West, with 
 Mr. Bodman of the Chicago Tribune, and Joseph McCullagh, 
 " Mack" of the Cincinnati Commercial. Mr. Anderson says: 
 
 "Col. EUet had pressed into his service the pilot of the captured JEra, 
 and placinff him in the pilot house, forced him to assist at the wheel. 
 She moved slowly up the river at 'slow bell,' but with a full head of 
 steam in her boilers, and instead of taking the bend of the river outside 
 the eddy, ran inside, and in an instant was hard aground and immovable 
 as the hills. ' It was at this very instant that the three rifled thirty -two 
 
 1 A correspondent of the Memphis Appeal gave BiispicioUB looking craft had made her appear- 
 
 the following account of the capture of the auce in the mouth of Red Eiver, consequently 
 
 Queenoftke West, through the exploit of her e&l- she tied up for furtlier developments. Other 
 
 lant Confederate pilot, who w^ taken from the boats, as many as four, came down and were 
 
 Confederate steamer Era, and ordered to the likewise stopped; tbey remained awhile and 
 
 wlieel of the Queen of the West imder the bayo- then returned up the river, 
 
 nets of a guard of Federal soldiers: " Saturday morning, the 14th, at daylight, the 
 
 " On the morning of the 12th instant, the Era Era steamed up and plowed her way down to 
 
 No. 6, with Mr. George Wood as her pilot, her destination, supposing she could reach the 
 
 steamed out from her mooring at Alexandria. mouth of Black River with safety, as nothing 
 
 loaded for Black River, which empties into the had then been heard of the Queen of the West 
 
 Bed River, some forty miles above her mouth. coming up. Gliding down her watery path, she 
 
 On reaching Gordon's Landing, some seventy- was bounding onward with full steam, when 
 
 five miles below Alexandria, where we have a some ten miles above the month of Black River, 
 
 military post, consisting of casemated guns her turning point, she was met at a bend in the 
 
 and Parrott pieces, the Era was stopped river, fired into, one shothittingherpilothouse, 
 
 and told that the night before (Wednesdav) a and was captured bythe Queen of tlieWest, which 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 355 
 
 pounders in Fort Taylor opened fire. Each shot told with fearful accuracy. 
 Solid shot crashed through her cabins as if they were made of paper. 
 Shell exploded between her chimneys, upon her declis, over her pilot 
 house— aU about her, and she fixed and immovable. .Every exertion was 
 made to back her off, but all was of no avail. In her present position 
 none of the Queen's guns were effective. The rebels had the range per- 
 fectly, and if firing at a target in broad daylight could not have done 
 better execution. Presently word came from the engine room that the 
 lever was shot away, then that the escape pipe was broken, and almost 
 immediately after the terrible roar and tumult of rushing steam showed 
 that her steam chest was penetrated. 
 
 "At this time no one thought of saving the boat. It needed all their 
 exertions to save themselves. It was at first thought the boiler had ex- 
 ploded, but though the vessel shook and reeled as if from an earthquake 
 shock, it was soon discovered the boilers were unhurt. Soon the rushing 
 steam entered every part of the vessel, the main-deck, the hold, the cabin 
 and pilot house My informant was in the pilot house, and with diiHculty 
 prevented suffocating by filling his mouth with a woollen rag lying hard by. 
 With some difficulty he escaped to the cabin, and from thence to the hurri- 
 cane roof, where many of the crew and the three journalists were gathered. 
 
 "All this time the crash of the shell and roar of the guns were fear- 
 fully distinct, the shot hissing and screaming in dangerous proximity to 
 their heads. Some leaped overboard and were drowned. Others tumbled 
 cotton bales into the river and attempted to float with the current. Mr. 
 Anderson was last seen standing, undecided whether to risk escape on a 
 cotton bale or risk capture by remaining. Bodman swung himself from 
 the hurricane roof, and reached the De Soto in a skiff. McCuUagh sought 
 a cotton bale^ and debated whether he should trust his precious body 
 upon it. While thus engaged the bale floated beyond his reach, and im- 
 mediately thereafter a shell alighted upon it, and exploding, blew it into 
 a thousand fragments. ' Mac ' seized another bale, and reached the De 
 Soto in safety. Col. EUet escaped in like manner. 
 
 " The enemy hearing no reply to his guns, and discovering from the 
 rush of steam that some accident had occurred, slackened his flre and 
 
 was steaming upward on forbidden waters. The two holes through her chimney stacks, and one 
 crew and passengers of ■ the Era were taken happy shot through her main body, which was 
 prisoners, and all were guarded on board the providentially guided to thecutting of lier steam- 
 JBra^ by a band of Abolition soldiers, save Mr, pipe, but no other damage was done her. Thus 
 George Wood, the pilot, who was ordered aboard grounded and crippled, it was then contem- 
 the Queen of the West, and, with heavy threats, plated to blow up hei' magazine, and thus de- 
 directed to her pilot wheel to assist her pilot in stroy her by fire, but the surgeon protested 
 directing her onward to the capture of our fort. against it, as fortunately her' captain lay on 
 On they glided, but not distrustful, and much board mortally wounded by a rifle shot received 
 elated at their success, till they came in reach of near Semmesport, and it was impossible to move 
 our battery at five p. m., when she commenced him, so Col. Ellet consented to let her lay, for 
 firing, still advancing. Our batteries challenged the sake of humanity to her dying commander, 
 her by opening most furiously from their hid- She was well barricaded with cotton bales. On 
 den recesses. Still she advanced, till, as I was seeing all hope of success gone, the command- 
 told by one of our lieutenants, who was there, ing officer. Col. Ellet, made his escape, with 
 she came within a quarter of a mile of our bat- nearly all his crew, by getting on cotton bales 
 tery and on the opposite shore in full range for and floating down the river. She raised the 
 our guns, when the gallant Wood, who directed white signal, as the storm abated, as it was seen 
 her wheel, had her rounded, ran her aground, by the light of a burning warehouse, but it was 
 breaking her rudder and thus crippling her and not answered till next morning. Thirteen of 
 turning her broadside to give our guns a fair the crew remained in silence till daylight, then 
 chance. This gallant man, in the confusion, her white banner was still afloat, and then, and 
 made good his escape, as it was a life and death not till then, our Southern sons of thunder 
 case with him. Thus crippled and disabled by crossed the river and formally took possession 
 the hand that drove her on to her destiny, she of this proud and haughty triumph, as she lay a 
 lay like a wounded falcon, at the mercy of her victim of a single hand, the gallant Wood, 
 adversaries, "The results of the capture are one thirty- 
 "The nightwas dark andstormy, the heavens two-pound rifle Parrott gun, one twenty-four- 
 overhung with clouds, which now and then pound rifle Parrott gun, three twelve-pound Por- 
 pealed forth their muttering thunder, and terfield brass pieces, and one thirteen-pound 
 drenched the earth with rain. Thus In the rain- brass piece— damaged, a fine supply of ordnance 
 storm this crippled Queen lay beaten by the tem- stores, a good deal of quinine, three fine cases of 
 pest. Our batteries made some four or five surgical instruments, and provisions in abund- 
 shots in her guard around the upper deck, and ance " 
 
356 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 sent boats to reconnoitre. Three yawls, loaded with men, approached 
 the vessel, to whom the crew remaining on board signified their surren- 
 der. Thus the Queen of the West, with all her guns and ammunition, fell 
 a prize into the hands of our enemies. 
 
 "The Be Soto was less than a mile below -where the accident to the 
 Queen of the West occurred, and came up as near the point as prudence 
 justified. She picked up the floaters, and sent her yawl for the survivors, 
 but before it reached the Queen of the West all who remained on board 
 were in the enemy's hands and prisoners, herself narrowly escaping 
 capture. The river banks began to be lined with soldiers, who demanded, 
 in voices plainly discernible by those on board, the surrender of men 
 swimming for their lives. Fearing a re-enactment of the White River 
 tragedy, Col. Ellet thought proper to order the Be 8oto to move down the 
 river. She was turned, and slowly floated down with the current, picking 
 up poor unfortunates as she ran. The steamer had not proceeded more 
 than three miles before she ran aground in a sharp turn of the river, and 
 unshipped her rudder. For fifteen miles and for three hours she was un- 
 manageable, and moved with the current, sometimes head on and at other 
 times stern on. At eleven o'clock she reached the Bra, and found the 
 men and prisoners undisturbed. The coal barge had sunk, and Col. Ellet 
 was forced to leave it. 
 
 " Just as they reached the B7-a the pilot caused the second rudder to 
 be unshipped. She was now totally unmanageable, and there was no al- 
 ternative left but to destroy her. A man was sent on board, who knocked 
 out her water pipes and then laid a train to a keg of powder placed 
 under the boilers, and setting a slow match on fire the Era had barely 
 time to move a hundred rods or so before the Be Soto exploded with 
 a tremendous report. Her magnificeut thirty-two pounder Parrott, the 
 chief object of Col. EUet's care, lies forty feet below the surface of the 
 river. 
 
 "It was nearly twelve o'clock Saturday night before the Mra was 
 well imder way again. Col. Ellet knew that the gunboat Webb was at 
 Alexandria, sixty miles above Gordon's Landing, and he was certain she 
 would attempt to pursue him. All hands were set to work to throw over- 
 board the corn with which she was laden, and in the fog, thunder, light- 
 ning and rain she worried her way out of the Red River into the Mississippi. 
 They cursed the fo^ then; they blessed it afterwards. 
 
 "Sunday morning the Mr a had reached the mouth of Old River. All 
 day long, with no fuel but the corn with which she was laden, and a few 
 cords of water-soaked cypress, which she found on the bank of the Mis- 
 sissippi, and with which she found it impossible to make steam enough to 
 give her headway, the fleeing steamer attempted to get up the river. 
 Forty miles in twenty-four hours is poor sailing under the most unfavor- 
 able circumstances : yet the Mra made scarcely that. At Union Point she 
 was run aground. This delayed her three hours. How this delay affected 
 the fugitives may easily be imagined. They knew that the Webb was at 
 Alexandria, sixty miles above Gordon's Landing, and they felt assured she 
 would start in pursuit when she heard of their repulse at Fort Taylor. 
 At the best, even if she laid over for the fog — a thing hardly likely under 
 the circumstances — she could be but a short distance behind. Those on 
 board, anticipating their capture, were discussing the probabilities of 
 escape by skiffs and yawls to Port Hudson. 
 
 " The carpenter had managed to construct a spar from the forest near 
 where the Era was aground, and after three hours' hard work the steamer 
 was afloat again. Colonel EUet's first duty afterwards was to place the 
 pilot under arrest. 
 
 " They had just passed Ellis' Cliffs, when, through the fog, the look- 
 out discovered the black chimney of some passing steamer. At that dis- 
 tance, and because the hull of the steamer was still enveloped in dense 
 vapor, it was impossible to make her out. That she burned coal, as was 
 evident from the black smoke pouring from her chimneys, was enough to 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 357 
 
 satisfy the crew of her character. ' It was the Federal Bteamei Indianola.' 
 No more fear of the Webb. 
 
 " The Sra was laid alongside the Indianola and coaled. The crew 
 had eaten nothing for thirty-six hours, and were nearly famished. The 
 Indianola fed them. They were coatless and bootless, some of them, and 
 the Indianola clothed them. They had lost their arms and ammunition 
 in the Queen, and these were supphed by the Indianola.'''' 
 
 Scarcely was the Era well settled in her new position beside 
 the Indianola yvheTo. the Confederate ram Webb hove in sight, 
 having been dispatched by Gen. Richard Taylor to overtake 
 the escaped crew of the Queen. The Indianola cleared for 
 action and fired two shots, when the Webh with her consorts 
 returned up the Red River. The Era, having been protected 
 with cotton bales, seized on the plantation belonging to the 
 heirs of Dr. Jenkins, above Red River, proceeded up the 
 Mississippi, and finally anchored in good condition below 
 Vicksburg. 
 
 On Monday following her capture, the Queen of the West 
 was towed up to the forts on Red River, and finally to Alexan- 
 dria, a distance of sixty miles, where by working night and day 
 she was soon repaired, and on February 19th, 1863, placed 
 in the Confederate service under the command of Capt. James 
 McCloskey. 
 
 After meeting the steamer Era No. 5, with those who 
 escaped from the Queen of the West, the Indianola proceeded 
 to the mouth of Red River in pursuit of the Confederate 
 ram Webh. Ascending the river some twenty or thirty miles, 
 Capt. Brown, the commander of the Indianola, ascertained 
 that the Queen of the West had been removed from the 
 bar where she was captured, and was repaired and ready for 
 action. The Indianola then hastened down the river to the 
 Mississippi, and reached Grand Gulf, where she was over- 
 taken by the Confederate fleet under the command of Major 
 J. L, Brent. 
 
 Major Gen. Richard Taylor, commanding the Confederate 
 forces in the Western District of Louisiana, with headquarters 
 at Alexandria, on February 19th, 1863, ordered Major J. L. 
 Brent to take supreme command of an expedition which was 
 then fitting out on Red River for the capture of the U. S. iron- 
 clad Indianola. Major Brent's fleet consisted of the gunboats 
 Queen of the West, Capt. James McCloskey; the Webb, Capt. 
 Charles Pierce; the steamer Dr. Batey, and the tender Grand 
 Era. The steamer Grand Duke was also placed at his dis- 
 posal if he deemed it advisable to use her. Major W. M. 
 Levy, commanding post at Fort De Russey, was at the 
 same time ordered to lend Major Brent all the assistance in 
 his power for fitting out the expedition in the shortest possible 
 time. 
 
 The movements of the expedition under the command 
 of Major Brent are fully narrated in his official report to 
 
358 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Major E. Surget, Gen. Taylor's A. A. General, which is as 
 follows : 
 
 "Major General R. Taylor's G-unboat Expedition, ] 
 
 "C. S. Webb, Thirty Miles Below Vicksburg, ! 
 
 "Off Prize Iron-clad Indianola, ( 
 
 " Febraary 25th, 1863. J 
 
 "MAJ. E. Sitrget, a. a. General: 
 
 "Major— My last dispatch to you, exclusive of the telegram sent you 
 last nigitit, was from Natchez. The Federal iron-clad Indianola had 
 forty-eight hours start of us at AckUn's Landing; at Natchez she was less 
 than twenty-five hours in advance. We left Natchez on the evening of 
 the 33d Inst., and I found that we could easily overhaul her on the morn- 
 ing of the 24th, but I determined not to do so, in order that I might bring 
 the enemy to an engagement only at night, considering for many reasons 
 that this time was most advantageous to us. 
 
 "We reached Grand Gulf before sunset, and there learned that the 
 enemy was only about four hours in advance of us. As we were run- 
 ning more than two miles to his one, the time required to overtake him 
 could be easily calculated, and 1 determined to overtake and bring him to 
 action early in the ni^ht. 
 
 "We came up with the Indianola about 9:40 last night, just above 
 New Carthage, near the foot of Palmyra Island, and I immediately sig- 
 nalled the Webb to prepare for action. 
 
 " Our order of approach was as follows: The Queen of the West about 
 500 yards in advance of the Webb, and the Batey, Lieut. Col. Brand com- 
 manding (whom I wrote you joined us with a force and steamer fitted out 
 at Port Hudson), over two miles in the rear, and lashed to my tender the 
 Grand Bra. 
 
 " The moon was partially obscured by a veil of clouds, and gave and 
 permitted just sufBcient light for us to see where to strike with our rams, 
 find just sufficient obscurity to render uncertain the aim of the formid- 
 able artillery of the enemy. 
 
 "We first discovered him when about 1,000 yards distant, hugging 
 the western bank of the Mississippi, with his head quartering across and 
 down the river. 
 
 " Not an indication of hfe appeared as we dashed on towards him, his 
 lights obscured, and his machinery apparently without motion. 
 
 ' " We had also covered our lights, and only the fires of the Era could 
 be seen, two miles back, where she was towing the Batey. 
 
 "The distance between him and the Queen had diminished to about 
 ."iOO yards, when, for the first time, we could clearly distinguish the long 
 black line of the two coal barges which protected his sides from forward 
 of his bow to nearly abreast his wheels. 
 
 "The impatient desire of our men to open fire could be scarcely re- 
 strained, but I would not allow it, as the vast importance of traversing 
 the distance to be passed over without drawing the fire of his powerful 
 guns was too apparent. At last, when within about 100 yards, I author- 
 ized Capt. McCloskey to open fire, which he accordingly did with his two 
 Parrott guns and one Cross twelve-pounder ; but at the second round the 
 twenty-pounder Parrott was disabled by blowing out its vent-piece. 
 
 "Our intention was to dash our bow near the enemy's wheel-house, 
 just in rear of the coal barge, but when about fifty yards distant he 
 backed and interposed the barge between us and him. Our bow went 
 crushing clear through the barge heavily loaded with coal, and was not 
 arrested until struck with a violent shock, and scattered some of his 
 timbers amidship, deeply indenting the iron plating of his hull. 
 
 " So tremendous had been the momentum of our attack, made under 
 full pressure of steam, that for some minutes we could not disengage our- 
 selves, but remained with our bows against the sides of the Indianola, 
 held fast by the pressure of the coal and barge through which we had 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 359 
 
 crushed. In this position, our sharp-shooters kept up fire, sweeping the 
 deck of the enemy, who feebly answered. 
 
 "Alter a brief interval, one end of the coal barge sunk, and the other 
 drifted down the current; and the Queen, finding herself free, immediately 
 rounded up stream to add to her next charge the additional power obtain- 
 able from the descending current of the river. Just then the Webb came 
 dashing by us, and plunged into the Indianola with great force, just in 
 rear or on the turn of her bow. 
 
 "Some of the iron plating was loosened, but this blow of the Webb 
 produced no serious external injury, though prisoners since report that it 
 disabled the left-hand engine. 
 
 "As thel^e&6 approached on this her first charge, the two eleven-inch 
 Dahlgren guns, in the forward casemate of the enemy, opened on her at 
 seventy-five yards distant, but fortunately she was untouched. 
 
 " The vigor of the WeoVs onset forced the enemy around, and carry- 
 ing her forward laid her across and in actual contact with these monitor 
 guns, if run out in battery. Dashing safely around from this perilous 
 position, the Webb swung across the bow and on to the starboard side of 
 the enemy, getting between him and his remaining coal barge, breaking 
 its fastenings and setting it adrift. 
 
 "The result of our first onset was to strip the Indianola of the two 
 coal barges which protected her sides, and to injure her to some extent 
 in her wheel, which was apparent from the subsequent want of rapidity 
 and precision in her movements. 
 
 "As soon as the Webb swept away clear of the enemy, the Queen 
 swung around, and again dashed upon him, who, this time with partial 
 success, endeavored to break the force of the onset by presenting his bow 
 to our blow. But his movements were too torpid, and not entirely suc- 
 cessful, which tends to confirm the belief that his machinery was injured 
 by the first blow. 
 
 " The Queen struck a little forward of midships, but, as she was turning, 
 the force of the blow glanced along his side and passed his wheel-house. 
 
 "Just as the Queen swung clear of his stern, lieopened upon us with 
 two nine-inch guns in his after iron casemate at so near a range that the 
 flames of the guns almost touched us — their heat being felt. 
 
 " One shot struck the Queen on her starboard shoulder, and knocked 
 away ten or twelve bales of cotton, causing us to list over, and then a 
 shell entered under our front port-hole, on the port side, struck the chase 
 of a brass twelve-pounder gun and exploded, killing two men, wounding 
 four, and disabling two pieces. 
 
 " This time the Queen swung around rapidly up stream, and in a very 
 brief interval, dashed on the enemy for the third time, striking a little 
 to the rear of his starboard wheel-house, crashing through and shatter- 
 ing his framework, and loosening some of his iron plates. By this time 
 the Webb had run up stream, making a wide circuit, had turned and, for 
 her second onset, came charging on with a full head of steam just as the 
 Queen had rounded out after her third blow, and striking the enemy very 
 nearly in the same place where the Queen had just before hit him. 
 
 "Through and through his timbers, crushing and dashing aside his 
 iron plates, the sharp bow of the Webb penetrated as if it were going to 
 pass entirely through the ship. As the Webb backed clear, the Indianola, 
 with all the speed she could raise, declined further fight, and ran down 
 the river towards the western bank, with the intention, as afterwards 
 appeared, of getting a line out on shore, in order that the officers and 
 crew might land and abandon their steamer. In fact, a line was got out 
 on shore, but not fastened, and three of the crew effected their escape, but 
 were captured to-day by the cavalry of Major Harrison. 
 
 "After the Queen had struck the enemy for the third time, she was 
 for some time almost unmanageable — she had listed so much over on the 
 port side that one of her wheels was raised nearly out of the water, and 
 presented every appearance of sinking. 
 
360 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " Capt. MoCloskey righted her a little by throwing over cotton from 
 his upper deck, 
 
 " He was able to bring her around very slowly, but still this gallant 
 commander succeeded wearing her with difficulty, and headed her for her 
 fourth charge. 
 
 " Whilst the Webb had her bow knocked off to within fourteen inches 
 of the water line, her splended machinery was unhurt, and she quickly 
 and gallantly bore up for her third charge, when bearing down and ap- 
 proaching the enemy, Capt. Pierce reports that he was hailed from the 
 enemy's deck, announcing his surrender, and begging to be towed ashore 
 as he was sinking. Capt. Pierce further represents that he then placed a 
 Une on board and commenced towing the Indianola, when the line 
 parted. 
 
 "As the Qiieen of the West was running off from her last charge, 
 making a circuit to obtain room and space to add increased momentum 
 to her onset, we encountered the steamer Bate)/, Lieut. Col. Brand com- 
 manding, who had cast from the tender Grand Era, and was hovering 
 around to enter the fight when an opportunity offered. 
 
 " The Batey is a frail steamboat, with but little power, and incapable 
 of being used as a ram. She was crowded with two hundred and fifty 
 gallant volunteers from the forces at Port Hudson, who had embarked in 
 the Batey with the resolution to fight the enemy by boarding him. We 
 called out to them that the opportunity for boarding had arrived, as it 
 was apparent the enemy was disabled and much demoralized. 
 
 "Lieut. Col. Brand with his command gallantly bore away, ap- 
 proached the enemy after the line from the Webb had parted, and gave, 
 as I am informed by him, the command, ' prepare to board,' when he was 
 greeted by a voice from the Indianola, announcing her surrender, and 
 that she was in a sinking condition. 
 
 " Lieut. Col. Brand then boarded her upper deck, and received the 
 sword of the Federal commander, Lieut. Brown. This result must have 
 been very gratifying to Col. Brand, as it was obtained without the loss or 
 injury of a single man of his command. Upon my reaching the deck of 
 the Indianola, Lieut. Col. Brand most handsomely acknowledged that 
 the capture was entirely due to the Queen of the West and to the Webb, 
 and he has so officially reported. I have no doubt, if it had been neces- 
 sary, that Col. Brand and his gallant command would have again demon- 
 strated that nothing can resist the desperation of troops who regard not 
 their own lives, but victory. 
 
 " Upon taking possession, I immediately appointed Lieut. Thomas H. 
 Hardy prize-master. We found our prize a most formidable gunboat, 
 mounting two eleven-inch guns aft, all protected by thick iron casemates 
 utterly impenetrable to our artillery, even at the very shortest range. 
 The motive power consisted of side-wheels and two propellers. She was 
 filled with a valuable cargo, embracing supplies, stores, etc. The ofScers 
 and crew, ambunting to over one hundred, fell into our hands as prison- 
 ers. Nothing shows more clearly how well she was protected than the 
 fact that our artillery, though frequently fired at the range of twenty 
 and thirty yards, utterly failed to injure her. Lieut. Handy, of the Webb, 
 fired an eighty-pound shell from his rifled and banded thirty-two-poand 
 gun so close to the forward casemate of the enemy that it actually envel- 
 oped his port-holes in flames, and yet no injury was sustained by the case- 
 mate. 
 
 " Our sharp-shooters deliberately and coolly fired at every onset. 
 
 " Notwithstanding all these circumstances, the enemy lost but one 
 man killed and none wounded. The Wehb had one man wounded, and 
 the Queen, two killed and four wounded. 
 
 "The fire of the enemy was terrific, and delivered at short range 
 ;iiostly. His huge shot and shell were directed a little wide of the mark, 
 except the two shot that struck the Queen, and one shot that passed 
 through the bulwarks of the Webb. This was remarkable, as he frequently 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 361 
 
 fired at such close range that the flames of his enormous guns almost en- 
 veloped our bows. 
 
 ' ' The escape from destruction of the feeble crafts, that were five times 
 precipitated upon the iron sides of this powerful war-steamer, mounting 
 an armament of 9 and 11-inch guns, was providential. 
 
 "On taking possession, we found our prize rapidly making water 
 which we could not arrest. Seeing that she would sink, I did not wish 
 that this should take ^lace on the western side of the river, where the 
 Federal forces could easily have retaken her, and therefore made fast to 
 her with two of my steamers, and towed her over the river to the eastern 
 side, where she sunk in the water up to her gun-deck, just as we reached 
 the shallow water, thus losing us the enormous value of her capture, as 
 weU as the valuable stores that were in her hold. 
 
 "I am much indebted for the success of this expedition to the skill 
 and gallantry of my oflacers and men. Capt. James McCloskey, com- 
 manding the Queen, combined with the courage of the soldier the skill 
 and aptitude that characterizes the sailor of our western waters. Lieut. 
 Thomas H. Handy, of the Crescent Artillery, commanded the troops on 
 the Webb. He exhibited skill and courage in handUng his command, and 
 in person assisted in manning the thirty-two-pound rifled gun. Lieut. 
 Rice, of the Twenty -first Tennessee, was on the Webb with a detachment 
 from his regiment, and bore himself well and gallantly. Lieut. Prather, also 
 on the Webb, served his two field-pieces entirely unprotected with praise- 
 worthy courage, and was well seconded by Mr. Charles Schuler, acting as 
 chief of one of the guns. 
 
 "Capt. Charles Pierce, a civilian, commanded and controlled the 
 movements of the Webb. It was he who selected the weak spots of the 
 enemy, and with a steady hand and eye dashed the Webb against the 
 Tndiajiola. 
 
 " Not only did the officers act well, but I have nothing but commenda- 
 tions for the private soldiers. 
 
 " Capt. Caines' and Lieut. Rice's company, of the Twenty-first Ten- 
 nessee, and the detachment of Lieut. Doolan, adjutant of Major Burnett's 
 battalion of Texans, and a detachment from the Third Maryland Artil- 
 lery, were in the expedition, and acted with courage and discipline when 
 under fire. 
 
 " Capt. J. W. Mangum, Assistant Adjutant Gen. of Brigadier Gen. 
 Moore, accompanied the expedition as a volunteer and acted as my adju- 
 tant. He comported himself gallantly under fire; and throughout the 
 expedition rendered me valuable services. 
 
 " I herewith submit the report of Capt. MeCloskejr, commanding the 
 Qwen. He mentions favorably Capt. Caines and Lieut. MUler, of the 
 Twenty-first Tennessee; Lieut. Doolan, adjutant of Major Burnett's bat- 
 talion ; Sergt. E. H. Langley, of the Third Maryland Artillery, acting 
 as lieutenant in charge of the two Parrott guns; and the volunteers, 
 Capt. J. H. White, shghtly wounded , acting with efficiency as ordnance 
 officer ; Capt. Tank and Lieuts. Fisk and Stanmeyer, both wounded; and 
 Lieut. R, R. Hyams, who, as quartermaster and commissary, exhibited 
 much energy. As I was on board the Queen during the action, the conduct 
 of the officers and men was under my own eye, and I cheerfully endorse 
 the commendation of Capt. McCloskey. He also speaks highly of the in- 
 trepid promptness and skill of his pilots and engineers, and of the conduct 
 of Assistant Surgeon Blanchard, who manifested much care and coolness, 
 coming on the gun-deck in the midst of the action and personally super- 
 vising the removal of the wounded. 
 
 "Sergt. Magruder, of the signal corps, also deserves mention for 
 having rendered very important services in the discharge of the responsi- 
 ble duties devolved upon him. 
 
 "Capt. Pierce, of the Webb, verbally reports to me that his pilots and 
 engineers behaved themselves with coolness and bravery, and discharged 
 their duties with promptness and energy. 
 
363 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 "I have no doubt that this is correct, from the skillful maimer in 
 which his boat was handled. 
 
 " This report is dated from the Webh, as I have dispatched the Queen, 
 Capt. McCIoskey, to Warrenton, and, if possible, to Vicksburg. 
 " I am, major, yours respectfully, 
 
 "J. L. Brent, Major Commanding.'''' 
 
 The Indianola lost in the engagement two killed and five 
 wounded out of a crew numbering in all about 120 men. The 
 Indianola was one of the most formidable iron-clads on the 
 Mississippi River. She was 174 feet long, fifty feet beam, ten 
 feet from the top of her deck to the bottom of her keel. Her 
 sides of oak were thirty-two inches thick, covered with three- 
 inch iron plates. Her decks were also covered with iron. Her 
 casemates stood at an angle of twenty-six and one-half degrees 
 and were covered with three-inch iron on heavy oak backing. 
 Her coal bunkers were seven feet thick alongside of her boilers. 
 
 U. S5. IRON-CLAD "INDIANOLA," CAPTTTRED BY THE CONFEDERATES, MAT 24TH. 1863. 
 
 The entire machinery being in ■^he hold. She had seven en- 
 gines, two for working the side-wheels, one on each quarter 
 stern, two for her two propellers, between the wheels, two for 
 her capstans, and one for supplying water and working the 
 bilge and five pumps. She had also hose for throwing scald- 
 ing water from the boilers that would reach from stem to 
 stern. She had also five large fire-flued boilers. The pilot- 
 house was also thoroughly iron-clad, and instant communica- 
 tion could be had with the gunners and engineers, enabling 
 the pilot to place the vessel in just such position as might be 
 required for effective action. Her forward casemates had two 
 eleven-inch Dahlgren guns, and her after casemate two nine- 
 inch guns. Her forward casemate was pierced for two guns 
 in front, one on each side, and two aft, so that she could fire 
 two guns forward, one on each side, and four angling side- 
 ways and astern. She was one of a number of gunboats built 
 by Joseph Brown, on the Ohio River, in 1863, and cost about 
 $100,000. 
 
 When captured, the Indianola was in a sinking condition. 
 She was run on a sand-bar on the Mississippi side of the river, 
 and the Queen of the West was dispatched to Vicksburg to 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 363 
 
 bring down mechanics to repair and raise her. Before the 
 Confederates succeeded in raising her, she was blown up to 
 prevent her recapture by the Federals. 
 
 In April, Oapt. Fuller, in command of the Queen of the 
 West, determined to make an attack on the Federal gunboats 
 then lying in the Teche. A company of infantry had been 
 placed on board, and a regiment on the steamer Minna Simma, 
 ■which accompanied her. The Federal fleet, composed of the 
 gunboats Estrella, Calhoun and Arizona, under the command 
 of Commodore Cook, encountered the Queen of the West at 
 Orand Lake. At a quarter past five a. m., on April 14th, 18G3, 
 the fight commenced, the Estrella firing the first gun, the 
 Arizona and Calhoun following. The Queen did not reply 
 until she was within three-quarters of a mile, when she fired 
 rapidly from one to another of the gunboats. The intention 
 of the Union vessels was to surround the Queen of the West, 
 open a tremendous cross fire upon her, and, if necessary, run 
 her down. When within a half a mile of the Arizona, the 
 Queen turned slowly to the left and steamed for her, with the 
 evident intention of running her iron prow into her. At the 
 same time the Calhoun started for the Queen of the West, fot 
 the same purpose, when the latter, as if uncertain what to do, 
 stopped her engines and appeared to stand at bay, while the 
 Federal shell and shot were flying around her from every 
 quarter. Suddenly at this time a cloud of white smoke was 
 seen to rise, as if from the deck of the ram, followed a mo- 
 ment after by a dense, black smoke and then a sheet of flame. 
 It appears that one of the shells struck and burst in a box 
 of ammunition, instantly setting her upper decks and rigging 
 in a blaze. 
 
 As soon as the Federal fleet saw their powerful enemy on 
 fire, her guns silent, and her crew running here and there in 
 wild confusion — some throwing overboard cotton bales with 
 which she was barricaded, while others jumped into the river 
 — all feelings of enmity vanished. Commodore Cook immedi- 
 ately blew the signal-whistle to cease firing, and assist in res- 
 cuing the crew ; and as the Estrella, Calhoun and Arizona 
 steamed up to the doomed vessel to save and succor those on 
 board of the Queen of the West, boats were lowered, drowning 
 men rescued, and all on board of the burning ram were trans- 
 ferred to the decks of the gunboats. In the confusion, the 
 Minna Simma steamed off as rapidly as possible. Ninety- 
 five persons were taken out of the water and from on board 
 the <^ueen of the West ; but notwithstanding these humane 
 exertions to rescue those on board, it is believed forty of 
 them were drowned. As soon as the crew and officers and 
 soldiers were rescued the ram was abandoned. She drifted 
 about for some time, the flames each moment raging more 
 fiercely until they reached her magazine, when she exploded 
 with a noise which was heard for miles around. 
 
364 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The ram Webb, which aided very materially in capturing 
 the Indinnola, was originally called the William H. Webb. 
 Before the war she was used in New York as a tow boat, and 
 as an ice breaker in winter, for which purpose she was spe- 
 cially constructed, being of great strength and fitted with 
 powerful engines. She was purchased by some of the New 
 Orleans merchants for the purpose of towing the heavily 
 laden ships to and from the city. She was a low-pressure 
 side-wheel steamer, about two hundred feet long, and noted 
 for her power and speed. When the war broke out she was 
 still in New Orleans, and was seized by the Confederate au- 
 thorities and converted into a ram and gunboat, by placing 
 heavy solid timbers in her bow, running about thirty feet aft 
 and bolting them firmly and strongly together. 
 
 In the latter part of May, 1861, the Webh seized three ves- 
 sels laden with oil and made prizes of them, but after the 
 establishment of the Federal blockade her privateering oper- 
 ations ceased. Upon the evacuation of New Orleans by the 
 Confederates, the Webb was sent up the Red River to Shreve- 
 port. La. Very little was heard of her again until she at- 
 tacked, with her consort, the ram Queen of the West, the iron- 
 clad Indianola, in the Mississippi, and, after a desperate strug- 
 gle, in which she rammed her several times, compelled her to 
 surrender. On the passage of the Vicksburg batteries by the 
 Federal fleet, the Webb retreated to the Red River, which she 
 ascended far above Alexandria, where she remained until 
 after the failure of the Banks' expedition up that river, when 
 it is said Lieut. Commander Charles W. Read, of the C. 8. 
 navy, conceived the idea of converting her into a Confederate 
 cruiser, to prey upon the commerce of the United States, and 
 submitted the project to Secretary Mallory. The Webb, at 
 this time, was lying at Shreveport, La., and the mouth of Red 
 River below was strongly blockaded by a Federal fleet. Be- 
 sides this blockade, the Mississippi was being constantly 
 patroled by Federal gunboats and other armed craft. New 
 Orleans was literally full of Federal troops, while Federal 
 war vessels lined her levee and occupied and guarded the 
 channel both above and below the city, and further down, 
 Forts Jackson and Philip presented formidable obstacles to 
 the success of such an enterprise as the brave and intrepid 
 Read proposed to undertake. It is said that it was the design 
 of Read, if he should reach the mouth of the Mississippi in 
 safety, to surprise and capture the ship Pampero, guardship 
 at the mouth of the river, and then go to Havana, sell the 
 cargo, and sink and destroy whatever he could capture en route 
 and then run the blockade into Galveston. 
 
 The plan was approved, it is said, by Secretary Mallory, 
 and Commander Read made immediate preparations to carry 
 his enterprise into effect. With Lieut. W. H. Wall as his ex- 
 ecutive officer. Master Samuel P. Blanc, Midshipman Scott, 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 365 
 
 Surgeon W. J. Addison and other navy officers, Commander 
 Bead left Richmond for the scene of his daring undertaking 
 with sealed orders. Arriving at Shreveport, Commander Read 
 reported to Lieut. Commander Robert R. Carter, commander 
 of the naval defences at that point, and in compliance with 
 orders from the Secretary of the Navy was placed in command 
 of the Webb. Every assistance was rendered Commander 
 Read to get his vessel ready for her hazardous expedition. A 
 rough bulwark was built around her forecastle to protect her 
 as much as possible from the sea, and several hundred bales of 
 cotton were piled up around her machinery, to protect it from 
 the guns of the enemj^ while running the blockade. For fuel, 
 pine knots were substituted for coal. A month's rations and 
 water were placed on board, and the vessel received a good 
 white-washing to prevent her from being seen at night. Her 
 armament consisted of one thirty-two pound rifled gun, 
 mounted on the forecastle, and two twelve pound iron cannon 
 on the quarter-deck. Engineers and pilots were secured, and 
 the craft was manned by volunteers from Gen. E . Kirby Smith's 
 command. 
 
 Information of the intended expedition of the Webb 
 reached Admiral Lee of the Federal navy, and he dispatched a 
 fleet of iron-clads and gunboats to the mouth of the Red River 
 to prevent her escape. Among them were the monitor Man- 
 hattan and the iron-clads Lafayette and Choctaw. 
 
 Everything being prepared, the Webb left Shreveport, 
 La., on the Red River, twenty-five miles below Alexandria, 
 on Monday, April 16th, 1865. She stopped at Cotes' Landing, 
 and took on board 350 cords of wood. Arriving at the mouth 
 of Red River on the night of April 33d, 1865, with all lights 
 screened, and her safety-valve tied down, she was allowed 
 to drift with the current by the Federal gunboats. Scarcely 
 had she run the gauntlet when a musket was fired at her 
 from the Manhattan, quickly followed by a discharge of 
 canister from a howitzer on her deck. The moment the Webb 
 was discovered, the engines were started at full speed, and she 
 rushed down the river at the rate of twenty miles an hour, 
 leaving far astern the Lafayette and a gunboat which had 
 started in pursuit. Her speed was slackened when the gun- 
 boats were out of sight, and she steamed along easily, so as to 
 pass the forts below New Orleans in the night. Ten miles 
 above the city. Commander Read sent a boat ashore and cut 
 the telegraph wires to the city, but unfortunately for him not 
 before a dispatch had been sent from Donaldsonville to New 
 Orleans that she had passed the Federal fleet, giving the Fed- 
 eral authorities in the latter city three hours' notice in advance 
 of her approach. On nearing New Orleans the Union ensign 
 was hoisted at half-mast — on account of President Lincoln's 
 death — and her crew, dressed in Federal army overcoats, 
 sat around on the cotton, on deck, and on the guards, coolly 
 
366 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 smoking and picking their teeth, as if they were only inno- 
 cent soldiers. The fleet lying at New Orleans were prepared 
 for the approach of a ram, but looking for something of the 
 Merrimac style of iron-clads, and not for the innocent-appear- 
 ing army transport, laden with cotton, and thronged with sol- 
 diers, that steamed leisurely down the river. The ram had 
 nearly passed the Federal fleet when the pilot of the Lacka- 
 wanna, an old steamboat man, at once recognized her as the 
 Webb, and so informed Capt. Emmons. Several shots were 
 fired at her by the Lackawanna and Ossipee, which laid above 
 Algiers, and could use their guns without endangering the 
 town. In an instant, the American flag was hauled down and 
 the Confederate colors run up. The Webb was hit several 
 times, but she dashed forward at the rate of twenty -five miles- 
 an hour and ran by the Portsmouth, Quaker City, Florida, 
 Ossipee, and other vessels, whose batteries were manned, but 
 which could not be fired in consequence of the danger of kill- 
 ing innocent people who thronged the streets and levee of Al- 
 giers, watching for the ram. The excitement in New Orleans 
 was intense. The news soon spread, and in a few moments it 
 was reported that President Davis and Gen. E. Kirby Smith 
 were passengers, and that John Wilkes Booth was at the 
 helm; that gold and silver in untold quantities were on board, 
 together with all the valuable and ofiicial documents of the 
 Confederacy. The Webb passed the city on the afternoon 
 of April 24th, under a full head of steam, with astonished 
 crowds on the levee to witness the extraordinary sight. 
 Her pilot was ordered to " keep the channel and run through 
 anything that attempts to cross your track." Her torpedo 
 was triced up in front and every man was at his station. 
 Plugs were provided for plugging shot-holes that might be 
 made near the water-line, and,~ altogether, a ship never rode 
 the waters more gracefully and defiantly than this little vessel 
 as she dashed along through the muddy Mississippi, scattering 
 the white spray far out in her front and on her sides. As she 
 passed the French man-of-war she dipped her flag. When the 
 Webb approached the Federal ordnance ship Fearnought, 
 Commander Read ordered the torpedo lowered and the vessel 
 run into. In the eagerness and haste of lowering the tor- 
 pedo the spar gave way, and the current carried it under the 
 starboard wheel. Seeing the danger. Commander Read very 
 coolly cried out, " Stop the engine and cut away the guy- 
 ropes." Prompt obedience of this order sent the torpedo to the 
 bottom of the river, and saved the Webb perhaps from being 
 blown up by its own torpedo. Commander Read after- 
 wards expressed great satisfaction that he was unable to 
 blow up the Fearnought, as the vessel had over three 
 hundred barrels of powder on board, which would have 
 blown herself, as well as the Webb, out of the water. 
 The Hollyhock, the Florida, the Quaker City, and the Ossipee 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 3G7 
 
 were dispatched by the Federal commander in pursuit of the 
 Webb, the Hollyhock far ahead. When the Webb had pro- 
 ceeded about twenty-three miles away from the city, and had 
 slowed her engines to allow the Hollyhock to come up, the 
 masts of the sloop-of-war Richmond were seen over a point 
 of the river bank. Thinking that she had been placed there 
 to trap him, Commander Read ordered the pilot to put the 
 Webb at her, to blow her up with a torpedo, and then to 
 hurry on. On the pilot informing him that a flat laid be- 
 tween them, and that the Webb must go around the curve 
 in the channel and pass under the Richmond's broadside, he 
 said he had tested her guns before, and would not try them 
 again. He then ordered the Webb to be run ashore, and 
 every man to look out for himself. This was at once done 
 on the left bank of the river. The vessel was fired and 
 Commander Read, and his officers and men, took to the 
 swamp. When the Florida and Hollyhock arrived later, the 
 Webb was in a mass of flames, and too far burned to save. 
 Finding that they were surrounded by cavalry sent down 
 from the city to effect their capture, the officers and crew 
 returned to the wreck, where a gunboat was lying alongside, 
 commanded by a naval officer, and desiring to fall into the 
 hands of the U. S. navy rather than the army, the officer was 
 called on shore, and received the officers and. crew of the 
 Webb, as prisoners of war. They were at once conveyed to 
 New Orleans and placed on board the Lackawanna, and finally 
 transferred to the Florida, which conveyed them to New York. 
 They arrived in the latter city on May 6th, and on May 10th 
 were consigned to Fort Warren, in Boston harbor. They re- 
 mained in Fort Warren until the surrender of Gen. E. Kirby 
 Smith, when they were allowed to return to their homes. 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 NORTH CAROLINA WATERS. 
 
 THE most cursory examination of the map of the South- 
 ern States will show to the reader that the sounds of 
 North Carolina were no less important to the defence 
 of that State than Hampton Roads was to that of Vir- 
 ginia, and that if the blockade of the Southern coast was to 
 be effective indeed, then these sounds, as coaling stations 
 and harbor of refuge, were of prime importance to the United 
 States. The long, low sandy islets that separated the waters 
 of the ocean from those of the sounds, were indented with 
 inlets, which often changing positions, and always treacher- 
 ous, were yet, at one or two points always navigable for 
 vessels that could ride with safety in the shoal waters of 
 the sounds. 
 
 From Cape Charles to Cape Lookout that island chain ex- 
 tended but inclosed no inland water of importance until Albe- 
 marle Sound was reached; there Roanoke Island separated 
 that sound from the larger and deeper water of Pamlico 
 Sound, upon the eastern border of which Cape Hatteras jutted 
 farthest out into the ocean, and Hatteras Inlet and Ocracoke 
 Inlet offered the only safe and reliable entrances from the 
 ocean. Oregon Inlet, near Roanoke Island, had been at all 
 times unsafe for any but the smallest of crafts. The com- 
 mand of the broad waters of these sounds, with their navi- 
 gable rivers extending far into the interior, would control 
 more than one-third of the State and threaten the main line 
 of railroad between Richmond and the sea-coast portion of the 
 Confederate States. Roanoke Island, between Albemarle and 
 Pamlico Sounds, was the commanding position in those waters. 
 These sounds were connected with the waters of Hampton 
 Roads by the Albemarle and Chesapeake Canal, capable of 
 passing vessels of light draft from Norfolk to Elizabeth City. 
 Prom Albemarle Sound, the Pasquotank River afforded navi- 
 gation to Elizabeth city; the Perquimans River to Hertford; the 
 Chowan River toWinton; the Roanoke River to Plymouth. 
 
 (368) 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 369 
 
 Erom Albemarle Sound, the Pamlico River extended to 
 Washington, from whence the Tar River was navigable to 
 Tarboro; the Neuse River opened wide and deep communi- 
 cation with Newberne, and further up to Kingston and 
 Beaufort, and Morehead City, below Cape Lookout, were 
 accessible also from Pamlico Sound. A large portion of the 
 population of this large and fertile area was, if not actu- 
 ally hostile to the Confederate cause, so indifferent to its suc- 
 cess, as to avail themselves of the first and every opportunity 
 to evade the duty of defence and to secure the protection of 
 the enemy for their persons and property. 
 
 The State of North Carolina, immediately after passing 
 the Ordinance of Secession, began the work of defending the 
 possession of these sounds. The steamer Winslow, a small 
 sjde-wheel steamboat, was fitted out by the Governor of the 
 State, and on the outside of Hatteras' began to annoy and 
 destroy the commerce of the United States. Under Thomas 
 M. Crossan, formerly of the U. S. navy, the Winslow cap- 
 tured and brought into the sounds, for condemnation, many 
 prizes, among them the brig Hannah Butley, with molasses; 
 the bark Lenwood, with 6,000 bags of coffee; the schooner 
 Jjydia French, the brig Oilvery, with 315 tierces of rnolasses; 
 three unknown brigs, the schooner Gordon, with fruit; 
 the schooner Priscilla, with 600 bushels of salt; a brig and 
 three schooners; the brig Itasca, with 500 hogsheads of 
 molasses; the schooner Henry Nut, with mahogany and log- 
 wood, and the schooner Sea Witch, with fruit. The outcry 
 that went up from commercial circles at the North may have 
 had no little to do in influencing the naval authorities to 
 block the outlet from which the little Winslow inflicted such 
 damages. 
 
 After the State united herself to the Confederate States, 
 her navy, consisting of the Winslow, the Ellis, the Raleigh, 
 and the Beaufort, all ordinary steamboats, armed with one 
 gun each, were turned over to the Confederate States. 
 
 The defence of the entrances to these sounds was under- 
 taken by the erection of batteries at Hatteras and Ocracoke 
 Inlet and at Beaufort; on the interior waters. Newborn e, 
 Roanoke Island, and the mouth of the Neuse River, were de- 
 fended under the State by small batteries, which were not 
 ■completed when the State adopted the Constitution of the Con- 
 federate States. 
 
 Major R. C. Gatlin' was appointed Commander of the 
 "Southern Department Coast Defences," with headquarters 
 at Wilmington, N. C. ; promoted to Brigadier General in August, 
 1861, he was assigned to the command of the Department of 
 North Carolina and the coast defences of the State. 
 
 ' Gen. Gatlin was a major in tlie U. S. army, released on parole, and resigning his commis- 
 
 rifth infantry, when the State seceded. He sion accepted service under North Carolina, 
 
 had been captured at Fort Smith by the forces and was transferred by her Ordinance to the 
 
 of the State of Arkansas, April 23d, 1861, and Confederate States Army. 
 
370 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The importance of seizing and retaining possession of 
 the North Carolina Sounds was as apparent and urgent upon 
 the United States as their defence was to the Confederate 
 States. . .These safe and commodious anchora,ges not only- 
 afforded protection against the storms which so often pre- 
 vail along the Atlantic coast, but they were depots from 
 which the very central line of inland communication of the 
 Confederates might be broken, and, moreover, they were the 
 "back door" to Norfolk, by which the navy-yard might be 
 regained. 
 
 To the Navy Department of the United States is due the 
 credit for seeing the importance of these sounds, and taking 
 early steps to regain their possession and control. The prep- 
 aration and concentration of a naval expedition was com- 
 menced in the summer of 1861, and so far completed by the 
 25th of August that the infantry detail, numbering 860 men 
 under Gen. B. F. Butler, was taken aboard, and on the 36th 
 of August the expedition sailed. The expedition consisted of 
 the steam frigate Minnesota, Capt. Gr. I. Van Brunt, the flag- 
 ship of Commodore Stringham ; the steam frigate Waba^, 
 Capt. Samuel Mercer ; the Monticello, Commander John P. 
 Gillis ; the Pawnee, Commander S. C. Rowan ; and the reve- 
 nue-cutter Harriet Lane, Capt. John Fanner. The steamer 
 Adelaide, Commander Henry S. Stellwagen, with 500 infantry 
 from the Twentieth New York regiment, Col. Weber ; and 
 the Peahody, Lieut. R. R. Lowry, with 220 infantry of the 
 Ninth New York regiment; 100 men of the Union coast- 
 guard, Capt. Nixon; and sixty men of the Second U. S. 
 artillery, Lieut. Learned. As the means of landing through 
 the surf, the transports towed two schooners with very 
 large iron surf -boats. On the same afternoon the expedi- 
 tion anchored off Hatteras Inlet, and preparations were im- 
 mediately made for landing the troops, as well as to attack 
 the batteries from the war vessels. The frigate Susquehanna 
 joined the expedition off Hatteras and took part in the bom- 
 bardment. 
 
 The entrance to Hatteras Inlet is endangered by a bar 
 which covers the whole front of the inlet, and is further im- 
 peded by a "bulkhead" on the sound side only, while the 
 water is very seldom of greater depth than seven and a half 
 feet. Of the forts defending the inlet. Fort Hatteras, the 
 larger, mounting twenty-five guns, was separated from Fort 
 Clark by a shallow bay about half a mile wide. The surf, 
 though heavy and dangerous along the beach, was not 
 such as to prevent the landing of troops, and a detachment 
 was put on shore during the bombardment, at a point far 
 beyond the reach of the guns of the fort and without re- 
 sistance from the Confederates, whose garrison was unequal 
 to defence, and only large enough to give importance to its 
 capture. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 371 
 
 Flag-officer Capt. Samuel Barron/ C. S. N., to whom had 
 been assigned the duty of commanding the defences, did not 
 arrive at Hatteras until the 28th of August, one day after the 
 bombardment had been going on. Col. Martin's little force, 
 the Seventh North Carolina Volunteers, exhausted and worn 
 down with constant fighting, had been driven from Fort Clark 
 to Fort Hatteras, when Major Andrews, commanding all the 
 forces on land, awaited another regiment from Newberne. 
 The land forces of the enemy took possession of Fort Clark 
 and defended it with naval howitzers brought with them. At 
 the urgent request of Major Andrews, Flag-officer Barron 
 assumed command. He found Col. Martin utterly prostrated 
 by the severe action and the duties of the day. 
 
 There were but two guns mounted on the side next to Fort 
 .Clark, both thirty-two pounders, and one gun on the corner 
 next the bar, an eight-inch shell gun. During the night Major 
 Andrews tore away a traverse on the back face of the work 
 and brought another gun to bear in the same direction. The 
 companies of the command, under Capts. Cobden, Lamb and 
 Sutton, having been in action all the previous day, displaying 
 great courage and devotion, were perfectly exhausted. He 
 
 1 Admiral Samuel Barron was bom in Virginia, 
 and entered the tJ. 8. navy as midshipman, on 
 Janiiary 1, 1812. .He was attached to the Bravdy- 
 viine when she conveyed Gen. Lafayette to 
 Prance, in 1825; was promoted to be lieuten- 
 ant March 3, 1827. commander July 15, 1847, 
 and captain in 1855. At the beginning of the 
 war he was appointed chief of the Bureau of De- 
 tail in the TJ. S Navy Department. He entered 
 the C. S. navy on the 10th of June 1861, with 
 the rant of commander, and put in charge of 
 the naval defences of North Carolina and Vir- 
 ginia, with the rank of flag-ofacer. He did not 
 arrive at Fort Hatteras until after the fall and 
 evacuation of Fort Clark. He was requested by 
 Col. Martin, in command of the North Caro- 
 hna troops, to take command of the land ofl&cers, 
 and conduct the defence of Fort Hatteras, as it 
 was armed with navy guns and the ofificers and 
 men were not accustomed to the management 
 of them. Commodore Barron then assumed 
 the general direction of the defences. He was en- 
 gaged all night in preparing to defend Fort Hat- 
 teras, by transferring the olficerB and men from 
 the other forts to do it. During the fight the 
 next day (the 29th of August) Commodore Barron 
 did not have a single gun that could reach the 
 enemy's ships, while their batteries were throw- 
 ing shells into the fort every few seconds. 
 
 The following were the articles of capitulation 
 agreed upon at the surrender of the forts, at the 
 inlet of Hatteras, N. C.,— the first agreed upon 
 after the war began : 
 
 "Off Hattebas Inlet, 1 
 "TJ. S. Flag-ship * Minnesota,' Aug. 29, 1861. f 
 "Articles of capUulation between Flag -officers 
 J^tringkam, coTnmanding the 'Atlantic Blockad- 
 ing Squadron* and Benjamin F. Butler, U. S. 
 army, commanding on behalf of the United States 
 Government, and Samuel Barron, commandiTig 
 <Ae naval force for the defence of North Carolina 
 and Virginia, and Col. Martin, commanding the 
 forces, and Major Andrews, commanding the 
 iajnejbrces, at Fort Hatteras. 
 
 " It is stipulated and agreed between the con- 
 tracting parties that the forces under the com- 
 mand of the said Barron, Martin and Andrews, 
 and all munitions of war, anns, men, and prop- 
 erty under the command of said Barron, Martin, 
 and Andrews, be unconditonally surrendered to 
 the Government of the United States in terms 
 of f uU capitulation. 
 
 "And it is stipulated and agreed by the 
 contracting parties on the part of the TJnited 
 States Government that the officers and men 
 shall receive the treatment due to prisoners 
 of war. 
 
 ** In witness whereof, we, the said Stringham 
 and Butler, on behalf of the United States, and 
 the said Ban-on, Martin and Andrews repre- 
 senting the forces at Hatteras Inlet, hereunto 
 interchangeably set our hands this twenty- 
 ninth day of August, A. D. 1861, and of the in- 
 dependence of the United States the eighty -fifth 
 
 y^^* "S H. Stringham, 
 
 ** Flag-officer Atlantic Blockading Squadron. 
 
 "Benj. F. Bdtlek, 
 " Major-General U. S. Army, commanding. 
 "S. Barbon. 
 "Flag-officer Confederate Stat^es Navy, command- 
 ing Naval Defences South omd North Caro- 
 lina, 
 
 "Wm. F. Martin, 
 " Colonel 1th Regiment Infaniry North Carolina 
 Volunteers. 
 
 "W. S. G. Andrews, 
 •' Major, ccmimanding Forts Hatteras omd Clark.'* 
 After the surrender Commodore Barron was 
 sent to Fort Warren, Boston Harbor, until ex- 
 changed in 1862. During the remainder of the 
 war he was in England and France engaged iu 
 carrying out the plans of his government, in 
 getting war vessels afloat. He secured for the 
 Confederacy the cruisers Stonewall and Georgia. 
 After the close of the war he returned to Vir- 
 ginia and now (1887) resides, a great invalid, at 
 Loretto, Essex Coimty, Virginia. 
 
373 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 placed the batteries in charge of fresh troops, as follows : 
 Nos. 2 and 3 of the channel battery under the command of 
 Capt. Thomas Sparrow, assisted by his Lieuts., Shaw and 
 Thomas; Nos. 4 and 5 of the same battery were under com- 
 mand of Lieut. Col. George W. Johnston, assisted by First 
 Lieut. Mose and Second Lieut. George W. Daniels; No. 6, fac- 
 ing the bar, and No. 7, facing Fort Clark, were placed in 
 charge of Major Henry A. Gillion, assisted by Lieuts. John- 
 ston and Grimes; No. 8, a gun mounted on naval carriage, 
 was commanded by Lieut. William H. Murdaugh, of the 
 C. S. N., assisted by Lieut. Wm. Sharp ^ and Midshipman J. M. 
 Stafford. Capt. Thomas H. Sharp had command of No. 1, 
 but owing to the wrenches not fitting the eccentric axles, was 
 unable to bring it into action. He staid by his gun during 
 most of the engagement, but could not fire. Thus, the Con- 
 federates had but three guns they could bring to bear (if the 
 enemy took up his position of the previous day), viz. : Nos. 6, 
 7 and 8. 
 
 At 7:40 A. M. of the 29th the enemy opened fire from the 
 steam-frigate Minnesota (forty-three guns), Wabash (forty- 
 three guns), Susguehanna (fifteen guns), frigate Cumberland 
 
 1 William Sbarp entered the navy of tbe United 
 States September 9th, 1841, and resigned as a 
 lieutenant at tbe Norfolk navy-yard, where he 
 was stationed, on the day Virginia seceded. He 
 entered the service of the Confederate States 
 navy on June 10th, 1861, and was first placed 
 on duty in the Navy Department at Eich- 
 mond, by and with Commodore Samuel Barron. 
 Later be was stationed at a fort on the Naval 
 Hospital Grounds, Norfolk, commanded by Capt. 
 Chas. F. Mcintosh, where he was for some weeks 
 engaged in drilling several regiments in heavy 
 artillery. Later, Commodore Barron was oi'dered 
 to North Carolina in charge of the Water Defences 
 of that State, and he was sent as his aide with 
 headquarters at Newbeme. On themoruiiigaft«r 
 the arrival of the U. S. squadron under Com- 
 mander S. H. Stingham with Gen. B. T. Butler on 
 board, off Hatteras Inlet, he attended Commodore 
 Barron to tbe vicinity of that locality, witnessed 
 the first day's flgbt, and at 9 p.m. of the same day, 
 at tbe request of Col. W. F. Martin, commanding 
 Fort Hatteras, Commodore Barron relieved him, 
 and the navy officers entered it at once. 
 
 EarJy next day the Federalfleetretumed from 
 their anchorage, and commenced the attack on 
 Fort Hatteras, as Fort Clark (to tbe northward) 
 had surrendered on the previous day, and rained 
 Minie balls ov^r their heads throughout tbe 
 morning. The guns of Fort Hatteras were harm- 
 less to the fleet, while nearly every shot from 
 them told against the Confederates. During the 
 action Lieut. Sharp was wounded in the face and 
 fell, remaining insensible for some time. He 
 was taken up, supposedly dead, by Col. Charles 
 Heywood, U. S. Marine Corps, who entered the 
 fort with Gen. B. F. Butler when he landed, and 
 received the surrender, Lieut. Sbarp was sent 
 off to the flag-ship Minnesota, which went to 
 New York immediately, and was landed as a 
 prisoner at Fort Columbus. Governor's Island, 
 commanded by Col. Loomis, U. S A. After a 
 stay of some months, he was sent to Fort Warren, 
 Boston Harbor, in November, 186i, commanded 
 by Gen. Justin Dimmick, II, 8. A. 
 
 After some weeks, in charge of Lieut. W. F. 
 Spicer, U. S. N., and a marine guard, he was 
 taken to Boston, placed on the Old Colony R. B. 
 and taken to the U. S. receiving ship North 
 Carolina, Brooklyn navy-yard. On the same day 
 he was sent to the gunboat Connecticut, Capt. 
 Maxwell Wood hull, which steamed for Hamp- 
 ton Roads, he being sent as a prisoner to the 
 TJ. S. frigate Congress, Capt. Wm. Smith. On 
 November 2 ', 1861, he was exchanged for Lieut. 
 John L. Worden, U. S. N., and was landed in 
 Norfolk. In a few days afterwards, he was 
 ordered to the C. S. steamer Patrick Henry at 
 Richmond, and had charge of her forward di- 
 vision in the Hampton Roads battles of March 
 8th and 9th, 1862. Some weeks later he was as- 
 signed to the command of the Confederate gun- 
 boat Beaufort, relieving Lieut. W. H. Parker, 
 and was one of four sent to Hampton Roads 
 with the intention to attempt boarding the 
 Monitor. The Monitor did not come out aud 
 nothing was accomplished. Soon after that he 
 towed the schooner Kaigan's Point at night past 
 the blockading squadron off Newport News, 
 and to Drewry's Bluff, loaded with iron for the 
 Tredegar Iron Works at Richmond. 
 
 After a while he was stationed at Charlotte, 
 N. C, thence accompanying Commodore Bar- 
 ron to Murfreesboro, Tenn., where their expect- 
 ations of getting to Nashville to block up tbe 
 Cumberland were frustrated by tlie Federal army 
 being in possession. Returning to Richmond 
 he was one of a board of examiners to examine 
 Midshipmen, which sat in Mobile, Savannah, 
 Charleston and Richmond 
 
 Then he was sent tore-command the gunboat 
 Beaufort, remaining till the winter of 1863, 
 when be was sent to Winston, N. C, to relieve 
 Commander James W. Cook in supervising tbe 
 construction of the iron-clad steamer Neuse. He 
 remained on this duty till tbe spring of 1864, 
 when he was sent to Charleston, S. C, in charge 
 of the Naval Ordnance Department, and con- 
 tinued there until Sherman s advance through 
 Georgia. This was his last service. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 373 
 
 (twenty-four guns), steamer Pawnee (ten guns), and Harriet 
 Lane (five guns), and a rifled battery of three guns erected in 
 the sand-hills three miles east of Fort Clark. 
 
 Bringing seventy-three guns of the most approved kind 
 and heaviest metal to bear on the forts, the shells thrown being 
 nine-inch, ten-inch, and eleven-inch Dahlgren, Paixhan, and 
 Columbiad ; while, from the position taken, the guns of the 
 forts were unable to reach them with the greatest elevation. 
 The men of the channel battery were ordered to leave their 
 guns and protect themselves as well as possible, the council 
 of the commanding officers having decided that it was to be 
 an action of endurance until reinforcements came up. After 
 a few shots had been fired, and it was ascertained that the 
 guns could not reach them, the Confederate firing ceased, 
 and only answered the fire of the enemy occasionally, to show 
 that the forts had not surrendered. The shower of shell in 
 half an hour became literally tremendous, falling into and 
 immediately around the works not less, on an average, than 
 ten each minute, and, the sea being smooth, the firing was re- 
 markably accurate. 
 
 One officer counted twenty-eight shells, and several others 
 counted twenty, as falling in a minute. At a quarter to 
 eleven o'clock a council of the officers was held, and it was 
 determined to surrender. A white fiag was raised, and the 
 firing ceased at eleven o'clock. Thus for three hours and 
 twenty minutes Fort Hatteras resisted a storm of shells per- 
 haps more terrible than ever fell upon any other work. At 
 the time the council determined to surrender, two of the fort's 
 guns were dismounted, four men were reported killed, and 
 between twenty -five and thirty badly wounded. ' One shell 
 
 1 Among the severely wounded was Lieut. of the enemy until resistance ceased ou the part 
 William H. Murdaugh, who had his left arm of the Confederates. From Charlotte, Lieut. 
 ■ shattered by a shell and was slightly wounded Murdaugh was ordered to the command of the 
 in the knee by a fragment of a shell. Lieut. steamer Beaufort, on James Kiver, and after- 
 Murdaugh, after the acceptance of his resigna- wards was sent abroad to purchase ordnance 
 tion in the old navy, reached Eichmond in supplies. Commander Bulloch, in his admira- 
 June, 1861. The duty to which he was first ble work on " The Secret Service of the Confed- 
 assigned was that of making surveys in James erate States in Europe," says: " Amongthe ofl- 
 Kiver, in connection with the establishment of cers sent to Europe for service in the iron-clad 
 batteries and the obstruction of channels. vessels it was' hoped might be got to sea was 
 Lieut.CommanderEobertH. Carter, of Virginia, Lieut. William H. Murdaugh. Besides having 
 was associated with him in this work. After the special experience and general professional 
 this duty was faithfully discharged, Lieut. knowledge which fitted him for ordnance work, 
 Murdaugh went with Commander Barron to he possessed admirable tact and judgment, and 
 the defences of North Carolina, where he was also the reticence and faculty of self-control 
 assigned to the command of a vessel, but be- which are essential for the satisfactory perform- 
 fore he could take charge, the affair at Fort ance of duties requiring secrecy. The speciM 
 Hatteras came off. in which he was severely ordnance stores were nearly all overlooked and 
 wounded. While unfit for active service from certiaed by him. The whole of the work was 
 his wound, he was on ordnance duty at the performed creditably, and the goods passed out 
 Norfolk navy-yard. He was with Capt. French of the manufacturer's hands, and went through 
 Forrest in the tug Harmony in Hampton Boads the shipping-ports, without attracting notice or 
 duringthe two days' flght When it was deter- causing.any embarrassing scrutiny. The execu- 
 mined to evacuate Norfolk, he was sent off to tion of the foregoing special orders brought 
 select a place for an ordnance depot to which Lieut. Murdaugh into constant and confidential 
 the stores and tools from the Ordnance Depart- communication with me, and I was most desir- 
 ment of the navy-yard could be removed. He ous to appoint him to another and still more 
 selected Charlotte, N. C ., as the place and rented important service, but the war came to an ab- 
 machine shops and store houses for the purpose. rupt end just before the maturity of the enter- 
 Charlotte was an important workshop all dur- prise in which he was to have had a leading 
 ing the war, and was never pressed by the foot part." 
 
374 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 had fallen into the room adjoining the magazine, and the 
 magazine was reported on fire. 
 
 Articles of capitulation of unconditional surrender were 
 demanded and the whole command became prisoners of war. ' 
 
 An officer of the C S. steamer Ellis, who witnessed the 
 bombardment and surrender of Port Hatteras, in a letter to the 
 Washington (N. C.) Dispatch, gave the following account of 
 the affair: 
 
 "Proceeding up the Sound, we came up 'with the little despatch boat 
 M. C. Downing, just from Hatteras, bringing up the intelligence that the 
 patriotic little band of 100 men who were at Fort Clark, a little above 
 Fort Hatteras, after making a desperate resistance, firing their last shot, 
 had evacuated the fort, having previously rendered the guns useless by 
 spiking and dismounting them, and that the vandal horde of the North, 
 led on by a trailprous Methodist minister, had landed and taken posses- 
 sion of the fort, and now the ' Stars and Stripes ' were floating over the 
 time-honored soil of the Old North State; that Fort Hatteras was still 
 gallantly fighting, but was in need of men and munitions of war. The 
 men we could easily supply, tout the ammunition we had not. The little 
 steamer then passed ahead after ammunition, and we with beating and 
 anxious hearts eagerly waited the time when we should cheer our noble 
 companions by our presence. Just at this time we saw the steaoner Wins- 
 low approaching with a plenty of ammunition, and the following ofiScers 
 on board: Capt. Samuel Barron, Lieuts. Sharp and Murdaugh, and Sur- 
 geon Greenhow. She came to anchor about two and a-half or three miles 
 from tiie fort. This was indeed cheering, and our expectations knew no 
 bounds. All this time a severe and constant cannonade was being kept 
 up, the fleet firing continual broadsides of shell, while we replied at inter- 
 vals with shot, our shell having been expended. The shot and shell drop.- 
 ped thick and fast upon the fort and island, but so far no one was hurt, 
 except two men killed and Lieut. Knight wounded, while retreating from 
 Fort Clark. In the face of the dreadful storm of iron, our captain, with 
 that firmness and tranquility which ever characterizes the true officer and 
 gentleman, ran the C. S. steamer JSUis near the fort, which now of course 
 toecame the prominent mark for the Yankees, as we were not only a gun- 
 boat, but our decks were crowded with men. Protected by our Heavenly 
 Father, though the balls whistled close and fast by us, we remained un- 
 hurt. One thing I can vouch for is, that there is not a man upon this lit- 
 tle steamer but who has grown familiar with that peculiar whizzing 
 sound which always accompanies a ball in its flight through the au". 
 Several rifle cannon balls passed in close proximity to us, and though per- 
 haps it was the first time that some of them had ever heard a cannon fired, 
 
 J Major W. S. G. Andrews, in his official report never saw a man posseBsed of more cool courage 
 to the Adjutant Gen. of North Carolina, says : than animated Capt. Barron in that hour of 
 "I desire especially to siieak of the conduct of peril ; and he says also, that the resolution to 
 the officers and men at the naval gun, who fired surrender the fort was the result of calm and 
 frequently to ti-y the range. Lieut. Murdaugh serious deliberation, actuated by decided feel- 
 was badly wounded, Lieut Sharp was knocked ings of honor and patriotism. The gaUant Ueu- 
 down by a shot which passed through the para- tenant, who also behaved most nobly in the en- 
 pet near his head and brought the blood from gagement, will, when he recovers from the 
 tiis ear and cheek in considerable quantity, kill- effects of his wound, bear me out in the state- 
 ing aman at his side, at the same time knocking ment of facts, which I think ought in justice to 
 down and covering Col. J. A. Bradford with sod be made. I know, what eveiy one who witnessed 
 and earth; and Midshipman Stafford cheered the engagement must feel, and that is, that Capt. 
 on the men, behaving in a most gallant manner. Barron is as brave as he is honorable, and that 
 After the fall of Lieut. Murdaugh his men bore in his conduct at Hatteras he was actuated by a 
 him to the commodore's boat and he escaped. strict sense of duty alone." 
 
 An officer of the steamer ITinfi/oiy said: "Lieut. Another officer, writing from Hatteras, says: 
 
 Murdaugh, the friend and brother officer of " Capt. Barron, though forced to yield by over- 
 
 Capt. Barron, who was brought on board of the whelming batteries, he, and those who fought 
 
 Window during the engagement, with a severe with him in that conflict of fire, are worthy of 
 
 wound in the left arm, informed me that he their country's approbation and honor." 
 
THE CONFEDEKATB STATES NAVY. 375 
 
 yet the crew and officers stood it with most pei'fect nonchalance, exhibit- 
 ing throughout the whole action perfect confidence in their officers, and a 
 reliance upon the Almighty hand. After safely landing the troops, we 
 again returned to the Winslow, and taking a plentiful supply of ammuni- 
 tion, we went alongside the schooners and took all the troops on board, 
 and safely landed everything at the fort. Our escape was truly miracu- 
 lous. Nobly has the Ellis performed her duty in this terrible encounter, 
 and it is due to her that her services should be acknowledged. Too much 
 praise cannot be given to her commander and crew. 
 
 "The enemy, after an incessant fire of about six hours, having 
 sounded all about, and planted buoys ready for the dreadful work of to- 
 morrow, retired for the night, and no doubt employed themselves for the 
 ■coming struggle. Nearly all night we were employed in making the fort 
 impregnable, as we then thought. Much of the disaster which occurred 
 on Thursday may be attributed to the fact that we did not possess our- 
 selves of Fort Clark by the bayonet that night; but wiser and older heads 
 than mine thought otherwise. Certain it is, in my opinion, it was one of 
 the causes, second only to the shameful neglect of the authorities in not 
 properly fortifying the coast, that caused our defeat. From these two 
 causes we have the following result: the possession of Hatteras, the key 
 of the Sound; the road open to invasion at any moment; Capt. Barron, 
 Lieut. Sharp, and about 700 or 800 gallant men prisoners, taken by the 
 Abolition Kangaroos, beside^ prolonging, in my opinion, the war for half 
 a year. 
 
 " I must not here forget to mention a trivial circumstance, it may seem, 
 "but one which exhibits the brave man and patriot. On going to the fort 
 about two o'clock at night, Lieut. Murdaugh might be seen standing, in 
 the clear moonlight, upon the well-defended ramparts at Hatteras. He 
 "was calmly superintending the works about the guns, having one fixed so 
 as better to bear on the enemy with which he himself intended to ^gpt. 
 No one who saw him could doubt but that he would do good service. 
 The next morning, August 39th, a day ever memorable to those who wit- 
 nessed or participated in this sublime but terrible contest, rose calm and 
 heautiful. This was just what the Yankees wished. All the morning I 
 wasTjusily engaged in going to and fro on duty to Capt. Barron, who was 
 very anxious for me to go on shore and help about the guns, as they had 
 not many in the fort who knew mueh about gunnery; but as we had not 
 the officers to spare, Capt. Muse wojild not consent for me to go. I will here 
 mention a fact to show how close the Yankees were to the fort. While 
 ashore, standing on the ramparts, in company with Capt. Barron, Lieut. 
 Sharp and Lieut. Barron, all of us being in uniform, were of course a 
 good mark, and the Yankees thought so too, for whiz went a ball in close 
 proximity to the captain's head, while several struck in the parapSt inr- 
 mediately under us. It will here be proper to state that Midshipman 
 J. M. Stafford had been sent ashore, where, during the fight, he fully per- 
 formed his duty and rendered valuable service, conducting himself with 
 manly coolness surpassing Ms years. 
 
 "At 8:30 A. M., the frigate Wabash steamed up, and as she passed Fort 
 Clark the Stars and Stripes were waved three times to her from the para- 
 pet of the fort, which she acknowledged by dipping her colors. She then 
 rounded to, dropped anchor, and opened fire upon the fort. She was im- 
 mediately joined by the Susquehanna, Cumberland, and Minnesota, in an 
 incessant fire of shell which dropped thick and fast around and in the 
 fort. The fort replied at intervals, and the Susquehanna was evidently 
 damaged, as she withdrew from the range of the fort, and only fired two 
 more shots during the engagement, her place being supplied by the Roan- 
 oke. Fort Clark now also opened on Fort Hatteras, together with several 
 other land batteries which they had erected on shore, one of these, con 
 sistingof rifie cannon, seemed to pay particular attention to us; and as 
 they gradually got our range, they came near hitting us several times, so 
 that we changed our position, and the guns were then turned on the fort. 
 
376 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 All eyes -were now turned to that gallant little fort fighting against such 
 desperate odds. One continual stream of shell fell upon it, but still it does 
 not fire ! What can be the matter 1 Look, there goes the fort again ! 
 Again ! But alas ! all fall far short. The reason is now evident ; they 
 cannot reach the vessels, while every shot almost from them tells upon 
 the fort. Amid a perfect hail-storm of iron a boat leaves the fort. "What 
 can it want? My Grod, they are bringing the wounded to the steamer! What 
 a terrible scene! Never shall I forget it. They approach. Surely that 
 blackened face, that body almost covered with blood cannot be the noble 
 and chivalrous Lieut. Murdaugh. Alas ! it is. He has fallen, manfully 
 battling against them by the side of his gun, with words of encourage- 
 ment upon his lips. After firing three or four effective shots, which orip- 
 Eled the Susquehanna^ and finding they were out of range of our guns, 
 e remarked to his men, ' Well, boys, we wiU wait till they come up, when 
 we will give it to them again.' But he had hardly uttered these words 
 ere an eleven-inch shell exploded close by, sent two or three fragments of 
 shell through his left arm, completely shattering it to pieces, causing 
 
 freat pain, exhaustion and loss of blood. He was supplied with lint by 
 [r. Tredwell, one of our oflBcers, who had very thoughtfully provided 
 some for his own use, should he be wounded, and who, during the whole 
 action, behaved, as did all the oiBcers, with the utmost coolness and firm- 
 ness. He was taken on board the Winslow, and placed under the care of 
 Surgeon Greenhow, of the C. S. navy, an intelligent and successful sur- 
 geon, where he was properly cared for. 
 
 " The bombardment of Fort Hatteras, by the flower of the Federal 
 navy, was a scene which will ever be present to the minds of those who 
 witnessed it. On that day many a fireside was made desolate ; many a 
 mother and wife made to weep over the sad fate of those who were near- 
 est to them, and whose bloody and mangled corpses, perhaps, now lay 
 stark and still upon the blood-stained beach of Hatteras. But such 
 scenes as these are the necessary attendants of war. But what is that ap- 
 pearing on the fort t A white flag! Surely those who were that morning so 
 buoyant and full of joy and hope at the prospect of beating the Yankees, 
 cannot now be suing for peace ! Yet it is so. Such a continual stream of 
 shell was more than the gallant little fort could stand ; the bomb-proof 
 had given way, and every shell now played sad havoc among them ; so, 
 laying aside their pride, they yielded to necessity, and to prevent any 
 more sacrifice of life, had resigned themselves to months of imprisonment, 
 perhaps, in the loathsome dens of the Tombs 1 It was truly a humUi- 
 ating sight. 
 
 '' The fight lasted for a day and a half, out of which time there were 
 fourteen hours of incessant firing, during which time they threw some 
 400 or 500 shot and shell. After finding the fort had surrendered, and that 
 we could be of no possible use, we left for Ocracoke, to take on board the 
 sad and weeping wives of the ofiBoers, now prisoners, and shall proceed to 
 Washington, N. C." 
 
 Of this engagement Admiral Porter ' remarks that " in 
 days of wooden ships one gun mounted on shore was consid- 
 ered equal to five on shipboard ; but even this allowance 
 made the squadron superior to the forts, without considering 
 the heavier guns and better equipment of the frigates;" and to 
 those advantages must be added the still more important fact 
 that the squadron took position beyond the range of any gun 
 on shore — and thus, without the possibility of injury, were 
 able to " almost smother " the people in the forts. " This was 
 our first naval victory — indeed, our first victory of any kind,* 
 
 ^ Naval History, p. 45. 2 Naval History, p. 47. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 377 
 
 and great was the rejoicing thereat throughout the United 
 States." 
 
 Thus, on the 31st of August, the important position atHat- 
 teras Inlet was captured, and that at Ocracoke Inlet aban- 
 doned by the Confederates, and safe entrance to the fleets of 
 the enemy gained to the sounds and rivers of North Carolina. 
 Notwithstanding the loss of Hatteras Fort and the ability of 
 the enemy to cover the waters of the sound with their gun- 
 boats, they soon discovered that they must hold their conquest 
 with a force ever present to defend it. Capt. Wm. F. Lynch' 
 succeeded Flag-oflBcer Barron, who had been taken prisoner 
 in the command of the naval defences, and, ever alert and 
 active, received information on October 1st that the enemy 
 was sending reinforcements of men and supplies to Chicama- 
 commico, a station about forty miles north of Hatteras Inlet, 
 on the narrow strip of sand that divides the sound from the 
 ocean. With the Raleigh, Lieut. Commander J. W. Alexan- 
 der ; Junaluska, Midshipman W. H. Vernon, commanding, 
 assisted by Midshipman James M, Gardner, and the Curlew, 
 Capt. Lynch proceeded to intercept any steamer that might 
 be found cruising in the sound. Midshipman commanding 
 Taylor was left in charge of the floating battery, and Midship- 
 man Gregory on the Cotton Plant. At 5 p. m. the Federal 
 steamer Fanny, loaded with ammunition and supplies for the 
 Federal -post at Loggerhead Inlet, was sighted. The arma- 
 ment of the Fanny was two rifled cannon, and she had just a 
 few hours before received from the Putnam a rifled cannon 
 and ammunition for the Twentieth Indiana Regiment. 
 
 Col. Claiborne Snead, of Augusta, Ga., describing the 
 spirited affair, says: 
 
 " On the first day of October, 1861, the army of occupation of Roanoke 
 Island consisted of the Third Georgia Regiment, under the command of 
 Col. A. R. "Wright and Col. Shaw's North CaroUna Regiment. Here these 
 Gteorgians, just one day after the fall of Fort Hatteras, soUtary and un- 
 aided, planted the Confederate flag. The night previous, when only a 
 detachment of four companies had arrived in Pamlico Sound, they 
 
 1 Capt. "Wm. F. Lynch, C. S. N., was bom in Symonde, of the British navy, being fully cor- 
 Virginia in 1801, and entered the U. S. ser- roborated as correct, and the depression estab- 
 Tice as a midshipman, January 26th, 1819. He lished as 1,312 feet. On his return Lieut. Lynch 
 was promoted a lieutenant in May, 1828, and published a narrative of his expedition, which 
 ozigiaated his famous expedition to the Dead has passed through several editions and at- 
 Sea and River Jordan, which received the sane- tained a position among standard worlds, 
 tion of the government. He sailed from this On his return he was promoted a commander, 
 cotmtiy for Smyi-na in the naval store-ship He prepared to engage in an expedition iuto 
 Supply in November, 1847. He visited Constan- Africa, but the exploration was abandoned. In 
 tinople to obtain the requisite authority and 1851 he pubhshed a volume entitled iVaDaZ iiye; 
 protection from the Turkish government to or, Observations Afloat and on Shore. In 1856 he 
 paflB through Palestine. He made this neces- was promoted captain, and this position he re- 
 sary overland journey on camels, and by the tained until his resignation on April 2lBt, 1861. 
 aid of Arabs and others. His party was landed Immediately alter his resignation from the 
 in the Bay of Acre in March, 1848, and in the TJ. S. navy he entered the service of Virginia 
 following April began the work of navigating and was assigned to duty on the Potomac River 
 the Jordan to the Dead Sea. A thorough explo- and the coast defences of the State. He en- 
 ration and sounding of the sea were made, tered the C. S. navy on June 10th, 1861. with 
 Among other curious features of the labor was the rank of captain. After his gallant defence 
 the establishment by a series of levels of the of the coast of North Carolina he was assigned 
 depression of the Dead Sea below the level of to duty on the Mississippi River. He died at 
 the Mediterranean, a former survey by Lieut. Baltimore, October 17th, 1865. 
 
378 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 received the unwelcome tidings of the surrender of this fort to which they 
 were proceeding as a reinforcement. Hence, they landed, and from that 
 day till the period of which we now wi'ite, they were continuously at 
 work, working bj' day, and frequently the moon shining on, or the dark- 
 ness of night enveloped them still at work, building entrenchments and 
 batteries on this and Croatan Island and other adjacent points, for the 
 protection of the inland coast of North Carolina. 
 
 " The North Carolina regiment had but recently arrived, having been 
 previously in garrison at Fort Oregon, on Oregon Inlet, the extreme 
 northern point on Hatteras Island, the evacuation of which had been 
 necessitated by the fall of Fort Hatteras on the extreme point south. 
 
 " Receiving information that a Federal steamer had been seen just 
 south of Roanoke Island, Col. A. R. Wright, commanding as senior officer 
 of the Confederate forces, determined at once to intercept and capture 
 her, and if possible to learn the intentions of the enemy, who were evi- 
 dently meditating some hostile movement upon his position. He was 
 warmly seconded by Commodore Lynch, a man of iron nerve and justly 
 celebrated for his exploration of the Dead Sea, who was then in command 
 of what was commonly called " The Mosquito Fleet," composed of light- 
 draft miniature vessels, drawing from two to six feet of water. These 
 vessels were thus peculiarly constructed with the view to avoid the dan- 
 ger of the shallows and frequent rough state of the waters of Albemarle 
 and PamUco Sounds. But the disaster at Hatteras, with the occupation 
 of the inlet by the United States Navy, and the consequent opening of 
 all the sounds and tributary rivers of northeastern North Carolina to the 
 inroads of the enemy, caused a hasty transformation of these crafts into 
 men-of-war, which, if not really formidable, were sufficient to command 
 respect and frighten oS the Federals tiU the final attack on Roanoke 
 Island by Burnside with an overwhelming land and naval force. 
 
 " From this little fleet the steamers Jimaluska, Raleigh and Curlew 
 were selected for the projected expedition, but as neither of these boats 
 had received any armament except the Raleigh, which had a couple of six- 
 pounder smooth-bore boat howitzers, it became necessary to provide guns 
 and crews for them. In Fort Bartow, an earth- work just completed near 
 the " marshes," there was a long navy thirty-two pounder which had been 
 recently rifled and reinforced with heavy steel rings in the navy-yard at 
 Portsmouth. This gun had but a few days previously been mounted and 
 placed in position en barbette in the fort. It was determined to remove 
 it and place it temporarily on a pivot on the bow of the Curlew, which 
 was a large side-wheel steamer, formerly used as a passenger boat on the 
 Albemarle Sound. During the night this difficult task was accomplished. 
 An old twelve-pounder smooth-bore gun, mounted on a field carriage, was 
 placed in the stern of the Curlew, and these two guns composed her arma- 
 ment. On the Junaluska, a small propeller tug-boat, drawing three and 
 a half feet, was placed a six-pounder field gun. Crews to work these guns 
 were selected from three companies of the Third Georgia regiment. 
 These men had been practiced for a few days with the guns in the fort, 
 but neither of them had ever seen a cannon discharged, and were there- 
 fore perfectly green and inexperienced in the use of such guns. Few of 
 them had ever been on shipboard, their whole naval experience being 
 comprised in the fact that they had been transported from Norfolk to the 
 Island a few days previous on a canal barge drawn by the little tug jMJia- 
 luska." 
 
 " Having received their armament, guns, crews and a small force of 
 infantry composed of the "Dawson Greys," the "Governor's Guards," 
 and the "Athens Guards," all of the Third Georgia regiment, were dis- 
 tributed on board the three little vessels, armed with Enfield rifles. Weigh- 
 ing anchor they proceeded down the sound in the direction of Hatteras 
 Inlet, moving slowly and cautiously in order to keep within the narrow 
 channels and to avoid the dangerous shoals. In less than two hours the 
 object of the cruise was plainly seen, when an advance upon her was 
 
THE CONFBDEKATE STATES NAVY. 379 
 
 ordered, the Curlew (Commodore Lynch's flag-ship, upon which was Col. 
 Wright, commanding the expedition), leading; and when within ran^e a 
 brisk flre was opened which was promptly responded to, her guns being 
 well worked and aimed with precision. Each vessel advanced rapidly 
 with the intention of grappling and boarding the foe that exhibited so 
 much spirit in her responsive fire; but after fifteen or twenty shots, one 
 shell exploded on the deck of the Fanny (for that was the name of the 
 TJ. S. steamerl, when immediately her colors were struck, and a few mo- 
 ments thereafter up to her masthead went the Confederate ensign amid 
 the shouts of the victors. 
 
 "She carried two rifled guns, a crew of forty-nine men, besides a large 
 amount of army stores valued by some as high as $100,000. Among the 
 latter were 1,000 new overcoats, which were turned over to the Third 
 Georgia regiment, and contributed greatly to their comfort during the 
 •ensuing winter. 
 
 "The prisoners were sent to Norfolk, while the Fanny became a part 
 of the Mosquito fleet; and subsequently, with her every now and then, 
 Capt. Hunter, a vigilant, active and energetic C. S. naval officer, would 
 run down the sound and send greetings with shell into Fort Hatteras. 
 
 " This victory was important in more respects than one. It was our 
 first naval success in North Carolina and the first capture made by our 
 arms of an armed war-vessel of the enemy, and dispelled the gloom of re- 
 cent disasters. The property captured was considerable, much needed, 
 and highly esteemed at that time. But more important than all was the 
 information obtained as to the movements and intentions of the enemy. 
 These stores were found to be intended for the Twentieth Indiana regi- 
 ment at Chickaoommico, twenty miles distant, on Hatteras Island, where 
 a camp had been established with a view to make it a point, (Pappui from 
 which to attack Roanoke Island." 
 
 The Federal account of the engagement, by Gen. Mans- 
 field, is that "not a shot struck the Fanny, and some eight or 
 nine shots were fired at the enemy, one of which took effect. 
 Then the cable was slipped and the Fanny was run ashore 
 some 2| miles still from the beach, and the crew abandoned 
 her in a boat, and the officer in charge, Capt. Hart, hoisted a 
 white fiag, and surrendered before a gun was fired on either 
 side." It is not for us to reconcile the discrepancies in a re- 
 port which, while mentioning an "attack" in which "eight 
 or nine shots were fired at the enemy" yet concludes with the 
 statement that the vessel was "surrendered before a gun was 
 fired on either side."^ Capt. Lynch reports that "after an 
 engagement of 35 minutes the Fanny surrendered, and we 
 made prisoners of the entire force — 47 men, 3 officers and 
 1 negro. The Fanny mounted two rifled guns and made a 
 gallant resistance, but the superior weight of our guns gave 
 us the advantage." Want of fuel compelled Capt. Lynch to 
 return and set his sailors to work cutting and chopping wood. 
 
 While bestowing a full page to the most minute descrip- 
 tion of the destruction of some abandoned material in the 
 fort at Ocracoke, Admiral Ammen dismisses the capture of the 
 Fanny with a single line : "this speedily led to the capture of 
 the army tug Fanny and a considerable quantity of army 
 stores." The prize had very valuable stores on board; besides 
 
 1 Brig. Gen. J. K. T. Mansfield's report in Vol. TV., p. 696, Official Hecords. 
 
380 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the powder, shell, and fixed ammunition for her rifled guns, 
 there were 65,000 musket balls and buckshot cartridges, 7,000 
 Minie ball cartridges, and a large quantity of blankets, over- 
 coats and shoes. The loss of the Fanny eventually led to the 
 Twentieth Indiana regiment being sent elsewhere. ' The in- 
 formation obtained by Capt. Lynch in his expedition of the 
 1st led him to attempt a more important one on the 4th, with 
 the whole of his little fleet, with a portion of Col. A. R.Wright's 
 regiment on board. 
 
 Col. Claiborne Snead, in describing this expedition, says : 
 
 " Hatteras Island, -whereon occurred the scene of which we write, is a 
 narrow strip of land lying between the Atlantic Ocean and Pamlico Sound, 
 about forty miles in length and from one-fourth to half a mile in 
 breadth. It was a bald sand beach, interspersed here and there at a dis- 
 tance of a league or more with chaparral or small clusters of trees resem- 
 bling the oasis of a desert, and is inhabited by a class of people who sub- 
 sist by fishing and hunting, as well as from the cargoes of vessels stranded 
 upon the stormy coast. They are commonly called " wreckers," and seem 
 to do a lucrative business, from the numberless wrecks scattered along the 
 beach. The warning rays of the light-house, the extreme point east, are 
 not seen or cannot be heeded by vessels riding along this, the roughest 
 point of the American coast. The misfortunes of the sea-farer bring to 
 these people a day of joy, all the mysteries connected with which will 
 never be revealed until old ocean unearths her account on the day of 
 judgment. The islanders mingle but little with the world; apparently in- 
 different to this outside sphere, they constitute a world within them- 
 selves. During the late war their indifference or neutrality was evinced 
 by raising white flags to the house-tops on the approach of either Con- 
 federates or Federals. 
 
 "By the capture of the U. S. steamer Fanny, on the first day of Octo- 
 ber, 1861, it was ascertained that the enemy had estabUshed a camp at 
 Chicamacommioo, about forty miles from Fort Hatteras, and near the 
 southern extremity of Roanoke Island. The Twentieth Indiana regi- 
 ment had there gone into camp, whither the Fanny, when captured, was 
 proceeding with commissary and quartermaster's supplies. A large force 
 was soon to follow: and, in fact, a majority of the prisoners captured on 
 this vessel were Zouaves of Col. Hawkins' New York regiment, who were 
 pioneers of the projected reinforcements. The situation of the Confeder- 
 ates was alarming. It was evident that the new position taken by the 
 enemy was intended as a base of operations — the point d'appui from 
 which to assail Roanoke Island and capture the small garrison thereon. 
 The Third Georgia regiment and Col. Shaw's North CaroUna regiment, 
 with Commodore Lynch's " Mosquito fleet," comprised our entire de- 
 fence, while reinforcements could not be obtained nearer than Norfolk by 
 a long and difficult route through Albemarle Sound, Dismal Swamp 
 Canal and the Elizabeth River. On the other hand, the Federal forces, 
 daily accumulating at Fort Hatteras, had behind them, on an open sea, a 
 powerful navy, efficient both in attack and in the transportation of troops. 
 
 " Col. A. R. Wright, senior officer, commanding, seeing that a crisis 
 was near at hand, and fully appreciating the danger of being isolated and 
 attacked at a disadvantage, determined at once to move forward an d strike 
 the first blow. He had the warm co-operation of Commodore Lynch, who 
 in this, as in every other emergency, showed himself as zealous an oiflcer 
 as he was skillful and brave. 
 
 1 The cargo of the Fanny was valued in the coneisted of 250 of Sawyer's shells. 76,000 
 
 reports of her loss at " about $150,000 worth of canister shot, 1.000 overcoats, 1,000 dress coats, 
 
 property on board," and she was " one of the 1,000 pairs of pantaloons, and 1,000 pairs of 
 
 most useful gunboats." " A part of her cargo shoes. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 381 
 
 "All preparations having been made whicli the limited means at 
 hand would permit, at one o'clock on the morning of the 5th day of Oct- 
 ober, the third Georgia regiment, with Lieut. Col. Reid in command, 
 and Colonel Shaw's North Carolina regiment, were embarked on the 
 steamers Curlew, Raleigh, JunalusTca, Fanny, Empire, and Cotton Plant. 
 Passing through Croatan Sound into and down Pamlico Somid, the little 
 fleet arrived off Chicamacommico, and about three miles- therefrom, just 
 after sunrise. All the vessels were of too deep a draft to get nearer 
 this point of the island, except the Cotton Plant, which was enabled to 
 advance a mile further on. Upon her. Colonel Wright, with three 
 companies of the third Georgia and two six -pound boat howitzers, 
 commanded by Lieut. J. R. Sturgis, with forty men, proceeded to- 
 wards the shore, the ofiBicers and men wading in water up to their 
 middles for three fourths of a mile, and opening a rapid fire upon the 
 enemy, who stood in hne of battle on the beach, twelve hundred 
 strong according to their muster-rolls. Soon after the firing commenced 
 they began a retreat, moving hastily and in great disorder towards Fort 
 Hatteras. 
 
 " Orders were immediately sent to the North Carolinians to move 
 down the sound on board the Empire, to a point opposite the light-house, 
 twenty miles distant, and there intercept and cut off the enemy. 
 
 " The rest of the Third Georgia having been signalled to ad- 
 vance, effected a landing in the same way as the three preceding com- 
 panies. Then commenced a chase which has been properly styled " Chi- 
 camacommico Races." The attacking party scarcely numbered seven 
 hundred men, some of whom, with their own hands, drew the two 
 howitzers through the deep sand, pursued the retreating foe flying pell- 
 mell for twenty-six miles, killing eight and capturing forty-two men. 
 About six miles from the starting point, Col. Wright being in advance of 
 his command, overtook a part of the rear guard, who flred on him, bring- 
 ing down his horse, but with one hand seizing a small Yankee boy and 
 holding him in front as a shield, and with pistol inthe other, he advanced 
 upon the party and captured Sergt. Major Hart, who flred the shot, to- 
 gether with four others of his regiment. Night alone closed the pursuit 
 at Kinakeet, where the Confederates, exhausted from fatigue, went into 
 camp. 
 
 " On the following morning, learning that Col. Shaw had not effected 
 a landing at the point where he was expected to intercept the enemy, or- 
 ders were given to countermarch back to Chicamacommico. And it is 
 proper here to say that Col. Shaw failed to carry out his part of the pro- 
 gramme not from indisposition or want of energy. His transport 
 grounded on the shoals at a considerable distance from the shore. Per- 
 severing in his efforts to reach the land, he, with his men, commenced to 
 wade, but were stopped by intervening deep sluices, and compelled to 
 return. 
 
 "At about one o'clock, just after the Third Georgia regiment had 
 emerged from the grove of Kinakeet upon a long, barren sand beach, the 
 Confederate Light Guards, commanded by Lieut. C. Snead, being de- 
 ployed in front as skirmishers on a line stretching from the ocean to the 
 sound, in order to pick up any straggling Federals who might have been 
 passed over in the preceding day's pursuit, the U. S. steamer Monticello 
 hove in sight on the southeast, hugging the shore closely, which she 
 could safely do in the waters of this particular locality. When within 
 range she opened with round shot, following the fire up with shell, grape- 
 shot and canister, moving in close proximity and at even pace with the 
 Confederates, and keeping up a furious cannonade till the shades of even- 
 ing closed the scene. Fortunately a rough sea, causing her to careen 
 alternately from side to side, prevented precision in the aim of her guns ; 
 and every man who started in the pursuit from Chicamacommico re- 
 turned in safety, except a member of the Governor Guards, who died from 
 exhaustion." 
 
382 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The Confederates captured on the expedition Lieut. F. M. 
 Peacock, U. S. N., Lieut. J. W. Hart, Twentieth Indiana regi- 
 met, besides forty-two privates belonging to the Ninth New 
 York and Twentieth Indiana regiments. The U. S. naval 
 report of this affair is one of the most remarkable made dur- 
 ing the war. It is by Lieut. D. L. Braine, October 6th, 1861 : 
 
 "At half -past 1 P. M. we discovered several sailing vessels over the 
 woodland Kine Keet, and at the same time a regiment marching to the 
 northward, carrying a rebel flag in their midst, with many stragglers in 
 the rear; also two tugs inside, flying the same flag. As they came out of 
 the woods of Kine Keet we ran close in shore and opened a deliberate fire 
 upon them, at the distance of three-quarters of a mile. At our first shell, 
 which fell apparently in their midst, they rolled up their flag and scat- 
 tered, moving rapidly up the beach to the northward. We followed them, 
 firing rapidly from three Runs, driving them up to a clump of woods, in 
 which they took refuge, and abreast of which their steamers lay. We 
 now shelled the woods, and could see them embarking in small boats 
 after their vessels, evidently in great confusion and suffering greatly from 
 our fire. Their steamers now opened fire upon us, firing, however, but 
 three shots, which fell short. Two boats filled with men were struck by 
 our shells and destroyed. Three more steamers came down the sound and 
 took position opposite the woods. We were shelUng also two sloops. We 
 continued firing deliberately upon them from half-past 1 p. m. untU half- 
 past 3 p. M. * * * Six steamers were now off the point, one of which I recog- 
 nized as the Fanny. At twenty-five minutes to 5 p. m., we ceased firing, 
 leaving the enemy scattered along the beach for upwards of four miles. 
 I fired repeatedly at the enemy's steamers with our rifled cannon, a Par- 
 rott thirty-pounder, and struck the Fanny, I think once. I found the 
 range of this piece much short of what I had anticipated, many of the 
 shot turning end over end, and not exceeding much the range of the 
 smooth-bore thirty-two pounder." 
 
 Of that affair Gen. J. K. F. Mansfield said, October 14th, 
 1861: "Under the circumstances Col. Brown probably did well. 
 No guns were fired at him by the enemy, nor was he attack- 
 ed" — because he fled before the Confederates could land. Con- 
 tinuing, Gen. Mansfield said: 
 
 ' ' We lost some stragglers along the road. Not a man was killed, that 
 I have heard of, except an old inhabitant shot by the rebels. I do not 
 understand the report of the navy in this matter. The rebels had landed 
 only about 500 out of about 2,000 supposed to be on board their fleet of nine 
 steamers and vessels, besides flats, that approached the landing. I did not 
 learn that a vessel of the rebels was taken or sunk or that a man was killed 
 by the shells from the sh ips of war. I did hear that they carried off all the 
 small fishing vessels belongingto the inhabitants." >■ 
 
 Admiral Ammen finds more importance in the highly 
 colored report of Lieut. Braine than Gen. Mansfield did, and 
 Admiral Porter in perpetuating the misstatements of Lieut. 
 Braine, says: " Two of the boats loaded with men were struck 
 by shells and sent to the bottom, several officers were killed, and 
 the shore for a distance of four miles was strewn with killed 
 and wounded " — and yet Gen. Mansfield, after investigating the 
 conduct of the officers commanding the Indiana regiment,. 
 
 1 Official Record, Vol. IV., p. 620. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 383 
 
 visiting the ground, and questioning the parties engaged in 
 the retreat, wrote to Gen. Wool, " that I did not learn * * * 
 that a man was killed by the shells from the vessels of war." 
 And there was neither vessel or man injured by Lieut. 
 Braine's shells. 
 
 In November, the French man-of-war Prony. Commander 
 De Pontage, was wrecked on the beach below Hatteras, and 
 Lieut. Commander J. W. Alexander, in the C. S. steamer 
 Wmslow -(formerly the Coffee), was sent to her relief; but 
 striking on a sunken vessel in the sound, the Winslow was 
 sunk and burned. The oflScers and crew of the Prony were 
 saved by the Ellis and the Seabird without the loss of a man, 
 and the wreck of the Prony burned to prevent its falling into 
 the possession of the enemy. Commander De Pontage and 
 his oflScers were carried to Norfolk by Commander Lynch, 
 where they were cordially and hospitably received by Flag- 
 oflBcer Forrest. 
 
 The capture by the U. S. forces of Hatteras Inlet and the 
 sand-banks of the sound brought most forcibly to the atten- 
 tion of the Confederate authorities the defenceless condition 
 of the sound waters and rivers of North Carolina, which Gen. 
 Gatlin had been persistently urging with little avail since he 
 was placed in command. 
 
 Upon hearing of the fall of Hatteras he wrote to the War 
 Department for four regiments and a light battery for the 
 eastern counties, and that now it was imperatively necessary 
 to fortify every river running into the sounds. The loss of 
 Hatteras exposed so many points to attack and invasion, 
 some of them of great importance from their connection witli 
 the railroad and public works, that Gen. Gatlin again urged 
 the importance of sending at least two regiments to Newberne 
 and ten to Wilmington. Brig. Gen. Joseph K. Anderson was 
 ordered to Wilmington, November 30th, the order assigning 
 him to duty saying that one regiment of Georgia volunteers 
 had been sent from Norfolk to Roanoke Island ; that two 
 regiments were at the mouth of Cape Fear River, five compa- 
 nies in Fort Macon, one regiment and two battalions at New- 
 berne — that the whole force available in North Carolina at all 
 I)oints was equal to seven regiments, one battalion, and one 
 light battery ; that a large number of heavy guns had from 
 time to time been sent to the State, and that an additional 
 number could be furnished if needed. At that time Fort 
 Macon had not one practical gunner, only forty reliable fuzes, 
 no rifled cannon, no ordnance officer, and only raw troops 
 without proper supplies. It was the hope of Col. Wright at 
 Roanoke Island " to have seven guns mounted to-night (Sep- 
 tember 6th) on the Pah Pauh Battery, and will commence on 
 Wein Point Battery as soon as they can get the engineers to 
 look after the work." The British ship Alliance, learning 
 from a British man-of-war that the blockading fleet would 
 
384 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 attack Fort Macon on September 7th, communicated the in- 
 formation to Col. Brydges, at which time there were no gun- 
 ners who could manage the guns, and Gen. Clarke called on 
 Secretary Mallory for oflScers who understand the use of naval 
 guns. Capt. Lynch determined to go into the fort with the 
 crew of the Winslow, and placed Lieut. W. H. Parker of the 
 navy, who remained for two weeks instructing the soldiers in 
 the working and handling of naval guns. Gen. Clarke recog- 
 nized this assignment of a naval officer to Fort Macon as very 
 satisfactory, and asked that Fort Caswell might be served also 
 with naval officers. The Georgia regiment was landed on 
 Roanoke Island by Lynch's little fleet, which proceeded to 
 Oregon Inlet and removed the troops and guns. The Winslow 
 and Ellis, when retreating from Hatteras, had removed the 
 guns and troops from Ocracoke Inlet. 
 
 The work of fortifying Roanoke Island was pressed with 
 vigor and energy, but under most embarrassing circumstances. 
 The '•' front wheels and axles of the wagons" were taken for 
 limbers for twelve and twenty-four pounders, and the latter 
 were found so heavy that all the teams in the island could not 
 move it to its battery. But, worse than all, the North Caro- 
 lina troops were disorganized and demoralized, and Col. Wright 
 could "hope nothing from them;" and Commander Thomas 
 T. Hunter regarded " the maintenance of Roanoke Island pos- 
 sible only so long as it is defended by troops from another 
 State, or from a more loyal part of North Carolina." 
 
 The Secretary of the Navy had sent from Norfolk to North 
 Carolina, up to October 30th, 242 guns, including six rifled 
 thirty-two-pounders, and he found himself unable to do any 
 more, as the vessels of the navy needed guns. The condition 
 of the sound defences at the middle of October is shown by 
 Gen. D. H. Hill as follows : 
 
 "Fort Macon has but four guns of long range, and these are badly 
 supplied with ammunition, and are on very inferior carriages. 
 
 " Newbeme has a tolerable battery, two eight-inch Columbiads and 
 two thirty-two pounders. It is, however, badly supplied with powder. 
 This is also the condition of Washington. Hyde, the richest county in 
 the State, has ten landings and only one gun — an English nine-pounder of 
 great age and venerable appearance. 
 
 ' ' Roanoke Island is the key of one-third of North Carolina, and whose 
 occupancy by the enemy would enable him to reach the great railroad 
 from Richmond to New Orleans.; four additional regiments are absolutely 
 indispensable to the protection of this island. The batteries also need 
 four rifled cannon of heavy calibre. I would most earnestly call the atten- 
 tion of the most Honorable Secretary of War to the importance of this 
 island. Its fall would be fatal as that of Manassas. The enemy now has 
 8,000 men at Hatteras, and Roanoke Island will undoubtedly be attacked." 
 
 This was a very greatly exaggerated estimate of the 
 number of troops at Hatteras, which on December 1st, 1861, 
 numbered only 1,713 officers and men present. ' But under the 
 
 1 Official Record, Vol. IV., p. 632. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVi'. 385 
 
 impression that the enemy was very strong at Hatteras, Gen. 
 D. H. Hill issued. October 17th, a peremptory order against any 
 expedition for offensive operations without his previous sanc- 
 tion and authority. This order prevented Capt. Lynch and Col. 
 Wright from undertaking an expedition against Hatteras. They 
 had a large number of flats or large fish boats, enough to trans- 
 port 1, 300 or 1, 500 men. Capt. Lynch's fleet was ready and he was 
 willing and anxious to make the attack, but the order of Gen. 
 Hill was peremptory, and thus a naval and military expedition 
 was stopped which might have released eastern North Carolina 
 from capture. The enemy's preparation in October of the Port 
 Royal expedition was at "first suspected of having either Beau- 
 fort, N. C., or Roanoke Island as its objective; and its effect 
 was to increase to a limited extent the efforts to defend 
 eastern North Carolina. In observing the movements of the 
 Federal vessels, Capt. Lynch, on October 30th, started up the 
 sound and looked in on the abandoned forts at Beacon Island 
 and Ocracoke, and finding no enemy at either place, continued 
 on to Hatteras Inlet, and when near the position of the inner 
 buoy the enemy opened fire upon the Curlew, Commander 
 Thomas T. Hunter, C. S. N. , from the fort and two or three of 
 their steamers, without injury. On coming within easy range, 
 Capt. Lynch sighted the rifled gun at the Harriet Lane,^ and 
 iired, the fort and two steamers continuing to fire as rapidly 
 as possible. The Curlew fired six shells of twenty-five and 
 twenty fuse, and as the course of the steamer was necessarily 
 changed to keep in the narrow channel, the stern gun was 
 fired at them five times, training it well forward. It is un- 
 certain whether the enemy sustained any injury, although 
 many of the crew and oflicers thought the fourth shell took 
 effect amidship of a very long three-masted steamer lying 
 near the Harriet Lane, and another burst between the two. 
 A small steamer was seen employed towing a merchant vessel 
 either out of danger or out of range of the fort. The enemy 
 fired twenty-three shells, only one of which came near. 
 
 Having taunted and invited the enemy to accept battle, 
 and finding them reluctant, Capt. Lynch withdrew and waited 
 within half a mile of the buoy, hoping to draw the small 
 steamer outside. When the fort returned the shot, the Cur- 
 lew stood back, fired another shell, and then sailed back to 
 Eoanoke Island. 
 
 The long delay on the part of the U. S. authorities which 
 ensued after the fall of the Hatteras forts, before the sounds 
 of North Carolina were again visited by that navy, appears 
 very strange, considering the importance of these inland seas 
 to both parties to the war. Hatteras, without the complete 
 control of the sounds, was a barren victory, for though the 
 
 '"Thie surveying steamer Corurin is the Bar- about the Ist mst.,aiid one of the vessels he 
 
 ne( Lam mentioned in the report of the rebel was supposed to have seriously damaged." 
 
 Capt Hunter, of the naval battle at this place —N. T. Herald, HaUeras letter, Nov, 16tk. 
 26 
 
386 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 occupancy of the inlet might prevent the egress of privateers 
 and blockade-runners, yet its possession only was not so 
 severe a blow at the Confederate cause as the newspapers had 
 represented it to be. 
 
 The U. S. Navy Department again took the initiative, and 
 in January, 1863, organized a naval expedition for the purpose 
 of completely controlling the waters of the sounds. The an- 
 noyance to and destruction of commerce, it was found, con- 
 tinued as well after the fall of Hatteras as before, and public 
 sentiment in loud complaint urged the department to do 
 something with its immense navy to better protect the coast- 
 wise commerce than had resulted from the capture of Hat- 
 teras. Moreover, it was known that within the waters of 
 those sounds there were building some powerful iron-clads, 
 which, if permitted to be completed, would not only enable 
 the Confederates to retain supremacy in the sounds, but re- 
 capturing Ha.tteras, to issue to sea, and raise the blockade of 
 Beaufort and Wilmington. But while the navy might capture, 
 it could not hold the interior points, and it was therefore 
 necessary that a combined expedition of army and navy 
 should be dispatched to the sounds; and to this end Rear- 
 Admiral Louis M. Goldsborough, U. S. N., and Major Gen. A. 
 E. Burnside, were selected to command the navy and army 
 contingents. A fleet of seventeen vessels, mounting 48 guns, ' 
 and an army of 17,000 on transports, sailed from Fortress Mon- 
 roe, January 11th, 1863, and arrived off Hatteras on the 12th. 
 From that day till the 4th of February the expedition was en- 
 gaged in getting over the bar and bulkhead at Hatteras, and 
 on the 8th appeared before Roanoke Island. Gen. H. A. Wise 
 was appointed to the command of the Confederate forces on 
 Roanoke Island on January 32d. With the military defence 
 of Roanoke Island this work has no proper connection, except 
 to express the opinion that greater want of preparation was 
 nowhere else shown in all the war; that a more inadequate 
 force was nowhere else intrusted with the defence of an im- 
 portant position; and to confirm the language of Gen. Gatlin, 
 that the authorities " failed to make timely efforts to main- 
 tain the ascendancy on the Pamlico Sound, and thus admitted 
 Burnside's fleet without a contest : we failed to put a proper 
 force on Roanoke Island, and thus lost the key to our interior 
 
 1 The fleet waa compoeed of the Stnrs and rifled: Hunchback, A. Y. Lieut. Com. Colhoun, 
 
 Stripes, Lieut. Com. Worden, four 8-inch 55 cwt. three 9-inch and one lOO-pdr. rifled: Morse, Acting 
 
 and one 20-pdr. Parrott gun; Louisiana, Lieut. Master Hiiyea, two 9-iiich: Whitehead, Acting 
 
 Com. Murray, one 8-inch 6i cwt., one 32-pdr. Master French, one 9-inch; Seymour, Acting 
 
 of 67 cwt., two 32-pdrB. of 3 cwt , one 12-pdr. Master Wells, one 30-pdr. rifled, one 12-pdr. 
 
 rifled Dablgren; Heizel, Lieut Com. L)avenport, rifled: Shawsheen, Acting Master Woodward, 
 
 one 9-inch, one 80-pdr. cwt. ; Underwriter, Lieut. two 20-pdr. rifled ; Lockwood, Acting Master 
 
 Com. Seffers, one 8-inch 63 cwt., one 80-pdr Graves, one 80-pdr. rifled, one 12-pdr. rifled, one 
 
 lifled, one 12-pdr. rifled, one 12-pdr. smooth- 12-pdr. smooth-bore; Ceres, Acting Master Mc- 
 
 bore; Delaware, Lieut. Com. Qnackenbush, one Diarmid, one 30-pdr. rifled, one 32-pdr. of 33 
 
 9-inch, one 32-pdr. 67 cwt., one 1'2-pdr rifled; cwt ; Putnam, Acting Master Hotchkiss, one 20- 
 
 Valiey Oity, Lieut. Com. Chaplin, four 32-pdr. pdr rifled; Brinckner, Acting Master Giddings; 
 
 42 cwt., one 12-pdr. rifled; Southjfield, Act. Vol. and Granite, Acting Master's Mate Boomer, one 
 
 Lieut. Com. Behm, three 9-inch, one lOO-pdr. 32-pdr. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 387 
 
 coast; and we failed to furnish Gen. Branch with a reasonable 
 force, and thus lost the important town of Newberne." 
 
 On that day Capt. Lynch, from on board the Seabird, off 
 Eoanoke Island, informed Secretary Mallory of the enemy's 
 readiness to advance from Hatteras with a fleet of twenty- 
 four gunboats seven large steamers, and sixteen transports, 
 and that : 
 
 "To meet these, I have two old side- wheel steamers, and six pro- 
 pellers — the former possessing some speed; the latter slow in their 
 movements and one of them frequently disabling its shaft; but my great- 
 est difficulty is in the want of men. So great has been the exposure of our 
 •crew that a number of them have necessarily been invalided; conse- 
 quently the complements are very much reduced, some of them one-half. 
 I have sent to Washington, Plymouth, Bdenton and Elizabeth City for 
 recruits without success, and an earnest appeal to Commodore Forrest 
 brought me only four. To meet the enemy I have not more than a suf- 
 ficient number of men to fight half the guns." 
 
 The military defence of the island and that by the navy 
 are so connected that it is proper to explain in brief the pro- 
 visions for defence on the island, and its adjacent waters. By 
 a strange omission, and against suggestions amounting almost 
 to orders, the defence of the island was made north of A.shby's 
 Point, which was left dependent for defence upon two pieces 
 of field artillery; and there was "no battery on Sandy Point," 
 which Admiral Goldsborough regarded as an "omission to 
 guard the point," which was the most favorable one on the 
 island for the debarkation of troops, and where it was made 
 unmolested and undisturbed. The forts upon the island were 
 Fort Bartow, the most southern end of the defences on the 
 west side — a sand fort well covered with turf, armed with six 
 long thirty-two-pounders in embrasure, and three thirty- 
 two-pounders en barbette; next Fort Blanchard on the 
 same side of the island, about two and a half miles from 
 Fort Bartow— a semi-circular sand fort, turfed, and mounting 
 four thirty-two-pounders en barbette; twelve hundred yards 
 from Fort Blanchard, on the same side of the island, stood 
 Fort Huger, a turfed sand fort, with a low breastwork in rear, 
 with a banquette for infantry, armed with eight thirty-two- 
 pounders in embrasure, ten rifled thirty-two-pounders en bar- 
 bette, and two small thirty-two pounders en barbette on the 
 right. On the east side of the island, three miles from Fort 
 Bartow at Midgett's Point, there was a battery of two 
 thirty-two-pounders, guns en barbette, and in the centre of 
 the island a mile from Fort Bartow, and one mile from 
 Midgett's Point, there was a redoubt, or breastwork, across 
 the road, about seventy or eighty yards long, with embras- 
 ures for three guns, with, a swamp on the right and a marsh 
 on the left, supposed to be impassable to infantry; and on 
 other side of the sound, nearly opposite Fort Huger, there 
 stood Fort Forrest, mounting seven twenty-two-pounders. 
 A barrier of piles extended from the east side of Fulker's 
 
388 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Shoals toward the island, having for its object to compel 
 vessels passing on the west side to approach the shore bat- 
 
 PLAN OF ROANOKE ISLAKD. 
 
 teries, but up to the day of the battle a space of 1,700 yards 
 was open opposite Fort Bartow, since vessels had been sunk 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 389 
 
 and piles driven on the west side of Fulker's Shoals. These 
 completed the land defences of the island, which, when man- 
 ned, left 1,024 men, of whom 300 were on the sick list, 
 available to resist Burnside's army of 17,000. 
 
 In the sound, between the island and the mainland, Com- 
 modore Lynch had his fleet of seven vessels— the Seabird 
 (flagship), Lieut. Com. Patrick McCarrick, one 32-pounder 
 smooth bore, and one 30-pounder Parrott ; the Curlew, Lieut. 
 Com. Thos. T. Hunter, one 33-pounder; the Ellis, Lieut. Com. 
 J. W. Cooke, one 33-pounder ; the Appomatox, Lieut. Com. 
 C. C. Sims, one 33-pounder; the Beaufort, Lieut. Com. W. H. 
 Parker, one 33-pounder ; Raleigh, Lieut. Com. J. W. Alexan- 
 der, one 33-pounder; Fanny, Midshipman Commander Taylor, 
 one 33-pounder ; Forrest, Lieut. Com. James L. Hoole, one 
 32-pounder; the -BtocfcTFarrior, Lieut. Harris, two 33-pounders. 
 Of these vessels, the Seabird was a wooden side-wheel steamer, 
 and the Curlew an iron side-wheel steamer, the others were 
 screw tugboats built for the canals; the Black Warrior was a 
 large schooner. The armaments of the fleets were as 11 to 
 48, ' and even with the land batteries that could be used in 
 the battle, the disparity in numbers, as well as weight of 
 metal, was still very largely in favor of the U. S. fleet. At 11 
 o'clock, the enemy's fleet, consisting of about thirty gunboats 
 and schooners, advanced in two divisions, the rear division 
 having the schooners and transports in tow. The advance 
 and attacking division again sub-divided, one assailing Capt. 
 Lynch's squadron, and the other firing upon the forts with 
 nine-inch, ten-inch and eleven-inch shell, spherical case, a few 
 round shot, and every variety of rifled projectiles. The fort 
 replied with four guns (all that could be brought to bear), and 
 after striking the foremost vessel several times, the enemy's 
 fleet fell back so as to mask one of the guns of the fort, leaving 
 but three to reply to the flre of the whole fleet. The bombard- 
 ment continued in that manner throughout the day, and the 
 enemy withdrew at dark. Com. Lynch's squadron retained 
 its position most gallantly, notwithstanding the disparity of 
 guns, and only retired after exhausting all its ammunition 
 and the loss of the Curlew and the disabling of the Forrest, 
 and wounding her gallant young commander, Lieut. Hoole. 
 On the morning of February 7th, 1863, the enemy succeeded 
 in landing a large infantry and artillery force at Hammond 
 (a point north of Ashby's Landing, and out of reach of 
 the few field-pieces at Ashby's, and defended by a swamp 
 from the advance of the Confederate infantry, and protected 
 by his gunboats), and effected a permanent lodgment on the 
 island. Having landed a force amounting nearly to 15,000 
 infantry and artillery, the enemy was able to outflank the 
 
 1 Capt. Parker says; "At daylight the next and the TfarWor did not take any part in the ac- 
 moming, the Apptymatox was dispatched to tion, this reduced our force to aeven vessels and 
 Menton, and as she did not return till sunset, eight guns."— iSecoJ/edwnso/aiVam! 0^.,^). 229. 
 
390 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Confederate line, upon which there "were but 803 men [left] 
 for infantry duty," and compelled the abandonment of the first 
 line of defence; repeating the movement, the enemy compelled 
 the abandonment of Fort Bartow, and also of Forts Blanchard 
 and Huger. 
 
 Upon the evacuation of the forts, Capt. Lynch held a con- 
 sultation with his oflScers on the propriety of retreating to Nor- 
 folk, through the Chesapeake and Albemarle Canal, or to 
 Elizabeth City on the Pasquotank River. By going to Norfolk 
 all the vessels might have been saved, but that would have 
 been a total abandonment of the waters of North Carolina, 
 to defend which Com. Lynch had been sent to the sounds. 
 For that reason it was decided to retreat to Elizabeth City, the 
 terminus of the Dismal Swamp Canal, by which it was hoped 
 to obtain ammunition from Norfolk. Having communicated 
 this determination to Col. Shaw, in command on Roanoke 
 Island, through Lieut. Parker, the squadron got under way 
 for Elizabeth City, the Seabird towing the Forrest. The night 
 was pitchy dark, and as no vessel could show a light without 
 discovering to the enemy the retreat, navigation without col- 
 lision required all the skill and nerve of the ofiicers. On the 
 morning of February 8th, Com. Lynch had the satisfaction of 
 finding his six steamers at Elizabeth, and immediately dis- 
 patched Capt. Hunter to Norfolk for ammunition. The next 
 morning, having found a few rounds of ammunition, he 
 steamed out of the river in the Seabird, taking the Raleigh with 
 him, to reconnoitre and ascertain the purpose of the enemy. 
 
 The fleet of Commander Goldsborough, consisting of the 
 Louisiana, the Hetzel, the Underwriter, the Delaware (flag- 
 ship), the Perry, the Valley City, the Morse, the Seymour, the 
 Whitehead, the Lockwood, the Ceres, the Shawsheen, Brinck- 
 ner, and Putnam, after getting through the obstructions, fol- 
 lowed close upon the retreating squadron of Commander 
 Lynch; for as the enemy's flotilla passed into Albemarle 
 Sound, the smoke of Commander Lynch's steamers was seen 
 not far distant near the opposite shore, heading for Pas- 
 quotank River. Chase was immediately signaled by Com- 
 mander Rowan, commanding the flotilla, and an effort made 
 to cut off the steamers before they could reach the river. But 
 Lieut. Parker was too quick and safely steamed in, and as 
 night closed on the enemy, he discontinued the chase, and 
 anchored at 8 p. m. within ten miles of Fort Cobb, on Cobb's 
 Point. 
 
 Capt. Lynch's reconnoitering detachment found Com- 
 mander Rowan's fleet, which immediately sent two steamers 
 in pursuit— compelling Lynch to return to Elizabeth City, 
 which place he reached about 6 p. m. About daylight on the 
 10th, Commander Rowan's flotilla weighed anchor and with 
 the tinder writer, Perry, Morse and Delaware, the Ceres, Loui- 
 siana, Hetzel, Valley City and Whitehead, proceeded up the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 391 
 
 river, and discovered- Lynch's six steamers behind the battery 
 at Cobb's Point — which contained four thirty-two-pounders 
 taken from the lost Curlew — the schooner Black Warrior, two 
 thirtj^-two pounders, which was moored on the opposite side of 
 the river. The armament of the respective forces was eight 
 guns to thirty-two — six vessels to fourteen. The Raleigh had 
 escaped to Norfolk, and the Forrest was drawn up on the ways 
 at Elizabeth City. At 8:30 a. m., the enemy's flotilla was 
 seen steaming swiftly up the river — and at that moment the 
 Confederate infantry in the fort fled, and Lieut. Parker, of 
 the Beaufort, was ordered with his crew to occupy the aban- 
 doned fort; and, quick to obey the order, he dispatched the 
 Beaufort to Norfolk, under the pilot, and with his men re- 
 paired to the fort. The enemy, while this change was taking 
 place, had got into line and was received by the fire of the 
 guns of the fort under Parker and his men from the Beaufort. 
 Capt. Lynch was caught on shore, by his row-boat being cut 
 to pieces by one of the enemy's first shots. The fiotilla under 
 Commander Rowan reserved its fire until close to the fort 
 and the vessels of Capt. Lynch, when without slacking its 
 speed it passed the fort and fell upon the little fleet of Capt. 
 Lynch — the Perry rammed and sunk the Seabird, the Ellis 
 was speedily captured after a desperate defence, in which her 
 gallant commander, James W. Cooke, was badly wounded — 
 the schooner Black Warrior was set on fire and abandoned 
 by her crew — the Fanny was run on shore and blown up by 
 her officers. The Appomatox was fought with great success 
 by Lieut. Commander Simms until her gun was accidentally 
 spiked, when she was drawn off, firing her howitzer from the 
 stern, and made for the mouth of the canal, but being about 
 two inches too wide she could not enter and was then set on 
 fire by Lieut. Simms. Parker from the fort witnessed the 
 destruction of the fleet, but was powerless to prevent or even 
 annoy the enemy while at their work of destruction, and 
 seeing that he could do no further service, spiked the guns 
 and withdrew his men, and with Capt. Lynch and the sur- 
 vivors retreated to Norfolk. Midshipman Wm. C. Jackson, in 
 swimming from the Ellis, was wounded and taken on board 
 the Wetzel, where he received every attention and kindness 
 until he died the next day. The Forrest was burned on the 
 ways to prevent her falling into the hands of the enemy. ' 
 
 1 The following officers and men of the C. S. any manner or way, nor divulge, to their preju- 
 
 navy were captured and paroled upon signing a dice, anything I may have heard or seen during 
 
 paper worded as follows : my captivity." 
 
 "Off Roanoke Island, Noeth CabClina, ) Their names and rank are ; 
 
 On Boabd U. S. Vessel-of-Wak, [ J. W.Cooke, lieut. commanding; J.W. B.Green- 
 
 February 12th, 1862. ) how, surgeon; E. Holt Jones, assist, surgeon; P. 
 
 "Belonging to the Confederate States navy, McCarrick. master commanding; Jerry Bowden, 
 
 and held as a prisoner of war by the authori- colored boy; Stephen Beasly, seaman; Thomas 
 
 ties of the United States, I, understanding that T. Baum, ordinary seaman; Eames Williams, 
 
 this paper is intended to release me on parole, land.sman: John Thornton, ordinary seaman; 
 
 do hereby pledge my sacred honor that, until James Bamett. seaman; Iowa Gregory, ordi- 
 
 duly exchanged, I will neither take up arms nary seaman; Elias Williams, seanian; James 
 
 against the United States, serve againstthem in A. Peters, midshipman; J. W. Wolmsley, third 
 
393 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Speaking of tlie engagement in Albemarle Sound, Com- 
 mander John N. MafBtt, C. S. N., in his Reminiscences, says: 
 " Commodore Lynch was appointed to the command of the 
 naval forces in the waters of North Carolina. Early in Feb- 
 ruary, 1863, he hoisted his flag on board the Seabird, a small 
 passenger steamer. The six remaining vessels of his force 
 were of the same flimsy character. Burn side entered the 
 sound with sixty-seven vessels. Twenty-five were powerful, 
 well-armed gunboats, mounting the heaviest naval ordnance; 
 the remainder transported a large army with its equipment 
 and all military requirements. 
 
 "Nothing daunted, the heroic Lynch, on the T'th of Febru- 
 ary. 1863, formed his line of battle abreast of the Confederate 
 batteries established on Roanoke Island." 
 
 "The boldness and unflinching attitude of these diminutive rebel ves- 
 sels in defying immense odds in power and num.ber, elicited from many 
 Federals flattering expressions of admiration for this exhibition of decided 
 pluck by their nautical enemies — a chivalry of sentiment too rarely in- 
 dulged in by either side during the war. To disparage the courage of an 
 enemy is to detract from the honors of the victor. 
 
 " The unequal contest commenced at 10 A. M., and continued until 
 5 p. M., when Lynch was forced to retire, having expended all his ammu- 
 nition, not a cartridge remaining in the fleet ; in fact the Ellis, Capt. 
 Cooke, had continued fighting for hours on borrowed powder. Several 
 vessels were seriously damaged. The Curlew was struck by a 100-pound 
 shot between wind and water ; the commander ran her ashore and ap- 
 plied the torch. The casualties in the fleet were numerous. The commo- 
 dore hastened to Elizabeth City and sent to Norfolk by express for ammu- 
 nition. On its arrival he started back for Roanoke Island, but returned 
 to Elizabeth City on receiving information of the surrender. Here the 
 determined Lynch, with a _ew remaining vessels, decided to make a final 
 stand for weal or woe. 
 
 "On the morning of the 10th, fourteen Federal gunboats, fiushed 
 with their recent success, dashed impetuously upon the Confederates, and 
 in spite of a desperate resistance their immense preponderance of force 
 swept everything before them. Tlie commanders of the Fanny, Acco- 
 mao, and Seabird, seeing that capture was inevitable, fired their steam- 
 ers and escaped with their crews. The Beaufort and Raleigh passed 
 through the canal and arrived in safety at Norfolk. The JSllis, com- 
 manded by James W. Cooke, resisted to the bitter end. Boarders 
 swarmed on board of her, and were met, cutlass in hand, by the daunt- 
 less captain, who, though badly wounded by a musket ball and by a 
 thrust from a bayonet, fought with the fierceness of a tiger, refusing to 
 surrender or haul down his flag. 
 
 ' ' Overpowered by numbers he was borne to the deck ; and would have 
 been slaughtered on the spot but for the generous interference of an old 
 associate, who caused him to be safely conveyed to Commodore Rowan's 
 flag-ship, where extreme kindness was extended. 
 
 "The regular officers of the navy had not expunged from their bear- 
 ing the ancient Chivalry of the profession*; brave prisoners received at 
 
 assistant engineer; George Livingston, captain's assistant engineer ; Reuben Willis, pilot ; Jo- 
 clerk; Jas. McCarrick, master's mate; John W. seph F. Weaver, carpenter; Alfred Reid, officer's 
 Yonng, seaman; J. W, Ballance, landsman, otiok; JosiallW. Butt, quartermaster; Edwin T. 
 John W. Phillips, quartermaster: Thomas John- K. Jones, carpenter's mate; John W. Horton, 
 fiton, gunner's mate; John A.Wilson, seaman; ship's cook, George W. Dowdy, seaman; Jas. 
 AA'illiam Maro, second-class fil'eman; James T. L. Day, seaman; William B. Scraggs, second 
 Sullivan, ordinary seaman; J, J. Henderson, lieutenant, company D., artillery corps, Wise 
 third assistant engineer; Junius Hanks, third legion. 
 
BeSaLijE'. :.A- .: 
 
 COMMANDEB JOHK NEWLAUB MAPFITT, 
 
 CONFEDEBATE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVV. 393 
 
 their hands that generous consideration taught by the examples of Deca- 
 tur, Stewart, Bainbridge, and other grand ojd nautical fathers. If dur- 
 ing the struggle there was a departure from "the golden rule of honor, the 
 perpetrator was anathematized by the navy proper, -which, through all 
 the labyrinths and horrors mdigenous to civil war, humanely endeavored 
 to ameliorate its harshness. 
 
 "The naval battles in Albemarle Sound and oil Elizabeth City re- 
 flected much credit upon the personal courage of all the Confederate offi- 
 cers therein engaged. With mere abortions for gunboats, badly armed 
 and sparse of ammunition, they confronted without hesitation the well- 
 equipped and powerful vessels of the North. 
 
 " Even those who, to prevent capture, fired their steamers, fought 
 their guns amid raging flames and banners flying, retreating at last with 
 the stubbornness of the Old Guard, that 'were conquered, but not sub- 
 dued.' This defeat, like those of Hatteras Inlet and Port Royal, being 
 inconsiderately weighed in the scales of popular estimation, as a natural 
 sequence the navy was pronounced ' short of weight.' Success is the 
 vital spark that excites confidence and admiration. Without the smiles 
 of good fortune all the ability man can possibly be endowed with is un- 
 appreciated. "^ 
 
 Thus Roanoke Island was lost. It was the key to all 
 the rear defences of Norfolk: it unlocked two sounds (Albe- 
 marle and Currituck), eight rivers — North, West, Pasquo- 
 tank, Perquimans, Little, Chowan, Roanoke and Alligator, four 
 canals — the Albemarle and Chesapeake, the Dismal Swamp, 
 the Northwest and the Norfolk, and two railroads — the Pe- 
 tersburg and Norfolk and the Seaboard and Roanoke. It 
 guarded more than four-fifths of Norfolk's supplies of corn, 
 pork and forage, and it cut the command of Gen. Huger off 
 from all its most efficient transportation. Its possession by 
 the enemy endangered the existence of Huger's army, threat- 
 ened the navy-yard at Gosport, and to cut off Norfolk from 
 Richmond, and' both from railroad communication with the 
 South Atlantic States. It lodged the enemy in a safe harbor 
 from the storms of Hatteras, gave him a rendezvous and a 
 large and rich range of supplies, and the command of the sea- 
 board from Oregon Inlet to Cape Henry. It ought to have 
 been defended by 20,000 men, instead of the single brigade 
 of Gen. Wise and the little fleet of seven small vessels of Capt. 
 Lynch. That the enemy did not appreciate the value of his 
 capture, and the importance of the waters he had won, is as 
 little to the credit of the military and naval authorities of the 
 United States as the loss of the position was discreditable to 
 "the Confederate authorities. 
 
 From Elizabeth City Commander Rowan dispatched the 
 Louisiana, the Underwriter, the Perry, and the Lockwood to 
 Edenton, where a vessel was being built, which was destroyed. 
 Upon the return of the expedition from Edenton, Commander 
 Rowan dispatched a portion of his fleet to block the Chesa- 
 peake and Albemarle Canal, and while he was blocking it at 
 one end, the Confederates were doing the same work furtlier 
 
 1 Reminiscences of ike Confederate Navy, United Service Magazine, Got. 1830. 
 
394 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 up, and thus the back door of Norfolk was effectually closed 
 by the labors of its assailants and defenders. 
 
 The Confederate navy in the waters of the sounds of North 
 Carolina was in that first action, if not entirely destroyed, 
 dissipated and scattered; the enemy not encountering a single 
 armed vessel in any one of the expeditions up the rivers and 
 to the towns of that large section of that State. 
 
 The official report of Commodore Lynch of the participa- 
 tion of his fleet in the defence of Roanoke Island and Elizabeth 
 City, on the 7th of February, was as follows: 
 
 "Flag-ship 'Sbabtrd,' ) 
 "Off Roanoke Island, February 7th, 1862. f 
 
 " Sra: I have the honor to report that the enemy, at 10 A. m., today, 
 ■with twenty-two heavy steamers and one tug, made an attack upon this 
 squadron and the battery at Pork Point. 
 
 '' As his numerical force was overwhelming, we commenced the action 
 at long range, but as our shell fell short, while his burst over and around 
 us (owing, I think, to the superior quality of his powder, we were event- 
 ually compelled to shorten the distance. 
 
 "The fight lasted continuously from 10 A. M. to 5:30 p. M., throughout 
 which the soldiers in the battery sustained their position with a gallantry 
 which won our warmest approbation. The fire was terrific, and at times 
 the battery would be enveloped in the sand and dust thrown up by shot 
 and shell. 
 
 ' ' And yet their casualties was only one man killed and three wounded. 
 The earthwork, however, was very much cut up. I mention the battery 
 because, in all probability, communication will reach you before intelli- 
 gence will be received from appropriate official source. The enemy ap- 
 proached in two divisions, the rear one having the schooner transports in 
 tow. 
 
 "The advance, which was the attacking division, again subdivided, 
 and one portion assailed us and the other the battery. Repeatedly, in the 
 course of the day, I feared that our little squadron of seven vessels would 
 be utterly demolished, but a gracious Providence preserved us. 
 
 " Master-Commanding Moall, of the Forrest, received a wound in the 
 head, which is pronounced serious, if not mortal. I yet trust that this 
 promising young oflHcer, who so bravely fought his ship, will be spared to 
 
 the service. Midshipman Camm. of the Ellis, and of the Curletn, 
 
 each lost an arm, which, with three others slightly wounded, constitute 
 the sum of our personal casualties. 
 
 ' I am sorry to say that the Curlew, our largest steamer, was sunk, 
 and the Forrest, one of the propellers, disabled. AVe have received other 
 injuries from the shot and shell, but comparatively of light character, 
 and could, with the exception of the Forrest, be prepared to renew the 
 action to-morrow, if we only had ammunition. I have not a pound of 
 powder nor a loaded shell remaining, and few of the other vessels are bet- 
 ter off. During the latter part of the engagement, when the ammunition 
 was nearly exhausted, I sent to the upper battery for a supply, but ten 
 charges were all that could be spared, and those were expended at dark, 
 as the enemy was withdrawing from the contest. 
 
 " In all probability the contest will be renewed to-morrow, for the 
 enemy having landed a force below the battery will doubtless endeavor 
 to divert its lire. I have decided, after receiving the guns from the wreck 
 of the Curlew, to proceed direct with the squadron to Elizabeth City, and 
 send express to Norfolk for ammunition. Should it arrive in time we will 
 return to aid in the defence; if not, will there make a final stand, and 
 blow up the vessels rather than they shall fall into the hands of the 
 enemy. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 395 
 
 "There are reasons for retiring upon Norfolk, but it would be un- 
 seemly thus to desert this section of country. If I have erred in j udgment, 
 by a speedy notification the error will be corrected. 
 
 "Commander Hunter, Lieut. Commanders Cooke, Parker, and Alex- 
 ander, and Masters Commanding McCarrick, Taylor, and Hoole, bravely 
 sustained the credit of the service, and every officer and man performed 
 his duty with alacrity. Lieut. Commanding Simms, although absent oq 
 detailed service, exhibited such an eagerness to participate in the conflict 
 as to give fuU assurance that, if gratified, he would have upheld his high 
 reputation. 
 
 " I am, very respectfully, your obedient, 
 
 "W. F. Lynch, Flag-officer. 
 
 "The Hon. S. U. Mallorx, Secretary of the Navy:'' 
 
 But though defeated, and all the naval vessels destroyed^ 
 and the enemy controlling all the waters of the North Carolina 
 Sounds — the hope yet remained of regaining control and re- 
 establishing Confederate authority over the district watered 
 by the rivers and sounds of eastern North Carolina. While new 
 vessels were being constructed in the upper waters, the enemy 
 was watched with eagerness for any unguarded point where 
 an enterprising and bold assailant might make an effort to 
 capture a gunboat to form the beginning of a force afloat. 
 The long period of inactivity, with only patrol duty by gun- 
 boats in the sounds and rivers, produced a carelessness and 
 want of watchfulness which offered the opportunity desired. 
 
 In January, 1864, the Confederate naval commanders at 
 Richmond, Wilmington and Charleston, received orders from 
 the Navy Department to select a boat's crew of fifteen able and 
 trusty seamen, under the command of an experienced officer, 
 from each of the gunboats then lying at the above-named 
 ports, and report with their arms and boats to Commander 
 John Taylor Wood, of the C. S. navy, and Colonel on the 
 President's staff, at Wilmington, N. C. By the latter part of 
 January everything was in readiness; the men were well 
 armed, and accompanied by four boats and two large launches, 
 they left Wilmington by the Kingston railway, under the 
 command of Col. Wood. The utmost secrecy had been observed 
 by those in command as to the object of the expedition and its 
 destination. 
 
 The town of Newberne, a place of some note in North 
 Carolina, lies on a point of land at the junction of the Trent 
 and Neuse Rivers with Pamlico Sound. Roanoke Island was 
 captured on the 14th of February, 1863, and following that 
 event Newberne surrendered to the Federals. They at once 
 threw up fortifications, which extended over an area of twenty 
 miles, and in order to strengthen their position and provide 
 against the chances either of surprise or capture, three or four 
 of their gunboats were either anchored off the wharf at New- 
 berne, or else kept cruising up and down the Neuse or Trent 
 Rivers. The largest of these gunboats was the Under toriter, 
 a large side- wheel steamer, which fired the first gun in the 
 attack on Roanoke Island, and participated in most of the 
 
39G THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 engagements fought along the North Carolina coast. The 
 Underwriter had engines of 800 horse power, and carried four 
 guns, one six-inch rifled Dahlgren, one eight-inch of the same 
 pattern, one twelve-pound rifle, and one twelve-pound how- 
 itzer. Jacob Westervelt, of New York, Acting Master U. S. 
 navy, was her commander. 
 
 The expedition under Col. Wood reached Kingston early 
 on the morning of Sunday, January 31st; the boats being at 
 once unloaded from the cars and dragged by the men to the 
 river and launched in the Neuse. The distance between 
 Kingston and Newberne by rail is about thirty miles, but the 
 tortuous and circuitous course which the river takes, makes 
 the journey by water at least twice that length. Bending 
 silently to the muffled oars, the expedition moved down the 
 river. Now, the Neuse broadened until the boats seemed to be 
 on a lake; again, the tortuous stream narrowed until the party 
 could almost touch the trees on either side. Not a sign of life 
 was visible, save occasionally when a flock of wild ducks, 
 startled at the approach of the boats, rose from the banks, and 
 then poising themselves for a moment overhead, flew on swift 
 wing to the shelter of the woodland or the morass. No other 
 sound was heard to break the stillness save the constant, steady 
 splash of the oars and the ceaseless surge of the river. Some- 
 times a fallen log impeded the progress, again a boat would 
 run aground, but as hour after hour passed by, the boats still 
 sped on, the crews cold and weary, but yet cheerful and un- 
 complaining. Night fell, dark shadows began to creep over 
 the marshes and crowd the river ; owls screeched among the 
 branches overhead, through which the expedition occasionally 
 caught glimpses of the sky. There was nothing to guide the 
 boats on their course, but the crew still kept hopefully on, and 
 by eleven o'clock the river seemed to become wider, and Col. 
 Wood discovered that he had reached the open country above 
 Newberne. 
 
 When in sight of the town. Col. Wood ran his boats into 
 a small stream, and succeeded in getting them close to the 
 shore. The party landed on what seemed to be a little island 
 covered with tall grass and shrubs. Here the men found tem- 
 porary shelter, and rations were served. 
 
 At midnight the men were called to quarters, and the object 
 of the expedition was explained. Major Gen. G. E. Pickett, 
 who was then commanding the Confederate forces operating 
 against Newberne, was to open fire on the enemy's lines 
 around the town, thus drawing his attention inland, while 
 Col. Wood and his command, under cover of the diversion, 
 were, if possible, to capture one or more of the gunboats and 
 clear the river. Arms were inspected and ammunition dis- 
 tributed, and everything made ready to embark on what 
 each of the party felt was a perilous enterprise. In order to 
 •distinguish the Confederates in the dark, each man was 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 397 
 
 furnished with a white badge, to be worn around the left arm, 
 and the pass-word " Sumter" was given. 
 
 The firing of Pickett's command was now heard on the 
 right. In company with Hoke's brigade, a part of Corse's 
 and Clingham's and some artillery. Gen. Pickett had made a 
 reconnoissance within a mile and a half of Newberne. He 
 met the enemy in force at Batchelor's Creek, killed and 
 wounded about one hundred in all, captured thirteen officers 
 and 380 men, fourteen negroes, two rifled pieces and caissons, 
 300 stands of small arms, besides camp and garrison equipage. 
 His loss was thirty-five killed and wounded. 
 
 While the engagement at Batchelor's Creek was in prog- 
 ress. Acting Volunteer Lieut. G. W. Graves, of the U. S. 
 steamer Lockwood, commanding the Federal vessels at New- 
 berne, communicated with Acting Master Westervelt, com- 
 manding the Underwriter, and Acting Master Josselyn, com- 
 manding the Hull, ordering them to be in readiness for a move. 
 Early on the morning of the 1st of February, Lieut. Graves 
 ordered the Underwriter to get under way and take up posi- 
 tion on the Neuse River, so as to command the plain outside 
 of the Federal line of works, and the Hull to take a station 
 above her. At 9 a. m. the Underwriter had reached the posi- 
 tion assigned her, but the Hull, soon after getting under way, 
 got aground, and could not be got off during the day. Soon 
 after this, hearing from Gen. J. W. Palmer, in commarid of 
 the Union forces, that the Confederates were planting a bat- 
 tery near Brice's Creek, Lieut. Graves, in the Lockwood, pro- 
 ceeded as far up the Trent River as he could get, and laid 
 there for the night. 
 
 In the meantime, Col. Wood had again launched his boats 
 in the Neuse, and arranged them in two divisions, the first 
 commanded by himself, and the second by Lieut. B. P. Loy- 
 all. After forming parallel to each other, the two divisions 
 pulled rapidly down stream. When they had rowed a short 
 distance, Col. Wood called all the boats together, final instruc- 
 tions were given, and this being through with, he offered a 
 fervent praver for the success of his mission. It was a strange 
 and ghostlv sight, the men resting on their oars with heads 
 uncovered," the commander also bareheaded, standing erect in 
 the stern of his boat ; the black waters rippling beneath ; the 
 dense overhanging clouds pouring down sheets of rain, and in 
 the blackness beyond an unseen bell tolling as if from some 
 phantom cathedral. The party listened— four peals were 
 sounded and then they knew it was the bell of the Underwriter, 
 or some other of the gunboats, ringing out for two o'clock. 
 Guided by the sound, the boats pulled toward the steamer, 
 pistols, muskets and cutlasses in readiness. The advance was 
 necessarily slow and cautious. Suddenly, when about three 
 hundred yards from the Underwriter, her hull loomed up out 
 of the inky darkness. Through the stillness came the sharp 
 
398 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Ting of five bells for half -past two o'clock, and just as the echo 
 died away, a quick, nervous voice from the deck hailed," Boat 
 ahoy!" No answer was given, but Col. Wood kept steadily 
 on. "Boat ahoy ! Boat ahoy ! !" again shouted the watch. 
 No answer. Then the rattle on board the steamer sprang 
 summoning the men to quarters, and the Confederates could 
 see the dim and shadowy outline of hurrying figures on deck. 
 Nearer Col. Wood came, shouting, " Give way !" "Give way, 
 l)oys, give way !" repeated Lieut. Loyall and the respective 
 boat commanders, and give way they did with a will. The 
 few minutes that followed were those of terrible suspense. To 
 retreat was impossible, and if the enemy succeeded in opening 
 fire on the boats with his heavy guns all was lost. 
 
 The instructions were that one of the Confederate divi- 
 sions should board forward and the other astern, but, in the 
 excitement, the largest number of the boats went forward, 
 with Col. Wood amidships. 
 
 In the meantime, the Underwriter, anchored within thirty 
 yards of two forts, slipped her cable and made efforts to get 
 up sufficient steam from her banked fires, to move off, or run 
 the Confederates down. This movement only hastened the 
 boarding party, and the crews pulled rapidly alongside. Lieut. 
 George W. Gift, believing that the Underwriter was moving, 
 gave orders to Midshipman J. Thomas Scharf, who was in 
 command of the boarders in the bow of his launch, to open 
 fire on the steamer with the howitzer which was mounted in 
 the bow, and endeavor to cripple her machinery. One shot 
 was fired which struck in the pilot-house, and before the how- 
 itzer was reloaded the boats were alongside, and the crews 
 scrambling on deck. The enemy had by this time gathered 
 in the ways just aft of the wheel-house, and as the Confeder- 
 ates came up they poured into them volley after volley of 
 musketry, each flash of which reddened the waters around, 
 enabling the attacking party to note their position. In spite 
 of the heavy fire, the boarders were cool and yet eager, now 
 and then one or more were struck down, but the rest never' 
 faltered. When the boats struck the sides of the tfnderwriter, 
 grapnels were thrown on board, and the Confederates were 
 soon scrambling, with cutlass and pistol in hand, to the deck 
 with a rush and a wild cheer, that rung across the waters, the 
 firing from the enemy never ceasing for one moment. The 
 brave Lieut. B. P. Loyall was the first to reach the deck, with 
 Engineer Emmet P. Gill, and Col. Wood at his side. Following 
 in their steps came Lieuts. Francis L. Hoge, Wm. A. Kerr, 
 Philip Porcher, James M. Gardner, P. M. Roby, Henry Wilkin- 
 son, George W. Gift, Midshipmen Saunders, H. S. Cook, J. T. 
 Scharf, and William S. Hogue, gallantly leading their men. 
 
 The firing at this time became so hot that it did not seem 
 possible that more than half the Confederates would escape 
 with their lives. Col. Wood, with the bullets whistling around 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 399 
 
 him, issued his orders as coolly and unconcernedly as if the 
 enemy had not even been in sight. All fought well. There 
 was no halting, no cowardice; every man stood at his post and 
 did his duty. The conduct of the officers was beyond all 
 praise. Cool and collected in every movement, they executed 
 their parts well. From Commander Wood down to the young- 
 est midshipman, not one faltered. Conspicuous among all 
 was the conduct of the marines, a company of them under 
 Capt. Thomas S. Wilson being distributed through the boats. 
 As the Confederates came up to the ship the marines rose and 
 delivered their fire, taking accurate aim, reloading still under 
 the heavy fire from the enemy. When on board they obeyed 
 their orders promptly, and, forming on the hurricane deck, 
 not even the explosion of the monster shell fired by the enemy 
 from one of the shore batteries among them could break the 
 ranks or turn a man from his post. 
 
 Once on the deck of the Underwriter the onslaught was fu- 
 rious. Cutlasses and pistols were the weapons of the Confed- 
 erates, and each selected and made a rush for his man. The 
 odds were against the attacking party, and some of them had 
 to struggle with three opponents. But they never flinched in 
 the life-and-death struggle, nor did the gallant enemy. The 
 boarders forced the fighting. Blazing rifles had no terrors for 
 them. They drove back the enemj^ inch by inch. Steadily, 
 but surely, the boarders began to gain the deck, and crowded 
 their opponents to the companion-ways or other places of con- 
 cealment; while all the time fierce hand-to-hand fights were 
 going on on other portions of the vessel. Now, one of the Con- 
 federates would sink exhausted — again, one of the enemy 
 would fall on the slippery deck. Rifles were snatched from 
 the hands of the dead and the dying, and used in the hands 
 as bludgeons did deadly work. Down the companion-ways 
 the attacked party were driven pell-mell into the ward-room 
 and steerage, and even to the coal-bunkers, and after another 
 sharp but decisive struggle the enemy surrendered. The Un- 
 derwriter was captured, its commander slain, ' and many of 
 its officers and men killed and wounded, or drowned. The 
 Confederate loss was over one-fourth of the number engaged 
 — six killed and twenty-two wounded. E. F. Gill,'' the Con- 
 federate engineer, lay in the gangway mortally wounded, and 
 Midshipman Saunders, ' a gallant boy, cut down in a hand-to- 
 hand fight, breathed out his young life on deck. 
 
 The Underwriter was moored head and stern between 
 Fort Anderson and Fort Stevenson, and scarcely a stone's 
 
 1 Acting Master Joseph Westervelt, the com- time of hig death he was stationed on the iron- 
 "mandercftheDTMfenoWtenwasbominNewYork, cXaA Fredericksburg , at Eichmond, Va. 
 
 and appointed from that State, Feb. Sth, 1862. His 3 palmer Saunders was born in Virginia, and 
 
 body was not recovered until Feb. 28th, 1864. appointed from that State on August 14th, 1861, 
 
 2 Emmet F. Gill was bom in Virginia, and a midshipman in the C. S. navy. He was cut 
 appointed from that State a Third Assistant En- through the head several times with a cutlass, 
 gineer in the Provisional Navy of the Confed- and afterwards shot in the stomach. He was a 
 erate States on February 19th, 1863. At the very promising young ofacer. 
 
400 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 throw from the shore. The sound of the firing was heard at 
 the batteries, and by the time the Confederates captured the 
 boat, which took about ten minutes, the Federals on shore fired 
 a shell into her, which struck the upper machinery and ex- 
 ploded on deck. All of the shore batteries then opened fire on 
 the doomed vessel, either careless of or not realizing the fact 
 that their own wounded must be on board; and the captors soon 
 found that a rapid movement would have to be made. The 
 prisoners were ordered into the boats, and the Confederates who 
 were on board began to prepare for action. Lieut. Hoge opened 
 the magazines and manned the guns. Steam, however, was 
 down and the machinery disabled, and with a heavy fire from 
 the batteries pouring upon them, it was seen that the Confed- 
 erates could not take sufficient time to carry off their prize. 
 It was, therefore, determined to set fire to the vessel. The 
 Confederate wounded and those of the enemy were carefully 
 removed to the boats alongside, the guns were loaded and 
 pointed towards the town, fire was applied from the boilers, 
 and in five minutes after the boarders left, the Underwriter 
 was in one mass of fiames from stem to stern, burning with 
 lier the dead bodies of those of the brave antagonists who had 
 fallen during the action. 
 
 The Confederates retired under a heavy fire from the shore 
 batteries, and also from a volley of musketry, which whistled 
 along the water. They turned once more up the Neuse, and 
 pulled away from the town. As they rounded a point of woods 
 they took a last look at the burning steamer, now completely 
 enveloped in flame, the lurid light flaming in ,the sky and 
 flashing for miles across the water. Although hidden from 
 view, they could see by sudden flashes in the sky, and by the 
 dull, heavy booming sound which came to them upon the night 
 air, that the shell-room was reached and that the explosion 
 had begun. Turning into Swift Creek, about eight miles from 
 jSTewberne, the party landed on the shore to care for the 
 wounded and receive intelligence from Gen. Pickett. It was 
 part of the Confederate plan, if the military had been success- 
 ful in their attack on the enemy's works on the land side of 
 Newberne, for the boats to land a large force of infantry on the 
 water side of the forts and to attempt to carry them by assault. 
 Owing to the failure of some of his command to co-operate in 
 tlie demonstration. Gen. Pickett withdrew his troops from 
 before JSTewberne, and the naval force, on the next morning, re- 
 tired up the river. 
 
 During the attack on the Underwriter, which was defended 
 with great gallantry, the other gunboats took the alarm and 
 made up the Trent as fast as steam could carry them, and 
 luckily for the Confederates they did not dare to take part in 
 the fight. When the shell exploded on the deck of the Under- 
 irriter, it is said that Acting Master Westervelt, the commander, 
 leaped overboard, and was killed hanging to a hawser. Edgar 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 401 
 
 G. Allen, the engineer of the Underwriter, who escaped, in his 
 report to Lieut. Graves, under date of February 2d, 1864, says: 
 
 " I, together with eighteen or twenty of the crew, being put into the 
 -whale boat belonging to the Underwriter. * * * "We then shoved ofif 
 and were proceeding up the stream, the boat I was in being astern the rest, 
 when I -discovered that, in their hurry to get off, they had put only two 
 men as guard in the boat. This fact I discovered by the one in the stern 
 steering (by whom I was sitting) hailing the other boats, which were 
 some fifty yards ahead of us, and asked them to take off some of us, as 
 the boat was so overloaded it could make no headway, and also saying 
 they wanted a stronger guard, as all but two were prisoners. One of the 
 other boats was turning to come back, when I snatched the cutlass from 
 the belt of the guard and told the men to pull for their lives. Some of 
 the men, the other guard among them, jumped overboard and swam for 
 the land. I headed the boat for the shore and landed at the foot of the 
 line of breastworks, delivered my prisoner to the commanding oflBcer, and 
 procuring an ambulance, took one of our disabled men to the hospital" 
 
 The Underwriter lost in the engagement about nine 
 killed, twenty wounded and nineteen prisoners. Twenty- 
 three of her officers and men escaped. 
 
 In recognition of the distinguished gallantry displayed in 
 the capture of the Underwriter, the Confederate Congress, on 
 February 15th, 1864, unanimously passed the following: 
 
 ^ Joint resolution of thanks to Commander John Taylor Wood and 
 the officers and men under his command, for their daring and brilliant 
 
 Ofifi i^tJ of 
 
 "■Resolved, hy the Congress of the Confederate States of America, That 
 the thanks of the Congress of the Confederate States are due, and are 
 hereby tendered, to Commander John Taylor Wood, Confederate States 
 Navy, and to the officers and men under his command, for the daring and 
 brilliantly executed plans which resulted in the capture of the TJ. S. trans- 
 port schooner Elmore, on the Potomac River; of the ship Alleghany, and 
 the U. S. gunboats Satellite and Reliance; and the U. S. transport 
 schooners Golden Rod, Coquette and Two Brothers, on the Chesapeake ; 
 and more recently, in the capture from under the guns of the enemy's 
 works of the U. S. gunboat Underwriter, on the Neuse River, near New- 
 beme, North Carolina, with the officers and crews of the several vessels 
 brought off as prisoners." 
 
 " This was rather a mortifying affair for the navy " (U.S.) 
 says Admiral Porter, "however fearless on the part of the 
 Confederates. This gallant expedition," he continues, " was 
 led by Commander John Taylor Wood. * * It was to be ex- 
 pected that with so many clever officers who left the Federal 
 navy and cast their fortunes with the Confederates, such gallant 
 actions would often be attempted," and it is his opinion that 
 "had the enemy attacked the forts the chances are that they 
 would have been successful, as the garrison was unprepared 
 for an attack from the river, their most vulnerable side."' 
 
 1 Most of the officers asBOoiated with Col. Navy Depabtment, C. S. A. 1 
 
 Wood were promoted for their dariog and des- Bichmond, Feb. 10th, 1865. J 
 
 Iterate act in capturing the Underwriter. Lieut. Commander Benjamin P. Lotall, P. N. C. S.: 
 
 liOyaU received the following letter from Score- Sib : You are hereby Informed that the Presi- 
 
 tary of the Navy S. R. Mallory in recognition of dent has appointed you, by and with the advice 
 
 Ilia distinguished gallantry: and consent of the Senate, a Commander in the 
 
 26 
 
403 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The experience which old steamboats mounting a gtin, 
 and called by the sounding name of a gunboat, brought to 
 the Confederate authorities, was of a kind to teach the lesson 
 that, as the vessels which could regain the sounds must be 
 built, it was wiser to build iron-clad steamers of light draft, 
 and to carry one or two guns, than to attempt to strengthen 
 any river craft and convert them into gunboats. 
 
 The Confederate Navy Department on January 13th, 1863, 
 entered into a contract with Gilbert Elliott, agent for J. G. 
 Martin, of Elizabeth Citj"^, N. C, to construct and deliver to the 
 Navy Department, at Elizabeth City, the hulls of three gun- 
 boats, within four months after the 6th day of January, 1862. 
 The capture of Roanoke Island, followed by the occupation of 
 the Pasquotank River, frustrated that contract. Again, on 
 April 16th, 1862, another contract was entered into with the 
 same party for the construction of "one gunboat, to be iron- 
 clad," wherein it was stipulated "that if the work is inter- 
 rupted by the enemy, the party of the first part is to receive 
 compensation for the work done upon the boat to the time of 
 such interruption. The contract as published in the report of 
 the Investigating Committee, does not indicate in what waters 
 that iron-clad was to be built. On September 17th, 1862, an- 
 other contract with Martin & Elliott, of Elizabeth City, was 
 made for the construction at Tarboro', N. C, of the hull of one 
 gunboat, to be iron-clad, and to be completed on or before the 
 first day of March, 1863. On October 17th, 1862, a contract 
 with Howard & Ellis, of Newberne, N. C, was entered into 
 for the construction, at White Hall, N. C., of the hull of one 
 gunboat, to be iron-clad, and completed on or before the first 
 day of March, 1863. 
 
 Almost a year before the battle of Plymouth and the ex- 
 ploit of the Albemarle, Lieut. Commander C. W. Flusser, of 
 the Miami, obtained all the particulars of the construction of 
 "a rebel iron-clad battery nearly completed on the Roanoke 
 River above Plymouth " — and on June 8th, 1863, advised Act- 
 ing Rear Admiral S. P. Lee, with the following description: 
 
 " The battery is built of pine sills fourteen (14) inches square, and is 
 to be plated with railroad iron. The steamer intended to tow her is one 
 hundred and thirty-four (134) feet long, and twenty-foar (24) feet beam, 
 ■with two screws. The boat has six ports, two on each side, and one on 
 either end. She carries a pivot gun forward, and another aft. Each gun 
 ■works out of three ports. The battery carries t^wo guns on each of two 
 opposite faces, and one on each of the two remaining sides. The boat is 
 built on the plan of the former Merrimab. The roof (slanting) of the 
 
 Provisional Navy of the Confederate States of When the Confederates landed in Swift Creek. 
 
 Amei-ica, " for gallant and meritorious conduct as they took their wounded ashore, where two of 
 
 seccmdin commarulandexeoiUivefrSicet'ofthenavaL the crew died. They were buried in the after- 
 
 e3-pedUionwhichfOnl}ienightofthe\stof February, noon, the funeral services being read by Lieut. 
 
 1864, cui out from under the guns of the enemy at Loyall. It was a very solemn scene. The boats 
 
 Newbeme, N. C, the Federal gtmboat Underwriter crews were form ed in a square around the graves, 
 
 and destroyed Jter." with the officers in the centre After the fune- 
 
 You are requested to signify your acceptance ral services, Lieut Loyall offered up a beautiful 
 
 or non-acceptance of this appointment. prayer, thanking God "for their victory and safe 
 
 S. B. Malloky, Secretary qfthe Navy. return. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 403 
 
 battery and all parts exposed are to be covered 'with five inches of pine 
 five inches of oak, and then plated with railroad iron. So say the work- 
 men. We are driving piles in the river, and preparing to receive them. 
 I do not doubt we shall whip them if they venture down." 
 
 ■plan 
 
 At the same time Lieut. Flusser enclosed the following 
 
 
 c ^-*«. 
 
 - - 
 
 
 _->» n 
 
 
 
 
 
 — ^D 
 
 
 
 /^ 
 
 1 
 
 1! 
 
 
 
 \ 
 
 ^'^feeL 
 
 
 < . 
 
 
 
 \.^ 
 
 \ 
 
 
 t 
 
 
 A 
 
 / 
 
 \ 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 / 
 
 \ 
 
 
 40 fcoL j 
 
 
 \ 
 
 < 
 
 
 
 vi/ 
 
 
 
 SCBJ. f ^ I f(N>L 
 
 A. IJ, C. D. E, F la w oe plated. 
 
 Perpeadicuieu line bctweeo C D dcDotos mc eulniQce to itie vwsel. 
 
 DIAGEAM OF THE HAM "ALBEMARLE." 
 
 On August 8th, 1863, Rear Admiral Lee wrote to Secretary- 
 Welles, that: 
 
 " The iron-clad on the Roanoke River at Edward's Ferry, forty miles 
 above Rainbow Blufif, heretofore reported to the department, is consid- 
 ered by Lieut. Commander Plusser as a formidable affair though of light 
 draft. The fortifications at Rainbow Bluff, and the low state of the 
 river, make it impracticable for the navy to destroy her before comple- 
 tion, which is reported near. I have made written application to Major 
 Gen. Peck to send out an expedition to accomplish this desirable object, 
 if practicable. If this is not done, we must have iron-clad defence on the 
 sound, though I do not see how any iron-clads we have now can be got 
 over the bulkhead at Hatteras, where the most water is about nine feet 
 in the best tides." Admiral Lee, September 10th, ordered Lieut. Flusser 
 to co-operate with the land forces of Gen. Foster on an expedition up the 
 Chowan River, having for its destination the destruction of the railroad 
 bridge at Weldon. The object of the expedition not being attained, 
 Lieut. Flusser requested Gen. Foster to detach a small party from the 
 main cavalry force to destroy the boat and battery building at Edward's 
 Perry, but did not succeed in impressing him with the Importance of the 
 move and it was not done. 
 
 Secretary Welles, under date of September 17th, 1863, 
 represented to Secretary Stanton the near completion of the 
 ram at Edward's Ferry, and urged a joint expedition of land 
 and naval forces for her destruction. Secretary Stanton 
 merely referred the letter to Gen. Foster for such action as his 
 judgment suggested, by whom it was transmitted to Major^ 
 Gen. Peck, who advised Admiral Lee, November 13th, 1863, 
 
404 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 that he had frequently called Gen. Foster's attention to the 
 ram being built at Edward's Ferry, and proposed to him expe- 
 ditions for burning the same, but " he never attached any im- 
 portance to it," and Admiral Lee, in a communication to Secre- 
 tary Welles, November 24th, 1863, says: "The general [Foster] 
 expressed his unconcern about the rebel ram." This " uncon- 
 cern " cost the Federal army the loss of Plymouth, the destruc- 
 tion of several gunboats, and the death of many brave men, 
 among them Lieut. Flusser. 
 
 " In 1863 two citizens, residing near Edward's Ferry, ' on the Eoanoke 
 River, proposed to the Navy Department to construct an iron-clad. 
 Their experience heretofore had been Umited to flat-boats, but with the 
 assistance of an intelligent, practical naval officer, coupled with their own 
 natural genius, they felt confident that the desired vessel could be built 
 and rendered formidable for service. 
 
 " As Commander Cooke was near at hand, the Secretary of the Navy 
 very .I'udiciously directed him to assume control of the work for the con- 
 struction of this earnestly desired vessel, whose province was expected to 
 be the rescue of Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds from the possession of 
 the enemy. "When aroused to action Cooke was one of the most industri- 
 ous and indefatigable officers in the navy. With hearty zeal he embarked 
 in the enterprise. 
 
 " Iron in all shapes was a necessity. In person Cooke ransacked the 
 country, gathering bolts and bars and the precious metal in any shape 
 that admitted of application to his needs by the manipulation of the 
 blacksmith. His greed for iron became amusingly notorious. At the 
 Tredegar Works in Richmond, and the Clarendon Foundry at Wilming- 
 ton, he was amusingly known as the 'Ironmonger Captain.' To vamp 
 up from refuse piles serviceable pieces of machinery afforded him excessive 
 delight. 
 
 " The building of the iron-clad, under all the disadvantages of place 
 and circumstances, was viewed by the community as a chimerical absurdity. 
 Great was the general astonishment when it became known that the in- 
 domitable commander had conquered all obstacles and was about to 
 launch his bantling. On the appointed day ' Cooke & Company ' com- 
 mitted their ' nonesuch ' to the turbid waters of the Roanoke, christening 
 her, as she glided from the launching-ways, ' the good ship Albemarle.' 
 
 " Boilers, engines, roofing, and iron shield were to be fitted ere the 
 iron-clad would be ready for service. While this finishing work was in 
 progress Cooke received a communication from Gen. Hoke asking for a 
 careful statement as to the exact time, with increased facilities, that the 
 Albemarle could be depended upon for assistance in an important mili- 
 tary expedition. The commander's response was quite laconic : 
 
 " 'In fifteen days, with ten additional mechanics.' The assistance 
 was rendered, Cooke was ordered to pi-epare the ram, and guns, ammuni- 
 tion, and a few men arrived, with a promise of the remainder of the crew 
 in a few days. 
 
 " On the 17th, two young officers with twenty men and the residue of 
 the steamer's outfit arrived. In spite of the herculean exertions of the 
 commander, the Albemarle was not entirely completed. The energetic 
 commander had named his day for action, and he was not a man to deal 
 in disappointments. 
 
 " At early dawn on the 18th, steam was up; ten portable forges, with 
 numerous sledge-hammers, were placed on board, and thus equipped the 
 never-failing Cooke started on his voyage as a floating workshop. Naval 
 history affords no such remarkable evidence of patriotic zeal and individ- 
 ual perseverance. 
 
 1 " Bemlniscencea o( Confederate Navy," by John N. Mafatt. The United Service, p. 601. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 405 
 
 " On the turtle-back numerous stages were suspended, thronged with 
 sailors wielding huge sledge-hammers. Upon the pilot-house stood Capt. 
 Cooke giving directions. Some of the crew were being exercised at one 
 of the big guns. ' Drive in spike No. 10 ! ' sang out the commander. ' On 
 nut below and screw up I Invent and sponge! Load with cartridge,' 
 was next command. 'Drive in No. 11, port side— so. On nut and screw 
 up hard ! Load with shells — prime 1 And in this seeming babel of words 
 the floating monster glided by. 
 
 " By five in the afternoon the Albemarle was secured to the river 
 bank, her forges landed, decks cleared, and the efBciency of the ram en- 
 sured, so far as human ingenuity contending against meagre facilities 
 could accomphsh. 
 
 " The entire construction was one of shreds and patches ; the engine 
 was adapted from incongruous material, ingeniously dove-tailed and put 
 together with a determined will that mastered doubt, but not without 
 some natural anxiety as to derangements that might occur from so 
 heterogenous a combination. The Albemarle was built in an open corn- 
 field, of unseasoned timber. A simple blacksmith shop aided the me- 
 chanical part of her construction. 
 
 " How different the accomplishment of like work at the North. There, 
 convenient docks, elaboi-ate machine shops, material in abundance con- 
 veniently at hand, and throngs of machinists accomplish construction with 
 methodical ease and promptness. 
 
 " After an active drill at the guns, an aide was dispatched to sound 
 the obstructions placed in the river by the enemy. He returned at mid- 
 night and reported favorably, upon which all hands were called, and soon 
 the steamer was under way. 
 
 " Soon that dull, leaden concussion which to practiced ears denotes a 
 heavy bombardment, smote upon the ear. Nearer the rapid explosions 
 grew upon the ear, and ere long, by the dawn's early light, the spires of Ply- 
 mouth greeted the sight. Cooke was up to time, and now for his promise. 
 
 " It was 3 A. M. on the 19th of April, 1864, when the Albemarle 
 passed in safety over the river obstructions, and received without reply a 
 furious storm of shot from the fort at Warren's Neck. Instantly grasping 
 the situation, amid the cheers of his crew, he made for the Federal gun- 
 boats that were chained together in the rear of Fort Williams, guarding 
 its flank, and dashed nine feet of his prow into the Southfleld, delivering 
 at the same time a broadside into the Miami, killing and wounding many 
 of her crew. Among the killed was numbered her commander, the brill- 
 iant Flusser. In ten minutes the Southfleld was at the bottom, the prow 
 of the ram still clinging to her and exciting for a few moments serious ap- 
 prehensions for the safety of the Albemarle. However, she was soon dis- 
 entangled, and being released from the downward pressure, was fiercely 
 pursuing the enemy, who were finally driven out of the river. 
 
 " This brilliant naval success ensured the triumph of Gen. Hoke. The 
 defences of Fort Williams, the citadel of Plymouth, were powerful on the 
 land side, and had already repulsed several Confederate assaults; on the 
 river side the fortification was defective, its open works entirely depend- 
 ing on gunboats. These having been dispersed, Cooke promptly opened 
 with his guns upon the vulnerable part of the fort, soon rendering it un- 
 tenable, and Gen. Ransom's command entered the town on that flank. 
 This was the prominent part performed by the Albemarle in the sanguin- 
 ary but brilliant capture of Plymouth. 
 
 " Major Gen. Peck, the second in command of the Federal forces in 
 the miUtary district, in his official report asserted and demonstrated that, 
 in the absence of the Confederate ram, and with the Federal gunboats 
 intact. Gen. Wessels could have sustained himself for an indefinite length 
 of time. 
 
 " After raising the Federal steamer Bombshell, which Hoke's artillery 
 had consigned to the bottom, Cooke soon floated and prepared her for 
 service* 
 
406 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " On the 4th of May, Commodore Pinkney, commanding the naval 
 defenses of the Roanoke, ordered Commander Cooke to convoy the 
 steamer Cotton Planter (a cotton-clad vessel sent from Halifax with sharp- 
 shooters to aid Gren. Hoke) and the Bombshell to Alligator River for mili- 
 tary purposes. On the 5th, at noon, the Albemarle left the river with her 
 consorts. 
 
 " She proceeded about sixteen miles on the east-northeast coast when 
 the Federal fleet, consisting of nine powerfully-armed steamers, hove in 
 sight and gallantly approached in double line of battle. By orders, the 
 Cotton Planter instantly returned to Plymouth. Two broadsides received 
 by the Bombshell brought down her colors and she surrendered. 
 
 " Admiral Lee's instructions to Commander Smith, who commanded 
 the fleet, were imperative : 'At all hazards the rebel ram must be de- 
 stroyed, by shot, ramming, or torpedoes. Her existence jeopardizes our 
 occupation of this section of North Carolina.' 
 
 " These stringent orders were issued to brave and intrepid seamen, 
 who right gallantly (though failing) performed their duty. Their oppo- 
 nent, reared in the same school, was equally brave and as firm as ada- 
 mant. Though considering his vessel impervious to shot, he was con- 
 scious of many defects in her improvised machinery, steering-gear, and 
 fire-draft if, perchance, his smoke-stack should be injured. Combined 
 with these drawbacks was the lack of necessary experience among the 
 very young officers who composed his command. The crew, with but 
 few exceptions, were all landsmen and but slightly practiced in gunnery. 
 All these drawbacks in the aggregate rendered his vessel less formidable 
 than reputation awarded. 
 
 "The most serious impediment to a successful issue of a contest 
 against nine fast and well-disciplined men-of-war, using torpedoes, was 
 the lack of speed, which, if possessed, would have enabled Cooke to frus- 
 trate every critical movement of the enemy, select his own distance for 
 battery effect, and avoid being demolished by their torpedoes. 
 
 " At 4 P. M. the Federal fleet fearlessly approached in double columns 
 and delivered their heavy broadsides at less than 100 yards. The Albe- 
 marle responded effectually, but suffered in return with loss of boats, 
 riddled smoke-stack, broken plates on the shield, and the after-gun 
 cracked some eighteen inches from the muzzle. The fleet grouped around 
 the ram and hurled their 100-pound shot, flred with double charges of 
 powder, aiming particularly at the ports and stern, which they supposed 
 were the vulnerable parts of the vessel. Near sunset. Commander Roe, of 
 the Sassacus, selected his opportunity, and with open throttles and a 
 speed of about eight knots, struck the Albemarle squarely, just abaft her 
 starboard beam, causing every timber in the vicinity of the impact to 
 crack and complain, but not give way. The pressure from her revolving 
 wheels was so powerful as to force the deck of the iron-clad several feet 
 below the surface of the water and create a momentary impression that 
 she was sinlting. The crew became alarmed, and were becoming panic- 
 stricken, when the stern voice of the undismayed Cooke checked incipient 
 disorder and promptly restored discipline as he sang out: ' Stand to your 
 guns ! If we must sink, let us perform our duty and go down like brave 
 men.' 
 
 " The AZ&eraarZe soon recovered, and hurled shot after shot through 
 and through her assailer. The last caused howls of agony and shrieks of 
 despair, for one of her boilers was shattered, and the hissing steam em- 
 braced with its deadly vapor some twenty of the crew of the Sassacus. 
 Notwithstanding the natural consternation under the appalling circum- 
 stances, two of her guns' crews continued to energetically fire upon the 
 Albemarle until the disabled vessel drifted out of the arena of battle. 
 
 " The enemy's fleet were not idle ; the incessant roar of their artillery 
 thundered over the placid waters of the sound as their ponderous pro- 
 jectiles thugged upon the shield of the Albemarle and ricochetted innocu- 
 ously beyond. One of the fleet made an ineffectual effort to foul th^ ram's 
 
THE CONFEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 407 
 
 , propeller -with a large seine, and the Miami failed with her torpedo in con- 
 sequence of the ram's destructive fire. The contest continued until night 
 
 ■ shrouded the inland sea, when both parties withdrew from the fierce con- 
 
 ' test. The Federals suffered severely in their hulls and killed and wounded. 
 His tiller broke when rammed by the Sassaous, and it was with great dilH- 
 
 , «ulty, from the construction of the vessel, that she could be guided by the 
 relieving tackles. 
 
 " One gun was badly cracked in the muzzle by a shot, and the smoke- 
 stack was so torn and riddled that its draft-power became entirely oblit- 
 erated, and a small head of steam could only be obtained by burning 
 bacon, lard, and the bulkheads. At last the afflicted Albemarle arrived 
 and anchored off Plymouth. Had her speed amounted to ten or eleven 
 knots, the Federal squadron might have been annihilated. 
 
 " After being thoroughly repaired the Albemarle was detained at 
 Plymouth for harbor defence, awaiting the completion of a sister iron- 
 clad, then nearly ready for launching on Tar Kiver. 
 
 The government had decided that two ironclads acting in concert 
 were necessary for a successful encounter with the formidable force of the 
 enemy then in possession of the Albemarle and Pamlico Sounds. 
 
 " The Fates had decided that the career of the Albemarle should close. 
 "On anight of November, 1864, while the Confederate was insuffi- 
 ciently guarded by a section of artillery, the ubiquitous Lieut. Gushing, 
 with hardy daring, entered the harbor with a torpedo-boat, and in spite 
 of the strenuous efforts of Lieut. Warley, then commanding the Albe- 
 marle, succeeded in blowing her up." 
 
 As has been stated by Commander Maffitt, the Confed- 
 erate authorities, in 1864, had organized and equipped another 
 naval force in the waters of North Carolina. 
 
 The co-operating naval expedition was under the command 
 of Commander E. F. Pinkney. Commander J. W. Cooke com- 
 manded the iron-clad gunboat Albemarle, in Roanoke River, 
 Lieut. B. P. Loyall commanded the iron-clad gunboat Neuse, 
 in the Neuse River, and Lieut. R. B. Minor, commanded a flo- 
 tilla of " cutters " in the Chowan River. 
 
 Plymouth is in Washington county, near the mouth of the 
 Roanoke River, and the country around was very rich and 
 full of supplies. The two other places held by the Federal 
 forces on the North Carolina coast were Washington, at the 
 mouth of Tar River, and Newberne, at the mouth of the Neuse. 
 The latter was strongly garrisoned; but it was supposed that 
 the larger part of the forces at Washington had been moved 
 up to Plymouth. , . , j_ i 
 
 The contest for the capture of Plymouth lasted night and 
 day, from Sunday the 16th to the aoth, and resulted m the 
 capture of the city by Gen. Hoke, including Gen. Wessels and 
 his forces, numbering over 1,500 men, and twenty-five pieces 
 of artillery. 
 
 On Monday morning the U. S. gunboat Bombshell ran up 
 the Roanoke River to reconnoitre, and observing the ram Albe- 
 marle approaching turned to steam down to the U. S. fleet, but 
 was struck by a shell from a Confederate battery, and sunk. 
 
 1 The gunboat Bomishell was one of the vessels two small light pieces. Her early history may 
 liBedbyaieU.S.MarineArtmerycorps. She was be found among the records of the Erie Canal, 
 an ordinary canal boat, mounting one gun and She was purchased, with four others, for the 
 
408 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Below the town of Plymouth, in the broad waters of the 
 sounds of North Carolina, were five U. S. gunboats — the WTiite- 
 head, the Southfield, the Miami, the Ceres, the Mattahessett, the 
 Sassacus, and the Wyalusing, 
 
 The approach of the Albemarle had been made known to 
 the officers commanding the Federal fleet, and every prepara- 
 tion had been made to meet and overpower her. The South- 
 field and the Miami had been chained together for the purpose 
 of' running bows on, and possibly in obedience tothe instruc- 
 tions of Eear Admiral Lee, that *^ the great point is to get and 
 hold position on each side of the ram. Have stout lines with 
 small heaving lines thereto, to throw across the ends of the 
 ram, and so secure her between two of our vessels. Her plat- 
 ing will loosen and bolts fly like canister, and the concussion 
 will knock down and demoralize her crew if they keep their 
 ports down." 
 
 To encounter that formidable squadron, Commander 
 Cooke ^ steamed slowly down the Eoanoke, in the early morn- 
 ing of April 19th. The Federal vessels came on at full speed — 
 the Miami and the Southfield chained together. The former 
 was struck by the Albemarle on the port bow, and later the 
 Southfield, pierced by a shot, rapidly sank. The Miami, un- 
 injured, surged a little off, passed ahead and delivered her 
 broadside at short range ; using her 100-pounder rifle and 
 nine-inch guns, loaded with shells. It was directly after 
 that fire that Flusser, commanding the Miami, fell, struck by 
 a piece of shell, which bounded from the side of the ram — and 
 
 Bumside expedition. The othera were named a negro coal-heaver to the enemy, wh.o prevented 
 
 reBpectively Grenade, Rocket, Schrapnel and it. MidBhipman William O. Jackson was shot 
 
 Orape^ot. They were officered and manned by and taken on board a Federal vessel where be 
 
 marine artillerists, under Col. Howard, formerly died in twenty hours. He was a meritorious- 
 
 of the United States revenue service. officer." 
 
 Lieut. Commander Cooke in this desperate 
 
 J Capt. James Wallace Cooke entered the TJ. S. engagement displayed the greatest gallantry, 
 
 navy April Ist, 1828, and resigned as lieutenant He fired all the muskets brought to him by Mr 
 
 May 1st, 1861. On May 4th, 1861, he received an Bagley from the armory, and was badly wounded 
 
 appointment in the navy of Virginia, and on in the right arm, and received a thrust from a. 
 
 June 11th, 1861, entered the service of the C. S. bayonet in the leg. He was kindly and courte- 
 
 navy. He was engaged in blockading the ously treated by his captors, and paroled and 
 
 Potomac at Aquia Creek until after the battle allowed to return to his home at Portsmouth, 
 
 of Manassas, when he was ordered to take com- Va., until exchanged. He remained in Ports- 
 
 mand oi a small steamer at the Gosport navy- mouth until March 8th, 1862, when he removed 
 
 yard for operations in North Carolina waters. to Warrenton, N. C. He was exchanged in 
 
 He was employed in putting obstructions at the September, and on the 17th of that month wa& 
 
 entrance of Albemarle Sound to prevent the promoted to Commander in the C. S. navy, with 
 
 entrance of the Federal gunboats to Roanoke orders to proceed to Halifax on the Roanoke 
 
 Island. These were afterwards removed by River, in North Carolina, to build a gunboat, 
 
 order of the commanding general, and the He selected as his navy-yard the farm of Peter E. 
 
 island and Elizabeth City captured. In the Smith at Edward's Ferry. From this land the 
 
 battle of Roanoke Island, Lieut. Cooke, while in timber for building the Albemarle was cut, and 
 
 command of the EUis, was the last to haul off, here her keel was laid. The citizens of the 
 
 after he had fired all his ammunition and that neighborhoodrenderedCommanderCookeevery 
 
 taken from the Curlew, which was disabled. lu assistance in their power. There were, how- 
 
 his official report of the naval engagement at ever, no machine shops, no shipwrights, and no 
 
 Elizabeth City he said: "Being surrounded and collection of matei-ial for ship-building. There 
 
 boarded by two of the enemy's vessels ; and was an inexhaustible supply of pine for the 
 
 having made every possible effort of resistance, frame, but even this was sprouting and bloom- 
 
 and seeing that it was in vain t<} resist further, ing in the green tree. Iron, bo indispensable in 
 I gave the order to blow up the vessel. I ordered . the equipment of an iron-clad, in the neighbor- 
 
 the men to save themselves, if possible, as the hood of Commander Cooke's navy-yard, was 
 
 vessel was near shore. Several had been killed. scarce to the degree of a famine. His entreatiea 
 
 The order to blow up the boat was betrayed by at the Tredegar Iron Works, iu Richmond, for 
 
OOMMANDEE JAMES W. COOKE. C. S. N. 
 
THE CONPEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 409 
 
 several others were wounded at the same time. At that mo- 
 ment the bow-hawser parted and the after-hawser being cut 
 or broken, the Miami swung round to starboard and the 
 Southfield sank. The Albemarle then turned again upon the 
 Miami, whose officer reported that "from the fatal effects of 
 her prow upon the Southfield, and our sustaining injury, I 
 deemed it useless to sacrifice the Miami in the same way " and 
 withdrew from action. 
 
 This great triumph of the Albemarle was a severe disap- 
 pointment to the Federal authorities, and the Navy Depart- 
 ment called upon Capt. Melancton Smith to destroy the 
 ram; and Admiral Lee said to Capt. Smith, "entrusted by 
 the Department with the performance of this signal service, 
 I leave (with the expression of my views) to you the manner 
 of executing it." To the discharge of that duty Capt. Smith, 
 on May 30th, hoisted his flag on the "double ender " Matta- 
 bessett, and arranged the following order of fighting: 
 
 " The steamers will advance in the third order of steaming, the Miami 
 leading the second line of steamers. The Mattabessett, Sassacus, Wyalusing 
 and PI%ite7ieaQ! forming the right column, and thjd Miami, Ceres, Commo- 
 dore Hull and Seymour the left. 
 
 " The proposed plan of attack will be for the large vessels to pass as 
 close as possible to the ram without endangering their wheels, delivering 
 their flre and rounding to immediately, for a second discharge. 
 
 " The steamer Miami will attack the ram and endeavor to explode 
 her torpedo at any moment she may have the advantage, or a favorable 
 opportunity. Ramming may be resorted to, but the peculiar construction 
 of the sterns of ' double enders ' will render this a matter of serious con- 
 sideration with their commanders, who may be at Uberty to use their 
 judgment as to the propriety of this course when a chance presents itself." 
 
 this necessary article secured for him the name the enemy's ships and batteries; and in co- 
 of the "Iron Captain." After the launch of the operating with the army in the capture of Ply- 
 Mbenmrle she was removed to Halifax, N. C, for mouth, N. C. ; and in the action of the 6th of 
 completion. As it was feared the waters of the May, 1864, between the sloop Albemarle, under 
 river would be too low to get her down in the your command, and nine of the enemy's guii- 
 summer, about April Ist she was removed about boats in Albemarle Sound, 
 twenty mUes lower down to Hamilton. Here "S. R. Mai,loby, Secretary of the Navy." 
 Commander Cooke and his men suffered from He was reUeved from the immediate command 
 the effects of bad water and poor food, consisting ^f tjjg Albemarle and placed in command of the 
 almost wholly of coarse, unbolted corn-meal and naval forces operating in the waters of North 
 bacon. At this time the indefatigable com- Carolina, in the neighborhood of Plymouth, 
 mandcr worked on board of his ship from sun- Lieut. Commander John N. Mafatt relieved 
 rise until very of teu to midnight. About the capt. Cooke in command of the Albemarle, and 
 lethot April Gen. Hoke, commander of the land j^ ^ short time he being required for other 
 forces, visited the Albemarle, and notwithstand- a^ty^ Lieut. Commander A. ¥. Warley succeeded 
 ing she was far from being finished, her heroic jijm. The Albemarle was destroyed by a torpedo 
 commander promised that she would be ready while under the command of Lieut. Commander 
 to co-operate with him in the Confederate attack Warley. While the Albemarle was being built 
 on Plymouth. How far Commander Cooke kept on tj^g Roanoke Kiver, the Confederate govern- 
 his promise, and (he distingmshed part the mgnj „as engaged in building another iron-clad 
 Albemarle took in that gallant affair, has been ^n the Neuse Kiver. This vessel was never 
 elsewhere shown. After the successful engage- completed, but was destroyed after the loss of 
 ments of the Albemarle, Commander Cooke was tjjg Albemarle. Capt. Cooke remained at Halifax 
 promoted to the rank of Captain in the Pro- ^,ntii that place was abandoned by the Con- 
 visional Navy of the ConfederatB States. The federates about the Ist of April, 1865. H.e per- 
 letter conveying the commission was as follows: formed arduous service during this time in 
 "Capt. James W. Cooke, PlyTntmth, N. C: facilitating army movenieuts, and laying tor- 
 " Sia — You are hereby informed that the Presi- pedoes in the rivers, which were very effective 
 dent has appointed you, with the advice and in destroying several of the enemy's gunboats, 
 consent of the Senate, a Captain in the Pro- and preventing marauding expeditions in the 
 visional Navy of the Confederate States for interior of North Carolina. Capt. Cooke re- 
 gallant and meritorious conduct in command of turned to Portsmouth, Va., after the surrender 
 the iron-clad steam sloop AWemMrle on the 19th, of Gen. Lee, and spent the remainingfouryears 
 20th and 21st days of April, 1864, in attacking of his life there, dying in 1869. 
 
410 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 In that order of battle, Capt. Smith's squadron on May 
 5th, when near the buoy at the mouth of the river, saw the 
 Albemarle moving down to the sound, accompanied by the 
 little transport Cotton Plant and captured gunboat Bombshell. 
 Observing the enemy's fleet. Commander Cooke ordered the 
 Cotton Plant to seek a place of safety and proceeded on with 
 the Bombshell. A Confederate eye-witness gives the follow- 
 ing description : 
 
 " Three very large gunboats were moving swiftly around Sandy Point 
 and directly for the rain. She meanwhile stood still, her brave httle con- 
 sort slightly in the advance, and as the forward vessel came within range, 
 saluted her with one of her deep-mouthed guns. Very promptly the Fed- 
 eral forces responded with one of theirs, and the fight began. 
 
 " The enemy came on in single file and at full speed. The foremost 
 vessel ran straight up to the ram, as if she would run her down, veered 
 off a httle, passed ahead and gave her a broadside ; then crossed her bows, 
 returned and deUvered another broadside, and passed on out of range. 
 The second and third steamers moved and fired in like manner. The first 
 repeated these evolutions, and was again followed by the other two. This 
 terrific grand waltz continued for some time, the ram receiving the tre- 
 mendous fire apparently with the most stoical coolness and indifference, 
 and delivering her fatal bolts deliberately and accurately, while the enemy 
 fired rapidly and very wildly. 
 
 "Meantime the inglorious squadron of observation, with one addi- 
 tional boat, were coming up from the distant rear, and very cautiously 
 joining, one by one, and at long range, in the melee. The Uttle Sombshell 
 had been standingup bravely to the large vessels as they passed, they con- 
 temptuously sparing her till her sharp fire provoked them to attack her. 
 The rear boat, avoiding closer quarters with the ram, found a nearer and 
 less formidable antagonist in the Sombshell, which, undismayed, main- 
 tained a brisk fight with nearly the whole squadron for some minutes, 
 till, surrounded and cut off from her consort and protector, she raised a 
 white fiag and dropped out of action — a captive, mute and motionless, 
 and awaiting the orders of captors. 
 
 "During this time the guns of the ram had been doing execution. 
 From the hold of the largest steamer issued a thick column of smoke, 
 wliieh increased as the cloud of powder smoke was blown away. She 
 ceased firinjr, and all hands seemed to engage in subduing the flames. Af- 
 ter half an hour's work this was accomplished, and again she mingled in 
 the dreadful fray. The battle now raged more fiercely than ever. The 
 ram, to our surprise, began to move slowly toward Plymouth, firing regu- 
 larly, but at longer intervals, while the enemy pressed her more hotly. 
 The larger steamers kept up their solemn waltz, varied with occasional 
 digressions; the smaller boats moved a Uttle nearer, and the whole nine 
 vomited forth their shell and solid shot at irregular "but frequent inter- 
 vals. Sometimes the whole number, the ram included, were completely 
 shrouded in thick, white smoke, which lay upon the blue, rippling, glanc- 
 ing waters Uke a thunder cloud in a clear summer sky, while naught else 
 was seen of the fierce conflict behind it but columns of snowy spray, ris- 
 ing successively in long lines as the bsills ricoehetted across the water. 
 Then the soft south wind would lift the curtain just in time to disclose 
 the red flashes of new broadsides from the enemy, or the jet of lurid 
 fire which preceded one of the sonorous, metallic voices of the iron 
 monster. 
 
 " Now one of the enemy's largest vessels has withdrawn from the 
 fight and steams rather slowly behind Sandy Point, where she stiU lies at 
 this moment, badly crippled; the ram meanwhile steadly pursuing her 
 course towards Roanoke River, and firing leisurely as she moves. The 
 fire of the enemy somewhat slackens, and only the two remaining large 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 411 
 
 •vessels continue the pursuit. Presently they stop and wait for two 
 smaUer boats commg up, and while the four are lying in a group, as if in 
 consultation, we distinctly hear the dull crash of a ball from the ram as it 
 bunesitself moneof the wooden huUw. As if maddened by the blow, 
 they start more eagerly after the retreating monster, who now nears the 
 nver s mouth. Away in the distance the battle once more rages furiously, 
 and long after we ceased to distinguish the vessels, the flashes of flame 
 were visible till the gathering gloom of evening put an end to the fight. 
 The last gun, as well as the first, was fired by the Albemarle as she entered 
 the Roanoke." 
 
 The Federal accounts, now^ at hand, show that the Matta- 
 bessett, leading the right column of attack, received two shells 
 from the ram, which did considerable wounding among the 
 crew— and that the first line of the enemy's vessels continued 
 their advance, when the Albemarle put her helm to port, with 
 the purpose of ramming the Mattabessett, and that vessel put 
 her helm to starboard to avoid the ram — which action threw 
 the two vessels apart. The Mattabessett in passing delivered 
 Tber broadside of two rifled guns and four nine-inch guns, 
 at a distance of 150 yards; the Sassacus about this time, while 
 nearly abeam the ram, delivered her broadside, and passed 
 astern of the Albemarle, following the Mattabessett, which as 
 she passed the little Bombshell fired her rified gun and howit- 
 zer, and compelled her surrender. The Wyalusing following 
 the Sassacus poured in her broadsides and was followed by 
 the Whitehead; while the ram thus surrounded was replying 
 to her many foes, the Sassacus ran into the Albemarle, striking 
 her nearly at right angles, just abaft the casemate, and at a 
 speed estimated by her commanding officer of not less than 
 ten knots. The ram, though jarred, was able to fire her rifle 
 gun and put a shot through both sides of the Sassacus. Just 
 at that moment three solid shots from 100-pounder rifles were 
 fired into the Albemarle, and shattered on her armor came in 
 fragments on the deck of the Sassacus — but at that moment 
 the ram righting herself sent a shell from her Armstrong gun 
 longitudinally through the Sassacus, which filled her with 
 steam and drove her out of the fight. Baffled at every attack 
 Capt. Smith now, at 5:20, signalled the Miami "to go ahead 
 and try her torpedo" — signals to "keep in line" "close 
 order" and "cease firing" followed at short intervals until at 
 6:55 the Wyalusing replied that she was "sinking" — when the 
 Mattabessett steamed inside and delivered her fire as rapidly 
 as possible when on the quarter and abeam the ram, and en- 
 deavored ineffectually to lay a seine to entangle the propeller 
 of the Albemarle — then the pounding continued until 7:30 p. m., 
 when the enemy retired. In that fight the Mattabessett from 
 her two 100-pounder Parrott rifles expended twenty-seven solid 
 shots, from her four nine-inch Dahlgrens expended twenty- 
 three solid shot; four twenty-four-pounder howitzers expended 
 one shrapnel; two twelve-pounder howitzers expended one shell 
 — casualties; three killed, five wounded. 
 
413 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Sassacus battery, two 100 -pounders Parrott guns, four 
 nine-inch Dahlgrens, two twenty-four-pounder howitzers, two 
 twelve-pounder howitzers, expenditure not given — casualties, 
 one killed, nineteen wounded. 
 
 Wyalusing battery, two 100-pounder Parrott rifles ex- 
 pended forty-seven solid shot, twenty -eight shell; four nine- 
 inch Dahlgrens expended thirty-seven solid shot, thirty- 
 three shell; two twenty-four-pounder howitzers expended 
 twenty -seven Shrapnel, eighteen shell; two twelve-pounder 
 howitzers (one rifled) — casualties, one killed. 
 
 Miami battery, one 100-pounder Parrott rifle expended 
 forty - one solid shot ; six nine-inch Dahlgren expended 
 seventy-six solid shot; one twenty-four-pounder howitzer. 
 
 Whitehead battery, one 100-pounder Parrott rifle ex- 
 pended seventeen solid shot; three twenty -four-pounder how- 
 itzers. 
 
 Commodore Hull battery, two thirty -pounder Parrot rifles, 
 expended sixty shell; four twenty-four-pounder howitzers, 
 expended twenty-four shell. 
 
 Ceres battery, two twenty-pounder Parrott rifles (pivot). 
 
 The Albemarle had one of her two guns disabled early in 
 the action, but notwithstanding that, she maintained her 
 ground, drove off the enemy, disabled, discomfited and de- 
 feated. The "eye-witness," from whom we have already 
 quoted, continued: 
 
 "The shore now bears Innumerable evidences of the damage done to 
 the enemy — splinters and large fragments of oak sheathing, copper fas- 
 tened, portions of window sash, with bits of glass and putty still adher- 
 ing, pieces of paneling and other ornamental work from cabins or 
 saloons, several fine launches, two of which are badly shot to pieces; 
 oars, gun rammei's, window shutters, cabin doors, hatchments, fragments 
 of fine furniture, and even of little articles of toilet and table furniture, 
 with hundreds of other little proofs of the destruction wrought by the 
 gun, rather than the guns, of the ram." 
 
 On the 24th of May, 1864, the Albemarle again made her 
 appearance, dragging for the torpedoes which the enemy had 
 laid in the mouth of the Roanake — the Whitehead observed her 
 and from afar fired a single shell and retired out of the way. 
 
 From the 34th of May to the 37th of October the Albemarle 
 lay in inglorious inactivity at Plymouth. Cooke, her former 
 gallant commander, had broken down in health and had been 
 superseded by Lieut. A. F. Warley, who fought the Manassas 
 so gallantly at New Orleans. This long period of inactivity 
 is unexplained either in contemporaheous accounts or in any 
 extant official records — indeed, the published Confederate 
 Official Records at Washington contain nothing whatever of 
 the ram Albemarle. 
 
 About eleven o'clock at night on May 35th, an effort was 
 made by five volunteers from the U. S. Steamer Wyalusing to 
 destroy the Albemarle while she was lying at Plymouth. The 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 413 
 
 party left their vessel at two o'clock p. m. on the 25th of May, 
 (having made a reconnoissance two days before, ) and ascended 
 the middle river in the MattabesseU's dingey, with two torpe- 
 does (each containing 100 pounds of powder), and their ap- 
 pendages, which they transported on a stretcher across the 
 island swamps. Charles Baldwin, coal-heaver, and John W. 
 Loyd, cockswain, then swam the Eoanoke Eiver, with a line, 
 and hauled the torpedoes over to the Plymouth shore, above 
 the town. They were then connected by a bridle, floated down 
 with the current, and guided by Charles Baldwin, who de- 
 signed to place them across the bow of the ram — one on either 
 side — and Allen Crawford, fireman, who was stationed on the 
 opposite side of the river, in the swamp, was to explode them 
 on a given signal. 
 
 Everything had worked favorably for the enemy from the 
 time of starting until the torpedoes were within a few yards 
 of the ram, when Baldwin was discovered, and hailed by a 
 sentry on the wharf. Two shots were then fired, and a volley 
 of musketry, which induced John W. Loyd, who heard the 
 challenge and reports of small arms, to cut the guiding line, 
 throw away the coil, and swim the river again to join John 
 Laverty, fireman, who was left in charge of his clothes and 
 arms. These two men, with the boat-keeper, Benjamin Loyd, 
 coal-heaver, returned to the Wyalusing on the morning of the 
 27th, after an absence of thirty-eight hours in the swamps, 
 encountering the additional discomfort of a rainy day and 
 night. 
 
 Two days' unsuccessful search was made by the Confed- 
 erates for Baldwin and Crawford, both of whom made their 
 appearance in the Federal fleet on Sunday, the 29th of May, 
 much fatigued by travel, and somewhat exhausted from want 
 of food. The attempt to blow up the Albemarle was defeated by 
 the party accidentally fouling a schooner anchored in the river. 
 The next attempt, however, by Lieut. Commander Wm. B. 
 Cushing, on October 28th, 1864, was more successful. 
 
 On the morning of October 27th, the Albemarle was 
 moored near the wharf at Plymouth, a gangway connecting 
 her with the shore. Some distance down the river, in the 
 stream, lay the hull of the Southfield, sunk there by Capt. Cooke 
 when Plymouth was captured from the Federals. The South- 
 field was used as a picket station by our infantry forces, to 
 which they passed to and from the shore by a boat, and this 
 boat was usually kept at the Southjield. The night was dark 
 and stormy, and the Federal expedition under Lieut. Cushing 
 passed the Confederate pickets on the wreck of the Southfield 
 unobserved. About 3 a. m. a fire on shore lighted the way for 
 Lieut. Cushing, and showed him the Albemarle surrounded 
 by a raft of logs. The lookout on the Albemarle did not dis- 
 cover the approaching enemy until they reached the log barri- 
 cade, about thirty feet from the ram. Although defence was 
 
414 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 attempted, it was too late to prevent the use of torpedoes on 
 the launch from blowing a hole in the bow of the ram, from 
 which she filled and sank. ' 
 
 Thus, by negligence and carelessness on the part of the 
 Confederates, and by the enterprise and gallantry of the Fed- 
 eral detachment, the ram Albemarle, which had successfully 
 stood the solid shot and shell from the Federal gunboats, was 
 destroyed by a launch and thirty brave men, and with the 
 weapon the Confederates had perfected and appropriated as 
 peculiarly theirs. With the destruction of the Albemarle the 
 control of the waters of the North Carolina sounds was again 
 assured to the Federal gunboats. The companion boat of the 
 Albemarle that was building on the Neuse River, was destroyed 
 by a raid of the Federal forces under Gen. Foster; and later, 
 the ram Neuse, in Cape Fear River, was destroyed by the Con- 
 federates, on the retreat of Gen. Hardee after the battle of 
 Kins ton. 
 
 Wilmington continued to resist all efforts for her capture, 
 until exhaustion had weakened the grasp which no Federal 
 effort had been able during four years to un wrench. But 
 while the forts resisted successfully assault after assault, and 
 blockade runners eluded all the watchfulness of the squad- 
 rons — the same fatality seemed to follow Confederate naval 
 vessels at Wilmington, that had destroyed the vessels wher- 
 ever they displayed their colors in battle. 
 
 At half -past seven o'clock on the night of May 6th, 1864, 
 the iron-clad Raleigh, Lieut. Pembroke Jones commanding; 
 bearing the broad pennant of Flag-officer Lynch, with the 
 Yadkin and Equator, two small river steamers, steamed out of 
 New Inlet, Cape Fear River, convoying several blockade run- 
 ners and in quest of the enemy. The Raleigh steamed di- 
 rectly for the U. S. steamer Britannia, with the evident pur- 
 pose of running her down. The intention was discovered in 
 time, but the Britannia narrowly escaped being; injured from 
 her shot and shell. When the Britannia discovered the 
 Raleigh she made signals to the Federal fleet of approaching 
 danger, and fired several shots without effect at the advanc- 
 ing ram. Several blockaders, whose stations were convenient, 
 
 1 See particulars in chapter on torpedoes else- to my notice during the war by my happeninjf 
 
 where. to get hold of his report of the loss of the U. S. 
 
 Of Cooke and Gushing, Capt, W. H. Parker Steamer HUii, under his command, at New 
 
 says : River Inlet, Nov. 24th; 1862. I was impressed 
 
 "I had not known Capt. Cooke in the old with this part of his official report (the italics are 
 navy, but I saw enough of him at Roanoke mine) : ■ and the only alternatives left were a 
 Island and Elizabeth City to know that he was surrender or a pull of one and a lialf miles un- 
 a hard fighter. Few men could have accomp- der their fire in a small boat. The first of these 
 lished what he did in taking the Albemarle down was not, of course, to be thought of.' Knowing 
 the river with the carpenters still at work upon him to be at that time only 19 years old, I com- 
 ber. It was only done by his energy and per- prehended his heroic qualities and was not at 
 severance. He was deservedly promoted for all surprised to hear more of him. Immedi- 
 his services. ately after the war I went to San Francisco, and 
 
 " Young Cusbing had been a pupil of mine at luy first visitor was Cushing. He was the hero 
 
 the Naval Academy in 1861. He was rather a of the hour and the citizens made much of him. 
 
 delicate-looking youth, fair, with regular, clear- Under the circumstances, I thought he con-' 
 
 cut features, and a clear, greyish-blue eye. He ducted himself with much modesty. He died. 
 
 stood low in his classes. He was first brought in ISli."— Recollections of a Navy Officer, p 340. ' 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 415 
 
 stood for the scene, thinking that it was a blockade-runner 
 trying to escape. When the Baleigh got within 60i) yards of 
 the Britannia she began firing, the first shot putting out the 
 Britannia's binnacle light, and the next going over her star- 
 board paddle box. The Britannia then burned a blue light 
 when the Raleigh fired again. The Britannia in her efforts 
 to elude the Baleigh changed her course three times, until she 
 passed the buoy and got into shallow water, where she burned 
 several Coston signals for assistance from the Federal fleet. 
 The Baleigh then changed her course and steering northeast, 
 about midnight, ran for the U. S. Steamer Nansemond. The 
 Federal vessel challenged the Baleigh a third time, and then 
 ran off and opened fire with her after-howitzer. The Baleigh 
 immediately replied by a shot, which passed over and near the 
 Nansemond' s walking beam, the Baleigh at this time not being 
 over 500 yards distant. Several shots were exchanged on both 
 sides until the Nansemond got out of range. Near daylight 
 the Baleigh sighted the U. S. steamer Howquah, which put to 
 sea with all speed after firing twenty shot and shell. The 
 Baleigh returned the fire with her bow gun, one shell going 
 through the Howquah' s smoke-stack. At daylight the Nanse- 
 mond, Mount Vernon, Howquah, Britannia, Kansas, Niphon 
 and the entire Federal fleet came upon the scene of action, 
 when the Baleigh and her consorts returned up the river. The 
 ill-fated luck of the Confederate vessels overtook the Baleigh 
 as she crossed the bar. She stuck and " broke her back."' 
 
 - The Federal blockading fleet, believing that the iron-clad 
 which had been destroyed on the bar a little above Fort Fisher 
 was the North Carolina, organized an expedition under the 
 command of Lieut. Commander William B. Cushing, U. S. N., 
 to attempt the destruction of the only remaining iron-clad in 
 Cape Fear River, which they supposed was the iJa^eig'fe. Before 
 proceeding on his perilous journey, Lieut. Cushing deemed it 
 prudent to make a thorough reconnoissance of Wilmington 
 harbor, to determine the position of the Baleigh, and to post 
 Acting Rear Admiral S. P. Lee, commanding the North At- 
 lantic blockading squadron, in regard to the city, land and 
 
 1 Commander Jones asked for a Court of In- mained outside the bar of Cape Fear River fora 
 
 quiry which examined the circumstances with few hours with apparent [safety]; but, m the 
 
 the foUowine result: opinion of the court, it would have been im- 
 
 . m- „ , TIT n T„„. c 1 BKi proper; and, in view of all the circumstances, 
 
 z, , ATWli.MmGTON,N C, June 6, 18^ £er commanding ofBcer was justified in at- 
 
 Beport of the Cmrl of Inquiry cmvmed tofanim^ ^^^^ ^o go b£=k into the harbor when he did. 
 
 vntoOie armmstanc^ condoled wtthUwlogof V ^^^^^^ ^^^ ;^.^^ ^j ^^^ „„^rt, that the 
 
 the iron-clad sloop Raleigh, m the Cape liar ^^^^^ ^^ ^^^^^ ^j the RaUigh was too great, even 
 
 ■m?"!?''' _x ^ • ■ • J ■ J. 11 iv,„ *.„f= lightened as she had been on this occasion, to 
 
 TheCourthavingmqmred intn all the facta J,>S passage of the bar, except under 
 
 connected with the loss of toe C. S. steamer J^^^^'ble cir^mstonces, a safe operation, par- 
 
 R2lmgh. m the waters of North C^ohna have JfJ^i^^i ^^ j^ej. strength seems to have been in- 
 
 the honor to report the same together with our ^^ j^j ^ enable hir to sustain the weight of 
 
 opinion upon the pomts m which it is required ^^^ armor long enough to permit every prae- 
 
 by the precept. ^ ^^ , „„**!,„ ticable means of lightening her to be exhausted. 
 
 In the opinion of the court, the loss of the ">'"'"'= „!„„„„ w ti„tttwo 
 
 BaUigh cannotbeattrlbutedtothenegligenceor *^^° ?.„„Vi:^ w^ Pramfcn( 
 
 inattention on the part of any one on board of Captain and Frmdent. 
 
 her, and every effort was made to save said vessel. J. W. B. Geeenhow, 
 
 We further find that the Raleigh could have re- Surgeon and Judge Advocau. 
 
416 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 water defences of that port. He left the U. S. steamer Mon- 
 ticello oft Wilmington, N. C, on the night of the 23d of June, 
 in the first cutter, with two officers (Acting Ensign J. E. Jones 
 and Acting Master's Mate William Ho worth) and fifteen 
 men, and started in for the west bar. In his official report to 
 Eear Admiral Lee, dated July 3d, he says : 
 
 "We succeeded in passing the forts, and also the town and batteries 
 of SmithviUe, and pulled swiftly up the river. As we neared the Zeke 
 Island batteries, we narrowly escaped being run down by a steamer, and 
 soon after came near detection from the guard boat; evading them all we 
 continued our course. As we came abreast of the Old Brunswick batter- 
 ies, some fifteen miles from the starting point, the moon came out 
 brightly and discovered us to the sentinels on the banks, who hailed at 
 once, and soon commenced firing muskets and raising an alarm by noises 
 and signal lights. We pulled at once for the other shore, obliquing so as 
 to give them to understand that we were going down; but as soon as I 
 found that we were out of the moon's rays, we continued our course 
 straight up, thereby baffling the enemy and gaining safety. When within 
 seven miles from Wilmington, a good place was selected on the shore; the 
 boat hauled up, and into a marsh, and the men stowed along the bank. 
 It was now nearly day, and I had determined to watch the river, and if 
 possible to capture some one from whom information could be gained. 
 Steamers soon began to ply up and down, the fiag-ship of Commodore 
 Lynch, the Tadkin, passing within two hundred yards. She is a wooden 
 propeller steamer of about three hundred tons, no masts, one smoke- 
 stack, clear deck, English build, with awning spread fore and aft, and 
 mounting only two guns; did not seem to have many men. Nine steam- 
 ers passed in all, three of them being fine, large blockade-runners. Just 
 after dark, as we were preparing to move, two boats rounded the point; 
 and the men thinking it an attack, behaved in the coolest manner. Both 
 boats were captured, but proved to contain a fishing party returning to 
 Wilmington. From them I obtained all the information that I desired, 
 and made them act as my guides in my further explorations of the river. 
 
 " Three miles below the city I found a row of obstructions, consisting 
 of iron-pointed spiles driven in at an angle, and only to be passed by 
 going into the channel left open, about two hundred yards from a heavy 
 ibattery that is on the left bank. 
 
 "A short distance nearer the city is a ten-gun navy battery, and 
 another line of obstructions, consisting of diamond-shaped crates, filled 
 and supported in position by two rows of spiles; the channel in this in- 
 stance being within fifty yards of the guns. A third row of obstructions 
 and another battery complete the upper defences of the city. The river 
 is also obstructed by spiles at Old Brunswick, and there is a very heavy 
 earthwork there. Discovering a creek in the Cypress swamp, we pulled 
 or rather poled up it for some time, and at length came to a road which, 
 upon being explored, proved to connect with the main road from Fort 
 Fisher and the sounds to Wilmington. Dividing my party, I left half to 
 hold the cross-road and creek, while I marched the remainder some two 
 miles to the main road and stowed away. About 11:30 A. M. a mounted 
 soldier appeared with a mail-bag, and seemed much astonished when he 
 was invited to dismount, but as I assured him that I would be responsi- 
 ble for any delay that might take place, he kindly consented to shorten 
 his journey. About two hundred letters were captured, and I gained 
 such information as I desired of the fortifications and enemy's force. As 
 an expedition was contemplated against Fisher by our army about this 
 time, the information was of much value. There are thirteen hundred 
 men in the fort; and the unprotected rear that our troops were to storm 
 is commanded by four light batteries. I enclose rebel requisition and re- 
 port of provisions on hand. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 417 
 
 " I now waited for the courier from the other direction, in order that 
 ■we might get the papers that were issued at 1 P. m. in Wilmington; but 
 just as he hove in sight, a blue jacket exposed himself, and the fellow 
 took to instant flight. My pursuit on the captured horse was rendered 
 useless from the lack of speed, and the fellow escaped after a race of some 
 two miles. 
 
 " In the meantime we captured more prisoners, and discovered that a 
 store was located about two miles distant, and being sadly in need of 
 some grub, Mr. Howorth, dressed in the courier's coat and hat, and 
 mounted upon his horse, proceeded to market. He returned with milk, 
 chickens, and eggs, having passed every one, in and out of service, with- 
 out suspicion, though conversing with many. At 6 p. M., after destroying 
 a portion of the telegraph wire, we rejoined the party at the creek, and 
 proceeded down, reaching the river at dark. In trying to land our prison- 
 ers upon an island, a steamer passed so close that we had to jump over- 
 board, and hold our heads below the boat to prevent being seen. As we 
 had more prisoners than we could look out for, I determined to put a por- 
 tion of them in small boats, and set them adrift without oars or sails, so 
 that they could not get ashore in time to injure us. This was done, and 
 we proceeded down the river, keeping a bright look out for vessels in or- 
 der to burn them, if possible. None were found, but I found the pilot to 
 take me to where the ram Raleigh was said to be wrecked. She is indeed 
 •destroyed, and nothing now remains of her above water. The iron-clad 
 North Carolina, Capt. Muse commanding, is in commission, and at anchor 
 oflE the city. She is but little relied upon, and would not stand long 
 against a monitor. Both torpedo boats were destroyed in the great cot- 
 ton fire some time since. One was very near completion. As I neared the 
 forts at the east bar, a boat was detected making its way rapidly to the 
 shore, and captured after a short chase. It contained six persons, four 
 of whom were soldiers. Taking them all into one boat, I out theirs adrift, 
 but soon found that twenty-six persons were more than a load. By ciues- 
 tions I discovered that at least one guard-boat was afloat, containing 
 seventy-five musketeers, and situated in the narrow passage between Fed- 
 eral Point and Zeke Island. As I had to pass them, I determined to en- 
 gage the enemy at once, and capture the boat if possible. 
 
 "The moon was now bright, and as we came nearer the entrance, I 
 saw what we supposed to be one large boat just off the battery; but as 
 we prepared to sail into her, and while about twenty yards distant, three 
 more boats suddenly shot out from that side, and five more from the 
 other, completely blocking up the sole avenue of escape. I immediately 
 put the helm down, but found a large sail-boat filled with soldiers to wind- 
 ward, and keeping us right in the glimmer of the moon's rays. In this try- 
 ing position both officers and men acted with true coolness and bravery. 
 
 " Not the stroke of an oar was out of time; there was no thought of 
 surrender, but we determined to outwit the enemy or fight it out. Sud- 
 denly turning the boat's head, we dashed off as if for the west bar, and 
 by throwing the dark side of the boat towards them, were soon lost to 
 view. The bait was eagerly seized, and their whole line dashed off at 
 once to intercept us. Then again turning, by the extraordinary pulling 
 of my sailors I gained the passage of the island, and before the enemy 
 could prevent, put the boat into the breakers oh Caroline shoals. The 
 rebels dared not follow, and we were lost to view before the guns of the 
 iorts, trained on the channel, could be brought to bear upon our unex- 
 pected position. Deeply loaded as we were, the boat carried us through 
 in fine style, and we reached the Cherolcee just as the day was break- 
 ing, and after an absence from the squadron of two days and three 
 nights." 
 
 The U. S Navy Department had endeavored, from the 
 ■winter of 1863, to induce the War Department to make a joint 
 attack upon the defences of Cape Fear River, but the latter 
 
 27 
 
418 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 department claimed that no troops could be spared for the ex- 
 pedition. Lieut. Gen. Grant, late in the summer of 1864, gave 
 his attention to the subject and decided that a body of troops 
 could be spared to make the attack about the 1st of October. 
 Upon consultation he was of the opinion that the best results 
 would follow the landing of a large army, under the guns of 
 the U. S. navy, on the open beach north of New Inlet, to 
 take possession and intrench across to Cape Fear River, the 
 navy to occupy the attention of the Confederate works on 
 Federal Point with a heavy fire, in conjunction with the army, 
 and at the same time, such force as could run the batteries 
 was to do so, and thus isolate the Confederates. " The oper- 
 ation," says Secretary Welles, '■' is an important one, as closing 
 the last port of the rebels, and destroying their credit abroad, 
 by preventing the exportation of cotton, as well as preventing 
 the reception of munitions and supplies from abroad." 
 
 Rear Admiral David G. Farragut was assigned to the 
 command of the North Atlantic Squadron on the 5th of Sep- 
 tember, and the whole subject was committed to his hands. 
 The necessity of rest, however, rendered it important that he 
 should come immediately North, and he declined the com- 
 mand of the operating Federal navy forces. The command 
 was then given to Rear Admiral David D. Porter, and every 
 squadron was depleted and vessels detached from other duty 
 to strengthen the expedition. 
 
 It was arranged that an attack should be made on the 1st 
 of October, but it was postponed to the 15th, and in the mean- 
 time over 150 vessels of war were concentrated at Hampton 
 Roads and Beaufort, to form the attacking squadron. 
 
 This immense fleet of war vessels remained idle, awaiting 
 the movements of the army, until the day before Christmas, 
 when it went into position and attacked the forts at the mouth 
 of the Cape Fear River. 
 
 William R. Mayo, who was a midshipman in the Confed- 
 erate States Navy, but who is now (1887) Collector of the port 
 of Norfolk, Va., and who took a prominent part in the defence 
 of Fort Fisher, has kindly furnished the following interesting 
 narrative of the two attacks on that fort : 
 
 " During the summer of 1864, the navy of the Confederacy stationed at 
 "Wilmington, or a portion of it, together -with officers and men from some 
 other stations, were put ashore at the mouth of New Inlet to garrison a 
 battery built at Confederate or Federal Point, which was commanded by 
 Lieut. Robert T. Chapman, formerly of the U. S. navy, then of the C. S 
 navy. This battery was called by Gen. Whiting, ' Buchanan, ' after the 
 admiral. It was built somewhat after the fashion of the Mound Battery 
 of Port Fisher, though a more complete and formidable work. It mounted 
 two Brooke guns of heavy calibre. The names of most of the officers of 
 this battery have escaped me. It is well known that Fort Fisher was 
 built along the Atlantic coast line, which line was about North and South. 
 Battery Buchanan was located to the west of and about a mile from 
 the mound at Fort Fisher on the extreme south point of the Atlantic 
 beach, the land falling back at this point in a westerly direction for about 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 419 
 
 a mile. The first attack of the Federal fleet that was made during the 
 latter days of December, 1864, was confined entirely to Fort Fisher, 
 they paying no attention to Battery Buchanan— indeed If they knew it 
 were there is doubtful. Having no demand for the garrison at home.there- 
 fore, about one-half of the men and oflicers were sent to reheve the Fort 
 Fisher garrison, and were stationed principally at the guns on what is 
 known as the land face of the fort — the chief point of attack. The next 
 day these were relieved and the other half of the Buchanan garrison were 
 sent up. Thus, all of the garrison had a chance at this attack to help re- 
 ply to the salutations of the Federal fleet, and those of the last day to 
 witness at night Mr. Butler's reconnoisance in force— which resulted in his 
 withdrawal the next morning and the sailing away of the fleet. Some 
 two weeks afterwards the second attack was made. Admiral Porter again 
 in command of the fleet, but Mr. Butler was succeeded by Gen. Terry. 
 This time the attack of the fleet was more systematic and well organized. 
 Instead of, as in the first attack, moving around in a circular direction at 
 too great a distance generally for the most effective work of the long range 
 guns of the fleet, and much too far for a fair exchange of courtesies, our 
 guns being of shorter range, each ship fired her battery as she came 
 abreast of us. This was the general tactics of the first attack — the iron- 
 clads and lighter gunboats came at once in close to the beach, and the 
 iron-clads apparently anchored. The next of the fieet taking up a posi- 
 tion farther out, and all paying their especial attention to the land face 
 of the fort, the idea being to disable this portion of the fort, which was 
 the only obstacle in the way of the army, which had been landed some 
 eight miles up the beach. There must have been some lour or five hun- 
 dred guns brought to bear upon this earthwork during this attack. Dur- 
 ing the first day of this second attack no special attention was paid to 
 the southern point of the fort, or mound as it was called, but if my mem- 
 ory is not here again at fault, during the morning of the second day 
 one or more of the enemy's vessels seemed to have been directed to shell 
 this particular spot, which they did, and later in the day a detachment of 
 several double-end ers and the lighter gunboats, some six or eight, perhaps, 
 in number, came around the south and east of the mound directly in the in- 
 let, and evidently for the purpose of attacking Battery Buchanan and run- 
 ning in the river, thus taking the fort in the rear, which, had it been ac- 
 complished, rendered a surrender at once imperative. I think Admiral 
 Porter saw this, and as the work was the navy's, would have been de 
 lighted to have stamped it as such while the army was lying hid away 
 among the sand hills up the beach. During all this day, the first of the 
 second attack, the garrison of Battery Buchanan was in Fort Fisher, man- 
 ning the land face guns mot all of them, of course), which were one by 
 one disabled by the terrific bombardment, and until the demonstration 
 was made upon our own battery and the inlet. At this time the Con- 
 federate navy detachment was withdrawn from Fort Fisher and placed 
 in Battery Buchanan. The vessels sent around in front of us were 
 shy, keeping well off, being evidently uncertain of what we were and 
 of the channel also. In a few minutes they had a fleet of several boats 
 out sounding, and these came in and in, until within range of our guns, 
 when they were opened upon by the gun covering this particular pomt. 
 There is one circumstance which I remember distinctly in this con- 
 nection which is worthy of note. Bach of these boats was in charge of 
 an officer sitting in the stern. One of them more venturesome than the 
 rest came nearer; a shell fired from our gun cut away the flag from his 
 boat: it fell m the water; he backed his boat up to it, picked it up, waved 
 it over his head and replaced it on the broken staff. Another shot was 
 fired at him, which cut his boat in two and spiUed him and his jolly tars 
 in the water, but the other boats instantly came to his rescue, gathered 
 them all in and at once took their departure. The gunboats made no et - 
 fort to run in. I have heard since, and with much pleasure, that no hves 
 were lost on account of this shot, the only casualty being a broken leg. i 
 
430 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 have never learned the name of the ofBcer who commanded that boat, but 
 he certainly did not leave his flag. 
 
 " The Federal fleet, after battering down or disabling all the guns, or 
 nearly aU, on the sea face of Fort Fisher, landed a large force of sailors 
 and marines on the beach in front of the sea face of the fort and made an 
 assault, with great loss. Though proving a great failure in itself, this 
 assault occupied the nearly worn-out and depleted garrison, and had the 
 direct result of admitting the army to the ramparts of the disabled land 
 face of the fort before attention could be given to the assaulting column in 
 that direction. 
 
 " Among those of the garrison of Battery Buchanan who were act- 
 ively engaged in repelling the combined attack of the Federal army and 
 navy, were the Confederate marines under Capt. Van Benthuysen of the 
 C. 8. Marine Corps, who had with him about fifty men. How they worked 
 that night with the rest of th e little garrison falling back from gun chamber 
 to gun chamber can best be told by Col. Lamb. They were all killed or 
 captured. The writer of this took to the water as the Federals, having 
 captured the fort, pushed their way down the beach, and on that January 
 night, in preference to being caught, ran the risk of freezing and drowning 
 too, but finally succeeded in getting in a boat some several hundred yards 
 out. After the fall of Fort Fisher, the navy at Wilmington garrisoned 
 the batteries on the north side of the Cape Fear. The lowermost of them 
 was commanded by Lieut. Gregory, who also escaped from Fisher, and 
 the upper one by Lieut. Camm. I was at the lower one with Lieut. 
 Gregory, and as Gen. Hoke, C. S. army, fell back before the overwhelm- 
 ing numbers of Gen. Terry, this battery finally became the base of the 
 extreme right wing of his army. I think there was some doubt in the 
 Federal mind as to the exact location and character of these batteries. 
 They really amounted to very little, yet great caution was displayed in 
 coming up the river. One morning early, I remember, as the fog Ufted, 
 the sentry reported a monitor in full view from around the point a mile 
 below. Glasses were instantly turned that way, and Gregory after a little 
 observation determined it was a decoy, as it was, an old barge of some 
 sort with a sham turret, and so kept quiet. Not so Camm above us, how- 
 ever ; being a half mile farther away he was deceived, and very soon 
 opened in good earnest, butafterafewshots the monitor (?) retired, having 
 found out where we were, and also that we ' were alive and able to be 
 about.' Here this portion of the navy remained until "Wilmington was 
 evacuated, which was brought about by the advance of a force on the 
 south side of the Cape Fear, Gen. Hoke holding Gen. Terry in check on 
 the north side, when he fell back with the army through North Carolina 
 until it arrived in the lines around Petersburg. The naval force from 
 Wilmington with the army then joined the garrison at Drewry's Bluff on 
 the James River." 
 
 The part taken by the navy contingent in the defence of 
 Battery Buchanan near Fort Fisher, is reported by Lieut. 
 Com. Eobert T. Chapman to Flag-officer R. T. Pinkney, com- 
 manding the naval forces at Wilmington, as follows : 
 
 "BatteetBuchanast, Dec. 29th, 1864. 
 
 " Sir : I reported to yon on the 20th inst. that the fleet of the enemy 
 had arrived off this place. They disappeared on the same day and re- 
 turned on the 23d, and anchored about six miles off Fort Fisher. A de- 
 tachment of twenty -nine men, under Lieut. Roby, was sent from this bat- 
 tery to man the Brooke guns at Fort Fisher. 
 
 " On the 24th, at 12 m., the fleet of the enemy got under way in line 
 ahead (the Ironsides leading), and at one o'clock they opened fire on the 
 fort. There were forty-three vessels engaged, throwing every kind of 
 projectiles from a three-inch bolt to a fifteen-inch shell. A most terrific 
 bombardment continued until 5:30 p. M., when the enemy withdrew. On 
 
THE CONFEDERATE SPATES NAVY. 421 
 
 the 25th, at half-past ten, the fight was renewed by the same number of 
 vessels, and the fire was incessant until 5:30 p. m., when the fleet again 
 went beyond the range of our guns. 
 
 " At half- past two o'clock a number of boats were lowered from the 
 ships of the fleet and approached the battery. I think they were drag- 
 ging for torpedoes. We opened fire on them from one gun, and at the 
 fourth discharge sunk one of their boats ; the others quickly withdrew. 
 At 5:20 P. M. a message was received from Port Fisher saying that the 
 enemy had landed and were advancing on the fort, and asking for rein- 
 forcements. Two-thirds of the men belonging to the battery were imme- 
 diately sent to the fort, under Lieut. Arledge and ofHcers of the companies. 
 They double-quicked to the fort, and got there in time to assist in repel- 
 ling the assault. We were at quarters nearly all Sunday night, expecting 
 an attack from the boats of the fleet. 
 
 " On the 36th, the men belonging to the battery, except those under 
 Lieut. Roby, returned from Fort Fisher. There was no firing on the fort 
 on the 26th. or 27th. On the 26th the forces of the enemy re-embarked, 
 and on the night of the 38th the fleet disappeared, leaving only the regu- 
 lar blockading squadron off this place. 
 
 " Both of the guns commanded by Lieut.Roby burst. I send his report. 
 
 "Passed Midshipmen Gary and Berrien were with Lieut. Roby, and 
 I understand the conduct of these ofHcers and the men with them is above 
 all praise. Out of the twenty -nine men from this battery serving at Fort 
 Fisher nineteen were killed and wounded, and I regret to state that some 
 have since died. Lieuts. Armstrong and Dornin came down as volun- 
 teers. They went to the forts and behaved as gallantly as men could do. 
 Lieut. Dornin was painfully wounded by the explosion of a shell. "^ 
 
 Major Gen. W. H. C. Whiting, in his report of the attack 
 on Fort Fisher under date of December 31st, 1864, presents his 
 
 "Acknowledgements to Flag-officer Pinkney, C. S. N., who was 
 present during the action, for the welcome and efficient aid sent to Col. 
 Lamb, the detachment under Lieut. Roby, which manned the two Brooke 
 guns, and the company of marines under Capt. Van Benthuysen, which 
 reinforced the garrison. Lieut. Chapman, C. S. N., commanding Battery 
 Buchanan, by his skilful gunnery saved us on our right from a movement 
 of the enemy, which, unless checked, might have resulted in a successful 
 passage. 
 
 " The navy detachment at the guns, under very trymg circumstances, 
 did good work. . 
 
 " No commendations of mine can be too much for the coolness, disci- 
 pline and skill displayed by officers and men. 
 
 " Their names have not all been furnished to me, but Lieuts. Roby, 
 Dornin, Armstrong and Berrien attracted special attention throughout. 
 
 "To Passed Midshipman Gary I wish to give personal thanks. 
 Though wounded he reported after the bursting of his gun, to repel the 
 threatened assault, and actively assisted Col. Tansil on the land front. 
 
 "Above all and before all we should be grateful, and I trust all are, 
 for the favor of Almighty God, under which and by which a signal de- 
 liverance has been achieved." 
 
 The landing of the Federal forces was effected on Janu- 
 ary 13th, 18G5, and during the 14th the fire of the Confederate 
 
 1 Lieuts. Thomas L. Domin and K. F. Arm- pressing the guns to sink Lieut. Wm. B. Ousli- 
 
 strona, altliough senior in rank to Lieut. Eoby ing's boat, close mshore draggmg for torpedoes, 
 
 who commanded the naval contingent of two Lieut. Domin was wounded, and Koby ordered 
 
 guns' orew8atBattervBuchanan(namedinhonor to another part of the defences of Tort Jisher. 
 
 of Admiral Franklin Buchanan, 0. S. N.) volun- Lieut. Armstrong then volunteered in a battery 
 
 teered, and served one of the guns as sponger commanded by a North Carolina officer, who hy 
 
 and loader until it burst. They served likewise order of Col. Lamb was detached, and Lieut, 
 
 at the second gun until it burst, caused by de- Armstrong placed in command of the two guns. 
 
423 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 cruiser Chickamauga, which had returned to Wilmington, 
 killed and wounded a number of men, so that Lieut. O'Keeffe, 
 with his corapany of the fifteenth regiment N. Y. V., was di- 
 rected to build a battery of thirty -two-pounder rifle Parrott 
 guns on the bank of the river to drive her oflE. ' 
 
 The following account of the part taken by the officers of 
 the Chickamauga in the defence of Wilmington, is from the 
 pen of Midshipman Clarence Gary, now a prominent member 
 of the New York bar : 
 
 " Arrived at Wilmington, the Chickamauga had for the next month 
 but little to do. There had been some intention on the part of the naval 
 authorities to send her out on another raid, but rumors of an impending 
 great naval demonstration against Fort Fisher decided them to keep the 
 ship at hand for such service as events might enable her to render. In 
 December, these rumors began to take shape, and it became apparent 
 that the most formidable fleet yet called into being by the war was 
 gathering at Hampton Roads, for the projected attack. About the 33d 
 of December, 1864, affairs had progressed to such a degree that the scanty 
 garrison at Fort Fisher was hastily, although still insufBciently, rein- 
 forced, and preparations for resistance hurried forward. A call was made 
 upon the Chicltamauga for sufficient men and officers to man two 
 seven-inch Brooke rifled and banded guns which, taken recently from the 
 sunken Roanoke in the river, had been mounted in a partially completed 
 battery on the sea-face of the fort ; the navy men being desired in this 
 instance, because the soldiers did not understand the tackling and man- 
 agement of the pieces. 
 
 " Accordingly on the morning of the 33d, a picked lot of some twenty- 
 nine blue-jackets from^ the Chickamauga, in charge of Lieut. Roby, 
 and two passed midshipmen, were drafted away for shore service, and 
 soon found themselves tramping over the long sand stretches of Fort 
 Fisher, where, during the next few days, they were destined to meet some 
 novel and adverse experiences. If any anticipation of misfortunes 
 troubled these lads, it was not apparent. They had left the ship in high 
 spirits, envied by those who were forced to remain behind, and the usual 
 sailor-like, devil-may-care hunger for adventure possessed them wholly. 
 
 " The advance vessels of the fleet were already hovering on the coast, 
 a little way to the northward, and it was ' in the air ' that the attack 
 might begin at any moment. The sailor men were quartered in the fort, 
 but the scanty pi-ovision for officers' quarters there forced the lieutenant 
 and midshipmen to find temporary accommodation, pending the outbreak 
 of the expected battle, in a deserted hut, a little way up the beach out- 
 side the fort. This circumstance led to their being closer than any others 
 of the garrison to the scene of explosion of the famous powder-ship, 
 brought in by the enemy on the following night, a demonstration which 
 was expected by its promoters to level the walls of the fort and produce 
 general havoc and dismay in the ranks of its defenders. 
 
 "This is what the Chickamauga' s officers heard of it: Towards morn- 
 ing on the night of the 33d, while sleeping on the floor of the hut in that 
 uneasy half-consciousness which men have, even while asleep, on the 
 eve of battle — for the great fleet was then close at hand and might come 
 in for attack at any high tide— ahalf heard muffled report, such as might 
 come from a distant, heavy gun, was noticed. Rousing at once for atten- 
 tion, for they supposed the sound to be that of an alarm gun, and that it 
 would be followed by the long roll beat of the drums calling the men to 
 the batteries, they waited with an alert interest. But nothing more came 
 of the interruption, and the circumstance was forgotten in renewed slum- 
 ber. It was not learned till afterwards that the sound they heard and 
 
 1 Kep. of Ch. of Engineers of U. S. A., year ending Jan. SOtli, 1866, p. 63. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 433 
 
 puzzled over was the explosion of the powder ship, and that they chanced 
 to be in such close proximity to a form of attack which, if only half its 
 expected success had attended it, would have incidently blown themselves 
 into space. 
 
 " On the following morning, that of Christmas Eve, 1864, when the 
 sky was clear and the sea blue, with just enough westerly breeze to ripple 
 
 XIKB OBCONl'ElIKa.53:ETfaRKg, 
 
 . 1:0 
 
 Rrb oTaXee f Stable). 
 !?- 
 
 the surface of the ocean and stiffen out the dancing flags overhead, the 
 splendid fleet steamed slowly in for the attack. In stately line of battle, 
 three abreast, with the iron-clads in the van and the frigates, sloops of 
 war and gunboats, all trimmed for action, ranged behind, the fifty-flve 
 vessels of the squadron silently advanced. Inside the fort, from the navy 
 guns, now manned by the Chickamauga's people, all the way up the 
 quarter mile of sand mounds composing the sea face, and away back 
 
434 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 along the more elevated land face ■which turned off at right angles till it 
 met the marsh and river at the rear, one could see the motionless groups 
 of grey-uniformed gunners standing silently at the barbette guns, no- 
 movement showing anywhere, except in the flags which still fluttered 
 gaily in the wind. 
 
 ' ' Presently the formidable Ironsides took up her desired position, and 
 rounding sUgntly, jetted out a puff of heavy smoke from one of her bow 
 ports. This, with the screaming, whizzing shell which followed, gave the 
 signal for the heaviest artillery battle of modem times to begin its two 
 days of turmoil. 
 
 ' At the first shot from the enemy, the fort began its response. The 
 rigid groups unlocked, and a lively, rattling interchange of fire opened 
 between the hundreds of guns of the fleet and the fifty odd pieces perched 
 on the sand mounds of the fortress. What with the continuous roar of 
 the firing, and the scarcely frequent reports of bursting shell, the aggre- 
 gate noise was not unhke that of a roUing, volleying, long-sustained thun- 
 der storm. It continued throughout the day tUl, with the setting in of 
 the early winter twilight, the fleet hauled off and left the fort to recoup 
 its damages and wonder at the shower of shell fragments and pit-holes so 
 plentifully besprinkling its spacious surface that turbulent Christmas Eve. 
 The Chiokamauga detachment had found themselves in an unfinished 
 battery, where the incomplete sand mounds, or traverses between the guns, 
 left them somewhat exposed to a raking fire, but they were not without the 
 satisfaction of seeing more than one or two of their chilled bolts and big 
 shells knock a shower of splinters from the wooden ships abreast of the 
 position. An able seaman named Higgins had been the first to figure in 
 the list of casualties. Early in the day he found his left leg spinning 
 away from him across the sand plain before a bursting shell. Later, other 
 mishaps here and there occurred, and in the afternoon a shell burst in the 
 battery of gun No. 1, which sent a five-pound fragment through the 
 shoulder of a sailor, and at the same moment bestowed a crack on the 
 knee to the officer in charge. It had not been deemed expedient to fire 
 the heavy Brooke guns of the navy detachment oftener than at fifteen- 
 minute intervals, by way of saving undue exposure of the guns' crews, 
 and also avoiding heating the pieces; and so, between the discharges, 
 and while crouching in comparative safety under the sand mounds, am- 
 ple opportunity was found to watch the antics of the hostile missiles 
 showered into the fort. These were of aU sorts and sizes, from the big 
 fifteen-inch spherical shot or shell, and the 100-pounder rifled Parrotts, 
 down through the list, and the whiz or whistle of each variety seemed to 
 strike a different and more vicious note. Occasionally a spherical shell, 
 after it had passed safely by, and was nearly spent, exploded with its 
 base turned towards the battery, the result being to toss its bottom-end 
 back among the unprotected gunners, and curiously enough one of these 
 bits delivered a highly-condensed temperance lecture by knocking a bot- 
 tle of grog just then served out to the sailors, from the hands of the man 
 engaged in taking the first pull. The sympathy of the blue jackets was 
 not addressed to the unfortunate sailor who held the bottle, although he, 
 too, had received a knock from the same fragment. 
 
 " In one interval of watching, a young courier was observed miming 
 in at top speed across an exposed place to gain cover under the Chicka- 
 mauga's battery. Before the lad reached it, however, an exploding fifteen- 
 inch shell intervened, and almost eliminated him, so much so, that the 
 saUors could find scarcely a recognizable semblance of humanity left to 
 bury in the little hole they hastily scraped out of the sand for that pur- 
 pose. Some of the missiles striking the sand mounds ' full and by,' sent 
 fountains of dust aloft, while here and there others burrowed in the sand 
 plain, and exploding, left a hole big enough to plant a tree in. Just back 
 of the navy guns, scarcely two hundred yards away, were some frame- 
 work stables in which a few officers' horses had been left in the emergency 
 of the attack. These buildings, being in the hottest line of concentrated 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 435 
 
 fire, and wholly unsheltered, were speedily breached, and set in flames by 
 the shells, leaving the terrified animals free to escape and gallop madly 
 up and down the plain inside the fort, until one after another they were 
 shotdown. One horse, a handsome grey, came back exhausted after his 
 frantic gallop, with the blood from a wound showing plainly on his neck, 
 and stood patiently as near his stable gate as the flames would permit, 
 until another shell fortunately soon finished his affair. 
 
 " Up in the bomb-proof, in the angle formed by the meeting of the 
 land and sea faces of the fort, the surgeons were busily at work over the 
 stream of wounded which trickled in to them during the day, and j ust 
 outside of their doorway, bejrond a little sand-curtain, one found an indi 
 cation of their whereabouts, in the dozen or so of legs and arms which had 
 been hastily tossed there after amputation. The Chiokamauga detach- 
 ment furnished its quota to the hospital, but the worst experience for the 
 sailors was destined to come the following day. 
 
 "Then, on Christmas morning, after an harassing night of false 
 alarms spent by the garrison, the fleet came in again, this time earlier, 
 and prepared for a fuller day of it. The same hammering from the ships, 
 and the same sullen and slow response from the fort, characterized the 
 proceedings of the second day's work during the morning hours, but the 
 enemy's flre increased in intensity in the afternoon, as the preliminary of 
 an attack from the land forces of military, which were then disembarking 
 from, various transports beyond range up the beach. 
 
 " Before this latter demonstration took place, however, the Chicka- 
 mauga's people were treated to a new and highly disagreeable ex- 
 perience. 
 
 " While they were engaged in flring gun No. 1, and just as a shell 
 burst over the battery, severely wounding Lieut. Dornin of the navy, who 
 was standing near, the piece itself exploded with terrific force. This heavy 
 gun, weighing about 15,000 pounds, was split by the explosion from the 
 3aws of the cas-cabet horizontally through to the trunnions, and then 
 sliced perpendicularly through the chase. One-half of its breech was 
 blown back over the heads of a group of oflflcers near by, and the other 
 portion smashed through the carriage to the ground, while the heavy 
 bands from around the breech spread apart and miscellaneously damaged 
 the gun's crew. When the officers at the rear struggled to their feet . . . 
 and whether they were knocked down by concussion or astonishment 
 they never knew ... a strange sight presented itself. 
 
 "One man lay dead, with his arms stretched out towards them and 
 his skull blown off, while another appeared twisted in a knot over a piece 
 of iron band lapped across his stomach. Others were more or less hurt, 
 and one man was leaping about the battery like a lunatic, crying out that 
 he was on fire. He could scarcely be comforted, even when on stripping 
 off his shirt he was found only to be tattooed by grains of powder and 
 sand blown into his back and shoulders. 
 
 "This finished the work of gun No. 1. Its remaining crew turned to 
 at the other gun, and its midshipmen found duty at headquarters in 
 assisting the staff of Gen. Whiting about the preparations then in course 
 to meet the threatened land attack. 
 
 "As it happened curiously enough. Passed Midshipman Berrien s 
 gun, the remaining one of the Chickamauga's battery, soon after followed 
 the bad example of its mate, and exploded much in the same manner, 
 with a further but not so disastrous damage to the crew. 
 
 "By this time, towards three o'clock in the afternoon, there was a 
 slackening of the sheUing on the land face, and a redoubled firing on that 
 fronting the sea, indicating that the land forces were advancing to attack 
 th6 former portion of the fort. Orders were immediately issued by the 
 general to man the breastworks and parapet on that side, and to this end 
 it became necessary to get from out of the bomb-proofs a battalion ot 
 conscripts which had been drafted from home-guard service to eke out 
 the garrison. As these 'Junior Reserves' were the remains of former 
 
436 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 consoriptions, and ooiuposecl of decrepit old men and young boys, with- 
 out experience of service, and wholly unfit lor the field, it was some- 
 what of a task to dislodge them from the ' rat-hole ' where they had 
 sheltered in security while the two days' cannonade had thundered over- 
 head. But by dint of scolding and swearing on the part of the olBcers 
 of the staff, and an occasional use of the flat of the sabre, the unhappy 
 creatures were finally marshalled out on the parapet where thej' made a 
 show of numbers, and so helped out the gallant soldiers of the regular 
 garrison. 
 
 "By this time, a glance over the parapet disclosed an irregular blue 
 line of skirmishers trotting out across the sand plain at the front from a 
 denser body of troops behind them; those in advance alternately putting 
 up their muskets to tire at the men in the fort, and then burrowing like 
 flddler-orabs, behind hastily tossed-up piles of sand. A lively exchange 
 of musketry fire ensued for a few minutes, but it lacked seriousness on 
 the part of the attaclc, and presently lulled, showing the blue coats 
 scampering back out of range. This was all that came of the land at- 
 tack. If it had been pushed with vigor, as was the similar one a few 
 weeks later, it is hardly probable that the fort, weakly garrisoned as it 
 was, could have successfully resisted. 
 
 "When it was observed from the fleet that the mihtary were re- 
 treating, the ships hauled off, out of action, but not without a long, 
 vindictive spurt of terrific shelling at the land face, by way of parting 
 salute. 
 
 "After two days' further waiting, spent in anxiously watching the 
 fleet and the land forces which remained up to the beach, in sight but out 
 of range, the garrison had the agreeable surprise and satisfaction of see- 
 ing the troops re-embark, and their transports, accompanied by the host 
 of war- vessels, fade away out of sight to the northward. For the present, 
 at least, the victory was left with Fort Fisher. 
 
 "The Chickamauga's detachment of thirty-two men and ofBcers, 
 what with the casualties due to their exposed position and to the burst- 
 ing of their guns, had a ' butcher's bill ' of nineteen killed and wounded 
 to show for their share in the two days' affair, and the following morning 
 saw them a shabby, limping squad on foot, with a cart-load of disabled 
 companions trailing on astern ; marching back across the sandy plains to 
 where the ship lay anchored in the river. 
 
 " They had received a kind congratulation from Gen. Whiting, and 
 a cordial mention in his official report, as also pleasant demonstrations 
 fi-om gallant Col. Lamb and the garrison on leaving the fort; but perhaps 
 the most stirring moments of their lives were still in waiting for them 
 further down the point, at the navy works of Battery Buchanan, where 
 the garrison was composed of some two hundred and fifty of their brother 
 sailors. There, after a brief halt at the shut doors of tte sally-port, the 
 CMckamauga lads found themselves, cart and all, unexpectedly marched 
 into the centre of a hollow square of tumultuously cheering sailors. Af- 
 ter this episode, they were soon again at home and afloat in the Chicka- 
 ■mauga. 
 
 " The second attack on the fort occured on January 15th, a few weeks 
 later, and although the military officers of Fort Fisher kindly applied 
 again for the detachnlent in the preparation for that affair, the ship was 
 deemed too short-handed to admit of their going back. Thus they es- 
 caped a further harsh experience, and, as events proved, a certain cap- 
 ture. Their part in the subsequent operations was limited to such shell- 
 ing of the attacking troops as the ship was able to accomplish from her 
 position in the river. 
 
 " From there they witnessed the second attack and the final capture 
 of the fort. After that the ship was taken back to Wilmington, and sub- 
 sequently burnt and sunk, higher up the river, where she lay at peace 
 till some enterprising Yankee a few years later raised her hull and con- 
 verted her into an inglorious West India fruiterer." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 427 
 
 The fall of Wilmington was the severest blow to the Con- 
 federate cause which it could receive from the loss of any 
 port. It was far more injurious than the capture of Charles- 
 ton, and but for the moral effect, even more hurtful than the 
 evacuation of Richmond. With Wilmington and the Cape 
 Pear River open, the supplies that reached the Confederate 
 armies would have enabled them to have maintained an un- 
 equal contest for years, but with the fall of Fort Fisher the 
 constant stream of supplies was effectually cut off and the 
 blockade made truly effective — not by the navy fleet, but by 
 its captures on land. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 THE BLOCKADE. 
 
 THE diplomacy of Wm. H. Seward, U. S. Secretary of 
 State during the years 1861-5, is a subject of much perplex- 
 ity, and the more it is examined and analyzed with the 
 light of contemporary and subsequent facts, the greater 
 will be the difficulty in deciding whether it was more harmful 
 to the cause of the United States than to that of the Confederate 
 States. That he accomplished no practical result; that he hu- 
 miliated the pride of the United States; that he abandoned the 
 historical policy of the government from its beginning without 
 successfully initiating any other in its stead, will be apparent to 
 the most cursory reading of his diplomatic dispatches. And 
 a closer examination will convince the reader that he exhibited 
 an ignorance of geography, of history and of literature, 
 which cannot be traced in the dispatches of any of his official 
 predecessors. ' 
 
 Nor was his temper and discretion suited to the manage- 
 ment of diplomatic intercourse. His defects were so well 
 marked and defined that to them may be directly traced sev- 
 eral of those rebuffs and discourtesies which were given him 
 
 1 A few extracts from Mb diplomatic oorre- Bippi was discovered, either at its source or its 
 
 spondence will establish the truth of this asser- mouth. His literature is as defective as his 
 
 tion. On July 7th, 1862, writing to Mr. Adams geography and history are incorrect. Commend- 
 
 of Commodore Farragut'spassing the batteries at iug Mr. Harvey, U. S. Minister at Lisbon, for at- 
 
 Vicksburg, he says: "Thus the last obstacle to tending the erection of amonumenttoCamoeus. 
 
 the navigation of the Mississippi Biver has been he says : " The incident seems doubtless the 
 
 overcome, and it is open tw trade once more more pleasing to us because it occurs at this con- 
 
 from the head waters of its tributaries, near juncture, when we are engaged in combating, in 
 
 the Lakes and Prince Rupert's Land, to the Gulf its full development, a gigantic error which Por- 
 
 of Mexico." tugal, in Vie age rtf Camoens, brought into this 
 
 Prince Rupert's Land lies on the eastern continent." Camoens died at Lisbon in 1579, 
 
 side of Hudson's Bay at least fifteen degrees of and the Portugese slave trade in this hemisphere 
 
 latitude, and, as a " bird flies," over a thousand began in 1630. Such literary bungling is further 
 
 miles from the sources of the Mississippi. So clouded with a vulgarity and insensibility to 
 
 much for geography. His history is not more decorum which never before dirtied the pages 
 
 reliable. After calling the motto of the Order of of American diplomacy. The euphemism by 
 
 the Garter, *' tbe motto of the National Arms," which when a household is gladdened by the 
 
 he asserts that 'J Eichelieu occupied and forti- birth of a babe, the convalescence of the mother 
 
 fied a large portion of this continent, extending is described in technical and courtly phrase: 
 
 from the Gulf of Mexico to the Straits of Belle " that the mother is getting on as well as could 
 
 Isle." The cardinal was dead and in his grave be expected," was introduced by Mr Seward in 
 
 in the Sorbonna thirty years b'efore the Missis- a dispatch of July 18th, 1862, to .Mr. Adams, 
 ' (428) 
 
THE CONFEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 439 
 
 by Lord Russell, by M. Drouyn de Lhuys, and by Baron Van 
 Luyden. The moral side of his character involved him in 
 questions of personal veracity with M. Mercier which his 
 most devoted friends have failed to satisfactorily explain. His 
 political fortunes, or some other motive as yet unexplained, 
 induced him to select for diplomatic positions abroad the 
 Pikes and Foggs, and Judds, names which recall the grotesque 
 characters of Dickens' novels, and whose performances and 
 dispatches add_ to, if they do not embellish, the absurdities 
 and crudities which fill the volumes of diplomatic correspon- 
 dence for the years 1861-5. Of all the men selected to repre- 
 sent the United States at European courts only Mr. Adams at 
 London, and Mr. Dayton at Paris, and possibly Cassius M. Clay 
 at St. Petersburg, had any reputation for fitness or capacity 
 beyond the narrowest limits of their homes; the rest were ob- 
 scure and untrained fanatical stump speakers, and news- 
 paper purveyors. To Holland he sent a semi-editor of a New 
 York paper. At religious and bigoted Madrid he placed a 
 German adventurer, — the word is not used in an offensive 
 sense, but as descriptive of the unfitness of Mr. Schurz. 
 
 One turns from these mental and moral defects to an ab- 
 sence of political convictions, and a vacillation of political 
 purpose, that is astonishing. It is not surprising to' read in a 
 dispatch of March 9th, 1861, that "the President entertains a 
 full confidence in the speedy restoration of the harmony and 
 the unity of the government;" while the powers of Europe were 
 advised by a dispatch to England of April 10th, 1861, that 
 "The President neither looks for nor apprehends any actual 
 and permanent dismemberment of the American' Union, 
 especially by a line of latitude. He is not disposed to reject 
 a cardinal dogma of the South, namely, that the Federal gov- 
 erment cannot reduce the seceding States to obedience by con- 
 quest, even although he were disposed to question that propo- 
 sition. But, in fact, the President willingly accepts it as true. 
 Only an imperial or despotic government could subjugate 
 
 as : ".The work of pacification in the region patches of Mr. Seward describe the British 
 concerned is gtnng on as successfully as could be Colonial Empire aa " extending from Gibralter, 
 txpeded. You hear of occasional guerilla raids, through the West Indies and Canada, till it be- 
 but these are the after^angs of revolution in gins again on the southern extremity of Africa;" 
 that quarter which has proved an a^orbUm" and that "armed insurrections to overturn the 
 
 He accuses Voltaire of having said, " Dieu est government are frequent in Great Britain;" that 
 
 toujours *Mr Ze cote des gros canons." No edu- most of the wars in modem times have been 
 
 cated Frenchman would have said " sur le cote." revolutionary wars ;" that " the government of 
 
 What Voltaire did say to M. Le Biche was: " Le the Netherlands is probably an ally of Japan;" 
 
 nombre des sages sera toujours petit. II est and, lastly, his singular forgetfulneas or igno- 
 
 vrai qu'il est augment^; mais ce n'est rien en ranee of the history of his own country, and of 
 
 cumparaison des sots, et par malheur on dit que what Silas Deane and Dr. Franklin, and the 
 
 Dieu est toujours pour les gros bataillons," and Lees, and John Adams were sent to do and did, 
 
 M. Bussy Rabutiu wrote : "Dieu est d'ordi- in Europe, when he wrote to Mr. Schurz that "it 
 
 naire^oMr les gros escadrons contre les petits," seems the necessity of faction in every country, 
 
 but neither wrote sur le cote. And Minister Sand- that whenever it acquires sufficient boldness to 
 
 ford informs Mr. steward, July 3d, 1861, that inaugurate revolution, it forgets alike the coun- 
 
 " They would in no case make a treaty which sels of prudence, and stifles the instincts of 
 
 should bind them to perpetual abolition of pass- patriotism, and becomes a suitor to foreign 
 
 ports, vis-a-vis to my nation." He might have courts for aid and assistance." These specimens 
 
 said with equal propriety, dos-a-doj / / of literary bungling and ignorance might be mul- 
 
 In such tawdry effusions the diplomatic dis- tiplied a hundred-fold if space only permitted." 
 
430 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 thoroughly disaffected and insurrectionary members of the 
 State. This Federal republican system of ours is, of all forms 
 of government, the very one which is most unfitted for such a 
 a labor." The dispatch continues to explain how the Constitu- 
 tution can be amended by a "National Convention," and con- 
 cludes that while "the President will not suffer the Federal 
 authority to fall into abeyance, nor will he, on the other hand, 
 aggravate existing evils by attempts at coercion which must 
 assume the form of direct war against any of the revolution- 
 ary States." Thus Mr. Seward sustained the political doctrine 
 of the South that the Federal government had no constitu- 
 tional right to coerce a seceded State, and par consequence, 
 no power to declare war, proclaim blockade, or exercise any 
 other hostile agency to reconstruct the Federal Union. Tlie 
 British government, thus advised of the principles by 
 which Mr. Lincoln proposed to conduct his administration, 
 must have naturally concluded that secession had divided the 
 Federal Union into two confederacies, which were to be re- 
 united only by discussion and agreement. Within ten days 
 after that pacific declaration, Europe was astonished by the 
 Proclamation of Blockade, of April 19th, 1861, from the Capes 
 of Virginia to the mouth of the Rio Grande. 
 
 Blockade is a recognized agency of war only between in- 
 dependent nations. European governments had never seen a 
 nation blockade its own ports; and as Mr. Seward had declared 
 that this government had no constitutional right to coerce a 
 State back into the Union, and had followed that declaration 
 with a blockade, the conclusion was irresistable, that the 
 seceded States were to occupy some intermediate position be- 
 tween independency and restoration to the Federal Union. Is 
 it surprising that tliis anomalous and contradicting diplo- 
 macy should have determined European governments to as- 
 sume a neutral position and to declare both the United States 
 and the Confederate States to be belligerents ? What other 
 course was open to them ? Hence, the Queen's Proclamation 
 of Neutrality of May 13th, and that of the Emperor of the 
 French of June 10th, 1861, were the consequences of Mr. Sew- 
 ard's diplomacy and of his blockade which constituted the Con- 
 federate States belligerents both on land and at sea. England 
 and France recognized what Mr. Seward had done as the con- 
 stitutional outcome of the absence of the right to coerce the 
 States back into the Union, and as a declaration of war 
 against the Confederate States for the purpose of conquering 
 them, notwithstanding the want of constitutional warrant. 
 
 " The only justification that I have heard for this extra- 
 ordinary concession," said Senator Charles Sumner ' " which 
 unleashed upon our country the furies of war to commingle 
 with the furies of rebellion at home, is that President Lincoln 
 
 1 Speech in the U. S. Senate on the Johnson-Olarendon Treaty. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. iol 
 
 undertook to proclaim a blockade of the rebel ports. By the 
 use of this word ' blockade' the concession (of belligerency) is 
 vindicated. Had President Lincoln proclainaed a closing of 
 the rebel ports, there could have been no such concession." 
 And again : 
 
 " So far as is now known, the whole case for England is made to stand 
 on the use of the word 'blockade ' by President Lincoln. Had he used 
 any other word the concession of belhgerency would have been without 
 justification, even such as is now imagined. It was this word which, with 
 magical might, opened the gates to all those bountiful supplies by which 
 hostile expeditions were equipped against the United States. It opened 
 the gates of war. Most appalling is it to think that one little word, un- 
 consciously used by a trusting President, could be caught up by a friendly 
 power and made to play such a part." 
 
 It was Mr. Seward that spoke the word "blockade," and 
 whether by ignorance of its import and consequences, or by a 
 design to have that " little blood-letting " which Senator 
 Chandler invoked as the best means of preserving the unity 
 of the Republican party, was immaterial to European powers. 
 They accepted the war agency of Mr. Seward's selection, and 
 made their governments neutrals, in the war between the 
 " belligerents." 
 
 Mr. Seward had but two objects befor'e him. One was, 
 to prevent even the indirect recognition of the Confederate 
 States; the other, to effect a complete prohibition of privateer- 
 ing. His diplomacy completely failed in both. His blockade 
 constituted the Confederate States belligerents, and as sucJi 
 they were recognized; and being belligerent, and not having 
 acceded to the Treaty of Paris of 1856, the right of privateei- 
 ing belonged to both the United States and the Confederate 
 States, and was recognized as a rightful war agent to either 
 belligerent. Mr. Seward's blockade, which prevented unre- 
 stricted trade between the Confederate States and foreign 
 countries, was not without a multitude of troubles to his de- 
 partment and to his country. While it affected the recogni- 
 tion of the Confederate States as belligerents, it also caused 
 the government of those States to resort to privateering as a 
 counterstroke against the blockade. The Act of the Confed- 
 erate Congress of May 6th, 1861, by which letters of marque 
 were authorized to be issued, assigned as a reason that the 
 President of the United States " has issued his other procla- 
 mation announcing his purpose to set on foot a blockade of the 
 ports of the Confederate States." Thus Mr. Seward's manage- 
 ment of the State Department, which had been so bunglmg 
 and unwise as to cause European powers to invest the Con- 
 federate States with a quasi-recognition, had also set loose, 
 "unleashed" as Mr. Sumner put it, a fleet of privateers to 
 prey upon the commerce of the United States. England 
 and France, in accordance with the purpose of the Treaty 
 of Paris to suppress privateering, closed their ports to Con- 
 federate and United States privateers, and Mr. Seward s 
 
43;i THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 blockade shut up the Confederate ports, so that the con- 
 demnation of prizes by admiralty courts was impossible to 
 Confederate captors. The wisdom of a policy which, depriv- 
 ing the merchant owners in the United States of all the ad- 
 vantages of trial of prizes for condemnation by admiralty 
 courts, and compelling the burning on the high seas of many 
 captures, will certainly not be regarded as evincing any very 
 great statesmanship. 
 
 The Hon. Charles Sumner, in his speech in the Senate' 
 was as unreliable in his statements as the Secretary of State 
 was unwise in his diplomacy. Mr. Sumner averred, years 
 after the war was closed, that at the time when belligerency 
 was conceded to the Confederate States, they were " without 
 prize courts, or other tribunals for the administration of jus- 
 tice on the ocean."^ By the Act of March 11th, 1861, the Con- 
 federate Congress established "a Court of Admiralty and 
 maritime jurisdiction at Key West, in the State of Florida," 
 and adopted for its guidance the " laws of the United States," 
 until otherwise provided. And the Act of March 16th, 1861, 
 " to establish the Judicial Courts of the Confederate States," 
 gave to all district courts "original cognizance of all civil 
 causes of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction," and gave to 
 " the laws of the United States and the rules of court in ref- 
 ernce to admiralty proceeding in force in the Admiralty Courts 
 of the United States on the 20th day of December, 1860," * * * 
 full force and effect in the courts of the Confederate States." 
 Thus it will be seen that it is not a fact, as Mr. Sumner as- 
 serted, that " at the early date when this was done the rebels 
 were, as they remained to the close, v/ithout ships on the ocean; 
 without prize courts or other tribunals for the administration 
 of justice on the ocean, without any of those conditions which 
 are the essential prerequisites to such a concession." Adopt- 
 ing, then, Mr. Canning's celebrated declaration made during 
 the Greek Revolution, that ocean belligerency is a "fact," and 
 not a principle — a "fact " to be proved, as any other fact, by 
 
 1 On the Johnson-Clarendon Treaty. their cargoes, were captured or plundered, and 
 
 BUfih shipa and cargoes were appropriated to 
 
 - If that assertion had been true, there were their own use. The fitting out of these priva- 
 well-established precedents in American history teers at Baltimore was a matter of public no- 
 to sustain the claim of the Confederate States toriety, and many of the leading citizens there, 
 to recognition as a belligerent, and to the use including the sheriff and postmaster, were sum- 
 of privateers in the war with the U. S. Refer- moned before the courts as owners or infer- 
 ence need only be made to the Portuguese case ested in such privateers. It is well known that 
 and to the correspondence thereon between the noted Sanda-Oilental chief, Artigas, held no 
 Chevalier Joseph Corr6a de Serra, Portuguese seaport, had no ships, no sailors: and the priva- 
 Minister at Washington, with Mr. Monroe, Sec. teers, assuming his unrecognized flag, were 
 of State, in 1816-lfi, with John Quincy Adams, mostly manned and commanded by ciUzens of 
 sec. of State, in 1818, published in Ex. Doc. 1st the United States, and in some instances, the 
 Sess. 32d Congress, Doc. No. 63, 3d series, No. 1, oflicers held commissions in the navy of the 
 pp. 161, 163. 166. Also the correspondence on United States." The U. S. naval officei-s were 
 the same case in 1850, between Chevalier de Lieuts. Peleg and Dunham, and Midshipmen 
 Figauier, Portuguese Minister at Washington, Swartout and G'rimke. The United States re- 
 aiid Mr. Clayton and Mr. Webster, Sec. of State fused positively to entertain the Portuguese 
 (Kk. Doc. supra pp. 179 and 180). In the latter claims, to appoint commissions, or in any man- 
 correspondence Chev.FJganier presents the same ner whatever to accept responsibility for the 
 state of facts which Mr. Sumner imagined. $1,600,000 worth of vessels destroyed by Ameri- 
 
 "Upward of sixty Portuguese vessels, with can privateers. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 433 
 
 evidence — it is shown that the Confederate States had ships- 
 of-war on the ocean, and possessed admiralty courts, where 
 the laws and proceedings of the United States were recog- 
 nized and administered; that they were organized in their 
 State autonomies and even confederated by the same kind of 
 league or constitution that bound together the States of the 
 United States ; and that Mr. Seward had recognized all these 
 evidences of " fact" by resorting to the blockade of the Con- 
 federate ports, the ports of the very States he had declared 
 could not be coerced back into the Federal Union. 
 
 Events culminated in the assault on Sumter, and on April 
 19th, 1861, the Proclamation of Blockade was issued. ' 
 
 The administration of Mr. Lincoln was from its beginning 
 greatly embarrassed as to the commercial questions likely to 
 be involved in secession. As early as March 7th, the subject 
 was being discussed fn the leading newspapers. The N. Y. 
 Herald of that day, voiced the prevailing opinion when it said: 
 
 " We may observe in this connection that no government can block- 
 ade its own ports. It may lay an embargo on goods leaving its ports, but 
 it cannot legally and constitutionally prevent the ships of other nations 
 entering its ports while it is at peace with those nations. As to laying 
 an embargo on cotton going to England and France, we hardly think Mr. 
 Lincoln will ever try that game with two powerful nations, who so re- 
 cently cut their way to Pekin to establish the freedom of their commerce. " 
 * * * " At present the distinguished rail-splitter is too much en- 
 gaged in the distribution of the spoils to pay much attention to foreign 
 policies, or to the blockading of the Southern coast, but it is evident from 
 the paragraph in the Tribune that that journal feels that the government 
 of Mr. Lincoln will never undertake a blockade."^ 
 
 On March 10th, 1861, the U. S. government had only forty- 
 two vessels in commission and 207 men in all the forts and re- 
 ceiving ships upon the Atlantic coast. Of these vessels, 
 twenty six were steamers, with eleven knots as the highest 
 
 1 " WASHrNGTON, April 19 The President has lives and property of quiet and orderly citizens 
 
 Issued a proclamation as follows : pursuing their lawful occupations, until Coii- 
 
 " An iusurrectlon against the Government of gress shall have assembled and deliberated on 
 
 the United States has broken out in the States of the said unlawful proceedings, or until the same 
 
 .South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Mis- shall have ceased, has further deemed it ad- 
 
 eissippi, Louisiana and Texas, and the laws^ of visable to set on foot a blockade of the ports 
 
 the United States for the collection of the rev- within the States aforesaid, and in pursuance 
 
 enue cannot be effectually executed therein of the laws of the United States and the law of 
 
 comfortably to that provision of the Constitu- nations in such case provided, 
 
 tion which requires the duties to be uniform " For this purpose a competent force will be 
 
 throughout the United States. posted so as to prevent the entrance and exit of 
 
 " And, further, a combination of persons eu- vessels from the ports aforesaid, 
 
 gaged in such insurrection have threatened to ■' If, therefore, with a view to violate such 
 
 grant pretended letters of marque to authorize blockade, any vessel shall attempt to leave 
 
 the bearers thereof to commit assaults on the any of said ports, the vessel will be duly 
 
 lives, vessels and property of good citizens of warned by the commander of one of said 
 
 the country, engaged in commerce on the high blockading vessels, who will endorse en her 
 
 seas and in the waters of the United States. register the fact aud date of such naming, and 
 
 " And whereas an Executive proclamation has if the same vessel shall again attempt to enter 
 been already issued, requiring the persons en- or leave the blockaded port, she will be cap- 
 gaged in these disorderly proceedings to desist tured and sent to the nearest commercial port, 
 therefrom, calling out a militia force for the for such proceedings against her and her cargo 
 purpose of repressing the same, and convening as may be deemed advisable." 
 Congress in extraordinary session to deliberate 
 
 and determine thereon, the President with a 2 in April, 1861, a resolution was adopted by 
 
 view to the same purposes before mentioned, the New York Chamber of Commerce : " That 
 
 and to the protection of public peace and the the United States Government be recommended 
 28 
 
434: THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 speed. The entire naval force available for defence of the whole 
 Atlantic coast consisted of the Brooklyn (twenty-five guns), 
 and store-ship Relief (two guns), while at that date fifty-six offi- 
 cers had resigned. Orders were hurried abroad for the return of 
 all war-vessels, the navy-yards were filled with operatives, and 
 day and night were heard the sounds of earnest preparations 
 for war, and the Navy Department consulted with some of the 
 most prominent shipping merchants of New York relative to 
 the enlargement of the navy by purchase and charter. 
 
 The blockade of the Atlantic coast, to be recognized by 
 foreign powers, "must be effective." The Maritime Law, as 
 laid down by the Treaty of Paris, would have to be observed 
 by the United States; and though the blockade law does not 
 define the eflfectiveness which it prescribes, yet the accepted 
 opinion of publicists and naval officers was that from " two to 
 six " vessels at each port would be necessary. To that end, 
 ships, barks, schooners, sloops, tugs, ferry-boats, anything 
 that floated and could carry even a howitzer, were accepted 
 and put in commission by the U. S. Navy Department, to give 
 an appearance of effectiveness. In addition to vessels-of-war 
 at the harbors, a novel mode of blockade was adopted — that 
 of sinking vessels loaded with stone across the main channel 
 of entrance to Charleston Harbor and the Savannah River, 
 and the threat to apply the same mode of closure to every 
 Southern harbor. The rights to open and close ports of en- 
 try, that is, to declare which natural harbors shall be revenue 
 ports and which shall not be open to trade, was never before 
 understood to carry the right to destroy the natural road- 
 steads which offered to vessels a harbor of refuge from the 
 storms of the coast. Mr. Seward, as the diplomatic chief of 
 liis government, was bound to know that such barbarism 
 would not be tolerated by enlightened governments, and he 
 ought to have restrained Secretary Welles, of the navy, from, 
 doing an act so wicked and so uncivilized. Lord John Rus- 
 sell's attention was called to the stone blockade by the Liver- 
 pool Ship-owners' Association, and replied that: 
 
 "Lord Lyons was told that such a cniel plan would seem to imply 
 despair of the restoration of the Union, the professed object of the war ; 
 for it never could be the wish of the United States (xovernment to destroy 
 cities from which their own country was to derive a portion of its riches 
 and prosperity. Such a plan could only be adopted as a measure of re- 
 venge, and of irremediable injury against an enemy. 
 
 ■'Lord Lyons was further told that even as a scheme of embittered 
 and sanguinary war, such a measure would not be justifiable. It would. 
 
 and urged to blockade the ports of such States neutral nations.granting to those who succeeded 
 
 or any other State that shall join them (in seces- in breaking or running the contemplated block- 
 
 aion), and that this measure is demanded for de- ade, remission of all duties and charges; and 
 
 fence in war, as also for protection to the com- also suggested the propriety cf a plan to pur- 
 
 merce of the United States veraus those so-called chase ocean steamers, by some sort of assurance 
 
 privateers invited to enroll under the authority from Congress to the owners of ttiose vessels, 
 
 of such States." As a reply to that resolution, a suitable for war purposes — that upon their suc- 
 
 public meeting in Marietta, Ga., recommended cessful entry into our porta they would be pnr- 
 
 the Confederate Congress to throw open all Con- chased for our navy, after examination by a 
 
 federate ports to the shipping and commerce of commission, etc. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 435 
 
 be a plot against the commerce of all maritime nations, and against the 
 free intercourse of the Southern States of America with the civihzed 
 ■world. Lord Lyons was desired to speak in this sense to Mr. Seward, who 
 it was hoped would disavow the illegal project. 
 
 "Now, however, that the project seems to have been carried into ef- 
 fect at Charleston, Lord Lyons will be instructed to make a further repre- 
 sentation to Mr. Seward with a view to prevent similar acts of destruc- 
 tion in other ports." 
 
 And in January 1862, Lord Lyons, in response to his call for 
 explanation, vsras told by Mr. Seward that " the Government 
 of the United States had, last spring, with a navy very little 
 prepared for so extensive an operation, undertaken to block- 
 ade upwards of 3,000 miles of coast," and that the Secretary 
 of the Navy had reported that he could "stop up the 'large 
 holes ' by means of his ships, but that he could not stop up 
 the ' small ones.' It had been found necessary therefore, to 
 close some of the numerous inlets by sinking vessels in the 
 channel." An ambassador has been said to be a " man sent 
 abroad to lie for his State," but the stricture, it appears, can 
 as well be applied to the Federal Secretary of the Navy, for 
 the main channel to Charleston Harbor was not a small inlet. 
 Of that stone blockade, the London Times of December 17th, 
 1861, voiced the universal condemnation and execration in 
 which it was held by all enlightened nations.' After ridiculing 
 
 1 Of that barbarous act the N. Y, Herald said: 
 "There are twenty-five vesBels, averaging 335 
 tons each, and they will be so heavily loaded 
 with stone that, when once sunh, it will be no 
 easy matter to raise them. They will thus be- 
 come the real blockading fleet, that no storm or 
 fog can interfere with or no small craft pass by. 
 The following are the names of the vessels 
 purchased : 
 Sale. 
 1861. Names. Part. Tons. 
 
 Oct. 16 — Ship Oerea New London . . 356 
 
 BartTenedos " ... 246 
 
 ShipLewis " ...308 
 
 Bark Fortune " ...292 
 
 " Ship Kobin Hood . . .Mystic 395 
 
 Oct. 17— Ship Archer New Bedford.. 322 
 
 " Bark Cossack " ..254 
 
 " Bark Amazon Fairhaven 31S 
 
 " Bark Frs. Henrletta.New Bedford.. 407 
 
 Oct. 18— Bark Garland " ..243 
 
 Oct. 21— Bark Harvest , Fairhaven 314 
 
 " Bark America Edgartown ... 329 
 
 Ship Timor Sag Harbor.... 289 
 
 '■ Ship Meteor Mystic 324 
 
 Oct. 22— Ship Eebecca Sims.. Fairhaven ... 400 
 Oct. 23— Ship L. 0. Richmoud.New Bedford. 341 
 
 Ship Courier ■• 381 
 
 Ship Maria Theresa... " 330 
 
 Ship Kensington " 357 
 
 Ship Herald " 274 
 
 Oct. 28— Ship Potomac Nantucket 366 
 
 Bark Peter Demill . . .New York 300 
 
 Ship Phoenix New London,. 400 
 
 Not. 1-Bark Leonidas .. .New Bedford. 231 
 -' Bark South America. " 606 
 
 26 Vessels Total tons 8,376 
 
 Average tonnage 335 
 
 On the day of sailing (the 20th inst.) the 
 captains of the different vessels received sealed 
 
 orders respecting the destination of the fleet, 
 with injunctions not to open the same until 
 they were oat at sea and the pilots had taken 
 their departure. The following is a copy in 
 blank of one of these orders : 
 
 SECRET ORDERS. 
 
 To Captain :— Sir— The ■ 
 
 under your command, having been purchased 
 by the Navy Department for service on the 
 Southern coast of the United States, the follow- 
 ing are your orders for your proposed voyage : — 
 
 You wiU proceed from this port on the 
 
 - inst., or with the first fair wind, and when 
 
 clear of the land make a direct passage to the 
 
 port of , and there deliver your ship to the 
 
 commanding ofl&cer of the blockading fleet off 
 said port, taking his receipt for her to return to 
 me. After the delivery of your vessel, yourself 
 and crew will be provided with passages to the 
 port of New York by the Navy Department, and 
 
 on arrival there you wiU call on , who will 
 
 furnish you funds to return to this poi-t. 
 
 On the voyage down it would be well, as far 
 as practicable,, to keep in company of your 
 consorts, to exhibit lights by night and sound 
 horns or bells in case of fog near the coast. 
 
 You will also examine daily the pipe in the 
 quarter of your ship under water, to see that it 
 remains safe. 
 
 The only service required of you is the 
 safe delivery of your vessel ; and as she is old 
 and heavily laden, you will use special care that 
 she sustains no damage from unskillful seaman- 
 ship or want of prudence and care. 
 
 On a close approach to your port of destination, 
 begin to put between-decks cargo into lower hold, 
 and before anchoring permanently, have your 
 second anchor and chain (if you have one), 
 secured on deck. On leaving your vessel, unless 
 otherwise ordered, you will bring away papers, 
 chronometer, charts, compasses, spyglass and 
 
436 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 with pungent severity the naval operations of the United 
 States during 1861, the Times said : 
 
 " The blockade has been so notorioitsly a failure that nothing hut the 
 extraordinary scrupulousness of the European powers has allowed it to 
 continue. Ships have passed in and out at all times just as they pleased, 
 and^so far as the harbors are concerned, there has never been any difji- 
 culiy in getting into them or in getting out of them. The Federal govern- 
 ment has itself emphatically admitted the failure of their naval block- 
 ade by an act of barbarity which is unparalleled in the history of national 
 wars. They have actually endeavored to undo what Columbus had done — 
 to shut up from all mankind forever the ports which the great discoverer 
 opened to the human race, and to destroy by artificial impediments the 
 gates by which men of all nations enter and pass out of some milhons of 
 square miles of fertile and productive lands. This is a crim,e against all 
 human kind. If it does not call down universal opposition, it is only be- 
 cause the enterprise is believed to be as impossible as its design is 
 execrable." 
 
 The blockade announced by the proclamation of April 19th 
 was extended by that of May 27th to Virginia and North Car- 
 olina, and embraced the whole Atlantic coast from the capes 
 of Virginia to the mouth of the Rio Grande. 
 
 The terms of the proclamations were that "a competent 
 force will be posted so as to prevent entrance and exit of ves- 
 sels," and it further provided that "if with a view to violate 
 such blockade, a vessel shall approach or shall attempt to leave 
 any of the said ports, she will be duly warned by the commander 
 of one of the blockading vessels, who will endorse on her re- 
 gister the fact of such warning, and if the same vessel shall 
 again attempt to enter or leave the blockaded port, she will be 
 captured and sent to the nearest convenient port for such pro- 
 ceedings against her, and her cargo as prize, as may be deemed 
 advisable." 
 
 The blockade thus proclaimed, was referred to by Mr. 
 Welles as "necessary to interdict commerce at those ports 
 where duties could not be collected " — but that " in perform- 
 ing this domestic municipal duty, the property and interests 
 of foreigners" would be guarded by a fifteen days' notice of 
 blockade and a warning before seizure. A blockade carries 
 with it, under the law of nations, the right of visitation and 
 search, which a " domestic municipal duty " did not embrace. 
 If the proclamation of '&\ocka.6.Q-w&& merely domestic municipal 
 duty, it could not be so exercised as to hinder and embarrass 
 
 any other valuable portable articles not required diameter, with a valve attached, so that Ihe 
 
 by the commander of the blockading fleet there, water can be let in witha veloLity calculated to 
 
 and return them safely to me. eink any of tlie ships in the space of fifteen or 
 
 In case of disaster to preclude going on, you twenty minutes. In case the valves should 
 
 can call at Fortress Monroe, Hampton Roads, not work as well as expected each vessel is 
 
 to repair damages, reporting to the flag-oflBcer furnished with large augers, so that there will 
 
 there, benodifl&culty whatever onthc score of sinkii^g. 
 
 Wishing you a safe and speedy passage, I am. The crews— which consist of six men to each 
 
 yours respectfully, . ' vessel, will be returned to this city by the men- 
 
 By an examination of the list of vessels com- of -war who assist in the work of sinking. It 
 
 prising the fleet it will be seen that most of them is intended that the stone vessels shall be 
 
 hail from the New England States. In the anchored broadside in the channel and then 
 
 bottom of each vesselahole is bored, into which sunk, and that the crews shall not leave them 
 
 is fitted a piece of lead pipe, Ave inches in until the work has been securely performed." 
 
. THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 437 
 
 the commerce of foreign nations. Thus, both Mr. Seward 
 and Mr. Welles blundered in the early days of the war. A 
 blockade may begin by public announcement or proclamation, 
 or by merely stationing a naval force before the port intended 
 to be blockaded. But proclamation without the naval force 
 would not be tolerated — for blockade by mere notification 
 would have been a paper blockade which all nations would 
 have resisted, and a blockade by actual present force could 
 only apply to the particular harbor where the force was sta- 
 tioned. The proclamations, while announcing a blockade hy 
 notification, also included a de facto blockade. By the latter a 
 breach of blockade could only be considered as attempted after 
 notification on the register of the ship and a subsequent at- 
 tempt to enter. At the date of the two proclamations of in- 
 tended blockade, there was no naval force at the disposal of 
 Mr. Welles to make a de facto blockade, hence it was not until 
 late in the summer of 1861 that the entire coast witnessed the 
 presence of an actual blockading force. Prof. Soley points 
 out the defects of the proclamations : 
 
 "In the statement about warning, therefore, the President's proc- 
 lamation said either to much or too Httle. If it was intended, as the 
 language might seem to imply, that duringthecontinuanceof the block- 
 ade — which as it turned out, was the same thing as during the continu- 
 ance of the war— all neutral vessels might approach the coast and receive 
 individual warning, and that only upon such warning would they be 
 liable to capture, it conceded far more than usage required. If it meant 
 simply that the warning would be given at each point for such time after 
 the force was posted as would enable neutrals generally to become aware 
 of the fact, it conveyed its meaning imperfectly." 
 
 And the author might have added that if the proclama- 
 tion meant both, and was so drawn as to cover any contin- 
 gency that might arise, it was most likely that Mr. Seward in- 
 tended this last interpretation. That the proclamation fixed 
 no time for warning to cease, that it permitted such errors as 
 that of Pendegrast, the comprehensiveness of which included 
 ports of North Carolina, ' where no force was stationed, and 
 that at Charleston, where vessels where warned off the whole 
 coast, though no ship of war was at Savannah, were errors 
 which subsequently involved the United States in difficulties 
 which resulted in the payment of "a round sum to their 
 owners in damages for the loss of a market, which was caused 
 by the official warning." 
 
 The British consul at Mobile was on May 8th advised by 
 Lord Lyons, that : 
 
 "The best advice you can give British ships is to get off as fast as 
 possible, without serious inconvenience. After the effective blockade 
 
 1 The following ig a copy of the notice of the ship Qimlcer City, of United States blockading 
 
 blockade of Southern ports endorsed on the squadron, and warned not to enter any port of 
 
 registers of all vessels, foreign and domestic, Virginia, nor any other port of the XInited States 
 
 bound into the Chesapeake : to the south of it. 
 
 " Prussian hark Bdward from Bremen bound " S. W. Mather, Acting Master XT. S. Navy. 
 
 to Baltimore, boarded by United States steam- " Off Cape Henry, 18th May, 1861." 
 
438 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 has commenced they will be allowed fifteen days to take their departure, 
 but they will not be allowed to carry out any cargo, or part of a cargo, 
 taken on board after the effective blockade was actuaUy begun. Indeed, 
 according to the rules of blockade, I believe they will be liable to confisca- 
 tion for attempting to go out with a cargo shipped after the commence- 
 ment of a blockade. But the effective blockade does not begin until the 
 blockading squadron actuaUy appears off the port. The President's proc- 
 lamation is only the declaration of an intention to blockade.'' 
 
 In the latter part of May, before the arrival off Charleston, 
 S. C, of any blockading vessels, the British schooner Eliza and 
 Catharine entered that port, discharged her cargo and loaded 
 immediately, and was proceeding to sea when she was brought 
 to by a shot from the Minnesota, and her captain compelled to 
 go on board the man-of-war. After examination the schooner 
 was ordered back to Charleston to discharge her cargo and 
 leave in ballast. Robert Bunch, her Britannic Majesty's con- 
 sul at Charleston, immediately visited the Minnesota, and con- 
 vinced her commanding officer that, considering the real facts 
 of the blockade at Charleston, it would be best for him to per- 
 mit the English schooner to depart with her cargo. This per- 
 mit was immediately given, but the Norwegian bark, Admiral 
 Zendenskjord, which entered Charleston under the very same 
 circumstances as the British schooner, was compelled by the 
 blockading officers to leave in ballast. It was impossible for 
 such partiality not to be suspected of proceeding from the 
 very great difference between the English navy and that 
 Of Norway and Sweden, and to conclude, at that early day, 
 that the favors of the blockading squadron were confined to 
 the ships that could command the protection of the heaviest 
 squadrons. 
 
 The general result of inquiries made by Lord Lyons and 
 other foreign ministers, was communicated under date of May 
 11th by Lord Lyons to Admiral Milne, and may be summarised 
 as follows : 
 
 1. " That the date of the commencement of the blockade in each 
 locality will be fixed by the issue of a notice by the commanding ofBcer 
 of the squadron appointed to blockade it. It does not, however, appear 
 to be intended that such notice shall be officially communicated to the 
 governments of neutral nations, or to their representatives in this 
 country. 
 
 2. " That fifteen days from the beginning of the effective blockade 
 will be allowed in every case for neutral vessels already in port to put 
 to sea. 
 
 3. " That until the fifteen days have expired neutral vessels will be 
 allowed to come out with or without cargoes, and whether their cargoes 
 were shipped before or after the commencement of the blockade. 
 
 4. That except in the last mentioned particular, the ordinary rules 
 of blockade will be strictly enforced. 
 
 5. " The armed vessels of neutral States will have the right to enter 
 and depart from the blockaded ports. 
 
 " I continue to lie of opinion that, provided the Mookade be effective, 
 and be carried on in conformity with the law of nations, we haveno other 
 course, in the absence of positive instructions from her MaJesty^s govern- 
 ment, than to recognize it." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 439 
 
 In October following Lord Lyons addressed to her Majes- 
 ty's consuls in the Confederate ports the following instruc- 
 tions for their government, and the letter of Mr. Seward as to 
 the commencement of the blockade : 
 
 "WASHiisraTON, Oct. 16th, 1861. 
 
 " Sir : On the llfch of May last I made to Her Majesty's consuls in the 
 Southern States the following announcement : 
 
 " ' Neutral vessels will be allowed fifteen days to leave port after the 
 actual commencement of the blockade, whether such vessels are with or 
 without cargoes, and whether the cargoes were shipped before or after 
 the commencement of the blockade.' 
 
 " I enclose herewith a copy of a note which I have received to-day 
 from the Secretary of State of the United States, and in which he informs 
 me that the law of blockade, which does not permit a vessel in a block- 
 aded port to take on board cargo after the commencement of the blockade, 
 will be.expected to be strictly observed by aU vessels in ports blockaded 
 by the naval forces of the United States. 
 
 " You will take note of this communication of the Secretary of State 
 for your own guidance and that of the masters of British, vessels ; and 
 you will mark carefully, and report to me, the exact date at which the 
 present dispatch and its enclosure reach you. 
 
 "You will, without delay, send copies of this dispatch and its en- 
 closure to your vice-consuls, for their information and guidance. 
 
 " I am, sir, your most obedient, humble servant, Lyons. 
 
 " To Her Majesty's Consul at " 
 
 "Department of State, ) 
 "WAsmireTON, Oct. 16th, 1861. J 
 
 "MtLord: The Judge of the Court of the United States for the 
 Southern district of New York having recently decided, after elaborate 
 argument of counsel, that the law of blockade does not permit a vessel, 
 in a blockaded port, to take on board cargo after the commencement of 
 the blockade, with a view to avoid any future misunderstanding upon 
 this subject you are informed that the law, as thus interpreted by the 
 judge, will be expected to be strictly observed by all vessels in ports of 
 insurgent States during their blockade by the naval forces of the United 
 States. I avail myself, etc., William H. Seward. 
 
 " The Right Honorable Lord Ltons." 
 
 The great interest taken by foreign nations in the blockade 
 of the ports of the Confederate States will be appreciated from 
 the facts that, in 1860, shipments of tobacco alone amounted 
 to twenty millions of dollars annually, upon which the gov- 
 ernments of Europe collected as follows : England, duty on 
 tobacco $31,000,000; Holland, duty on tobacco $20,000,000; re- 
 venue in France $18,000,000, revenue in Spain $5,000,000— 
 making a total of $64,000,600 of revenue. When to that sum 
 is added the support derived by thousands of operatives in the 
 manufacture of tobacco, as well as the profits arising from 
 its sale, the hardships of a blockade which could prevent 
 tobacco from reaching Europe would rise into national im- 
 portance. The cotton exportation of $150,000,000 was the 
 chief support of over five millions of people engaged in its 
 manufacture. The consideration of the effects which a stop- 
 page of exportation of the chief products of the Confederate 
 
440 THE CONPEDEKATB STATES NAVY. 
 
 States would have upon European nations, created expecta- 
 tions both in the United States and in the Confederate States 
 •which were never realized. In the United States the hopes 
 and expectations were stated by the New York Herald of 
 May 38th, 1861, that as the blockade bars all outlets in every 
 direction — 
 
 " England, France and the other European powers -will see the neces- 
 sity of rendering the war as short as possible; and, therefore, they wiE 
 not acknowledge the Southern Confederacy, or give it any aid or comfort; 
 but, on the contrary, knowing that it is the only way in which a very 
 speedy termination can be put to the conflict, they will give all the assist- 
 ance possible to the United States government. Otherwise they cannot 
 get tobacco, or cotton, or turpentine, and they cannot sell their manufac- 
 tured goods in the markets of the South. They are completely in our 
 power. A short war is manifestly the interest of the European nations, 
 and as soon as they understand that any recognition of the Southern Con- 
 federacy is likely to prolong the war, they will consult their interest by 
 adopting that course which will put a speedy end to it.'' 
 
 And in the Confederate States the power and resources of 
 " King Cotton " to lift the blockade, admit Confederate cruis- 
 ers to the Admiralty Courts of foreign nations, and to a 
 speedy recognition of the independence and nationality of the 
 government, was a hope and a belief that never entirely de- 
 parted from either the government or the people. 
 
 Her Majesty's Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, 
 speaking of the blockade, represented the necessity that ex- 
 isted in England for a supply of cotton, and said: "Thou- 
 sands are now obliged to resort to the poor - rates for 
 subsistence, owing to this blockade, yet her Majesty's govern- 
 ment have not sought to take advantage of the obvious im- 
 perfection of this blockade, in order to declare it ineffective. 
 They have, to the loss and detriment of the British nation, 
 scrupulously observed the duties of Great Britain to friendly 
 States." The London Post (Lord Palmerston's organ), of July 
 24th, denying the effectiveness of the blockade, asserted that 
 Charleston had been left for some time without any blockad- 
 ing force, and Admiral Milne, in obedience to orders from 
 home, issued instructions to a frigate under his command that 
 "no port is to be considered efficiently blockaded if any ves- 
 sel can enter or depart from it unknown to or in spite of the 
 blockading squadron — that an efficient blockade necessitates 
 the complete cutting off of all maritime ingress or egress, and 
 the escape of the third vessel from the blockading squadron 
 signifies the invalidity of the blockade." 
 
 By that test there was no effective blockade at any Con- 
 federate port, and yet England respected a blockade which 
 produced such distresses at home, rather than aid a Confeder- 
 acy whose-corner stone was to be slavery. The "invalidity 
 of the blockade " by the standard test of Admiral Milne was 
 demonstrated in one day at Charleston. A correspondent of 
 the New York Times, on board the U. S. steamer Roanoke, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 441 
 
 flag - ship Blockading Squadron off Charleston, Saturdav, 
 August 17th, 1861— writes : 
 
 " About 8:30 o'clock in the evening of the next day lights were seen 
 crawling along close in shore, in the direction of the harbor, one of whiclx 
 was made out to be quite a large sail, but she passed in safely. Since 
 that event other sails have been duly reported. It is but proper to state 
 that the blockading squadron, composed at present of the Roanoke, the 
 gunboats Seminole and Iroquois, and the sloop-of-war Vandalia^ lay at 
 least twelve miles from the entrance of the harbor. 
 
 "But if this should occasion surprise, what will your readers think 
 when they are told that on the 9th inst. a Secession steamer ran the block- 
 ade ? She was first seen puiBng away toward the coast, on our starboard 
 bow. After spending much valuable time in staring through glasses, 
 hoisting signals, and examining signal books, the Vandalia was finally 
 ordered in pursuit, but having only a quarter wind, you may judge the 
 result. After the steamer had made good her retreat, the Seminole made 
 chase. Hardly had the excitement of this event subsided, when another 
 steamer, emboldened by the success of the former, accomplished the same 
 exploit." 
 
 At Wilmington, Sept. 30th, the steamer Kate and two 
 schooners successfully ran the blockade, and though one of 
 the latter grounded on the bar, yet she succeeded in landing 
 her cargo, and was subsequently brought into port. In further 
 evidence of the ineffectiveness of the blockade, and of the 
 strange conduct of England in sustaining its pretended effect- 
 iveness, the Evening Express, of Halifax, N. C, in August 
 published the following : 
 
 " The two principal ports of North Carolina, Wilmington and Beaufort, 
 we learn, have not been and are not now under blockade, and an active 
 trade is carried on in the export of naval stores and the import of provi- 
 sions. Recent accounts state that six vessels were loading in Beaufort 
 and four in Wilmington, which would shortly sail for Nassau, N. P., and 
 other British ports. The reason the blockade has not been made effect- 
 ive at these two ports is said to be that the government is poorly pro 
 vided with vessels of draft sufficiently light to enable them to lay off 
 these harbors. Taking advantage of this fact, the rebels are profiting in 
 the exportation of the principal product of the State — naval stores — 
 and weekly receive cargoes of provisions from vessels of light draft, from. 
 Nassau, N. P. As a proof of this two vessels have arrived at this port 
 lately from North Carolina, one on Sunday and another yesterday after- 
 noon, both laden with naval stores. It is stated that they had not the 
 slightest difficulty in leaving. Both vessels, we understand, belong to 
 the same person, and we have no doubt that he will make a handsome 
 thing out of the transaction. There have been three arrivals at this port 
 from the same place a few weeks ago. " 
 
 Nova Scotian vessels continued " to do a good business at 
 the South," and many were " making arrangements to receive 
 a share of the profits to be realized by running the blockade." 
 The sympathies of the people at St. John's, IST. B., were largely 
 in favor of the Confederates, and the shi^ Alliance, which 
 sailed from England with a cargo of munitions of war, upon 
 being ordered off from Charleston by the blockading squad- 
 ron, proceeded to St. John's, IST. B., where she added to her 
 contraband list "$1,100, worth of tin plate, |1,200 worth of 
 
443 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 block tin, $950 worth of quicksilver, etc., etc., all of which was 
 landed alongside of the Alliance; and a correspondent of the 
 Merchants' Exchange states that Mr. Lafltte (the owner) and 
 the captain (both citizens of Charleston) have been pur- 
 chasing, from time to time, such further supplies as would in- 
 dicate a ' forward movement ' to Palmettodom. The Alliance 
 has kept the 'Confederate flag' flying since her arrival, not- 
 withstanding the protests of the American sea captains and 
 other citizens of St. John." 
 
 These, together with many other illustrations and examples 
 of an ineffective blockade, caused the dispatch of the British 
 Admiral Milne with a squadron of "thirty -five men-of-war" 
 to the Gulf of Mexico. The arrival of the British fleet in 
 Southern waters encouraged the hopes of the Confederate peo- 
 ple of an early rupture between England and the United States, 
 the consequence of which would be the recognition of the Con- 
 federate States. 
 
 The Mobile Advertiser and Register of August 4th thus 
 expressed the hope that was entertained by all classes of peo- 
 ple in the Confederacy : 
 
 " Perhaps everybody does not know what a formidable fleet of British 
 ships-of-war are now occupying our Grulf waters, lying right within striking 
 distance of Lincoln's blockaders, whom they are watching with sleepless 
 vigilance and ' evident anxiety to pick a quarrel with on this blockade 
 question.' We have good authority for stating that the British fleet of 
 the Gulf, under Admiral MUne, numbers no less than thirty-five men-of- 
 war, each carrying heavy metal and equipped on a war footing. We 
 know, of course, that this armada is not here to operate against the Con- 
 federacy. We know this, without the avowal of the British government 
 and every other authority, that its object is to oversee and investigate the 
 doings of Lincoln's blockaders. 
 
 Being opposed to the operations of our enemies the British fleet is 
 necessarily in quasi, but as yet inactive, alliance with us. It is in our 
 waters as a naval ' corps of observation,' and in force which gives it power 
 at any time to become ' a corps of operation.' Here in our waters will it 
 stay, awaiting a possible, perhaps probable, moment of action, when the 
 British government may deem it necessary to raise the blockade. Should 
 the war not be sooner concluded, we may expect that during the latter 
 part of next fall Great Britain, and perhaps France, will offer to mediate. 
 If the infatuated North rejects propositions we may expect to hear from 
 the British fleet of the Gulf. The way it will run off the Lincolnite ships 
 and open our ports will be a caution to tyrants. 
 
 " The tone of Admiral Milne's report to the British government, the 
 substance of which we have published, indicates more fully than any 
 thing has done heretofore the position of Great Britain with regard to 
 the blockade." 
 
 That the possession of the cotton in the Confederate States 
 was as much a motive with the Washington authorities for 
 the blockade, as for the restoration of the Union, will appear 
 very plainly by considering the legislation that followed sharp 
 upon the proclamation of blockade. By the Act of the United 
 States Congress July 13th, 1861, " to provide for the collection of 
 duties on imports, and for other purposes," a forfeiture was 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 443 
 
 declared of all goods coming from the States of the Confeder- 
 acy into the United States, with a convenient proviso, which 
 authorized the President "to license and permit commercial 
 intercourse " with any part of any State in the Confederacy, 
 "in such articles, and for such time, and by such persons," 
 a.s he may " think conducive to the public interest ; " and he 
 was authorized to establish rules and regulations for the gov- 
 ernment of such "commercial intercourse," and to do any 
 other thing that would conduce to the early acquisition of 
 " all goods and chattels, wares and merchandise" of the people 
 of the South. While foreign nations were shut out by the 
 blockade, the President of the United States, having declared 
 war against the Confederate States by his proclamation of 
 blockade, was authorized to open up comnaercial intercourse 
 with the States, from dealing with whom all other nations were 
 interdicted. This law authorized the President to proclaim 
 "an insurrection," whereupon all "commercial intercourse" 
 was to cease, and all property be confiscated to the United 
 States. According to the Republican theory the Southern States 
 were in the Union, but in rebellion to its authority ; and if so, 
 what part of the Constitution authorized Congress to confis- 
 cate property and to declare the forfeiture of all goods in 
 transitu ? As between independent nations at war, all com- 
 mercial intercourse ceases ; but to apply that principle to the 
 war between the States would have been to recognize their 
 independence. It was necessary, therefore, to force the Con- 
 stitution beyond any interpretation yet given to it, and declare 
 the people to be insurrective, but not at war — to be liable to 
 blockade, but open to commercial intercourse under the Presi- 
 dent's permit — to shut out from Europe the cotton and tobacco 
 of those States, but to open the back door of the United States 
 to all that could be gotten under license and permit. A book 
 of "rules and regulations, prescribed by the Secretary of the 
 Treasury with the approval of the President, concerning com- 
 mercial intercourse with and in States and parts of States in 
 insurrection," etc., etc. — was issued to legalize an illegal traffic, 
 if there existed war between independent States, and uncon- 
 stitutional if there was merely an insurrection or rebellion to 
 be suppressed. The law was pronounced unconstitutional, 
 null and void by Chief Justice Taney in the Carpenter case; 
 but that made little difference with men and a party which 
 were running the war on fictions of law and constitution, and 
 regardless of all the restraints which were declared by the 
 plainest provisions and principles of American liberty. The 
 rulings of Chief Justice Taney were of little avail, until supple- 
 mented by the orders of General Grant on March 1 0th, 1865, sus- 
 pending all these permits; but even he was compelled to revoke 
 that order on the 11th of April; but on April 39th these regula- 
 tions ceased by notice of the conquest and subjugation of the 
 Southern States. 
 
444 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 That the administration at Washington forecasted, as early 
 as July, 1S61, the effect upon European public sentiment which 
 a stoppage of the cotton supply would create, is hardly to be 
 accepted. These laws and regulations were more likely the 
 results of national and individual cupidity than instrument- 
 alities for securing a supply of cotton to palliate the anger of 
 European public sentiment. But whether these measures 
 proceeded from consummate forecast or from the greed of 
 gain, they preceded by a year the hints of the governments of 
 Great Britain and France, "informally expressed" to Mr. 
 Seward, "for some further relaxation of the blockade in favor 
 of that trade."' 
 
 The "relaxation," which the laws and regulations above 
 mentioned had given to the scarcity of cotton, was not enough 
 for the English market, and "further" relaxation was sug- 
 gested. These hints were "not rejected, but are held under 
 consideration, with a view to ascertain more satisfactorily 
 whether they are really necessary, and whether they can be 
 adopted without such serious detriment to our military opera- 
 tions as would render them injurious to the interest of all con- 
 cerned," and to appease the British sentiment. Mr. Seward 
 added : "We shall speedily open all the channels of commerce 
 and free them from military embarrassments, and cotton, so 
 much desired by all nations, will flow as freely as heretofore. 
 We have ascertained that there are three and a half millions 
 of bales yet remaining in the regions where it was produced, 
 though large quantities of it are yet unginned and otherwise 
 unprepared for market. We have instructed the military 
 authorities to favor, as far as they can consistently with the 
 public safety, its preparation for and dispatch to the markets 
 where it is so much wanted." 
 
 From these extracts it is evident that England and France 
 had made some demands on Mr. Seward, with which he was 
 endeavoring to comply, and yet not yield entirely to the pres- 
 sure from abroad. The contemporaneous expression of New 
 York newspapers are not without light upon those hints which 
 Mr. Seward had received. By the New York Herald it was said: 
 
 "That the British fleet have not already broken it [the blockade] 
 is owing to an unwillingness to have an open rupture with the United 
 States, and the policy of waiting to see what might turn up — 
 whether our government would defeat the rebels in a decisive battle 
 and thus get cotton for England, or whether the rebels would defeat 
 our government and thus impose on England the necessity of get- 
 ting cotton for herself. It is now less than two months till the cot- 
 ton crop will be ready for shipment, and of course it will be necessary for 
 the English government to give previous notice to British merchants and 
 ship-owners that the blockade will not be respected by England, and that 
 they can safely send their vessels for the Southern staple. We may, there- 
 fore, at any moment hear of a royal proclamation in Great Britain and 
 Ireland declaring the blockade inelHcient, invalid and void." 
 
 1 Mr Seward to Mr. Adama, July 28th, 1863. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 445 
 
 The "relaxation" suggested by Lord Lyons to Mr. Seward 
 came in a very limited and unsatisfactory degree from the 
 instruction to collectors of revenue, at the captured ports of 
 Eeaufort, Port Royal and New Orleans, issued May 23d, 1862. ' 
 
 These '^^instructions," which were regarded as orders to 
 open certain cotton ports to European trade, were received 
 in England with hope, which was soon disappointed. The 
 London Times, of May 17th, before the issue of those in- 
 structions, pointed out what might be done from New Orleans: 
 
 " Since the beginning of the war both North and South have had a 
 common idea, which has filled the one with anxiety and the other with 
 liope. The Americans have not been able to free themselves from the 
 suspicion that cotton is really king, and that England would go to any 
 extremity to show her allegiance to the sovereign lord of her manu- 
 factures. The attitude of the French Emperor and the murmuring of 
 the French operatives have also given the North serious fears. We are 
 almost justified in saying that the expeditions to various points of the 
 Atlantic coast, such as Beaufort, Hatteras, and Newberne, and the oc- 
 cupation of these places, without the hope of producing the smallest 
 effect on the war, have been measures really prompted by the desire to 
 open a cotton port, and thus take away the pretext of European powers 
 for intervening in the affairs of the war. 
 
 ''The capture of New Orleans makes that easy which before would 
 have hardly been possible. It would have been but a mockery to 
 ask Lancashire to send ships to Beaufort for cotton ; but now that 
 the great emporium of the Mississippi and the access to millions of 
 acres of cotton-growing land are now in the power of the Federals, 
 4t is their ohmous policy to declare the trade with New Orleans open^ 
 and to let the refusal to supply cotton for the wants of Europe lie 
 on the planters who still assert their allegiance to the Southern Republic.'''' 
 
 1 Washington, May 23d.— The following is a States, or that there is imminent danger that the 
 
 ■copy of the instructions transmitted to various goods, wares, or merchandise, of whatever 
 
 Collectors of Customs : description laden, or such vessels, will fall into 
 
 " Tbeasuey Department, May 23d, 1862. the possession or under the control of insurgents; 
 
 " Sir : In pursuance of the provisions of the and in all CHses where, in your judfjment, there 
 
 Proclamation of the President modifying the is ground for apprehension that any goods, wares, 
 
 "blockade of the ports of Beaufort, Port Royal or merchandise shipped to your port will be 
 
 and New Orleans, and of the regulations used in any way for the aid of insurgents or the 
 
 of the Secretary of the Treasury relating to insurrection, you will require substantial se- 
 
 "trade with those ports, no articles contraband curity to be given that such goods, wares or 
 
 ■of war will be permitted to enter at either of the merchandise shall not be transported to any 
 
 «aid ports, and you will accordingly refuse place under insurrectionary control, and shall 
 
 •clearance to vessels bound for these poi-ts not in any way be used to give aid or comfort to 
 
 or either of them with any such articles on such insurgents. 
 
 "board. tJntil farther instructed you will "You will be especially careful, upon appli- 
 
 regard as contraband of war the following cations for clearances, to require bonds with 
 
 -articles, viz : sufficient sureties, conditioned for fulfilling 
 
 "Cannon, mortars, firearms, pistols, bombs, faithfully all the conditions imposed bylaw or 
 
 ^enades, firelocks, flints, matches, powder, departmental regulatioiis, from shippers of the 
 
 saltpetre, bales, bullets, pikes, swords, sulphur, following ai'ticlee tu the ports opened, or to any 
 
 helmets or boarding cape, sword belts, saddles other ports from which they may easily be, 
 
 and bridles {always excepting the quantity of and are probably intended to be, reshipped in 
 
 the said articles which may be necessary iorthe aid of the existing insurrection, viz : — Liquors 
 
 ■defence of the ship, and of those who compose of all kinds, coal, iron, lead, copper, tin, brass, 
 
 ihe crew), cartridge bag material, percuHsiou and telegraphic instruments, wire, porous cups, 
 
 -othercaps, clothingadaptedfnruniforms, resin, platina, sulphuric acid, zinc, and all other 
 
 sail cloth of aU kinds, hemp and cordage, masts, telegraphic materials, marine engines, screw 
 
 ■«hip timber, tar and pitch, ardent spirits, propellers, paddle wheels, cylinders, cranks, 
 
 military persons in the service of the enemy, shafts, boilera, tubes for boilers, fire bars, and 
 
 dispatches of the enemy, and articles of like every article, or any other component part of 
 
 character, with these specially enumerated. an engine or boiler, or any article whatever, 
 
 "You wili also refuse clearances to all vessels which is, can or may iiecome applicable to the 
 
 "Which, whatever the ostensible destination , are manufacture of marine machinery, or for the 
 
 "believed by you on satisfactory grounds to be armor of vessels. I am, very respectfully, 
 
 intended for ports or places in possession or "S, P. Chase, 
 
 Tinder control of insurgents against the United *' Secretary of the Treasury." 
 
446 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The refusal to supply Europe with cotton through the cap- 
 tured ports followed from the patriotic action of the planters 
 withholding their cotton from markets held by the Federal 
 forces. The press throughout the Confederacy, public senti- 
 ment in every State, and the best interest of society and indi- 
 viduals, united in urging the planters not to send their cotton 
 to either the interior towns or ports — that the farmer and plant- 
 er should keep his cotton at home, avoid the cost of storage 
 and transportation, the certainty of confiscation and seizure 
 at ports held by Federal authority, and lastly that the torch' 
 was his more patriotic weapon than even the price which his 
 cotton might bring through intermediary agency of his coun- 
 try's enemy. While these considerations did not prevent some 
 cotton from going forward to market, yet the amount was so 
 small that the demand in Europe did not experience much 
 more relief after the fall of Beaufort, Port Royal and New Or- 
 leans than before the sailing of the expeditions which were set 
 on foot, with the double purpose of blockade and of opening 
 cotton ports ; the former to prevent cotton from going forward 
 to Europe, the latter for the purpose of sending cotton forward 
 to Northern markets without the Confederates realizing upon 
 its value. 
 
 Another part of this scheme for getting hold of the cotton 
 and other staple products of the States of the Confederacy 
 were the Acts of March l".ith, 1863, and July 3d, 1864: " Concern- 
 ing commercial intercourse between loyal and insurrectionary 
 States, and to provide for the collection of captured and aban- 
 doned property, and the prevention of frauds in States declared 
 in insurrection ;" and the Act of July 17th, 1862 : " To suppress 
 insurrection, to punish treason and rebellion, to seize and con- 
 fiscate the property of rebels, and for other |)urposes." That 
 each and all of these acts had an "eye to business" as well as 
 to patriotism, a purpose to " turn a penny " while restoring the 
 Union, is apparent from even their titles. The scheme over- 
 reached the purpose of its inventors, and while it made money 
 for the "baser sort" it impeded military operations to such an 
 extent that Gen. Grant wrote, July 31st, 1863 • 
 
 " My experience in West Tennessee has convinced me that any trade 
 whatever "with the rebellious States is weakening to us at least thirty 
 per cent, of our force. No matter what restrictions are thrown around 
 
 1 " In 1862, all the planters on the water the breaking of the Levee. One gentleman 
 
 courseB opposed to iuvaaiou, had bnrnt their boated his cotton. 650 bales, from his gin-house 
 
 cotton. This was done in obedience to orders to an Indian mound, the only spot upon his 
 
 cheerfully obeyed by the people, who were place that was dry, and burnt it there, on that 
 
 perfectly willing to sacrifice tlieir wealth as tumulus of a buried race. This all seems very 
 
 well as their lives to attain, or rather to re- strange now, but we were desperately in earnest 
 
 (din. as they supposed, their liberties. In 1862 at that time. This cotton-burning was then 
 
 I stood on the balcony of my then pleasant the policy of the Confederate Government." — 
 
 borne, and saw the volumes of smoke ascend- Recollectums of Henry Watkins Allen, by Sarah A. 
 
 jng on every side, for miles and miles, which Dorsey, p. 281. 
 
 iiiMrked the spots where the planters were In the winter of 1864 the intention of de- 
 
 biiriiing their crops of cotton, in obedience to strpying all the cotton in the State of Louisiana. 
 
 Beauregard's orders in the face of the gun- exposed to Federal capture and invasion, waa 
 
 boats ascending the Mississippi River. Many seriously entertained by Gen. E. Kirby Smith, 
 
 or the plantations were nearly submerged by C. S. A. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 447 
 
 trade, if any -whatever is allowed, it will be made the means of supplying 
 to the enemy -what they -want. Restriction, if lived up to, makes trade un- 
 profitable, and hence none but dishonest men go into it. I -will venture 
 to say, that no honest man has made money in West Tennessee, in the 
 last year, -while many fortunes have been made there during the time. 
 The people in the Mississippi Valley are now nearly subjugated. Keep 
 trade out for a fe-w months, and I doubt not but that the -work of sub- 
 jugation -will be so complete that trade can be opened freely -with the 
 States of Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi." 
 
 The traders were too strong in influence at Washington 
 for Gen. Grant, and the trade under the license system con- 
 tinued until an end -was put to it by a return of peace. 
 
 Intimately connected -with and growing out of the rig:ht to 
 blockade an enemy's port, is the belligerent's right of visita- 
 tion and search of neutral vessels to prevent a breach of block- 
 ade. No nation has more strenuously opposed the exercise of 
 this right than the United States; to enforce "free trade and 
 sailors' rights" the United States went to war with Great 
 Britain in 1812-15, and up to 1861 the United States had cham- 
 pioned the rights of neutrals, maintaining the perfect right of 
 a neutral to trade with either belligerent, without restraint 
 as to contraband of war or restrictions of any kind upon the 
 citizens, whether as fillibusters, privateers or sj^mpathizers. 
 No sooner was the war between the States over than the United 
 States Congress returned to its " first love" and asserted the 
 very doctrines of which it complained when practiced by Eng- 
 land. The Banks' bill, No. 806, in the Thirty-ninth Congress, 
 first session, enacted in its tenth section "that nothing in this 
 act shall be so construed as to prohibit citizens of the United 
 States from selling vessels, ships or steamers built within the 
 limits thereof, or materials or munitions of war, the growth or 
 product of the same, to inhabitants of other countries, or to 
 governments not at war with the United States." 
 
 That England made no objection to the severest exercise 
 of the right of search was because, as expressed by the Lon- 
 don Times : 
 
 "It is certainly not for our interest as a nation to impeach the bel- 
 ligerent right of search, and, if the Federals have not actually exceeded 
 their pri-vileges, it would be impolitic as well as unjust to interfere with 
 their proceedings. They cannot be allo-wed to presume, or to encroach ; 
 nor can they reasonably complain if -we look -with more than ordinary 
 suspicion on the movements of an officer so notorious as Com.modore 
 Wilkes. 'Within these limits, however, they are free to exert that power 
 "which their maritime ascendancy gives them, and we must say that, with 
 the exception of the case of the Gladiator, they do not appear to have 
 materially overstepped their rights. That they have gone to the very 
 verge of illegality is by no means improbable, but neither is it improb- 
 able that they have had sound reasons for their eagerness. They as- 
 sumed, and perhaps with sufficient warrant, that in the Bermuda -waters 
 "were lying ships consigned to their enemies, -which -would be lawful prize at 
 sea, but which would be likely enough to elude them if they got clear 
 away. They, therefore, lingered about the harbor and hung about the 
 offing as long as they could justifiably do so, and perhaps a little< longer. 
 
448 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 They watched the port so closely as almost to blockade it, and they 
 stopped vessels that might have been reasonably allowed to pass with- 
 out challenge. 
 
 " In these proceedings there may have been something extravagant, 
 as well as much that was provoking ; but, on the other side, there was 
 probably the practical provocation of successful smuggling. The popu- 
 lation of the islands, we may be pretty sure, is Southern in its sym- 
 pathies, and many a cargo has doubtless been run through the aid to the 
 venture which tht 36 harbors have furnished. The Federals know this, 
 and i fc is but natural that they should strive, by all the means in their 
 power, to break up the trade. Whether in these proceedings they have 
 transgressed the rules of international law, or whether they have limited 
 their operations to the sharp practice of a baffled and mndiotive bel- 
 ligerent, is more than we can precisely say at present. In the former 
 case they must be brought to reason ; and they may well Indeed be con- 
 tent to observe a law which is operating so decidedly in their own favor. 
 But if, as we should be disposed to surmise, they have done little more 
 than press their privileges as rigorously as possible under the provocation 
 given them by a brisk contraband traffic, we think we may as well make 
 allowance for their temptations, and put ourselves in their place before we 
 pronounce upon their conduct."' 
 
 The remark that Bermuda was watched so closely "as to 
 almost blockade it " was confirmed in literal truth by the re- 
 port of the master of the British schooner Albert, of Liverpool, 
 that his ship had been stopped and searched by an officer from 
 the Mercedita in English waters, and who added: 
 
 " Now, In all this there is nothing to complain of if the Bahama Is- 
 lands and the passages are under blockade by the United States naval 
 force, since all the customary forms prescribed for such a case were com- 
 plied with ; but up to the time of my sailing from Nassau no notice of such 
 blockade had been made public, and I have been unable to find any such 
 notice in the newspapers since my return to England. 
 
 " The United States vessels now on duty off Abaco are the Mercedita, 
 Quaker City and Albatross, and their vigilance and attention to the busi- 
 ness in hand are such that no vessel bound to or from Nassau can pass 
 either way without being overhauled and searched, except by a rare and 
 fortunate accident. Such vessels as the commander of the cruiser fiancies 
 he seizes ; others he permits to escape. I consider myself fortunate in 
 being among the latter on the present occasion. '"^ 
 
 The considerations which, apart from the law of nations, 
 induced England to put a construction so lenient upon the 
 practices of Federal cruisers arose from her own national in- 
 terests. The part then being played by the Federal cruisers 
 on the ocean against the commerce of the Confederate States, 
 was exactly that part which England had played very fre- 
 quently, and which she meant to play again, whenever occa- 
 sion and opportunity offered. It was as a belligerent and not 
 as a neutral, that she appealed to the doctrines of public law, 
 and it was not to her interest to depreciate or curtail those 
 
 1 "I am ignorant, I confess, of the laws of send to New York, for adjudication, Teasels on the 
 blockade, or indeed if a law tbere be that allows mere suspicion of their being intended blockade- 
 its enforcement and penalties to be enacted, five runners, and to chase and fire into real blockade- 
 hundred miles away from the ports blockaded. runners so near to theshorethaton one occasion 
 But it did seem stranae that the men-of-war of a the shot and shell fell into a fishing village, and 
 nation at peace with England should be allowed that within sight of an English man-of-war lying 
 to cruise off her ports, to stop and examine trad- at anchor in the harbor at Nassau."— ,S&rfc/ie« 
 ing vessels of all descriptions, to capture and from my lije, by the late Admiral Hobari Pasha. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 449 
 
 rights which the law of nations placed in her hand, and which 
 her powerful navy could enforce in future against the United 
 States, and plead the precedents of the Federal cruisers 
 against the Confederate commerce. 
 
 "It may be our own lot," continued the Times, "any day to receive 
 complaints about unjustifiable captures, and to be put upon our defence 
 for acts committed in the course of war. Both interest and equity, there- 
 fore, should dispose us to.scan the proceedings of the blockading squadron 
 with reasonable indulgence ; but, unhappily, there are not wanting con- 
 siderations on the other side, also. We cannot overlook the appointment 
 of such an officer as Admiral Wilkes^ to so peculiar a command, nor can we 
 conceal from ourselves that what is now actually charged against the 
 Federals was imputed to them as a deliberate and concerted policy long 
 ago. Already has Mr. Seward been under the necessity of 'instructing' 
 the officers of the Federal navy to observe the dictates of ordinary law, 
 and though the ' instructions' may be quoted to the credit of the Wash- 
 ington government, they are evidence of the previous lawlessness which 
 rendered them necessary. We must wait, however, for the decisions of the 
 American Prize Courts before we can come to any practical conclusion. If 
 the Adela. Peterhoffsmd the Dolphin are on sufficient evidence fairly con- 
 demned, the question is at an end." 
 
 The judicial d'etermination in Prize Courts of the United 
 States, of the vessels mentioned by the Times, presented occa- 
 sions where the established doctrines of international law, as 
 applied to blockade, contraband of war and the right of visita- 
 tion and search, were carried far beyond the extremest rulings 
 of either English or continental prize courts. In the cases of the 
 
 1 The conduct of Admiral "Wilkes to which, the 
 Times takes exception, was not so much that of 
 the *' Trent affair " as the following behavior 
 in the harbor of Bermuda, which is to be found 
 in the Acadian Recorder of Oct.. 11th. 
 
 " We have been sadly insulted by the three 
 flhlps of the Union navy, under command of the 
 notorious Wilkes. Three ships arrived here, 
 direct from New York, in four days, on the 25th 
 ult., said to be in want of coal. The Admiral, 
 with one of his fleet, after being presented with 
 a copy of the Queen's proclamation relative to the 
 twenty -four hours' limit, entered the port of St. 
 George for coal, with the understanding that she 
 was to leave at the latest on Monday morning. 
 Monday came— the diver represented that the 
 Admiral's ship required some repairs to her 
 Taottom— but no repairs were attempted. On 
 Tuesday, the ships were still in port. Our 
 Governor and the commandant of the troops 
 went on board, to expostulate with Admiral 
 Wilkes, and he promised to leave on Wednesday, 
 Wednesday came — still the obnoxious vessels 
 were in the limited water of the port, and no 
 symptom of their intention to move. On 
 Thursday morning, however, the Admiral and 
 tile gunboats he brought in with him left, and 
 the one that was blockading the port was moved 
 in to take coal and undergo repairs. 
 
 " The Admiral was induced to leave at length, 
 it seems, by a communication from the Gover- 
 nor, telling him that if he did not he would 
 compel him. The Admiral, after he got to sea, 
 wrote a very offensive letter to the 0ovemor, 
 accusing him of many things— things, indeed, 
 as such men only as Wilkes conld and were 
 guilty of in the port of St. George. It would 
 seem that Wilkes had a double object in com- 
 ing to Bermuda — first, to insult the authorities, 
 29 
 
 for he must have known in what a defenceless 
 state we were in, and secondly to capture or 
 destroy the vessels in that port— six steamers — 
 that are engaged, either directly or indirectly, 
 with the Confederate ports, and to destroy the 
 powder, of which there is said to be a large 
 quantity stored on one of the small islands in 
 Castle Harbor. The Admiral and one of his 
 steamers have gone out of sight of land, but the 
 other one, having coaled and repaired, is 
 cruising outside of St. George. 
 
 "During this rebeUion the Americans have 
 taken many liberties with the British, but I do 
 not think any of them equals this. 
 
 "The poor Confederates were sadly frightened, 
 for, knowing the character of the Admiral, they 
 knew he would do anything, however iUega], to 
 destroy them ; and the inhabitants of St. George 
 were under great apprehension lest some turn 
 might take place which would result in a row, 
 when they would suffer materially. 
 
 " Monday Morning. — Two of the Admiral's gun- 
 boats still close in with the harbor of St. George." 
 
 The Halifax Reporter of the same date says: 
 
 "Considerable excitement was caused this 
 afternoon by a rumor extensively circulated on 
 the authority of several gentlemen who professed 
 to have inquired into the facts of the case, that 
 the Koyal mail steamer Merlin, on leaving 
 Bermuda, suffered an indignity somewhat 
 similar to that which the Trent experienced on 
 a previous occasion, and at the hands of the 
 same valiant individual. The statement is. that 
 Capt. Wilkes, smarting under the affliction of 
 some slighte received at Bermuda, stood off the 
 port until the Merlin made her appearance, when 
 she was brought to by the firing of a gun across 
 her bows, and detained until she underwent a 
 close examination of her papers, etc." 
 
450 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Peterhoff, the Bermuda and the Springbok, the Prize Courts of 
 the United States and the Supreme Court, in its final judgment, 
 announced doctrines of prize law against which almost every 
 writer on international law has since vigorously protested. 
 
 The facts in the case of the Peterhoff were that she was 
 one of a line of steamers owned by Pile, Spence & Co., of 
 London, and trading between England and Matamoras, Mexico ^ 
 that she was dispatched from London January 7th, 1863, with a 
 general cargo, containing nothing contraband, and having a 
 regular British and Mexican clearance, and conveying her 
 Majesty's mails, as well as dispatches for the Mexican con- 
 sul ; that she was boarded on the 21st of February, when within 
 three miles of St. Thomas, by an officer from the U. S. S. 
 Alabama, who, after examining the ship's papers, permitted 
 her to proceed on her voyage; that just after leaving St. 
 Thomas, and when within sight of that port, the U. S. S. 
 Yanderbilt hove in sight, and, having communicated with 
 Admiral Wilkes, went in chase of and stopped the Peterhoff, 
 and putting an armed crew on board sent her to the United 
 States as a prize. 
 
 The facts of seizure were communicated to Earl Russell by 
 the owners of the Peterhoff as early as March 26th, 1863, who, 
 after considering all the papers of the vessel and the state- 
 ments of her owners, replied that : 
 
 "The government of the United States has clearly no right to seize 
 British vessels honaflde bound from this country or from any other British 
 possession to the ports of Vera Cruz and Matamoras, or either of them, or 
 vice versa, unless such vessels attempt to touch at or have an intermediate 
 or contingent destination to some blockaded port or place, or are carriers 
 of contraband of Avar destined for the Confederate States ; and, in any 
 admitted case of such unlawful captui-e, her Majesty's government ■would 
 feel it their duty promptly to interfere, with a view to obtain the imme- 
 diate restitution of the ship and cargo, with full compensation and with- 
 out the delay of proceedings in a prize court. 
 
 "Her Majesty's government, however, cannot, without violating the 
 rules of international law, claim for British vessels, navigating between 
 Great Britain and these places, any general exemption from the belligerent- 
 right of visitation by the cruisers of the United States, nor can they pro- 
 ceed upon any genei-al assumption that such vessels may not so act as to 
 render their capture lawful and justifiable. 
 
 "Nothing is more common than for those who contemplate a breach 
 of blockade, for the carriage of contraband, to disguise their purpose by a. 
 simulated destination and by deceptive papers; and the situation of the 
 ports on the coast of Mexico, with reference to the Confederate States, is 
 such as to make it not only possible, but in many oases probable, that an 
 ostensible Mexican destination would be resorted to as a cover for objects 
 which would really justify capture. It has already happened, in many 
 cases, that British vessels have been seized while engaged in voyages 
 apparently lawful, which vessels have been afterwards proved in the 
 prize courts to have been really guilty of endeavoring to brfeak the block- 
 ade, or of carrying contraband to the Confederates. 
 
 " It is the right of the belligerent to capture all vessels reasonably 
 suspected of either of these transgressions of international law, and when- 
 ever any cause of capture is alleged the case cannot be withdrawn from, 
 the consideration of the prize court of the captor. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 451 
 
 "After the case has undergone investigation it is the duty of the 
 prize court to restore any such prizes, unlawfully made, with costs and 
 damages j and the proper time for the interference of her Majesty's govern- 
 ment is in general when the prize courts have refused redress for a 
 capture which the evidence shows to have been unjustifiable. 
 
 " Her Majesty's government cannot, upon ex parte statements, deny 
 the belligerents in this war the exercise of those rights which, in all wars 
 in which Great Britain has been concerned, she has claimed herself to 
 exercise. 
 
 "As regards the allusion which has been made to the case of the 
 Adela, before her Majesty's government can form any opinion as to the 
 judgment stated to have been given in that case, they must have before 
 them a correct report of that judgment, it being impossible to rely upon 
 the general representation of its effect contained in a newspaper para- 
 graph, founded on printed letters, especially as none of the other judg- 
 ments of the United States prize courts, which have been reported to her 
 Majesty's government during the present war, evince any disregard of 
 the established principles of international law. 
 
 "As regards, however, the particular case of the Peterhoff, in which, 
 you are more directly interested, her Majesty's government having taken 
 into consideration the papers transmitted by you, and being satisfied that 
 those papers disclose no prima facie ground of capture, and that there is 
 every reason to believe the voyage to have been lawful and iona fide and 
 the seizure of the vessel wholly unjustifiable, they will instruct Lord 
 Lyons to make an immediate representation of the circumstances of that 
 case to the government at Washington, and if no legal ground of capture 
 should be alleged, then to press for the release of the vessel and her cargo, 
 with compensation and without the delay of proceedings in the prize 
 court. But if any legal grounds of capture should be alleged by the govern- 
 ment of the United States, this case, like all others, must unavoidably fol- 
 low the ordinary course. I am, sir, your most obedient humble servant." 
 
 The British Foreign Office vsras too fully committed to the 
 extremest doctrine of visitation and search to enter any pro- 
 test against its exercise, in any apparently legal manner, by 
 the United States, which of all the great nations has been the 
 firmest opponent of its exercise. The cargo of the Peterhoff was 
 found upon examination by the prize commissioner to be an as- 
 sorted one, and if not intended for the Confederates to contain 
 just what they stood very much in need of, there being a very 
 large quantity of quinine and other drugs on board, but noth- 
 ing contraband of war. Nevertheless, tfxe U. S. District Court, 
 Judge Betts, adjudged the Peterhoff a legal prize — because : 
 
 " First — That the said ship Peterhoff, in the premises mentioned, was 
 knowingly, on the voyage aforesaid, laded in whole or in part with articles 
 contraband of war, and had them in the act of transportation at sea. 
 Second— That her voyage with the said cargo was not truly destined to 
 the port of Matamoras, a neutral port, and for purposes of trade and 
 commerce, within the authority and intendment of public law, but, on 
 the contrary, was destined for some other port or place, and in aid and 
 for the use of the enemy, and in violation of the law of nations. Third — 
 That the ship's papers were simulated and false as to her real destination. 
 Wherefore, it is considered by the Court that the said vessel and her cargo 
 are subject to condemnation and forfeiture, and it is ordered that a decree 
 therefor be entered accordingly." 
 
 Four years afterwards the Supreme Court overruled the 
 District Court, and the United States compensated the owrners. 
 
453 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Upon the Peterhoff there were large quantities of mail matter 
 in sealed packages — which were seized upon by Sec. Welles, 
 and their return positively refused. Mr. Seward and Lord 
 Lyons had, previously to the capture of the Peterhoff, agreed 
 that mail bags of any captured vessel shall be forwarded un- 
 opened to the governments to which they belonged, or 
 whose seals they bore. The refusal of Sec. Welles to deliver 
 up the mails was brought to the attention of the English 
 Parliament, where it was announced that the mails would be 
 forwarded at once. ' 
 
 But it was not known that the delivery of the mails had 
 been made, only after the interchange of notes between Mr. 
 Seward and Mr. Wells and the active interposition of Presi- 
 dent Lincoln." 
 
 The evidence upon which Judge Betts found the cargo of the 
 Peterhoff to be contraband of war, throws some light upon the 
 character and description of goods which were being imported 
 into the Confederacy through the blockade, as well as illustrates 
 how the U. S. Courts stretched the doctrine of contraband. 
 
 The report filed by the Prize Commissioner contains the 
 following language : 
 
 " That a very large portion of the said cargo will be found, on examina- 
 tion of the inventory aforesaid, to be particularly adapted to army use; that 
 a large number of cases contain Blucher boots, which are known as army 
 shoes; a number of cases contain 'cavalry boots,' and are so labelled, 
 samples of said labels being hereto annexed ; that one hundred and ninety- 
 two bales of the said cargo consists of gray blankets, adapted to the use 
 of an army, and are believed to be such as are used in the United States 
 army ; ninety-five cases contain horse-shoes, of a large size ; thirty-six 
 cases, of a large size, contain artillery harness, in sets for four horses, with 
 two riding saddles attached to each set ; there are also on board two 
 hydraulic presses, in pieces, adapted to cotton. That a considerable por- 
 tion of said cargo consists of drugs, directed to 'Burchard & Co., succes- 
 sors, Matamoras, Mexico, in which, among an assorted cargo of drugs, 
 quinine, calomel, morphine and chloroform form an important portion. 
 The inventory also showed coiled rope, boxes of tin, of sheet zinc, of hoop 
 and of bar iron, anvils and bellows, and ' other articles of a contraband 
 character.'" 
 
 As there are but very few articles of commerce which, in 
 a direct or indirect manner, are not " adapted to army use," 
 
 1 In the House of Commons, on the 5th of May, government. It appeared that a difQculty had 
 
 Lord R. Cecil wished to put a question to the arisen in the prize court as to what was to be 
 
 Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs. "Some days done with the mail bags, which was referred to 
 
 since the honorable gentleman told the House Mr. Seward, and he informed Lord Lyons that 
 
 that Earl Russell had received a letter stating he had sent orders to New York that the mail 
 
 that Mr. Seward had promised that the mails bags should be forwarded at once to their desti- 
 
 on board the Peterhoff should be forwarded nations without being opened. At the same time 
 
 unopened to their destinations. In the news- —as had been stated by Earl Russell in another 
 
 papers of yesterday, however, it was stated that place — Mr. Seward informed Lord Lyons that a 
 
 the captors — thatwas. Admiral Wilkes — dechned gentleman was coming to this country to settle 
 
 to allow the course to be taken. He wished to with the ISritish government the principles upon 
 
 know whether the Foreign OflBce had received which the question of mails found on board 
 
 anyinformationupon that point, and, if BO, what captured vessels should be treated. No further 
 
 course had been determined upon," information had since been received." 
 
 "Mr. Layard said that what he had stated to the 
 
 House on a former day was strictly in accord- 2 History of the United States Navy, by C, B. 
 
 ance with the information theu received by the Boynton, Vol. II., p. 117. 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 403 
 
 that criterion of contraband, if recognized by all nations, 
 would prohibit all commerce on the part of neutrals in time of 
 war between any two nations. But the court held that a 
 breach of blockade was intended by a voyage from London to 
 Matamoras, Mexico, and that ruling was made in New York, 
 from which port regular clearances to American vessels were 
 given for Matamoras. But, notwithstanding Americans might 
 trade with Mexico, English vessels were liable to seizure going 
 to the same port, because of the known sympathy of that peo- 
 ple with the Confederate cause. It was a fact, admitted on 
 the trial, that the Rio Grande "was not blockaded with any 
 declared or actual design to impair the legitimate commerce of 
 any Mexican port." 
 
 That the final destination of the trade between England 
 and Matamoras was Texas and the Confederacy, was too plain 
 to deceive ; the abnormal growth of the number of ships that 
 sought the mouth of the Rio Grande, " from two or three to as 
 many hundreds," was a part of the evidence introduced at the 
 trial to prove a "simulated and false destination." But that 
 the trade was legal, that the destination in the ship's papers 
 was the true destination of the ship, was clearly established 
 on the trial. The cargoes for Matamoras were landed and be- 
 came a part of the goods of the merchants of that port, and 
 were afterwards sold and delivered at Brownsville, Texas, and 
 entered the Confederacy without breach of the blockade, real 
 or technical. The immediate destination of the goods was 
 Matamoras, Ibut their ulterior destination was the Confederacy; 
 and though it is a rule of international law that "the ulterior 
 destination of the goods determine the character of the trade, 
 no matter how circuitous the route by which they are to reach 
 their destination;" yet, if in that "circuitous route" the 
 goods intermingle with the stock of neutrals, and are sold as 
 part of that stock, the trade of the neutral is legitimate and 
 not liable to interruption by a belligerent. 
 
 The aid and comfort derived by the Confederate States 
 from the successful evasion of the blockade, the sympathy 
 and assistance extended by a very large part of the English 
 people, and the derogation from the dignity of the United 
 States which the neutrality of England and Fran ce was thought 
 to have effected by recognizing the Confederate States as bel- 
 ligerents, of equal right and consi'deration with the United 
 States, produced, even among the judges of the highest courts, a 
 condition of mind and temper that unfitted them to administer 
 justice where a subject of Great Britain was a party litigant,^ 
 
 1 That the minds of the Judges of the Supreme strong against England, and the judges, as 
 
 Court were influenced by patriotic feelings has individual citizens, were no exception to that 
 
 been avowed by one of its most distinguished feeling. Besides, the court was not familiar 
 
 members — the late Associate Justice Samuel with the law of blockade." This avowal was 
 
 Nelson, who in a letter to the Hon. W. Beach made with reference to the condemnation of 
 
 Lawrence, dated 4th August, 1873, and since the Circassian, shortly after Chief Justice Chase 
 
 made public, wrote as follows : — " The truth is had passed from the Department of State to the 
 
 that the feeling of the country was deep and Chief Justiceship. 
 
454 THE CONFEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The Hon. Wm. M. Evarts seems to have recognized the 
 warp and twist of the judicial mind, in the condemnation by 
 the Supreme Court of the Springbok, since he quoted, by way 
 of censure, from the charge of Count Portalis to the prize 
 courts of France, that : " Courts of law deserve the severest 
 censure when, instead of proceeding on the principle of inter- 
 national law, applied with equity, and in a manner favorable to 
 neutrals, they take for their point of departure the interests of 
 belligerents. State policy may have its plans and mysteries, 
 but on the bench reason should ever maintain its empire and 
 its dignity. When arbitrary pretexts, founded on fear or self- 
 ishness, direct the judgment seat, all is lost." It was be- 
 fore the Mixed Commission on English and American Claims, 
 in the case of the Springbok, to which Mr. Evarts administered 
 that rebuke; and when the extreme limits to which the U. S. 
 Supreme Court carried the law of blockade and contraband, 
 in that and other cases, are considered in connection with the 
 previous ruling of that court and of English prize courts, it 
 will become apparent that unfam.iliarity with the law of 
 blockade is not the only reason that will be assigned for rul- 
 ings which the future interest of the United States will impera- 
 tively demand shall be reversed and departed from. To fully 
 comprehend this wide departure from American rulings on 
 international law it is necessary to take a cursory review of 
 the efforts to modify the laws of seizure in the interests of 
 neutral commerce. 
 
 The object of the Declaration of the Treaty of Paris, in 
 1856, was to mitigate the restrictions which the occurrence of 
 war between two or more nations imposes on the commerce 
 of neutrals. The object of the treaty, which the government 
 of the United States urged, was that the treaty did not go far 
 enough in its protection of the commerce of neutrals; and 
 Mr. Marcy proposed, on the part of the United States, to ex- 
 empt from belligerent capture on the high seas all private pro- 
 perty which is not in the nature of contraband. And while 
 objecting to the abolishment of privateering, unless private 
 property at sea was exempt from capture, the United States 
 readily agreed to accept the declarations that the neutral flag 
 covers enemy's goods, with the exception of contraband of war; 
 that neutral goods, with the same exception, are not liable to 
 capture under enemy's flag; and that blockades in order to be 
 binding must be effective, that is to say, maintained by a force 
 sufiicient really to prevent access to. the coast of the enemy. 
 The Confederate States were informally invited by the cabinets 
 of Great Britain and France to accede to the Treaty of Paris, 
 and assented by Resolution of Congress of August 13th, 1861. ^ 
 
 1 Whereas, the Plenipotentiaries of Great as uniform rules for their guidance, in all 
 
 Britain, Austria, France, Prussia, Russia, Sar- cases arising under the principles thus pro- 
 
 dinia, and Turkey, in a conference held at claimed; And, whereas, ifbeing desirable, not 
 
 Paris on the 16th of April, 1856, made certain only to attain certainty and uniformity, as far 
 
 declarations respecting maritime law, to serve as may be practicable in maritime war, but also 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 455 
 
 The invitation by England and France to the Confederate 
 States to accept the Treaty of Paris, and their formal accept- 
 ance of every provision except that against privateering — 
 which had been reserved by the United States — implied a duty 
 on the part of England and France, to enforce the provisions 
 of that treaty in favor of all parties to it. Having invited the 
 Confederate States to guarantee the rights of England, France 
 and all other neutral nations, and the " informal proposals " 
 having been accepted, the faith of treaties was implied that 
 the reciprocal benefits to the Confederate States, as a party 
 "to the Treaty of Paris, would be guaranteed by England and 
 J'rance. It was worse than bad faith to make the Confederate 
 States parties, however "informal," to the treaty, and deny 
 to them its benefits. Yet Great Britain, after submitting for 
 one year to an ineffective blockade,' went still further and by 
 dispatch on February 11th, 1863, declared that : 
 
 " Her Majesty's Government, however, are of the opinion that, assum- 
 ing that the blockades was duly notified, and also that a number of 
 ships are stationed and remain at the entrance of a port sufiBcient really 
 to prevent access to it, or to create an emdent danger of entering or 
 leaving it, and that these ships do not voluntarily permit ing^ress or 
 egress, the fact that various ships may have successfully escaped through 
 it (as in the particular instance here referred to, ) will not of itself prevent 
 the blockade from being an effectual one by international law." 
 
 This extract serves well to illustrate how completely 
 Lord Russell and the English Foreign OflSce overreached 
 Mr. Seward in the diplomacy of blockade; and succeeded in 
 inveigling the United States into acquiesence and compliance 
 with England's ruling in the law of blockade. 
 
 From the seventeenth century, and all through the wars of 
 the eighteenth century, the primary and essential condition of 
 a violation of blockade has been held to be the existence of a port 
 "in a state of blockade" in the legal sense. The Fourth Article 
 of the Declaration of Armed Neutrality in 1780, was: "Que 
 pour determiner ce que characterise un port bloque on n'accorde 
 cette denomination qu' k celui on il y a, par la disposition de la 
 puissance, que I'attaque avec des vaisseaux arretes et suf- 
 fisament proches un danger evident d'entrer." (That in order to 
 determine what characterises a blockaded port, that term shall 
 
 "to maintain "whatever is ju8t and proper in the must be effectual, ttiat is to say, maintained by 
 
 «stablislied usages of nations, tlie Confederate a force suflicient really to prevent access to the 
 
 States of America deem it important to declare coast of the enemy, 
 the principles by which they will be governed 
 
 in their intercourse with the rest of mankind. i Lord Kussell's dispatch of May 6th, 1862, 
 
 Now therefore — recites : " This blockade, kept up irregularly. 
 
 Be it anacted by the Congress of the Confederate but when enforced, enforced severely, has 
 
 States of America, 1. That we maintain the right seriously injured the trade and manufactures 
 
 of privateering, as it has been long estab- of the United Kingdon. * * * Yet, her 
 
 lished by the practice and recognized by the Majesty's Government have, never sought to 
 
 law of nations. take advantage of the obvious imperfections of 
 
 2. That the neutral flag covers enemy's goods, this blockade, in order to declare it ineffective," 
 ■with the exception of contraband of war. —and May 11th, that the blockade might, no 
 
 3. 'That neutral goods, with the exception of doubt, bemade effective, considering the small 
 contraband of war, are not liable to capture, number of harbors on the Southern coasts, even 
 under enemy's flag. though the extent of three thousand miles were 
 
 4. That blockades, in order to be binding, comprehended in the terms of that blockade." 
 
456 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 only be applied to a port where, from the arrangement made 
 by the attacking power with vessels stationed off the port, 
 and sufficiently near, there is evident danger in entering 
 the port.) 
 
 In the Second Armed Neutrality in 1800, the same principle 
 was laid down. " Un port ne peut-etre comme bloque que se 
 non entree est evidemment dangereux par suite des dispositions 
 prises par une des puissances belligerantes, par le moyen des 
 a vaisseiix places a proximite." (A port shall not be understood 
 as blockaded unless it is evidently hazardous to attempt to 
 enter it, in consequence of the measures adopted by one of the 
 belligerent powers, by vessels of war stationed in its proximity. ) 
 
 England violated these articles in the grossest manner, 
 and arrogated to herself the right to declare, by Royal 
 Order in Council, ports to be in a state of blockade al- 
 though there was no blockade stationed oflf such ports 
 in their proximity. Her cruisers captured neutral vessels 
 bound for such ports, and her courts condemned vessels and 
 cargoes. These "paper blockades," were defended only as 
 "defensive retaliation" justified by necessity. But in the 
 treaty of June 17th, 1801, with Russia, England introduced 
 surreptitiously this novel doctrine, in defining blockade in that 
 treaty, while using the phraseology of the armed neutrality 
 of 1780, a material change was introduced. The words in the 
 Armed Neutrality of 1780, were : " Avec des vaisseux arretes 
 et suffisamment proches;" this language was deftly changed 
 into "avec des vaisseux arretfes ou suffisamment proches." 
 This same change was made by Lord Russell in sustaining the 
 blockade of Confederate ports; and instead of adhering to the 
 language of the Treaty of Paris — that a blockade is effective 
 only when "maintained by a force sufficient really to prevent 
 access to the coast of the enemy," he added, "or to create an 
 evident danger of entering or leaving " the port. This was 
 reviving the blockade " par croisidme," (by cruising squadrons) 
 sometimes near and sometimes at a distance from the so-called 
 blockaded port. Mr. Seward did not see the position to which 
 he was committing the United States by accepting Lord 
 Russell's addenda. And the United States now stands com- 
 mitted to a doctrine of blockade similar to that which England 
 maintained against all the principles of international law, and 
 which at some future day will return to plague the commerce 
 of neutral America in the wars of European belligerents. 
 
 The solemn protest of the Confederate States against the 
 modification of the provisions of the Treaty of Paris which 
 Lord Russell made m that dispatch, did not avail to correct 
 its great injustice. By the treaty of Paris England engaged 
 to observe blockades only " when maintained by a force suffic- 
 ient really to prevent access to the coast of the enemy." It is 
 difficult to see from what principle of public faith or interna- 
 tional law Lord Russell drew the right to interject into that 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 457 
 
 treaty the important modification, that effectiveness of block- 
 ade was complied with where the force at the entrance of a 
 port, not on " the coast of an enemy," was sufficient " to create 
 an evident danger of entering it or leaving it " ! These incon- 
 sistencies and vacillations were made by the political branches 
 of the governments of Great Britain and the United States, 
 and whether excusable or not should have found no sanction 
 or support from tiie highest judicial tribunal of the United 
 States. 
 
 International law ought to be more perfect common-sense 
 than any other law, since there is no supreme power to enforce 
 it, and its varying problems can never be Solved but by an 
 appeal to the judgments and sentiments of mankind. It is 
 accordingly one of the first duties of courts of justice, called 
 upon to administer international law, to repudiate fictions of 
 all kinds, as they are as distasteful to common-sense as a 
 vacuum is repugnant to nature. The Supreme Court, instead 
 of rising with the occasion that was presented, to liberalize 
 and modify the harsher doctrines of international law intro- 
 duced by British prize courts to protect a colonial trade, em- 
 braced the opportunity to enlarge and extend the obsolete 
 " Eule of the War of 1756," and engrafted on Lord Stowell's old 
 stock of " continuous voyages," a twig that may yet bear the 
 most noxious fruit to American commerce. Prior to the war 
 of 1756, between European States and their transmarine colo- 
 nies, trade with those colonies was not permitted to other 
 nations. When, under the stress of war, any one of those States 
 threw open their interdicted colonial trade to neutrals, the 
 hostile power refused to recognize this as lawful neutral com- 
 merce ; but it was treated as aid to the enemy, in relief of his 
 trade which the war had strangled, and the adverse belligerent 
 captured and condemned the ships and cargoes of the neutral 
 as of an enemy. "As trade, however, in subsequent times," 
 said Mr. Evarts, ' "between the colonies and the neutral State 
 and the neutral and European States was incontestably open 
 to the neutral, a trade was attempted of a colorable im- 
 portation from Cuba, for instance, into Boston and from 
 Boston to Spain, and so of return voyages, through the inter- 
 position of a neutral port. This scheme was denounced and 
 this commerce was attacked by the belligerent. The question 
 for the prize court was whether the importation into and the 
 exportation from the intermediate neutral port were really 
 transactions of the neutral's own and of course legitimate 
 commerce, or whether it was really a trade between the colony 
 and the parent State, and the interposition of the neutral port 
 was only colorable." It was to meet this novel form of neu- 
 tral adventure, in aid of an enemy's trade, and to prevent the 
 produce of an enemy's colony from being imported into the 
 
 1 Brief in the Springbok case. 
 
458 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 mother country, oi- vice versa, through an , apparently legiti- 
 mate channel, that Lord Stowell took upon himself to invent 
 the doctrine, as it has been termed, of "continuous voyages," 
 and clothed it in language which has enabled the Supreme 
 Court of the United States to apply it with plausibility to a 
 very different class of cases. Lord Stowell's " rule of the war 
 of 1756 " was applied only to captures made on the ulterior 
 voyage, that is the voyage from the neutral port, and it was 
 never applied to captures made on the immediate voyage, that 
 is the voyage to the neutral port. Under the rule, as laid 
 down by Lord Stowell, condemnation never followed capture 
 made on the voyage de facto from one neutral port to another ; 
 but under the application of the rule, or rather its unjustifiable 
 extension by the Supreme Court, captures were condemned by 
 the court on its presumption that the first voyage was but a 
 part of the second ; and while, in the cases before Lord Sto- 
 well, the corpus delicti was incontestable ; in the case of the 
 Springbok, before the Supreme Court, the corpus delicti was 
 only a matter of argument, presumption and inference. 
 
 The Springbok was a sailing vessel of draft too great to 
 enter any Confederate port, and was upon a voyage from Lon- 
 don to Nassau when she was intercepted and seized by a 
 United States cruiser and sent into New York, under a prize 
 crew, and there condemned. ' 
 
 Upon appeal to the Supreme Court the decree of the U. S. 
 District Court, condemning the vessel, was reversed ; the 
 Supreme Court holding that the ship was improperly con- 
 demned {' but while releasing the ship the Supreme Court 
 affirmed the condemnation of the cargo, because the voyage 
 was one and the same whether broken or not at Nassau.^ 
 Upon that ruling Mr. Evarts remarked: "Thus it appears 
 condemnation passed finally upon the cargo, not as taken in 
 delicto during a voyage in which the vessel carrying it was to 
 be an agent of transportation with intent to violate the block- 
 ade, but simply as set in progress (by and through an innocent 
 
 1 " The United Slates vg. the Bark Springbok arid tured, was from London to Nassau, both neu- 
 Cargo, — This suit having been beard by the tral ports within the definition of neutrality, 
 Courtupon the pleadings, proofs and allegations furnished by international law. The papers 
 of the parties, and evidence legally invoked too, were all genuine, and there was no conceal- 
 therein from other cases, and the premises ment of any of thena, and no spoliation. Her 
 being fully considered ; and it being found by owners were neutral, and do not appear to have 
 the court therefrom that the said vessel, at the had any interest in the cargo ; and there is 
 time of her capture at sea, was knowingly laden insufficient proof that they had any knowledge 
 ill whole or part with articles contraband of of its alleged unlawful destination." — B. Wal- 
 war, with intent to deliver such articles to the lace p. 21. 
 
 aid and use of the enemy ; that the true desti- o .-. x.. ... i j i.. .i, . *i. 
 
 nation of the said hhip and cargo was not to 2" Upon the whole, we cannot doubt that the 
 
 Nassau, a neutral port, and for trade and com- cargo was originally shipped with intent to 
 
 merce. but to some port lawfully blockaded by violate the blockade ; thai the owners of the 
 
 the forces of the United States, and with intent "^'g" intended that it should be trans-shipped at 
 
 to violate such blockade. And further, that Nassau in some vessel more likely to succeed 
 
 the papers of said vessel were simulated and "■ reaching safely a blockaded port thau the 
 
 false. Wherefore, the condemnation and for- Spnngiok ; that the voyage from London to the 
 
 feiture of the vessel and cargo is declared. blockaded port was, both in law and in intent of 
 
 Ordered, that a decree be entered accordingly." *•"' parties, one voyage ; and that the Uabihty 
 
 to condemnnation, if captured during any part 
 
 2 " Her papers were regular and they all of that voyage, attached to the cargo from the 
 showed that the voyage, on which she was cap- time of sailing."— 6. Wallace, p. 27. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 459 
 
 voyage by an innocent vessel to a lawful port) towards a pur- 
 pose of thereafter obtaining transportation by a voyage yet to. 
 be commenced, by some unknown and unnamed vessel, to 
 some unknown and unnamed blockaded port. " The antiquated 
 and obsolete " rule of the war of 1756" was revived, enlarged 
 and applied by the Supreme Court to the war of 1861, in order 
 to hamper and hinder the Confederate States in obtaining 
 from England the same kind of supplies which the United 
 States obtained by violation of English laws and against the 
 protests of the English Foreign Office. ' 
 
 Surprise is increased that England and Prance should 
 have continued to respect and observe a blockade which was 
 not only ineffective, according to the rule of the Treaty of 
 Paris, but which was converted into a j)aper blockade by the 
 rulings of the prize courts. European jurists were taken by 
 surprise at the novel doctrine announced in the Springbok 
 case ; the learned Dr. Bluntschli, of Heidelberg, observing : 
 " Si cette maniere de voir venait a I'emporter dans la pratique, 
 le commerce neutre sera bien plus menace que par le blocus 
 sur papier. '"^ 
 
 Whatever effectiveness the blockade had was as much the 
 result of the rulings of the courts, in prize cases, as of the 
 ships that watched the mouths of harbors. The former ex- 
 tended the blockade in reality, if not in avowal, to the Engi 
 lish ports in Bermuda, Nassau, St. John, and to the Spanish 
 ports in Cuba. And it was not the stopping of large or " small 
 holes" by ships, but by traps along the paths to the "holes" 
 that the United States cruisers reaped their largest and most 
 profitable prize harvest. Even Lord Russell's interpolation of 
 the law of blockade would not have made that at Wilmington 
 respectable, if he had not permitted the new rulings of the 
 
 1 Lord Russell to Mr. Adams, December 19th, cannot he ignorant. Her Majesty's government, 
 1862: " It is right, however, to observe that therefore, has just ground for complaint against 
 the party which has profited by far the most both of the belligerent parties, but most es- 
 by these unjustifiahle practices, has been the pecially against the goverument of the "United 
 government of the United States, because that States, for having systematically, and in dis- 
 government, having a superiority of force by regard of the comity of nations which it was 
 «ea, and having blockaded most of the Con- their duty to observe, induced subjects of her 
 federate ports, has been able on the one hand, Majesty to violate those orders, which, in con- 
 safely to receive all the warlike supplies which formity with her neutral position, she has 
 it has indwxd British manufacturers and mer- enjoined all her subjects to obey." 
 chants to send to the United States in violation 
 
 of the Queen's proclamation ; and on the other 2 " Le Droit Internationale Codifie, 2me 
 
 hand, to intercept and capture a great part of Editione, Paris, S. 835. Dr. Louis Gessner, 
 
 "the supplies of the same kind which were Imperial Councillor of the Legation at Berlin, 
 
 destined from this country to the Confederate concurred in tlae same opinion. The United 
 
 States. If it be sought to make her Majesty*s States authority on international law, "Wm. 
 
 government responsible to that of the United Beach Lawrence, wrote to M. Rolin- Jacquemyns, 
 
 States because arms and munitions of war have Sept. 30th, 1878, that : " the recent adjudications 
 
 left this country on account of the Confederate of our Supreme Court have even gone beyond 
 
 government, the Confederate government, as the cases arising out of "the Rule of Fifty-sis. 
 
 the other belligerent, may very well maintain Dr. Heffter, of Berlin; Mr. Carlos Calvo, of Paris; 
 
 that it has a just cause of complaint against Mr. "Westlake, Q. C, of London; M. G.Rolin- 
 
 the British government because the United Jacquemyns, of Gaud ; Professor Goldsmidt, 
 
 States arsenals have been replenished from of Leyden ; Sir Robert Phillimore, Sir W. 
 
 Britisli sources. Nor would it be possible to Atherton, Sir Boundell Palmer Lord Sel- 
 
 deny that, in defiance of the Queen's procla- borne, Mr. George Mellish, Sir W. "V"ernon- 
 
 mation, many subjects of her Majesty, owing Harcourt — all concur in holding that there was 
 
 allegiance to her crown, have enlisted in the a miscarriage of justice iu the condemnation of 
 
 armies of the United States. Of this fact you the cargo of the Springbok." 
 
460 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 U. S. Supreme Court to extend the blockade back to the Eng- 
 lish colonial ports. 
 
 The Springbok case was reviewed before the Mixed Com- 
 mission on British and American Claims, under the Treaty of 
 Washington, in 1871. That Mixed Commission held, as to ques- 
 tions arising under the blockade, very nearly the same rela- 
 tion that the Geneva Conference held to those questions 
 which grew up out of the action of Confederate cruisers. But 
 the Commission that sat at Washington was a very different 
 affair from that at Geneva. It was composed, on the part of 
 Great Britain, of Mr. Russell Gurney, a mere criminal lawyer, 
 " Recorder" of the city of London, the arbitrator ; on the part 
 of the United States was Judge James S. Frazer ; and Count 
 Corti, the Italian Minister at Washington, was named as 
 umpire by both governments. The Commission wais provided 
 for in Article XII of the Treaty of Washington, ratified May 
 8th, 1871, and was limited in duration by Article XIV to two 
 years. Its session began at Washington on the 36th of Sep- 
 tember, 1871. and its final award was made at Newport, R. I., 
 on the 25th of September, 1873. By April 23d, 1873, it had 
 decided eleven cases, and from that date to the 2d of October 
 following it transacted no business whatever, in consequence 
 of the American Commission having refused to adjudicate 
 any British claims while the tribunal at Geneva was at a 
 deadlock. The Washington Commission refused to hear oral 
 argument, gave no reasons for its awards, but curtly an- 
 nounced in stereotyped formula that "this claim is dis- 
 allowed." It sat with closed doors, and departed most glar- 
 ingly from the precedent of the similar Anglo-American 
 Claims Commission, which sat in London in 1853. The Pro- 
 tocol XXXVI, of April 14th, 1871, provided : " That the Con- 
 vention of 1863 should be followed as a precedent." The Con- 
 vention of 1853 required both commissioners, as well as the 
 umpire or arbitrator, to state in writing the grounds of their 
 respective opinions or awards, and a full report of those opin- 
 ions was published by both governments ; the sittings were 
 open, and special counsel were "heard" on behalf of the 
 claimants. Of these flagrant departures from the precedents 
 of the Commission of 1853, Mr. Beach Lawrence remarked : 
 "Of the Mixed Commission, established by the treaties be- 
 tween the United States and Great Britain of 1794 and 1853, 
 for adjusting the claims of citizens or subjects of the one 
 country or the government of the other, we have reports more 
 or less complete. Moreover, the discussions connected with 
 the arbitrament of the so-called 'Alabama Claims' by the 
 tribunal, created under Article I of the treaty of 1871, whose 
 sittings were held at Geneva, fill many volumes. But the 
 Mixed Commission, appointed under Article XII of that 
 Treaty, did not, save in a few of the early cases, state the 
 reasons on which its adjudications -were based. In the absence 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 461 
 
 of any announcement by the Commissioners of their mode of 
 arriving at their conclusions, we have no means by which to 
 interpret the motives of the decrees. The decisions of arbi- 
 ters, for the adjustment of international claims, should in 
 every case be furnished in writing to the respective govern- 
 ments."' 
 
 The number of British claims presented to the Commission 
 was 478, of which 181 were allowed ; eight were withdrawn, 
 one was dismissed, and 360 were disallowed. The amount 
 claimed aggregated $96,000,000, exclusive of ten years' in- 
 terest, and the amount awarded was $1,939,819 in gold, or a 
 trifle over two per cent, on the entire claims. Eighty-seven 
 of the claims were for wrongful seizure of British ships and 
 cargoes ; of these four were allowed, but without interest ; 
 thirteen were partly allowed, and seventy were disallowed or 
 rejected in toto. The aggregate amount of these eighty-seven 
 ship claims was $9,833,680, of which the Commission allowed 
 only $735,630 in gold. Article XVI provided five per cent, on 
 the sums awarded for the expenses of the Commission, and 
 this deduction from the final award amounted to_ $96,491, 
 which was apportioned to "the two governments in equal 
 moieties." The $45,345 received by the United States the offi- 
 cial report of Mr. Hale, the agent and counsel of the United 
 States, shows to have been far short of the amount actually 
 expended, which reached $300,000 ; which, in contrast with 
 the whole expenses of the Commission of 1853, which sat in 
 London, $13,940, was suggestive of the inquiry: "How the 
 $300,000 had been employed ?" Without attempting to solve 
 that riddle it would be interesting and useful to know the 
 grounds upon which the conclusions of the Commission were 
 based. But a far more interesting inquiry is why the British 
 Commissioner concurred in rulings so variant from established 
 international law and so wrongful to British subjects, and 
 which was done in spite of the strong opinion of the law- 
 officers of the crown. Dr. Phillimore (Queen's Advocate), Sir 
 William Atherton (Attorney General), and Sir Roundell Pal- 
 mer (Solicitor General), as well as of Mr. George Mellish 
 (afterwards a Lord Justice of the Court of Chancery), and 
 William Vernon Harcourt, the famous "Historicus" of the 
 Times, and Solicitor General under Mr. Gladstone's administra- 
 tion. Were those wrongful awards consented to in the hope 
 and expectation that they would become precedents, profit- 
 able to Great Britain against neutrals at some future day, 
 and conclusive against the neutral commerce of the United 
 States when Great Britain should again be at war? If so, 
 the Mixed Commission has sown seeds from which the com- 
 merce of the United States may gather fruits more injuri- 
 ous even than those of the war between the States in 1861-65. 
 
 I Mr. Beach Lawrence's Letter to M. Eolin-Jaoquemyns, September 30tli, 1873. 
 
463 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The ease with which the blockade at Wilmington was 
 run, and the success with which the blockading fleet was 
 avoided, is explained in that very interesting work of Captain 
 John Wilkinson, C. S. N.,' "The Narrative of a Blockade 
 Runner." 
 
 " The natural advantages of Wilmington for blockade-running were 
 very great, chiefly owing to the fact that there are two separate and dis- 
 tinct approaches to Cape Pear River, i.e., either by "New Inlet" to 
 the north of Smith's Island, orbj^the "western bar" to the south of it. 
 This Island is ten or eleven miles in length ; but the Frying Pan Shoals 
 extend ten or twelve miles further south, making the distance by sea be- 
 tween the two bars thirty mUes or more, although the direct distance 
 between them is only six or seven mUes. From Smithville, a little village 
 nearly equidistant from either bar, both blockading fleets could be dis- 
 tinctly seen, and the outward bound blockade-runners could take their 
 choice through which of them to run the gauntlet. The inward bound 
 blockade-runners, too, were guided by circumstances of wind and weather; 
 selecting that bar over which they would cross after they had passed the 
 Gulf Stream, and shaping their course accordingly. The approaches to 
 both bars were clear of danger, with the single exception of the " Lump " 
 before mentioned ; and so regular are the soundings that the shore can be 
 coasted for miles within a stone's throw of the breakers. 
 
 " These facts explain why the United States fleet were unable whoUy 
 to stop blockade-running. It was, indeed, impossible to do so ; the result 
 to the very close of the war proves this assertion, for, in spite of the vigi- 
 lance of the fleet, many blockade-runners were afloat when Fort Fisher 
 was captiu'ed. In trutli the passage through the fleet was little dreaded ; 
 for although the blockade-runner might receive a shot or two, she was 
 rarely disabled ; and in proportion to the increase of the fleet the greater 
 would be the danger (we knew) of their firing into each other. As the 
 boys before the deluge used to say, they would be very apt "to miss the 
 cow and kill the calf." The chief danger was upon the open sea ; many of 
 the light cruisers having great speed. As soon as one of them discovered 
 
 ^ Capt. Johii Wilkinson was bom in Norfolli. position towards the government aa other classes 
 
 Va., in 1821, and was the eldest son of the late of citizens. But this charge was never brought 
 
 Commodore Jesse Wilkinson of the U. S. navy. against them till the war waa ended. The re- 
 
 Capt. John Wilkinson entered the U. S. navy as signation of their commissions was accepted 
 
 a midshipman in 1837, served in the Mexican when their purpose was well known. As to the 
 
 War on board of the Saratoga ; and after more charge of -ingratitude, they reply, their re- 
 
 than the average amount of sea service, was in spective States had contributed their full shai-e 
 
 command of the steamer Corwin, on coast towards the expenses of the general government, 
 
 survey service when his native State seceded. acting as their disbursing agent ; and when 
 
 He then resigned his commission, and offered these States withdrew from the Union, their 
 
 his services to the State of his birth. Like citizens belonging to the two branches of the 
 
 many of his brother oflicers. Captain Wilkinson public service did not, and do not, consider 
 
 up to that time had meddled so little with themselves amenable ix) this charge for abandon- 
 
 poUtics as never even to have cast a vote ; but ing their oflficial positions to cast their lot with 
 
 having been educated in the belief that his their kindred and friends. But yielding as they 
 
 allegiance was due to his Htate. he did not did to necessity, it was nevertheless a painful 
 
 hesitate to act as honor and patriotism seemed act to separate themselves from companions 
 
 to demand. Speaking of those citizens of with whom they had been long and intimately 
 
 Virginia who resigned their commissions, in associated, and from the flag under which they 
 
 his interesting Narrative of a Blockade Runner, had been proud to serve." 
 
 he says : "They were compelled to choose During the brief interval which elapsed be- 
 
 whether they would aid in subjugating their tween the act of secession and the admission of 
 
 State, or in defending it against invasion-; for the State into the Confederacy, the Virginia 
 
 it was already evident that coercion would be army and navy were organized : and all of the 
 
 used by the general government, and that war naval ofl&cers who had tendered their services 
 
 was inevitable. In reply to the accusation of received commissions in the Virginia navy, 
 
 perjuiy in breaking their oath of allegiance, Captain Wilkinson's first service was at Fort 
 
 since brought against the officers of the army Powhatan, an earthwork situated on James 
 
 and navy who resigned their commissions to River, a short distance below City Point, and 
 
 render aid to the South, it need only be stated carrying six or eight guns mounted on ships* 
 
 that, in their belief, the resignation of their carriages. From thence he was transferred to 
 
 commissions absolved them from any special the command of a battei-y on Acquia Creek.- On 
 
 obligation. They then occupied the same Juno loth, 1861, he entered into the service of 
 
THE CONFBDBEATE STATES NAVY. 463 
 
 a blockade-runner, during daylight, she would attract other cruisers in 
 the vicinity by sending up a dense column of smoke, visible for many 
 miles in clear weather. A cordon of fast steamers stationed ten or fifteen 
 miles apart, inside the Qulf Stream, and in the course from Nassau and 
 Bermuda to Wilmington and Charleston, would have been more effectual 
 in stopping blockade-running than the whole United States navy concen- 
 trated off those ports ; and it was unaccountable to us why such a plan 
 did not occur to good Mr. Welles ; but it was not our place to suggest it. 
 I have no doubt, however, that the fraternity to which I then belonged 
 would have unanimously voted thanks and a service of plate to the Hon. 
 Secretary of the United States Navy for this oversight. I say inside the 
 Qulf Stream, because every experienced captain of a blockade-runner 
 made a point to cross "the stream" early enough in the afternoon, if pos- 
 sible, to establish the ship's position by chronometer, so as to escape the 
 influence of that current upon his dead reckoning. The lead always gave 
 indication of our distance from the land, but not, of course, of our posi- 
 tion; and the numerous salt works along the coast, where evaporation 
 was produced by fire, and which were at work night and day, were vis- 
 ible long before the low coast could be seen. Occasionally, the whole 
 inward voyage would be made under adverse conditions. Cloudy, thick 
 weather and heavy gales would prevail so as to prevent any solar or lunar 
 observations, and reduce the dead reckoning to mere guess-work. In 
 these cases the nautical knowledge and judgment of the captain would 
 be taxed to the utmost. The current of the Gulf Stream varies in velocity 
 and (within certain limits] in direction; and the stream, itself almost as 
 well defined as a river within its banks under ordinary circumstances, is 
 impelled by a strong gale toward the direction in which the wind is blow- 
 ing, overflowing its banks as it were. The counter current, too, inside of 
 the Gulf Stream is much influenced by the prevailing winds. Upon one 
 occasion, while in command of the R. E. Lee, formerly the Clyde-built 
 iron steamer Giraffe, we had experienced very heavy and thick weather, 
 and had crossed the Stream and struck soundings about midday. The 
 weather then clearing, so that we could obtain an altitude near meridian, 
 we found ourselves at least forty miles north of our supposed position, 
 and near the shoals which extend in a southerly direction off Cape Look- 
 out. It would be more perilous to run out to sea than to continue on our 
 
 the Confederate States navy, and when the subsequently relieved, and the naval portion of 
 line of the Potomac was abandoned, he was it was placed under the command of Capt. John 
 ordered to duty on the Mississippi below Taylor Wood, C. S. N., and one of the President's 
 New Orleans, first in command of the Con- aides. It is hardly necessary to add, that this 
 federate States steamer Jackson, and afterwards expedition also failed, owing to the fact that, 
 as executive officer of the iron-clad Louisiatia, secretly as all the preparations had been made, 
 carrying the flag of Commodore John K. information of it was speedily conveyed to 
 Mitchell. He succeeded to the command of the Washington, and prompt measures taken to 
 Louisiana after the mortal wounding of Captain prevent its success. Captain Wilkinson was then 
 C. F. Mcintosh, who fell in the action during the placed in charge of the ot&ce of " Orders and 
 passage of the U. S. fleet under Admiral Far- Detail, " which was charged with lighting the 
 ragut. After the destruction of the iOMistana, approachesto Wilmington and of detailing pilots 
 to prevent her from falling into the hands of the and signal officers to the blockade mnners. In 
 enemy, most of the officers (and Lieut. Wilkin- the later part of September, 1864:. he was ordered, 
 son among them) were captured and imprisoned to the command of the Chickamauga, & double 
 at Fort Warren. screw steamer converted into a man-of-war, and 
 Aft^r an exchange he was sent to Europe made in her a successful cruise along the At- 
 under orders from the War Department, to pur- lantlc coast. After his return he was put in 
 chase a steamer. Besides commanding the command of the Tallahassee, which under the 
 Giraffe, afterwards named the R. E. Lee, he also name of the diattieUon proceeded with all 
 commanded the secret expedition to attempt the despatch to Bermuda for a cargo of provisions 
 releaseof the prisoners at Johnson's Island. It for General iee's starving army. Procuringher 
 is believed the plot was betrayed through the return cargo the CftamcZeon made several attempts 
 indiscretions of an agent of the C.S. government to enter a Confederate port but failed. Oaptiiin 
 then residing in Canada. Betuming to' Bermuda Wilkinson returned to Liverpool, and with th« 
 Captain Wilkinson assumed command of the public funds turned her over to Captain Bulloch 
 blockade runner Whisper, and arrived safely in without appropriating any of the spoils of the 
 Wilmington. He was then ordered to the iron- perishing ship of state. Capt. Wilkinson with 
 clad Soanoke, and after a few weeks to Bich- his opportunities could have accumulated a 
 mond, where he was given command of the large fortune during the war, hut being a gentle- 
 naval portion o£ the expedition to attempt the man of the purest integrity he returned to hii 
 release of the Point Lookout prisoners. He was family " dead broke," with a clear conscience. 
 
404 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 course, for we had passed through the off-shore line of blockaders, and 
 the sky had become perfectly clear. I determined to personate a trans- 
 port bound to IBeaufort, which was in tlie possession of the tJ. S. forces, 
 and the coaUng station of the fleet blockading Wilmington. The risk of 
 detection was not very great, for many of the captured blockade-runners 
 were used as transports and dispatch-vessels. Shaping our course for 
 Beaufort, and slowing down, as if we were in no haste to get there, we 
 passed several vessels, showing United States colors to them all. Just as 
 we were crossing through the ripple of shallow water off the ' tail ' of the 
 shoals, we dipped our colors to a sloop-of-war which passed three or four 
 mUes to the south of us. The courtesy was promptly responded to; but 
 I have no doubt her captain thought me a lubberly and careless seaman 
 to shave the shoals so closely. We stopped the engines when no vessel 
 was in sight, and I was relieved from a heavy burden of anxiety as the 
 sun sank below the horizon, and the course was shaped at full speed for 
 Masonboro' Inlet. 
 
 "The staid old town of Wilmington was turned ' topsy turvy during 
 the war. Here resorted the speculators from all parts of the South, to 
 attend the weekly auctions of imported cargoes ; and the town was in- 
 fested with rogues and desperadoes, who made a livelihood bjr robbery 
 and murder. It was unsafe to ventuie into the suburbs at night, and 
 even in daylight there were frequent confhcts in the public streets, be- 
 tween the crews of the steamers in port and the soldiers stationed in the 
 town, in which knives and pistols would be freely used; and not unfre- 
 quently a dead body would rise to the surface of the water in one of the 
 docks with marks of violence upon it. The civil authorities were power- 
 less to prevent crime. ' Inter arma silent leges !' The agents and em- 
 ployees of different blockade-running companies lived in magnificent style, 
 paying a king's ransom (in Confederate money) for their household ex- 
 penses, and nearly monopolizing the supplies in the country market. 
 Toward s the end of the war, indeed, fresh provisions were almost beyond the 
 reach of every one. Our family servant, newly arrived from the country 
 in Virginia, would sometimes return from market with an empty basket, 
 having flatly refused to pay what he called ' such nonsense prices' for a 
 bit of fresh beef, or a handful of vegetables. A quarter of lamb, at the 
 time of which I now write, sold for $100, a pound of tea for $500. Con- 
 federate money which in September, 1861, was nearly equal to specie in 
 value, had declined in September 1862 to 225 ; in the same month, in 1863, 
 to 400, and before September, 1864, to 2,000 ! 
 
 " Many of the pjermanent residents of the town had gone into the 
 country, letting their houses at enormous prices ; those who were com- 
 pelled to remain kept themselves much secluded ; the ladies rarely being 
 seen upon the more public streets. Many of the fast young officers be- 
 longing to the army would get an occasional leave to come to Wilming- 
 ton ; and would live at free quarters on board the blockade -runners, or at 
 one of the numerous bachelor halls ashore. 
 
 "The convalescent soldiers from the Virginia hospitals were sent by 
 the route through Wilmington to their homes in the South. The ladies 
 of the town were organized by Mrs. De R. into a society for the purpose 
 of ministering to the wants of these poor sufferers ; the trains which 
 carried them stopping an hour or two at the depot, that their wounds 
 might be dressed and food and medicine supplied to them. These self- 
 sacrificing, heroic women patiently and faithfully performed the offices 
 of hospital nurses. 
 
 " Liberal contributions were made by companies and individuals to 
 this society, and the long tables at the depot were spread with delicacies 
 for the sick, to be found nowhere else in the Confederacy. The remains 
 of the meals were carried by the ladies to a camp of mere boys — home- 
 guards outside of the town. Some of these children were scarcely able to 
 carry a musket, and were altogether unable to endure the exposure and 
 fatigues of field service; and they suffered fearfully from measles, and 
 
LIEUTENANT COMMANDER JOHN WILKINSON, C. S. N. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 465 
 
 typhoid fever. Gen. Grant used a strong figure of speech, when he asserted, 
 that "the cradle and the grave were robbed, to recruit the Confederate 
 armies." The fact of a fearful drain upon the population was scarcely ex- 
 aggerated, but with this difference in the metaphor, that those who were 
 verging upon both the cradle and the grave, shared the hardships and 
 ■dangers of war, with equal self-devotion to the cause. It is true that a 
 class of heartless speculators infested the country, who profited by the 
 scarcity of all sorts of supplies, but it makes the self-sacrifice of the mass 
 of the Southern people more conspicuous, and no State made more liberal 
 voluntary contributions to the armies, or furnished better soldiers, than 
 B'orth Carolina. 
 
 " On the opposite side of the river from Wilmington, on a low, marshy 
 flat, were erected the steam cotton presses, and there the blockade-run- 
 ners took in their cargoes. Sentries were posted on the wharves, day and 
 night, to prevent deserters from getting on board, and stowing themselves 
 away; and the additional precaution of fumigating the outward bound 
 steamers at SmithviUe was adopted ; but in spite of this vigilance, many 
 persons succeeded in getting a free passage abroad. These deserters, or 
 'stowaways,' were in most instances sheltered by one or more of the 
 crew; in which event they kept their places of concealment until the 
 steamer had arrived at her port of destination, when they would profit 
 by the first opportunity to leave the vessel undiscovered. A small bribe 
 would tempt the average blockade-running sailor to connive at this means 
 ■of escape. The 'impecunious' deserter fared more hardly; and would 
 usually be forced by hunger and thirst to emerge from his hiding place 
 while the steamer was on the outward voyage. A cruel device, employed 
 by one of the captains, eflfectually put a stop, I beUeve, certainly a check 
 to the escajje of this class of 'stowaways.' He turned three or four of 
 them adrift in the Gulf Stream, in an open boat, with a pair of oars, and 
 a few days' allowance of bread and water." 
 
 At the beginning of the war, nearly all the lights along 
 the Southern coast had been discontinued; the apparatus be- 
 ing removed to places of safety. In 1864, it v^as deemed ex- 
 pedient to re-establish the light on Smith's Island, which had 
 been discontinued ever since the beginning of hostilities, and 
 to erect a structure for a light on the " Mound."' 
 
 Under special instructions from the Navy Department, 
 Capt. "Wilkinson was charged with the duties of relighting 
 the approaches to the Cape Fear Eiver, and of detailing pilots 
 and signal officers to the blockade-runners. To provide the 
 means of light, every blockade-runner was required to bring in 
 a barrel of sperm oil. In addition to these aids to navigation, 
 
 1 The ' ' Mound " ■was an artificial one, erected along this monotonous coast.but one of the range 
 
 "by Col. Lamb, ■who commanded Fort Fisher. lights for crossing Ne^w Inlet bar was placed on 
 
 ■Capt. Wilkinson says; "Two heavy guns were it. Seamen ■will appreciate at its full value this 
 
 mounted upon it, and it eventually became a advantage; but it may be stated, for the benefit 
 
 sight for a light, and very serviceable to block- of the unprofessional reader, that while the 
 
 •ade runners; but even at this period it ■was an compass bearing of an object does not enable a 
 
 «xcellent landmark. Joined by a long, low pilot to steer a vessel with suflBcient accuracy 
 
 isthmus of sand with the higher malnlaiid, its through a narrow channel, raiige tights answer 
 
 regular conical shape enabled the blockade-run- the purpose completely. These lights were only 
 
 Tiers easily to identify it from the ofiBng; and in set after signals had been exchanged between 
 
 clear weather, it showed plain and distinct the blockade-runner and the shore station, and 
 
 ■against the sky at night. I believe the military were removed immediately after the vessel had 
 
 men used to laugh slyly at the colonel for under- entered the river. The range lights were 
 
 ■taking its erection, predicting that it would not changed as circumstances required; for the 
 
 stand; but the result showed the contrary; and New Inlet channel, itself, was and is constantly 
 
 whatever difference of opinion may have existed changing, being materially affected both in 
 
 with regard to its value as a military position, depth of water and in its course by a heavy 
 
 there can be but one as to its utility to the block- gale of wind or a severe freshet in Cape Fear 
 
 Ade-runners, for it was not a landmark, alone, Kiver," 
 30 
 
466 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the signal stations were extended farther along the coast, and 
 compulsory service was required of the pilots. Owing to the 
 constantly increasing vigilance of the blockading fleet, and 
 the accession to the United States navy of fast cruisers, many 
 prizes were captured about this time. Their pilots were, of 
 course, held as prisoners of war ; and the demand for those 
 available for service increasing in proportion to their dimin- 
 ished number, there was much competition between the rival 
 companies, to the great detriment of the public service. It 
 was considered necessary, therefore, to establish an office of 
 "Orders and Detail" at Wilmington, in charge of Captain 
 Wilkinson, whence should proceed all orders and assignments 
 in relation to pilots and signal officers. In a short time, the 
 benefit of these arrangements was very perceptible. The 
 blockade-runners were never delayed for want of a pilot, and 
 the casualties were much diminished. 
 
 Some of the blockade-runners were constructed regardless 
 of any good quality but speed, consequently their scantling 
 was light and their sea-going qualities very inferior. Many 
 of them came to grief; several were swamped at sea, and 
 others, after being out a few days, struggled back to Queens- 
 town without making a voyage. 
 
 The distance from Bermuda to Wilmington is 730 miles, 
 and the in-and-out-voyage, including the time in unloading at 
 the latter port, generally occupied sixteen days. Before 
 making the trip the blockade-runner was prepared for the 
 work by reducing her spars to a light pair of lower masts, 
 without any yards across them; the only break in their sharp 
 outline being a small crow's-nest on the foremast, to be used 
 as a look-out place. The hull, which showed about eight feet 
 above water, was painted a dull, grey color, to render her as 
 nearly as possible invisible in the night. The boats were 
 lowered square with the gunwales. Coal of a smokeless nature 
 (anthracite) was taken on board. The funnel, being what 
 is called " telescope," was lowered close down to the deck. In 
 order that no noise might be made, steam was blown off under 
 water. In fact, every ruse was resorted to, to enable the 
 vessel to evade the vigilance of the Federal cruisers, who 
 were scattered about in great numbers all the way between 
 Bermuda and Wilmington. Among the fowls taken on board 
 as provisions no cocks were allowed, for fear of their proclaim- 
 ing the whereabouts of the blockade-runner. 
 
 The in-shore sqiiadron off Wilmington consisted of about 
 thirty vessels, and lay in the form of a crescent facing the 
 entrance to Cape Fear Eiver, the centre being just out of 
 range of the heavy guns mounted on Fort Fisher, the horns, 
 as it were, gradually approaching the shore on each side; the 
 whole line or curve covered about ten miles. 
 
 When the blockade-runner arrived at Wilmington the 
 cargo was landed as quickly as possible and a cargo of cotton 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 467 
 
 immediately shipped. In the first place, the hold was stored 
 by expert stevedores, the cotton bales being so closely packed 
 that a mouse could hardly find, room to hide itself among 
 them. The hatches were put on, and a tier of bales put fore 
 and aft in every available spot on the deck, leaving openings 
 for the approaches to the cabins, engine-room, and the men's 
 forecastle; then another somewhat thinner tier on the top of 
 that, after which a few bales for the captain and oflScers. 
 Loaded in this way, the vessel, with only her foremast up, 
 with her low funnel and grey-painted sides, looked like a 
 huge bale of cotton with a stick placed upright at one end 
 of it. 
 
 A'^'ter the blockade-runner left the quay at Wilmington 
 she steamed down the river, where she was boarded to be 
 searched and smoked; the object of the latter proceeding being 
 to search for runaways, deserters, spies, etc. 
 
 On September 1st, 1863, Major-Gen. W. H. C. Whiting 
 issued the following regulations in regard to steamers run- 
 ning the blockade, from and to the port of Wilmington, and 
 they were enforced after that date : 
 
 " 1. Yankee goods must not be imported, upon penalty of confiscation 
 of the goods, except munitions of war and medicines. 
 
 " 2. Improper or suspicious persons must not be taken as passengers 
 to this port. They must be properly vouched for, and permission given 
 to embark, iy Major L. Heyliger, at Nassau, or Major Norman Walker, at 
 Bermuda. Any passenger brought to this port -without proper creden- 
 tials will be sent back by the same steamer. 
 
 " 3. Steamers will not be permitted to bring in seamen, or other em- 
 ployees of the vessel, to be discharged upon arrival here. In all such 
 cases special permission must be obtained from these headquarters. 
 
 "4. Passengers outward bound must obtain permits from headquar- 
 ters. The officers in charge of boarding vessels will take out such persons 
 as have no permits, and detain the vessel until further orders, if the party 
 is on board by permission of the officers of the vessel. 
 
 "5. All Vessels, after obtaining proper clearances, must apply to head- 
 quarters for permission to sail, and without such permission will be stop- 
 ped at the forts and sent back. 
 
 " 6. Letters upon outward and inward bound vessels must be sent to 
 headquarters for inspection and approval. Failure to comply with this 
 rule will involve the offending parties in considerable penalties. 
 
 "7. Lists of the officers and crews of all vessels arriving, must be made 
 out for the inspecting officer. As spies can more readily ship as seamen 
 or firemen, care must be taken by captains in selecting their crews. 
 
 "8. Copies of manifests of cargoes of vessels arriving will be sent to 
 headquarters. 
 
 "9. All vessels from Nassau will remain at quarantine until permis- 
 sion is given to come to the city. 
 
 "10. Persons, other than officers of vessels, must be on board by nine 
 o'clock p. M., every night, unless by special permission from headquarters. 
 Such persons violating this order will be arrested and lodged in guard- 
 house. 
 
 "11. Official business at these headquarters in relation to steamers 
 wUl be attended to by Col. Duncan, A. D. C." 
 
 Under Capt. Wilkinson, the Lee continued to make her 
 regular trips, either to Nassau or Bermuda, as circumsta-nces 
 
468 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 required/ carrying abroad cotton and naval stores and 
 bringing in "hardware," as munitions of war were then in- 
 voiced, until the Lee had run the blockade twenty-one times 
 while under his command, and had carried abroad between 
 six and seven thousand bales of cotton, worth at that time 
 about two millions in gold, and had carried into the Confeder- 
 acy equally valuable cargoes. 
 
 The Charleston, S. C, Mercury, of November 7th, 1862, in 
 reply to some complaints against the character of the im- 
 portations through the blockade, explains quite fully the 
 manner in which the Confederate government and cause ben- 
 efited by blockade-running. It said: 
 
 " A single firm in Charleston, John Prasier & Co., have shippedabout 
 seven-eighths of the cotton that has gone from the ports of the Gon- 
 
 THE O. B. BLOOKADE-BTINNEB " EOBEBT E. LEE. 
 
 federate States for some time past. Not one pound of cotton shipped by 
 that house has gone to the United States, either by sale or capture. 
 Every particle of it has gone to Europe. So much for * the Yankees 
 getting our cotton.' 
 
 "It is broadly asserted that 'scarcely a single article applicable to 
 the immediate purposes of the war is brought in by the adventures which 
 ' run the blockade ' so constantly.' We affirm, on the contrary, that, in 
 making up the return cargoes, each steamer is first loaded with as much 
 
 1 Lieut. Com. John Wilkinson says that the Lee, 
 before she was purchased, by the Confederate 
 government for £32,000, pUed aa a packet be- 
 tween G-lasgow and Belfast. She waa a very 
 long and narrow side-wheel steamer, of light 
 draft, very strongly built, with a speed of 
 about thirteen and a half knots. She had two 
 short maata on which fore and aft sails could 
 be set and which were only aeiTiceable to keep 
 her steady in a sea abeam. Her beautiful 
 saloon and cabins were dismantled, and bulk- 
 heads constructed to separate the quarters for 
 oflBcera and men from the space used for stow- 
 age of her cargo. She sailed from Glasgow for 
 Nassau, and arrived there in good time. On 
 December 26th, 1862, she sailed from the 
 latter port, and a littie before midnight of the 
 
 29th, passed over the Wilmington bar and an- 
 chored ofE SmithviUe. After having run the 
 blockade twenty-one times, by the culpable 
 mismanagement of the commander who suc- 
 ceeded Lieut. Wilkinson, the R. E. Lee fell an 
 easy prey to one of the T7. S. cruisers off the 
 coast of North Carolina. 
 
 Among those seized on board of the Lee was 
 Lieut. Books, a Britiah officer. 
 
 The following extracts from his diary give 
 an account of the last cruise of the famous 
 blockade-runner : 
 
 " Thubsdat. Nov. Bth, 1863.— Start fi-om St. 
 George's in the Confederate steamer Robert E. 
 Let, Capt. Enox, for Wilmington, North Caro- 
 lina; have fine weather the first three days; 
 third day out (Sunday, 8th) fellin with a Yankee 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 469 
 
 heavy freight for the government as she can with safety carry, and that 
 then packages of Hghter goods are put in to complete the cargo. Most of 
 the latter are also goods of the most importance to the government and 
 the troops, such as shoes, clothes, medicines, etc., etc. The invoices of 
 Messrs. John Frasier & Co. are handed to the agents of the government, 
 and they are allovped to take whatever the government desires, fixing the 
 prices themselves. The balance, which the government does not want, 
 is advertised and sold at auction. Take, for example, the last steamer 
 that run the blockade— the Minho, She has brought in of heavy freight 
 for the government, 367 cases of rifles, containing 7,340 ; thirty -five cases 
 of swords, containing 3,100; eighty-seven cases ammunition; eighty cases 
 of caps. This was her heavy freight, and as much as she could safely 
 take. Besides this she had aboard salt and cases of shoes, goods, etc., to 
 complete her cargo. It is not customary to tell the public what the 
 government takes. This is but a sample of these adventures. Almost all 
 the goods brought in her are British goods. Some shoes, some cotton 
 cards, some thread, some cases of calicoes, etc., have been bought at 
 Nassau, and brought to Charleston and sold at auction. But they were 
 not paid for in cotton, nor was any cotton sold at Nassau to buy them. 
 The cotton has all gone to Europe. They were paid for by exchange 
 drawn on Liverpool or London. They have generally been articles greatly 
 needed, which we could afford to purchase at Nassau, whether they came 
 from Yankeedom or elsewhere. The Southern people and soldiers need 
 the cloth on which the objectionable ' Herculean Zouave ' is stamped, and 
 
 cruiser (the - 
 
 -), who does not see us; steer 
 
 away from her: Monday morning at three 
 o'clock, make the land breakers ahead six or 
 seven miles north of Wilmington; the pilot, not 
 kuowinjT where he is, refuses to take the ship 
 in; having run foul of three Yankees, the cap- 
 tain could not put her head out to sea and had 
 to steer north; when the morning breaks a 
 large Yankee cruiser appears about five miles 
 to the southward, bearing down upon us under 
 eail and steam ; the first thing I heard on waking 
 was a passenger coming down the steps, saying: 
 ' By Jove! there's a sail to the south; if she's a 
 cruiser she will be down upon us in five minutes. ' 
 
 " I dressed and went on deck; saw two ves- 
 sels — the Yankee and the Comvbia — a prize, 
 looming in the distance. We steamed away 
 from her, but cguld not escape, as we were 
 jammed up in a bay, the light-house on Cape 
 Lookout to the east of us. Seeing she was gain- 
 ing rapidly, I went down and packed up all my 
 small traps, brought them on deck, and by that 
 time she was less than a mile from us, when 
 bang went the first shot. It fell at least three 
 hundred yards short; the second about fifty, and 
 on the starboard side; the third was better, go- 
 ing straight over, very close to the rigging; tiie 
 fifth shot, as We afterwards found out, was a 
 shell from a nine-inch Parrott gun. Luckily for 
 us, the fuse was blind, as the line was splendid; 
 it fell about eighty yards astern and rixiochetted 
 close over us. Bang, bang, bang, went more 
 guns, until they had fired twelve, and they were 
 within eight hundred yards of us when they 
 fired the last. The captain then stopped her, 
 as the firemen, who had been working indiffer- 
 ently aie whole time, struck work. As soon as 
 they came alongside, they sent off a boat with a 
 prize crew, and took possession of her, 
 
 • ' As Roon as she was captured, it was most 
 amusing to see the snowstorm of paper going 
 overboard— Confederate dispatches, letters, etc. 
 — Webber was seen coming up the stem hold 
 with a bottle of brandy in one hand and a few 
 In his pockets, the rest of the crew following his 
 example. However, on going on board the 
 Yankee (the James Adger, as she proved to be). 
 
 we were compelled in the most mortifying man- 
 ner to disgorge our stock. I had one in each 
 great coat pocket. On taking it out I was going 
 to throw it overboard myself; but I told the 
 captain it was excellent brandy, so he put it in 
 his cabin, and I had one drink of it next after- 
 noon. All the officers of the ship were most 
 civil; but we couldn't get over their cold water 
 system. We were only allowed to drink water; 
 it was awful cold, aud our stomachs were 
 frozen. Webber and I longed to be on the 
 News' steps at Bermuda calling for drinks. 
 
 "Next day I managed to get hold of some 
 smuggled brandy, which was very acceptable. 
 At night six of us were slung up in hammocks 
 in a row in the cockpita, where we ha<l to make 
 shift with the bare hammock as best we could. 
 It was next to impossible to sleep, thanks to the 
 cold .and the snoring of the pilot, one of the 
 party. In the morning we had one basin and 
 one towel between us to wash with. At four 
 o'clock in the altemoon the crew were sent on 
 board. The boatswain of the Lee (an ex-man- 
 of-war boatswain) tickled my fancy immensely. 
 He came on deck gnawing a huge piece of 
 leather, and when he was asked what he was 
 about, he said he was so hungry. Webber, Mr. 
 Servant and mygelf went off with the captain, 
 who was very civil throughout; and at thirty-five 
 minutes past five we saw the last of the James 
 Adger, and were imder way for Fortress Monroe 
 in the United States steamer N^ewbem, 156 in all. 
 She is very uncomfortable, and we were dread- 
 fully crowded. 
 
 " The captain very kindly gave us the cabin 
 to sleep in, where I managed to rig up some 
 sort of a bed on the floor with great coate, etc. 
 I slept very little, and in the morning I was ach- 
 ing all over and felt very dirty, as I did not 
 have my clothes off for four .days. We arrived 
 at Fortress Monroe at half -past seven, November 
 11th. Admiral Lee telegraphed to Washington, 
 and we start for New York at three o'clock in 
 the morning. Arrive at New York at five o'clock, 
 November 13th ; got to Provost Marshal's office at 
 four o'clock ; were released, and went to the 
 New York Hotel." 
 
470 THE COXFEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 can afford to wear it. They are not ashamed to wear Yankee suits and 
 shoes when captured in battle, nor to sleep in Yankee blankets when they 
 can get them. If the Confederate States had twenty mercantile houses 
 with the enterprise and patriotic liberality of John Frasier & Co., we 
 would not want for arms and ordnance, our army would not now be in 
 rags, and our people would not want many of the comforts of lite. It 
 other Southern cities had done as much for the purposes ofwar as 
 Charleston, the South would be in a much better condition. Without 
 Charleston as an emporium of trade the South would be badly off to-day. 
 
 An interesting and instructive contemporary account of 
 the blockade auction sales in Charleston, explains the manner 
 in which such portions of the imported cargoes, as the govern- 
 ment did not need, made their way into the hands of the 
 people. 
 
 " On King and East Bay streets at least four-fifths of the stores are 
 closed, and on Meeting street the only oasis one sees in the great desert of 
 suspension is at the houses where the piles of goods which so constantly 
 run the blockade are auctioneered off. Here, when an auction is to take 
 place, merchants, professional characters and men of leisure, aU eager for 
 the accumulation of dollars, congregate in vast numbers, and the store- 
 rooms present a scene of busy life which contrasts strongly with the re- 
 maining portions of the city. 
 
 " I have, by dint of extraordinary perseverance, worked my way into 
 one of these densely-packed auction rooms, and found the scene presented 
 one of suflBcient interest to describe. A burly man, of about 240 pounds 
 avoirdupois, mounts a chair and announces that the sale is about to com- 
 mence, continuing with the remarks that the conditions are cash, and 
 that no issue of the Hoyer & Ludwig Confederate plate will be taken. 
 The crier, who possesses a strength of lung of which 'Stentor' himself 
 would have been proud, and a rapidity of articulation that has never been 
 surpassed by human tongue, is accompanied by a little, grey-headed man, 
 who wears a woollen cap of richly variegated hues, the crown of which 
 displays the Confederate flag. 
 
 " This little man's chief occupation is to exalt the merits of the goods 
 on sale, throw in occasional witticisms, and catch the ' winks and bUnks ' 
 of bidders which the crier overlooks. A wink is as good as a nod with the 
 little man, and he bawls it out as lustily as if he were giving an alarm of 
 fire, or crying ' stop thief.' The great majority of the crowd who attend 
 these cargo sales are German Jews, and one is as much surprised at their 
 numbers as at their unpronounceable and strangely sounding cognomens, 
 which, at the knock down of every article, grate harshly upon the ear of 
 a stranger. For the amusement of your uninitiated readers, I give a few 
 which it was my privilege to hear, viz.: Litchtenstein, Mittledorfer, Stein- 
 lein, Doorflinger, Bosenbaum, Gretzgraw, Zinnlouf, Retscrating, Slinglow, 
 Ungrauphit, etc. 
 
 " Many of the merchants here complain that although these immense 
 cargoes are sold at their very doors, yet by means of combinations made 
 among buyers from abroad, they are unable to purchase articles sufficient 
 to justify them in keeping open their stores. For example, three, four, 
 five, or six buyers may combine and purchase a lot of articles amounting 
 in the aggregate to $100,000, or more, and then divide the lot. This is fre- 
 quently done, as the auctioneers, who have a most extensive catalogue to 
 dispose of, go upon the principle of condensing all they can, the buyer of 
 more limited purse has no means of replenishing his exhausted stock. 
 The magnitude of these sales is really surprising, and the last one made 
 by R. A. Pringle & Co., I understand, footed up over $2,500,000. The par- 
 tie? for whose benefit they are chiefly made, viz. : John Frasier & Co., have 
 already realized $20,000,000. Of the amount |6,000,000 have been invested 
 in Confederate bonds." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 471 
 
 Like the Lee, the steamer Kate became a "regular pack- 
 et" — sailing on moons — with a regularity of dispatch which 
 the New York Times commended to the officers of the block- 
 ading squadron: 
 
 " Can we not extract a similar good from the successes of our Southern 
 rebels in running the national blockade? Here, for instance, we find in 
 the Richmond Dispatch, of September 30th, the following item: ' The 
 steamer Kate, from Nassau, successfully ran the blockade into Wilmington 
 on Thursday.' This steamer Kate ran into Savannah early in July. In 
 the beginning of August she ran out of Savannah and went to Wilming- 
 ton. Prom Wilmington she started for Nassau about the middle of Au- 
 gust, and now she comes back to Wilmington, of course, with an ' assorted 
 cargo ' of arms and ammunition. In other words, the Kate is a regular 
 rebel packet, performing her trips with 'regularity and dispatch,' and, 
 no doubt, to the serious advantage of owners, shippers, and consignees. 
 Her successful voyages do not indeed tend to exalt our estimate of the 
 officers of our blockading squadron. Let us console ourselves, therefore, 
 like Mr. Disraeli, by allowing them to ' increase our respect for the energy 
 of human nature.' 
 
 The cargoes of the Kate, in two trips were: 
 
 1,100 kegs of powder. 
 
 400 cases rifles. 
 1,405 boxes ammunition. 
 144 bales of blankets, grey cloth, 
 
 etc. 
 318 cases mess-tins, boots, pouches, 
 knapsacks, horse-gear, medi- 
 cines, etc, 
 15 eases medicines. 
 
 4 cases instruments. 
 2 cases lint. 
 
 5 packages tarpaulins 
 4 cases tarpaulins. 
 
 1 case. 
 
 1 box samples. 
 1 barrel. 
 600 kegs powder. 
 780 boxes cartridges. 
 31 boxes caps. 
 
 134 casks containing mess-tins, 
 boots, horse-gear, medicines, 
 knapsacks, etc. 
 100 cases rifles. 
 113 bales blankets. 
 5 packages tarpaulins. 
 4 cases tarpaulins. 
 1 case luggage. 
 1 box samples. 
 
 Total, 5,048. 
 
 The Kate made over forty trips. 
 
 At Havana, the blockade runners were more frequent call- 
 ers than the regular packets between that city and New York. 
 A correspondent of the Herald says: 
 
 " Our friends south of Mason and Dixon's line have kept us pretty well 
 posted through the following named vessels, which I give, with the date 
 of arrival. 
 
 " April 18— Steamer W. &. Howes, 760 tons. New Orleans. 
 
 "April 18— Steamer Arizona, 670 tons. New Orleans. 
 
 " April 30 — Steamer Atlantic, 660 tons. New Orleans. 
 
 " April 31— Steamer Matagorda, 650 tons. New Orleans. 
 
 " April 33— Schooner Wide Awake, 85 tons. New Orleans. 
 
 " April 33— Schooner Getieral Qartbaldi, 85 tons. New Orleans. 
 
 "April 23— Steamer Victoria, 487 tons. New Orleans. 
 
 " April 37— Schooner Cora, 63 tons, New Orleans. 
 
 " April 37— Schooner Q. Burrows (Eng.), 57 tons. Mobile. 
 
 " April 38— Schooner Thomas C. Acton, 130 tons, Mobile. 
 
 " All these vessels brought cotton, of which there must be not less 
 than 10,000 bales here at present. Last Monday or Tuesday a few hun- 
 dred bales were sold at twenty-four and a half cents— a pretty good price." 
 
473 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 A»d the arrivals and clearances at Nassau, N. P., for parts 
 of the preceding months were as follows: 
 
 " AKBIVED. 
 
 "Marcli 16 -Steamer Gfranite City, McEwan, Wilmingrton, cotton, to 
 H. Adderley & Co. 
 
 "March 17— Steamer Eagle, Capper, Wilmington, cotton, to H. Ad- 
 derley & Co. 
 
 "Marcli 21— Steamer Stonewall Jackson, Black, Havana, ballast, to 
 H. Adderley & Co. 
 
 " March 37— Steamer Gertrude, Raison, Charleston, cotton, to H. Ad- 
 derley & Co. 
 
 "March 28— Steamer Charleston, Robinson, Charleston, cotton to 
 Sawyer & Menendez. 
 
 " March 28 — Schooner Convoy, Roberts, Wilmington, cotton and tur- 
 pentine, to Saunders & Son. 
 
 " March 30— Sloop Express, Carey, Charleston, cotton, to H. Adderley 
 &Co. 
 
 " April 2 — Schooner James R. Pringle, Hecklinberg, Charleston, cot- 
 ton, to H. Adderley & Co. 
 
 " April 3 — Steamer Ellie and Annie, Carlin, Havana, assorted cargo, 
 to H. Adderley & Co. 
 
 " April 3 — Sloop Richard, Mooney, Charleston, cotton, to Saunders & 
 Son. 
 
 "April 6— Steamer Eagle, Capper, Charleston, cotton, to H. Adderley 
 &Co. 
 
 "April 9 — Schooner Victoria, Wickland, Matamoras, cotton, to T. 
 Darling & Co. 
 
 " April 10 -Steamer Margaret and Jessie, Wilson, Charleston, cotton, 
 to H. Adderley & Co. 
 
 "April 10— Schooner Julia Gordon, Wilmington, cotton, to Saunders 
 &Son. 
 
 " CLEARED. 
 
 "March 16— Sloop Alfred Haywood, Wark, Port Royal, S. C, via 
 Abaca, coffee, by Sawyer & Menendez; schooner 8ue, Erickson, Beaufort, 
 N. C, assorted cargo, H. Adderley & Co. 
 
 "March 19— Schooner /we^, Edgett, Beaufort, N. C, salt, by the mas- 
 ter: steamer Eagle, Capper, St. John, N. B., assorted merchandise, by 
 H. Adderley & (Jo. 
 
 " March 20— Steamer Granite City, McEwan, St. John, N. B., assorted 
 merchandise, by H. Adderley & Co. 
 
 " March 21— Schooner William D. S. Hyer, Marsden, Matamoras, in- 
 ward cargo, by H. Adderley & Co.; Steamer Margaret and Jessie, Wilson, 
 St. John, N. B., assorted merchandise, by H. Adderley & Co. 
 
 "April 7— Bark Nelson, Irving, England, cotton, by Saunders & Son;. 
 brig Han Juan, Berretiago, Matamoras, assorted cargo, by the R. W. H. 
 Weech. 
 
 " April 9— Bark Earl of Mar, Still, Liverpool, cotton, by A. Johnson; 
 sloop Maria Biggs, Port Royal, S. C, salt, by the master." 
 
 As letters from Northern men in Nassau to newspapers, 
 at home are not likely to misrepresent affairs unfavorably to 
 the Confederates, the following correspondence of the Buffalo 
 Commercial Advertiser may be accepted as giving a fair and 
 truthful account of the effectiveness of the Federal blockade, 
 as well as furnishing some data from which the amount ^nd 
 value of the commerce carried on in blockade-running bottoms : 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 473 
 
 " The steamers which run to Charleston are all painted a light lead 
 color, which renders them almost undistinguishable from the horizon. 
 They leave here at such a time that a common run will bring them off 
 Charleston about midnight the third day from here, then as they can eas- 
 ily see our fleet, they steer quietly between the blockaders, and being of 
 this dull lead color, and with their single mast, and smoke-pipe lowered, 
 and withal being wonderfully long, low, and swift, they are almost cer- 
 tain of getting in. 
 
 " Coming out is still more a certainty, for at sunset they take froia 
 Fort Sumter very precise compass observations of our fleet at anchor, and 
 then, as our vessels do not change their positions after dark, it is a per- 
 fectly simple matter to steer solely by the compass out into the open sea. 
 Once out there is no danger, for they can show a clean pair of heels to any 
 of our gunboats. Communication is truly more frequent with Charleston 
 than New York, and we have New York dates six and seven days later this 
 way than direct. Since I have been here, now six days, one steamer, the 
 Calypso, has arrived from Charleston laden with cotton, and five, the 
 Ruby, Giraffe, Antonica, Nicholas I., and Leopard, have sailed for the 
 same place, besides several sail vessels which have cleared for Northern 
 ports, but with cargoes that make it certain they will see Charleston or 
 Wilmington if possible. 
 
 " It is a great matter of wonder here to Union men, and Southerners 
 too, that our government has not put forth every exertion to capture 
 Charleston, for it has been by that port and from this place, that their 
 immense supplies of arms have been drawn. Now, if it is captured, it will 
 be shutting the barn door too late, for their supplies are so ample that 
 large quantities of gun-carriages and guns are lying in this place, and not 
 sent across because there is no call for them. These successful affairs, and 
 particularly the naval affair of Charleston (of which we heard before you 
 did>, have made the Secessionists very jubilant, of course, and had a con- 
 trary effect upon us of the North. We can feel it the more because there 
 was no necessity for it. As long ago as June last, our Consul here, Mr. 
 Whiting (formerly, by the way, a lake captain, running out of Buffalo \ 
 ofBcially informed our government that the machinery and iron plates 
 for a ram were here, and being sent to Charleston as fast as opportunity 
 offered. Later, he wrote that, from information he gathered, the ram was 
 about finished, and would be at work very soon. 
 
 " Every cargo of cotton is worth from a quarter to a million of dollars, 
 and as the Antonica has made six round trips and the Leopard the same, 
 they may well put their fingers to their noses, and laugh about their 
 packet and their ferry to Charleston. The authorities here are of course 
 not ignorant of all this. The clearances are taken to Halifax or St. John, 
 hut they know perfectly well the real destination. Nearly every white 
 person is in sympathy with the South, and all are more or less engaged 
 in these blockade ventures, which are a perfect game of chance, with 
 chances on the side of the risk. Large quantities of cotton are piled up, 
 waiting shipment to England. Storekeepers put their stocks on ship- 
 board and take their pay in cotton, on the return trip. Cotton seUs for 
 sixty cents per pound, specie, and Mr. Storekeeper gets rich." 
 
 From July, 1862, to June, 1863, fifty-seven steamers and 
 ninety-one sailing vessels left Nassau for Confederate ports, 
 of which fifty-one of the former and fifty-five of the latter 
 landed their cargoes, and forty -four steamers and forty -five 
 sailing vessels reached Nassau from the Confederacy during 
 the same period; and on the 33d of April there were seventy- 
 three ships, chiefly British, loading with cotton at Matamoras. 
 
 As freights were enormous, ranging from $300 to $_1,000' 
 per ton, some idea may be formed of the profits of a business. 
 
47-1: THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 in which a party could afford to lose a vessel after two suc- 
 cessful trips. ' 
 
 The following letter illustrates, in a measure, the difficulties 
 and embarrassments which, towards the end of the year 1863, 
 began to affect the Confederate government in obtaining cer- 
 tain kinds of supplies : 
 
 "Richmond, Dec. 15th, 1863. 
 ^'■Hon. J. A. Seddon, Secretary of War: 
 
 " Sir— I beg leave to refer to my communication relative to the trans- 
 fer of the General Clinch to us. She is chartered at, I believe, $175 or |200 
 per day, and valued at $40,000. I would here suggest that, in order to save 
 the charter money, she be purchased by the government, and we will pay 
 for her when she returns with the cargo proposed, if not damaged, her valu- 
 ation, etc., should the government desire to discontinue the adventure. 
 
 " Permit me to say that there is very little prospect of the government 
 receiving on private enterprise certain class of goods, owing to their weight 
 and price, and dangers of capture. These goods are as follows, and are 
 very much needed by all ordnance, engineer, and navy departments, and 
 also by private parties under government contracts, viz. : steel, iron, pig- 
 iron, copper, zinc, ordnance of all kinds, munitions of war, chemicals and 
 acids in particular, boiler iron, engines, etc., etc. 
 
 " The freight per ton in Nassau, payable in advance, is $500 to a Con- 
 federate port. This is equal to $1,500 here; therefore it is self-evident that 
 such classes of goods as above cannot be imported on private account; 
 because many other articles pay much better and take up less room. For in- 
 stance, we take the article salt, worth $7. 50 per ton in Nassau, and will bring 
 $1,700 here; coffee is worth $240 per ton in Nassau and here $5, 500, etc., etc. 
 
 " By the arrangement we propose the government will get seventy-five 
 tons in weight or measurement of this class of goods for a risk of $40,000 — 
 the usual freight being $37,500 in Nassau, equal to at least $100,000 here, 
 and at the same time we will receive facilities which will enable us to im- 
 port in other ships the necessary goods contracted for. 
 
 "We will pay all expenses of the outward and inward trips, except 
 the oflBcers, which the Honorable Secretary of the Navy has promised to 
 detail, i. e. an engineer and some other men. 
 
 "If we can leave Charleston on the 1st of January, we can return 
 about the 15th. Our other ship will be here about the same time with 
 'army suppUes,' etc., etc. 
 
 "I hope that my proposition will meet your approval, and that an 
 order be given accordingly, and that the importance of the subject will be 
 a sufficient apology for so long a letter. 
 
 "I have the honor to remain, your obedient servant, 
 
 "J. M. Vbrnost, of Vernon & Co., 
 
 ''Government Contractors, etc. 
 
 "P. S. — I desire to leave for Charleston as soon as possible." 
 
 iNewYork/feraH, June 13th, 1863. Oct. 21. Kelpie Limerick. .0ct.21. Nassau. 
 
 The followtng is a partial list of blockade run- Deo. lO.Antona Liverpool. Dec. 16. Havana, 
 
 ners that coaled at and passed through St. Dec. 13 Thistle Liverpool Dec. 27. Nassau. 
 
 Thomas from March, 1862, to March, 1863: Dec. IS.Nioholas 1. ..Liverpool. Dec.23 Nassau. 
 
 ENGLISH STEAM BLOCKADE RUNNERS. 1863. 
 
 Dec. 26.Havelock . . .Glasgow. ..Jan.30. Nassau. 
 
 Arrtved Vfnipia Nime. Wliere from. Cleared Where fxmnd. 1863. 
 
 Mch IS.AdamKana- Jan. 1. Pearl Glasgow.. Jaii.13 Nassau. 
 
 ris London. ..Mch22.Berm'da Jan. 7. Flora London... Jan. 7 Nassau. 
 
 Ap'l 25. Circassian. ..Bordeaux. Ap'126. Havana. Jan. 23 WaveQueen.London... Feb. 6. Nassau. 
 
 Ap'l 25 Minho Liverpool Ap'l 26. Havana. Jan. 23.Euby Glasgow.. Jan.24 V. Cruz. 
 
 May lO.Patras London. .. May 10. Havana. Jan. 31. Eagle Glasgow. . Feb. 2 Na=isau. 
 
 May 13. Pacific London & Feb. 5 Granite City.Glasgow. . Feb. 6 Nassau. 
 
 Falmouth May 18. Nassau. Feb. 20. Peterhoff.... London . .Feb.24.Mata'ms 
 
 May 19. Modem Feb. 24. Aries Naguabo...Mohl3.Havana. 
 
 Greece. . . .Falmouth. June 2. Nassau. Mob 3. Pet Liverpool. Mch 4 Nassau. 
 
 June 14 Ann London... June 14. Havana. Mch 16. Neptune.. ..Glasgow . .Mchn.Havana 
 
 Oct. S.Bonita Liverpool . .Oct. 4.Nas8au. Mch 18. Dolphin Liverpool. Mchl8.Nassa«. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 475 
 
 The cause of the Confederacy was beginning to experience 
 the chilling influence of avarice, and men were becoming more 
 disposed to amass wealth than to aid the very cause by which 
 they were able to accumulate immense fortunes. The real 
 blockade capitalists were Englishmen and Northern mer- 
 chants,' rather than Confederates. The companies that 
 owned the vessels were of London, Liverpool and other Eng- 
 lish cities, and but comparatively few native Southern people 
 were engaged in the business, except as officers and pilots.' 
 And notwithstanding the enormous number of captures, 
 aggregating, according to the Report of Assistant Secretary 
 of the Navy, Mr. Fox, up to June, 1863, 855 vessels, the trade 
 and business was at that date as brisk and pushed with as 
 great energy as at any time in the war. The large class of 
 steamers had been abandoned, and a new and different kind 
 had been built expressly for the trade. ^ 
 
 During the summer and fall of 1863 the blockade business 
 was at its height, scarcely a dark night passed that one or 
 more did not run into or out of Charleston. Never before, in 
 the annals of blockade, were those low, long and fast Clyde- 
 built steamers so numerous. They came and went in droves. 
 It \vas said at the time that: 
 
 " Every one in London and Liverpool, who has capital enough to pur- 
 chase a share in a steamer, invests in that way, and looks with composure 
 upon the prospects of running a valuable cargo into some rebel port, and 
 a return trip with the accompanying' immense profits. Hence a cloud of 
 steamers mottles the seas, bearing cargoes of valuables to the rebels, and 
 we find them daUy, or rather nightly, dashing through our thin shell 
 of blockaders.'' 
 
 An officer from the blockading squadron off Wilmington, 
 writing to the Boston Traveller of August 10th, says : 
 
 "There ought to be ten blockade-runners caught where we now get 
 one. We have fifteen miles to guard, and to do it we have sometimes four 
 and sometimes only two vessels. Ten vessels is the least number we ought 
 
 1 Mr. Charles Cowley, Judge Advocate of the was shown in running the blockade of Mex- 
 
 South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, in his very loo, but it is none the less true that in the Civil 
 
 interesting work, entitled " Leaves from a Law- War as in the Mexican War, the munitions of 
 
 yer's Life Afloat and Ashore," says: " During war were furnished in very large quantities to 
 
 the whole of Dupont's command, the Charleston the enemies of the United States by citizens of 
 
 newspapers reported the arrival and departure the United States Good old Horace Greeley 
 
 -of vessels from that port ae regularly and as used to say, not only in his despondent hours, 
 
 openly, but, of course, not as numerously, as but also in his more hopeful moods, that the 
 
 before the war. Even after Dahlgren estab- ideas and vital aims of the South were ' more 
 
 lished his iron-clad fleet inside the bar, and generally cherished' in New York than in 
 
 posted his pickets every night in the throat of South Carolina or Louisiana." — page 112-113. 
 the harbor, between Sumter and Moultrie, these 
 
 arrivals and departures were from time to time 2 On Friday last a handsome looking paddle- 
 announced, but more guardedly, except when wheel steamer of about five hundred tons 
 the blockade-runner had been run aground, or measureraeut was launched by Messrs. Stevens, 
 hadly shelled. of Kelvinhaugh, a sister to the Fergus, built by 
 
 " We have been accustomed to berate the the same firm, and now about to proceed to 
 
 commercial classes of Great Britain for export- Nassau. On Saturday, Messrs. Laird & Co.. 
 
 ing goods to the Confederate States, in viola- Greenock, launched a beautiful modelled paddle- 
 
 tion of our blockade. But probably more goods wheel steamer of seven hundred and fifty tons, 
 
 were carried into the Confederate States through a sister to the City of Petersburg, launched by 
 
 the instrumentality of merchants in the United Messrs. Laird and Co. lately. They are each to 
 
 States than by all the merchants o| Europe. be supplied with powerful engines of two 
 
 More secrecy was observed by those residing in hundri^dand fifty horse power. These two vessels 
 
 New York, who engaged in this business, than were first of all contracted for as steamers for 
 
476 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 to have. The blockade seems to be a farce to me, and I am ashamed and 
 disgiisted with the whole thing. The Niphon, the fastest vessel of the 
 fleet, is stationed near Smith's Island, where there is nothing to catch. 
 She was on the North Station a few days, and while there drove the 
 Hebe ashore and destroyed her, but for some reason was sent back to 
 Smith's Island. We have now one steamer less than formerly. 
 
 " "While we have fifteen miles to guard, we cannot see these blockade 
 runners more than half a mile, and if dark not half that distance, so it is 
 no easy thing to get one. If one is seen she is soon out of sight, under the 
 guns of the fort. 
 
 "The Niphon has been trying to destroy a steamer that one of the 
 squadron turned back a few mornings since. She got on shore, and is 
 there now, but is under the guns of Fort Fisher. The Niphon had a 
 grand shooting match with the fort yesterday, but it was of no use, as she 
 only hit the steamer twice in two hours, firing at two and a half miles. 
 The guns of the fort had a longer range than those of the Niphon. " 
 
 It vi^as that manifest and acknowledged ineffectiveness of 
 the blockade that, in the fall of 1863, revived the discussion by 
 the English press, as to declaring its character and disregard- 
 ing it altogether. The London Times of September 25th, said : 
 
 " With such facility is this accomplished that a question is arising in 
 connection with the blockade which is likely soon to take a shape seriously 
 affecting ourseVces. The number of ships that get into the Southern ports 
 is so great and the difficulty of passing the Federal fieet so slight, that the 
 Southern government intends formally to dispute the legality of the block- 
 ade under the conditions of the fourth article of the Treaty of Paris. That 
 article declares that a blockade is not binding unless it is 'efBcient,'or 
 maintained with such stringency as ' to prevent access to the coast of the 
 enemy.' Now, in seven months forty-three steamers have carried cargoes 
 into Charleston and forty -nine into Wilmington. The difficulty of getting 
 a ship into either harbor seems to hate become only nominal. So great Is 
 the impunity that the Southern Ordnance Bureau actually imports mili- 
 tary stores in vessels of its own, and these ships have made twenty-two 
 voyages from Europe and back in perfect safety. ' No vessel belonging 
 to the Confederate government has yet been captured by the Federals,' 
 and, with rare exceptions, 'the government ships come in and go out 
 without molestation.' ' In fact,' says our correspondent, ' the blockade of 
 the Confederate ports is the veriest farce.' What has become of the im- 
 mense Northern navy, how is it distributed or what it is doing, it is diffi- 
 cult to say. But it appears not to be stopping Southern trade, which 
 seems to be limited only by the Southern power of purchasing. Of safely 
 receiving all it buys it has not the slightest apprehension. But on this 
 very facility the Confederate government fotmds a demand that the block- 
 ade shall be declared illegal and non-existent by the nations of Europe. 
 President Davis contends that it has lapsed and become void by ' ineffi- 
 ciency.' This is not the first time the question has arisen, and, like every 
 other, it has two sides. Against the list of vessels that have made the run 
 in, the Federal government may produce a list of ships captured in the 
 attempt; and if it is shown that there are enough cruisers on the coast, or 
 that the commanders are sufficiently vigilant to ' create an evident danger 
 in entering or leaving' a port, the escape of certain ships, either way, will 
 not invalidate a blockade. The ' efficiency ' implied in the treaty is, we 
 assume, to be decided by the circumstances. It must admit of a more or 
 less absolute perfection being impossible. But the conviction is strong in 
 
 the Glasgow and Belfast mail service, but were christened by tlie wife of Captain Kollins, a 
 
 sold while being built. They are on the same thorough American sailor, who is nomiual 
 
 model as the lamous Lord Clyde, now on her owner, and who will take command of this 
 
 WiLy to Nassau as a blockade-runner, and are ex- vessel when finished. [From the Scotsman, of 
 
 pectcd to be very fast sailors. The Nola was Edinburgh, Sept. 16th.] 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 477 
 
 "the South that the terms of the treaty are interpreted too rigidly against 
 it; and if renewed representations of what it considers injustice should 
 iail to obtain a hearing, there is a prospect of the Floridas and Alabamas 
 enforcing the right of detention and seizure on English ships carrying 
 ' contraband of war ' to Northern ports. This would he a complication of 
 <tffairs that was scarcely looked for and deserves consideration. But the 
 very demand proves anything but the increasing weakness of the Con- 
 federacy. " 
 
 The number of vessels that evaded the blockade at Wil- 
 mington, between January and July, were forty-three, and 
 forty-nine that sueceeded in running out. The number of 
 round trips is not to be ascertained. For the same period 
 of time the following was the statement of the receipts of 
 cotton : 
 
 ■" Total by steamers from Charleston, "Wilmington, and Savannah, 28,704 
 " Received by sailing vessels from Atlantic ports, .... 667 
 •" Received from Matamoras, 2,704 
 
 "Grand total of bales, 32,075 
 
 The following is a statement of the exports of cotton from 
 January 1st to June 24th, 1863: 
 
 *' Exported to European ports, 23,817 bales. 
 
 " Exported to ports in the United States, .... 2,695 bales. 
 
 " Total exports 26,512 bales. 
 
 "On hand 5,663 bales. 
 
 The cotton from Matamoras was shipped in vessels having 
 regular clearance from New York, and was as much an eva- 
 sion of the United States blockade as any blockade-running 
 from Nassau. It was the " return cargo " for goods exported 
 from New York to Brownsville, Texas, stopping at Matamoras 
 for lighterage to Brownsville. Notwithstanding the United 
 States authorities regarded that evasion of the blockade as 
 legitimate trade, the United States courts condemned the 
 Teterhoff and other vessels, trading between Liverpool and 
 Matamoras, as engaged in illicit trade. During the year the 
 loss of the cotton trade of the South began to touch a nerve 
 more sensitive than those of patriotism, and we find the Fay- 
 etteville, N. C, Observer of July, 1863, noticing the arrival at 
 "Wilmington of a steamer from New York, which merely 
 touched at Nassau, with an unbroken cargo of Yankee goods, 
 on joint account of parties in New York and Wilmington." 
 Between the 11th of May and the 6th of June, 1863, eleven 
 steamers and three sailing vessels arrived at Nassau, and four- 
 teen steamers cleared from that port for the blockaded ports 
 of the Confederacy " loaded with uniforms, blankets, cannon, 
 small arms, percussion caps and other munitions of war to aid 
 and comfort the rebels. If we could capture these vessels we 
 
478 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 should deprive the rebel armies of their supplies and be paid 
 handsomely for our trouble. Will not our blockading officers 
 be a little more vigilant, active and energetic ? Here is a 
 rich game slipping between their fingers every day of their 
 lives."' 
 
 A Queenstown correspondent of the liondon Daily Express 
 of November 38th, 1863, says that: 
 
 "Notwithstanding the season of the year, blockade-running seems to 
 be on the increase. Queenstown is seldom without a vessel of this class 
 among its shipping, and at present there are two anchored there. One of 
 them, which had to put in during the gale of Friday, is of extraordinary- 
 length. The other, which came in on Monday night, is very large, and 
 fitted with a double screw of superior workmanship. They can be easily 
 recognized by their long, black, rakish-looking two-funnelled huUs, and 
 by an ostentatious display of the British flag. The larger steamer is 
 bound to Bermuda, the other to Nassau. By all accounts the trade is 
 very profitable, as in case of capture the vessel is insured for far more 
 than its value; and in case of success, the immense profit yielded can well 
 afl'ord the extraordinary premiums charged." 
 
 In ten months of 1863, from January to October, ninety 
 vessels ran into Wilmington. During August " one ran in 
 every other day," making fifteen in that month; four on the 
 11th July and five on the 19th of October. 
 
 A dispatch at the Merchant's Exchange room, Boston, 
 reported the follovcing blockade-runners at Bermuda, 4th of 
 August, 1863 : British steamers Gibraltar, Banshee, Harriet 
 Pinckney, Mail, Ella, Gladiator and Spalding. Also the Con- 
 federate steamers Lady Davis, Eugene and Advance. The 
 Sumter was also in port. 
 
 In the following month, a letter from an officer of the 
 blockading squadron off Wilmington, N. C, stated that: 
 
 " Two or three steamers had run into Wilmington each day for five 
 days previous. One large steamer ran in at ten o'clock in the forenoon on 
 the 17th inst. A few mornings since, a steamer of fifteen hundred tons 
 ran in. She was pierced for six guns, in addition to two pivot guns, and 
 probably would receive an armament and be ready to proceed to sea 
 within a week. She is larger than the Alabama or Florida, and appeared 
 to be very fast. The writer thinks she may be the.steamer known as the 
 Southerner. The Niphon and the Minnesota were the only eflioient ves- 
 sels off the port, the Iroquois having left a week previous in chase of a 
 blockade-runner. " 
 
 The clearances from Nassau on the 7th and 9th of May. 
 were : steamers Britannia, Emma, Norseman, Pet. Antonica. 
 Victory, Calypso, and Banshee. And the N. Y. Herald's 
 letter from Nassau, May 30th, called attention to the Wave 
 Queen, Granite City. Stonewall Jackson, Victory, Flora, Have- 
 lock, Emma, Ruby. Hero, St. John's, Margaret and Jesse, Mina. 
 Eagle, Calypso, Nicholas I., Duoro, Antonica, Giraffe, This- 
 tle, Gertrude, Georgiana, Britannia, Pet, Ella, Anne, Charles- 
 ton, Dolphin aiid others — twenty -eight in all. 
 
 1 New York Herald. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 479 
 
 Of these the following were captured : Grariite City, St. 
 John's, Nicholas I. , Gertrude. Thistle, Duoro, and Dolphin. 
 
 A naonth later, June 39th, the same correspondence stated 
 that: 
 
 "Charleston or Savannah, in their palmiest days, were never so over- 
 run with cotton as is the city of Nassau at the present time. Every avail- 
 able place large enough to hold half a dozen bales is crammed full and 
 running over. It is piled up six and eight bales deep on all the wharves, 
 vacant lots and even on some of the lawns. It is literally ' laying around 
 loose.' To judge by appearances, bagging must be rather a scarce article 
 in Dixie's land, and it strikes me that some other thing will soon be rather 
 scarce there if Uncle Sam sticks to the bonding business in regard to ship- 
 ments to Nassau. Already numbers of those who have been coining 
 money by sending western flour and eastern goods and notions to Dixie 
 are beginning to howl. Well, let them; they will howl to a different tune 
 when the time comes for a settlement with England and Englishmen for 
 all the wrong done to us in this war. Of course some innocent people must 
 suffer with the guilty, and there are several firms here who do a legitimate 
 retail business, who are put to considerable trouble and annoyance by this 
 bonding business. The government contractors are among the sufferers. 
 They are for the most part Americans and loyal to the Union. Their con- 
 tracts were made on the strength of getting supplies from the States, and 
 they have to pay heavy fines for the non-fulfilment of their contracts, 
 and it really looks like a hard case. But it is to be hoped that their Yan- 
 kee ingenuity will help them out of the scrape. 
 
 " The blockade, reported to be so effective two weeks ago that it was 
 impossible for a vessel to leave Charleston, would seem to be relaxed, 
 judging by the arrivals here during the last ten days. The steamers 
 Charleston, Lizzie, Fanny, Alice, Raccoon, Kate, Ella and Annie, Ban- 
 shee, Antonioa, Beauregard and one or two others, have all arrived dur- 
 ing that time from Wilming:ton and Charleston, with full cargoes of cot- 
 ton, and some have left again for Dixie." 
 
 Nassau became an important point for the arrival and de- 
 parture of the blockade-runners. All vessels from wherever 
 they came, designed for entering the port of Charleston or en- 
 gaged in trade with Matamoras, stopped at Nassau either on 
 their way to or returning from these ports. From Nassau, 
 the blockade-runners could watch the opportunities when the 
 cruisers of the U. S. navy were not near to embarrass the 
 movement, and the voyage became an easy one, either to the 
 blockaded port, or to the cotton mart at the mouth of the Rio 
 Grande. As a central point, Nassau became of great impor- 
 tance in changing the character of the cargoes from con- 
 traband to British goods. Equally with Nassau, Matamoras 
 became a place of note as soon as the entrance to Charleston 
 harbor became difficult. The cotton that was taken to the 
 Bahamas paid no duty to the government, and the tonnage 
 duty was only one shilling a ton. Notwithstanding this, the 
 arrival of the blockade-runner made trade lively and brisk, 
 and the goods imported from the Confederate States yielded 
 some remuneration to the government. Many of the import- 
 ations paid 15 per cent, ad valorem duty, and others a fixed 
 duty of about the same amount. When these goods were 
 bonded and exported again a drawback of ninety per cent. 
 
480 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 was allowed and half the tonnage duty was refunded if the 
 vessel carried away products of the island as a return cargo. 
 Nassau is described as — ' 
 
 "A busy place during the war: the chief depot of supplies for the 
 Confederacy, and the port to which most of the cotton was shipped. Its 
 proximity to the ports of Charleston and Wilmington gave it superior ad- 
 vantages, while it was easily accessible to the swift, light-draft blockade- 
 runners; all of which carried Bahama bank pilots who knew every 
 channel, while the United States cruisers having no bank pilots and draw- 
 ing more water were compelled to keep the open sea. Occasionally one of 
 the latter would heave to outside the harbor and send in a boat to com- 
 municate with the American consul- but their usual cruising ground was 
 off Abaco Light. Nassau is situated upon the island of New Providence, 
 one of the Bahamas, and is the chief town and capital of the group. All 
 of the islands are surrounded by coral reefs and shoals, through which are 
 channels more or less intricate. That wonderful ' river in the sea' — the 
 Oulf Stream — which flows between the Florida coast and the Bahama 
 bankSj is only forty miles broad between the nearest opposite points ; but 
 there is no harbor on that part of the Florida coast. The distance from 
 Charleston to Nassau is about five hundred miles, and from Wilmington 
 about five hundred and fifty. Practically, however, they were equidis- 
 tant, because blockade-runners bound from either port, in order to evade 
 the cruisers lying in wait off Abaco, were compelled to give that headland 
 a wide berth, by keeping well to the eastward of it. But in avoiding 
 Scylla they ran the risk of striking upon Charybdis; for the dangerous 
 reefs of Eleuthera were fatal to many vessels. The chief industries of the 
 islands before the war were the collection and exportation of sponges, 
 corals, etc., and wrecking, to which was added during the war, the lucra- 
 tive trade of picking and stealing. The inhabitants may be classed as 
 'amphibious,' and are known among saUors by the generic name of 
 'Conchs.' The wharves of Nassau, during the war, were always piled high 
 with cotton, and huge warehouses were stored full of supplies for the Con- 
 federacy. The harbor was crowded at times with lead-colored, short 
 masted, rakish-looking steamers; the streets alive with bustle and activity 
 during day-time and swarming with drunken revellers by night. Every 
 nationality on earth, nearly, was represented there; the high wages ashore 
 and afloat tempting adventurers of the baser sort; and the prospect of 
 enormous profits offering equally strong inducements to capitalists of a 
 speculative turn. The monthly wages of a sailor on board a blockade- 
 runner was one hundred dollars in gold, and fifty dollars bounty at the 
 end of a successful trip;* and this could be accomplished under favorable 
 circumstances in seven days. The captains and pilots sometimes received 
 as much as five thousand dollars besides perquisites. All of the cotton 
 shipped on account of the Confederate government was landed and trans- 
 ferred to a mercantile firm in Nassau, who received a commission for as- 
 suming ownership. It was then shipped under the British or other neu- 
 tral flag to Europe. The firm is reputed to have made many thousands 
 of dollars by these commissions. But besides the cotton shipped by the 
 Confederate government, many privstte companies and individuals were 
 engaged in the trade ; and it was computed (so large were the gains) that 
 the owner could afford to lose a vessel and cargo after two successful voy- 
 ages. Three or four steamers were wholly owned by the Confederate 
 government; a few more were owned by it in part, and the balance were 
 
 1 Narrative of a Blockade Runner, p. 122. tain, tliree ofQcers, three engineers and twenty- 
 
 eight men (ten seamen and eighteen firemen). 
 
 2 Capt. John Wilkinson, C. P. N., was offered They were generally all Englishmen. The Eng- 
 £2,000 in gold a trip by merchants of Liverpool, liah men-of-war on the West India station found 
 but preferred to remain loyal to his government it a difficult matter to prevent their crews from 
 and receive a navy officer's salary. A blocliade- deserting, so great was tl temptation offered 
 runner's crew generally consisted of one cap- by the blockade-runners. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 481 
 
 private property; but these last were compelled to carry out, as portion 
 of their cargo, cotton on government account, and to bring in supplies. 
 On board the government steamers, the crew which was shipped abroad, 
 and under the articles regulating the ' merchant marine,' received the same 
 wages as were paid on board the other blockade-runners; but the captains 
 and subordinate ofiBcers of the government steamers who belonged to the 
 Confederate States navy, and the pilots, who were detailed from the army 
 lor this service, received the pay in gold of their respective grades. '"^ 
 
 There was one singular fact connected with the blockade- 
 running vessels which speaks well for the C. S. naval officers. 
 Down to August 16th, 1864, and perhaps later, only a single 
 blockade-running vessel was lost while under the command 
 of ofl&cers of the navy ! Officers in the navy, in the mean- 
 while, commanded many of them and made many successful 
 trips. The Coquette, which was one of the most indifferent 
 of all blockade-vessels, and which was sold in the summer of 
 1864, made nine round trips under the command of Lieut. 
 Robert R. Carter, C. S. N., and saved them everyone, clearing 
 for the Confederate government at least six hundred thousand 
 dollars. The Robert E. Lee, the best ship the Confederates 
 had, was successful in all her numerous trips as long as she 
 was under the able command of Capt. John Wilkinson, 
 C. S. N. As has been stated elsewhere, on the first trip she 
 made after the command had been transferred to a person 
 who was not an officer of the navy, she was captured. 
 
 1 The following comparison of ezpenseB in 
 running a steamer before the war and those of 
 a blockade-runner will illustrate the profits 
 made in the hazardous trade: 
 
 DWbursememU of a Steamship Uefore the War. 
 
 One captain, per month $150 00 
 
 Oue clerk, per month 100 00 
 
 OnefirstOfflcer 76 00 
 
 One second officer 60 00 
 
 One third ofScer 45 00 
 
 One boatswain 40 00 
 
 One carpenter 60 00 
 
 One steward and three assistants 110 00 
 
 Oue coot and two assistants 90 00 
 
 One engineer and three assistants 250 00 
 
 Twelve firemen and coal passers 600 00 
 
 Twelve deck hands 360 00 
 
 240 tons of coal at $4 960 00 
 
 Oil, tallow, packing, etc 100 00 
 
 Stevedores out and home ,. 2,000 00 
 
 "Wharfage and boatage 400 00 
 
 Pilotage, out and in .. 256 00 
 
 Insurance, 25^ per cent, per month, 
 
 on $150,000 3,760 00 
 
 Wear and tear, 2% per cent, per month, 4,250 00 
 
 Incidental expenses 1,000 00 
 
 Interest 875 00 
 
 Bations for crew 405 00 
 
 -Rations for passengers 3,000 00 
 
 Earnings out and home : 
 JVeight, out and home, four 
 
 trips $14,800 00 
 
 Passengers 38,000 00 
 
 $19,136 00 
 
 62,800 00 
 
 DisJmrsemifnts of a Blockade Steamer. 
 
 One captain, per month $5,000 00 
 
 First oflcer, $600, second do., $250 
 
 thirddo, $170 1,020 00 
 
 One boatswain 160 00 
 
 One carpenter 160 00 
 
 Onepurser 1,000 00 
 
 One steward, $160; three assistants, 
 
 $180 330 00 
 
 One cook, $160; two assistants, $120.. 270 00 
 
 One engineer and three assistants 3,500 00 
 
 Twelve firemen and coal-heavers 2.400 00 
 
 240 tons of coal at $20 4,800 00 
 
 Rations for crew 2,700 00 
 
 Oil.tallowand packing 1,000 00 
 
 Stevedores 5,000 00 
 
 PUotage, out and in 3,000 00 
 
 Sea Insurance 3,500 00 
 
 Wearandtear 4,260 00 
 
 Incidental expenses 1,000 00 
 
 Interest 875 00 
 
 Risks, 26 per cent 37,600 00 
 
 Provisions for passengers 3,000 00 
 
 $80,265 00 
 Earnings, out and home : 
 
 800 bales of cotton for gov- 
 ernment $40,000,00 
 
 800 bales of cotton for 
 
 owners 40,000 00 
 
 Return freight for owners 40,000 00 
 
 Return freight for govern- 
 ment 40,600 00 
 
 Passengers, out and home. 12,000 00 
 
 $172,000 00 
 
 Profits made per month previous to 
 war, by a first-class steamer on 
 
 aspecie currency $33,664 00 
 
 31 
 
 Leaving a monthly profit (and if suc- 
 cessful in five trips will clear the 
 steamer) of $91,735 00 
 
482 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 While the officers of the navy were successful in all their 
 many trips except one, every ship belonging to the Confeder- 
 ate government, not commanded by an officer of the navy, 
 was lost. These officers were skillful seamen, good navi- 
 gators, gentlemen of standing and character; the cause was 
 their cause, and they were above all the suspicion that could 
 be attached to others less favorably situated. 
 
 Several British naval officers of high rank and character 
 were engaged in the same exciting and lucrative occupation 
 of blockade-running; among them the gallant Capt. Burgoyne, 
 who commanded afterwards the unfortunate ship Captain, of 
 H. B. M.'s navy, and who perished together with nearly the 
 whole crew when she foundered at sea. The late Hon. Aug- 
 ust Charles Hobart, Marshal of the Turkish Empire, and Vice- 
 Admiral of the English Navy, was a daring navigator in the 
 blockade-running business, under the name of Capt. Roberts. 
 He made several successful trips. 
 
 During the first two years of the war, blockade-running 
 had been a matter of no very great difficulty. Sailing-vessels 
 had time after time eluded the vigilance of the Federal cruis- 
 ers, and with a steamer of very low pressure success was 
 almost certain. Many that could steam no more than seven 
 or eight knots at their highest speed had run in and out sev- 
 eral times without a shot being fired, at a time, too, when 
 cotton could be purchased in the Confederacy at eight cents a 
 pound and sold for six times that sum in Nassau or Bermuda. 
 Most of the captures of that period were made by cruisers 
 falling in with the vessels on their passages from either port, 
 and many that were not legally liable to forfeiture were seized 
 and destroyed by the Federal cruisers in their pursuit of the 
 
 Eersevering evaders of their navy. But as the number of 
 lockade-runners increased, the captures became more numer- 
 ous and the cruisers gained experience. About this time, too, 
 the United States having failed to fulfill their oft-repeated 
 promise of bringing the Confederacy into subjection, Europe 
 began to doubt the power and ability of the United States to 
 accomplish their end, or, at all events, to look upon the fall of 
 the Confederacy as an event far distant; and in the mean- 
 time Confederate cruisers were making sad havoc among 
 American merchantmen, and European merchants deemed it 
 no longer safe to trust their goods in American bottoms. Thus 
 hundreds of vessels were thrown out' of employment, or were 
 obliged to change their flag; many of their fastest steamers 
 were armed, and employed as cruisers and coastguards. This 
 addition to the U. S. naval power affected the interests and 
 changed the character of the blockade-runner in two ways: 
 first, by placing a larger number of much faster cruisers" in 
 the waters between the Confederate States and the British 
 West Indies; and, second, by enabling the U. S. government 
 to add to their blockading squadrons many more of their war 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 483 
 
 steamers, thus rendering the attempts to run in and out a 
 very precarious one indeed. But " the hour has never failed 
 to bring forth the man," and the emergency was promptly met 
 bjr companies formed for the purpose, with large capitals 
 widely distributed, which immediately ordered vessels from 
 the best English and Scotch builders and spared no expense 
 on their fittings and machinery. These vessels were planned 
 and built expressly for the hazardous trade, and were adapted 
 to carry largely on a light draft of water, and were fitted 
 with steam power to drive them at a rate of speed which even 
 put capture from a fair chase out of the question. 
 
 With the advent of these great English blockade-running 
 companies, influenced by no Confederate sentiment or patri- 
 otic motive, and inspired only by the greed of gain, the block- 
 ade business began to develop influences as hurtful to the 
 Confederate cause as its importations had been helpful to its 
 armies. About the end of 1863, and the beginning of 1864, 
 there began in many quarters of the Confederacy an outcry 
 against a business which was fast degenerating into an illicit 
 and unpatriotic traflfic. Its naoral effects upon the people 
 were beginning to be most injurious, and to throw out tempta- 
 tion to an extravagance which was ruinous to the finances 
 and demoralizing to society. It was building up a class of 
 influential monied men whose interests lay in a continuation 
 and extension of a business which depleted the country with- 
 out a corresponding return. It was becoming the agency by 
 which the currency, never founded on any stable or sensible 
 basis, was discredited and brought to an unjust and ruinous 
 discount. The export of cotton, for anything beyond military 
 supplies and for the payment of government indebtedness 
 abroad, began to be regarded as an evil, and many consider- 
 ate and thoughtful citizens urged upon the government not 
 only a more stringent regulation, but a total control over the 
 business of blockade-running. The Richmond (Va.) Enquirer 
 urged that: 
 
 " The State governments and the Confederate government should 
 monopolize the entire blockade business — controlling all the exportations 
 and all the importations — the former acting for the people and the army, 
 the latter for the army alone. A fleet of fifty steamers owned by the 
 States and by the Confederate States, setting apart each -trip a portion of 
 the outgoing cargo as insurance, could be maintained at all times on the 
 ocean, and render the importation and exportation of the country entirely 
 subservient to the cause of national liberty. We would not forbid in- 
 dividual and corporate enterprise, but only regulate it so that it should 
 exist only by making the cause of the country its cause, and subordinating 
 avarice to patriotism. If companies were not willing to run their steamers 
 exclusively for the cause, receiving a liberal compensation, they should not 
 be permitted to enter the ports, but be treated as jmblie enemies, ■which they 
 would be; for, in this war, every citizen that is not with us is against us. 
 The blockade does not require regulating, but controlling — not depart- 
 ment rules, but official management. 
 
 "By such control of the importations the exports would be made to 
 contribute exclusively to the military defence of the country. By curbing 
 
484 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the means of display in dress and on the tahle the unbecoming vanity 
 of the people would be cheeked and habits of frugalitj; and economy en- 
 couraged. By closing the markets of the country to imported luxuries 
 the disgraceful extravagance that now pervades all classes of the people 
 would be checked, and if the currency was not appreciated it would not 
 be depreciated by a daily comparison with articles of luxury. The block- 
 ade regulations of the last Congress were a failure because they impeded 
 individual enterprise, and did not provide that the government should 
 supply the place of the companies that would not run the blockade under 
 those regulations. Fair and liberal compensation should be paid to in- 
 dividual enterprise; but the governments — Btateand Confederate — shoSild 
 own a fleet of steamers, and run the blockade under a system which, in- 
 suring against capture, would supply losses as fast as they occurred. This 
 is a gigantic war, and requires gigantic means and herculean efforts.'' 
 
 The exorbitant prices obtained at the great auction sales 
 of blockade goods, the combination between dealers to pur- 
 chase all of certain lines of goods, and dividing up the lot 
 prevent all competition, and the positive refusal of the im- 
 porter to recognize Confederate money as currency, pointed 
 prejudice at both the trade and the auctions. In addition to 
 those evils, the character of much of the goods imported was 
 not in the least contributive to the support of the army or to 
 the necessities of the people. Expensive silks, cloths, brandies, 
 rum, ales, whiskeys, sardines, the use of which cultivated 
 tastes and catered to an extravagance hurtful to that self- 
 denial so necessary to a people struggling for existence 
 against enormous odds. The regulation of the blockade 
 business, rather than its suppression, was demanded both by 
 the sentiment of the people and by the necessities of the army. 
 To have prohibited blockade-running, or to have so hampered 
 it with restrictions as to deprive it of that profit necessary to 
 induce capitalists to incur its risks, and the adventurous to 
 share its dangers, would have been to institute, within Con- 
 federate lines, the very system that the United States had at- 
 tempted on the outside. The aid of the outside world was 
 necessary to the army and people of the Confederate States, 
 but that aid had become encrusted with an evil which it was 
 very difficult to remove. 
 
 In response to public sentiment the Confederate Congress 
 enacted laws ' to regulate foreign commerce, and to prohibit 
 the introduction of " luxuries."' The first act prohibited 
 the exportation of cotton, tobacco, military and naval stores, 
 and forbid any vessel, vehicle, slave or animal engaged in 
 loading or transporting such articles, to go beyond the limits 
 of the Confederate States, or to any Confederate port actually 
 within the enemy's lines. And by the law all persons con- 
 cerned in such exportations were to be deemed guilty of high 
 misdeameanor, unless authorized by special permits to be 
 given under rules to be prescribed by the President. 
 
 1 " An act to prohibit the importation of lux- Impose regulations upon the foreign commerce 
 nries, or of articles not necessaries or of common of the Confederate States to provide for the pub- 
 nse." Approved February 6tb, 1864. " A bill to lie defence." Approved February 6th, 18M. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 485 
 
 The act prohibiting the introduction of " luxuries," after 
 March 1st, 1864, contained a long list of prohibited articles, 
 and limited the liberty of importation into the ports of the 
 Confederate States to articles of prime necessity. It provided 
 that the Secretary of the Treasury should prescribe the maxi- 
 mum prices within which importations of articles partly or 
 wholly of cotton, flax, wool or silk thread should be made, 
 and provided that any article imported contrary to that law 
 should be forfeited, and the owner be required to pay double 
 the value thereof. 
 
 The regulations • of the Treasury and War Departments, 
 under these laws, required of all vessels going out of Con- 
 federate ports that one-half of the tonnage may be employed 
 by the Confederate government for its own use, both on the 
 outward and homeward voyage; and required the owners of 
 vessels to execute a bond conditioned "that the vessel will 
 pursue the voyage designated and that she will return with 
 reasonable dispatch to a Confederate port after her outward 
 cargo shall be^ discharged, with a cargo consisting of one-half 
 of articles not prohibited by the laws of the Confederate 
 States, and that the other half of such cargo shall be such as 
 the government shall offer for shipment from such port." The 
 regulations fixed the freight to . be paid by the Confederate 
 States, on all cotton and tobacco shipped from a Confederate 
 port, at five pence sterling per pound, payable on delivery at 
 the port of destination in coin or sterling exchange ; and the 
 return freight was fixed at the rate of twenty-five pounds per 
 ton in cotton, payable on its delivery at the Confederate port, 
 at ten pence sterling per pound for middling uplands, and 
 a proportionate price for cotton of other qualities. In cal- 
 culating the ton of freight by weight, 3,340 pounds, and by 
 measure forty cubic feet, were to be allowed. If the outward 
 bound vessels should consent^ at the request of the government, 
 to take two-thirds of her cargo on account of the Confederate 
 States, the outward freight was fixed at six pence sterling per 
 pound ; and whenever the government was not prepared to fill 
 up any portion of the tonnage reserved for its use, at the time 
 of sailing, her owners were allowed to fill up the same on their 
 own account; but no vessel was to be allowed to sail on her 
 outward voyage, without the consent of the government, 
 until one-third of her cargo was laden for the use of the 
 government. 
 
 The publication of these laws and regulations upon 
 blockade-running created intense interest in Nassau and other 
 ports, where the blockade-runners most congregated. The 
 Nassau Herald intimated the probability of a withdrawal of 
 many companies from the business, saying : 
 
 " We must conclude that the responsihle framere of this measure are 
 fully aware that the agents here will shrink from incurring the responsi- 
 bility of running the vessels of their principals, without first receiving 
 
486 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 positive instructions. What then could be the object of the framers of 
 tliis startling measure, in launching it without even a preliminary an- 
 nouncement, or without specifying a reasonably distant day when it 
 would come into operation ? A surprise was clearly intended, and most 
 assuredly has been effected— with what object we forbear to scrutinize 
 too closely; but that less partial pens will probe the motives for so sud- 
 denly announcing, and so suddenly carrying into effect, this new and 
 sweeping change, we are quite prepared to expect. 
 
 " We have in our former article stated that the sequel may show 
 material advantages to the Confederacy, and those advantages may arise 
 under the measures being adopted by Mr. Slidell, the Confederate Com- 
 missioner at Paris. Mr. Slidell has issued instructions to the effect that 
 persons holding cotton-loan bonds for which they wish to obtain cotton 
 must transfer the bonds to his keeping, and on their doing so he will give 
 a certificate or delivery order for the amount of cotton which they re- 
 present. If it be the aim of Mr. Slidell, acting of course under instruc- 
 tions, to reissue these bonds at their enhanced value, the Confederate ex- 
 chequer will be provided with funds, although such a course of procedure 
 will probably meet with censure from the bankholders. 
 
 " Large sums have been made and large sums have been lost in these 
 ventures by English sympathizers and speculators, and the authorities at 
 Richmond will find that all such persons will retire as soon as the pros- 
 pect of gain adequate to the risk incurred ceases. It must not be for- 
 gotten that the adventurous spirit of English merchants led the way at 
 the outset in blockade-running, and it is much to be regretted that the 
 Confederates, themselves did not take the initiative in the matter, and 
 that even at this date their enterprise (their patriotism is beyond question) 
 has not been more concentrated on so vital an issue as the conveyance of 
 munitions of war and necessary merchandise to the Confederacy. 
 
 " We have investigated the merits of the new law with an anxious 
 desire to trace in it marked and decided advantages to Confederate in- 
 terests, as distinct from all other interests; but we are not of those who 
 consider the cause of the Confederacy wUl be best served by tacitly as- 
 senting to all the measures which may emanate from the executive, and 
 we consider it to be self-evident, that in examining such a measure as the 
 one we are discussing, it is impossible to ignore the interests of the block- 
 ade-runner. The Confederates have made great and noble sacrifices, but 
 they cannot surmount the impossibilities, and an impossibiUty it cer- 
 tainly would prove to be to carry on blockade-running on a comprehensive 
 scale without a large margin of profit being allowed to meet inevitable 
 contingencies.' 
 
 On the other hand, it was replied to tlie complaint of the 
 blockade-runner, that the system as it had been conducted 
 had not been beneficial to the Confederate government, nor 
 helpful to the people; that it had depreciated the currency, 
 created an exorbitant rate of prices, and established a wide- 
 spread and unprincipled extortion; that the English block- 
 ade-runners, by refusing to take Confederate money, and 
 demanding gold or cotton, had drained the country of all 
 specie, and greatly increased the price of exchange; that 
 under the then existing system gold flowed out of the country 
 and the supply of cotton was being reduced without a corre- 
 sponding remuneration; that cotton was not bought with gold, 
 but swapped for goods, and sometimes trinkets — not fit 
 for consumption, but adapted only to vanity and display; 
 that silks, satins, laces, broadcloths, liquors, and ladies' 
 goods generally, had made up the bulk of the cargoes of the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 487 
 
 blockade-runner, and that while they carried a small propor- 
 tion of army supplies, it was only because they were stowed in 
 "that part of the vessel reserved for the government; and that 
 real and substantial aid and help to the army and people had 
 never been the aim or purpose of the English blockade-runner; 
 a,nd, finally, that if the great English blockade-running com- 
 panies withdrew from the business, the citizens, States, and 
 government of the Confederate States would go back into and 
 conduct it for the purpose of defence only, and not merely for 
 the avarice and greed with which it had been prosecuted. 
 
 Though the legislation for the regulation of blockade was 
 adopted in the early part of 1864, there were more vessels, in 
 January, 1865, engaged in blockade-running than when the 
 regulations went into effect. 
 
 Notwithstanding the use of swifter blockade vessels, 
 many of them being captured blockade-runners, as well as 
 the largely increased navy of the United States, and the 
 stimulant to increased vigilance which many prizes had given 
 to the officers of the blockading squadron, it was still recog- 
 nized as impossible for the Federal government to stop block- 
 ade-running, except by capturing with the army the ports 
 from which the business was done. This impossibility, so far 
 as the navy was concerned, resulted from physical causes, 
 and not from any neglect, indifference, or absence of stimu- 
 lating motives. The conformation of the Atlantic coast, and 
 the direction and force of the winds, were the causes that 
 aided blockade-running as well as hindered and embarrassed 
 the blockading squadron. If the wind blew off the coast, it 
 ^ove the squadron to sea, and enlarged the perimiter of the 
 circle through which the blockade-runner could swiftly and 
 safely steam. If the wind blew land-ward the blockading 
 squadron were compelled to haul off to a greater distance to 
 escape the consequences of the heavy seas which dashed with 
 violence upon the coast. The shoals that lined the North 
 Carolina coast extended for miles into the sea, and the whole 
 coast is not surpassed in danger to navigation by any other 
 when a strong easterly wind meets the ebb-tide. And yet it 
 was an easy matter for a pilot experienced in the coast to run 
 a swift-steaming light-draft vessel out to sea or into port, 
 while the heavier and deeper draft vessels of the blockading 
 squadron were buffeting the storpay winds and waves. 
 
 The restrictions imposed upon foreign commerce by the 
 above-mentioned Acts of the Confederate Congress had not, in 
 January, 1865, materially reduced the number of vessels en- 
 gaged in running the blockade. President Davis, in a mes- 
 sage to Congress on this subject, said that the number of 
 vessels arriving at only two ports — Charleston and Wilming- 
 ton— froni November 1st to December 6th, had been forty- 
 three, and that only a very small portion of those outward- 
 bound had been captured; that out of 11,796 bales of cotton 
 
488 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 shipped since July 1st, 1864, but 1,372 bales had been lost. 
 And the special report of the Secretary of the Treasury in 
 relation to the same matter stated, that there had been im- 
 ported at the ports of Wilmington and Charleston since Octo- 
 ber 26th, 1864. 8,632,000 pounds of meat, 1,507,000 pounds of 
 lead, 1,933,000 pounds of saltpetre, 546,000 pairs of shoes, 
 316,000 pairs of blankets, 520,000 pounds of coffee, 69,000 rifles, 
 97 packages of revolvers, 2,639 packages of medicines, 43 can- 
 non, with a very large quantity of other articles. In addition 
 to these articles, many valuable stores and supplies had been 
 brought in by way of the Northern lines, by way of Florida, 
 and through the port of Galveston, and through Mexico, 
 across the Rio Grande. From March 1st, 1864, to January 1st, 
 1865, the value of the shipments of cotton on Confederate 
 government account was shown by the Secretary's report to 
 have been $5,296,000 in specie, of which $1,500,000 had been 
 shipped out between July 1st and December 1st, 1864. 
 
 A list of vessels which were running the blockade from 
 Nassau and other ports, in the period intervening between 
 November, 1861, and March, 1864, showed that 84 steamers 
 were engaged; of these, 37 were captured by the enemy, la 
 were totally lost, 11 were lost and the cargoes partially saved, 
 and 1 foundered at sea. They made 363 trips to Nassau and 
 65 to other ports. Among the highest number of runs made 
 were those of the Fanny, which ran 18 times, and the Mar- 
 garet and Jessie, which performed the same feat, and was 
 captured. Out of 425 runs from Nassau alone (including 100 
 schooners), only 62 — about one in seven — were unsuccessful. 
 A letter from Nassau, on the chances of blockade-running, 
 published in June, 1864, said: 
 
 ' ' You ■will please observe that most of the boats here enumerated were 
 wholly unfit for the purpose to which they had been hastily applied under 
 the inducements of the large profit, and are very different from those 
 which have been more recently built, and expressly for blockade-running. 
 Still, even now it is by no means an uncommon thing for a five or six linot 
 boat to make several successful trips, while the better class pass the block- 
 ading squadron almost as carelessly as if none such existed, freq^uently in 
 open daylight. The average life of a boat, which from the subjoined ta- 
 ble would appear to be about five runs, is therefore in reality much higher, 
 and may be safely estimated, with proper management, to be at least four 
 round trips, or eight successful runs. Taking all the craft, good, bad, and 
 indifferent together, you will find that out of eighty-four steamers, eleven 
 only failed on the first run; thirty -seven have been captured, and twenty- 
 five lost from various marine accidents; while twenty-two are still safe, 
 after having paid themselves many times over." 
 
 In confirmation of the ineffectiveness of the blockade, as 
 well as of the fact that the restrictive legislation of the Con- 
 federate Congress had not materially reduced blockade-run- 
 ning, the New York Herald, commenting upon the above 
 exhibit, remarked that: 
 
 "Of the vessels which carried this, twenty-five cleared from Mata- 
 moras, the quantity brought by them being about 5,000 bales. These 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 489 
 
 figures will serve to give an idea of the immense activity that has prevailed 
 in the traffic between the rebel States and England, despite all the efforts 
 of our cruisers. The shutting up of the port of Wilmington, the principal 
 channel for this trade, will, of course, cut off a large proportion of it. All 
 the means of entry on the rebel Hne of coast will then be hermetically 
 closed, and their supplies by direct sources cut off. There will remain 
 only the line of supply through Texas ; but, as this is circuitous and tedi- 
 ous, it will fail to satisfy the wants of the rebels as fast as needed. The 
 possession by the French of Matamoras will, of course, continue to facili- 
 tate the traffic to a certain extent by rendering the articles that pass that 
 way secure from seizure. Had measures been taken by our government 
 to permanently occupy Brownsville and the Une of the Rio Grande we 
 should have been enabled to put an estoppal upon all traffic by that 
 route. This, however, will, we presume, be done as soon as a sufficient 
 force can be spared for that purpose; but by that time we should be in a 
 condition to suppress it in another and more effective manner— namely, 
 by clearing the French and their Austrian proteges out of Mexico." 
 
 And in its issue of January 31st, 1865, its correspondent 
 from the Bahamas stated that 
 
 "The utmost activity prevailed in the Anglo-rebel blockade-running 
 fleet plying between Wilmington, and Charleston and Nassau. Cotton 
 valued at $3,500,000 had been landed at Nassau from the above-named 
 Southern ports within ten days. A large number of British trading ves- 
 sels had sailed from Liverpool, London, and the Clyde laden with supplies 
 for the rebels. Their names and days of sailing are published in the Her- 
 ald, so that our gallant sailors off Wilmington may have a fair chance of 
 rewarding themselves liberally with the spoils of the common enemy. 
 Two blockade-runners cleared for that port, at Nassau, on the 14th inst. 
 They have probably discovered before now, on arrival in New Inlet, that 
 a change has taken place in the position of affairs there, and that they 
 were just in time to fall into the hands of the national forces." 
 
 The military and naval expeditions against Wilmington, 
 in December, 1864, and January, 1865, resulted in the capture of 
 the forts and the closing of the port. Eight vessels left the port 
 of Nassau between the 12th and 16th of January, one of vs^hich 
 took four one-hundred-pounder Armstrong guns; and at the 
 time of their sailing there were over two and a half million 
 pounds of bacon stored at Nassau awaiting transportation. 
 The confidence reposed in the defence of Wilmington contin- 
 ued unabated on the part of the blockade-runners, and the 
 Charlotte, the Blenheim, and the Stag, all British steamers, 
 ran in after the fall of Fort Fisher, and were captured by the 
 Federal cruisers in the river. The blockade-runner Owl, 
 Capt. John N. MaflBtt, C. S. N., in command, succeeded in 
 passing over the bar near Fort Caswell and anchored at 
 Smithville on the night the forts were evacuated, and imme- 
 diately returned to Bermuda, arriving on the 31st, and carry- 
 ing the news of the fall of Fort Fisher and the end of block- 
 ade-running at Wilmington. Her arrival was timely, stopping 
 the Maud Campbell, Old Dominion, Florence, Deer and Vir- 
 ginia. Most, if not all, of these steamers now turned their prows 
 toward Charleston, the last harbor remaining accessible; and 
 though the fall of that city was impending, yet a cargo might 
 
490 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 be safely landed and transported along the interior line to the 
 famishing armies of the Confederate States. To that end 
 Capt. Wilkinson determined to make the effort: 
 
 " But it was the part of prudence to ascertain, positively, before 
 sailing, that Charleston was still in our possession. This intelligence 
 was brought by the Chicora, which arrived at Nassau on the 30th of 
 January; and on February 1st, the Owl, Carolina, Dream. Chicora, and 
 Chameleon sailed within a few hours of each other for Charleston." 
 
 The effort was a brave and gallant one, but was ineffec- 
 tual — the U. S. S. Vanderbilt intercepted the Chameleon, and 
 after an exciting chase was dodged by the fast-sailing vessel 
 under the cool seamanship of the gallant Wilkinson. Turning 
 on the Vanderbilt, the Chameleon again attempted to reach 
 Charleston, but having lost a day in escaping from the Van- 
 derbilt, and retarded by unfavorable weather, did not reach 
 the coast near Charleston bar till the fifth night after leaving 
 Nassau. The blockading fleet, reinforced from that off Wil- 
 mington, now closed every practical entrance; but it was not 
 until after assurances from the pilot that entrance was impos- 
 sible that Capt. Wilkinson " turned away from the land, our 
 hearts sank within us, while conviction forced itself upon us 
 that the cause for which so much blood had been shed, so 
 many miseries bravely endured, and so many sacrifices cheer- 
 fully made, was about to perish at last." The Chicora, more 
 fortunate than the Chameleon, ran into Charleston, but find- 
 ing that city evacuated, ran out, despite the effectiveness of 
 the blockade, and reached Nassau on the 28th. The Fox, less 
 fortunate, ran into Charleston in ignorance of its capture, 
 and was seized by the Federal cruisers. 
 
 Capt. John N. MafRtt, C. S. N., in the Owl, left Havana 
 about the middle of March, within "a quarter of an hour" 
 after the U. S. S. Cherokee steamed out of the harbor. Passing 
 Morro Castle, the Owl hugged the coast towards the west, 
 followed by the Cherokee — the chase continued for an hour or 
 more; the Owl had the speed, and Maffitt the seamanship, to 
 throw "dust into the eyes" of his pursuer by changing her 
 coal from hard to soft, and clouding the air with dense black 
 smoke, under cover of which the Owl turned on the Cherokee, 
 and steaming away to the stern of the cruiser, disappeared 
 in the darkness of night and storm. 
 
 In the trans-Mississippi, blockade-running continued with 
 some success until the 2d of June, when the terms of surrender 
 in Galveston, by Gens. E. Kirby Smith and J. Bankhead 
 Magruder with Gen. A. J. Smith brought the war to an effec- 
 tual close. Charleston was evacuated on the 17th of February, 
 and Fort Anderson, the last'of the defences at Wilmington, fell 
 on the 19th. 
 
 With the termination of blockade-running the commercial 
 importance of Matamoras. Nassau, Bermuda, and other West 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 491 
 
 India ports, departed. On the 11th of March there were 
 lying in Nassau thirty-five British blockade-runners, which 
 were valued at $15,000,000 in greenbacks, and there were none 
 to do them reverence. Their occupation was gone, their 
 profits at an end, and some other service must be sought to 
 give them employment. There exists no record, if any were 
 kept, from which computation can be made of the amount 
 and value of goods, arms, supplies and stores introduced into 
 the Confederate States during the four years of blockade- 
 running. But the Hon. Zebulon Vance, who was Governor, 
 of North Carolina during a large part of the war, has put on 
 record the share, in part, of that State, in blockade-running, 
 from which a general idea of the amount of values introduced 
 may be approximated. In an address before the Association 
 of the Maryland Line, delivered in Baltimore, February 33d, 
 1885, he said: 
 
 "By the general industry and thrift of our people, and by the use 
 of a number of blockade-running steamers carrying out cotton and bring- 
 ing in supplies from Europe, I had collected and distributed, from time to 
 time, as near as can be gathered from the records of the Quartermaster's 
 Department, the following stores: Large quantities of machinery supplies, 
 60,000 pairs of handcards, 10,000 grain scythes, 200 barrels blue stone for 
 the wheat growers, leather and shoes for 250,000 pairs, 50,000 blankets, 
 grey-wooled cloth for at least 250,000 suits of uniforms, 12,000 overcoats 
 (ready made), 2,000 best Enfield rifles (with 100 rounds of fixed ammuni- 
 tion), 100,000 pounds of bacon, 500 sacks of coffee for hospital use, $50,000 
 worth of medicines at gold prices, large quantities of lubricating oils, be- 
 sides minor supplies of various kinds for the charitable institutions of the 
 State. Not only was the supply of shoes, blankets, and clothing more 
 than sufficient for the supply of the North Carolina troops, but large 
 quantities were turned over to the Confederate government for the troops 
 of other States. In the winter succeeding the battle of Chickamauga, I 
 sent to Gen. Longstreet's corps 14,000 suits of clothing complete. At the 
 surrender of Gen. Johnston, the State had on hand, ready made and in 
 cloth, 92,000 suits of uniform, with great stores of blankets, leather, etc. 
 To make good the warrants on which these purchases had been made 
 abroad, the State purchased and had on hand in trust for the holders 
 11,000 bales of cotton and 100,000 barrels of rosin. The cotton was partly 
 destroyed before the war closed, the remainder, amounting to several 
 thousand bales, was captured after peace was declared, by certain officers 
 of the Federal army." 
 
 The Proclamations of President Andrew Johnson, of the 
 22d of May and of the 13th, 14th and 23d of June, and that of 
 the 39th of August, 1865, removed all restriction on internal, 
 domestic and coastwise intercourse and trade with the South- 
 ern States, as well as all restrictions as to contraband of war; 
 and dispersed the squadrons and put an end to the blockade 
 of the Southern ports. Peace was coming, and, after years of 
 reconstruction almost as hurtful and cruel as war itself, finally 
 settled down to bless a reconstructed Union. 
 
 During the whole period of the war, and despite the 
 efforts of the government at Washington, and the vigilance 
 of the generals commanding the armies, there existed a kind 
 
492 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of blockade-running across the Potomac and along the whole 
 lines of the armies, between the peoples on both sides, by 
 which large amounts of supplies were introduced into the 
 Confederate States. A kind of legality was thrown around 
 this trade by permits given at Washington, and the whole 
 spirit of the laws relating to trade in " insurrectionary dis- 
 tricts," as well as those in regard to "captured and aban- 
 doned property," were mere disguises to favor certain persons 
 engaged in illicit traffic. The following letter was captured 
 and published in the New York Times, and affords some evi- 
 dence of how that traffic was conducted and who were en- 
 gaged in it: 
 
 " My Dear Sib — Allow me to suggest for your consideration a place 
 for a most profitable adventure, which a little diplomacy can render 
 perfectly safe and practicable. 
 
 "To obtain the privilege, either tacit or written, so that it be reli- 
 able to run the line of blockade with a cargo of staple articles from a 
 foreign port, and to return with a cargo of Upland or Sea Island cotton. 
 
 " Such a vessel coming in at Ocsabaw Inlet, under a discreet and reti- 
 cent master, with vessel and cargo (when within Confederate lines) in 
 my name, would be perfectly safe, and I would furnish her outward 
 cargo — more than sufficient to pay for the inward— and send sterling 
 exchange for your half of the profits. 
 
 " The profits would enable you to pay handsomely for the privilege, 
 either by a pro rata division or by a direct bonus — to whomsoever you 
 negotiate with. 
 
 "If you negotiate for such an adventure in any way that is reliable, 
 I will pay my half of all costs and expenses — including that for the pass 
 in and out, and give my personal attention to the sale of the inward 
 and outward purchase of the cargo, and guarantee the latter safely on 
 board. The profits in and out could not fall short of 300 to 500 per cent, 
 on the investment, which would be equally divided after deducting all 
 expenses. 
 
 " A reply, addressed to R. W. H. Welch or Alexander Johnson, Esqrs., 
 Nassau, N. P., and to further care of Messrs. John Frazier & Co., Charles- 
 ton, will reach me. 
 
 " I am, etc., tj. b. Lamab. 
 
 " To Hon. Feenando Wood, New Tork.'" 
 
 The publication of Mr. Lamar's letter in the Confederate 
 States had much influence in shaping the legislation, referred 
 to in the text, for prohibiting commercial intercourse with the 
 enemy. Mr. Lamar's letter, though addressed to the Hon. 
 Fernando Wood, of New York, does not implicate that gentle- 
 man, since there exists no evidence that Lamar was author- 
 ized by Mr. Wood to make such a proposition, and the mere 
 writing to Mr. Wood is only evidence of what Lamar pro- 
 posed, and not that Mr. Wood assented to or was cognizant in 
 advance of the proposition. The letter, however, is instructive 
 as to the profits arising from that traffic, as well as the shifts 
 and resorts to which men went in making haste to get rich — 
 even in the midst of desolating war. Mr. Lamar acknowl- 
 edged the genuineness of the letter, defended his scheme for 
 trading with the enemy as "advantageous" and "beneficial" 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 493 
 
 to the Confederate cause, as well as highly profitable to him- 
 self. Mr. Lamar — and he was but one example of many 
 people engaged in that trade — failed to comprehend that 
 trading with an enemy in time of war was a crime infamous 
 under every known construction of international law, as well 
 as against the provisions of the statutes of the Confederate 
 States. Such people, realizing enormous profits, disguised 
 from themselves, under the color of helping with their impor- 
 tations the cause of the Confederate States, the crime they 
 were committing as well as the aid they were giving to the 
 enemy. 
 
 Before Mr. Lamar's letter was captured, he ventilated his 
 patriotism in the Savannah papers after this fashion: 
 
 " I don't own a wharf in the city that I would not sooner saeriflce 
 altogether than the infernal Yankees (now waging the most savage war- 
 fare against us, and using the scum of Europe, of all their own large cities, 
 as well as their Billy Wilson regiment of convicts, to kill and destroy our 
 most valuable citizens, as they have done and are doing), should ever be 
 allowed to enjoy any right or privilege within this State." 
 
 Such evidence of greed is a melancholy instance of the 
 infirmity which overtook a very large class of people at the 
 South during the war. That class was composed of heavy 
 capitalists, who, rich by accident, were greedy by nature, and 
 while blatant of their patriotism and furious in their advocacy 
 of hostilities, were at all times willing to trade with the enemy 
 and to accumulate fortunes out of the impoverishment of 
 their country. 
 
 The interchange of kindnesses and the material aid sent 
 across the Potomac from sympathizing friends in Maryland, 
 and particularly in Baltimore, of which the amount and value 
 was immense, must not be confounded with blockade-running. 
 There was no trading in their kindness, no element of gain, 
 no part of greed or money-making. It was the materializing 
 of sympathy, without the demoralizing influence of trade or 
 traffic. 
 
CHAPTER XVII. 
 THE TRANS-MISSISSIPPI WATERS. 
 
 IN the early days of the war, the operations of the great 
 armies and navies which were then organized, were con- 
 fined almost exclusively to the territory east of the Missis- 
 sippi River. In some of the States west of that river, there 
 were a few important military movements before 1863, but the 
 great demonstrations of -the Federal government to crush the 
 independence of the Southern States were aimed at those more 
 vital points of the Confederacy from which issued the intelli- 
 gence and the power that directed and prosecuted the struggle. 
 The Confederate naval operations west of the "Mississippi 
 were confined mainly to the army, or were conducted jointly 
 by both branches of the service — the army and the navy. At 
 the beginning of the war, the few navy officers who were 
 assigned to duty in the trans - Mississippi department were 
 placed under the command of district commanders. They 
 performed meritorious service as engineer officers, building, 
 arming and officering shore batteries and fortifications ; and 
 it can be said of them, that without their co-operation and aid 
 many Confederate successes would not have been obtained. 
 The deeds of enterprise and daring of the navy officers in the 
 trans-Mississippi department, in the early days of the war, 
 are worthy of all praise, and we regret that their labors in 
 the cause of the South are covered up in the operations of the 
 army with which they co-operated. 
 
 In 1861 Texas, like all her sister States of the South, was 
 entirely unprepared for war, but her people were ready to 
 answer with alacrity any call from the President of the Con- 
 federacy. One of the first accessions to the Confederate 
 States navy was the capture of the U. S. steamship Star of the 
 West off Indian ola, Texas, by a party of volunteers from 
 Galveston. The Star of the West was 1,172 tons burden, and 
 built to run from New York to A spin wall on the route to Cal- 
 ifornia. She was chartered by the U. S. government to take 
 a small force and supplies to Major Anderson at Fort Sumter, 
 
 (494) 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 495 
 
 Charleston. She left New York at five o'clock in the after- 
 noon of January 5th, 1861, and proceeded down the bay, hove 
 to and received on board four officers and two hundred 
 and. fifty soldiers with their arms and ammunition, and pro- 
 ceeded to sea, crossing the bar at Sandy Hook at nine 
 o'clock the same night. She arrived off Charleston bar 
 at half -past one in the morning of the 9th, and as the 
 lights were all out and no guiding marks to be found, 
 she proceeded slowly until 4 a. m., and then, being in four 
 and a half fathoms of water, lay to until daylight. As the 
 day began to break a small steamer was seen inshore, which, 
 as soon as she discovered the Star of the West, burned 
 a blue light and two red lights as signals, and shortly after 
 steamed over the bar into the ship channel. The soldiers 
 were now all put below, and no one allowed on deck except 
 those belonging to the vessel. As soon as there was light 
 enough to see, the Star of the West crossed the bar and pro- 
 ceeded up the channel until she was about two miles from 
 Forts Moultrie and Sumter, when a masked battery on Morris 
 Island opened fire on her. The battery floated a red Palmetto 
 flag, and the Star of the West the United States flag. The 
 latter continued on under the fire of the battery, which was 
 about five-eights of a mile distant, for over ten minutes. 
 Several of the shots went entirely over her ; one shot passed 
 just clear of the pilot-house, another passed between the smoke- 
 stack and walking-beam of the engine ; another struck the 
 ship just abaft of the fore rigging and stove in the planking, 
 while another came near carrying away the rudder. At the 
 same time there was a movement of two steamers from near 
 Fort Moultrie, one of them towing a schooner, which was 
 thought by the officers of the Star of the West to be an armed 
 vessel to cut them off. Fearing capture or destruction, Capt. 
 McGowan of the Star of the West wore round and steered 
 down the channel, and the battery continued to fire upon him 
 until the shot fell short. He crossed the bar outward at 8. 50 
 a. m. and returned to New York. 
 
 A correspondence immediately took place between the 
 commander of Fort Sumter and the Governor of South Caro- 
 lina, in which the former stated that an unarmed vessel of the 
 United States had been fired on, and wished to know if it had 
 been with the sanction of the Grovernor. The latter replied, 
 that any attempt to send troops into Charleston harbor by the 
 United States, to re-enforce the forts or to retake and resume 
 possession of the forts within the waters of South Carolina, 
 would be regarded as an act of hostility. 
 
 The Star of the West was subsequently chartered again 
 by the Federal government, and sent to Texas to receive and 
 convey to New York a part of the regular force withdrawn 
 from that State; but on the 17th of April, 1861, she wias boarded 
 oflE Indianola and captured without resistance. 
 
496 THE CONFEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 It appears that in April 1861, Col. Earl Van Dorn, being 
 in Galveston, determined to attempt her capture. He called 
 for volunteers, and in about two hours and a half detachments 
 from the Galveston Artillery, Lieut. Van Buren commanding; 
 the Island City Rifles, Capt. Muller, a German company, and 
 the Wigfall Guards, Capt. McGrath, an Irish company, re- 
 sponded to the call. The entire party amounted to 71 men — 
 13 artillerists, 29 rifles, and 29 guards. They embarked on the 
 steamer Jfatog^orda, which left early on the following morning 
 for Indianola, reaching that point about five in the afternoon. 
 The men were concealed in the state rooms. At Indianola the 
 transport Fashion was loading with U. S. troops, numbering 
 about 6,000 men, with baggage, to put on board the Star of 
 the West, Capt. Howe, which was lying in deep water outside 
 of the bar. The Matagorda put back, and at Siluria, eighteen 
 miles distant, she transferred her armed force to the General 
 Rusk. About midnight the Rusk, with the soldiers on board, 
 came in hailing distance of the Star of the West, and upon 
 being hailed, answered, "The General Rusk, with troops on 
 board; can you take our line now?" "Certainly," was the 
 answer from Capt. Howe, he fancying that the troops belonged 
 to the United States. Capt. Howe asked why the Fashion did 
 not bring the troops, and was told that she would be along in 
 a few hours, with the rest of the troops and their baggage. 
 The sea Was rather rough, and after some little trouble the 
 Rusk made fast alongside. In a very short time the Galveston 
 soldiers were on board with their guns; and Capt. Howe 
 hardly had time to look at them, when they suddenly pre- 
 sented bayonets, and their officer commanded him to sur- 
 render. 
 
 " To what flag am I requested to surrender?" asked the 
 astonished captain. Ensign Duggan, of the Wigfall Guards, 
 here displayed the Lone Star flag of Texas, and in his richest 
 brogue exclaimed: " That's it, look at it, me byes; did ye iver 
 see the Texas flag on an Irish jackstaff before ?" The cap- 
 tain, having no means of resistance, surrendered without say- 
 ing a word. He had a crew of forty-two men and 900 barrels 
 of provisions, but nothing else; none of the arms or munitions 
 of the Federal troops had yet arrived on board. 
 
 The prisoners were all treated with politeness. The 
 steamer was immediately put about for Galveston; and great 
 must have been the bewilderment of the officers of the Fashion 
 and of the Federal troops next morning when they found the 
 Star of the West nowhere in sight. 
 
 At Galveston, Col. Van Dorn put Mr. Falval, first mate of 
 the Mexico, on board the Star of the West as captain, and 
 likewise the engineer of the Mexico; and ordering the soldiers 
 on board to see her safely into New Orleans, he left, to take 
 charge of some 600 troops who were waiting there for him to 
 go back to Indianola. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 497 
 
 The Star of the West arrived safely in New Orleans and 
 was moored in the Mississippi River below Algiers. She was 
 turned over to the C. S. navy, and for some time was used as a 
 receiving-ship. 
 
 The Texas coast, extending over several hundred miles, 
 •was reported, September 37th. 1861, as " in almost a defence- 
 less state," and that the " task of defending successfully any 
 point against an attack of any magnitude amounts to a mili- 
 tary impossibility." Earnest efforts were made to put all 
 points of danger in a position of defence. For this purpose, 
 by " Special Orders No. 123," from the Adjutant and Inspector 
 General's oflSce, at Richmond, Va., on August 14th, 1861, Com- 
 mander W. W. Hunter, 0. S. N., was ordered to proceed to 
 Galveston, and " report to Gen. Earl Van Dorn for duty, as 
 superintendent in charge of the works for the defence of the 
 coast of Texas." By the same order, John Withers, Assistant 
 Adjutant General, directed Brig. Gen. Paul 0. Hebert to 
 assume command of the Department of Texas in place of 
 Gen. Earl Van Dorn, who was ordered to turn the department 
 over to him and report in Richmond. 
 
 On September 37th, upon assuming command, Gen. He- 
 bert reported to the Secretary of War, that " On a coast like 
 this, where in calm weather a landing can be effected at any 
 point, and the bays in the rear and flank of Galveston Island 
 reached in that manner, or by the pass at the west end, the 
 problem of defence, considering the means available to that 
 effect, is certainly one of very difficult, if not impossible, 
 solution." The port of Galveston was partially defended by a 
 few open sand-works, mounted with guns of calibres ranging 
 from eighteen to thirty-two pounders and totally inadequate 
 to resist a bombardment with heavy guns. 
 
 Upon his arrival in Texas, Commander Hunter was placed 
 on special duty and assigned to the immediate command of 
 the naval defences of the port of Galveston and the vessels 
 in the employ of the Confederate government. He was sub- 
 ject to the orders of his military superiors in the district and 
 was authorized " to emploj^ such boats propelled by steam or 
 otherwise, as the service, in his judgment, rendered neces- 
 sary." He was to "take measures to guard against any sur- 
 prise by the enemy in the harbor and bay of Galveston," and 
 report upon a plan for " establishing a system of alarm sig- 
 nals with the forces on the island and at Virginia Point." His 
 attention was also directed to the railroad bridge. 
 
 In obedience to these orders Commander Hunter made a 
 complete inspection of the water approaches and defences of 
 Galveston. On November 17th, 1861, with the chartered 
 steamer John F. Carr, drawing two and a half feet of water, 
 he made an examination, and reported on the Rollover, and 
 the practicability of the launches being transported across it, 
 and the necessity of defending that point, and the best means 
 
498 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of effecting this. He also examined the water of East Bay; 
 from Bolivar Point to the nearest approachable shore of the 
 Rollover in that direction and examined and recommended 
 the means of defence at Smith's Point. On the 22d of No- 
 vember, by direction of the commanding general, he reported 
 on the practicability of gunboats of the class represented to 
 be in the enemy's fleet being able to reach a position in Gal- 
 veston Bay to command the bridge from Galveston Island to 
 the mainland; and on December 2d, he reported on "the 
 means of defence of the mouth of Trinity River." 
 
 Commander Hunter was exceedingly active, and directed 
 all his energies and talents to fortifying Galveston, Browns- 
 ville, Pass Cavallo, and Sabine Pass. There were no vessels 
 under his command, except a few improvised "cotton-clad" 
 river steamers and with these he rendered efficient service to 
 the army in transporting troops and munitions of war, and 
 guarding the coast from the marauding expeditions of the 
 enemy. The " mosquito fleets" of Texas cotton -clad steamers 
 had many severe engagements with the enemy during the war, 
 and their brave actions form a noteworthy series of episodes. 
 
 If the Texan authorities found the coast defenceless, and a 
 navy non-existent, in 1861, fortunately the Federal govern- 
 ment, in blockading the Atlantic coast, Mobile and New Or- 
 leans, exhausted its supply of vessels. We find the following 
 decided opinion expressed of this attempted blockade in the 
 London Shipping Gazette, as late in the year 1861, as August: 
 
 "There is no doubt that, up to the present time, so far as we have 
 been informed, the blockade of the Southern coast has not been efficient. 
 The more important ports, such as New Orleans, Mobile, Charleston aud 
 Pensacola, have been blockaded, but the blockade of these places appears 
 to have nearly exhausted the disposable forces of the national govern- 
 ment and the consequence is that other places, such as Wilmington, 
 Beaufort, etc., although declared to be blockaded, have not as yet been 
 legally, that is, efficiently closed against commerce. It is in vain for the 
 national government to proclaim, the blockade of the Southern ports from 
 Baltimore to the Rio Grande. Neutral States are only bound to respect 
 such a proclamation so far as there is the ability to give effect to it, which 
 on the part of the national government there does not appear to be. All 
 this is, of course, well known to Admiral Milne, who has been placed in 
 the somewhat difficult position of having to witness an inefBcient block- 
 ade with a force at his disposal adequate to raise it. That he should have 
 applied to his government for precise instructions under the circumstances 
 is more than probable, but with the sincere desire to preserve a strict neu- 
 trality between the American belligerents, which animates our govern- 
 ment and people, it is equally probable that Admiral Milne has been di- 
 rected to avoid any collision with the blockading squadron, until at least 
 a fair time has elapsed for establishing the blockade of coast along the 
 line indicated by President Lincoln's proclamation." 
 
 To anticipate a little, it was not in fact until 1863 that the 
 blockade of the Texas coast became formidable, and opera- 
 tions began with a purpose to hold the important points. 
 
 In July 1861, the South Carolina, a vessel previously in 
 the New York and Savannah trade converted into an armed 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY 499 
 
 cruiser, Capt. Alden commanding, appeared before Galveston, 
 and captured five small sloops, among them the yacht Dart. 
 and the sloops Shark and Falcon. Great excitement followed 
 the arrival of the South Carolina, and the citizens of Gal- 
 veston immediately dispatched a pilot-boat to Sabine Pass to 
 intercept vessels bound for Galveston. The Dart was sub- 
 sequently armed by the United States; and on August 3rd, the 
 South Carolina and Dart, against the protest of all the foreign 
 consuls, shelled the shore batteries, and the city of Galveston, 
 but without doing much damage. ' 
 
 Gradually the Federal fleet was re-enforced. The Rhode 
 Island and Santee were sent to Galveston, the steamer Mont- 
 gomery to cruise off the Brazos; the steamers Hatteras and 
 De Soto cruised between the passes of the Mississippi and 
 Sabine Pass, and the schooner Kittatinny and lighter vessels 
 were on other duties. A letter to the New York Herald, 
 however, from the mortar schooner Henry Janes off Sabine 
 Pass reported the blockade still "ineffectual." It became 
 necessary to capture Galveston and Sabine Pass. The demand 
 for the surrender of the former was made in the following 
 terms: 
 
 "Unitbd States Ebi&ate 'Santeb,' / 
 " Off Galveston, Texas, May 17th, 1862. ) 
 " To the Military Commandant commanding Confederate Forces, Galves- 
 ton, Texas: 
 " Sib: In a few days the naval and land forces of the United States 
 will appear off the town of Gralveston to enforce its surrender. To pre- 
 vent the effusion of blood and destruction of property which would result 
 from the bombardment of your town, I hereby demand the surrender of 
 the place, with all its fortifications and batteries in its vicinity, with all 
 arms and munitions of war. I trust you will comply with this demand. 
 " I am, respectfully, etc., u henbt Eagle, 
 
 " Captain Commanding XT. S. Naval Force., off Galveston, Texas.''' 
 The foreign consuls protested, and were curtly answered: 
 
 "May 22d, 1862. ' ( 
 " Gentlemen: Let me assure you, gentlemen, that no person can de- 
 plore more than myself the misery that would result from the bombard- 
 ment of the town of Galveston and its fortifications, yet it is a duty that 
 
 iThe protest of the foreign consuls was as warfare, and meriting the condemnation of 
 
 follows: Christian and civilized nations. 
 
 Galveston, August 5th, 1861. Arthur Lynn, British Consul. 
 
 To Captain Jas. Alden, Commanding United States James Frederick. Hanoverian and Oldenburg 
 
 steamer "South Carolina." Consul; and, in the absence of J. W. Jackorsh, 
 
 Sir: The undersigned.Gonsuls and Vice-Consuls Acting-Consul for Prussia and Hamburg. 
 
 at Galveston, consider it their duty to enter J. C. Nuhn, Swiss Consul, Vice-Consul for 
 
 their solemn protest against your bombardment Prussia. 
 
 of this city on the evening of the 3rd inst., with- Wm. Bobkheimer. Deputy-Consul for Bremen, 
 
 out having given any notice so that the women Saxony, Belgium, Holland, and Vice-Consul for 
 
 and children might llave been removed, and Austria. 
 
 also against your iiring a shell into the midst of F. Jonzales, Mexican Consul, 
 
 a large crowd of unarmed citizens, among whom T. H. Zettl, Consul for Nassau. 
 
 were many women and children, causing there- B. Theron, French Agent-Consul, and Consul 
 
 by the death of an unoffending Portuguese, and for Spain. 
 
 ■wounding boys and peacefully disposed persons, Frederick Wagner, Consul pro tern for Elec- 
 
 as acts of inhumanity unrecognised in modem toral Hesse. 
 
500 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 ■will become necessary to enforce its surrender. It is not in my power to 
 give you any assurance of security during the bombardment, for it is im- 
 possible to tell what direction the shot and shell will take. 
 
 " Henby Eaglb, 
 " Captain Commanding V. S. Naval Forces off ffalveston. 
 ''To the Foreign Connuls, ffalveston." 
 
 As has been previously noticed, the fall of G-alveston was, 
 in the opinion of its military commander, Gen. Hebert, inevi- 
 table when a strong force should appear before it. The city was 
 therefore evacuated at the approach of the enemy, who took 
 possession. Without proper guns, with no vessels of war of 
 importance, the place was indefensible; but this fact was not 
 known in the interior of the State, where its fall created a pro- 
 found sensation, and some unjust criticism of the authorities. 
 The Houston Telegraph said, editorially: 
 
 " To whom censure for this most serious calamity to our State is to 
 be imputed we cannot, nor will we undertake to say — in fact we do not 
 know. It is not now with the past but the future we have to do. We, 
 however, cannot avoid saying that we see with regret, now that Galves- 
 ton has fallen, and the people do not hesitate to express their deep con- 
 demnation of those to whom the country looked as the persons expected 
 to avert this blow. Upon them it is now the fashion not only to charge a 
 supineness criminal in its nature, but a most glaring incompetency and 
 imbecility. Whether these censures be just or not, as we have already 
 stated, it is not within our competency to say. But it appears to us that 
 if founded in truth, many of those who employ these censures are them- 
 selves not free from blame. If it be true that the military authorities 
 were either imbecile or neglectful, the fact that it was so has been long 
 apparent, for long has it been believed that Galveston was in perU, and 
 knowing it, it thus became the duty, at least the right, of those whose in- 
 terests were immediately involved to put in operation measures to avert 
 the apprehended calamity. 
 
 "It is true that cannon were removed from the place, but it appears 
 to us that by timely remonstrance this might have been prevented; and 
 there certainly existed no sufficient reason why the people might not 
 themselves have otherwise prepared to meet the foe. But we repeat, that 
 it is not with the past, but the present, we have to do; and as the place 
 has fallen, it now becomes the part of patriotism to so aid the authorities 
 as to confine the enemy to his present limits, and thereby prevent him 
 from using his conquest to the further injury of the State. It is no time 
 for querulous complaint. With the citizens of Galveston exiled by this 
 event we sincerely and deeply sympathize, and so, we have no doubt, does 
 every generous, right-minded person in the State." 
 
 All this was unjust. The military authorities made as 
 brave a defence as was in their power. Even after the battle, 
 though the Federal fleet dominated, the army never took pos- 
 session of the city. 
 
 During the floods of the spring of 1862, several steamers 
 were brought away from New Orleans, and with others the 
 Webb and the Cotton. The former was taken to Alexandria 
 on the Red River, and the latter, a large, fine river steamer, 
 built for the Bayou Sara route, was in the lower Teche, in 
 ■charge of Capt. E. W. Puller, a western steamboat man, and 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 501 
 
 one of the bravest of a bold, daring class. The engines of the 
 Cotton were compound, high and low pressure. Captain Fuller 
 desired to convert her into a gunboat, and was assisted to the 
 extent of his means by Major J. L. Brent, chief of artillerv 
 and ordnance on the staff of Gen. Eichard Taylor, who armed 
 her with one thirty-two pounder, smooth-bore, and two twenty 
 four pounders, smooth-bore, in casemate, covered with cotton 
 bales and railroad iron. On her upper or hurricane deck she 
 had one nine-pounder rifled piece, on field carriage. Her case- 
 mate extended aft sufficiently to partially protect her boilers 
 and engines. 
 
 In October 1863, the Federal General Weitzel brought up 
 a force from New Orleans, with the intention of invading the 
 interior of Louisiana. In connection with gunboats he made 
 several attacks on the small Confederate force below Brisland, 
 on the Teche between Berwick's Bay and Franklin. In these 
 affairs Captain Fuller was always in the advance with the 
 Cotton, though her boilers were inadequately protected, and 
 she was too large and unwieldy to be handled in the narrow 
 Teche. We give below the report of Capt. Fuller of one 
 of the most gallant and successful engagements of the 
 war. In the Cotton he fairly defeated four Federal gun- 
 boats, mounting twenty-seven guns, in a fight which lasted 
 three days. The report was endorsed by Major General Tay- 
 lor, in command of Western Louisiana, as being "true in 
 everv word." 
 
 " Gunboat ' Cotton,' Nov. 3d, 1863. 
 " GrBN. A. MouTBN, Commanding Forces South of Red River: 
 
 " Sib: I embrace the first opportunity of making my report of the 
 recent affair between the Cotton, under my command, and the squadron 
 of Federal gixnboats that have occupied Berwick's Bay. 
 
 " On Saturday evening, November 1st, the smoke from the enemy's 
 boats warned me of their near approach in such force that resistance at 
 the bay was considered by me to be rashness. Acting upon your order, 
 received but a few minutes previously, I immediately gave the necessary 
 orders for leaving the bay. The steamers Hart and Segur were there at the 
 time, also Launch No, 1, under the command of J. M. Rogers, whom I had 
 temporarily appointed to the position of acting master. My order to the 
 officers of those boats was to get immediately under way; the Hart, un- 
 der command of Lieut. E. Montaigue, to proceed up to the Teche with a 
 barge loaded with government sugar in tow. This was safely done ac- 
 cording to orders, with one exception. Lieut. Montaigue at one time 
 dropped his barge and returned, like a gallant soldier, to aid the Cotton 
 in an unequal conflict. As soon as I could communicate to him my wishes, 
 he resumed his tow, and proceeded safely to his destination. 
 
 ^'Launch No. 1 also obeyed the order given to her commander, and 
 conveyed the launch up the lake to a place near Indian Bend, from where 
 he has since safely reported, and is now in position to render valuable 
 service. 
 
 "The Segur, under the command of Acting Master J. C. Coons, dis- 
 obeyed the orders I gave of proceeding up the lake, and turned up the 
 Atchafalaya, and was ignobly abandoned to the enemy at a time when the 
 Cotton was between the enemy and the Segur. The commanding officer 
 has not since reported. I have been informed that he abandoned his men 
 and proceeded as fast as possible to St. Martinsville. Up to the present 
 
502 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 time the only reliable fact I have about the Segur is that it is in the 
 hands of the enemy, prowling about Grand Lake and bayous in the vicin- 
 ity; of the crew, nothing. 
 
 "The enemy came into Berwick's Bay on Saturday evening, just at 
 dark, as the Cotton was in range, having had to wait to get the other 
 boats off. They immediately opened fire upon us, and gave chase up the 
 bay with three boats, continuing the fire, which I did not return until 
 rounding into the Atchafalaya, when one of our guns was brought to bear, 
 and we fired one shot, which sped straight to its mark, striking one of the 
 Federal boats in her bows, breaking many timbers, and I have since been 
 informed kilhng three and wounding five men. The Federals continued 
 to 'ire shot and shell at us from eighteen guns, for about thirty minutes, 
 wnen they gave up the chase. 
 
 "The Cotton came up to the Teche turned bows down, and backed 
 into it, keeping our teeth to the enemy. We backed up to the Fuselier 
 plantation, where we stopped for the night. On Sunday morning, the Sd 
 inst., I received orders to move the Cotton above Cornay Bridge, which I 
 did as soon as possible. The bayou had some obstructions thrown 
 across at that point, which I was ordered to defend until it got too hot 
 for me, and then to fall back, turn my boat across the bayou at the second 
 bridge, and, if pursued, sink her. 
 
 "On Monday, at 2 o'clock p. m., the four Federal boats, mounting 
 twenty-seven guns, came up and opened fire upon us. They came up in 
 full confidence of overpowering numbers, giving us broadside after broad- 
 side, frequently the whole four delivering their fire at once. The shot 
 and shell literally rained on and about our boat, several striking us, but 
 without doing serious damage. We returned their fire, my brave boys 
 cheering frequently, when a well-directed shot struck the Federal boats. 
 One of them retired from the contest in about fifteen minutes, her place 
 being taken by another. One boat, for several minutes, had her colors 
 down. Whether accidentally down or that they hauled them down to 
 indicate a surrender, we had no means of learning. However, they hoisted 
 them again after a delay of about twenty minutes. One, more venture- 
 some than the rest, steadily steamed up the bayou. When in about 200 
 yards of the obstructions, we gave her a plunging shot from each of our 
 guns, which all struck near the water on the starboard quarter; the boat 
 immediately run her head up on shore, and was listed down so as to throw 
 her guns out of use, and ceased her fire, except occasionally from one gun 
 on the bow. At this time, when but one of the enemy's boats fired with 
 any vigor, when victory seemed to be within our reach, it was announced 
 that we had no more cartridges, having fired the last one. Retreat was 
 all that remained for us; but as we slowly backed up, we had some sacks 
 made, and by cutting off the legs from the pantaloons of some of our men, 
 which we filled up, and returned fire with one as often as we could, in that 
 manner, obtain a cartridge; this we continued until out of range, and the 
 enemy ceased their fire. 
 
 " We had to mourn the loss of one brave soldier killed by an accidental 
 discharge of his gun, which severely wounded another. Another was ac- 
 cidentally wounded at another gun by recoil of the carriage, and has since 
 died. One man was wounded by a piece of the enemy's shell. These are 
 all the casualties that occurred. The boat sustained no perceptible dam- 
 age. 
 
 " On Tuesday morning we resumed our original position near the ob- 
 structions, the enemy having previously retired. We worked hard to im- 
 prove the condition of our boat, and got up some iron to shield the engines. 
 Nothing occurred worthy of note during the day. 
 
 " On Wednesday the 5th inst., the enemy again opened fire upon 
 us with four boats at about half-past ten o'clock. They fired from 
 behind a point out of our range for about twenty minutes; when two of 
 them steamed up into sight. We then immediately returned their fire 
 and with such effect that the enemy retired and abandoned the contest 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 503 
 
 in flfty-flve minutes from firing their first shot. The two boats that came 
 into sight were badly damaged and their loss heavy— ours nothing; the 
 only damage being a trifling break in the cabin roof. This day victory 
 ■was clearly ours; the enemy retired from the action badly discouraged 
 ■with severe loss. We ■were unhurt. 
 
 " On Thursday the enemy came up and opened fire upon us, but took 
 care not to come into sight. I did not return their fire. They threw 
 shells at us for half an hour and retired ■without doing us any damage. 
 Since that up to present date they have not assailed us. 
 
 " I cannot close this report without returning thanks to officers and 
 Tnen. Where all did their duty gallantly it may seem invidious to mention 
 particular names, yet I must particularly mention the goodconductof O. S. 
 Burdett, Pilot, who for two hours and a half, during the full contest on 
 the 3d inst., manoeu-vred the boat with the utmost coolness — also the same 
 gallant conduct on the 5th inst. Each of my lieutenants did their duty 
 nobly and ably. Also, F. G. Burbank, gunner, and privates P. D. Wil- 
 kinson and Henry Doming deserve particular mention for their gallant 
 conduct— but all did their duty weU, and are again ready to meet the en- 
 emy should they come up and try us again. 
 
 " Respectfully your obedient servant, 
 
 " E. W. PULLEB, 
 
 " Captain, Commanding Gunboat ' Cotton.''" 
 
 In the first days of January, 1863, Weitzel's force was in- 
 creased to forty -five hundred men, and on the 11th, accom- 
 panied by gunboats, he advanced up the Teche and drove in 
 the Confederate pickets at the obstructions "left unprotected by 
 the retreat of the pickets. " Gen. Richard Taylor says the Cotton 
 ■was assailed on all sides. ^ Fuller fought manfully, responded 
 to the fire of the enemy's boats v^ith his tvventy-fours, 
 and repulsing the rifiemen on either bank with his field 
 piece. 'His pilots were killed and he had an arm broken, but 
 he worked the wheel with his feet, backing up the bayou,t as 
 from her great length the boat could not be turned in the nar- 
 row channel. Night stopped the enemy's advance, and 
 Mouten, deeming his force too weak to cope with Weitzel, 
 turned the Cotton across the bayou, and scuttled and burned 
 her to arrest the further progress of the Federal boats. Weit- 
 zel returned to Berwick's, having accomplished his object, the 
 destruction of the Cotton, supposed by the Federals to be a 
 formidable iron-clad. ^ 
 
 On March 38th, 1863, Gen. Weitzel, who had been quiet at 
 Berwick's Bay for some time, sent the gunboat Diana, accom- 
 panied by a land force, up the Teche to drive in the Confed- 
 erate pickets. The capture of the Queen of the West, and 
 destruction of the Indianola, had impaired the prestige of 
 gunboats, and the troops at Brisland were eager to apply Gen. 
 Taylor's theory of attacking them at close quarters. The 
 Diana was armed with one thirty-two pounder Parrott rifle 
 on her open bow and one or two twelve-pounder bronze Dahl- 
 gren rifl!ed boat howitzers. As the Diana proceeded up the 
 Teche she was engaged by the Valverde battery, Capt. Sayres, 
 
 1 Distraction and Recomtrmtian, p. 121. bank of the Teche, to command the bayou and 
 
 2 The guus removed from the wreck of the road, and the line of breastworks at Brisland 
 €otton were mounted in a work on the west were strengthened. 
 
604 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 attached to Sibley's Texas brigade, and a detachment of cav- 
 alry. After a great slaughter among her crew she was cap- 
 tured with nearly two hundred infantry on board. The boilers 
 of the Diana were protected by two thicknesses of wrought 
 bar-iron, four by one-and-a-quarter inches, laid fiat on a wood 
 backing, built at an angle of thirty to forty degrees. The 
 captain and pilot occupied the pilot-house, the former being 
 killed by the side of the pilot, who jumped overboard, and, 
 swimming to the marsh on the left bank of the Teche, made 
 his way to Berwick's Bay and reported the loss of the boat. 
 
 The Diana was repaired and was posted in the centre of 
 the Confederate line at the battle of Brisland, April 12th and 
 13th, 1863. Capt. O. J. Semmes, son of Admiral Semmes, 
 C. S. N"., an officer of much coolness in action, was detached 
 from his battery and placed in command of the boat. Conical 
 shells from the enemy's Parrott guns had pierced the railway 
 iron, and killed and wounded several of her gunners and crew 
 and cut a steam pipe, and she was lying against the bank dis- 
 abled. Fortunately Capt. Semmes had kept down his fires, or 
 escaping steam would have driven every one from the boat. 
 It was necessary to take her out of fire for repairs, and she 
 was withdrawn to Franklin, to which point the Confederates 
 retreated. Later, when Gen. Taylor fell back up the bayou, 
 the gallant Semmes, to prevent her from being recaptured by 
 the enemy, after landing his crew applied the torch, and she 
 blew up soon after. Semmes remained too long near the Di- 
 ana to carry out his instructions and was captured. ' 
 
 Following these naval and military movements in western 
 Louisiana came the capture of Galveston, Texas; one of the 
 fiercest and most successful naval captures of the war — one 
 that was most creditable to the Confederates and most morti- 
 fying to the Federals — so mortifying that Admiral Farragut, 
 to account for the disaster, did not hesitate to cast a slur upon 
 his officers which was as hasty as it was undeserved. During 
 the month of December, Galveston was blockaded. The Har- 
 riet Lane, a favorite vessel of the Federal navy, was abreast 
 the city, outside were the steamers Owasco, the Westfield. 
 the Clifton and the Sachem — the whole under the command of 
 
 1 Capts. SemmeB, Fuller, PuBilier, and the Fusilier, who lived in tho parish of St. Mary's, 
 prisoners taken from the Queen of the West were twenty miles below New Iberia, was the possessor 
 on the transport Maple Leaf, when they were of great estates and of a hospitable, generous 
 Bent from Fortress Monroe to Fort Delaware. nature. His sons were in the army, and sixty 
 Beaching the capes of the Chesapeake at night- years had not diminished his energy or his on- 
 fall, the prisoners suddenly attacked and over- thusiasm. His corn-bins, his flocks and herds, 
 powered the guard, ran the transport near to the were given to the public service without stint; 
 beach in PrinceBs Anne County, Virginia, landed, and no hungry, destitute Confederate was per- 
 and made their way to Richmond, whence they mitted to pass his door. Fusilier was twice cap- 
 rejoined Gen. Taylor in Louisiana. All the prls- tured; after his escape from the Maple iea/he re- 
 oners escaped, excepting Fuller, who from joined Gen. TaylorinLonisiana. Again taken. he 
 wounds received in his last action was unable escaped, while descending the Teche on a steam- 
 to walk. Remaining in charge of the Maple boat, by springing from the deck and seizing the 
 Zea/until his friends were ashore, he restored overhanging branch of a live oak. Theguardfired 
 her to the Federals, was taken to Fort Dela- on him, but darkness and the rapid movement of 
 ware, and died in prison. ■' A braver man the steamer were in his favor, and he got off un- 
 never lived," says Gen. Taylor. Capt. Leclerc \\m:t.—(}en.Taylar'sDestruciiim and Rtamstmdim^ 
 

 
 
 P 
 
 M 
 
 o 
 
 9 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 505- 
 
 Commodore Renshaw. All December, 1862, the United States 
 naval forces lay at Galveston anticipating an attack. Letters 
 published in the Northern papers from Commodore Renshaw, 
 and Capt. Wainwright of the Harriet Lane, show this appre- 
 hension; so that when the attack came in January, 1863, they 
 could not claim to have been unprepared, although the defeat 
 was attempted to be softened by terming it a surprise. 
 
 All the winter the Confederate forces under Gen. Magru- 
 der had command of all points except the small strip of land 
 upon which Galveston was situated. The Federals were 
 masters of only the region within the range of their guns. 
 Renewed activity began with the appointment of the fighting 
 Gen. Magruder. Galveston was to be relieved at all hazards, 
 and the blockade raised. How well he succeeded the sequel 
 shows. Throughout December troops were quietly moved to 
 this point. On Galveston Bay and the Trinity River boats 
 were being cotton-clad and armed. Major Leon Smith was 
 actively engaged in this work, as in the subsequent fight at 
 Sabine Pass. The attack was delayed, however, for the co- 
 operation of the land forces, who were to engage first. The 
 time was spent in completing the fitting out of the boats as 
 speedily as possible. During Christmas week the expected 
 artillery arrived, and by January 1st, 1863, all was ready. 
 
 The Bayou City, a packet-boat on the river, had been fitted 
 up as a gunboat under the charge of Capt. Henry Lubbock; 
 she was armed with a thirty -two pound rifled gun on her bow 
 deck; bulwarks of cotton bales were built up on her sides, and 
 a force of 100 men put on board of her. Capt. Wier was gun- 
 ner, and the boat was manned by a portion of his regiment. 
 A party of Col. Green's sharp-shooters were among the crew. 
 The Neptune, another packet, was also cotton-clad; she was 
 armed with two howitzer guns. Col. Bayley, of the Seventh 
 Texas cavalry, commanded the sharp-shooters on board. The 
 men were detailed from the Sibley brigade; all the brigade 
 having stepped forward on a call for volunteers anxious to 
 take part in the aflCair. The full number of men was about 
 150. The Lady Qwinn and the John F. Carr accompanied the 
 expedition as tenders. , On the Carr were a number of troops 
 and volunteers: and on the Gwinn a number of spectators who 
 were prepared to take part in the fight if necessary. The 
 cutter Dodge and the Royal Yacht were present, but did not 
 go into action. The whole naval force was under the com- 
 mand of Major Leon Smith. 
 
 The boats moved down about midnight and took position 
 above the town, waiting for the land forces to open the fight. 
 In the meanwhile, the latter, consisting of detachments from, 
 some four or five regiments under the command of Brig. Gen. 
 Scurry and Col. X. B. Le Bray, were moved early in the night 
 from their station at Virginia Point. This point is on the 
 mainland, and from it a bridge, two miles in length, crosses 
 
506 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Galveston Bay to Galveston Island, being about five miles 
 distant from the city. On crossing this bridge the troops 
 moved down toward Galveston, but met with unexpected 
 delays, and did not reach their position until after 4 a. m. The 
 boats were twelve miles off, at Half Moon Shoals, awaiting 
 signals. 
 
 The town of Galveston was garrisoned by the Federal 
 naval brigade of Commodore Renshaw, and by Col. Burrill 
 with the Forty-second Massachusetts regiment, which had 
 been brought as a reinforcement, and arrived on the preceding 
 Christmas-day. Lying in the channel were the Harriet Lane, 
 near the town; the' Otvasco, a little distance further, keeping 
 in deep water, accompanied by the Westfield, iron-clad, nine 
 guns, and the Clifton and the Sachem, smaller armed vessels. 
 The Westfield was the commodore's flag-ship, and the Harriet 
 Lane was commanded by a brave and capable ofiicer. Com- 
 mander Wainwright. Three schooners were lying off the bar 
 a,t this time — two of them loaded with coal for the fleet. 
 
 At about five o'clock on New Year's morning the Confed- 
 erate troops reached the chosen point for an attack both on 
 the city and the Federal fleet. Silently the batteries were 
 placed in position. So quietly was this done that the officer 
 of the night of the Forty -second Massachusetts on his round 
 passed within a stone's-throw of where the artillery was 
 posted without discovering anything wrong. As soon as 
 everything was in readiness. Gen. Magruder in person fired 
 the first gun, saying, "Now, boys, I have done my part as 
 private, I will go and attend to that of general." 
 
 Just before this, however, the Confederate gunboats had 
 been sighted. A letter of January 8th to the Philadelphia 
 Inquirer stsites that at this time the Harriet Lane, then lying 
 near the city, signaled an attack on the town. Although it 
 was night, a beautiful moon plainly revealed everj'thing for 
 miles, and the course of the gunboats could be distinctly seen. 
 
 The artillery duel between the batteries and the Federal 
 fleet soon became one of the most terriflc on record. The Con- 
 federates were at one time driven from the batteries by the 
 appalling rain of iron hail poured upon them from the Owasco 
 and Harriet Lane. One of the most gallant exploits of the 
 contest was the attack on Kuhn's wharf by Col. Cook of the 
 Confederate forces. The Federal troops there consisted of the 
 Forty-second Massachusetts militia regiment, over three hun- 
 dred strong, commanded by Col. Burrill. They were upon the 
 outer end of the wharf, and had torn up the heavy planks 
 forming its floor for about fifty feet, making a wall of those 
 next to the strand, behind which a platform had been erected 
 for rifiemen. The Confederates dashed into the water at the 
 sides of the wharf, and by the use of planks succeeded in 
 crossing the gap amidst an enfilading fire of grape and can- 
 ister from the vessels, which continued with such fury that 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 507 
 
 Col. Cook withdrew his men to wait for daylight and renew 
 ■the attack. The Bayou City and Neptune had now arrived, 
 and their first attack was upon the nearest Federal vessel, the 
 Harriet Lane. The Bayou City was the first to open fire on 
 the Lane with her thirty-two pound rifled gun. Several shots 
 were fired — the second striking her behind the wheel, knocking 
 a large hole in her. As he fired again, Capt. Weir called out, 
 "Well, here goes for a New Year's present!" and the gun ex- 
 ploded, killing him instantly, and wounding Capt. Schneider 
 and one or two others. Deprived of its gun, the pilot, Capt. 
 McCormick, was ordered to use the vessel as a ram, and to 
 hit the Lane, so as to allow the men to board her. Going 
 with a strong ebb-tide he ran past her, and damaged the 
 Bayou City. Meantime, the Neptune came up, striking the 
 Harriet Lane on the starboard side, getting her bow stove in, 
 and causing her to leak badly. She then passed round under 
 the stern of the Lane, receiving her shots as she passed. One 
 of the shots of the Lane struck the Neptune's hull, causing her 
 to take water fast. She got on the edge of the channel and 
 soon sank in eight feet water. 
 
 By this time the Bayou City had rounded-to, with head up 
 stream, and run into the Harriet Lane, striking her fairly aft 
 of the larboard wheel-house, and running her bow so far under 
 the gunwale and wheel that she could not be extricated, and 
 the two vessels stuck fast together. The riflemen on the Con- 
 federate vessels immediately opened fire upon the deck of the 
 Harriet Lane at close quarters from behind the cotton bales 
 and every point of vantage. The fire was terrific for some 
 minutes, and the deck became a scene of fiight and slaughter. 
 There were 130 men on the vessel. Commander Wainwright 
 and First Lieutenant Lea fell early in the action. The crew 
 were driven from the deck and took refuge below, first hoist- 
 ing the white fiag ; upon which the boarding parties from 
 the Bayou City and the Neptune sprang on board and took 
 possession. The Neptune was so damaged in the encounter 
 that she soon sank, leaving only the Bayou City available. 
 
 The Owasco was the only Federal vessel formidable at this 
 time. About 10 a. m. the Westfield, with her splendid battery, 
 had run aground. After removing some personal effects, the 
 commodore determined to burn her. The decks were satu- 
 rated with turpentine, and the last of the crew, with Commo- 
 dore Eenshaw, were just about to leave the ship. The gig 
 was ready and the commodore was the last to descend. The 
 torch was applied — a bright flash ran along the deck — the 
 commodore turned his face to look at the vessel for the last 
 time. The sailors rested a moment on their oars; all eyes 
 were turned in the direction of the Westfield, attracted by the 
 vivid flame. It was a moment of surprise and of perfect 
 silence, and it was only a moment; then there was a flash 
 of blue smoke and a fearful explosion. The shells of the 
 
508 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 magazine, rising in the air, burst far up. There was a plung- 
 ing noise in the water, such as is occasioned by the taiiing ot 
 a heavy bodv, and then for a radius of four or five hundred 
 feet there was a shower of fragments which sounded like 
 falling rain. The Westfield was seen to part or burst out for- 
 ward, like a chestnut burr, and when the smoke cleared away 
 there was no sign of life about her. Forward she was blown 
 into fragments down to the water; but the machinery had not 
 been destroyed, as the singing of the steam was distinctly- 
 heard after the explosion. The commodore's boat and all in it 
 were annihilated in the terrible catastrophe— scattered through 
 the air in fragments. The smoke-stacks and the after part of 
 
 THE "HABBIET LANE," CAPTUEED BY THE CONFEDERATES, JANTIAEY iBT, 1863. 
 
 the ship lay a black mass in the water for ten minutes, when 
 there was another flash, and she was speedily wrapped in 
 flames. 
 
 Commodore Renshaw and Commander Wainwright having 
 been killed, the scene in the Federal fleet was one of utter con- 
 fusion. The Westfield blew up during a truce agreed upon by 
 Capt. Lubbock, commissioned by Major Leon Smith to demand 
 the surrender of the Federal vessels and Capt. Law, of the 
 Federal forces. The time of the truce was three hours, which 
 Capt. Law of the Clifton asked to consult Commodore Renshaw. 
 Instead of respecting this truce, Capt. Law took the opportu- 
 nity of getting the Clifton under way. Capt. Lubbock charged 
 him with breach of faith, and told him he considered his run- 
 ning away under the circumstances equivalent to stealing so 
 much Confederate property. Capt. Lubbock and Col. Green 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 509 
 
 had been dispatched by Gen. Magruder, who had come down 
 ■to the wharf, to close the negotiations for surrender. The 
 Clifton and the Owasco, in spite of remonstrance, sailed to 
 sea; the latter still having the flag of truce flying at her main- 
 mast. Major Smith, on board the John F. Carr, then called 
 for volunteers to follow the Owasco and avenge the death of 
 €apt. Weir. He obtained all he wanted and pursued the pro- 
 peller; but she was too swift for the lumbering cotton-clad 
 a,nd too far on her way out of the harbor, and the pursuit was 
 given up. 
 
 The casualties on the Confederate side were 12 killed, in- 
 cluding Capt. Weir, and 70 wounded. The Federal loss was 
 estimated by the New York Herald correspondent, January 
 13th, at 150 men killed, besides the wounded and pris- 
 oners. The captures were the Harriet Lane and her 
 crew, with three 9-inch, one 30-pound rifle, and two 24-pound 
 howitzer guns, with a complete armament, magazine and 
 stores of every description; the 43nd Massachusetts regiment, 
 about 300 strong, with their colonel, arms, and two flags, 
 stores, etc., the barques Elias Pike and Cavallo, with their 
 crews, guard, 700 tons of coal, 600 bbls. of Irish potatoes, and 
 a complete outflt; a pilot schooner, of fine speed, and the gun- 
 boat Westfield, partially destroyed, carrying eight heavy guns.-^ 
 
 The olficial report of the battle was as follows: 
 
 '■'■By telegraph from Headquarters, &alveston, to Major Hyllster, via 
 Natchez: 
 " This morning, 1st January, at three o'clock, 1 attacked the enemy's 
 fleet and garrison at this place, and captured the latter and the steamer 
 Harriet Lane and two barges, and a schooner of the former. The rest, 
 some four or five, escaped ignominously under cover of a flag of truce. 1 
 
 1 Some of the incidents of the memorable has not been stated, that Capt Leon Smith, to 
 
 battle are interesting enough to preserve. Que whose skill and gallantry Gen. Magruder attrib- 
 
 is quoted from the Jackson Mississippian of the utes the entire success of the attack on the 
 
 16th of February, and is as follows: enemy's fleet in Galveston Bay, is the brother of 
 
 "Dr. Holland was one of the boarding party Caleb B. Smith, until very recently the Secretary 
 
 thatcleared the decks of the Harriet Lane. Some of the Interior in Lincoln's Cabinet." 
 
 of the scenes and incidents he describes trans- The other is from the Houston Telegraph: 
 
 -ceud in strange interest the narratives of Alex- " Capt. "Wm. M. Armstrong went on board the 
 
 ander Dumas. Some years ago when the famous Lane after the battle, and found lying in the 
 
 steamer Merrimac, E^terwards changed into a blood on deck a Bible. He picked it up and re- 
 
 Tam by the Confederate government, and for- marked, ' Now I am going to open this Bible 
 
 -ever memorable from her engagement with the this New Year's day, and the first passage I read 
 
 Congress, Cumberland and Monitvr in Hampton I will take as an omen for the new year.* He 
 
 EoadB, made her trial trip across the Atlantic, she opened it carelessly, and the first passage his 
 
 ■entered, as we all remember, Southampton eye fell on was the Xst verse of the '20th chapter 
 
 waters, and her officers were received with great of Deuteronomy : 'When thou goest out to battle 
 
 hospitality by the authoilties of Southampton. against thine enemies, and seest horses and 
 
 ■Commander "Wainwright was then the Merri- chariots, and a people more than thou, be not 
 
 -moc'j first lieutenant, and on going up to Lon- afraid of them: for the Lord thy God is with 
 
 don was entertained by Dr. Holland, who was thee, which brought thee up out of the land of 
 
 then living in the great metropolis. The doctor Egypt 1' It is a good omen, as well as a most 
 
 never saw him again alive, and recognized with startling circumstance." 
 
 ■a feeling of astonishment, in the dead body of The United States steamer Harriet Lane w^a 
 
 the commander of the Harriet Lane iying upon well known to most of our citizens She was a 
 
 her decks, his guest of some years ago in Lon- side-wheel steamer of 619 tons burden, and was 
 
 -don. The saddest of all the terrible tragedies of built for, and engaged in, the revenue service as 
 
 this infernal war was enacted upon the same a cutter, under the command of Capt. John 
 
 ■crimsoned and slippery stage when Major Lea, Faunce. She was detailed in 1858 from that 
 
 of the Confederate army, encountered in the service, and was engaged in the Paraguay Ex- 
 
 ^ying lieutenant of the Federal steamer his pedition, under the same commander. During 
 
 own son. Can history or fiction afford any the visit of the Prince of Wales to this country 
 
 larallel to this ? It is a curious fact, too, which she wai used for the purpose of carrying the 
 
510 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 have about 600 prisoners, and a large quantity of valuable stores, arms, 
 etc. The Harriet Lane is very little injured. She was carried by board- 
 ing from two high pressure cotton steamers, manned by Texas cavalry 
 and artillery. The line troops were gallantly commanded by Col. Green, 
 of Sibley's Brigade, and the ships and artillery by Major Leon Smith, to 
 whose indomitaTole energy and heroic daring the country is indebted for 
 the successful execution of a plan which I had considered for the destruc- 
 tion of theenemy's fleet. Col. Bagby, of Sibley's Brigade, also commanded 
 the volunteers from his regiment for the naval expedition, in which every 
 officer and every man won for himself imperishable renown. 
 
 "J. Bankhbad Magrudbr, Major QeneraV 
 
 Gen. Magruder lost no time in issuing the following also: 
 
 "Galvbston, Jan. 4th, 1863. 
 
 " Whereas, the undersigned has succeeded in capturing and destroy- 
 ing a part of the enemy's fleet, and in driving the remainder out of the 
 harbor of Galveston, and beyond the neighboring waters, and the block- 
 ade having been thus effectually raised, he therefore proclaims to all con- 
 cerned that the harbor of Galveston is open for trade to all friendly na- 
 tions, and their merchants are invited to resume their usual commercial 
 intercourse with this port. 
 
 "Done at Galveston, this the 4th day of January, 1863. 
 
 " 3. B. Magrudbb, Major Qenerat Commanding.'''' 
 
 Gen. Magruders stirring address to the men engaged at 
 Galveston was issued January 14th: 
 
 "Headquartbrs District of Texas, Nbw Mexico and Arizona, I 
 
 "Galveston, Texas, Jan. 14th, 1863. f 
 "Soldiers of the Army of Galveston: 
 
 "The New Tear dawned upon an achievement whose glory is vmsur- 
 passed. That glory is yours. You have recaptured an island two miles 
 from the mainland. You have repossessed yourselves of your beautiful 
 ' Island City,' and made its hostile garrison, intrenched behind inaccessi- 
 ble barricades, surrender to you at discretion. You have planted your 
 artillery and battalions of infantry within 300 yards of the enemy's for- 
 midable fleet, and exposed yourselves to the showers of grape and canister 
 poured into you from his ships. 
 
 "You have repossessed yourselves of forts under a concentrated fire 
 of grape, canister and shell, at short ranges, and you have stormed, 
 
 royal visitor from WaBhington to Moimt Vernon, General Magruder, was the naeeting of Major 
 
 iiud from New York up the Hudson to West Lea, of the Confederate army, with his eldest 
 
 Point. When the war broke out she was trans- and fondly loved son, who was first lieutenant 
 
 f erred to the United States navy, and formed, of the Harriet Lane. 
 
 during its early stages, a part of the Potomac " Nearly two years ago, the father then resid- 
 
 flotilla. She was afterwards attached to the ing in Texas, had written repeatedly to the eon, 
 
 West Gulf blockading squadron, from which then ou the coast of China, euggestijig the priu- 
 
 Khe was detached for the Galveston expedition, ciples that should determine his course in the 
 
 ]n the capture of which place she figured then approaching struggle between the North 
 
 prominently. The Harriet Zone after her cap- and South, and saying that he could not dictate 
 
 tnre was transferred by the Secretary of War to to one so long accustomed to act on his own 
 
 the Confederate Navy Department, and Lieut. judgment ; and that decide as he might, such 
 
 Joseph N. Barney, C. S. N., was assigned to com was his confidence in his high conscientious- 
 
 iiiand her. She was intended as a cruiser, but ness, he would continue to regard him with the 
 
 Lieut. Barney, upon examination, finding her respect of a gentleman and the affection of a 
 
 inefficient for that purpose, on March 31st. father; but that if he should select the side of 
 
 1863, the Lane was transferred by the Secretary the enemy, they would probably never meet on 
 
 of the Navy back to the War Department, with earth, unless perchance they should meet in 
 
 the request that Captain Smith, who captured battle. 
 
 her. be placed in command. As will be seen "The father had served nearly eighteen months 
 
 rlsewhere, she ran the blockade with a load of eastward of the Mississippi, and, through un- 
 
 of cotton, and it is believed never returned to solicited orders, arrived at Houston, en route 
 
 this country. for San Antonio, late at night on the 30th ult., 
 
 A Texas paper says : " One of the most affect- when hearing of the intended attack on the 
 
 ms incidents of the brilliant and successful re- Harriet Lane, aboard of which he had heard was 
 
 •■.iptureof Galveston by the forces under Major his son, he solicited permission to join the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 511 
 
 capftured and destroyed a portion of his formidable fleet, and dispersed the 
 rest. With inadequate means, you have conquered the enemy upon that 
 element on which he boasts himself invincible, thus proving yourselves 
 successful rangers of the sea as of the land. 
 
 "Tour general is proud to command you; your State and country -will 
 honor you as long as patriotism and heroism are cherished among men. 
 
 "In honor of this victory, you are authorised to inscribe on your ban- 
 ners the words ' Galveston and Galveston Harbor,' to commemorate your 
 success. 
 
 " Your commanding general is well assured that wherever you meet 
 the enemy, you will win the right to adorn your standards with the glori- 
 ous records of your prowess and patriotism. 
 
 "The commanding general deems this a fitting occasion to express 
 publicly to the troops his high sense of the indomitable energy and chiv- 
 alric heroism of the naval commander, and those who so nobly supported 
 him. The country is proud of them. The ' stormers ' of the sea and the 
 'stormers' of the land should greet each other as brothers in battle, and 
 there should be no rivalry, save as to who shall be first permitted to die 
 for his country. 
 
 "J. Bankhead Magbuder, 
 
 "Official- ^^ffeneral Commanding District of Texas. 
 
 "Rob't S. Reid, lAeutenant and A. A. A. (?." 
 
 On the 38th of January, President Davis replied to the of- 
 ficial report of Gen. Magruder in complimentary terms: 
 
 "Richmond, Va., Jan. 28th, 1863. 
 ''Major Gen. J. Bankhead Magrtjdeb, ffalveston, Texas: 
 
 " Ml Dear Sir: I am much gratified at the receipt of your letter of 
 January 6th, conveying to me the details of your brilliant exploit in the 
 capture of Galveston and the vessels in the harbor. The boldness of the 
 conception and the daring and skill of its execution were crowned by re- 
 sults substantial as well as splendid. Tour success has been a heavy blow 
 to the enemy's hopes, and I trust will be vigorously and effectively fol- 
 lowed up. 
 
 " It is to be hoped that your prudence and tact will be as successful as 
 your military ability — ^retaking every position on the Texan coast. 
 
 " Tour suggestions will receive the favorable consideration due to you. 
 
 " The congratulations I tender to you and your brave army are felt 
 by the whole country. I trust your achievement is but the precursor of 
 
 expedition, in expectation of nursing or burying few minutes to live, and asked to express llis 
 
 his son, whose courage was to expose him fatally wishes, he answered confidingly, ' My father is 
 
 to the equal daring of our Texas boys. During here,' and spoke not again. He was borne in 
 
 theflghtMajor Lea was ordered by the general procession to the grave from the headquarters 
 
 to keep_ a lookout from a housetop for all move- of Gen. Magruder, in company with his captain , 
 
 ments in the bay. As soon as daylight enabled and they were buried together, with appropriate 
 
 him to see that the Lane had been captured, by military honors, in the presence of many of&cers 
 
 permission of the general, who knew nothing of of both armies and many generous citizens, all 
 
 the expected meeting, he hastened aboard, of whom expressed their deep sympathy with the 
 
 where he was not surprised to find his son bereaved father, who said the solemn service 
 
 mortally wounded. Wading through blood, of the Episcopal Church for the burial of the 
 
 amidst the dying and the dead, he reached the dead. 
 
 youth, pale and exhausted. • Edward, 'tis your " The remains of Captain Wainwright were 
 
 father.' ' I know you, father, but cannot move,' removed to the North soon after the war closed, 
 
 he said, faintly. ' Are you mortally wounded ?' but the grave of Lieutenant Lea can be seen in 
 
 ' Badly, but hope not fatally.' • Do you suf- the Episcopal cemetery at Galveston, covered 
 
 fer pain.' 'Cannot speak,' he whispered. A with a plain marble block inscribed : 
 stimulant was given him. How came you Edwakd Lea, 
 
 here, father?' When answered, a gleam of Lieut. Commander, TT. 8. N. 
 
 surprise and gratification passed over his fine Bom 31st January, 1837. 
 
 face. He then expended nearly his last words Killed in battle January 1, 1863. 
 
 in making arrangements for his wounded com- ' My father is here.' 
 
 tables. Hie father knelt and blessed him, and " The concluding words were the last ones he 
 
 hastened ashore for a litter, and returned just uttered. This event made a strange impression 
 
 after life had fled. and showed the horrible features of the war 
 
 " When told by the surgeon that he had but a between the States." 
 
■512 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 a series of successes, which may redound to the plory and honor of your- 
 self and our country. .. y respectfully and truly yours, 
 
 " jEFFERSOif Davis.'" 
 
 The blockade was temporarily raised at Galveston and 
 Sabine Pass by this action, as will be seen by Mr. Benjamin's 
 ■declaration issued to foreign nations: 
 
 "Department of State, ) 
 "Richmond, February 7th, 1863. ) 
 " Sir: I have again to inform you of the raising of the blockade of 
 two Southern ports by superior forces. 
 
 "This government is ofHeially informed of the total dispersion and 
 disappearance of the blockading squadron recently stationed off Galves- 
 ton harbor by the combined attack of land and naval forces of the Con- 
 federacy. In this attack the enemy's steamer Harriet Lane-was captured, 
 and the flag-ship of the squadron, the Westfleld, was blown up and de- 
 stroyed. 'The blockade of the port of Galveston is therefore at an end. 
 
 " The armed river boats which raised the blockade at Galveston then 
 proceeded to Sabine Pass, where they again attacked the enemy's block- 
 aders, captured thirteen guns, a large quantity of stores, and a number of 
 prisoners. No blockading fleet now exists off Sabine Pass, and the steam- 
 ers of the Confederacy were, at the last accounts, cruising off the Pass with 
 no enemy in sight. 
 
 " This information is given for the guidance of such of the merchants 
 of your nation as may desire to trade with either of the open ports of Gal- 
 veston or Sabine Pass. 
 
 " Respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "J. P. Benjamin, Secretary of State." 
 
 The Federal disaster at Galveston, followed by that at 
 Sabine Pass, was the most severe blow the Federal navy had 
 received. A correspondent of a Texas paper, who was in New 
 Orleans when the news was received there, states that he was 
 present when Admiral Farragut raved and "tore his hair" 
 on hearing of it. However that may be, the Federal admiral 
 was very much incensed and for the moment lost his head. 
 There was no reason, no facts, and no fairness, in charging 
 cowardice upon the officers and crew of the Harriet Lane. 
 Her first and second officers laid down their lives in her de- 
 fence. Her fire on the shore batteries was so severe as to 
 drive the gunners once at least from their guns. As to the 
 conduct of the officer, Capt. Lubbock, who accompanied the 
 flag of truce. Admiral Farragut traveled out of the record to 
 cast an unjust imputation upon a brave man, and to cover up 
 with an unworthy excuse the escape, as charged in Gen. 
 Magruder's first statement above, of the Owasco, the Clifton, 
 
 ^ Joint Resoluticm of ikanks to Major General J. 2. iZesoiu*;^, That the brilliant achievement, re- 
 
 Bankfiead Magruder, and Officers and Men of suiting, under the Providence of God. in the 
 
 his amimand, at Galveston, Texas : capture of the w»r steamer Harriet Lane, and 
 
 Resolved by the Congress of the Confederate States the defeat and ignominious ilight of the hostile 
 
 of America, that the bold, intrepid and gallant fleet from the harbor, the recapture of the city 
 
 conduct of Major Gen J. Bankhead Magruder, and the raising of the blockade of the port of 
 
 Col, Thomas Green, Major Leon Smith and Galveston, signally evinces that superior force 
 
 other oificers, and of the Texan Bangers and may be overcome by skillful conception and 
 
 soldiers engaged in the attack on, and victory daring courage. 
 
 achieved over, the land and naval forces of the 3. Resolved" That the foregoing resolutions bo 
 
 enemy at Galveston, on the first of .TanuaiT, communicated by the Secretary of War to Major 
 
 1863, eminently entitle them to the thanks of Gen. Magruder. and by him to his command. 
 
 ■Congress and the country. Approved, February 26th, 1863. 
 
THE CONPEDBEATE STATES NAVY. 513 
 
 and other vessels "under a flag of truce." Farragut's official 
 report was as follows : 
 
 "Flagship ' Hartford,' Nbw Orleans, Jan. 39th, 1863. 
 
 " Sir: I herewith enclose the report of Acting Master J. A. Hannum, 
 of the Harriet Lane, by which you will perceive the exag'gerations which 
 have been circulated concerning the defence of that vessel ; also the pusil- 
 lanimous conduct of the officer who accompanied the flag of truce and 
 corroborated to Lieut. Commanding Law the enemy's statement, that all 
 the officers and crew of the Harriet Lane had perished, save some ten or 
 fifteen persons, whereas there were scarcely that number of killed and 
 wounded. I take it for granted that of the nine slightly wounded the 
 greater part amounted to nothing, so that the testimony of the rebel pilot 
 was very near the truth when he said five killed and six or eight wounded. 
 I cannot thinls but that for the death of Commodore Wainwright and 
 Lieut. Commanding Lea, the vessel would not have been captured. It is 
 difficult, however, to conceive a more pusillanimous surrender of a vessel 
 to an enemy already in our power, than occurred in the case of the Har- 
 riet Lane. Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "D. G. Farragut, Rear Admiral. 
 
 " Hon. Gideon Welles, Secretary of the J^avy" 
 
 The idea that the "pusillanimous surrender" was to an 
 enemy " already in our [the Federal] power" is perfectly ab- 
 surd, in view of the fact that the Forty-second Massachusetts 
 regiment was captured, the Westfield blown up, and the Har- 
 riet Lane disabled. Discretion was obviously the better part 
 of valor for the remainder of the unfortunate fleet. The " pusil- 
 lanimity " was not in surrendering or in getting away as fast 
 as possible from an attack so fierce and successful, but in 
 escaping under a flag of truce with vessels which, in the lan- 
 guage of Capt. Lubbock, were "already to be regarded as so 
 much Confederate property." 
 
 Altogether it was a brilliant victory. Credit is due to the 
 land forces under Gens. Scurry, Green and Le Bray, and 
 •especially to Major Gen. Magruder for the foresight with 
 which the affair was planned. The brave men of the land 
 forces on the Neptune were under the command of Col. A. P. 
 Eagley, of Green's brigade; and those on the Bayou City 
 under the command of Col. Tom Green. Commodore Leon 
 Smith, of the old navy of the Republic of Texas, was in com- 
 mand of the whole naval expedition, which was managed 
 with rare skill. As to the vessels themselves, the Neptune 
 was commanded by Capt. William Sangster, with Dave Con- 
 nor, chief engineer. The Bayou City was under command. of 
 Capt. Henry Lubbock, with L. C. Hersberger, chief engineer. 
 No mention of this battle can be made without also giving 
 due honor to Capt. Michael McCormack, the brave pilot of 
 the Neptune, who was given by Commodore Smith his dis- 
 cretion in steering his vessel for the Harriet Lane, and who 
 was the first to begin the attack by water. ' 
 
 1 Captain McCormack lost his life in 1866, by half of the survivors of the battle of Galveston 
 
 accidentally falling overboard from a boat com- attended in that city a reunion and encamp- 
 
 manded by him, running between Galveston and ment, and went over the ground and fought 
 
 Houston. Twenty-three years after, about one- their battles over again. 
 33 
 
514 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 How thoroughly the harbor was cleared the incident of 
 the attempted capture of the U. S. steamer Cumbria shows. 
 The daring attempt of a single pilot-boat to perform such a 
 deed exhibits the confidence of the Confederates in the demor- 
 alization of the enemy. Though futile, it was one of the cool- 
 est things of the war. It is given from the New Orleans corre- 
 spondence of the New York Herald, and the letter is dated 
 from on board the Cumbria, for the vessel put back at once : 
 
 "The Cumbria left New Orleans on the evening of December 31st, 
 and arrived off Galveston bar, and anchored sixteen miles to the south- 
 west of it, on the evening of Friday, January 2nd. This was the day after 
 our disaster, and the enemy, of course, was in full possession. She lay 
 here during the niglit. The morning (Saturday) was rainy, and the city 
 of Galveston scarcely visible. At eignt o'clocli the vessel weighed anchor 
 and approached the bar; but no pilot boat was visible, and she fired a gun 
 as a signal for a pilot. This was not responded to in any manner, wmch 
 all Iiands thought extraordinary; yet, while all wondered at the delay, 
 no one really suspected the cause, and during the afternoon a boat was 
 dispatched to the city to report the arrival of the Cumbria and secure a 
 pilot. This boat contained Mr. Smith, a Texan refugee, and five of the 
 crew, who, of course, were taken by the rebels the moment they landed. 
 
 " Hour after hour passed, and still no return of the boat and no signal 
 or tidings from shore. The oiScers, by aid of their glasses, were enabled 
 to see flags, notwithstanding the fog; but they were quite unable to make 
 out whether they floated the stars and stripes or the stars and bars. As 
 the entire afternoon passed, however, without any return of the boat 
 which had been dispatched, or any tidings whatever from the shore, all 
 became suspicious that something was wrong, and when night at last 
 settled down upon the water there was a firm determination, strongly felt 
 if not expressed, to exercise the greatest caution before entering the harbor 
 the next morning, even if a pilot should make his appearance. 
 
 " On Sunday morning, having already lain oft the bar fuU thirty-six 
 hours, the captain again weighed anchor, and slowly cruised about. At 
 last, about eleven o'clock in the forenoon, a handsome and good-sized sail 
 boat was seen approaching from the direction of the city, with four men 
 in her. She passed the Cumbria at some distance, and, making tack, 
 headed for the city, and came alongside, and inquired how much water 
 the vessel drew. 
 
 "Capt. Sumner, of the Cumlbria, replied 'that she drew nine and a 
 half feet,' and the man said ' there were then eleven on the bar.' 
 
 " 'Are you a pilot ? ' asked the captain. 
 
 " 'Yes,' was the answer. 
 
 " 'Are you the regular pilot ?' inquired the captain. 
 
 " 'No,' was the reply of the spokesman from the boat. 'I am not the 
 regular pilot. The regular pilot is busy. He has to pilot out a bark which 
 is going to sea; but if you will follow me I wUl pUot you in, and go ahead 
 and take the soundings.' 
 
 "Capt. Sumner, whose suspicions were fully aroused by the non- 
 arrival of his boat, was determined not to let the pretended pilot off with- 
 out bringing him to the point. As he was talking he came to the stern of 
 the boat, bringing himself into full view, and was immediately recognized 
 by a number of the Texans on board the Cumbria. 
 
 " ' How are you, Capt. Payne?' shouted one of the Texans. 
 
 " The pretended pilot, finding himself discovered, replied, ' I'm first 
 rate; how are you ?' 
 
 " ' Come aboard, sir,' said Capt. Sumner. 
 
 " ' No, no,' replied Capt. Payne, ' there are too many damned blue coats, 
 aboard there to suit me.' 
 
 " ' Come aboard, sir !' shouted the captain. 
 
•THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 515 
 
 " But Payne had no idea of allowing himself to be caught, and -was 
 meantime, making off. 
 
 '"I don't want to come aboard,' he shouted. 'Follow me, and I'll 
 guide youoverthe bar; but I'm not the regular pilot, as I've told you, and 
 I don't want to take the responsibility of your vessel.' 
 
 " 'Who's in command at Galveston ?' inquired the captain. 
 
 " 'Commodore Wainwright,' was the reply. 
 
 " 'Come aboard, I say,' cried out the captain. 
 
 " ' No, no,' said Payne, still making off. 
 
 " The captain now ordered the Texans to stand at a "ready' with their 
 carbines. He also called out, as if giving orders to marines, saying that 
 the portholes must not be opened until the colonel had given the orders 
 to fire. The pilot hearing this, and witnessing the preparations to fire 
 upon him, stopped, and with great reluctance finally came on board. He 
 was then told that he must pilot the vessel in, and that if anything was 
 wrong — if he was leading the vessel into a trap— his brains would be 
 blown out upon the spot. 
 
 " ' WeU, gentlemen,' said the pilot, ' I suppose there is no use of lying 
 to you any more, as I see I am known.' He then told the truth- that Gal- 
 veston was in possession of the rebels, and that the gunboats had all left. 
 He was made a prisoner ; but for some reason not explained the three 
 rebels in the boat were allowed to go back to the city. As they sailed off 
 the pretended pilot shouted out to them: 
 
 " 'Good bye ! Take good care of my clothes, and tell the boys to look 
 out for themselves.' '' 
 
 The United States made every effort to again blockade 
 Galveston. Admiral Bell was despatched there with a formid- 
 able fleet, consisting of the Brooklyn, Commander Bell; the 
 Owasco, Capt. Wilson; the Katahdin, Capt. Johnson; the Sci- 
 ota, Capt. Lowry; and the Itasca, Capt. Lewis. The masts of 
 the Harriet Lane could be seen from the fleet rising behind the 
 town, and this made the Federals as angry as a hive of bees. A 
 correspondent writing from on board the U. S. steamer New 
 London, said: "Galveston is a doomed town. The disgr^ace 
 attending the capture of the Harriet Lane raust be wiped out; 
 and the vengeance upon the butchers and captors will beawful." 
 
 As soon as the Brooklyn arrived, therefore, she began to fire 
 upon the town, at long range and out of danger. Once before 
 all the foreign consuls in the city had protested in the name of 
 humanity and civilization against such an act. This time the 
 action was stopped by a flag of truce and a message from Gen. 
 Magruder that the hospitals containing both Confederate and 
 Federal wounded were within range; further, that there were 
 many women and children in the city; and also, most potent 
 of all, that the Confederate government had proclaimed Gal- 
 veston a free port, and that the foreign consuls were decidedly 
 of the opinion that the blockade had been successfully broken 
 and could not be recognized until they had communicated with 
 their respective governments. On which Commander Bell de- 
 ferred further belligerent operations. 
 
 At this period the U. S. vessels Morning Light, Rachel Sea- 
 man and Velocity were blockading the important outlet of Sa- 
 bine Pass. Fears were entertained for their safety. Lieut. Eead, 
 with the gunboat Cayuga,_was sent to reinforce the blockading 
 
516 THE CONFBDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 ships. He was too late. He arrived in time to see the Morn- 
 ing Light in flames, and the Velocity in the hands of the Con- 
 federates. The Rachel Seaman, he was told, had escaped. 
 The Morning Light and Velocity had been captured some days 
 before. When Lieut. Eead appeared the Confederates were 
 attempting to get the former off the shoals and over the bar, 
 but were compelled to burn her when they saw the Cayuga, 
 and knew it was useless to try to save her. The expedition was 
 fitted out against this portion of the Federal fleet soon after the 
 battle of Galveston. It was planned by Gen. Magruder to clear 
 Sabine Pass of the enemy. Two small steamers, the Josiah 
 Bell and the Uncle Ben, were cotton-clad and placed under the 
 command of Major Watkins, with about three hundred men of 
 Pyron's, Speight's and Cook's regiments. The Bell was armed 
 with a 64-pound rifled cannon, and the Uncle Ben with two 
 18-pounders. These vessels reached the pass on Jan. 30th; on 
 the 31st they discovered the Morning Light and the Velocity 
 twelve miles distant and well out toward the sea. The moment 
 the latter discovered the cotton-clads bearing down upon them 
 they set sail and endeavored to escape. An exciting chase 
 ensued. ' 
 
 The chase continued for fifteen miles, when the Bell got 
 within range and fired the first gun at the Morning Light. 
 Some ten or twelve shots were fired in all before the vessel 
 came within musket range, when the Texan riflemen on board 
 the Bell and the Uncle Ben soon cleared her decks. Before the 
 Bell could reach her for boarding, the colors of the Mor- 
 ning Light were lowered and the Confederates took pos- 
 session. The Velocity was easily captured after this; the Con- 
 federates did not lose a man; the loss of the Federals was four 
 killed and flfteen wounded. Major Watkins cruised for 
 several days off the pass waiting for Federal vessels, but found 
 none. The premature absurdity of the following procla- 
 mation by Admiral Bell will therefore be readily seen : — 
 
 " U. S. Steam Sloop ' Brooklyn,' ) 
 
 " Off Galveston, Jan. 30th, 1863. ) 
 ^'■Whereas, a proclamation dated Gralveston, Texas, 4th January, 1863, 
 and signed J. Bankhead Magruder, Major General Commanding, declares 
 the said port of Galveston to be open for trade with all friendly nations, 
 and invites their merchants to resume usual commercial intercourse witii 
 the said port of Galveston. Therefore, the undersigned hereby warns all 
 concerned that the port of Galveston, and also Sabine Pass, as well as the 
 
 1 It seems almost incredible that these vessels and is of nine hundred and thirty seven tons 
 
 should run away, for the description of the burthen. She is constructed of oak, copperand 
 
 Morning Light alone shows her to have been iron fastened, and was metalled in February, 
 
 a vessel well able to cope with the two small 1861. She has a draft of nineteen feet, is one 
 
 cotton-clads, to say nothing of the Velocity and hundred and seventy-two feet long, and thirty- 
 
 Rachel Seaman, both blockading ships, and four feet broad and twenty-four feet in depth, 
 
 armed. The Morning Light is thus described in She is of sharp model, and was last surveyed in 
 
 the New York Herald after the capture : this city in July, 1861. She carries a crew of 
 
 " The TJnited States ship Morning Light is a about one hundred and twenty men, and an 
 
 purchased vessel, which was put into com- armament of eight thirty-two pounders. She 
 
 mission about eighteen months since. She was was attached to the Gulf blockading squadron 
 
 built in Philadelphia in 1853, has two decks, under Admiral Farragut." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 517 
 
 whole coast of Texas, are under an actual blockade by a sufBeient force of 
 United States vessels, and any merchant vessel appearing oil the aforesaid 
 ports, or attempting to pass out from the said ports, under any pretext 
 whatever, will be captured, notwithstanding the aforesaid proclamation, 
 and sent into an open port of the United States for adjudication. 
 
 "H. H. Bell, 
 " Commodore Commanding IT. S. Forces 
 " Off Galveston and Coast of Texas.'''' 
 
 Gen. Magruder's proclamation of the raising of the blockade 
 was true, despite all attempts to hide the fact from foreign 
 countries. Soon after the clearing of the pass Major Watkins 
 bluffed off the Tennessee, a boat too swift for his vessels; it 
 was fitted up as a gunboat by the United States. The Tennes- 
 see, according to a letter to the New York Tribune, Jan. 30th, 
 1863, written on board, arrived .on the evening of the 21st of 
 January off Sabine Pass. 
 
 " Soon the Tennessee sighted a large steamer, strongly resembling the 
 Morning Light, though her top spars and the yards on her mizzen-mast 
 had been removed, and her jibboom was rigged English fashion. Behind 
 her lay another vessel, indistinctly made out in the fast gathering dark- 
 ness. Recognizing the Morning Light, in spite of her disguise, and rend- 
 ered additionally distrustful of what might have happened by the fact 
 that she showed no signal lights in answer to his own, Capt. Child of the 
 Tennessee caused her to be hailed and demanded her name. ' The Morn- 
 ing LlghV was the reply. ' Then send a boat, we have a communication 
 for you.' ' We've neither boat nor crew !' returned the unknown respond- 
 ent, although the former could be discerned, hanging at the stem, by the 
 officers of the Tennessee. ' Where is Caj)t. Dillingham?' next demanded 
 Capt. Child. The answer came, brief, decisive and exultant! 'Ashore and 
 a prisoner! The Confederates are in iDossession of the vessel!' 
 
 " A short consultation on board the Tennessee followed this disastrous 
 intelligence. Some of the officers were disposed to attempt a recapture of 
 the Morning Light. It being known, however, that she had no less than 
 eight broadside guns and one thirty-pound Parrott, all of which were in 
 undoubted possession of the rebels, while the Tennessee carried but an in- 
 considerable armament of howitzers, just sufficient for blockade purposes, 
 peaceful counsels prevailed, and Capt. Child steamed for Galveston, forty 
 miles to the southward, there to report the bad news to Commander Bell. 
 Prom the appearance of the Morning Light, it was evident that she had 
 been recently attacked, probably that very day, and no doubt existed 
 that the schooner Velocity, her only partner in the blockade of Sabine 
 City, had shared her fate.'' 
 
 Major Watkins at once sent official dispatches of this 
 effective engagement as follows • 
 
 " Sabine Pass, Texa.s, ) 
 
 "On Board C. S. Gunboat ' Bell,' \ 
 
 "January 31st, 1863. ) 
 
 " Captain: We met the enemy this A. m. in the Gulf of Mexico, and 
 
 whipped them. Brought everything to Sabine Pass. I fought his ten 
 
 guns to our one. We have captured two vessels — one a full-rigged ship 
 
 and the other a schooner, and twelve guns, medical stores, ammunition 
 
 in abundance and 109 prisoners, I am here waiting further orders. 
 
 " O. M. Watkins, 
 " Major Commanding Sabine Pass. 
 "To Capt. E. P. Turner, A. A. G." 
 
618 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " Sabine Pass, January 21st. 
 " To Capt. E. P. Turner, A. A. G.: 
 
 "I engaged the enemy to-day and captured thirteen guns, about a 
 $1,000,000 worth of property, and 109 prisoners. 
 
 "O. M. Watkins, Major Commanding.'''"- 
 
 Sabine Pass was an important outlet for the Confederates. 
 The Sabine River is the boundarjr line between Texas and 
 Louisiana ; and to it, and across it, were sent thousands of 
 bales of cotton to be shipped from Texan ports to Cuba and 
 other points in the West Indies, and to Europe. All the arms 
 and munitions of war from Mexico came to the pass on light- 
 draft blockade-runners, whenever the pass was clear, instead 
 of making the more tedious journey overland. 
 
 If Admiral Parragut was correct in his account of these 
 affairs at Galveston and Sabine Pass, the United States navy 
 had more cowards in it than was credited to it at the time. 
 The italics in the lines of his report of the Sabine Pass fight 
 are ours. 
 
 Abundant caution seems to have been a characteristic of 
 the Federal vessels in Texan waters, at this time. 
 
 FLAGsmp ' Hartford,' New Orleans, Jan. 29th, 1863. 
 
 " Sir: I have received dispatches from Commodore Bell and Lieut. 
 Commander Read, on the coast of Texas, extracts and a copy of which I 
 herewith enclose, by which you wiU see that our disasters on that coast 
 are not ended. As I had already anticipated, it appears that the enemy came 
 out of Sabine Pass, with two cotton -fortified steamers on a certain morn- 
 ing, and ran out to sea some twelve or fourteen miles where the Morning 
 Light was. The latter soon got under weigh; but, by the rebel accounts, 
 and we have no other, they gave chase, soon came up with and captured 
 her without losing a man. The same course of non-resistance appears to 
 have been pursued by the officers and crew of that vessel as was pursued 
 by those of the Westfleld and Harriet Lane. The schooner Velocity was 
 soon made also to surrender and was taken into port. I am very thankful 
 that they did not get the guns of the Morning Light, as it would have en- 
 abled them to erect a battery of great strength in such a shallow pass. 
 
 "You will notice the guns of t\i& Morning Light were loaded, and 
 went off when they became heated, by which circumstance I judge the 
 men did not even fire their last charge, but surrendered without a struggle. 
 
 "I am pleased to see by Commodore Bell's report that fhe Harriet 
 Lane is still in Galveston harbor, although they have tried to impress us 
 with the idea that she had run out during the last gale, which is now 
 known not to be the case. Your obedient servant, 
 
 "D. G. Farragut, Rear Admiral. 
 "To Gideon Welles. Secretary of the Navy. 
 
 "P. S. — I have just learned that the Morning Light was captured in 
 a dead calm by a steamer coming up astern of her. 
 
 "D. G. Farragut, Rear AdmiraV^ 
 
 The obvious purpose is to belittle the Confederate victories. 
 The conquest was easy, says Admiral Farragut in effect, 
 
 1 Joint resoMicm of thanks to Major Oscar M. command, for the signal victory achieved over 
 
 Watkins and the officers and men under his com- the naval forces of the United State's at Sabine 
 
 """"^ ■■ tasa, on the twenty-first of January, 1863, re- 
 
 Resolved l)y the Congress of the Confederate States suiting in the dispersion of the blockading 
 
 oj America, That the thanks of Congress are due squadron of the enemy, and the capture of two 
 
 and are hereby tendered, to Major Oscar M. of his gunboats. 
 
 Watkins, and the of&cers and men under his Approved May 1, 1863. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 519 
 
 because the Federal naval officers were cowards. He uses a 
 weapon, however, that wounds the gallant Admiral's own 
 friends more than it does his enemies. 
 
 Capt. Wainwright of the Harriet Lane at least needs no 
 further defence. He was ably championed by his brother, and 
 it is due to him, and due to the memory of Commodore Smith, 
 who was in an eager and cowardly manner accused by the 
 Federal papers of shooting him after he had surrendered, to 
 give the following card, published in December 1864, in the 
 New York Herald, which paper had given currency to the 
 scandalous charge. It is inserted here as pertinent to this 
 part of the history, and as reflecting honor upon the Con- 
 federate officers who took part in these engagements. The 
 same respect shown to the body of Capt. Wainwright, it may be 
 said also, was shown to that of the second officer, Lieut. Lea. 
 
 "HAVANA, Dec. 8th, 1864. 
 'To the Editor of the New York Herald: 
 
 " My attention has been directed to an article published in your jour- 
 nal of November 30th, headed " Cruise of the United States Steamer Fort 
 Morgan - Scenes in the Mexican Port of Bagdad— The Murderer of Com- 
 mander Wainwright, United States Navy, a Leader of a Lawless Band of 
 Rebels and Mexicans, etc., etc' — in which the writer, whom I suppose to 
 be an acting offleer of the United States Navy, and attached to the Fort 
 Morgan, says: 'The state of affairs in Bagdad, a town on the Mexican 
 side of the Rio Grande, is wretched in the extreme. A spirit of lawless- 
 ness prevails, and the town is said to be full of rebel desperadoes, who 
 have openly threatened to take the life of any Federal officer they may 
 meet in that town. The notorious Smith, who figured in Galveston Bay 
 in the attack on the Harriet Lane, and who shot down Commander Wain- 
 wright after he had surrendered, is at this time a leading spirit in Bagdad, 
 and is said to be perfecting his arrangements for the capture of the United 
 States gunboats at anchor off the mouth of the Rio Grande. 
 
 "Permit me to say, that justice to myself demands that I should ask 
 space in your columns to contradict at once such portions thereof as refers 
 to me, and which, from beginning to end, are utterly devoid of truth, and 
 could only have emanated in a spirit of wanton desire to defame my char- 
 acter and to pervert well established facts of history. 
 
 "During the action of January 1st, 1863, in Galveston Bay, I had the 
 honor to command the Confederate naval forces. I made the attack on 
 the Federal fleet shortly before daylight. The Harriet Lane was the first 
 vessel which I engaged by boarding; and it would have been impossible, 
 owing to the darkness then prevailing, to have distinguished her com- 
 mander from any of her other officers— particularly so, as he wore no 
 uniform or insignia of his rank. After a short struggle the ship was 
 surrendered to me by the senior surviving officer. Acting Master Hamblin, 
 lier commander having been killed some twenty minutes previous, gal- 
 lantly defending himself with his revolver and cutlass. 
 
 "A corroboration of my assertion that Commander Wainwright was 
 not killed by me after the surrender of the vessel, as asserted by your cor- 
 respondent, will be found in the official report of the court of inquiry or- 
 dered by Admiral Farragut to investigate the Galveston disaster, a copy 
 of which report I enclose, in which it is stated that ' the Harriet Lane 
 was carried by boarding from the Bayou City, her commander summoned 
 to surrender, which he refused, gallantly defending himself with his re- 
 volver until killed.' 
 
 "At the close of the action, I had the dead and wounded taken on 
 shore and cared for. I assisted with my own hands in moving the corpse 
 
520 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of Commander 'Wainwriglit to the headquarters of Gten. Magruder. While 
 doing so, 1 was informed that he had been a member of an Order with 
 which I nave the honor to be connected. He was dressed in full uniform 
 and laid out in state. I ordered the finest coiBn that could be found, and 
 paid for the same out of my own i)rivate purse. Although I met and 
 fought him as an enemy, I admired his undaunted courage and bravery, 
 and hence paid every respect to his remains. 
 
 "He was buried with military and Masonic honors. I among many 
 other Confederate officers followed him to his grave. I saw to the collec- 
 tion and safe keeping of all of his personal effects, including his two 
 swords, which I placed in charge of the senior surviving officer; but they 
 were subsequently sent out to Commodore Bell, at that time commanding 
 the United States squadron , off G-alveston, with the request that they 
 should be forwarded to his family in the North, to whom I have every 
 reason to suppose they were safely delivered. 
 
 "The statement of my being the leader of a lawless band of Mexicans 
 and rebels at the port of Bagdad is simply ridiculous, and may go for what 
 it is worth. 
 
 " If [ have done any damage to your government at that point it was 
 done legitimately, from the Confederate side of the Rio Grande, and under 
 the Confederate, not Mexican, flag. 
 
 " I have been induced to make this statement of facts in vindication 
 of my character as an officer and a gentleman. 
 " Very respectfully, etc., 
 
 "Lbon Smith, 
 
 " Confederate States Navy.'''' 
 
 On March 13th, 1864, Admiral Porter, with nineteen gun- 
 boats, followed by ten thousand men of Sherman's army, under 
 the command of Major Gen. N. P. Banks, entered the mouth of 
 Red River. On the 13th, under cover of a part of the fleet, the 
 troops debarked at Semmesport, on the Atchafalaya near the 
 Red River, and on the 14th, under command of Gen. A. J. 
 Smith, captured Fort DeRussy. On the 15th of March the ad- 
 vanced boats of Porter's fleet reached Alexandria, where by 
 the mismanagement of a pilot one Confederate steamer was 
 grounded on the falls and had to be burned. On the 26th of 
 April the Federal iron-clad Eastport grounded on a bar below 
 Grand Encore, and to prevent her from falling into the hands 
 of the Confederates she was destroyed. While intercepting 
 the Federal gunboats on their way down the Red River at the 
 junction of the Cane, on the 26th, the Confederates crippled one 
 gunboat and exploded the boiler of a transport. The loss of the 
 latter was one hundred dead and seventy-seven severely 
 scalded. On the 1st of May the Confederates captured and 
 sunk the transport Emma. On the 3d they captured the trans- 
 port City Belle, on her way up to Alexandria, with the 120th Ohio 
 regiment on board. On the evening of the 4th the Federal 
 gunboats Covington and Signal, each mounting eight heavy 
 guns, with the transport Warner, attempted to pass Davide's 
 Ferry. The Covington was blown up by her crew to escape 
 capture, but the Signal and Warner surrendered. 
 
 During these operations the Federals were engaged night 
 and day in the construction of a dam across the Red River, to en- 
 able the fleet to escape over the falls. This it finally succeeded 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 521 
 
 in doing, which ended the last Federal campaign undertaken 
 for political objects, or intrusted to political generals. 
 
 The Sabine River, between Louisiana and Texas, was a 
 line of great strategic importance to the forces of the United 
 States ; as its possession would give to their forces short lines 
 of operations against the interior of Texas, as well as recover 
 the morale that was lost in the harbor of Galveston. For that 
 purpose a fleet of twenty-one vessels was organized and dis- 
 patched in September, 1863, accompanied by a force of not less 
 than five thousand men. The Confederate authorities had 
 made no adequate preparations to resist such an army, and at 
 that time it was not possible to promptly organize a force that 
 could repel such an expedition. A few miles above the en- 
 trance to Sabine River a small earthwork had been constructed 
 and was at that time garrisoned by a force of forty -two men 
 and two lieutenants, with an armament of six guns. The com- 
 pany constituting the' garrison was composed of Irishmen and 
 called the "Davis Guards"; its captain, F. H. Odium, was 
 temporarily absent and the command devolved on Lieut. R. 
 W. Dowling. 
 
 After the first naval battle off Sabine Pass the United States 
 was content for some time to maintain a more or less effective 
 blockade of that estuary, of Galveston and of the mouth of the 
 Rio Grande. Later in the year 1863, however, the Federal au- 
 thorities saw the necessity, if they would close these ports, of 
 taking possession of them by a formidable land force. Sabine 
 Pass was the first objective point. The expedition against it 
 was organized at New Orleans. The 19th army. corps. Major 
 Gen. Ffanklin in command, constituted the land army, which 
 was embarked on transports on the 4th of Decenaber. It was 
 designed to land and hold Sabine Pass as a base of strategic 
 operations against western Louisiana and eastern and central 
 Texas. To cover the landing of the troops there was a navy 
 of four light-draft gunboats — the Sachem, the Clifton, the 
 Granite City and the Arizona. The foremost transport was 
 the Belvedere, having on board Gen. Adam Weitzel and 600 
 picked men, who were to occupy the post of honor and make 
 the first landing. The only fortified point at Sabine Pass, as 
 has been stated, was a Confederate earthwork of small pro- 
 portions with a few light guns, on the Texas side of the pass, 
 known as Fort Griffin, and commanded by Lieut. Dowling, 
 who managed the ensuing fight with a coolness and skill which 
 does him and the men under him infinite credit. The Federals, 
 officered by a general of such eminence as Franklin, and com- 
 posed in part of picked men recently from the victories on the 
 Mississippi, exulted in the anticipation of an easy conquest. 
 
 On the 5th of December the gunboats, accompanied by 
 the transports, started from New Orleans. The rendezvous 
 was Berwick Bay. It was determined that the attack should 
 
633 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 commence on the 8th of December, should be sudden and secret, 
 and before the Confederates had time to reinforce Fort GrifBn, 
 . or to erect shore batteries. On account of the absence of the 
 blockading vessel which they expected to sight, the expedition 
 missed the designated point and was delayed one day. On the 
 9th, however, the whole fleet was collected at the Pass and the 
 order of battle arranged. Gapt. Crocker, of the Clifton, was to 
 begin the action by feeling and uncovering the Confederate 
 batteries, while Gens. Franklin and Weitzel personally exam- 
 ined the shore of the Pass and ascertained the most eligible 
 point for disembarking the land forces. Accordingly the 
 Clifton was the first to enter the Pass, throwing shells as she 
 did so into Fort Griffin. She received no response and re- 
 turned. Then, the Clifton leading, the Arizona and the 
 Sachem steamed in opposite the fort, and the Clifton opened 
 with one of her nine-inch pivot guns. The shell exploded in- 
 side the fort, throwing up a shower of dirt, and was instantly 
 followed by another shell of the same kind. At once the 
 Sachem poured in a broadside from her thirty-two-pounder 
 guns, and the next moment the Arizona opened. Up to this 
 time, and not until thirty or forty shells had exploded appar- 
 ently in the fort, was a shot fired in return. The naval com- 
 manders began to think the works abandoned. The only 
 signs of life apparent on water or land were two steamers in 
 the river, one of which ran down to the fort and back just be- 
 fore the action. The silence did not continue long. A white 
 cloud of smoke arose from the parapet of the fort and floated 
 away in the still air. The shot passed directly over the Ari- 
 zona, striking the water beyond, showing that the aim was 
 good and the range effective. The next shot was 'at the 
 Sachem, and the next at the Clifton. Obviously those in the 
 fort did not intend to allow any of the vessels to complain 
 of neglect. None of these shots struck the vessel fired at. 
 The engagement now became general. The Clifton and Ari- 
 zona kept moving forward and backward, pouring in broad- 
 sides in quick succession, while the Sachem was moving 
 steadily forward in order to get in the rear of the fort, where 
 it was open and unprotected. This move was seen, and the 
 Confederates redoubled their fire at her, answered shot for 
 shot by the three boats, the huge shells every instant bursting 
 in the fort, carrying destruction in their wake and knocking 
 great holes in the parapet, which appeared of sufficient size to 
 admit the passage of a carriage and horses. The Confederates 
 acted with great bravery, however, and if their fire slackened 
 an instant after one of those terrific explosions, which seemed 
 to shake the very earth around them, it was instantly resumed 
 with increased rather than diminished determination. Grad- 
 ually, but surely, the Sachem was gaining her desired position. 
 A moment more and she would pass out of range, and the day 
 would be won. All eyes were bent upon her, when suddenly 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 523 
 
 a shot was seen to strike her amidships, crushing in her sides 
 and tearing her iron plating for the protection of sharp- 
 shooters as a piece of paper, and causing her to careen and 
 tremble from stem to stern. An instant more and she was en- 
 veloped in the scalding vapor of escaping steam and lay a help- 
 less wreck at the mercy of the fort. ' The flag was lowered. 
 
 The disabling of the Sachem enabled the fort to turn its 
 attention to the Clifton and the Arizona. The latter kept 
 well off; but the former, with a bravery we cannot but admire, 
 fought gallantly, running in toward the batteries and dehver- 
 ing her fire with a quickness and determination which exhib- 
 ited both courage and good handling by her .commander. A 
 large portion of her crew, as well as a majority of that of the 
 Sachem, were Irish, and as the troops in the fort were largely 
 of the same nationality, it was Irish pluck against Irish valor. 
 Just as the gunboat, however, ran down to the fort for the 
 last time, her bow was thrown round slightly in the act of 
 turning, and she was driven into the shallow river mud and 
 stuck fast. She offered for a moment a target, of which the 
 Oonfederate gunners took instant advantage, for she lay 
 broadside on. She still kept firing, and for some time with 
 the hope of keeping down the fire of the fort; but a shot from 
 the battery at length struck the boat in the centre and passed 
 through the boiler. She was now helpless and lay a wreck, 
 exposed to the fort and at its mercy. Her captain had fought 
 her gallantly but uselessly. ^ The white flag was run up and 
 the firing ceased. The Arizona was the only boat left, and 
 though the largest of them all, she hesitated to engage the 
 fort alone. She steamed off, and the fleet withdrew, and was 
 next hfeard of at New Orleans. 
 
 This affair at Sabine was highly creditable to all engaged, 
 especially to the Davis Guards, Capt. Dowling, at the fort. ^ 
 
 1 The Sachem was built in 1840, in New York, After the affair at Galveston she was command- 
 and was formerly owned in Hartford, Conn. ed by Lieut. Frederick Crocker, and was noted 
 -She was about 198 tons' burden, and drew about on the Texas coast. She served as a Confederate 
 seven feet of water. She had a vertical engine, gunboat until the 21st of March, 1864, when, at- 
 with a cylinder twenty-four inches in diameter tempting to run the blockade at Sabine Pass 
 and ten inches stroke. She was rebuilt in 1854, with over 700 bales of cotton on board, she ran 
 and was sold to the U. 9. government early in agr.iund and was burned to prevent her from 
 the war. In the attack upon the forts below falling into the hands of the enemy. 
 
 New Orleans she was in the Coast Survey ser- , , , ., ^ l- l^ 
 
 vice, under the charge of Mr Gerdes, Assistant ^ ANew York HercOd correspondent noting the 
 
 V. 8. Coast Snrvey. After the taking of New motion said :—" Considering the number of the 
 
 Orleans she was fitted up with heavy armament, tovces engaged, it is doubtful if any affair of the 
 
 and figured prominently at various times and ""'I'ole war can compare with the battleof Sabine 
 
 places. Her ofttcers were— Acting MasterCom- I'^bs in obstinacy of fighting, loss of life and 
 
 manding, Amos Johnson ; Acting Ensign, A. **"* amount of interest involved. To the enemy 
 
 H. Bfeynolds ; Acting Master's Mates, J. C. Dal- " ™s " matter of hfe and death and to the 
 
 lives, L. C. Granger : Acting Engineers. John U°i™ 'or^^s it "as the opening battle of a, most 
 
 Prazier, James E.Wall and George O.M.Woolfe. brilliant campaign. The enemy retained their 
 
 prize ; but their loss has been undoubtedly 
 
 2 The gunboat Clifttm was built in New York, without precedent in the annals of the war, and 
 and was purchased bythe Federal Navy Depart- they will, in the midst of their rejoicing, tremble 
 ment early in the war. She was a Staten Island at the thought of a repetition of the attack, 
 ferry boat, and well known in New York. She There were on board the OHfion, besides her 
 was attached to the Porter mortar flotilla, and crew, a party of seventy-five sharp-shooters and 
 did considerable service in the engagement be- three of the signal corps, and on the Sachem a 
 low the forts at New Orleans. She carried nine detachment of thirty sharp-shooters. Ofthecrew 
 guns of heavy calibre. After the mortar flotilla of the Clifton, iive soldiers, one sailor and one 
 was scattered she served in several expeditions. signal man escaped down the beach, and were 
 
524 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 E. P. Alsbury, a Confederate participant, gives the follow- 
 ing interesting account of the fight, and of the part Com- 
 modore Leon Smith .and his cotton-clads took therein. That 
 it was not a more active one is due to the quick dispatch of the 
 Davis G-uards in Fort Griffin^ and to the haste of the Federal 
 fleet to get to sea. 
 
 The Confederate authorities had notice of the fitting out 
 of the expedition of Gen. Franklin. Its destination was sup- 
 posed to be Galveston, or Matagorda. The army of Gen. 
 Magruder was distributed in accordance with this view. It 
 was a surprise, therefore, when a dispatch was received by 
 Col. Luckett at_Harrisburg, Texas, from Lieut. Dick Dowling 
 at Sabine Pass', stating that a large hostile fleet was in the 
 offing, and that he had at Fort Griffin but forty-two men of 
 the Davis Guards, a Houston company, and five pieces of artil- 
 lery. Commodore Leon Smith, who was present when the 
 dispatch was received, was at once requested to proceed down 
 the river to the scene of action. At Beaumont, on the river, 
 the steamer Bell, fitted up with cotton bales, incased in two- 
 inch plank around her front and boiler, was lying. Commo- 
 dore Smith took her, and with what men he could muster, 
 steamed down the river. The sound of cannon was heard as 
 the steamer neared Sabine Pass and told that the conflict had 
 already commenced. In the graphic words of Mr. Alsbury — 
 
 " The pass was ia full view. The white puffs from the advancing gun- 
 boats were seen, but the fort was silent. Could it be that it had been 
 deserted? I can better explain the situation by sending the story of the 
 fight, as it was detailed by its chief actor, and by others who supplied the 
 circumstances omitted by the modesty of the young commander. When 
 the fleet first anchored off the bar Lieut. Richard Dowling, a young Irish- 
 man, twenty years of age, and the junior officer of his company, was in 
 command of Fort Griffin, with forty-two nien present for duty. Alter 
 transmitting the news to headquarters, he made every preparation nec- 
 essary for defence, resolving to hold his position until it should become 
 untenable. His men fully entered into the spirit of their young com- 
 mander, and they calmly awaited the motions of their enemy. Fort Grif- 
 fin was an unfinished earthwork on the Texas side of the Pass, destitute 
 of any outer defences, presenting three bastioned sides on the east, south 
 and west, the north and rear enclosed by a redoubt about four feet above 
 the level. The work occupied high ground and commanded both the 
 
 taken oflf by a boat from tlie fleet. The number would have ' ' trembled at the thought of a re- 
 
 of killed and wounded must have been large, petion of the attack." They were only sorry when 
 
 particularly on the Clifton, a8 she was not only the Arizona steamed off. The Granite Ciiy with 
 
 exposed to a cross fire, but was raked from stem a broadside of brass guns was not heard of in the 
 
 to stem by grape. As to the killed and wounded action. She was intended to cover the landing 
 
 on the Sachem nothing is known ; but the loss of the troops, but none were ever landed. "Why. 
 
 is supposed to be light, and mostly from the it would be diflBcult to say; General Franklin bad 
 
 escaping steam, as but the one shot was known on the transports probably four thousand men» 
 
 to have stnick her. The loss of the euemy was many of them picked troops. He had to cover 
 
 undoubtedly enormous, as the huge nine-inch his landing, the uninjured gunboats Arizona 
 
 shell apparently searched every nook and cor- and Granite City, the latter of light draft and 
 
 uer of the earthwork ; and when the Clifton was especially chosen for the purpose. It seems an 
 
 aground the same guns poured in a murderous ignominious thing for such a force to sail away 
 
 fire of grape, sweeping the parapet from end to and put back to New Orleans, rather than face an 
 
 end. Their loss, however, will probably never earthwork fort of few guns, garisoned by lees 
 
 be known." than three hundred landsmen, and already sub- 
 
 The correspondent was sadly mistaken, never- jected to a prolonged and severe bombard- 
 
 theless, in his assertion that the Davis Gtuards ment. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 535 
 
 Texas and Louisiana channels. The former 300 yards ; the latter at the 
 distance of three-fourths of a mile. 
 
 "The armament consisted of one forty-four-pounder, smooth bore; 
 and four thirty-two-pound Parrotts, and a brass twenty-four-pounder. 
 The latter piece was not used in the action, for the want of suitable am- 
 munition. Sabine village was situated about a mile and a half from the 
 work, up the Pass, and contained only a few famihes, chiefly women and 
 children of men in the service. 
 
 "The morning of the 8th of September, 1863, dawned brightly, and 
 the golden glow from the east was reflected by the white sails of the Fed- 
 eral fleet which were making for a berth as near the shallow bar as possi- 
 ble. Some of the sailing transports were being towed by the steamers and 
 four of the latter, as the sequel proved, were gunboats. Their movements 
 were watched with thriUing interest by the people from the town and 
 fort, and but few of the former anticipated any other result in the coming 
 battle than disaster to the Confederates. 
 
 "Finally the cloud of sails on the outer bar, appeared to be arranged 
 to satisfaction, and two steamers headed for the Pass, followed by two 
 others, each with a transport in tow. When they arrived opposite the 
 light-house, about three miles distant, one of the steamers took the Texas 
 channel, while the other turned into that which skirted the Louisiana 
 shore. Lieut. DowUng now understood that the enemy meant business. 
 He had decided on his plan of defence. Ordering the men to enter the 
 bomb-proofs, there to remain until he should fire the first gun, he re- 
 mained to watch the gunboats, now slowly feeling their way up the 
 two parallel channels. From their long service on the Texan coast, the 
 two vessels were recognized with a glass by the time they had reached 
 the light-house. The gunboat Clifton, Capt. Crocker commanding, fol- 
 lowed the nearer channel; the other boat was the Sachem, under Lieut. 
 Johnson. At a mile distant, the Clifton commenced the flght with 
 shell, turning aside occasionally to bring her broadside into play. Sev- 
 eral of the missiles fell in the fort and scattered the dirt in all directions. 
 The Sachem did not fire, but advanced slowly, throwing the lead. 
 Bowling remained in an angle of a bastion, concealed from view, and 
 watching the approaching foe. This programme obtained until but 400 
 yards separated the Clifton from the Confederate position, when that 
 vessel turned her broadside full to the fort. Until now nothing but 
 silence answered the thunder of the Federal guns, and the commander 
 of the gunboats began to suspect that they were confronted by dum- 
 mies and a deserted work. But Bowling's opportunity had come. With 
 the cool precision of a target practice, he deliberately sighted the forty- 
 four pounder, and sent a solid shot through the enemy's side. The 
 'Bavies'were not slow to respond to the signal, and soon the fort was 
 wrapped in a curtain of smoke, and shook to the thunders of artillery. 
 Three pieces were turned upon the more distant Sachem,, now nearly 
 abreast the eastern battery. Her response in quick, successive broad- 
 sides added to the din of battle, and hot work was in order for the next 
 few minutes. A shot from the Clifton took off a handle of the elevating 
 screw of the forty-four-pounder, hardly a second after Bowling had 
 sighted the piece and moved to one side. The latter vessel fought desper- 
 ately and in the last attempt to bring her broadside to bear, ran her bow 
 into the mud. While in this position the Confederate shot pierced her 
 steam-chest and boilers, scalding a number of her crew, and her flag was 
 lowered. In a few moments the colors of the Sachem were struck, and the 
 cTieers from the fort succeeded the roar of cannon. At this moment the 
 Bell was noticed coming down the Pass, while far in her rear on the lake 
 the black smoke of another boat was visible. This proved to be an un- 
 armed supply boat from Beaumont, which left shortly after the Bell. 
 So soon as hostilities ceased, the other Federal steamers, which were 
 afterwards known to have been the Arizona and Granite City, steamed 
 back to the fleet, and left their gallant consorts to their fate. Capt. 
 
536 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Crocker came ashore with a boat's crew, and mounting the parapet of the 
 fort, asked for the commanding officer. Dowhng, full of the dust of bat 
 tie, and looking little like a hero, presented himself as the person sought. 
 
 " The gallant Federal, in handsome uniform, could scarce believe the 
 dirty boy was his conqaeror, oi- that the handful of men before him com- 
 prised the force who had calmly awaited a hostile fleet, and by their un- 
 aided effort had subjected it to defeat, with the loss of its two best gun- 
 boats. , .^, , . , 
 
 " As Capt. Crocker and party had come ashore without side-arms, 
 Lieut. Dowling stated that he would accompany him back to the prize and 
 receive his sword. While this formality of receiving the surrender of the 
 Clifton was in progress, the steamboat Bell, with Leon Smith and party 
 aboard, ran alongside of the Sachem, and she was taken possession of and 
 manned by the naval detachment accompanying the commodore. It was 
 discovered that the Sachem had also suffered in her boilers, and that fifteen 
 of her men had been scalded. Her brave commander had ordered the 
 canvas spread, and the run completed under sail, but her crew revolted 
 and hauled down her flag. Had the order been obeyed the vessel would 
 doubtless have succeeded in passing out of range, and could have engaged 
 the work from the rear. The officers and men taken on the captured 
 vessels amounted to about 315. In the fort not a single casualty had oc- 
 curred. The prisoners were landed during the afternoon, and placed 
 under the guard of a militia company of home guards, which hastily as- 
 sembled on hearing the cannonading, and arrived at the scene of the con- 
 flict shortly after it had ceased. This company was composed of men too 
 old to be in active service, and numbered about twenty. Their homespun 
 clothes and rusty old fire looks, some of which still had the flint pans, 
 afforded no little fun for the prisoners, who were neatly uniformed. The 
 majority of the latter were Irish, like their captors, and there was no end 
 to their wit, at the expense of their guard. 
 
 " The heroism displayed at Sabine Pass has never been excelled, when 
 the odds are considered and the moral stamina it must have required to 
 brave the presence of little less than an armada bearing a large army with 
 a well-defined object of invasion, and prepared to meet with resistance that 
 must have been believed to be ten ortwenty fold its real strength. The young 
 hero, Dick Dowling, has passed away from earth, but his memory will re- 
 main green among those who were his fellow soldiers, and still will hve in 
 song and story, when Texan valor will be the theme, and heroic deeds 
 recounted.'" 
 
 Sabine Pass vs'as an unlucky spot for the Federal fleet. 
 The Confederates were as active there as hornets. Eight 
 
 1 Joint resolution of thanks to Cwpt, Odium, Lieut. communicate the foregoing reaolTitione to Capt. 
 
 Dowling, and timmen under iheir command: Odium, Lieut. Dowling, and the men under 
 
 Besotved, That the thanks of Congress are emi- their command, 
 
 nently due, and are hereby cordially given, to Approved, FehriiBffyBth, 1864. 
 
 Capt. Odium, Lieut. Richard Dowling, and the The Federal oflBcial dispatch relating to this 
 
 forty-one men composing the Davis Guards, disastrous event telle its own story. The confl- 
 
 under their command, for their daring, gallant dent tone of the dispatch of Sept. 4th is in de- 
 
 and successful defence of Sabine Pass, Texas, cided contrast with the contents of the suhse- 
 
 againat the attack made by the enemy, on Ihe quent reports. 
 
 eighth of September last, with a fleet of five United States Steam-Sloop "Peksacola," ) 
 
 gun-boats and twenty-two steam transports. New Orleans, September 4th, 1863. ( 
 
 carrying a land force of fifteen thousand men. Sib : I have the honorto inform ttie depart- 
 
 Sesotved, That this defence, resulting, under ment that Major General Banl£s, having orgau- 
 
 the Providence of God, in the defeat of the en- ized a force of 4,000 men, under Masjor Gen. 
 
 emy, the capture of two gun-boats, with more Franklin, to effect a landing at Sabine JPass for 
 
 than three hundred prisoners, including the military occupation, and requested the co-oper- 
 
 commander of the ileet; the crippling of a third ation of the navy, which I most gladly acceded 
 
 gun-boat, the dispersion of the transports, and to, I assigned the command of tiie naval force 
 
 preventing the invasion of Texas, constitutes, in to Acting Vol. Lieut. Frederick Crocker, com- 
 
 the opinion of Congress, one of the most brill- manding U. S. steamer Clifton, accompanied by 
 
 iant and heroic achievements in the history of the steamer Sachem, Acting Vol. Lieut. Amos 
 
 this war, and entitles the Davis Guards to the Johnson; U. 8. steamer Arizona, Acting Master 
 
 gratitude and admiration of their country. Howard Tibbetts; and U. S. steamer Granite 
 
 Resolved, That the President be requested to City, Acting Master C. W. Lamson. These being 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 527 
 
 months after the action just mentioned, the U. S. steamer 
 Granite City, which then escaped, together with the steamer 
 Wave, were captured at the Pass. 
 
 While lying in the river waiting for coal the Confederates 
 threw a pontoon 'bridge across Mud Bayou, and brought over 
 six pieces of artillery and a force of men. The first intimation 
 the gunboats had of their proximity was the. opening of the 
 battery so near that in a few moments the Granite City sur- 
 rendered, and a little while after the Wave. The troops on 
 shore were aided by a cotton-clad steamer, probably the Bell. 
 The Granite Citywas an iron side-wheel steamer; the crew was 
 made up of the paroled and exchanged men of the unfortunate 
 Hatteras. The Wave, or Gunboat 45, was originally one of Ad- 
 miral Porter's gunboats and was protected by iron armor. The 
 Granite had been on the Texas coast since 1863, and the Wave 
 since April 1864. The officers captured with the Granite City 
 were Acting Master Commanding, C. W. Lamson; Acting As- 
 sistant Surgeon, E. C. Vermulen; Acting Assistant Paymaster, 
 John Reed; Acting Master, A. H. Atkinson ; Acting Ensigns, 
 S. R. Tyrrell and A. H. Terry; Acting Master's Mates, T. R. 
 Marshall, J. E. AshmeadandD. Hall; Engineers: Acting Second 
 Assistant, S. Greene; Acting Third Assistants, D. M. Schryver, 
 J. H. Rollins and R. H, Gordon; Paymaster's Clerk, H. H. Faring. 
 
 And the officers of the Wave were Acting Volunteer Lieu- 
 tenant, B. W. Loring; Acting Assistant Paymaster, Alfred G. 
 Lathrop; Acting Ensigns, F. J. Latham, Peter Howard, and 
 William Mellen; Acting Master's Mate, Charles Cameron; 
 Engineers: First Assistant, John Thompson; Second Assist- 
 ant, M. F. Fitzpatrick; Third Assistants, John Rodgers and 
 W. H. Wilson; Paymaster's Clerk, Charles H. Grace. 
 
 We have not the official report, but the following letter 
 will be of interest: 
 
 " Sabine Pass, Texas, May Sth, 1864. 
 
 " Mt Dbab I am under the painful necessity of informing you 
 
 that I was captured at Calcasien Pass on the morning of the 6th. The 
 
 the ODly available vessels of sufficient light madQ repeated attempts to go in alone, but 
 
 draft at my disposal for that service, and as they without success. 
 
 have good pilots, I have no doubt the force is I have the honor to be your obedient servant, 
 
 quite Bufacient for the object. The defences H. H. Bell, 
 
 afloat and ashore are believed to consist of two Commodore Commanding W. G. B. Squadron, 
 
 thirty-two pounders en harbettt, and a battery of pro tern, 
 
 field pieces, and two bay boats converted into To the Hon. Gideon Welles, 
 
 ramsl Seeretary of the Navy, Washington, D. C. 
 
 It was concerted with Gen. Franklin that the 
 
 squadron of four gun-boats, under the com- United States Steamer "Abizona," ) 
 
 mand of Acting Vol. Lieut. Crocker, shall make Sabine Bar, September 10th, 1883. ) 
 
 the attack alone, assisted by about one hundred Sib :— * * * At 6 a. m. on the 8th, the 
 
 and, eighty sharp-shooters from the army, di- CTi/i!<m stood in the bay and opened fire on the 
 
 Tided among his vessels; and having driven the fort, to which no reply was made. At 9 A, M. 
 
 enemy from his defences and destroyed or the Sachem, Arizona, and Granite City, followed 
 
 driven off the rams, the transports are then to by the transports, stood over the bar, and with 
 
 advance and land their troops. much difficulty (owing to the shallowness of the 
 
 I regret exceedingly that the officers and water) reached anchorage two miles from the 
 
 crews, who have been on blockade there, can- port at 11 a. m,, the gunboats covering the trans- 
 
 not participate in the attack, in consequence of ports. 
 
 the excessive draft of wafer drawn by their ves- At 3.30 p. m., the Sachem, followed by the Ari- 
 
 Bfils. zona, advanced up the eastern channel to draw 
 
 The New London, drawing 9)^ feet, is the the, fire of the forts, while the Clijlon advanced 
 
 lightest draft of all the blockaders, and had up the western channel ; the Granite Ctty to 
 
538 THE CONFEDERATE STATES l^AVY. 
 
 Wave was also captured at the same time. We fought for an hour and 
 forty minutes; but the enemy's sharp-shooters picked off our men so that 
 we could not keep our guns manned, and their batteries hulled us every 
 shot. 
 
 " The Granite City had sixteen shot-holes in her hull, near the water 
 line ; two oflBcers were wounded, one severely — so badly that his right arm 
 was obliged to be taken off at the shoulder. Ten men were wounded; 
 two since dead. 
 
 "The enemy's sharp-shooters annoyed us most, although we were 
 pretty well cut up by shot and shell. 
 
 " I am uninjured and in good health. I have met so far with high- 
 toned polite ofBcers, who have shown me every proper attention. 
 
 " We go from here by steamboat and railroad to Houston. Our des- 
 tination from there is now to me unknown. 
 
 " C. W. Lamson, Commanding U. 8. Steamer '■Ghranite City.'" 
 
 It will be seen that Commander Lamson pays a tribute to 
 the courtesy and kindness of his captors. In the course of the 
 narrative also it has been observed how generous a tribute 
 was paid to the remains of Commander Wainwright and 
 Lieut. Lea^ of the Harriet Lane. And further, the letter has 
 been given in which Commodore Smith so indignantly and 
 successfully defended himself against the charge of shooting 
 Commander Wainwright after his surrender. It is the unan- 
 imous statement of the ofHcers who were prisoners in Texas 
 from the Federal naval forces that they were well treated, and 
 as well fed, housed and clothed as the circumstances would 
 allow. Of course there were persons who, in Northern papers, 
 tried to influence the feelings of the North by assertions 
 unwarranted by the facts, but time has vindicated the Con- 
 federate authorities from all such charges. 
 
 cover the landing of a division of troops under "United States Steam Sloop "Pensacola," \ 
 
 General Weitzel ; no reply to the fire of the gun- New Orleans. September 13th 1863. ( 
 
 boats being made until we were abreast ot the Sir :— My dispatchNo.Alinformed you of the 
 
 forts, when they opened with eight guns, three repulse of the expedition at Sabine Pass, and 
 
 of which were rifled. Almost at the same the capture of the Clifton, Acting-Vol. Lieut, 
 
 moment the Clifton and Sachem were stnick in Frederick Crocker, and Sachem, Acting-Vol. 
 
 tlieir boilers, enveloping the vessels in steam. Lieut. Amos Johnson, by the rebels, ajxd the safe 
 
 There not being room to pass the Sachem, this return of the troops and transports to the river 
 
 vessel was backed down the channel and aboat without loss. 
 
 seut to the SOdiem, which rotui-ned with Engineer Lieutenants Crocker and Johnson are reported 
 
 Munroe and Fireman Linn badly scalded (since to have fought their vessels gallantly, and are 
 
 dead). The Arizona had now grounded by the unhurt. The rebel steamers took the Clifton 
 
 stera ; the ebb-tide caught her bows and swung and Sachem in tow within twenty minutes after 
 
 her across the channel ; she was. with much their auiTender. The extent of their damage is 
 
 difliculty, extricated from this position — owing unknown. 
 
 to the engine becoming heated by the collection The arrival of the Owasco this morning has 
 
 of mud in the boilers. given me the onlyreports from the naval ofllcers 
 
 The flags of the Clifton and Sachem were run concerned that I have yet received, 
 
 down and white flags were flying at the fore. As **##** 
 
 all the transports were now moving out of the He attack, which was to have been a surprise 
 
 bay, this vessel remained covering their move- and made at early dawn on the 7th, was not 
 
 ments, until she gi'ounded and remained untU made until 3 p. m. on the 8th, after the entire 
 
 midnight, when she was kedged off, as no assist- expedition had appeared off Sabine for twcnty- 
 
 auoe could bo had from any of the tugs of the eight hours, and a reconnoissance had been 
 
 expedition. There arc now on board this vessel, made ou the morning of the 8th, by Generals 
 
 William Low, Peter Benson, George W. Maker, Franklin and -Weitzel and Lieut. Commanding 
 
 John Howels, Samuel Smith.and George Hurton, Crocker, when they decided on a form of attack 
 
 of the crew of the Sachem. different fi-om that recommended by myself. 
 
 Very respectfully, your obedient servant, **# + #* 
 
 H. TiBBETTS, I have the honor to be your obedient servant. 
 
 Acting Master Commanding V. S. steamer ^ H. H. Bell, 
 
 Ariztma, Commodore Com. W. G. B. Squadron, pro tern. 
 
 Commodore H. H. Bell, Hon. Gideon Welles, 
 
 Commanding W. G. B. Squadron, New Orleans. Secretary ot the Navy, Washington, D. C. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 529 
 
 Lieut. Loring of the Wave was an ofRcer of distinction. 
 He served the guns that caused the Confederate ram Atlanta 
 to surrender, and it is said he fired the first shot at Fort Sum- 
 ter, and the one that exploded the magazine at Fort Moultrie. 
 
 The end was drawing near, however. The United States, 
 with its almost unlimited forces, was proving too strong for 
 the little State of Texas left to itself. Brownsville was occu- 
 pied by the Banks' expedition; the Matagorda peninsula, com- 
 manding Cavallo Pass and Corpus Christi, was firmly held ; 
 the blockade of Galveston was strengthened, and only the 
 forts at Sabine Pass were still defiantly held. It was not until 
 May, 1865, that they were evacuated, and then the long war 
 was drawing to a close, and Gens. E. Kirby Smith and Canby 
 were arranging terms of surrender. Acting Volunteer Lieut. 
 Pennington hoisted the United States flag on the memorable 
 Fort Griffin. He found it a small place with five bomb-proofs 
 covered with two feet of solid timber and two layers of rail- 
 road iron, and containing five guns, which he spiked. , 
 
 Acting Rear Admiral Thatcher's report of the capture of 
 the forts at Sabine Pass was as follows: 
 
 •' Nbw Oblbaij-s, La., May 31st, 1865. 
 
 " Sir : I have the honor to inform the Department that a dispatch, 
 under date of the 25th inst., was this day received from Captain B. F. 
 Sands reporting the evacuation of the defences of Sabine Pass, Ports 
 Mannahassets and Gri£Sn. 
 
 "Acting Volunteer Lieut. Commander Pennington hoisted the United 
 States flag on these forts. The guns, five in number, were spiked. Fort 
 Griffln is described as having five bomb-proofs covered with two feet of 
 solid timber, two layers of railroad iron, and four feet of each on top. 
 There were four magazines of like construction. Lieut. Commander Pen- 
 nington having left force enough to hold the forts, retired to his vessel, 
 leaving the American flag flying. 
 
 " Captain Sands, under date of the 37th of May, reports that the rebel 
 army of Texas have generally disbanded and gone home, and the terms of 
 surrender recently executed in New Orleans between the rebel command- 
 ers sent by General E. Kirby Smith and General Canby having been com- 
 plied with on the part of the rebels, it only remains for us to occupy the 
 fortifications. With regard to the rebel naval forces in Texas, I am as- 
 sured by the Confederate Lieut. Commander Jonathan Carter, who is now 
 here, and declares himself to be the senior naval oflBcer, that there is no 
 naval property nor any officers in Texas on the seaboard, and only one 
 vessel in the Red River— the ram Missouri — ^which will be surrendered to 
 the commander of the Mississippi Squadron. 
 
 " Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "H. B. T-KATCSJiB,, Aoting Rear Admiral, W. &. B. 8. 
 "To GiDBOBT Wbllbs, Secretary of the Navy. 
 
 On June 13th the U. S. Navy Department received from 
 Commander W. E. Fitzhugh his report concerning the sur- 
 render of the Confederate naval forces on Red River. Com- 
 mander Fitzhugh, in his dispatch, which was dated on board 
 the Ouachita, at Alexandria, Louisiana, June 3d, says that 
 he started up Red River on the 38th of May with the steamers 
 
 34 
 
530 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Benton, Ouachita, Fort Hindman and the tug Fern, in com- 
 pany with Major Gen. Herron and his steamer Ida May, in 
 advance of the troops. He encountered no resistance what- 
 ever. All whom he met seemed well disposed. On the morn- 
 ing of June 3d the squadron met Lieut. Commander J. H. 
 Carter, commanding the Confederate naval forces of the trans- 
 Mississippi squadron, and received from him the iron-clad 
 Missouri and the paroles of himself, officers and men. Lieut. 
 Commander Carter informed Commander Fitzhugh that the 
 Missouri was the only naval vessel on Red River or its tribu- 
 taries. The Champion, one of the pump-boats captured in 
 the expedition, was turned over to the army. The Missouri 
 was brought below the Falls, and was to be refitted at the 
 mouth of the river. She was designed to be quite a formid- 
 able vessel, made on the plan of the Tennessee, captured at 
 Mobile, but was built of timber not thoroughly seasoned, and 
 caulked with cotton, and it was believed that she leaked 
 badly. Her battery was composed of one 11 -inch gun, one 
 9-inch and two heavy thirty -two pounders. Commander Fitz- 
 hugh then went up to Shreveport to secure such property as 
 belonged to the navy. The number of Confederate naval pris- 
 oners paroled by him at Alexandria was eighteen men and 
 six officers, including Lieut. Commander J. H. Carter. 
 
 The end had come, and it only remained for the Uuited 
 States to garrison important points on the Texan coast. Ad- 
 miral Thatcher reports this fact on June 8th, 1865: 
 
 " West Gulf Squadron, TJ. S. Flagship ' R R. Cutler,' ) 
 " Off Galveston, Texas, June 8th, 1865. f 
 "Sir : In my dispatch, No. 136, ■written at Mobile, linformed theDe- 
 partment that the Rebel Commissioners at Galveston had desired trans- 
 portation to New Orleans, to meet Gen. Canby, with aviewto arrange the 
 terms of surrender, and that I had directed such transportation to be fur- 
 nished. On the evening of the 38th of May, I arrived at New Orleans, 
 where I remained until the morning of the 5th inst., and, during that pe- 
 riod, had several official interviews with Colonel Ashbel Smith, the com- 
 mander of the defences of Galveston, who assured me that there would be 
 no opposition on Ihe part of the forces under his command or the people 
 to the occupation of Galveston by Jhe navy. On the morning of the 5th 
 I left New Orleans in the U. 8. steamer R. R. Cuyler, and arrived off Gal- 
 veston yesterday at 3 p. m. Capt. Sands then informed me that on the 
 3d inst. Maj. Gen. E. Kirby Smith and Maj. Gen. J. B. Magruder cameon 
 board the \i. 8. steamer Fort Jackson, where they were met by Brig. Gen. 
 E. J. Davis, representing E. R. 8. Canby, and the terms of surrender here- 
 tofore agreed upon between the representatives of Generals Smith and 
 Canby were signed by Gen. E. Kirby Smith. After signing of the articles 
 of surrender, Capt. Sands immediately took the necessary steps to buoy 
 out the channels, and on the 15th inst. proceeded inside the bar in the 
 Cornelia, followed by the Preston, and landed at Galveston, accompanied 
 by Commander Stevens, Commander Downs, and Lieut. Com. Wilson, and 
 had an interview with the Mayor, C. H. Leonard ; after which the flag of 
 the United States was raised on the Custom House, the citizens conduct- 
 ing themselves in the most orderly manner. The flag is now floating on 
 all the forts in the harbor ; but as we have not sufficient force from the 
 fleet to garrison the latter, I have decided the light-draft gunboats Cor- 
 nelia, Preston, and New London to remain inside the bar, where they will 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 531 
 
 be joined by the Port Royal. I have also given order to Commander Le- 
 roy, of the Ossipee, to convey with his vessel the troops which Gen. Canby, 
 it is hoped, will in a few days be ready to dispatch to occupy the different 
 ports on the coast already surrendered to the United States. Gen. Brown, 
 of the U. S. army, on the 1st inst., with a brigade, took possession of the 
 garrison at Brownsville. The other ports on the coast of Texas, which have 
 been heretofore blockaded by our vessels, are now held by the naval 
 forces. Thus blockade running from Galveston and the coast of Texas is 
 at an end. To-day I went on shore and had an interview with the civil 
 and miUtary aathorities, by whom I was cordially received, and, in con- 
 versation, these gentlemen expressed their anxiety for the restoration of 
 the old order of things, and reiterated their desire that a portion of our 
 naval force should remain in the harbor for their protection. On the visit 
 I was accompanied by Captain Sands and a part of my staff. 
 
 " Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 '' H. K. Thatchbb, Acting Rear Admiral, 
 
 " Commandinff the Western Ghilf Squadron. 
 " Hon. Gideon Welles, 
 
 "^ Secretary of the Navy, Washington,!). C." 
 
 The fate of sorae of the captured vessels, or the river 
 steamers used by the Confederates, remains to be told. 
 
 The Harriet Lane escaped from Galveston about May 5th, 
 1864, in company with the blockade-runner Isabel, the Alice 
 and a schooner. They were loaded with cotton. The Lane 
 went by the southwest channel and was discovered by the 
 U. S. steamer Katahdin, one of the blockading squadron, which 
 immediately gave chase and got within range. The Katahdin 
 fired four shots at the Lane without effect. The chase soon 
 became exciting, the vessels being at times so near each other 
 as to distinguish the men on deck. At daylight the Katahdin 
 discovered that she was not only chasing the Lane, but three 
 other vessels, all keeping together. All the day the chase con- 
 tinued, the Lane keeping well out of range, but the Alice get- 
 ting several shots and being compelled to throw her deck load 
 of cotton overboard and break up the timbers of the hurricane 
 deck to burn in the boilers. During the night the Harriet Lane 
 and Isabel were lost sight of about thirty miles off the west 
 coast of Louisiana, and the next day the two others escaped 
 owing to a head wind springing up, lessening the speed of 
 the Katahdin some two points and enabling the steamers to 
 outrun her. 
 
 The Isabel was captured by the blockading fleet while at- 
 tempting to enter Galveston Harbor on May 28th, 1864. She 
 was chased by the U. S. steamer Admiral, Acting Vol. Lieut. 
 Eaton commanding. The Federal vessel reports that the cap- 
 tain of the Isabel handled her " with great skill and desperate 
 courage, not surrendering until he had received two broadsides 
 at short range, every shot hitting his vessel and the fire from, 
 the small-arms of the Admiral literally driving the men from 
 the wheel." The Wave was taken about September 13th, 1863. 
 
 The John F. Carr, noticed in the recapture of Galveston, 
 while firing upon troops in Matagorda Bay was caught in a 
 gale, driven on shore and wrecked early in 1864, 
 
533 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The Federals captured in Texan waters many blockade- 
 runners, while still more escaped. Among the unfortunate 
 ones were the Spanish bark Teriseta; the Major Barbour, of 
 New Orleans; the blockader Cora, off Brazos, by the Quaker 
 City; the schooners Loward and Julia, by the U. S. steamer 
 Chocura; and the schooner Hurley. The Anna Dale was cut 
 out in Matagorda Bay by the boats of the U. S. steamer Penola. 
 She struck the bank, however, and was burned. The blockade 
 running schooners Pet and Annie Sophia were taken in Gal- 
 veston Harbor by boats crews from the U. S. steamers Prin- 
 cess Royal and Bienville. The noted blockade-runner Will-o- 
 the- Wisp, while attempting to get into Galveston on the night 
 of the 3d February, 1865, ran ashore and was wrecked. The 
 U. S. steamer Tennessee captured the British schooner Friend- 
 ship from Havana, and at the same time another schooner, 
 supposed to have been the Jane, of Nassau, was blown up. 
 The Cayuga captured off the Rio Grande the J. T. Davis, which 
 had run out from Galveston. 
 
 All these vessels were laden with cotton, stands of arms, 
 or an assorted cargo. 
 
 Others were captured of which we have no record, for 
 blockade-running was brisk and often profitable on the Texan 
 coast, and one letter from an officer on board the blockading 
 fleet mentioned ten blockade-runners in sight safe in harbor, 
 or awaiting an opportunity to run out. 
 
 Fighting improvised cotton-clads, manned by untrained 
 crews, against regularly armored and equipped steamers 
 manned by experienced sailors; pitting earthworks, with feeble 
 garrisons and insufficient cannon, against blockading vessels, 
 heavily armed and iron-clad — the success which attended the 
 Confederate operations in Texas waters is remarkable and 
 should be as memorable to their descendants as it was honor- 
 able to the brave men who planned and executed the capture 
 of Galveston and who fought the battles of Sabine Pass. 
 
CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 ALABAMA WATERS. 
 
 AMONG the earlier of the Southern States to sever con- 
 nection with the North, alive and vibrant with the im- 
 pulse for independence, the possessor of a broad water 
 frontage upon the Gulf of Mexico and its estuaries, and 
 threaded inland with navigable rivers, every political and geo- 
 graphical consideration induced Alabama to take an imme- 
 diate and intimate interest in the maritime operations of 
 the Confederacy. Her chief city was the second in rank 
 of the great cotton ports of America; it had maintained 
 an increasing and lucrative foreign and coastwise com- 
 merce, upon which its fortunes had been- principally built; 
 and, whatever might be the fluctuations of war, the con- 
 tingency that Mobile would become at some time the object of 
 the enemy's attack by sea could no more be overlooked than 
 could the value of the harbor for blockade-running purposes, 
 or the adaptability of the Alabama, Tennessee and Tombigbee 
 Rivers for the movements of inland flotillas. The alert and 
 comprehensive genius of the strong men who founded the 
 Confederate government, and formed its schemes of offence 
 and defence, was quick to take cognizance of the fact that 
 Alabama possessed, upon and within her hills, in vast abund- 
 ance, the raw materials of wood and iron needed for the 
 creation of ships and their armaments; and that even with the 
 lack of money, of sufficient dock-yard and machine-shop 
 facilities and of an adequate number of trained designers, 
 builders, mechanics and engineers, under which the Confeder- 
 ate States struggled, Alabama would be able to contribute in 
 a very important degree to their enterprises afloat. Her waters 
 were destined to become the theatre of naval conflicts of vary- 
 ing magnitude, culminating in that death-grapple of Titans 
 at the battle of Mobile Bay; of scores of gallant exploits of 
 seamanlike skill and daring; of marine raids by the adventur- 
 ous hunters and fishermen of these semi-tropical sounds and 
 bayous upon the enemy's transports and tenders, and of that 
 
634 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 side play of blockade-running which was a constant acoo-m- 
 paniment to the main drama of the war. 
 
 The primary location of the seat of the new government 
 at Montgomery, and the presence there of such famous oflScers 
 of the old navy of the United States as Rousseau, Tatnall, In- 
 graham, Randolph, Semmes, Farrand, Brent and Hartstene, in 
 consultation with the civil heads of the Confederacy upon ways 
 and means of placing the new flag upon the seas, of course 
 were influential in fixing the consideration of the people of 
 Alabama upon the subject. ' Quick upon the seizure by their 
 State authorities of the forts in Mobile Bay on January 13th, 
 1861, they had mooted this question of ships and guns, and in 
 the nature of things it could nowhere have been more a focus 
 of thought than in the seaport town of Mobile. In his ' ' Memoirs 
 of Service Afloat," Admiral Semmes writes that when he 
 reached there on April 19th, 1861, he found it "in a great state 
 of excitement. Always one of the truest of Southern cities, 
 it was boiling over with enthusiasm; the young merchants had 
 dropped their day-books and ledgers and were forming and 
 drilling companies by night and by day, whilst the older ones 
 were discussing questions of flnance and anxiously casting 
 about them to see how the Confederate treasury could be 
 supported." 
 
 It comes within the domain of those morally well-estab- 
 lished facts, the documentary proof of which is missing by 
 reason of the loss of early records, that Alabama, at this open- 
 ing hour of the struggle, was preparing to do her part for the 
 Southern navy. The first actual evidence we have of the 
 movement in that direction is the signing by the Governor on 
 November 8th, 1861, of a bill which had just passed the Leg- 
 islature, appropriating $150,000 "for the immediate construc- 
 tion of an iron-clad gunboat and ram in the bay or harbor of 
 Mobile." This bill had been framed by the Select Committee 
 on Harbor Defences, had been reported by Mr. Langdon, and 
 had been passed by both houses, and received the Governor's 
 approval within a week. Messrs. L. J. Fleming, P. J. Pillans, 
 Peter Hamilton, and Duke W. Goodman, of Mobile, and Lieut. 
 Johnson, C. S. N., were appointed commissioners to superin- 
 tend the work of construction and outfit, and special instruc- 
 tions appear to have been laid upon them by the Legislature 
 to proceed with all practicable speed. They partially com- 
 pleted a fighting machine of the type described, and this is, in 
 all probability, the vessel spoken of in the report of the joint 
 Congressional Committee of Investigation into the Navy De- 
 partment in the autumn of 1862, as "an unfinished iron-clad 
 ram turned over to the Confederacy by the State of Alabama," 
 as the State had not authorized of itself any other such ship 
 to be built. The onlj^ other ship-of-war which was in the pos- 
 session of Alabama in 1861 was the Federal revenue cutter 
 
 1 See chapter 111. tor details of the organization of the Confederate States navy in Alabama. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 535 
 
 Lewis Cass, which on January 3ist was surrendered to the 
 State by her commander, Capt. James J. Morrison, of Georgia, 
 and was regularly enrolled in the Confederate navy by a sub- 
 sequent transfer from the State to the general government. 
 On the 20th of the same month the Mobile Chief of Police 
 seized a small craft, the Isabella, which was loading at one 
 of the city wharves with fresh provisions for the Federal 
 fleet off Pensacola. In May, ]861, Col. Bonner, of Alabama, 
 was announced by the 'New Orleans Delta to have invented 
 "an iron-clad steam propelling battery for the defence of Mo- 
 bile harbor, which is much approved by Cols. Hardee and 
 Chase and by Major Leadbetter of the Confederate States 
 army." 
 
 The blockade went into force at Mobile, as at other ports 
 of the Confederacy, on May 38th, 1861, and in anticipation of 
 it the harbor was cleared of all shipping under foreign flags. 
 The first blockader to appear upon this station was the frigate 
 Powhatan, under command of Lieut. David D. Porter, who in 
 a communication, of May 28th, to James Magee, the acting 
 British Consul, consented that the Mobile tow-boats should be 
 used in taking out the British merchantmen in port, and added 
 "that " it would be better, if it can be done without injury to 
 British interests, to get the ships to sea as soon as practicable." 
 No incident entitled to historical notice marked this cessation 
 of the commerce of Mobile, and from this date until Farragut's 
 attack the port and town passed through three years of clos- 
 ure to marine intercourse^ broken only as the low, long, swift 
 ocean racers stole in under the guns of the sentinel fleet, with 
 cargoes of arms, ammunition and stores, and out again with 
 the cotton for which the great mills of Lancashire were wait- 
 ing. But these were not years of idleness or monotony in these 
 waters. The occasional chase of a blockade-runner by Federal 
 cruisers until the cannon of Fort Morgan stopped the pursuit, 
 the dashes of boat parties upon Federal craft, the strengthen- 
 ing of the fortiflcations, the work of laying the obstructions in 
 the channel and setting the torpedoes, and the building of the 
 squadron that finally confronted Farragut, made the war a 
 sharp and close reality to the dwellers upon the Mobile 
 shores, the soldiers and the sailors who hereabouts sustained 
 the honor of the Confederate cause. 
 
 For some months after the beginning of the war a tol- 
 erably regular communication was maintained between Mo- 
 bile and New Orleans through Mississippi Sound by merchant 
 steamers, but the enemy soon undertook to close this outlet. 
 Early in December 1861, the steamer Anna, engaged in this 
 trade, was made a prize by the gunboat New London, and as 
 this capture was soon afterward followed by that of the P. C. 
 Wallace, another trading steamer, other vessels abandoned 
 a line of travel that it had been found dangerous and un- 
 profitable to pursue. 
 
536 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 
 
 Actual fighting was opened in the neighborhood on Janu- 
 ary 29th, 1863, when one of the blockaders chased into Mobile 
 Bay the schooner Wilder, which had run the blockade with a 
 cargo of goods from Havana. Seeing the gunboat approach, 
 Capt. Ward, of the Wilder, set the British colors and beached. 
 his vessel. The Federals came up in launches, into which 
 they began to transfer the cargo of their prize, In the mean- 
 time word had been sent to Mobile, and Capt. Cottrill, who 
 commanded a company of rangers, hurried to the shore with 
 his men and opened fire upon the launches, which was returned 
 from their howitzers and small arms, and the Federal 
 steamer sent in several rounds of shot and shell. The launches 
 were driven off, but at night a Federal steamer came in and 
 towed the Wilder out. It was claimed by the Confederates 
 that Capt. Cottrill's fire killed twenty-five or thirty of the 
 enemy's party. Nine of their bodies were found upon the 
 beach, and one of their small boats, which was abandoned, 
 was pierced from stem to stern with bullets. 
 
 The first occasion of the interchange of the compliments 
 of shot and shell between the beleaguering fleet, the Confeder- 
 ate land defences and the Confederate flotilla, was on the fol- 
 lowing 3rd of April, when the latter made a reconnoissance 
 down the bay and drew the fire of the Federal gunboats, which 
 they briskly returned but without any injury being accomp- 
 lished on either side. Having consummated the object of the 
 movement, the Confederate steamers withdrew toward Fort 
 Morgan, and as they were followed by the enemy the batteries 
 of the fort opened on the latter, who were then quick to retire 
 to their stations off the bar. On the night of June 28th the 
 British steamer Ann ran the blockade from London via St. 
 Thomas and Havana, but being discovered by the Federals the 
 next morning before she could reach the protection of the guns 
 of Fort Morgan, her crew deserted her on the approach of two 
 Federal men-of-war, who easily effected her capture. Her 
 officers had endeavored to scuttle the ship, but her water-tight 
 compartments saved her, and thus the Confederacy lost her 
 valuable cargo of arms and war material. 
 
 On August 30th the Federal gunboat Winona ran up to- 
 ward Fort Morgan with a view to dropping shells over Mobile 
 Point upon a Confederate armed vessel lying inside. The 
 latter was in no position for an engagement, but the fort 
 directed so steady a fire upon the Winona as to compel her to 
 beat a hasty retreat. The distance, three and a half miles, 
 was too great for any execution to be done, but the little affair 
 served to demonstrate that Fort Morgan's artillerists had an 
 excellent range of the channel, and the enemy's gunboats were 
 thenceforth somewhat more chary of exposing themselves to 
 their fire. This incident preceded by but five days the perilous 
 and splendid rush o-f the Florida under Capt. Maffitt, ' through 
 
 1 See chapter upon the career of the Florida. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 537 
 
 the lines of the blockaders into Mobile, and taught them to 
 keep at a respectful distance from Morgan's batteries during 
 the four months they passed in waiting for Maffitt to repeat his 
 bold exploit on the reverse course by forging out to sea again. 
 
 After having refitted for sea at Mobile, the Florida cele- 
 brated the Christmas Eve of 1862 by a duel at long distance 
 with the Federal ship New London, steaming for that purpose 
 down to the westward of Sand Island, while her antagonist 
 took up a position on the gulf side of the bar at that point. It 
 was a lively afternoon spectacle for the garrisons and the 
 blockaders, and it gave Capt. Maffitt the opportunity he de- 
 sired of exercising his new crew at quarters and putting them 
 through their gun drill with an enemy as a target to practice 
 upon. The contemporary Confederate accounts report that 
 the Florida was not struck, but it was believed that three of 
 her shot took effect on the enemy. ' 
 
 Allusion has heretofore been made to the raids of boats' 
 crews of Confederates by way of Mississippi Sound upon 
 Federal vessels. Two that occurred in 1863 are particularly 
 deserving of special description, because of their success and 
 because they illustrate the daring spirit of the Mobile 
 watermen. 
 
 On April 6th, 1863, Capt. G. Andrews organized at Mobile 
 a raiding party for the mouth of the Mississippi, where they 
 arrived the next day in a ship's boat, armed with nothing 
 heavier than their revolvers. " So eager were they to take a 
 prize," says the Mobile Tribune, of April 10th: 
 
 " That they resolved to board the first vessel they saw, but she proved 
 to be the Illinois, with six guns and a crew of 400 men. Of course they 
 abandoned the purpose immediately. Shortly afterward they sighted the 
 transport steamer Fox, formerly the Whittemore, and used as a tow-boat 
 before she was taken from the Confederates. She was lying at a coal-yard 
 in Pass I'Outre. At night, when all was still on board, the brave fifteen 
 boarded her and made all hands (twenty-three) prisoners. She was in 
 command of Capt. Walker, who was formerly captain of one of the 
 Mobile Bay boats. They submitted to the capture peaceably. Steam, 
 was immediately raised, and the Fox, manned by both crews, (the prison- 
 ers as well as the captors worked her) was steered away to Dixie land 
 with the United States fiag flying at her masthead. She was not inter- 
 rupted until she attempted to come in by the Swash Channel at about 
 three o'clock, yesterday morning, when thirty shots were fired at her 
 from the blockading fleet. One struck the top of her smoke-stack and 
 another one of her masts, doing, however, no damage. She came on 
 until she got safely under the guns of Fort Morgan and arrived at the 
 city last evening about six o'clock. Her capture is certainly one of the 
 most daring and well-managed exploits of the war." 
 
 1 "All but these three were seen to strike the " The spectators say that the Florida's long 
 
 water, but the thousands ot eyes which watch- and terrible guns were admirably served, the 
 
 ed could not tell where these three went to if practice being excellent, placing the shot and 
 
 they were not stopped by the New Lmdan. She shell all around the mark, so close, in many 
 
 was evidently hit hard, for after backing out instances, as to apparently dash the water upon 
 
 of the fight she signalled the fleet, and one the Lincolnites* decks. The engagement is said 
 
 of them ran down and lay alongside of her for to have been a most animating and exciting 
 
 several hours, rendering aBsistance, it is sup- scene aa witnessed from the forts." — Mobile 
 
 posed. Evening News, Bee. iBlk, 1862. 
 
038 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The prize had on board 1,000 barrels of coal. The men 
 who assisted Capt. Andrews were C. W. Austin, M. Riddle, 
 John Brown, Daniel Kernan, R. Hill, Oliver Bowen, D. Mc 
 Miclde, Wm. Brown, Asbell Glenson, J. W. Jones, John 
 Connor, Thomas Nelligan and Charles Stokes. 
 
 One of the most daring exploits accomplished at this epoch 
 of the war in the waters of the gulf was consummated by 
 nineteen citizens of Mobile. Cotemporary records have pre- 
 served only the name of their leader, Capt. James Duke, 
 although it would have been a solid gratification to have 
 handed down to the future the names of the eighteen volun- 
 teers who joined him in the perilous, gallant and successful 
 expedition. Starting from Mobile about the middle of the last 
 week of May, 1863, they pushed through Mississippi Sound in 
 a small boat to the mouth of the Mississippi River. They car- 
 ried nothing but small arms, and it does not appear that they 
 liad any more definite object in view than to reconnoitre the 
 enemy's position and inflict upon him any possible damage 
 the opportunity for which might be presented. After lying 
 tliree days ambushed in. the swamps a few miles above Pass 
 r Outre light-house, they discovered at dusk of the evening of 
 June 9th the fine steam-propeller Boston coming up the river 
 and having in tow the ship Jenny Lind from Boston, loaded with 
 ice for New Orleans. Speedily embarking his men on their 
 little boat, Capt. Duke in a few moments laid her alongside of 
 the Boston, whose commander had not the most remote sus- 
 picion of the presence of a foe in a region patrolled by Federal 
 gunboats. Before he could make any movements toward de- 
 fence the Mobile men had boarded him with drawn revolvers 
 and compelled his surrender. Capt. Duke cut the hawsercon- 
 necting the Boston with the ship and with his prize stood 
 down the river. The next day he captured the bark Lenox, 
 Capt. Cole, from New York for New Orleans, took off the offi- 
 cers, crew and a portion of the passengers, sent the others on 
 shore and burned the vessel and her cargo of general mer- 
 chandise. Then he stood out to sea, safely passing under the 
 guns of the blockading fleet, and on Sunday, June 14th, came 
 up with the bark Texana, Capt. Wulff, also from New York 
 for New Orleans, with a miscellaneous cargo and a quantity 
 of arms. She, too, was boarded and fired; but Capt. Duke 
 was now so encumbered with prisoners that he set all her 
 people on shore except the captain and mate. On the 17th, he 
 brought the Boston to the wharf in Mobile, having run the 
 gauntlet of the Federal ships in the bay without injury. He 
 landed eighteen prisoners and turned his prize over to the 
 Confederate government, which subsequently made good use 
 of her. Besides adding this serviceable steamer to the scanty 
 naval strength of the Confederacy, the ships and cargoes 
 destroyed by Capt. Duke's command were valued at $200,000. 
 The merit of his enterprise was properly recognized in Mobile, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 539 
 
 and the skill and courage of himself and his companions 
 highly applauded. Their daring is attested by the fact that 
 in the Mississippi they were for several hours within speaking 
 distance of the Federal sloop-of-war Portsmouth, and half an 
 hour previous to their capture of the Boston a gunboat had 
 passed up within gunshot of them. The newspapers of the 
 day speak of the expedition as having been fitted out by Julius 
 Buttner, a citizen of Mobile. 
 
 These cool and plucky dashes into the enemy's confines 
 liad an inspiriting effect upon the military and naval de- 
 fenders of Mobile, as affording an indication that notwith- 
 standing the weakness of the Confederacy upon the waters, 
 and the immense resources of the Federals, the latter were 
 not invulnerable against bold hearts and ready hands. 
 
 A hitherto unwritten chapter of the war in the Mexican 
 Gulf is that which must record in fitting language the recon- 
 noisance of Pensacola, made by Lieut. James Mc C. Baker, ' 
 of the Huntsville, and his brother Page M. Baker, Master's 
 Mate of the Tuscaloosa, and their subsequent project to cap- 
 ture Fort Pickens, which was thwarted by the hesitation of 
 their superior officers. The preliminary scout was an achieve- 
 ment that could only have been carried through by cool men 
 utterly devoid of fear, and the scheme which grew out of it 
 was phenomenal for its shrewdness and possibilities of success 
 •even in the days when men who wore the Confederate uniform 
 
 1 James Mc C. Baker entered the Confederate him in the temporary liospital established on a 
 service early in the war as a member of Drew's flatboat above Fort St. Philip. After the dis- 
 biittalion, and on January 23d, 1862, was trans- persinn or destruction of all the Confederate 
 f erred to the Washington artillery ; but very soon squadron except the Louisiana and McRae, Lieut, 
 afterward was appointed Acting Master in the Baker says, engineers and mechanics, by work- 
 -Confederate navy and ordered to report to Com- ing day and uij;;lit, put the irou-clad into work- 
 modore Whittle, in command at New Orleans, ing and fighting trim; and Baker, learning that 
 hy whom he was assigned to the iron-clad Commodore Mitchell contemplated taking her tu 
 Louisiana, then recently launched and still un- Mobile, offered himself as pilot. " I am glad to 
 finished. As her screw engines were not in know you are a pilot," responded Mitchell, " as 
 position and the recess wheels alone were in- I may need yourservices." On April 26th he was 
 sufficient to propel her, she was towed down the placed in command of the Burton, and ou the 26th 
 Mississippi and moored on the bank above Fort participated in the council of ofilcers called by 
 St. Philip to aid in the defence of the river Mitchell that decided to destroy the Louisiana 
 against the Federal fleet. Alongside of her was after hearing of the surrender of the forts. Early 
 'placed the river steamer W. Burton as quarters on the morning of the 28th Lieut. Baker says he 
 for the officers and crew, and the tug iaTwiis was was ordered to report to the commodore, and 
 -close at hand with a company of artillery de- as he presented himself on board the Louisiana 
 taUed to assist in serving her battery. When Chief Engineer Youngblood stepped up and re- 
 •I'arragut's ships advanced to the attack, Lieut. ported that the auxihary propeller engines were 
 Baker hastened from the Burton to his station ready and the whole machinery in running 
 on the Louisiana, making way for Commodore order. Lieut. Wilkinson, wuo had already re- 
 Mitchell to precede him on the ladder that celved orders to destroy the ship, asked 
 reached the deck, where Mitchell took his stand Mitchell, in Baker's presence, "What shall I 
 •and passed his Orders through Baker to the offl- do !" And the commodore after some hesitation 
 cersbelow. The floornotbeinglaid, Baker sup- replied: "Go on •«'ith the work." Baker was 
 ported himself astride a scantling in the pilot- then directed to have the Burton ready at a mo- 
 house, and when a Federal ship fouled with the ment's notice to take the crew off the Louisiana. 
 Louisiana during the battle the shock knocked All but those engaged in the destruction of the 
 him from his place and he fell through to the iron-clad were transferred to the tender, and 
 ^eck. As he rose to his feet, Lieut. John Wil- Mitchell, with Wilkinson, Ward and other ofli- 
 kinson, in charge of the forward division, or- cers soon followed, leaving the Louisiana iu 
 dered him to inform Lieut. Ward, who was aft, flames fore and aft. The Burton was headed for 
 to look out for the Federal vessel as she swung the opposite shore, w^here Baker made her fast, 
 around on the starboard side of the iron-clad. and the Louisiana blew up in the position where 
 The commander of the Louisiana, Capt. Mcln- they had left her. Discovering that the com- 
 ■'tosh, was mortally wounded while iu the act of modore had dispatched Lieut. Whittle to sur- 
 throwing a fire-ball on this vessel, and Baker renderthecommand, he requested permission to 
 "was detailed to take him ashore, where he placed effect his escape, and was the only oflcerorthe 
 
540 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 played the most desperate chances if there seemed to be stake 
 on the board of war that might be won. 
 
 On March 20th, 1864, Master's Mate Page M. Baker for- 
 warded to Gen. Butler, C. S. A, , his draft of a plan for the cap- 
 ture of Fort Pickens by means of a boat expedition to start 
 from Mobile Bay with 150 men, pull along the beach 35 miles 
 to the mouth of Perdido River, where they would lie con- 
 cealed until the following night, and then row to the head of 
 the Grand Lagoon, whence they would haul the boats over the 
 strip of land, but 30 yards wide, that divides the lagoon from 
 Pensacola Harbor, and would be close upon the fort. Mr. 
 Baker had given careful attention to the danger of being 
 detected by the sentries, and in the sketch submitted to Gen. 
 Butler he had pointed out that in all probability they could 
 make their landing without attracting the attention of the 
 solitary sentinel outside the fort; and he had ascertained from 
 previous prisoners in Pickens that there was usually but one 
 sentry on the parapet, a second at the gate and a third inside 
 the gate at the guard-room. He added : 
 
 '* Having landed we would* proceed as cautiously as possible to the 
 east face of the fort, and endeavor to effect our entrance through the em- 
 brasures, which are generally left open. Should they be closed, by means 
 of ladders carried with us, in sections, we would mouiit to the parapet 
 and descend to the centre of the fort by the stairways very fortunately at 
 this point. Once inside, it would be our object to secure the garrison, 
 consisting of from 150 to 200 men. For this purpose we would send a large 
 detachment to the men's quarters on the west side of the fort where they 
 
 Louisiana who escaped falling into the hands of the last course holding out the posaibilitiea of 
 
 the enemy after she was abandoned. Lieut. the most brillant achievement and important 
 
 Murdock, Acting Master Gift and a young vol- resulte. " I feel no hesitation," Lieut. Baker has 
 
 unteer named Wilkinson had permission to leave written, " in advancing the theory that Mitchell 
 
 the ship before she was destroyed and went might have fought his ship, for in a conversation 
 
 ashore on the east bank. Lieuts. Arnold and with Admiral Buchanan on the subject, the ad- 
 
 Bowei), and a few others who left the Burrow with miral expressed surprise that he had not done 
 
 Baker after Lieut. Whittle had started on his so." 
 
 errand, were all captured by the Federal pickets Another contribution by Lieut. Baker to the 
 
 on shore. Baker and Mr. Deariug. Chief En- verification of events in* connection with this 
 
 gineer of the Burton, effected their escape by engagement, is his denial of the intimation 
 
 crawling around the picket. Baker reached New made by Admiral Porter that after the Lmisi- 
 
 OrleauB on May 1st, and on the 3d left for Mobile, ana was set on fire she was sent adrift in order 
 
 from whence he reported tQ Secretary Mallory, that she might float down amongst his mortar 
 
 who inquired of him by telegraph whether the schooners and communicate the flames to thenj, 
 
 Louisiana had been destroyed, the wording of In support of this assertion Porter declared that 
 
 the dispatch causing him to infer that up to that when she blew up she was so near the Harriet 
 
 time the Secretary had only heard rumors of La-nx. that the concussion made that vessel heel 
 
 what had occurred after the battle on the over, throwing the officers, himself included, 
 
 river. from the seats which they were occupying in th© 
 
 Baker was ordered from Mobile to Georgia, cabin. Baker states that at the moment of the 
 
 and served some time at Columbus and at the explosion the Burton was much nearer than Ihe 
 
 navy-yard in Early County during the building Harriet Lane to the Louisiana, and no such ahak- 
 
 of the iron-clad at Columbus, Ga. He was af- ing up was felt on his steamer. The iron-clad, 
 
 terwards transferred to Mobile, and, as a first in fact was left by her ofBcers at the spot which, 
 
 lieutenant, was included in the surrender of she had occupied since tbe day when she joined 
 
 May 10th, 1865, at Nanna Hubba Bluff. the Confederate squadron, and there was no 
 
 Lieut. Baker's condemnation of the destruc- idea in the minds of her officers of setting her 
 
 tion of the ionmaTMi is very emphatic. Three adrift as a fire-ship. But Admiral Poi-ter's mor- 
 
 lines of conduct, in his opinion, were open to tar fleet had proved a good deal of afailure; the- 
 
 Commodore Mitchell, the pursuit of either of Federal honors had been won by Farragut, and 
 
 which, in his opinion, would have immortalized to represent himself as in danger from the 
 
 him. The first was to compel Gen. Duncan to Louisiana was a means of attracting public at- 
 
 hold the forts when he proposed to sun-ender; tention to himself. 
 
 second, to nm the gauntlet of the Federal fleet Lieut. Baker now resides in New Orleans, and 
 
 and make his way to Mobile; third, to steam up is captain of the steamship /fwicftinson belonging 
 
 the river and attack Farragut's wooden ships, to the Southern Pacific Company. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 541 
 
 sleep with their arms stacked. Another detachment would seize the relief 
 guard just inside of the sate (also asleep,) and a third the officers in their 
 quarters on the south side. You will observe there is no boat on the east 
 or south side of the fort. There are usually from 18 to 30 vessels lying off 
 the yards, and I have understood by letter recently from Pensacola that 
 JFarragut had removed most of their crews to man his fleet off Mobile; be 
 that as it may, they would fall an easy prey with the fort once in our pos- 
 session. At and around the navy -yard there is a force of about 3,500 men, 
 including one negro regiment. Should Gen. Canby move down with the 
 force under his command and invest the yard, they being cut off from all 
 relief must necessarily surrender. As we would need men who could be 
 lelied on in any emergency, I would request permission to select volunteers 
 and men who have .been tried under fire. We would necessarily need a 
 number of men accustomed to heavy artillery in order to man the guns. 
 It would be necessary also to take several days' provisions." 
 
 If the design of going outside from Fort Morgan to the 
 mouth of the Perdido was considered too hazardous, Master's 
 Mate Baker presented the alternative of reaching Perdido 
 Eay from Bon Secour by, hauling the boats over the interven- 
 ing tongue of land a mile and a half w^ide. In submitting the 
 plan to Gen. Butler he hoped that it vyould be approved, and 
 asked the general's influence with those who had the power to 
 aid hi-m in the undertaking. On April 30th, an order was issued 
 by Admiral Buchanan to Lieut. Jas. McC. Baker, that he 
 should proceed with all possible dispatch to equip a boat for 
 an important reconnoissance, and another order on the suc- 
 ceeding day informed him that the object was to reconnoitre 
 from Mobile to Pensacola by water with the view to ascertain 
 whether it would be practicable to capture Fort Pickens with 
 a sufficient force by a boat expedition. " You will, therefore" 
 "the admiral continued, "proceed to Pensacola in one of the 
 Morgan's cutters, taking with you Acting Master's Mate Page 
 M. Baker, C. S. N., and a crew of ten men M-ith ten days' 
 provisions. Confidence is placed in your judgment and dis- 
 cretion to make this reconnoissance and to be careful of your 
 men." 
 
 Lieut. Baker and Master's Mate Baker had the cutter 
 ■equipped for the expedition by Monday evening, April 25th, 
 but took with them only eight seamen. They carried the 
 boat nearly a mile across the land from Bon Secour Bay to the 
 gulf and launched her through the breakers — three men re- 
 maining in the boat, and the others, entirely nude, shoving 
 outside until the breakers were passed, when she was bailed 
 out and all hands taken aboard again. They were then six- 
 teen miles east of Fort Morgan and could" plainly see the 
 blockading fleet as they stepped their mast and set sail for 
 Port Pickens. It was Baker's purpose to run direct into the 
 mouth of Perdido River, but a gale that had been blowing 
 from the southwest for several days created on Perdido Bar a 
 sea that nearly swamped the cutter, which with ten men in 
 her was constantly running her gunwales under water; and as 
 "they could not get into Perdido they kept a course directly for 
 
643 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Pickens and passed the fort in the bright moonlight about 
 three o'clock a. m. of the 26th, going very near to the beach. 
 A few miles to the eastward a large sloop was sighted at 
 anchor and was promptly boarded and captured. She proved 
 to be the fishing-smack Creole, of New Orleans, ninety tons 
 burden, commanded by Capt. Benj. Lancashire, and having 
 as crew F. Miller, John McDougal, Bernard Brandon and 
 Edward Stafford, the last named of whom claimed to be a 
 discharged Confederate soldier, captured on the blockade- 
 runner Alice Vivien, en route for Havana.^ 
 
 The captain and crew of the Creole were completely dazed 
 by being captured, and could not imagine from whence had 
 come the craft that had made prisoners of them in the Federal 
 stronghold in the Western Gulf. They were sent below and 
 the hatch closed upon them, while the venturesome Bakers 
 and their men concealed their cutter, arrayed themselves in 
 the clothes of fishermen, and headed the Creole for Fort Pick- 
 ens, passing so near that in their disguise they spoke to the 
 guards, made a minute examination of the approaches to the 
 fort from the gulf, noted the positions of the sentinels, and 
 were delighted to find that there would be no difficulty in 
 landing a force of men on the beach and effecting an entrance 
 either through unguarded sally-ports or by means of scaling- 
 ladders — the moat on the sea-face of the fort having been 
 entirely filled up with sand. Their observations completely 
 confirmed the feasibility of the plan which Page M. Baker had 
 suggested for the capture of the post, and the reconnoissance 
 could not have been more thorough and satisfactory. 
 
 After making notes of every point upon which informa- 
 tion was desirable, the Creole was headed eastward along 
 Santa Rosa Island. A sail was descried, and concluding that 
 it was a vessel from New York or Boston bound for New Or- 
 leans with Federal army supplies, Lieut. Baker stood out to 
 sea so as to intercept and capture her. Everything was put 
 in readiness to send to her a boat's crew of the Confederate 
 seamen wearing the fishermen's attire and carrying arms 
 concealed beneath their garments. When they were nearly 
 in position and waiting for the vessel's approach, Lieut. Baker, 
 who had gone to the mast-head, discovered that she was an 
 armed steam-cruiser, having all sails set, burning hard coal 
 and coming along like a racehorse. The Creole was quickly 
 
 ' Lient. Baker prepared on board the Creole, as it is. I will be compelled to bum vessel at 
 
 ■while lying off Phillip's Inlet, a dispatch to Ad- this point, and make our way overland to Mo- 
 
 miral Buchanan, conveying valuable informa- bile. I tmat my course will meet with yourap- 
 
 tion gained from Capt. Lancashire concerning probation, as I have done what wider thecir- 
 
 the movements and disposition of the Federal cumstances seemed best and what necessity 
 
 vessels at Pensacola and New Orleans. " Our forced upon me. Should an opportunity present 
 
 provisions are running short," he wrote, " but itself on my return, I will finish the reconnois- 
 
 should the wind, which has been blowing con- sance which unfavorable weather has permitted 
 
 stautly from the westward, change in our favor, me to only make in part. It is probable I shall 
 
 I will endeavor to make my way back to Mobile see you before this reaches Mobile. In the 
 
 Bay, either by running the blockade or hauling event of our capture, however, this will give 
 
 ourcutter into Little Lagoon, etc., etc., in which you intelligence of our whereabouts and what 
 
 case I'll destroy vessel. Should the wind hold we have done up to this time." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 543 
 
 put about and headed in shore and measures taken to con- 
 tinue her masquerade as a peaceful fishing craft. The cutter 
 was hauled close under her bow and so fixed as to be cut away 
 and sunk at a moment's notice: dinner, which was just ready, 
 was ordered served on deck; the U. S. flag was conspicuously 
 displayed; and when the gunboat, coming uncomfortably 
 near, stopped her engines and critically surveyed the sloop, 
 the latter was in outward appearance the most innocent and 
 inoffensive fishing-smack ever seen. The cruiser's officers 
 stared at her through marine glasses, while the rifiemen in 
 the tops peered over and seemed anxious to try the effect of 
 their fire. A prolonged and careful scrutiny satisfied the 
 Federals that the Creole was all right, though she was sus- 
 piciously distant from the fishing grounds, and they then 
 went on on their course. The prisoners, who were safely 
 stowed away below, and whose expectations of release had 
 been raised to the highest pitch, were much cast down when 
 they discovered that the cruiser had gone without sending a 
 boat aboard. 
 
 Lieut. Baker sailed the Creole along the coast for nearly 
 two weeks in the hope of catching favorable winds to enable 
 him to run back to Mobile; but after waiting so long in vain, 
 and the sloop being slow in any wind, he concluded to destroy 
 her and make the best of his way overland to Mobile with his 
 men. She was burned in St. Andrew's Bay, Florida, and the 
 cutter was transported eighty miles across the land to Mari- 
 anne on ox- wagons furnished by the salt-makers along the 
 coast. ' From Marianna the party proceeded to Chattahoo- 
 chee Landing, on the Chattahoochee River, where they took 
 a steamer to Columbus, Ga. , going thence by railway to 
 Montgomery, at which point they launched their cutter, which 
 they had carried with them during their circuitous journey, 
 and made their way, by sailing and rowing, to Mobile. Ad- 
 miral Buchanan was much surprised to see them, and espe- 
 cially proud that they had brought back the cutter, which he 
 had warned them they would lose, but which Lieut, and 
 Master's Mate Baker had determined they would bring back 
 to Mobile at any cost. Four of the prisoners of the Creole 
 were permitted to escape when the sloop was burned, but one 
 man insisted on being taken to Mobile, where he said he had 
 friends. 
 
 The battle with Farragut's fieet on August 5th blocked the 
 immediate execution of a covert attack on Fort Pickens, but 
 did not cause Lieut. Baker to forget the project. On August 
 4th he submitted the proposition to Gen. Higgins, reviewing 
 the original plan proposed by Page M. Baker and claim- 
 ing that the reconnoissance had established its practicability: 
 
 ^Lient.Ba,kermentionsinhisreporttoAdmiral wagon hauling salt, and who has iindly offered 
 iiuchanan: " Mr. Broxton, a citizen of Alabama, to haul a seine of 90 fathoms and a new manilla 
 whom we accidentally met at this point with his hawser of 160 fathoms, to a place of safety." 
 
§44 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 "By the arrival of Mr. Newman [he wrote], who escaped from Fort 
 Pickens on Friday last, I have obtained information concerning sentinels 
 and garrison which leaves no doubt in my miind of the success of an 
 attack on the fort if attempted at the present time. There are in the fort 
 for garrison duty three companies of the Seventh Vermont, numbering 
 in all 100 men, in command of Major Allen. There are but two sentinels, 
 one on the parapet on the east face of the fort and one at the gate oppo- 
 site Barrancas. In view of this fact, I earnestly desire to obtain permis- 
 sion to attempt the capture of the fort, and should you approve the pro- 
 ject, would request your influence with the admiral, in order to have me 
 detached for that purpose. I would require but three or four boats carry- 
 ing about fifteen men each, with their arms, and five days' provisions. In 
 seven hours after leaving the lagoon we can reach the fort, so that start- 
 ing about 5 P. M. we would arrive about midnight. The enemy have now 
 withdrawn all their large vessels for an attack on Mobile, and their atten- 
 tion is wholly diverted from Pensacola. In the event of the capture of 
 the fort, with the immense amount of ammunition, stores, etc., there and 
 at the yard, the force of the blow here would be broken, as the enemy ob- 
 tain all their supplies from that point. Having already reconnoitred the 
 route, I feel confident in asserting its entire feasibihty and think it would 
 greatly relieve Mobile. Mr. Newman is an engineer whom I have long 
 known, is intelligent and trustworthy. He is well known by naval men, 
 and very anxious to accompany me on this expedition." 
 
 Gen. Higgins indorsed this communication: "I think a 
 diversion might be made in the manner proposed if the neces- 
 sary oflficers and men can be obtained"; and Gen. Maury's in- 
 dorsement was: "I approve of attempting this if the proper 
 outfit can be procured." Both these indorsements were made 
 on August 6th, the day after the battle. The removal, within 
 a few days succeeding, of Admiral Buchanan and other cap- 
 tured Confederate officers to Pensacola, stimulated the ambi- 
 tion of Baker to make a descent on Fort Pickens, for it might 
 include the recapture of the beloved admiral and those who 
 had shared his misfortune. Having secured the favorable 
 judgment of Higgins and Maury, he expected that Commo- 
 dore Farrand, who had succeeded to the naval command at 
 Mobile, would furnish him with the men and boats for the ex- 
 pedition; but on August 16th he received from Lieut. W. T. 
 Key, secretary of Admiral Buchanan, and who now occupied 
 the same office under Commodore Farrand, a missive that 
 broke rudely upon his lofty aspirations to do a grand deed for 
 the Confederacy. Key wrote him: 
 
 Tour letter to me, and communication to the commodore enclosed, 
 was received on Saturday evening. On Sunday (yesterday) I handed 
 it to him when he was at leisure, and said and did everything I could to 
 get him to give his consent to the proposed expedition; but all in vain. I 
 am disheartened at the way in which this project, one so perfectly feasi- 
 ble and practicable in all its bearings, ha,s been suffered quietly to be 
 passed over by the authorities that be ; and this particularly after it re- 
 ceived the full and entire endorsement of both the generals, and Commo- 
 dore Buchanan especially. 'Tis no further use, I aid sorry to say, to push 
 this matter with Commodore Farrand, as he is now decided that we can- 
 not go; if you think it would be right to telegraph the Hon. Secretary of 
 the Navy, do so; but be certain before you do so that you receive not a 
 reprimand for presuming to address him without sending your communi- 
 cation through your commanding officer, and thereby the whole plan 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 545 
 
 fall through. I do not know that it -would do so; you know best. I am 
 truly sorry to blight your hopes, but the truth must be told — the expedi- 
 tion will not be allowed to embark by the commodore. I am as sorry as 
 you are; and if you should go by consent of a higher authority, I also 
 ■will endeavor to go with you." 
 
 Baker endeavored to stride over the obstacle interposed 
 by Farrand's supineness by making an appeal to Secretary 
 Mallory. ' His letter of August 18th to the head of the Navy 
 Department inclosed the proposition submitted to Gens. Maury 
 and Higgins, and pointed out how easily the garrison of 100 
 men in the fort might be surprised by an inferior force in con- 
 sequence of the small number of sentinels on duty and the 
 abandonment of Fort McRae. In this communication the 
 daring sailor told Mr. Mallory that the generals had proffered 
 him all the men and arms necessary, and that Farrand " also 
 approved of the project, and indeed ordered me to make the 
 necessary preparations, but afterwards concluded that he 
 could not well spare my services at this juncture." 
 
 " Mr. Newman Pie continued] says there are immense stores of pro 
 visions, medicines, ordnance, etc., both in the fort and at the yard. In 
 the event of our succeeding. Gen. Maury would send a co-operating force 
 by land against the yard, which being assailed in front and rear, must 
 necessarily surrender. The reinforcements we would receive in the pris- 
 oners (numbering some fifty) would enable us to hold the fort without a 
 doubt. 
 
 "Believing, sir, that the capture of this place would be of incalcu- 
 lable advantage to us at this time, giving us, as it would, open port, and 
 distracting the attention of the enemy from more vital points, together 
 with the probability of recapturing our noble admiral and the ofBcers 
 confined there, I most respectfully and earnestly request that jfou will 
 detach myself and brother for the purpose of undertaking this expe- 
 dition. 
 
 " Having already reconnoitred the projjosed route, and being per- 
 fectly familiar with the coast and the localities in and around the fort, I 
 feel confident in asserting the feasibility of the enterprise.'' 
 
 Their proposal received at Richmond the respectful con- 
 sideration to which it was entitled, and Commodore Farrand 
 was overruled by the higher authority. It was referred by 
 Secretary Mallory to President Davis, who approved it and 
 directed Gen. Braxton Bragg to co-operate in its execution. 
 
 1 While holding the Fort Pickens' expedition it and consented to their detail for the work, 
 in view, Lieut. Baker and hia brother also had but his habitual timidity overcame him af ter- 
 in contemplation a project to destroy one ves- ward, and on August 27th he instructed Lieut. 
 Bel or more of the blockading fleet with torpe- Myers, of the Huntsville, to " inform Lieut, 
 does. They were to place a spar torpedo in a Jaa. McG. Baker, and request Lieut. Command- 
 row-boat and pull out on a dark night to the ing Chas. P. McGary, of the Tuscaloosa, to in- 
 ship selected for destruction. Lieut. Baker was form also Ms brother, Master's Mate Page M. 
 to keep the boat in position, while Master's Baker, that, upon due deliberation, lam in- 
 Mate Baker was to dive overboard with the duced to withhold the verbal permission given 
 torpedo, swim under the side of the ship, and them a few days since ' to destroy by torpedo, 
 endeavor to explode it below her water-line. in the manner proposed, any of the enemy's 
 The merest statement of such a design is all vessels in the bay," considering the whole 
 that need be said to carry conviction of the de- scheme from beginning to end impracticable 
 votion and heroism of these two young officers. and attended with too great personal risk and 
 They desired to attempt the task alone, being danger to the person or persons using the 
 unwilling that anyone else should venture into torpedo. They will therefore dismiss all 
 the peril which it involved. When it was first thought of it and return to their respective 
 proposed to Commodore Farrand he sanctioned duties." 
 
646 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 On September 26th, 1864, Mr. Mallory wrote to Lieut. Baker a 
 letter marked " Confidential," and saying: 
 
 " Your plan is approved. Flag-officer Farrand is in- 
 structed to take all necessary measures for fitting out the 
 expedition and securing its success, and he will promptly con- 
 fer with you. * * * My instructions as to secrecy must be 
 rigidly observed. Your success must depend upon a surprise. 
 I earnestly trust, as well for yourself, ofiicers and men as 
 for the country, that there will be no failure." 
 
 The Secretary inclosed a communication from Gen. Bragg 
 suggesting that one modification in the plan seemed advisable 
 to him. That was to rely solely on effecting an entrance at 
 the sally-port. '" But a small party," he wrote, " would suffice 
 for the ruse, whilst the main force was thrown by scaling- 
 ladders immediately into the fort, over the wall opposite Fort 
 McRae. This point is easily approached, is near the landing- 
 place, and is the lowest part of the wall. It could be scaled 
 by light ladders transported in the boats, which can be carried 
 readily by two stout men. It will afford me pleasure to order 
 the necessary assistance and co-operation from the land forces, 
 and to direct a movement in the diversion whenever the naval 
 expedition shall be in readiness." 
 
 In pursuance of Secretary Mallory's authorization, Farrand, 
 on October 6th, issued orders temporarily detaching Lieut. 
 Baker from the Huntsville and directing him to report for fur- 
 ther instructions. Five days later Baker announced that he 
 was ready to prepare the boats, and requested that they should 
 be turned over to him as soon as possible, and on the 12th he 
 made the following formal requisition upon the flag-officer: 
 
 "In accordance with your order, I beg leave respectfully to submit 
 to you the following statement: 1 will require the following boats, barge 
 and launcli at navy-yard, first cutters of Morgan and SuntsviUe, launch 
 and first cutter of Nashville, with their fixtures, and six wagons with 
 good teams to transport same from Shell Banks to Ross Point; also five 
 officers and 125 men— one-third sailors, the balance heavy artillerists, if 
 possible, armed with revolvers and some short, effective gun ; carrying 
 witli them seven days' cooked rations, two ladders, forty feet long, in sec- 
 tions of ten feet; six axes, lines for lashing and material for muffling oars 
 will be needed. AU to be ready in ten days from date." 
 
 On the same day he informed Secretary Mallory that he 
 had reconnoitred and would adopt the route suggested by 
 Gen. Bragg; that the boats, with fixtures, ladders, etc., would 
 be ready by the 19th, the moon serving about that time; but as 
 Commodore Farrand and Gen. Maury had so small a force 
 that they did not like to spare the men, he applied for an order 
 tliat would enable him to procure them without delay. The 
 necessity thus imposed upon Baker by the commanders at 
 Mobile • of communicating with the sources of authority at 
 Richmond at every step of his undertaking had already 
 caused valuable time to be wasted, and this refusal of Farrand 
 and Maury to provide him with the aid that it was most 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 547 
 
 unquestionably intended by President Davis, Secretary Mallory 
 and Gen. Bragg that he should have, without calling for fur- 
 ther orders from Richmond, prevented him from starting on 
 the 19th, as he had anticipated doing. However, the Confed- 
 erate government supported him, and on the aoth Gen. Maury 
 notified Gen. Liddell, commanding the Eastern Division, Dis- 
 trict of the Gulf, that Lieut. Baker was authorized to receive 
 100 volunteers from the Fifteenth Confederate cavalry regi- 
 ment for a special and dangerous service, and he recom- 
 mended that a portion should, if possible, come from each 
 company. The regiment named was in the brigade com- 
 manded by Col. R. McCoUock, whose headquarters were at 
 Greenwood, Ala., and on the 31st Baker was informed that 
 McCollock approved of the project of obtaining volunteers. 
 On the 24th, Gen. Maury wrote to Lieut. Baker a letter which 
 to an appreciable extent explains his attitude toward the ex- 
 pedition. In it he said: 
 
 "Having discharged my whole duty, and perhaps more, in laying 
 before you my views of your proposed operations, I will now aid you as 
 far as I can in their execution. Confer fully with Gen. Liddell, who will 
 CO opei-ate with you as he best can. I regret that my forces are so much 
 reduced as to prevent me from sending to Gen. Liddell any troops from 
 this point. I would not be justified in doing so. I earnestly hope com- 
 plete success will attend you, and I desire to express my respect for the 
 energy, eonfldenoe, tenacity and courage you have evinced. I beheve if 
 . your future movements be conducted with secrecy, you wUl capture the 
 fort, and in that case yours shall be aU the credit." 
 
 Fickle fortune seemed to smile at last upon the expedition. 
 Lieut. Baker and his brother had obtained the steamer Dick 
 Keys, and on October 24th he notified Farrand that they 
 would start that night for Blakely, transporting the boats 
 thence in wagons to Ross Point on the Perdido River, from 
 whence it would be easy rowing to Fort Pickens. Once in 
 possession of the fort, he was to signal the land forces that 
 were to co-operate. They did not, however, get away from 
 Mobile until the next evening and had only reached the bay 
 when their ardent hope of making a great coup for the Con- 
 federacy were blasted by the receipt of an order that they 
 should proceed no further. They returned to Mobile, and on 
 November 1st Lieut. Baker made the annexed report to Sec- 
 retary Mallory: 
 
 "I beg leave respectfully to report that on the evening of the 25th 
 ult. I left this place in the steamer Dick Keys, with five launches, fixtures 
 complete, two scaling ladders in sections, wagons, teams, etc. 
 
 " We landed at Blakely, at 9 P. M., where I found my men, 100 in 
 number, awaiting me. The better to conceal our movements, started at 
 once under cover of night. At this time I received an order from Brig. 
 Gen. Liddell, commanding me to suspend the expedition temporarily, by 
 order from Maj. Gen. Maury, who had heard of a heavy force of the en- 
 emy being landed at the navy-yard. Upon receipt of this I encamped 
 in an obscure spot, oflf the road, three miles from Blakely. On the 30th 
 ult. news was received by the general of the falsity of the rumor, and I 
 immediately requested permission of Gen. Maury to move forward. He 
 
548 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 again ordered a temporary suspension of the expedition, as he was not 
 fully prepared to co-operate and feared the enemy had obtained informa- 
 tion of the movement. I remonstrated against the delay, stating the im- 
 possibility of the enemy having obtained such information, since not even 
 the men in my command were aware of my destination, but the men being 
 under his control I was compelled to acquiesce. He advised that the men 
 be returned to their respective companies, so as to give the impression of 
 the move being abandoned; and on a given day suddenly ordered back, 
 when the expedition might proceed, he thought, with more secrecy and 
 certainty of success. This has been done, and I have left the boats on the 
 wagons concealed, and under cover with a guard in charge of Master's 
 Mate P. M. Baker. Had I been allowed to proceed without delay, I feel 
 confident we should have met with success. It is greatly to be regretted 
 that the men could not be obtained from the navy, as in that case they 
 would have been under my constant control and this delay avoided. I 
 would respectfully suggest that if possible sailors be procured for the en- 
 terprise. The generals commanding have recently received intelligence 
 that besides the vast quantities of stores, munitions of war, etc., always 
 at the yard, the enemy have accumulated there immense supplies for 
 Sherman's army. Inclosed you will find a letter to me from Gen. Maury 
 which unfortunately did not reach me until other orders had been issued. 
 As soon as the general is ready to co-operate, I will proceed to carry out 
 the plan without delay." 
 
 A week elapsed, and at its end, instead of receiving the 
 renewed instructions to move on to Pensacola that he was 
 pleading for, Baker was peremptorily commanded by Farrand 
 to withdraw from the undertaking. Nothing but his duty to 
 obey a superior officer could have compelled him to abandon 
 a project on which his courageous heart was set and which 
 promised such magnificent results. He did not forego his 
 scheme, however, without making to Secretary Mallory an in- 
 dignant protest against the vacillating counsels that had em- 
 barrassed and ultimately checked him. His last official com- 
 munication was addressed to Mr. Mallory, from Mobile, on 
 November 9th, and was as follows: 
 
 " I beg leave respectfully to report that while acting under orders 
 from the Department, bearing date Richmond, September 26th, 1864, and 
 while awaiting near Blakely, Ala., the co-operation of Maj. Gen. Maury, 
 I received enclosed communication from Flag-officer Farrand, order- 
 ing my return with boats, officers, etc., to this point. I obeyed the order, 
 and now respectfully enter my protest, as I conceive myself stiU under 
 orders from the Department. Furthermore, that upon reporting to 
 Flag-officer Farrand, I was ordered to relinquish the expedition, and re- 
 turn to my ship for duty. Inclosed you will also please find communi- 
 cation from Maj. Gen. Maury ordering a temporary suspension of the 
 expedition." 
 
 The Secretary of the Navy responded, under date of Nov- 
 ember 24th, with a note which closes the narrative: "Maj. 
 Gen. Maury," he wrote to Baker, " having withdrawn his men 
 from the enterprise to the command of which you were as- 
 signed, its prosecution became impracticable. It was Capt. 
 Farrand's duty therefore to issue to you the order of which ;^ou 
 complain, and against which your protest, for the protection 
 of either your own or the public interests, was unnecessary 
 and irregular. I regret that circumstances beyond the control 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 549 
 
 of the Department or yourself should have thus terminated an 
 enterprise which seemed to promise good results." 
 
 It was never questioned at the time or since that the pri- 
 mary cause of the thwarting of the expedition wa,s the opposi- 
 tion of Flag-oflBcer Farrand, who grudgingly consented to it 
 under the positive orders of Secretary Mallory, and even then 
 placed obstacles in its way that delayed it, and in the end 
 brought it to naught. The whole plan of operations had been 
 formulated before Admiral Buchanan was taken prisoner; it 
 had seemed to him practicable and praiseworthy, and we may 
 concur in the belief of Lieut. Baker and Master's Mate PageM. 
 Baker that if he had remained in command of the Confeder- 
 ate naval forces at Mobile, they could have been encouraged to 
 go ahead and furnished with whatever assistance they needed. 
 But Farrand only nominally filled Buchanan's place, and this 
 grand conception of taking a fortified place by a bold dash 
 was more than his spirit could grasp. The youthful officers 
 whom he restrained on the verge of their enterprise have been 
 vindicated as to the judgment which they displayed in formu- 
 lating and organizing the proposed assault. They felt that 
 they could take Fort Pickens, and since the restoration of 
 peace, Page M. Baker, now the honored editor of the New 
 Orleans Times- Democrat, has been informed by the officer 
 in command of the post in the summer and autumn of 1864, 
 that they would, beyond peradventure, have succeeded in 
 capturing it by the movement which they proposed. This 
 confirmation from their former enemy of the foresight and 
 wisdom of their plans renders it all the more regretful that 
 official timorousness balked them. To have taken this im- 
 portant post in the gulf, with its immensely valuable stock 
 of arms and munitions of war, to have released the valiant 
 Buchanan arid to have regained Pensacola and the navy- 
 yard would have been of vast benefit to the Southern cause 
 both in the moral and the material aspect, and justified the 
 assent given to the enterprise by the President, the Secretary 
 of the Navy, Gens. Bragg and Maury. That it was created in the 
 mind of Page M. Baker is an instance of the eminent genius 
 for the brilliant surprises of war frequently exhibited by young 
 men of the Confederacy in the face of the excessive strength of 
 the enemy, that partly sufficed to neutralize their superiority. 
 
 In anticipation of the assault by the Federal fleet that 
 had been threatened ever since the capture of New Orleans, 
 Admiral Franklin Buchanan had been assigned to the com- 
 mand of the Confederate naval force at Mobile and was 
 gathering a squadron of some respectable power. ' 
 
 1 "We are informed from pretty good author- built and equipped to aid in the defence of Mo- 
 
 ity that Admiral Buchanan, who has just re- bile. A crack raft, with a powerful battery and 
 
 turned from a trip of observation downtiie bay, picked crew, ably and gallantly commanded, is 
 
 determined upon an order which will materially the addendwn. This is the avant amrier of 
 
 add to the strength of the ileet which has been four other floating engines of war which will 
 
550 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 In June 1863, he had ready for operations the iron-clad 
 ram Baltic, the steam gunboats Morgan, Gaines and Selma, and 
 the tender Crescent. The history of the Baltic is somewhat 
 obscure, and there are no known details of her armament and 
 characteristics. She may have been the former coasting 
 steamer of that name altered for purposes of war, and it is 
 again possible that she was the vessel alluded to in a former 
 paragraph of this chapter as having been partially built by the 
 State of Alabama and then turned over to the Confederate 
 government. The lack of Confederate records renders any 
 precise determination of her identity impossible. 
 
 The squadron was officered as follows at this time : 
 
 Ram Baltic, flag-ship of Admiral Franklin Buchanan — Lieutenants, 
 Jas. D. Johnston, Wm. P. A. Campbell, John Grimball; Second Lieuten- 
 ants, Geo. A. Borohett, E. G. Read, A. G. Hudgins; Surgeons, John T. 
 Mason, Wm. P. Carrlngton ; Assistant Paymaster, M. M. Leay; Masters, 
 Ivey Foreman, H. W. Perrin; Midshipmen, S. P. Blanc, F. B. Dornin, T. 
 J. H. Hamilton, E. A. Swain ; Engineers, W. M. Fauntleroy, G. Simpson; 
 Gunners, W. H. Hayues, D. G. McComb. 
 
 Gunboat Morgan — Commander, C. H. McBlair ; Lieutenants, C. J. 
 Graves, Thomas L. Harrison ; Assistant Surgeon, Edwin G. Booth ; As- 
 sistant Paymaster, R. L. Mackall'; Midshipmen H. H. Scott, T. G. Gar- 
 rot, John A. Wilson, H. H. Tyson, James R. Norris, F. Arthur; Engineer, 
 H. B. Willy. 
 
 Gunboat Gainbs— Commander, T. T. Hunter; Lieutenants, John W. 
 Bennett, Hilary Cenas ; Assistant Surgeon, T. B. Ford ; Assistant Pay- 
 master, J. E. Armour; Master, E. C. Stockton; Midshipmen, J. A. Merri- 
 weather, James M. Gardner, D. D. Colcock, W. D. Goode, W. H. Ster- 
 ling, James H. Dyke, W. F. Clayton. 
 
 Gunboat Selma— Lieut., P. U. Murphy; Midshipman, J. B. Ratchffe. 
 
 One of the largest naval stations in the Confederacy was 
 located at Selma, on the Alabama River, where in the spring 
 of 1863 five gunboats were in process of construction. The 
 senior officer on duty at this point was Commander Ebenezer 
 Farrand, associated with whom were First Lieut. Van E. 
 Morgan, Assistant Paymaster G. H. O'Neil, Master John Pear- 
 son, First Assistant Engineer Wm. Frick and Carpenter John 
 T Rustic. Besides these the following attaches of the Mobile 
 station did frequent duty at Selma: Lieuts. John R. Eggles- 
 ton and Alphonso Barbot, Paymaster Thomas R. Ware, Mid- 
 shipman Wm. S. Hogue and Gunner Benjamin F. Hughes. 
 Surgeons Lewis W. Minor and O. S- Englehart were attached 
 to the Mobile station. The ablest naval designers, engineers 
 and ordnance officers in the Confederate service visited Selma 
 from time to time to assist in the construction and armament of 
 the vessels there fitted out. 
 
 The remainder of the year 1863 passed away in naval 
 inactivity around Mobile so far as actual hostilities were 
 
 soon take tbeir station in the bay, and oppose splendid aptitude for fighting on terra firma. 
 
 their iron sides to the iron shot of the Federal Whether we gain these additions to our navy 
 
 navy. Tlie Federals will find out, after awhile, through cracks in the enemy's blockade, or by 
 
 that 'some things can be done as well as others, ' other means, we leave him to find out or to 
 
 and that Southern men may develop a genius for infer." — Mobile AdvertUer, December 27th, 1862. 
 
 naval construction and warfare, as they liave a i Died August 11th, 1863. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY 551 
 
 concerned. Admiral Buchanan was kept on the constant alert 
 by the reports that Farragut was coming at last, and as became 
 so sagacious a commander he busied himself with the various 
 projects of obstructing the channel and placing torpedoes in 
 position that occurred to his keen judgment and fertile inven- 
 tion. He was too wise to underrate the strength of the enemy 
 as compared with the meagre naval equipment of the Con- 
 federacy, but his experience in handling the Virginia in the 
 battle of Hampton Eoads had imparted to him much con- 
 fidence in that type of fighting machine and he therefore ex- 
 erted himself in speeding the work upon the iron-clads then 
 building at Selma and Mobile. None but himself and those 
 nearest to him could comprehend the immensity and difficulty 
 of the task of putting afloat even one ship that might cope 
 with the monitors which the ship-yards of the North were 
 turning out with all the rapidity that unlimited money, plant, 
 material and workmen could secure. On that side were all 
 the advantages that invention, science and resources could 
 confer, while from laying the keel of a ship to installing her 
 engines and guns there was not a step at which the Confeder- 
 ate officials were not halted, embarrassed and almost thwarted 
 by their poverty in every appliance that should facilitate their 
 labor. No man can claim to have a truthful understanding of 
 the war who, in studying any of its phases, does not view 
 them by the light of the facts of this vast disparity between 
 the combatants, and it of course follows that the Confederates 
 are to be judged by the obstacles which they overcame rather 
 than by those that proved to be insurmountable. 
 
 On February 23d, 1864, the operations of the Federal 
 fleet for the destruction and capture of the seaward defences 
 of Mobile began. Before proceeding with the narrative of the 
 attack it is proper that an accurate description should be given 
 of the approaches to Mobile by water and of the fortifications 
 which guarded the channels. 
 
 The city is situated thirty miles from the Gulf of Mexico 
 at the head of the Bay of Mobile, the width of which varies 
 from fifteen miles at the lower end to six: at the upper. The 
 principal entrance is by the Swash Channel, which trends at 
 first northeastward from the gulf and closely skirts Mobile 
 Point, a long, low projection from the mainland on the east. 
 On the west side of the bay is Dauphine Island, the eastern- 
 most of the chain which bounds Mississippi Sound, the en- 
 trance to which is by Grant's Pass, which makes into the bay 
 at the northern side of the island. Because of the deflection 
 of the ship channel to the northeast it is fully three miles dis- 
 tant from Dauphine Island. The most important of the land 
 defences was Fort Morgan, built upon the western extremity 
 of Mobile Point to command the channel, and occupying the 
 site of old Fort Bowyer, which on September 15th, 1814, gal- 
 lantly repelled the attack of a British fleet. Fort Morgan was 
 
552 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 a pentagonal bastioned work, built of brick and intended to 
 carry guns both in casemates and barbette, but the Confeder- 
 ates had masked the embrasures of the curtains facing the 
 channel and thrown up an exterior water battery before the 
 northwest curtain. The main fort mounted seven 10-inch, 
 three 8-inch and twenty -two 32-pounder smooth-bore guns, and 
 two 8-inch, two 6.5-inch and four 5.82-inch rifled cannon. 
 
 DIAOBAM OF MOBILE BAY. 
 
 Twenty-nine more guns were placed in the exterior batteries, 
 the most formidable of which was the water battery, which 
 was armed with four 10-inch Columbiads, one 8-inch rifled gun 
 and two rifled 32-pounders. 
 
 On the eastern extremity of Dauphine Island, three nau- 
 tical miles west-northwest from Fort Morgan, stood Fort 
 Gaines, like Morgan constructed of brick. It was of second- 
 ary importance as a defence of the port, and its armament 
 
COMMANDER RICHAED L. PAGE, 0. S. N. 
 
 AliSO BBIGADIEB GENEBAL, O. S. A. 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 553- 
 
 consisted of but twenty-seven guns, of which three were 10-inch 
 Columbiads, four were rifled 33-pounders, and the remainder 
 smooth-bore 33's, 34's and 18's. Fort Morgan was commanded 
 by Brig. Gen. R. L. Page, ' and its garrison numbered 640 
 ofBcers and men. The commander of Fort Gaines was Co!. 
 Charles D. Anderson, and it was garrisoned by 864 officers 
 and men. 
 
 On Tower Island, a diminutive sand hummock at the 
 mouth of Grant's Pass, the Confederates had begun the con- 
 struction of a battery named Fort Powell, which, although it 
 never reached completion, mounted a 10-inch and an 8-inch 
 Columbiad and four rifled guns. These three fortifications 
 made up the land defences of Mobile Bay, and we have now 
 to take a look in detail at the squadron under Admiral Bu- 
 chanan's command. 
 
 His fiag-ship was the iron-clad steam-ram Tennessee, with 
 the exception of the Arkansas, destroyed upon the Mississippi 
 River, the most formidable vessel of her class that ever car- 
 ried the Confederate flag. The Tennessee was 309 feet in 
 
 ^^^^ 
 
 p,-^. 
 
 THE O. a, RAM "TENNESSEE. 
 
 length, with an extreme beam of 48 feet, and carried her bat- 
 tery in a casemate or shield amidships 79 feet long and 29 feet 
 wide, inside dimensions. Her frame was composed of yellow 
 pine beams, 13 inches thick, set close together vertically and 
 planked with 5^ inches of yellow pine in horizontal courses, 
 and 4 inches of oak in vertical courses. Within, the yellow 
 pine frames were sheathed with 2^ inches of oak. The 
 outer walls of the casemate were inclined at an angle of 45 
 degrees from the deck, and on this 25 inches of wood backing 
 was laid the plate armor, which was 6 inches thick on the 
 
 J Gen.Eichiird L.Page was bom in Virginia, and 
 entered theU. S. navy as midshipman on March, 
 12th, 1824, being assigned to the line of battle- 
 ship North Carolina, of the Mediterranean squad- 
 ron. In 1827 he was transferred to the frigate Con- 
 sHtutim, and in 1828 returned to the United States 
 to complete his studies. Between 1830 and 1834 he 
 served in the sloop Concordin the Mediterranean, 
 and the echooDer Fox a,t Baltimore. He received 
 hiBlieutenant'scommission March 26th, 1834,and 
 was made executive officer of the schooner En- 
 terprise, in which he remained upon the East 
 India station until the autumn of 1837, alter 
 which he was granted two years' leave of absence. 
 Prom 1830 to 1841 he was attached to the frigate 
 Macedonian of tbe West Indian squadron, and 
 the succeeding two years he spent at the Nor- 
 folk naval rendezvous, going to sea again in 1844- 
 45 on the sloop Plymovth, of the Mediterranean 
 squadron. In 1845 he was ordered to the line-of- 
 battle-ship Pennsylvania, at Norfolk, and the next 
 
 year was selected as executive officer of the frig- 
 ate Ind^endence, flag-ship of Commodore Shu- 
 brick, of the Pacific squadron, in which he re- 
 mained during the Mexican war. On his return 
 home in 1849, Lieut. Page was again detailed to 
 the Norfolk rendezvous, and in 1851 was select- 
 ed for special ordnance duty in company with 
 the then Commander Farragut. In 1852 he waa 
 assigned to the command of the brig Perry, and 
 was on duty with the African squadron until 
 July, 1854, when he was made executive officer 
 at the Norfolk navy-yard. On September 14th, 
 1855, he was promoted to commander and was- 
 appointed Assistant Inspector of Ordnance at 
 i^is navy-yard, where he remained until after 
 tbe inauguration of President Bncbanan in. 
 1857, when be was ordered to the command 
 of the sloop Germantown, and attached to the: 
 East Indian squadron. He remained with this, 
 squadron until April, 1860, when he was re- 
 called to the position of ordnance officer at the 
 
554 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 forward wall, and elsewhere 5 inches thick, and was fastened 
 to the wood with bolts IJ inch in diameter that went entirely 
 through the wall and were secured by nuts and washers on 
 the inside. The outside deck was plated with two inches of 
 iron. A curious arrangement of the casemate was that its 
 sloping sides were carried down two feet below the water- 
 line and then reversed at the same angle, so that they met the 
 hull seven feet under water. This projection was carried out 
 around the bow, where it was fashioned into a spur or ram. 
 The pilot-house stood on the forward edge of the casemate, 
 and was in fact made by building it up some three feet. 
 There were ten ports, two on each side, three forward and 
 three aft, so arranged that the pivot guns could be fought in 
 broadside, sharp on the bow and quarter and on a direct line 
 with the keel, but the ship never had more than six guns. At 
 each end she carried a Brooke 7g-inch rifled gun on pivots, 
 capable of throwing a solid projectile of 110 pounds' weight. 
 There were also four Brooke 6-inch rifles in broadside, each 
 firing a 95-pound solid shot. 
 
 So far the Tennessee was a credit to her builders, but she 
 had avoidable and unavoidable defects that proved to vastly 
 impair her efficiency in action. One avoidable defect was the 
 manner of constructing the port shutters which revolved upon 
 a pivot and were fatally apt to be jammed in an engagement. 
 Another and greater blunder was that the rudder chains were 
 exposed upon the after-deck, where they were at any moment 
 liable to be shot away. Of the defects that could not be 
 avoided the worst was her lack of speed. Her engines were 
 not built for the ship, but were taken from the high-pressure 
 river steamboat Alonzo Child; and though on her trial trip, in 
 March, 1864, her speed was set down at eight nautical miles 
 per hour, she could not make more than six with her battery, 
 ammunition and fuel on board. 
 
 Yet, taken in all, the Tennessee was a fighting machine of 
 which the Confederacy had a right to feel proud. She was as 
 apt an illustration as the whole war produced of the triumph 
 
 Norfolk navy-yard. He resigned from the navy established the ordnance and construction depot 
 of the United States as aoou as his native State at Charlotte, N. C, which under his adminis- 
 had seceded, and was appointed an aide on the tration became of inestimable value to the Con- 
 staff of Governor Letcher,ofVirginia,withspecial federacy. For nearly two years he continued in 
 reference to the organization of a State navy. The charge of this important post, the only iuter- 
 f ortifications at the mouth of James River, the rnption being an assignment to the command of 
 defencesofNansemond River and those of Pagan the naval forces at Savannah, during which 
 Oreek were constructed under his direction. service he was with Commodore Tatnall in the 
 Upon the formation of the Confederate govern- gunboat Savannah at the naval battle of Port 
 ment, he entered the Confederate States navy. Royal; chence returning to the Charlotte station, 
 June 10th, 1861, and received the commission he was detached from the latter, and ordered to 
 of commander in the navy, and acted as ordnance the command -of the outer defences of Mobile 
 officer at the Norfolk navy-yard until the evacu- Bay, mailing his headquarters at Fort Morgan, 
 ation of the place by the Confederates. During This new field of duty necessitated his transfer 
 the battles of the iron-clad Virginia in Hampton from the navy to the army, in which be was 
 Roads he volunteered for service at the Sewell's commissioned brigader-general. After the sur- 
 Point battery in working the 11-inch gun against render of Fort Morgan he was held prisoner by 
 the Federal ships. After the evacuation of Nor- the Federals until September, 1865, when he 
 folk. Commander Page was promoted to the was released. He now resides at Norfolk in the 
 rank of captain, and with the mechanics and enjoyment of a vigorous old ftge, after his many 
 machinery reniovcLl from the Norfolk shops years of honorable naval and military service. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 555 
 
 of dauntless energy over a host of obstacles, and it can never 
 cease to be a subject of wonder and admiration that Southern 
 builders and seamen, crippled in every department of con- 
 struction and outfit, could have wrough't their little available 
 material to so good a purpose. She was built at the naval 
 station at Selma, in the winter of 1863-64, and so expeditiously 
 was the work done upon her that when her keel was laid, 
 some of the timbers to be used in her were still standing in 
 the forests, and much of what was to be her plating was still 
 ore in the mines. In March 1864, Commander J. D. Johnston 
 was assigned to duty as her captain by Secretary Mallory, and 
 began preparations to take the ship to Mobile. The great prob- 
 lem was to float her over Dog River bar mud flats, on which 
 there were but nine feet of water at high tide. This was ac- 
 complished by placing on either side of her keel wooden 
 tanks or caissons, called by sailors camels, which, when 
 pumped free of water, were sufficiently buoyant to lift the 
 Tennessee five feet. Thus she was carried over the bar, and 
 on May 18th, all ready for action, she steamed down to the lower 
 
 DIAGRAM OF THE C. S. RAM "TENNESSEE. 
 
 bay and hoisted her ensign full in the gaze of Farragut's sail- 
 ors. Admiral Buchanan proposed that night to give the en- 
 emy a brush, but after dark the Tennessee was found to. be 
 hard and fast aground, and he was compelled to abandon his 
 intention. She was officered as follows : Admiral, Franklin 
 Buchanan; Captain, James D. Johnston; Lieutenants, Wm. 
 L. Bradford (also Executive Officer), A. D. Wharton, E. G. 
 McDermott; Masters, J. R. Molry and H. W. Perrin; Engi- 
 3ieers, George D. Linning, J. C. O'Connell, John Hayes, Oscar 
 Renson and Wm. B. Patterson; Paymaster's Clerk, J. H. 
 Cohen; Master's Mates, W. A. Forrest, Wm. Beebe and R. M. 
 Carter; Boatswain, John McCredie; Gunner, Herman L. 
 Smith. The crew numbered 110 men. 
 
 In addition to the Tennessee the Confederate squadron 
 ■consisted of three small gunboats: Oaines, J. W. Bennett, 
 Lieut. Commanding; Morgan, George W. Harrison, Com- 
 mander, and Selma, P. U. Murphy, Commander. All were 
 unarmored except for small spaces around the boilers, where 
 a, few inches of light iron plating had been put on in order to 
 ■afford some protection to the boilers and machinery. The 
 Morgan and Gaines had been hastily constructed by the Con- 
 federate government ; their frames were of unseasoned wood 
 
556 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 and their engines were entirely too small for their tonnage. 
 The Selma was an open-deck river steamer that had been, 
 hurriedly altered into a gunboat. The Morgan carried two 7- 
 inch rifles and four 32-pounders; the Gaines, one 8-inch rifle 
 and five 33-pounders ; the Selma, three 8-inch old fashioned 
 Paixhan shell guns and one venerable smooth-bore 33-pounder 
 that had been rather clumsily rifled and was not reliable for 
 close shooting. 
 
 The defence of Mobile was not entrusted entirely to the 
 forts and ships. From Fort Gaines a line of closely-planted 
 piles stretched southeasterly along the sand-reef in the direc- 
 tion of Fort Morgan, the heads of the piles being just visible- 
 at low water. Where the reef formed the western edge of the 
 channel the piles terminated, their use being to prevent any 
 light-draft vessels from crossing the flats, but from this 
 point a triple row of torpedoes was buoyed across the channel 
 and ended at a red buoy distant less than 800 feet from the 
 water battery of Fort Morgan. Thus there actually existed 
 only an open passage not much more than a hundred yards- 
 wide through the channel. This had been left unobstructed 
 as a means of ingress and egress for blockade-runners, who 
 were enabled to navigate it by means of lights displayed from 
 Fort Morgan. ' 
 
 The Confederate torpedo service at Mobile was somewhat 
 elaborate. About 180 torpedoes are said to have been planted 
 in the bay in anticipation of Farragut's advance. One kind 
 •was made of tin in the form of a cone. The greater diameter- 
 was filled with an air chamber, which floated upward and 
 carried a cap and trigger intended to be fired by a slight blow 
 like that from a passing vessel. The lower compartment con- 
 tained the charge, which so communicated with the cap that 
 the explosion of the latter would reach it. The other class of 
 torpedo was made of a barrel or beer keg, pitched to make it 
 water tight and with wooden cones secured to the top and bot- 
 tom to steady it. It was filled with powder and completed by 
 the attachment of half a dozen sensitive primers, which 
 would explode by concussion and transmit their flame to the 
 charge. When prepared with care these torpedoes were much 
 the more reliable as the caps of the can torpedoes got out of 
 working order by long exposure to the action of the water. 
 
 In January, 1864, Admiral Farragut began feeling his: 
 way toward an attack on Mobile, and on February 23d he 
 opened the bombardment of Fort Powell at Grant's Pass, with 
 his mortar-boats and light-draft vessels that had been able to 
 come up from Mississippi River by way of the sound. For 
 three days the "bummers" and gunboats poured their shot 
 and shell upon the fort without doing it any injury, or so much 
 as wounding one of its garrison, while on the other hand the 
 
 1 It -wag originally contemplated that in case of ing in it hnlbs laden -with stones; bnt for soma 
 an attack tliia entrance sliould be closed by sink- reason this plan was never carried into effect. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 557 
 
 fire returned by the Confederates was equally ineffective. Dur- 
 ing this harmless duel the Morgan, Gaines and Sehna man- 
 <Bvred about in the vicinity of Grant's Pass, but found no oppor- 
 tunity for the exercise of their guns; and the Tennessee laid at 
 rest close to Fort Morgan. The attack was indeed intended 
 only to prevent the Confederates from detaching any of the 
 iorces around Mobile for service against Sherman, who was at 
 "that time making his raid into Mississippi. ' 
 
 We have now pursued the succession of events in and 
 around Mobile up to the consummation of the plans which the 
 Federal government had for two years been maturing for an 
 attack from the sea upon the forts and Admiral Buchanan's 
 squadron. Ever since Admiral Farragut's capture of New 
 Orleans public opinion in the North, no less than the judgment 
 •of the Washington authorities, had selected him as the com- 
 mander under whom should be attempted the reduction of the 
 last stronghold and fleet remaining to the Confederates upon 
 the Gulf of Mexico; and his government was prepared to fur- 
 nish him with whatever overwhelming force of men and ships 
 he might deem requisite to crush the South at this point. Fully 
 aware of the tremendous odds that were to be brought against 
 them, Admiral Buchanan and Gen. Dabney H. Maury, the 
 military commander at Mobile, threw all their energies into 
 strengthening their squadron and their lines of resistance; but 
 there was literally no single phase of their schemes at which 
 they were not compelled to struggle against their woeful defi- 
 •ciency in everything except the valor of men and the skill of 
 officers that brings to the highest efficiency fleets and armies. 
 For instance, if the resources of the Confederacy had been 
 anywhere near equal to the demand upon them, Buchanan, in- 
 stead of being compelled to rely so largely upon the Tennessee 
 with which to oppose Farragut, would have been able to swing 
 into his line of battle the Nashville, and perhaps two or three 
 other iron-clads and gunboats that were lying unfinished at 
 Selma and Mobile because the government was unable to com- 
 plete them. Speculation upon what might have been the re- 
 sult of the battle of Mobile Bay if Buchanan had been rein- 
 forced by these ships may be useless at this late day, but it at 
 least presents an open question when we recall the great pre- 
 ponderance of power that was required to overcome the Ten- 
 nessee alone and oblige Buchanan to strike his flag. ^ 
 
 1 Deserters who about this time escaped from in passing Forts St. Philip and Jackson, the 
 
 "the Confederate lines reported that Admiral Nashville and Tennessee were to blockade the 
 
 Bnchanan contemplated a dash npon the Missis- river at Southwest Pass while the squadron from 
 
 «ippi River and New Orleans with his fleet. the Bed River attacked the city ; and in case 
 
 According to their story he was only waiting for they were repulsed they were to move up the 
 
 the completion of the iron-clad NashviUe to Mississippi and blockade it between New Orleans 
 
 .attempt this movement. The programme was and Natchez. If such a movement as this was 
 
 said to be that the Tennessee and ICashville, assist- ever proposed it was frustrated by the appear- 
 
 «d by the iron-clads from the Red River, should auce of Farragut's fleet in the Bay of Mobile 
 
 proceed up and down the Mississippi, while the and the necessity imposed upon Admiral Bu- 
 
 troops from Mobile, Gen. Magruder's and Gen. ohanan of meeting the enemy there. 
 Dick Taylor's commands, were to make a land 
 
 attack at the same time. If the iron-clads failed 2 Correspondents of the Northern papers added 
 
558 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Farragut's attack was delayed for several weeks because 
 he was waiting for his monitors to arrive. He had no notion 
 of exposing his wooden ships alone to the chances of the 
 combat, and it is, moreover, a very reasonable supposition 
 that in his requisitions upon his government for iron-clads he 
 was, to a certain degree, influenced by the exaggerated re- 
 ports afloat in the North of the formidable character of the 
 Tennessee. ' 
 
 Still another reason for Farragut's delay was the disar- 
 rangement of the Federal plans for the co-operation of the 
 army in the movement against Mobile. Grant had assumed 
 in March, 1864, that Banks' expedition up the Red River 
 would be a success, and had consequently ordered that after 
 returning from the Red River, Banks should move against 
 Mobile with 30,000 men, to which he expected to add 5,000 
 from Missouri. But instead of enjoying the anticipated mili- 
 tary promenade in Louisiana and Arkansas, Banks was re- 
 pulsed in a manner most humiliating to himself, and from his 
 shattered columns had no troops to spare for a diversion that 
 had Mobile as its objective. Consequently, Gen. Canby, the 
 succ essor of Banks, was so hard pushed by the Confederate 
 army under Gen. Dick Taylor, that he was unable to carry out 
 Grant's instructions, and was compelled to content himself 
 with sending a couple of thousand men under the command of 
 Major Gen. Gordon Granger and Brigadier Gen. McGinnis to 
 invest Fort Gaines; these, on August 3d, were landed on Dau- 
 phine Island in the rear of the fort and under the cover of the 
 guns of Lieut. J. C. P. DeKraft's flotilla of light-draft gunboats. 
 
 Farra.gut had formed his plan of battle as far back as 
 July 12th, when he issued a general order regarding the manner 
 in which his fleet should attempt the passage of the forts. In 
 this he provided that the wooden ships should be lashed in 
 couples; that all should open fire as fast as their guns could 
 be brought to bear; that short fuses should be used for the 
 shell and shrapnel; that grape should be fired as soon as a 
 range of 300 or 400 yards was obtained, and that disabled ships 
 must be helped by their consorts. In a subsequent order of 
 July 29th, he instructed his captains to take care to go to the 
 east of the easternmost buoy in order to avoid the triple line 
 of torpedoes, which, as we have previously explained, termi- 
 nated at the buoy which he mentioned, leaving clear water 
 
 to the Confederate squadron "a cigar-Bhaped appearance of confidence on tbe part of the 
 
 torpedo boat," that, according to their letters, writers, that if she were ever permitted to es- 
 
 " was sunli in the lower bay by the explosion of cape from Mobile Bay, every port of the North 
 
 ller boiler." would be at her mercy. They constantly urged 
 
 upon the Navy Department that if the most de- 
 i These reports are amusing reading twenty- plorable catastrophes were to be averted, Ad- 
 two years after tile close of the war. In the miral Farragut should have at his disposal 
 view of the correspondents of Northern news- evei-y iron-clad that could be spared from iui- 
 jiajiers accompanying Farragut, the Tennessee perative duty elsewhere, and Secretary Welles 
 Avas tile most destructive engine ■ of war that was scorched and slashed with criticism because 
 had ever floated. Her speed, her armor and her of his seeming indiffei^nce to the portentous 
 battery were exaggerated to the most remark- possibilities to the North threatened by this 
 able degree, and it was predicted, with all the solitary Confederate ship. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 559 
 
 between that point and Fort Morgan. No resources of inge- 
 nuity were left unexhausted to strengthen the wooden ships. 
 On one of them, the Richmond, three thousand bags of sand 
 were used in building a barricade from the port bow around 
 the starboard side to the port quarter, and in various shapes 
 this expedient was adopted on other vessels. Chain cables 
 were hung over the sides to protect the engines and boilers, 
 and the coal in the bunkers was shifted to where it might 
 catch shot coming in a line toward the boilers. 
 
 On the evening of August 4th the monitor Tecumseh, the 
 last iron-clad for which Farragut had been waiting, steamed 
 into the bay, and the morning of the 5th dawned with the con- 
 ditions which the Federal admiral desired — a flood-tide to help 
 his ships past the Confederate guns and a westerly wind to blow 
 the smoke of battle away from the fleet and in the direction of 
 Fort Morgan/ At 5:30 o'clock his wooden ships were double 
 banked in the prescribed order, and before six the four monitors 
 and the fourteen wooden ships were under way, the golden 
 summer sun of this semi-tropical clime shining from cloudless 
 skies as the prows of this formidable naval array, which could 
 not then have been exceeded by any nation in the world, cut 
 the lapping waves of the bay. They steamed in the following 
 order, the Hartford being the flag-ship of Admiral Farragut : 
 Monitors— Starboard Oolumis^. 
 
 Tecumseh 1,034 tons — 3 guns, Commander T. A. M. Craven. 
 
 Manhattan " " " " " J. W. A. Nicholson. 
 
 Winnebago 970 tons— 4 " " Thomas H. Stephens. 
 
 Chickasaw " " " " Lieut. Comr. George H. Perkins. 
 
 Wooden S^ps— Port Column. 
 
 Brooklyn 3,070 tons— 3-1 guns, Capt. James Alden. 
 
 Octorara 839 " 6 " Lieut. Comr. Chas. A. Greene. 
 
 Hartford: 1,900 " 31 " Capt. Percival Drayton. 
 
 Metacomet 974 " 6 ' Lieut. Comr, Jas. E. Jouett. 
 
 Richmond 1,939 " 2Q " Capt. Thornton A. Jenkins. 
 
 Port Royal. 805 " 6 " Lieut. Comr. Bancroft Gherardi. 
 
 Lackawanna 1,533 " g " Capt. Jno. B. Marchand. 
 
 Seminole 801 " 8 " Commander Edward Donaldson. 
 
 Monongahela 1,378 " 8 " Commander Jas. H. Strong. 
 
 Kennebec 507 " 5 " Lieut. Comr. "W. P. McCann. 
 
 Ossipee 1,240 " 11 " Commander Wm. E. Leroy. 
 
 Itasca 507 " 6 " Lieut. Comr. George Brown. 
 
 Oneida 1,033 " 9 " Commander J. R. M. Mullany. 
 
 Galena 788 " 10 " Lieut. Comr. Clark H. Wells. ^ 
 
 At this moment Admiral Buchanan, whose four ships had 
 been riding at anchor to the north of Fort Morgan, gave the 
 
 ' As Port Gaines was more than two miles their total weight o£ metal was U,246 pounds, 
 
 oiBtmt from the channel it did not count for and that they threw at a broadside 9.288 pounds, 
 
 anything in the scheme of engagement. The total weight of metal that could be thrown 
 
 from all the Tennessee's guns at one discharge 
 
 ^ All these ships carried batteries of the was but 600 pounds, while 900 pounds is a large 
 
 heaviest guns afloat proportionate to their size. allowance for a single round from the three 
 
 Commodore FoxhaJl A. Parker, of the U. B. navy, other Confederate craft. Thus it will be seen 
 
 states in his paper upon the battle of Mobile that the difference between the concentrated flre 
 
 Bay, read before the MUitary Historical Society of the Federal fleet, and that o£ Buchanan's 
 
 of Massachusetts, December 10th, 1877, that squadron, was nearly ten pounds to one in favor 
 
560 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 signal to prepare for action, and they stood out across the 
 channel just inside the line of torpedoes, their heads pointed 
 to the westward in order that their port batteries might bring 
 a raking fire to bear upon the advancing enemy. The admiral 
 posted his own ship nearest to the channel and to the Fed- 
 erals ^ in the full expectation of engaging the Tecumseh, 
 whose 15-inch guns had been loaded with sixty pounds of 
 powder and cylindrical fiat-headed steel bolts that it was sup- 
 posed would penetrate the armor of the Tennessee, By a 
 quarter-past seven o'clock the action had become general, 
 Farragut's ships pouring their broadsides into Fort Morgan, 
 which responded with so much energy that a dense cloud of 
 smoke had already settled down upon the bay, above which 
 loomed the naasts and spars of the Federal fleet, while it was 
 incessantly lit up with the flashes of the guns. The spectacle 
 was one of those grand and awful battle-pictures which men 
 who witnessed it confessed their inability to reproduce in 
 words. Still, Admiral Buchanan, stationed in the pilot-house 
 ■of the Tennessee, reserved his flre and kept his gaze fixed upon 
 the Tecumseh, whose flat raft of a hull and ominous-looking 
 turret were with every passing second creeping closer to him. 
 There was even a momentary lull in the fury of the fire as all 
 eyes were turned toward these gladiators of the seas, the 
 champions each of its own side of the dreadful combat.'' 
 Buchanan, determined that the struggle should be at the 
 closest quarters, had transmitted the order through Capt. 
 Johnston to Lieut. Wharton, in charge of the first division 
 of the Tennessee, "not to fire until the vessels are in actual 
 contact." "Aye, aye, sir," responded Wharton,^ tautening 
 
 ot the former. Each of Farragut's ships had the eleven and fifteen inch cannon that the 
 
 been built for the naval service, and they con- Federals placed so great a reliance upon. 
 Btituted the pick of the fighting force of the 
 
 V. S. government. His monitors were the most i Six other Federal ships than those In Farra- 
 powerful iron-clads that had been built. The gfit'a line of battle, the Sebago, Tennessee, (which 
 Tecumseh ajLd Manhattan were armored with ten must not be confounded with the Confederate 
 inclies of iron on their turrets, as against the iron-clad), Bienville, Pembina, Pinola and Genes- 
 -six inches of the Tennessee's casemate, and each see, were detailed to attack Fort Morgan on its 
 carried in her turret two 15-inch guns, the heav- southward and eastward faces, bo as to attract 
 iest that in those days 'had been put on ship- as much as possible of its fire while the fleet 
 board. was running the gauntlet; but they never steam- 
 The Chickasaw and Winnebago were double ed close enough to its guus to make an import- 
 turret monitors, clad in eight and a half inches ant factor in the action,, and the mention of 
 of iron, and firing from each turret two eleven them is only necessary that no feature of the 
 inch guns. The Hartford, Brooklyn and Richmond narrative should be left untouched, 
 were second-class wooden screw steamers carry- 
 ing nine-inch Dablgren guns, and lOO-pounder 2 Before going into the action Admiral Bn- 
 Parrott rifles, and these very effective pieces of chanau addressed his assembled ofBcers and 
 •ordnailce were common throughout the fleet, crew upon the Tennessee's gun-deck, saying :— 
 even the smallest ships mounting at least one "Now men, the enemy is coming, and I want 
 nine or eleven-inch gun in addition to the most you to do your duty ; and you shall not have it 
 approved form of rfied cannon and howitzers. to say when you leave this vessel that you were 
 There were few such obsolete guns on board not near enough to tbe enemy, for I will meet 
 of them as the thirty-two pounders of the Gaines, them, and then you can fight them alongside of 
 Morgan and Selma. By far the most valuable their own ships ; and if I fall, lay me on one 
 guns in possession of the Confederates were the side and go on with the fight, and never mind 
 Brooke rifles, which were manufactured at Rich- me— but whip and sink the Yankees or fight 
 mond, under the direction of their inventor, until you sink yourselves, but do not am- 
 Commander John M. Brooke, of the 0. 8. navy; render." 
 but the largest of them were but a little over 
 
 eight inches' calibre, his facilities being too 3 Lieut. A. D. Wharton entered the U. S. navy 
 
 restricted to allow him to turn out pieces like as cadet midshipman September 23d, 1856, and 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 561 
 
 the lockstring- of the bow-gun in his fingers as he spoke the 
 words. Simultaneously the Tennessee was moved a very short 
 distance to the westward of the buoy at the end of the torpedo 
 line, and Craven, the commander of the Tecumseh. made the 
 fatal mistake of disregarding the order of Farragut to keep to 
 the eastward of this buoy. Ordering his helm put hard-a-star- 
 board, he dashed straight at the Tennessee, this course taking 
 him directly across the chain of torpedoes. In a moment, and 
 when the ships were less than a hundred yards apart, a muf- 
 fled explosion was heard, a column of water like a fountain 
 springing from the sea shot up beside the Federal monitor; 
 she lurched violently, her head settled, her stern went up into 
 the air so that her revolving screw could be plainly seen, and 
 then the waves closed over her, leaving of her officers and 
 crew less than a dozen men swimming about for their lives, 
 while two officers and five men had climbed into a boat that 
 had been washed from her deck. ^ 
 
 The suddenness of this catastrophe for an instant called a 
 halt in the action. In Fort Morgan it was imagined that a 
 
 graduated at the Annapolis Naval Academy in 
 
 1860. He was in the Bteam-sloop Seminole ou 
 the Bi-azil Station when the war began, and his 
 vessel was not ordered home until March 8th, 
 
 1861. After returning, he resigned his commis- 
 sion in the U. S. navy, was arrested and im- 
 prisoned at Fort Lafayette for two months, and 
 then transferred to Fort Warren, where he 
 was confined for some time, with Capt. Robert 
 Tansell and Lieut. Wilson, who had resigned 
 from the XJ. S. marine corps- Early in 1862, 
 Lieut. Wharton was exchanged for Lieut. Van 
 Horn, who was surrendered in Texas by Geu. 
 Twifjgs. He entered the service of the C. S. 
 navy oa February 8th, 1862, and was assigned 
 to duty on board of the C. S. steamer Arkansas, 
 then building at Memphis. He was in all the 
 desperate engaRements which the Arka-n-sas had 
 with the Federal fleets until she left Vicksburg, 
 when he was ordered to Galveston as one of the 
 ofl&cers of the captured steamer Harriet Lane. 
 This vessel being unfitted for a cruiser, he was 
 ordered to Shreveport, La., where he remained 
 during the year 1863 in charge of the steamer 
 Webb, to await the completion of the Missouri 
 to which he was to be attached. In the winter 
 of 1863,. Lieut. Wharton proposed to the Navy 
 Department to load the Webb vrith cotton and 
 Tun the blockade at the mouth of the Bed River, 
 make an effort to pass New Orlean s, and proceed 
 to Havana. Before his proposition reached 
 Bichmond, he was ordered to the Tennessee at 
 Mobile. Lieut. Read afterwards attempted to 
 run the Webb to Havana, and came veiy near 
 succeeding. Upon one occasion Captain R. H. 
 Meade, of the U. S. navy, said that the attempt 
 of Lieut. Read was one of the most daring leats 
 of the war, and really excited his admiration. 
 Lieut. Wharton bore a distinguished and gallant 
 part in the battle of Mobile Bay, where he was 
 taken prisoner. He was sent to Fort Warren, 
 and, after a shortimprisonment, was exchanged 
 and returned to Richmond. He was then or- 
 dered as executive officer to the ironclad Rich- 
 ^«2 in the James River squadron. In January, 
 M65, he conceived the idea of destroying the 
 bridges over the Tennessee River in East Ten- 
 liessee, to delay what was then supposed to be 
 
 36 
 
 the intended advance of Gen. Thomas' army in 
 southwestern Virginia. He thought that by 
 taking a boat with inflammable material and 
 launching it near Abingdon, Va., and passing 
 down the river by night and concealing himself 
 during the day, he could reach the bridges un- 
 observed, and accomplish his mission. The 
 Navy Department assented to the plan and fitted 
 him out with a large flat-bottomed skiff, pulling 
 three oars on a side, with an ample outfit. A 
 dozen men volunteered for the perilous enter- 
 prise, among whom we can remember Lieut. 
 Henry Stiles, Lieut. Joseph L. Pearcy, Sergeants 
 William H. Wharton and J. Newton Jones. The 
 boat was conveyed by cars to near SaltviUe.Va., 
 and launched in the north fork of the Holston 
 River. The journey down the frozen river 
 through cold rains and heavy snows was one of 
 great privation and suffering. Often the party 
 were compelled to wade through ice and carry 
 their boat over shoals and bars, occasionally 
 jumping dams, mnning afoul of fish traps, and 
 passing camps of the enemy. Upon one occa- 
 sion the party were wrecked, and finally while 
 they were away from their boat, the river rose 
 so rapidly that it was caught under the over- 
 hanging branches of a tree, to which it was fas- 
 tened, completing destroying all their ammuni- 
 tion and material. It then became necessary 
 for the party to make their escape. They pro- 
 ceeded dovm the river and passed impotently 
 under the bridge at Strawberry Plains; passing 
 Knoxville and going under a second bridge at 
 London, they were completely used up. Shortly 
 afterwards they were taken piisoners and sent 
 to Camp Chase, Ohio, where they were confined 
 until the close ol the war. Lieut. Wharton is 
 at present (1887) in charge of the Hume Gram- 
 mar and High Schools at Nashville, Tenn. In 
 June, 1886, he was appointed by President 
 Cleveland a member of the Board of Visitors to 
 the Naval Academy. 
 
 1 Twenty-one men in all were saved out of her 
 complement of 141 souls. Commander Craven 
 was among the lost. Of the twenty-one four 
 swam to Fort Morgan and gave themselves up. 
 A week afterwards, when the divers went down 
 
563 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Confederate shot had sunk the Tecumseh and a cheer rang out 
 from the garrison. A boat put out from the Metacomet to pick 
 up the men struggling with the waves. The roar of battle 
 began again while she was on her errand of mercy, but Gen. 
 Page, with that fine appreciation of an enemy's gallantry 
 characteristic of the chivalrous soldier, ordered his artillerists 
 not to fire upon her. 
 
 While these events were occurring, the Selma, Gaines and 
 Morgan were doing their full share toward opposing the pas- 
 sage of the Federal fleet. Their guns were served promptly 
 and efficaciously and from their position across the channel 
 they were enabled to inflict much damage upon the wooden 
 vessels, although their heaviest shot rebounded harmlessly 
 from the impenetrable turrets of the monitors. The latter 
 steered steadily onward, but the Brooklyn, leading the wooden 
 ships, was stopped by Capt. Alden because of his fancy that 
 he saw torpedoes in the water ahead. Then she backed down 
 upon the Hartford and the Federal line of battle was in peril 
 of becoming involved in inextricable confusion when Far- 
 ragut dashed to its head in the Hartford and so restored order. 
 During this embarrassment the batteries of the Federal men- 
 of-war were almost silent, while Fort Morgan and Buchanan's 
 ships poured into them an incessant and destructive fire. But 
 Farragut took the risk of striking torpedoes and pushed ahead. ' 
 As he went over the line the keel of the Hartford struck 
 several torpedo cases and the primers were heard to snap; but 
 they had been so corroded by the action of the salt water that 
 not one of them exploded and the fleet passed safely through 
 the danger to which the Tecumseh had fallen a victim. 
 
 With the line of battle restored and the torpedo chain in 
 their rear the Federals pressed on< Fort Morgan hulled each 
 ship repeatedly as it passed, but the chain armor and the sand- 
 bag barricades saved every one from being disabled except 
 
 to examine the wreck they found nearly all the i Lieut. A. D. Wharton, who had command 
 crew at their posts, as they sank. The chief of the forward division of the Tennessee, writes 
 engineer, who had been married in New York that when the Harford passed the SrooWyn and 
 only two weeks before, and who had received led the Federal line into the hay, she passed 
 from the flag-ship's mail his letters while the line across the Tennessee s bow, and not more than 
 was forming, stood with one hand upon the 200 yards distant. The seven-inch riflo in the 
 revolving bar of the turret engine, and in the bow of Buchanan's ship was loaded with a per- 
 other an open letter from his bride, which his cussion shell, and Wharton congratulated him- 
 dead eyes still seemed to be reading. self that he would sink Farragut's flagship un- 
 Lieut.F.S. Barrett, in charge of the torpedo derthebatteriesof FortMorgan,andthatherde- 
 def ences at Mobile, on August 13th telegraphed struction would lead to the defeat of the others. 
 Brig. Gen. G. J. Eains at the office of the Toi-pedo " I took the lock-string from the captain of the 
 Bureau, Richmond, that "Monitor Tecumseh was gun myself," he wiites, "took a long deliberate 
 sunk by torpedo in thirty seconds," where- aim, and gave the commands: 'Eaise/ 'Steady/ 
 upon Gen. Rains made the following communi- ' Raise a little more,' * Ready,' ' Fire !' I was as 
 cation to the Secretary of War: " I have the confident that our shell would tear a hole in the 
 honor to enclose the within telegram with the Hartford's side big enough to sink her in a few 
 remark that previous to leaving Mobile I had minutes as I was that I had fired it. It did 
 67 torpedoes planted where this one acted, and tear the hole expected, but it was above the 
 had nine submarine mortar batteries under way water-line. Capt. Drayton refers to this shot 
 (three completed) to close the main channel, in his olficial report to Farragut. I have often 
 Buch as the enemy rexjort kept them out of speculated since upon the effect of not having 
 Charleston, they being unable to remove them. raised the breech of our bow-gun, and thus 
 But my instructions and wishes were frustrated caused that shell to ricodiet before striking the 
 ifter I left; the place left open and the enemy Hartford. I wish I had let the captain of the 
 made use of it." gun fire the piece himself." 
 
THE CONPEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 563 
 
 the Oneida, in whose starboard boiler one of Morgan's shells 
 burst, while another exploded in her cabin, and two of her 
 guns were dismounted. In this condition she was towed past 
 the fort by her consort the Galena. 
 
 At 8:30 o'clock the hard fighting had lasted a little more 
 than an hour and the Federal fleet was well into Mobile Bay 
 and past the guns of Fort Morgan. No commander in Gen. 
 Page's place could have done more than he had done to defend 
 the entrance, but it had been proved again, just as it had been 
 demonstrated at New Orleans, Vicksburg and Port Hudson, 
 that forts on shore could not stop the passage of a hostile 
 squadron of steam-vessels handled with skill and determina- 
 tion. But all hope for the Confederates was not lost with Fort 
 Morgan out of the fight. Adnairal Buchanan and the com- 
 manders of his quartette of vessels felt that it now devolved 
 upon them to take up alone the herculean task of turning back 
 the enemy, and they went to their work with steadfast courage 
 against odds that seemed to forbid them to hope for victory. 
 
 The Selma, Gaines and Morgan ran close down on the 
 starboard bow of the Hartford as she crossed the torpedo line 
 and inflicted upon her the most galling punishment that she 
 suffered during the day. The rapidity and accuracy of the 
 fire of these gunboats at this stage of the engagement was the 
 perfection of artillery practice. They were using mainly 
 their stern guns, for they kept a little ahead of the Hartford, 
 and the range varied from seven hundred to a thousand 
 yards. One shot from the Selma killed ten and wounded five 
 men at her forward guns, while that division was strewn with 
 the bodies of the dead and wounded, and human limbs and 
 splinters were hurled on to the deck of the consort Metacomet. 
 Yet Parragut did not halt, ' and Buchanan made a dash at him 
 with the Tennessee, proposing to give the Hartford a taste of 
 the ram, but she easily avoided him by her superior speed, and 
 Buchanan, finding that it was useless to pursue her or to in- 
 vite her to single combat, stood down the bay again to meet 
 the other Federal wooden ships, which were coming up a 
 mile astern of the Hartford, still lashed in couples, the 
 Brooklyn and Octorara being in the lead. In a battle where 
 there was so much valor exhibited, it is impossible to specify 
 the most daring deed, but this onslaught of the one ship 
 upon the twelve was not the least brilliant of the under- 
 takings of that memorable oth of August. 
 
 ^ Admiral Farragut told in his own way, after my view became more obscured, and I was 
 the war, the story of his being " lashed to the compelled to ascend the rigging gradually, 
 mast-head " of the Bartford during the battle. until flnaLy I got some little distance be- 
 " It was a fiction," he said to a reporter who neath the maintop. At this juncture, Capt. 
 questioned him in San Francisco. "At the com- Drayton fearing, he said, that I might fall over- 
 mencement of the battle," he oontinuea, " for board in case of being wounded, called one 
 the purpose of obtaining the best view of the of the quartermasters, and cutting off a piece 
 movements of the enemy, and to better govern of the signal halyard, ordered him to bring 
 the fleet under my command,! got into the lower it up to me, that I might render my position 
 part of the rigging of the Hartford, just above more secure. With this rope I attached my- 
 whal isknown as the hammock railing. As the self to the rigging, and I was nut near the mast- 
 smoke ascended from the heavy cannonading, head." 
 
564 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Buchanan had not got well down toward the fleet before 
 he was hampered by the low speed of his vessel and her tardi- 
 ness in answering her helm. He endeavored in succession to 
 ram the Brooklyn, Richmond and Lackawanna, but each 
 sheered off and he missed his aim. In passing each, how- 
 ever, he gave her his broadside, " which," says Commodore 
 Parker, " did great injury to the vessels and laid many a 
 brave fellow low, while their fire in reply made not the slight- 
 est impression on the iron shield." In fact, for a brief period 
 of time, Buchanan was master of the situation, as nearly 
 every shot that he fired did deadly execution, while he only 
 suffered from the musketry fusillade into his ports as their 
 shutters were swung open to allow of the guns being run 
 out. As the Tennessee was invulnerable to the enemy's shot, 
 Capt. Strong, of the sloop-of-war Monongahela. which had 
 been fitted with an iron beak below the cutwater, endeavored 
 to dispose of her by ramming, but Buchanan avoided the 
 direct blow and received it on his port quarter. By so doing 
 he rasped along the quarter of the Kennebec, the Mononga- 
 hela's consort, and lodged a shell on her berth-deck, which 
 knocked over an officer and four men. Holding his course 
 down the Federal line, he next drove a couple of shots into 
 the Ossipee and then swung around under the stern of the 
 Oneida, into which ship he discharged two broadsides that 
 disabled two of her guns, carried away much of her lower rig- 
 ging, and took an arm off Commander MuUany. He had thus 
 pitted the Tennessee single-handed against all Farragut's fleet 
 except the Hartford and her consort and the three monitors 
 left afloat; he had punished them most severely without being 
 himself crippled in the slightest degree, and he now rested 
 his ship and men for a little while close to the guns of Fort 
 Morgan. 
 
 While the Tennessee was thus employed with the fleet 
 astern of the Hartford, the Selma, Morgan, and Gaines were 
 continuing their battle with the Federal flag-ship. As soon as 
 Farragut saw that all vessels were clear of Fort Morgan and 
 the torpedoes, he hoisted the signal for his gunboats to cast 
 loose from the larger ships to which they were lashed and to 
 make chase after the Confederate gunboats. They did so, and 
 the latter were forced to retire up the bay, closely followed by 
 the Metacomet, Itasca, Kennebec, Port Royal and others of the 
 swift light-draft steamers, which Farragut had kept in hand 
 for this particular duty. Lieut. Murphy, in the Selma, Lieut. 
 Harrison, in the Morgan, and Lieut. Bennett, in the Gaines, 
 were conscious that in speed and weight of metal they were 
 no possible match for their pursuers, but they retreated 
 sullenly and without slackening the fire from their stern 
 guns. This running engagement was in progress when a nine- 
 inch shot hulled the Gaines below the water-line and a 
 few moments later a shell struck near the same place and 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 565 
 
 exploded, making a leak that flooded the magazine. The ship 
 was thus placed hors du combat, and to save the lives of his 
 ship's company Lieut. Bennett beached her on the sands in 
 front of Fort Morgan and applied the torch to her. 
 
 The officers of the gunboat Gaines at the battle of Mobile 
 Bay were Lieut. Commander J. W. Bennett; First Lieut, and 
 Executive Officer John Payne; Second Lieut. — Lambert; 
 Assistant Surgeon O. S. Iglehart; Midshipman Eugene Philips; 
 Master's Mate George Waterman. In addition to her crew of 
 100 men she had on board a small detachment of marines under 
 command of Lieut. Fendall. Mr. Philips writes in the course of 
 a letter concerning the share that his ship took in the action: 
 
 "As the Federal fleet approached we stood out to meet 
 them to keep them as much as possible under the guns of Fort 
 Morgan. Finding that we could not prevent their advance we 
 fell back and opened on the leading vessels at 600 yards. Our 
 fire was very effective, and as we perceived that the Federals 
 wanted to come to closer range, for the purpose of either cut- 
 ting us off or boarding, we made a running fight. We received 
 an eleven-inch shell under our port counter, which caused us 
 to leak very badly, and the port battery was run over to the 
 starboard side in hopes to list the ship so that the leak might 
 be reached and stopped. This could not be done, and the order 
 was given to stop firing and preparations were made to leave 
 the sinking ship, the men being allowed time to save what few 
 things they had. Marines were stationed at the falls of the 
 ship's boats to prevent confusion, but there was no need for 
 their services, as the men moved quietly and in good order. 
 First putting in the boats our dead and wounded, we rowed 
 away from the Gaines, and had gone about 200 yards when she 
 suddenly lurched and went down by the stern, the flag flying 
 from her main topmast ten feet above the water after she had 
 touched bottom. We reached Fort Morgan without any diffi- 
 culty and offered our services to Gen. Page, but as he did not 
 need us we buried our dead and that night we ran the block- 
 ade, taking with us our wounded. We arrived in Mobile the 
 next morning, after rowing all night, reported to Commodore 
 Parrand and were sent to Battery Buchanan." 
 
 A heavy rain and wind squall had come in from the gulf, 
 and with a dense mist succeeded the bright sun and unclouded 
 skies of the earlier morning. In the fog the Morgan lost her 
 course and went aground, but, getting off *as soon as the squall 
 lifted, ran down to a station under the Fort Morgan batteries. 
 The Selma was not so fortunate. Lieut. Murphy attempted 
 to steam through the fog, but his vessel was too slow to es- 
 cape the Metacomet, the speediest of all the ships of the Fed- 
 eral force. At nine o'clock, by which time the sky was clear 
 again, the Metacomet was across his bow with her nine-inch 
 guns and 100-pounder rifle trained upon him. Still he defi- 
 antly kept his colors at the peak and answered the Metacomet' s 
 
566. THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 fire, which within a few moments killed Executive OflBcer 
 J. H. Comstock and wounded four men. Lieut. Murphy was 
 himself wounded, and recognizing that there was no means 
 of escape from the swift enemy, and that to prolong the con- 
 flict with so much stronger a ship would be but to invite a 
 reckless sacrifice of his men, he struck his flag. The Morgan 
 remained near Fort Morgan until nightfall, when, under cover 
 of the darkness, she reached Mobile. 
 
 We left the Tennessee taking a breathing spell not 
 far distant from Fort Morgan, where she was within me- 
 dium gunshot of the Federal monitors, which had pur- 
 posely lingered near the fort to draw its fire until the wooden 
 ships had passed beyond reach of its guns. It is admitted that 
 Farragut supposed that Buchanan had given up the fight and 
 had sought protection from the fort, for he first proposed to 
 attack him as soon as his people had had their breakfasts and 
 then resolved to go in after him as soon as it became dark 
 with the three monitors. ' 
 
 But Farragut was not put to the necessity of waiting for 
 Buchanan or assuming the offensive against him. When the 
 Tennessee hauled off from her first engagement the examina- 
 tion of the ship showed that no essential damage had been 
 done to her, some slight dents in her armor and the carrying 
 away of a portion of her smoke-stack alone revealing that she 
 had been stormed at by the huge ordnance of twelve of the 
 Federal men-of-war. With this discovery made, Buchanan 
 communicated to Capt. Johnston his resolution to once more 
 challenge the enemy. The communication was in this simple 
 language : "Follow them up, Johnston; we can't let them o£E 
 that way." 
 
 Justice cannot be done in any narrative of the battle of 
 Mobile Bay that omits a glance at the situation as it was when 
 Buchanan ventured into this closing scene of that sanguinary 
 day. Commodore Parker compares what he calls Buchanan's 
 quixotic attack upon the three iron-clads and fourteen wooden 
 ships of the Federal fleet to the charge of the light cavalry 
 brigade upon the Russian guns at Balaklava and applies to it 
 the criticism of a French ofiBcer upon the onslaught of Cardi- 
 gan's Six Hundred that " it was magnificent, but it was not 
 war." Yet it would be manifestly absurd to contend that 
 Buchanan should hp-ve surrendered the Tennessee without 
 making one more effort for the honor and glory of his flag; 
 nobody who understood the iron will and pertinacious courage 
 of the man would have expected him to act differently from 
 
 1 Commander Mahan, of the Federal navy, in Commodore Parker quotes from a diary, kept 
 Ms account of the battle contained in his book, by Farragut, that '* bad Buchanan remained 
 "The Gulf and Inland Waters," says that Far- under the fort I should have attacked him as 
 ragut's resolution to attack the Tennessee after soon as it became dark, with the three mom- 
 breakfast bad been served was uttered in re- tors," It was probably the iiltimate conclusion 
 spouse to a remark by Capt. Drayton, of the of the Federal admiral that his advantages. 
 Hartford, and in the hearing of Lieut. Com. would be greater in a day than in a night afl- 
 Kimberly, Executive Officer of the Hartford. sault. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 567 
 
 what he did. True, he was absolutely alone; the remainder of 
 his squadron had disappeared and the forts could give him no 
 assistance in the battle into which he was plunging; but it 
 must also be taken into account that he had already proved 
 that his ship was more than a match for a dozen of the ene- 
 my's wooden vessels, and although he had not yet engaged 
 their iron-clads it would have evinced a distrust of himself and 
 his men of which he was utterly incapable to have taken it 
 for granted that the monitors would conquer him. All that 
 is said concerning the desperate character of his effort may be 
 freely conceded, but the exigencies of the situation demanded 
 that he should make it and he acted upon principles that should 
 control any naval warrior in a like emergency. There were 
 the chances that he might demoralize the Federals by ramming 
 and sinking one or more of their ships; that a lucky shell in a 
 boiler or magazine might have the same effect; or, finally, 
 that he might carry the Tennessee up to Mobile and save her 
 for the eventual defence of the city. These were contingen- 
 cies that fully warranted him in seeking a second conflict, to 
 say nothing of the battle fervor and devotion to their cause 
 felt by every soul on board the Tennessee,, from the admiral 
 down to the ammunition-passers. 
 
 Shortly after nine o'clock the Federal fleet had come to 
 anchor about four miles inside of Fort Morgan, and. naost of 
 their crews were at breakfast, when the Confederate flag-ship 
 steamed out from the fort and laid her course directly for the 
 Hartford, whereupon Farragut signaled to his monitors and 
 heavy ships to attack with their guns and with bows on at full 
 speed. The Monongahela was the first ship to strike her, which 
 she did on the port beam, and notwithstanding that the blow 
 was delivered at a slightly oblique angle, the shock knocked off 
 their feet many men on both vessels. Firing was begun on the 
 instant, and while the prow of the Monongahela was in actual 
 contact with the Tennessee's side the latter planted two shells 
 on the former's berth-deck, wounding an officer and two men. 
 The Federals were less active at the guns, but before the Ten- 
 nessee had passed on ten yards the Monongahela rapped her 
 casemate with a broadside that failed to penetrate. The fleet 
 closed in around her and in ten minutes' time she was the centre 
 of an irregular circle, the periphery of which consisted of the 
 hostile ships, she firing as rapidly as her guns could be han- 
 dled, while on each side and fore and aft she was pounded with 
 shot and shell. The second ship to ram her was the Lacka- 
 wanna, whose blow was so forceful that it swung her around 
 and listed her to port, but her recovery was speedily effected, 
 while the Lackawanna's stem was stove in for several feet be- 
 low the water line. The Tennessee did not come unscathed out 
 of the encounter with these two ships. A shot from the Lack- 
 awanna smashed one of her gunport shutters, and on sound- 
 ing the pumps it was found that the two rammings had started 
 
668 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 a leak which was making water at the rate of six inches an 
 hour; but there was little in these circumstances to discourage 
 Buchanan and he still endeavored to secure a position from 
 which he could ram the Hartford, his highest ambition being 
 to come to close quarters with the hostile flag-ship. He was 
 no more to be gratified, however, in this supreme intention 
 than in any other attempts to use his ship as a ram, for every 
 one of the Federal ships not merely exceeded his own in speed, 
 but also in rapidity of manoeuvering, and instead of ramming 
 he was rammed. 
 
 When the Lackawanna drew off he found the Hartford close 
 aboard and the two flag-ships struck each other in the bluff of 
 the bow. Nothing more vexing could have happened to Bu- 
 chanan than what did occur at this conjuncture. He was in 
 as favorable a position as could be desired to pour his shot into 
 the enemy, but one after another, as the order was given 
 to fire, his primers failed to explode except at one gun, whose 
 shell killed and wounded several men on the Hartford's berth- 
 deck. It was the most unfortunate moment of the conflict for 
 Buchanan up to that time, for his inability to inflict injury upon 
 the Hartford allowed her to get away and she described a circle 
 with the object of again ramming the Tennessee, but in so do- 
 ing she was run into by the Lackawanna and cut down nearly 
 to the water's edge. 
 
 During the time occupied in the Tennessee's combat with 
 the wooden ships, the monitors had come up and she was be- 
 set by a foe far more formidable than Farragut's walls of oak. 
 Her shield was impermeable to the latter's shot, but it was yet 
 to undergo the test of a fifteen-inch bolt. Lieut. Wharton has 
 put into a few concise words the effect of the first discharge 
 of one of these monstrous bolts from the Manhattan. " The 
 Monongahela" he says, " was hardly clear of us when a hideous 
 looking monster came creeping up on our port side, whose 
 slowly revolving turret revealed the cavernous depths of a 
 mammoth gun. ' Stand clear of the port side!' I shouted. A 
 moment after a thunderous report shook us all, while a blast 
 of dense, sulphurous smoke covered our port-holes, and 440 
 pounds of iron, impelled by sixty pounds ' of powder, admitted 
 daylight through our side, where, before it struck us, there had 
 been over two feet of solid wood, covered with five inches of 
 solid iron. This was the only 15-inch shot that hit us fair. It 
 did not come through; the inside netting caught the splinters, 
 and there were no casualties from it. I w:as glad to find my- 
 self alive after that shot." 
 
 From this moment to the end of the battle the Tennessee 
 was vainly contending against the only instrumentalities that 
 could have brought her to disaster. The three monitors, the 
 
 1 This was the maximum ctiarge of powder hiindrecl pounds with a proportionate gain of 
 then used in the fifteen - inch guns. It was the velocity and battering power of the pro- 
 afterwards found that they would stand one jectile. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 569 
 
 Manhattan, Winnebago and Chickasaw, had her at their mercy. 
 She could drive shot after shot and shell after shell through 
 the sides of the wooden ships, but the solid projectiles from 
 her 8-inch rifles were impotent against the iron-clads, whose 
 gunners, from their place of safety and advantage in the shot- 
 proof turrets, could aim and firo with all the coolness and se- 
 curity of participants in an artillery target match. Neither 
 the Manhattan or the Winnebago appears to have been handled 
 with much skill, as the 15-inch shot spoken of by Lieut. 
 Wharton was the only one that struck the Tennessee so as to 
 do her great harm, and the Winnebago planted but a few pro- 
 jectiles upon her; yet the fire of these vessels and especially 
 the smashing of her shield by the Manhattan's bolt were im- 
 portant factors in producing the eventual result. But the most 
 serious injury was done her by the Chickasaw, which took posi- 
 tion under her stern and from an average distance of fifty 
 yards fired over fifty steel-headed cylindrical projectiles, nearly 
 all of which struck either her hull or her casemate. Simulta- 
 neously the wooden ships rammed her in steady succession, 
 and the unfortunate construction of her port shutters was 
 evinced by three of them becoming jammed, which reduced 
 her to fighting with but three guns. Many of her plates 
 had been started by the 11-inch shot of the Chickasaw, and be- 
 iore ten o'clock, according to the statement of Capt. Johnston, 
 "the smoke-pipe, which had been riddled by shot, was broken 
 ■off close to the top of the shield or upper deck by the concussion 
 produced by the ramming process adopted by the enemy." 
 
 The gun-deck was now filled by smoke emitted from the 
 stump of the pipe and the heat was so great that the men, al- 
 though many of them had stripped to the waist, were in great 
 •distress. Then the rudder chains, which the enemy knew were 
 exposed on the deck aft the casemate and had aimed at, were 
 ■cut away, probably by a shot from the Chickasaw, and al- 
 though the relieving tackle was promptly manned, that, too, 
 was shot away in a few moments, and after her heroic fight 
 the Tennessee drifted a helpless hulk upon the waters. 
 
 Meanwhile Admiral Buchanan had descended to the gun- 
 deck and taken personal charge of the battery. He had sent 
 for a machinist to back out the pivot-pin of a jammed stern 
 port-shutter in order that the gun might be _ brought into 
 action again, when a shot struck the casemate just outside of 
 where the man was sitting, and the concussion shivered him 
 into remain, that, says Capt. Johnston, "had the appearance 
 of sausage meat," and that were shoveled into buckets. The 
 same shot started an iron splinter that struck the admiral 
 and fractured his leg, and he was carried below to the berth- 
 deck and placed under the care of Fleet Surgeon D. B, 
 ■Conrad. 
 
 Just prior to the shooting away of the rudder chains the 
 admiral had determined to endeavor to seek shelter with the 
 
570 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 disabled ship under the batteries of Fort Morgan, and accord- 
 ingly she liad been headed in that direction, it being impossi- 
 ble to carry her away from the enemy and into Mobile, and 
 during the few minutes in which the relieving tackle was 
 available she was still slowly steaming toward Mobile Point; 
 but when that last resource as a steering apparatus had van- 
 ished, when the admiral had been struck down, and when the 
 total responsibility of command had fallen upon Capt. John- 
 ston, there was no longer any avenue of escape. The Ten- 
 nessee could revolve her screw, and she could fire three guns 
 at any foe that might place himself in front of their muzzles; 
 but she could not be steered, and without that power every- 
 thing else was as nothing. Johnston did not want to give her 
 up, but the Chickasaw was still banging away at her, the 
 Manhattan and Winnebago were drawing nigher, and the 
 Hartford and Ossipee were heading for her at the' top of their 
 speed with the desire to do a little more ramming, while she 
 was unable to give them a gun in reply. With poignant 
 regret Capt. Johnston sought the side of Admiral Buchanan, 
 and reported that further resistance was out of the question. 
 From his couch of suffering Buchanan replied: " Do the best 
 you can, Johnston, and when all is done, surrender." 
 
 The crisis at which the only alternative of surrender was 
 a vain sacrifice of life had arrived. Johnston returned to the 
 pilot-house and beheld each Federal ship either cannonading 
 the Tennessee or preparing to ram her. It had been fifteen 
 minutes since she had discharged a gun and she was encircled 
 by a belt of fire. Within and without she was a picture of 
 the havoc wrought upon a lonely foe by the crushingly pre- 
 ponderating strength of Farragut's fleet. It was imperative 
 that Johnston should make his decision quickly to strike his 
 colors, or let his ship and all hands on board be sent to the 
 bottom of the bay. The staff upon which the Confederate 
 colors were hoisted had been shot away early in the fierce en- 
 gagement and the flag had been displayed again upon a boat- 
 hook thrust through the grating that covered the casemate. 
 Johnston's decision was that the surrender should be made, 
 and with his own hands he drew in the boat-hook that carried 
 the ensign, but the Federal ships still maintained their fire, 
 and he then mounted to the roof of the casemate and showed 
 a white flag. ' 
 
 This was accepted as the signal of capitulation, the white 
 flag and the figure of Capt. Johnston on the forward edge of 
 
 1 Commodore Parker says of Johnston that place on board the Tennessee. Capt. Johnston 
 
 " hastening to the top of the shield, which was had drawn in the boat-hook that bore the ensign 
 
 exposed to a perfect shower of solid projectiles, before it became necessary for him to tlirow 
 
 this truly brave man hauled down the Con- the white flag to the breeze from the top of the- 
 
 federate ensign with his own hands ; it had been Tennessee's shield. In a technical sense Johnston 
 
 raised in triumph ; it was lowered without dis- did " haul down the Confederate ensign with, 
 
 honor." Parker meant to render to Jobnston his own hands," but he was fired upon after the 
 
 the honor which is always the delight of one colors had been lowered, and his extreme feat 
 
 brave sailor to pay to another, but he failed to of daring consisted in his exposure of himseir 
 
 exactly comprehend the events that were taking from the top of the shield to the hail of shot and. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 571 
 
 the roof of the casemate being j)lainly in view of every ves- 
 sel in the Federal fleet. The Ossipee was approaching to ram 
 the Tennessee, but when the sign of surrender made its ap- 
 pearance her helm was shifted and her engines backed. A col- 
 lision could not be avoided, but it was a gentle one, and the 
 shock was a diminuendo of the stalwart blows that had been 
 administered a half hour previously. ^ 
 
 So ended this momentous battle at 10 o'clock in the morn- 
 ing. Com. Johnston made the formal surrender of the Ten- 
 nessee to Commander Le Roy, of the Ossipee, and his sword 
 and that of Admiral Buchanan were afterwards delivered to 
 Farragut. '^ 
 
 The first Federal officer to board the Confederate flag-ship 
 was Fleet Surgeon Palmer, who had been instructed to assist 
 Dr. Conrad in looking after the wounded, and he thus records 
 his entry into the vessel and his meeting with Admiral Bu- 
 chanan : 
 
 " I scrambled literally through the iron port and threaded my way 
 among the piles of confusion to a ladder, by which 1 mounted to wher& 
 Admiral Buchanan was lying in a place like the top of a truncated pyra- 
 mid. Somebody announced me and he answered (tone polite, but savage), 
 ' I know Dr. Palmer,' but he gave me his hand. I told him I was sorry tO' 
 see him so badly hurt, but that I should be glad to know his wishes. He 
 answered : ' I only wish to be treated kindly as a prisoner of war. ' My re- 
 ply was : ' Admiral Buchanan, you know perfectly well you will be treated 
 kindly.' Then he said, ' I am a Southern man, an enemy and a rebel.' I 
 felt a little offended at his tone, but rejoined carefully that he was at that 
 moment a wounded person and disabled and that I would engage to have 
 his wishes fulfilled. As to the present disposal of his person, that Admiral 
 Farragut would take him aboard the Hartford, or send him to any other 
 ship he might prefer. He said he didn't pretend to be Admiral Farragut's 
 friend and had no right to ask favors of him, but that he would be satis- 
 fled with any decision that might be come to. Dr. Conrad, lately an as- 
 sistant surgeon in our navy, told me he was fleet surgeon and desired to 
 accompany Buchanan wherever he might go. I promised that he should, 
 and returned to the Hartford and reported to Admiral Farragut circum- 
 stantially. He seemed hurt at Buchanan s irritated feeling and said he 
 (Buchanan) had formerly professed friendship for him. I saw there must 
 be some embarrassment in bringing them together and therefore proposed 
 
 shell while he was again announcing the sur- governments, but as soldiers and sailors who- 
 
 render of the Tem\£S&ee by the exhibition of the served the flag which they deemed to repre- 
 
 white flag. sent the right. Judged by this truthful stand- 
 
 1 As the Ossipee drew up beside the Tennessee ^^d, the meeting of Johnston and Le Eoy is- 
 
 Commander Le Boy came out on his forecastle ?.™ episode that it is proper to preserve m 
 
 deck and hailed Johnston. The two men had history. 
 
 served in companionship in the old navy, and 2 Farragut oflacially reported that Buchan- 
 
 the warmth of Le Boy's greeting was responded an's sword was delivered to him on board tho 
 
 to by the Confederate captain. It was one of Hartford, by Capt. Johnston, which was not the^ 
 
 those wa;r incidents which excited the wonder fact. In a note to his report to Secretary Mal- 
 
 of the correspondents of the English news- lory from thePensacolaHospitalouAugust26th, 
 
 papers, who could not understand how men Admiral Buchanan says: 
 
 who had just been engaged in the bloodiest " Sept. 17th. Since writing the above, I have 
 
 combat could, when a surrender had taken place, seen the report of Admiral Farragut, a portion 
 
 renew their old associations of friendship and of which is incorrect. Capt. Johnston did not- 
 
 amity, take each other by the hand and wish each deliver my swoi'd on board the Hartford. After 
 
 other well. It is a matter that is plain enough to the surredder of the Tennessee, Capt. Giraud, the 
 
 Americans in the light of the reunion in the officer who was sent on board to talie charge of 
 
 North and South, and that even in the war her, said to me that he was directed by Admiral 
 
 days was illustrated by the fact that Northern Farragut to ask for my sword, which was 
 
 and Southern men did not fight as personal brought from the cabin and delivered to him. 
 
 enemies or as the machines of monarchial by one of my aides." 
 
^72 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 that I should have a steamer to take all the -wounded to Pensacola and 
 another. one to send all ordinary invalids to New Orleans.,"^ 
 
 Gen. Page shortly afterward received a communication 
 from Admiral Farragut/ under a flag of truce, informing him 
 that Admiral Buchanan had been injured, and requesting that 
 he might be permitted to send all the wounded, also under a 
 flag of truce, on one of his vessels to Pensacola, where they 
 would be properly cared for, the understanding being that the 
 ship should take out nothing but the wounded and bring back 
 nothing that she did not take out. This proposition met the 
 humane impulses of Gen. Page, who at once acceded to it, and 
 the Metacomet sailed that night for Pensacola with Admiral 
 Buchanan and a number of the prisoners and wounded, while 
 the Federals proceeded to overhaul the Tennessee and Selma 
 and fit their prizes out for service. ^ 
 
 In making up the lists of killed and wounded, it was found 
 that the Confederates had suffered far less than their vast] y out- 
 numbering enemy. Omitting the loss by the sinking of the 
 
 1 Dr. Palmer evidently writes with a strong 
 prejudice against Admiral Buchanan, who may 
 have spoken just as the surgeon reported him 
 without warranting the supposition at which 
 Palmer hints, that he was bent upon saying un- 
 pleasant things to Farragut or any other Federal 
 officerni with whom he might be brought in con- 
 tact No man cherished a more punctilious 
 .sense of the proprieties than Buchanan, and it 
 is absurd to think of him railing at the enemy 
 to whom fate had given victory like a disappoint- 
 ed beldame. His heartily-expressed gratitude to 
 Palmer for the latter's professional services to 
 him should have convinced Palmer that in de- 
 feat as well as in triumph the Confederate com- 
 mander was incapable of trausgi'essing the code 
 of ceremonial courtesy. AVe have made use of 
 Dr. Palmer's report of the scene on the Tennessee 
 ■because it is the only record of the incident, but 
 it would be unfair to reprint it without the 
 caution that he seriously misapprehended the 
 character of Buchanan. 
 
 2 Flag-Ship "HAETFonD," Aup^stSth, 1864. 
 Sib 1 Admiral Buchanan is severely wounded, 
 
 having lost his leg. There are, in addition, 
 four or five others of the crew of the Tennessee 
 who require more comfortable quarters than 
 we can give them in the fleet. Will the com- 
 manding ofllcer at Fort Morgan permit a vessel 
 to take them to our hospital at Pensacola, with 
 or without our own wounded ? — the understand- 
 ing being that the flag of truce vessel takes 
 nothing whatever but the woim'led, and brings 
 nothing back that she did not take out. and my 
 honor is given for the above. 
 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 D. G. Fahbagdt, 
 Rear Admiral Commanding W. G. B. Squadron. 
 3rigadier Gen. R. L. Page, 
 
 Commanding Fort Morgan, 
 
 Headqtjaeters Third Brigade, D. G., ) 
 Fort Mobuan, Alabama, August 6th, 1864. J 
 
 Sir : Your communication of this date is re- 
 ceived, lam much obliged for the information 
 regarding Admiral Buchanan. 
 
 Your request relative to the wounded of the 
 Tennessee, and also those of your own com- 
 mand, being taken to Pensacola, will be permit- 
 
 ted under a flag of truce, and to return on the 
 conditions you propose. 
 
 I would be glad if Admiral Buchanan, having 
 lost a leg, be permitted, under parole, to go to 
 Mobile, where he can receive earlier and more 
 prompt attention. 
 
 If the latter request is granted please inform 
 me, and I will have a boat from town to take 
 him up. 
 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 R. L. Page, 
 Brigadier Gen. Commanding. 
 Rear Admiral David G. Faeragut, 
 
 Commanding W. G B. Squadron, Mobile Bay. 
 
 Flag Ship '* Hartford," Mobile Bat, \ 
 August 5th, 1864. J 
 Sir : In reply to your note of this date, I 
 would say that it is altogether out of the ques- 
 tion that I should permit Admiral Buchanan to 
 be sent to Mobile, but I will send him to Pensa- 
 cola, where he will receive the same comforts 
 as our own wounded, which I apprehend are as 
 good as they could be in Mobile. 
 
 It was simply as an act of humanity that I 
 made the proposition I did to-day. I would be 
 t^lad to bury my dead on shore; but if there is 
 any objection to it, they can have a sailor's 
 grave in the deep, honored by the heartfelt 
 sighs of their shipmates. 
 
 Very respectfully, 
 
 D G. Farragut, 
 Rear Admiral Commanding. 
 Brigadier Gen. R. L. Page, 
 
 Commanding Fort Morgan. 
 
 Fort Mohgan, August 6th, 1864. 
 Sir : Your note of the fifth received. There 
 is no objection to your burying your dead on 
 shore. When they arrive near the wharf here, 
 a point will be designated for the burial. 
 
 Very respectfully, your obedient seiwant. 
 R. L Page, 
 Brigadier Gen. C. S. A. 
 Rear Admiral D. G. Farragut, 
 
 Commanding JJ. S. JS'aval Forces, Mobile Bay. 
 
 3 Comm-inder Johnston, Lieut P. TJ. Murphy, 
 and Lieut. W. L. Bradford, were sent north 
 from Pensacola, and arrived at New York on 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 573- 
 
 Tecumseh, the Federals had 53 men killed and 170 wounded, 
 distributed on the various ships as follows: 
 
 Killed. Wounded, 
 
 Hartford 35 28 
 
 Brooklyn . . . . ; 11 43 
 
 Lackawanna .... . 4 '5 
 
 Oneida 8 30 
 
 Monongahela ... ... 6 
 
 Metacomet 1 3 
 
 Ossipee 1 7 
 
 Kichmond . . 3 
 
 Galena . . 1 
 
 Oetorara . . . 1 10 
 
 Kennebec 1 6 
 
 The proportion of injury inflicted upon the Federal fleet 
 relatively by Fort Morgan and by Buchanan's squadron can- 
 not be flgured out to a certainty, but it is known that the Con- 
 federate vessels did much the greater execution, Farragut 
 himself stating in his official report that in the conflict with 
 them " we lost many more men than from the fire of the bat- 
 teries of Fort Morgan." The Confederate losses were as fol- 
 lows : 
 
 Tennessee.— "KiW&A: John Silk, flrst-class fireman; Wm. Moore; sea- 
 man, mortally wounded and soon afterwards died — 3. Wounded : Ad- 
 miral Franklin Buchanan, leg broken ; Alvah T. Post, pilot, on head ; 
 J. C. O'Connell, second assistant engineer, head and shoulder; James 
 Kelly, boatswain's mate, in knee; Andrew Eossmorson, quartermaster, in 
 head; Wifi. Daly, seaman, in head; Robert Barry, marine, in head; James 
 McCann, marine, in shoulder- 8. 
 
 Cflsmes.— Killed : Daniel Ahem, quarter gunner ; Michael Vincent, 
 seaman— 3. Wounded: W. W. Smith, first quartermaster, contusions of 
 thighs and legB; Thomas Woods, seaman, contusions of thighs and legs- 
 (both these men were wounded by the explosion of a shell while standing 
 at the wheel) ; Newton Williams, landsman, left hand lacerated by a 
 splinter— 3. 
 
 jSeZma.— KiUed : J. H. Comstoek, lieutenant and executive oflBcer; 
 J. E. Murray, acting masters mate ; Wm. Hall, gunner's mate : James 
 Rooney, seaman ; James Montgomery, seaman; Bernard Eiley, ordinary 
 seaman; J. E. Frisley, landsman; Christopher Shepard, landsman— 8. 
 Wounded: P. TJ. Murphy, lieutenant commanding, in wrist; John Villa, 
 seaman, badly in leg and hand; Henry Fratee, landsman, badly in hand; 
 Daniel Linnehan, seaman, slightly in arm; John Shick, seaman, sUghtly 
 in face; John Davis, fireman, slightly; John Gilliland, seaman, sUghtly— 7. 
 
 ilfors'aw.— Killed: None. Wounded: One seaman, slightly— 1. 
 
 The total Confederate loss was 13 killed and 19 wounded, 
 while the Federals lost 173 killed and 170 wounded, including 
 in the killed the 130 souls who went down with the Tecumseh. ' 
 
 September lath. Admiral Farragut reported the l This is Admiral David D. Porter's, estimate 
 
 officers of the Tennessee captured as follows ;— of the loss by the sinking of the Tecumseh. The 
 
 "Admiral F. Buchanan, Commander James I). earlier Federal accounts of the battle placed the 
 
 Johnston, Lieuts. Wm. L. Bradford, A. D. Whar- total number of persons on that monitor at but 
 
 ton, E. J. McDermett ; Masters J. E. De Mahy, about 100, of whom, as has been said, 21 were 
 
 H. W. Perrin ; Fleet-Surgeon E. C. Bowles ; rescued. But Porter made up his figures after 
 
 Engineers G. V>. Lining. J. C. O'Connell, John a thorough scrutiny of all the official documents, 
 
 Hayes, 0. Benson, W. B. Patterson; Paymaster's and they must be accepted as more reliable than 
 
 Clerk J. H. Oonen ; Master's Mates W. S. For- the previous statements, which were compiled 
 
 rest, M. J. Beebee, and E. M. Carter; Boatswain withoutreferencetotherecordsto which he had - 
 
 John MoOredie ; Gunner H. L. Smith." access. 
 
574 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 This great disparity in the losses is a fact that bears a volume 
 of evidence to the pluck with which Buchanan's vessels were 
 fought, to the high standard of discipline of his crews, and to 
 the perfection of the aim of his gunners. 
 
 Many of the Federal wooden ships were badly cut up. 
 The Hartford was struck 20 times by shot and shell, the 
 Brooklyn 30 times, the Octorara 17 times, the Metacomet 11 
 times, the Lackawanna 6 times, the Ossipee 4 times, the Mo- 
 nongahela 6 times, the Kennebec twice, the Galena 7 times, 
 and most of the other vessels once or more. Of the monitors, 
 the Manhattan was struck 9 times, the Winnebago 19 times, 
 and the Chickasaw 3 times, but no bolt pierced their invulner- 
 able armor. 
 
 How the Tennessee came out of the action is best told by 
 the subjoined extract from the report of the Board of Survey 
 ordered by Farragut: 
 
 "The injuries to the casemate ol the Tennessee from shot are very 
 considerable. On its after side nearly all the plating is started ; one bolt 
 
 O. S. EAM *' TENNESSEE " AS SHE APPEAEED AFTER HER SURRENDER TO U. a. SQUADRON, AUGUST 5tH, 1864. 
 
 driven in, several nuts knocked off inside, gun-carriage of the after pivot 
 gun damaged, and the steering rod or chain cut near that gun. There are 
 unmistakable marks on the after-part of the casemate of not less than nine 
 11-inch solid shot having struck ■within the space of a few square feet in 
 the immediate vicinity of that port. On the port side of the casemate the 
 armor is also badly damaged from shot." 
 
 The report then speaks of the effect of the fifteen-inch shot 
 fired by the Manhattan and previously alluded to, and con- 
 tinues : 
 
 " There are visible between forty and fifty indentations and marks of 
 shot on the hull, deck and casemate, varying from very severe to slight ; 
 nine of the deepest indentations on the after-part of the casemate evi- 
 dently being eleven-inch shot, and the marks of about thirty of other 
 calibres on different parts of the vessel. There are no external visible 
 marks or evidences of injury inflicted upon the hull of the Tennessee by 
 the severe ramming of the Monongahela, Lackawanna and Hartford ; but 
 inasmuch as the decks leaked badly, and when there is a moderate sea 
 running in the bay her reported usual leakage of three inches an hour 
 being now increased to five or six inches an hour, it is fairly to be inferred 
 that the increased leakage is caused by the concussion of the vessels. The 
 Tennessee is in a state to do good service now. To restore her to the state 
 of efficiency in which she was when she went into action with this fleet on 
 the 5th inst. it wiU be necessary to overhaul much of the iron plating on 
 the port and after-sides of the casemate and replace some of it. The iron 
 gun-port slides or shutters, which were damaged, must be either removed 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 675 
 
 or repaired. A new smoke-stack is required, and additional ventilators 
 should be fitted. Blowers are required to produce proper ventilation in 
 the engine-room and on the berth-deck. When these small repairs and 
 additions shall have been made the iron-clad Tennessee will be a most for- 
 midable vessel for harbor and river service and for operating generally in 
 smooth water, both offensively and defensively." 
 
 It is of absorbing interest to turn now to the discussion by 
 the Confederate commanders of this famous battle. Admiral 
 Buchanan's report was not lengthy, it being made from his 
 couch of pain in the United States naval hospital at Pensacola 
 to Secretary Mallory, on August 36th. After relating the order 
 of the Federal vessels as they steamed up the channel, and 
 computing that they carried 199 guns and 3,700 men, he says: 
 
 " When they were discovered standing into the channel, signal was 
 made to the Mobile squadron, under my command, consisting of wooden 
 gunboats Morgan anA Gaines, each carrying six guns, and the Selmaiowr, 
 to follow my motions, in the ram Tennessee, of six guns, in all, twenty-two 
 guns and 470 men. AUwere soon under way and stood towards the enemy, 
 in a line abreast. As the Tennessee approached the fleet, when opposite 
 the fort, we opened our battery, at short range, upon the leading ship, 
 the admiral's flag-ship Hartford, and made the attempt to run into her, 
 hut, owing to her superior speed, our attempt was frustrated. We then 
 stood towards the next heavy ship, the Brooklyn, with the same view; she 
 also avoided us by her superior speed. During this time the gunboats were 
 also closely engaged with the enemy ; all our guns were used to the 
 greatest advantage, and we succeeded in seriously damaging many 
 of the enemy's vessels. The Selma and Gaines, under Lieut. Com- 
 mandants P. U. Murphy and J. W. Bennett, fought gallantly, and 
 I was gratified to hear from officers of the enemy's fleet that their 
 fire was very destructive. The Gaines was fought until she was found 
 to be in a sinking condition, when she was run on shore near Fort 
 Morgan. Lieut. Commandant Murphy was closely engaged with the Meta- 
 eomet assisted by the Morgan, Commander Harrison, who, during the con- 
 flict, deserted him, when, upon the approach of another large steamer, 
 the Selma surrendered. I refer you to the report of Lieut. Commandant 
 Murphy for the particulars of his action. He lost two promising young 
 officers, Lieut. Comstock and Master's Mate Murray, and a number of his 
 men were killed and wounded; and he was also wounded severely in the 
 wrist. Commander Harrison will no doubt report to the department his 
 reason for leaving the Selma in that contest with the enemy, as the Morgan 
 was uninjured. His conduct is severely commented on by the officers of 
 the enemy's fleet, much to the injury of that officer and the navy. ^ 
 
 " Soon after the gunboats were dispersed by the overwhelming supe- 
 riority of force, and the enemy's fleet had anchored about four miles above 
 Port Morgan, we stood for them again in the Tennessee and renewed the 
 attack, with the hope of sinking some of them with our prow, and again 
 were foiled by their superior speed in avoiding us. The engagement with 
 the whole fleet soon became general at very close quarters and lasted about 
 an hour, and notwithstanding the serious injury inflicted upon many of 
 their vessels by our guns, we could not sink them. Frequently during the 
 contest we were surrounded by the enemy, and all our guns were in action 
 almost at the same moment. Some of their heaviest vessels ran into us 
 under full steam, with the view of sinking us. One vessel, the Monon- 
 gahela, had been prepared as a ram, and was very formidable. She struck 
 ns with great force, injuring us but little. Her prow and stem were knocked 
 off, and the vessel so much injured as to make it necessary to dock her. 
 Several of the other vessels of the fleet were found to require extensive 
 
 ^ See report of Commander Harrison and accompanying explanations. 
 
576 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 repairs. I enclose to you a copy of a drawing of the Brooklyn, made by 
 one of her officers after the action ; and an officer of the Hartford informed 
 me that she was more seriously injured than the Brooklyn. I mention 
 these facts to prove that the guns of the Tennessee were not idle during 
 this unequal contest. For other details of the action and injuries sus- 
 tained by the Tennessee, I refer you to the report of Commander J. D. 
 Johnston, which has my approval. After I was carried below, unfortu- 
 nately wounded, I had to be governed by the reports of that valuable offi- 
 cer as to the condition of the ship, and the necessity and time of her sur- 
 render; and when he represented to me her utterly hopeless condition to- 
 continue the fight with injury to the enemy, and suggested her surrender, 
 1 directed him to do the best he could, and when he could no longer dam- 
 age the enemy, to do so. It affords me much pleasure to state that the 
 officers and men cheerfully fought their guns to the best of their abilities, 
 and gave strong evidence, by their promptness in executing orders, of their 
 willingness to continue the contest as long as they could stand to their 
 guns, notwithstanding the fatigue they had undergone for several hours; 
 and it was only under the circumstances, as presented by Capt. Johnston, 
 that she was surrendered to the fleet, about ten a. m., as painful as it was 
 to do so. I seriously felt the want of experienced officers during the action. 
 All are young and inexperienced, and many had but little familiarity with 
 naval duties, having been appointed from civil life within the year. The 
 reports of Commander Harrison, of the Morgan, and Lieut. Commandant 
 Bennett, of the Gaines, you have no doubt received from those officers. 
 
 "I enclose the report of Fleet Surgeon D. B. Conrad, to whom I am 
 much indebted for his skill, promptness and attention to the wounded. 
 By permission of Admiral Farragut, he accompanied the wounded of the 
 Tennessee and Sehna to this hospital, and is assisted by Assistant Surgeons 
 Booth and Bowles, of the Selma and Tennessee, all under charge of Fleet 
 Surgeon Palmer, IT. S. N., from whom we have received all the attention 
 and consideration we could desire or expect. 
 
 " The crews and many officers of the Tennessee and Selma have been 
 sent to New Orleans. Commander J. D. Johnston, Lieut. Commandant 
 P. U. Murphy, and Lieuts. W. L. Bradford and A. D. Wharton, Second 
 Assistant Engineer J. C. O'Connell and myself, are to be sent I^orth. 
 Master's Mates W. S. Forrest and R. M. Carter, who are with me, acting 
 as my aides, not having any midshipmen, are permitted to accompany 
 me. They are valuable young officers, zealous in the discharge of their 
 duties, and both have served in the army, where they received honorable 
 wounds. Their services are valuable to me. 
 
 " I am happy to inform you that my wound is improving, and sin- 
 cerely hope our exchange will be effected, and that I will soon again be 
 on duty." 
 
 Captain Johnston's report to Admiral Buchanan was made 
 from the Pensacola hospital on August 13th. He also recites 
 the advance of the enemy, and thus continues : 
 
 "When they had approached sufficiently near to draw the fire from 
 Fort Morgan, signal was made to follow your motions, and the Tennessee 
 was moved down to the middle of the channel, just inside the line of tor- 
 pedoes stretching across it, from whence she immediately opened her bat- 
 tery upon the advancing fleet. Every effort was made, at the same time, 
 to ram each of the leading vessels as they entered the bay, but their su- 
 perior speed enabled them to avoid this mode of attack ; the first, with the 
 admiral s flag, passing ahead, and all the remainder astern, before the 
 ship could be turned to encounter them. As she followed the fleet into 
 the bay the leading monitor, the Tecumseh, was discovered to be sinking, 
 and in a few seconds she disappeared, taking down nearly all on board, 
 consisting, as since learned, of 120 souls. The Tennessee's battery was used 
 to the greatest advantage as long as the fleet were within range, and when 
 
THE CONFEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 577 
 
 they reached a point about four miles from Fort Morgan and were in the 
 act of anchoring, she steamed alone up towards them (the other vessels of 
 the squadron having been dispersed), and attacked them as soon as she 
 was near enough to render her fire effective. 
 
 "The whole fleet were again put in motion to receive her, and she re- 
 ceived four heavy shoclss by the heaviest vessels running into her at fuU 
 speed, soon after which I received an order from you, in person, to steer 
 for Fort Morgan, as it had been reported by tlie acting chief engineer that 
 the ship was leaking rapidly. At this time it was reported to me that the 
 wheel chains had been carried away; and, ordering the relieving tackles 
 to be used, I made a personal examination of the broken chain to ascertain 
 if it could be repaired. This was found to be impossible, without sending 
 men outside of the shield to expose themselves several minutes to the fire 
 of the enemy's vessels, by which the after-deck (over which the chains 
 lead) was closely watched and constantly swept until the close of the 
 action. 
 
 "Returning to the pilot-house for the purpose of more closely observ- 
 ing the movements of the enemy, I soon received a report that you had 
 been wounded, when I went aft to see you, and while there found that the 
 after-port cover had been struck by a shot which instantly killed a man 
 engaged in removing the pivot bolt upon which it revolved, and wounded 
 yourself and one of the gun's crew— the latter mortally. I then learned 
 that the two quarter-ports, out of which the after-gun was intended to be 
 used, had also been so jammed by the flre of the enemy as to render it 
 impracticable to move them, and that the relieving tackles had been shot 
 away and the tiller unshipped from the rudder-head. The smoke-pipe 
 having been completely riddled by shot, was knocked down close to the 
 top of the shield by the concussion of vessels running into the ship. At 
 the same time the monitors were using their eleven and fifteen-inch solid 
 shot against the after-end of the shield, while the largest of the wooden 
 vessels were pouring in repeated broadsides at the distance of onljr a few 
 feet; and, I regret to say, that many favorable opportunities of sinking 
 these vessels were unavoidably lost by the repeated failure of our gun- 
 primers. The bow-port cover was struck by a heavy shot, as also the 
 cover on the forward port on the port side, and two of the broadside port 
 covers were entirely unshipped by the enemy's shot. 
 
 " The enemy was not long in perceiving that our steering gear had 
 been entirely disabled, and his monitors and heaviest vessels at once took 
 position on each quarter and stern, from whence they poured in their fire, 
 without intermission, for a period of nearly half an hour, while we were 
 unable to bring a single gun to bear, as it was impossible to change the 
 position of the vessel, and the steam was rapidly going down, as a natural 
 consequence of the loss of the smoke-pipe. 
 
 " Feeling it my duty to inform you of the condition of the vessel, I 
 went to the berth-deck for this purpose, and after making my report, I 
 asked if you did not think we hadT better surrender, to which you replied : 
 "Do the best you can, sir, and when all is done surrender," or words to 
 that effect. Upon my return to the gun-deck I observed one of the heav- 
 iest vessels of the enemy in the act of running into us on the port-quarter, 
 while the shot were fairly raining upon the after-end of the shield, which 
 ■was now so thoroughly shattered that in a few moments it would have 
 fallen and exposed the gun-deck to a raking flre of shell and grape. 
 
 " Realizing our helpless condition at a glance, and conceiving that the 
 ship was now nothing more than a target for the heavy guns of the en- 
 emy, I concluded that no good object could be accomplished by sacrificing 
 the lives of the ofBcers and men in such a one-sided contest, and therefore 
 proceeded to the top of the shield and took down the ensign which had 
 been seized on to the handle of a gun-scraper, and stuck up through the 
 grating. While in the act, several shots passed close to me. and when I 
 went below to order the engines to be stopped the firing of the enemy 
 was continued. I then decided, although with an almost bursting heart, 
 
 37 
 
678 THE CONFEDEEA.TE STATES NAVY. 
 
 to hoist the white flag, and returning again on to the shield, placed it in 
 the same spot where but a few moments before had floated the proud flag 
 for whose honor I would so cheerfully have sacrificed my own life, if I 
 could possibly have become the only victim ; but at the same time it 
 would have been impossible to destroy the ship without the certain loss 
 of many valuable lives, your own among the number. 
 
 '"It is with the most heartfelt satisfaction that 1 bear testimony to 
 the undaunted gallantry and cheerful alacrity with which the oflScers and 
 men under my immediate command discharged all their duties; and to 
 the executive oiflcer, Lieutenant Bradford, it is due that I should com- 
 mend the regular and rapid manner in which the battery was served in 
 every particular. While a prisoner on board the U. S. steamer Ossipee, 
 and since coming into this hospital, I have learned, from personal obser- 
 vation and from other reliable sources of information, that the battery of 
 the Tennessee inflicted more damage upon the enemy's vessels than that 
 at Fort Morgan, although she was opposed by 187 guns of the heaviest 
 calibre, in addition to the twelve eleven and fifteen-inch guns on board 
 the three monitors. 
 
 " The entire loss of the enemy, most of which is ascribed to the Ten- 
 nessee, amounts to quite three hundred in killed and wounded, exclusive 
 of the one hundred lost in the I'ecumseh, making a number nearly as 
 large as the entire force under your command in this unequal conflict. 
 Fitty-three shot-marks were found on the Tennessee''s shield, three of 
 which had penetrated so far as to cause splinters to fly on board, and the 
 washers over the ends of the bolts wounded several men." 
 
 Lieut. Commander Murphy, of the Selma, made his re- 
 port to Admiral Buchanan from the Pensacola hosDital on 
 August 15th. He wrote : 
 
 " The shattered state of my nervous system, produced by the wound 
 I received, has prevented my making my report before this. Between 
 five and six o'clock, on the morning of the 5th inst., it was reported to lue 
 that a move was made by the fleet outside. I gave the order at once to 
 get up steam, to weigh anchors, and to lash both securely and then to go 
 to breakfast; and, if we had time, for the crew to clean themselves. The 
 8elma was lying to the southward and eastward of the flagship and 
 much nearer the shore. After the anchor was weighed the steamer dropped 
 down with the tide to the northward and eastward. While the crew 
 were at breakfast the engagement commenced, and many shots were 
 fired by both sides before I went to quarters; but as soon as the crew 
 were through with their breakfast and the decks were cleared up, I went 
 to quarters and stood slowly to the northward and westward, under easy 
 steam, and nearly parallel with the vessels coming in, and as soon as I 
 passed the stern of the Tennessee I opened on the enemy with all my 
 guns, and continued to fight all of them for some time, when I perceived 
 the Metacomet was towing the Hartford, the leading ship, when I gave 
 the order to give her all the steam they could that I might get ahead 
 and on the port side of hev. My intention was perceived, and before I 
 could get into the position I wanted, the Metacomet cast off and gave 
 chase. A constant fire had been kept up all the time, first at one and 
 then at another, as the opportunity offered. Before the Metacomet had 
 cast off, my best gunner had been killed by a piece of shell from the 
 Hartford, I think; but several vessels were firing at me at the same time, 
 and in a short while my next best gunner met the same fate. The fight 
 was then with the Metacomet (carrying eight 9-inch Dahlgren and two 
 100 pounder Parrott guns), one of the fastest vessels in their squadron. 
 She tried hard to rake me, which was prevented by good steering. The 
 Metacomet, being so much faster, soon came quite near, and, firing one of 
 her nine-inch guns, killed six and wounded seven men at the same gun, 
 as well as disabling the gun itself. I had only been able to use two of 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 579 
 
 the four guns which composed the battery of the Selma for some time, 
 and the crew of No. 1 gun had just been sent aft to assist in working 
 these two. 
 
 "My first lieutenant, "Wm. Comstook, and Masters' Mate Murray 
 were both killed by the same shot, and I was wounded in the left arm 
 after firing one or two shots more. I perceived that the Metacomet was 
 about to rake me with grape and shrapnel, and that the Port Royal, of 
 about the same class, was about to open on me also, and as I did not believe 
 that I was justified in sacrificing more of my men in such an unequal con- 
 test, I gave the order, at about half-past nine o'clock, to haul down the 
 colors. My wound was bleeding fast, and I knew if I left the deck for 
 one moment the vessel might be sunk. I had eight killed and seven 
 wounded. My deck was a perfect slaughter-pen when I surrendered. I 
 cannot speak too highly of the officers and crew. Not the least confusion 
 occurred during the action. The wounded were taken below and the men 
 returned instantly to their quarters. The powder division was beauti- 
 fully attended to; every charge and every shell were sent to the different 
 guns without a single mistake. The enemy acknowledge great loss, in 
 kiUed and wounded, inflicted on them by the Selma.''^ 
 
 Lieut. Bennett, having escaped to Mobile after beaching 
 the Gaines on Mobile Point and burning her, addressed his 
 report to Secretary Mallory on August 8th, the essential por- 
 tions of w^hich are the following: 
 
 '' As soon as the Tennessee delivered fire, the Gaines, having placed 
 herself next the admiral, commenced at about two thousand yards dis- 
 tance, with her pivot guns, upon the leading wooden ships, supposed to 
 be the Hartford and her consort, at about fifty minutes past six, as nearly 
 as I can determine, and continued to deliver a raking fire upon the lead- 
 ing wooden ships until their passage past the fort. She then made circle 
 to prevent too close action, as she was lying nearly in the track of the ad- 
 vancing fleet, and afterwards steered in nearly parallel lines with the 
 enemy at distances gradually diminishing, until she was within at least 
 seven hundred yards, and engaging with her port guns. The enemy now 
 being clear of the fort was enabled to direct attention exclusively to our 
 little squadron. 
 
 " Early in the action a shell exploded near the steering wheel, wound- 
 ing the two men stationed at it, and cutting the wheel-rope. Th« ship 
 was then steered with the relieving tackles until the after wheel-ropes 
 could be rove. Shortly after this, it was reported that the forward maga- 
 zine was filled with smoke and thought to be onflre. This, on examination, 
 luckily proved a mistake. An eleven-inch shot had entered the starboard 
 bow, striking the deck above the magazine, had broken it in, and made 
 so much dust that the gunner's mate, serving powder in that magazine, 
 thought it smoke, and believed, from the shock and dust, that a shell had 
 exploded and fired that part of the ship. He reported accordingly. This 
 occasioned a short delay in the serving of powder to the forward division. 
 The firemen of this division, with hose and buckets, went promptly to the 
 spot, under the executive officer, and soon discovered the mistake. About 
 this time the ship was subjected to a very heavy concentrated fire, from 
 the Hartford, Richmond, and others at short range, as the enemy passed 
 me. Nearly their whole fire seemed, for a time, to be directed at the 
 Gaines. The after magazine was now discovered filling with water. _ I 
 went below to examine it, and found much water had accumulated in it, 
 and was rapidly increasing. Not being aware of any shot having entered, 
 near the water, that part of the ship, and being unable to see any damage, 
 upon inspection from the side, which could have caused such a leak, I di- 
 rected the executive officer, with the carpenter's mate, to get into a boat 
 and make examination of the counter. He found a shot had broken in 
 the outer planking under the port quarter, about the water-line, and 
 
580 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 "which, from marlss, seemed to have glanced below in the direction of the 
 stern-post. This could not be stopped by reason of the impossibility of 
 getting to it, because of the flare of the counter. As this break could 
 not have caused all the water which flowed into the ship, I am of opinion 
 that it was a shell which had caused the break and had probably ex- 
 ploded below the water, under the cotinter, and had started the timbers 
 near the stern-post. The ship had received a shock during the engage- 
 ment, which shook her from stem, to stern, being much more violent than 
 that of shot passing through. The bilge pumps were immediately 
 worked, but there was no water in the engine-room. Finding the maga- 
 zine rapidly filling, also the after hold and shell-room, with no water in 
 the engine-room, I caused the after bulk-head of the engine-room to be 
 knocked down so as to allow the flow of water to the bilge pumps. By 
 this time the stern had settled some and the steering became difficult. 
 TJnder these circumstances I determined to withdraw from action. The 
 enemy's fleet had now passed. 
 
 " Finding the ship would sink in a short time, and thinking I might 
 be able to reach the shore, now about two or three miles distant, I with- 
 drew from action, and made the best of my way towards the fort, steering 
 the ship principally with the side wheels, which position I reached with- 
 out embarrassment from the enemy — thanks to an opportune rain squall 
 which shut me from view — and placed her bow upon the beach within 
 five hundred yards of Fort Morgan, about thirty minutes past nine 
 o'clock. 
 
 " I am happy to state there was no confusion or panic under the cir- 
 cumstances of our position, but that every work was done with delibera- 
 tion and without undue excitement. The^hip delivered fire to the enemy 
 at the moment of striking the shore. At the time of beaching, the mag- 
 azine was nearly filled ; I had caused all the powder to be removed to the 
 cabin. The shells were removed as rapidly as possible, but not before 
 many of them might have become submerged. The usefulness of the 
 ship having been destroyed by the enemy, I devoted myself and crew to 
 the preservation of all valuable materiel, and landed all the powder, 
 shells, shot, gun equipments, etc., which I gave to the general command- 
 ing at Fort Morgan, to whom I thought they might be useful in the ex- 
 pected siege. The crew were then landed, with their bags and blankets, 
 muskets, cutlasses, and small-arm ammunition, and the ship abandoned 
 at twelve o'clock, with her battle-flags flying, and her stern settled as far 
 as it could — about two fathoms. I did not spike the guns because they 
 could be secured by the fort, and could not be taken by the enemy. 
 
 " Having thus left my command, it became necessary to devise a 
 retreat for my crew— they were not necessary to the fort, as I was in- 
 formed when I offered their services. Already I had secured two boats 
 belonging to the Tennessee, left by her at anchor, and with four boats of 
 the Gaines, one having been destroyed by shot, I left the fort at eight 
 o'clock p. M., and reached Mobile at seven o'clock A. m. on the 6th, with 
 129 officers and men, small arms, etc., and with six boats passed the en- 
 emy's fleet without observation, and reported myself and crew to the 
 senior officer for further service. Not a man was lost by straggling, and 
 I brought up the wounded. The dead were buried on the afternoon 
 of the 5th in the fort's burial-ground. ^Ve had only two killed and three 
 wounded. 
 
 " Whilst running the gauntlet up the bay, I became apprehensive of 
 capture or of being forced to land and make a march to Mobile. The 
 Morgan was being chased by the enemy. As I knew it was herintention 
 to pass near the eastern shore and could see her approach us, I feared she 
 might lead the enemy upon the boats. Under these circumstances I 
 deemed it prudent to drop the signal book into the sea. I did so. The 
 officers and crew of the Gaines, for about ten or fifteen minutes, were sub- 
 jected to a very heavy fire from the enemy at short distance, and, I am 
 proud to say, stood it with great gallantry; there were two exceptional 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 581 
 
 cases only. Without easting censure upon any by my silence, I cannot 
 withhold the expression of my thanks to Lieutenant Payne, Passed 
 Assistant Surgeon Iglehart, Second Assistant Engineer Debois, Gunner 
 Offut, and Paymaster's Clerk Wilson (in charge of the supply of shells to 
 the after division), for their examples of coolness and gallantry under the 
 trying circumstances of this combat against an overwhelming force, and 
 the influence it must have had among the crew, most of whom^ had never 
 before been in action. Frequent interviews with these officers caused me 
 to regard them with admiration. 
 
 " The ship received seventeen sbots in her hull and smoke-stack; of 
 these only two can be said to have caused her any distress — that which 
 caused the leak, and the cutting of the wheel-ropes. 
 
 " As is usual and proper when a ship is lost, I beg the Department to 
 order a court of inquiry to investigate the causes which led to the aban- 
 donment of the Q^aines." 
 
 Under date of August 33d, Secretary Mallory acknowledged 
 the receipt of Lieut. Bennett's report and added : 
 
 " Against the overwhelming forces brought to bear upon our little 
 squadron defeat seems to have been inevitable; but the bearing of our 
 officers and men has snatched credit even from, defeat ; and, mingled with 
 deep regret for the suffering and captivity of the brave old admiral and 
 the loss of our men and ships is the conviction that the triumph of the 
 enemy leaves the honor of our service untarnished. 
 
 "The court of inquiry for which you asked is deemed unnecessary. 
 Such a tribunal could but strengthen the public verdict, in which the De- 
 partment fully concurs, that the loss of your ship resulted from no want 
 of courage, skill or judgment on the part of yourself, your officers or crew. " 
 
 Comnaander Harrison was silent concerning his course in 
 running the Morgan into Mobile until October 1st, on which date 
 he addressed to Admiral Buchanan a communication which he 
 styles "this letter for the purpose of relating the particular 
 part taken by this vessel in the action with the enemy's fleet." 
 He speaks of engaging the Hartford in the earlier moments of 
 the action and of materially injuring her by shells, of which 
 "one in particular, from our forward pivot-gun, must have 
 been considerably destructive (afterwards confirmed by a New 
 Orleans account), as it struck her bulwarks forward and for a 
 time silenced the gun mounted on her forecastle." This fight 
 was continued until the Federal ships had passed Fort Morgan, 
 and of his ensuing movements Commander Harrison wrote : 
 
 " The Gaines had been disabled and forced out of action and the 
 course we were pursuing was taking us further and further away from the 
 peninsula — which was our only place of refuge in case of being hard 
 pressed— and thus the chances were continually increasing of our being 
 cut off from all retreat by the enemy's gunboats, which I foresaw would 
 soon be thrown off from the fleet in pursuit; so I sheered off to the star- 
 board—the Selma doing the same; and, as I anticipated, a double-ender, 
 said to be the Metaoomet, in a few minutes after, started off from the 
 Hartford and soon overhauled and engaged in action with my vessel, whilst 
 the Selma, on our bow-port, continued her retreat (unfortunately for her) 
 in a direction to cross the mouth of Bon Secour Bay, and to reach the 
 shore of Mobile Bay. After a short cannonading between us, the Meta- 
 comet slipped off and steamed rapidly in pursuit of the Selma, seeing which, 
 and that my vessel would inevitably be cut off and captured by the two 
 other vessels of the enemy now on the way to join in the pursuit, if I suf- 
 fered her to engage in a ' stern chase, which is always a long one,' and 
 
583 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 knomng, furthermore, that with the coal-dust on board, which was my 
 only fuel, I could not possibly make steam enough to overtake two such 
 fast vessels as the Jfeiacomet and Selma, going off as they were at 'top' 
 speed, i deemed it best to turn the Morgan's bow directly into shallow 
 water, and in doing so we grounded on the long stretch of shoals which 
 extends off from the land a little to the eastward of Navy Cove. We backed 
 off, however, in a few minutes, and the Selma, having by that time sur- 
 rendered to the Metaoomet, and the other chasing gunboats having nearly 
 reached them, I directed my vessel's course toward Fort Morgan, on ap- 
 proaching which we discovered a small Federal gunboat aground on the 
 western side of the seaward channel, about a mile and a half below the 
 fort. I steamed down toward her, and sent a boat, with Lieut. Thomas 
 L. Harrison, to burn her, which was accordingly done. She proved to be 
 the Phillippi, disabled by a shot from the fort, and abandoned. Having 
 performed this duty, we returned to the fort and made fast to the wharf. 
 
 ' ' A short time before proceeding on this affair of the burning, the 
 Tennessee, about four miles distant from us, after a desperate contest 
 with the enemy, had been compelled, by being disabled (as we afterwards 
 learned), to yield to an overwhelming force, and the Morgan -weiS now 
 the only vessel left of our little squadron. I felt exceedingly anxious to 
 save her to the Confederacy by ' running the gauntlet ' up the bay to 
 Mobile, distant about twenty -five miles, but it seemed so impossible in a 
 noisy, high-pressure steamer, making black smoke, to pass the enemy's 
 fleet unobserved, or to elude the vigilance of his gunboats, which were 
 feeen after the action to go up the bay, that I gave up the idea at one 
 time as impracticable, and made preparations to take to the boats, as the 
 &aines' people intended to do when night should come. Upon reconsid- 
 eration of the matter, however, I determined to make the effort, and 
 having landed three-fourths of my provisions for the use of the garrison, 
 and thrown overboard my coal-dust, for the purpose of picking out all 
 the lumps that could be found, as well as to lighten the vessel, I started 
 at 11 P. M. of a starlight night upon an enterprise which no one on shore 
 or afloat expected to be successful. Not only was this the universal 
 opinion, but all letters and papers from the fort were sent in charge of 
 Lieut. Commanding Bennett in his boats, which were to go up along 
 shore ; nor would the two or three town's-people who happened to be 
 down there take passage with us, preferring the longer and safer route 
 by land. But fortune favored us, and although hotly pursued and 
 shelled by the enemy's cruisers for a large portion of the way, we success- 
 fully reached the outer obstructions near Mobile at daybreak, having 
 been struck but once slightly. We found the ' gap ' through the obstruc- 
 tions, much to our surprise, closed, and it was not until the afternoon that 
 the gate was pulled sufficiently aside to allow us to enter. In the action 
 down the bay we had the good luck to escape with but small damage. 
 We were struck but six times, and only one of that number did any harm, 
 and that entered the port wheel-house and passed out of the starboard, 
 destroying some muskets, boarding-pikes a,nd stanchions in its progress 
 over the deck. Only one person was wounded, and he slightly, by a 
 splinter. 1 owe this exemption from injury and loss, doubtless, in a great 
 measure, to the excellent position I was enabled to keep generally on the 
 Hartford's bow. 
 
 " The oiHcers and men, in their conduct, afforded me much satisfac- 
 tion, particularly as the most of them had never been under fire before; 
 and I am a good deal indebted to my executive officer, Lieut. Thomas L. 
 Harrison, who had especial charge of the after division of guns, owing 
 to an insufficiency of olHcers, for his hearty co-operation and assistance. 
 ******* 
 
 " P. S. — Besides the two other double-enders mentioned in the fore- 
 going as having left the fleet shortly after the Metacomet, to join in the 
 chase, there was a gunboat also which followed after awhile. It must be 
 understood with regard to the Selma that she did not discontinue her 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 583 
 
 retreat to engage the Metacomet, bub that her fighting was done with 
 her after- gun, fired over her stern, at the approaching vessel, and that she 
 surrendered whilst the Metacomet was yet astern or had just got up." 
 
 This explanation by Commander Harrison must be con- 
 trasted with the criticism made upon him by Admiral Bu- 
 chanan, who speaks in his official report of Harrison having 
 during the conflict " deserted " the Selma while his own vessel 
 was uninjured, and further says that "his (Harrison's) con- 
 duct is severely commented upon by the officers of the enemy's 
 fleet, much to the injury of that officer and the navy." The 
 Mobile Advertiser and Register, the leading paper of the city, 
 taunted him with having had but one man hurt on his ship. 
 A court of inquiry was, however, subsequently ordered by 
 Secretary Mallory, and its decision exonerated Harrison from 
 blame. ' 
 
 After the surrender and dispersion of Admiral Buchanan's 
 squadron the Federal flotilla commanded by De Kraft, and the 
 monitor Chickasaw, bombarded Fort Powell, their fire soon 
 proving so effective that Lieut Col. J. M. Williams, who was 
 in command, telegraphed to Col. Anderson, commandant of 
 Fort Gaines : "Unless I can evacuate, I will be compelled to sur- 
 render within forty-eight hours." Anderson replied " Save 
 jour gal-rison when the fort is no longer tenable." Williams 
 had already held out about as long as he thought was possible. 
 He describes in his official report the difficulties under which 
 he labored. 
 
 " The front face of the work was nearly completed and in a defensible 
 condition, mounting one 8-inch Columbiad, one 6.4-inch rifie and two 7-inch 
 Brooke guns. The face looking towards Gaines and Little Dauphine Is- 
 land was half finished. The parapet was nearly complete, but traverses 
 and galleries had only been framed. The rear had only been commenced. 
 Two guns were mounted— one lO-inch Columbiad and one 7-inch Brooke 
 rifled. They were without parapets and exposed from the platform up. 
 During the morning the fort was shelled from five gunboats in the sound 
 at long range. The fort was hit five times, but no particular damage was 
 done. I replied with the four guns bearing on that side, with what effect 
 is not known. About 3 :30 P. m. one of the enemy's monitors came up within 
 
 1 CoNTEDEEATE STAtEB Steamer "MOHGAN," 1 at the opportunity thus offered to serve your 
 
 Off Fobt Moegan, August 4th, 1864. ( cotmtry. 
 
 Messes. Clabk a™ PoEsyTH, Editors AiverlUer Very ^^^f^^^^^^^^^ ^ 
 
 andB^ter: Geokge W. Haeeison, 
 
 M^uH^uSn rpSi^Sllrr eS't^th^ <^«^-^^ Oanfederate States Navy. 
 
 you to be possesaedof a courage quite uncommon The Editor of the Advertiser replied as follows : 
 
 ■aa well as an acquaintance with carrying on A thousand thanks to Oapt. George W . Harri- 
 
 naval warfare quite marvellous for gentlemen son, of the Confederate States steamer Morgan, 
 
 leading peaceable lives like yourselves, I feel for his polite invitation, and we have to regret 
 
 particularly anxious to obtain the service of two that it was only received yesterday morning, 
 
 such valuable recruits, and have therefore, at "the day after the wedding." Had it been in our 
 
 the suggestion of some of my brother officers, power to have accepted the invitation, and had 
 
 taken the liberty of addressing you this letter we " occupied the most conspicuous position on 
 
 for the purpose of requesting the favor of your board," we shoald still have been in the land of 
 
 ■company on board my vessel when the expected the living to acknowledge his courtesy, for " the 
 
 ■engagement with the enemy's fleet takes place. most conspicuous position " appears, by the re- 
 
 I promise that you shall have the most con- suit of the fight, to have been an emmently saf 6 
 
 «piouous position on board and the fullest oppor- one. Except an engineer, " slightly wounded 
 
 tUnity to display your bravery and naval knowl- by a splinter, "nobody was hurt " on board the 
 ■edge. As patriots, you will, I am sure, jump 
 
684 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 700 yards of the fort, firing rapidly with shell and grape. I replied from, 
 the 7inch Brooke gun {razied) on the southern angle. It was protected by 
 an unfinished traverse, which, however would not permit it to be depressed 
 sufficiently for ricochet firing. The gun was loaded with great difficulty, 
 there being no platform for the gunners in the rear, owing to which, and 
 the delay occasioned by a sponge- head pulling off in the gun, I succeeded 
 in firing but three shots from it while the enemy was in range. One shot 
 strucli on the bow, with no apparent effect. The iron-clad's fire made 
 it impossible to man the two guns in the rear and I made no attempt 
 to do so. 
 
 " The elevating machine of 10-inoh Columbiad was broken by a frag- 
 ment of shell. A shell entered one of the sally-ports, which are not trav- 
 ersed in the rear, passed entirely through the bomb-proof and buried it- 
 self in the opposite wall; fortunately it did not explode. The shells ex- 
 ploding in the face of the work displaced the sand so rapidly that I was 
 convinced that unless the iron-clad was driven off it would explode my 
 magazine and make the bomb-proof chambers untenable in two days at 
 the furthest." 
 
 Thus beleaguered, Col. Williams communicated with Col. 
 Anderson, and received the reply advising evacuation. " At 
 the tira.e his dispatch was received," continues Col. Williams, 
 " it was becoming dark. The fleet had not moved up to inter- 
 cept my communications with Cedar Point; I could not expect 
 to have another opportunity for escape, and I decided promptly 
 that it would be better to save my command and destroy the 
 fort than to allow both to fall into the hands of the enemy, as. 
 they certainly would have done in two days." 
 
 Soon after dark, on August 5th, he withdrew his garrison 
 of 140 men, left Lieuts. Savage and Jaffers behind long enough 
 for them to spike the guns and blow up the magazine, which, 
 they accomplished, crossed to the mainland at low water and 
 marched his troops into Mobile the following morning. 
 
 It was an immediate object with Farragut to secure pos- 
 session of the entrance to Mississippi Sound, in order that 
 troops and supplies might be brought into Mobile Bay from 
 New Orleans, without undertaking to pass the guns of Fort 
 Morgan, and this opening he secured by the Confederate evac- 
 uation of Fort Powell. The reduction of Fort Gaines was the 
 next feature on his programme, and on the afternoon of Aug- 
 ust 6th, he sent in the Chickasaw and several gunboatSj 
 which opened on it with their heaviest shell at short range.. 
 Col. Anderson made no serious reply to this bombardment, 
 and after nightfall he received an invitation by a flag of truce 
 from Farragut to come on board the Hartford with his staff. 
 Taking Major Brown with him. he was met on the flag-ship 
 by Farragut and Gen. Gordon Granger, the commander of the 
 Federal land forces. Farragut's intention was at once shown 
 to be to argue him into a surrender, and with this purpose in 
 view he began to expatiate on the hopelessness of attempting 
 to hold the fort. " Gentlemen," he said, " if hard flghting 
 could save that fort, I would advise you to fight to the death; 
 but by all the laws of war, surrounded on three sides by my 
 vessels and on the fourth by the army, you have not even a 
 
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THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 585 
 
 chance of saving it." Anderson was overcome by this reason- 
 ing, without stopping to consider whether his case was as 
 desperate as the Federal admiral made it out to be, and was 
 for capitulation on the spot; but Major Brown was made of 
 sterner fibre, and answered that he, for one, was willing to 
 fight so long as there was a man or gun left. His courage, 
 however, was not shared by Anderson, and becoming con- 
 vinced that the latter had fully decided to surrender there was 
 nothing left for him to do but agree. They left the ship to- 
 ward midnight, and on the morning of the 7th, Capt. Drayton 
 and Major Montgomery, representing respectively the Federal 
 navy and army, were admitted to the fort and the surrender 
 took place, the garrison marching out as prisoners of war and 
 being sent to New Orleans. ' 
 
 The loss of Forts Gaines and Powell was, as Gen. Maury 
 reported, a most unfortunate affair for the Confederates, for it 
 enabled Farragut and Granger to concentrate all their efforts 
 upon Fort Morgan, which was speedily invested and besieged 
 by the Federal fleet, now strengthened by the captured Ten- 
 nessee and Selma, while Gen. Granger landed 10,000 troops ou 
 Mobile Point in its rear, where siege works were thrown up 
 and mounted with shell guns and mortars, to which Farragut 
 contributed four nine-inch guns and their crews from the 
 ships. Parragut's fiag-lieutenant, J. Crittenden Watson, and 
 Granger's chief of staff. Major James E. Montgomery, deliv- 
 ered to Gen. Page, on August 8th, a summons to surrender, to 
 which he replied that he would defend his post to the last ex- 
 tremity. He had about 400 effective men to oppose to the 
 10,000 troops and 2,000 sailors of the enemy, and twenty-six 
 serviceable guns against over 300, but it was his decision that 
 the Federals could not have Fort Morgan without fighting for 
 
 1 Tlie evacuation of Fort Powell and surrender been exposed, as are sailors on an ordinary man- 
 
 of Gaiuea gave rise to much amazement and of-v7ar. It is altogether probable that a faith- 
 
 diacontent among the Confederates, who had ful service of their battery for half an hour 
 
 expected Williams and Anderson to defend their would have driven off or sunk the only boat 
 
 positions with the bravery displayed by Bu- attackingiteeastern face, and thatitmight have 
 
 chanan and Page. General Page had instructed been held long enough to compel the fleet to 
 
 Anderson to hold out until the last extremity, put to sea, or at least to enable Mobile to fully 
 
 and relied upon him to make a strong fight. He prepare for land attack " 
 
 had received similar orders from Gen. Dabney General Maury was still more severe in his 
 H. Maury, commanding the District of the Gulf, strictures upon Anderson's surrender. In 
 ■who was astounded when the two defences were the report of August 12th, he writes ; " Fort 
 given up. General Maury touches on the sub- Gaines was garrisoned by six companies. Twenty 
 jeot in several of Ms dispatches to Hon. James first Alabama regiment, two companies First 
 A. Seddon, Secretary of War. Under date of Aug. Alabama battalion, forty Pelham cadets, 120 re- 
 12th, he says : " Lieut. Col. Williams abandoned serves and about 40 marines— in all about 600- 
 and blew up his work without having a man good troops. The fort was well supplied for six 
 injured, nor had any injury been inflicted upon months. The three ten-inch guns were dis- 
 any part of the fort. He had under his bomb- mounted during the bombardment (by the care- 
 proof fully 30 days' water and two months' pro- lessness of cannoneers, but were subsequently 
 visions. He had hand grenades, revolvers, mus- remounted) ; twenty guns remained in good 
 kets and howitzers to defend his fort against order. The fort was uninjured and could have 
 launches, and eight heavy guns to use against long withstood attack." 
 
 the ships. The fort had just been connected In his report of September 1st Gen. Mauiy 
 
 by telegraph with Port Gaines and Mobile. On returned to the subject, saying : 
 
 the morning of the 6th there were 70 negroes "On the evening of August 3rd, the cnemy 
 
 with trenching tools in the fort; the guns on the had landed a force on Dauphine Island m order 
 
 east face of the work were mounted and in to besiege and reduce Fort Gaines. Gen. Page 
 
 fighting order, but were not yet covered by the called for reinforcements to enable him to attack 
 
 parapet, and the men serving them would have this force, which at that time he supposed to b& 
 
5S6 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 it, and he gave them a long and stubborn contest. For two 
 weeks preceding the 22d of August they were busy in ad- 
 vancing their lines on the land side, and on the morning of 
 that day they began a bombardment as furious as soldier or 
 sailor ever assisted in. Their heavy guns on Mobile Point 
 were only distant some 250 yards from the fort, and the can- 
 noneers were perfectly sheltered by the high and thick em- 
 bankments of sand behind which they fought. The ships took 
 their positions at leisure on the north, south and west faces 
 of the fort, the iron-clads lying the closest in and delivering 
 an incessant fire. In twelve hours 3,000 shells were thrown 
 into the fort. Gen. Page replied to this terrific bombardment 
 with all the vigor of which his little force of men and guns 
 was capable, but about nine o'clock at night a shell set fire to 
 the citadel of the fort, and in the renewed impulse of the as- 
 sault the walls were breached repeatedly and nearly all his 
 best pieces of ordnance disabled. The heroism with which his 
 men kept up the conflict during the weary hours of that fate- 
 ful night cannot be exaggerated. While some served the few 
 guns still capable of being fired, others labored to extinguish 
 the fiames, which were perilously near to the magazines in 
 which an immense quantity of powder was stored; parties 
 wrere detailed to spike or destroy the dismounted guns, and 
 other squads threw into the cisterns all the powder not re- 
 quired for immediate use. In each sort of work they were 
 under constant exposure to the rain of shot and shell that 
 with the burning citadel lit up the sky, but not a man flinched 
 from his duty. 
 
 The flames were extinguished, but soon after dawn of the 
 23d the citadel was again set on fire and Gen. Page displayed 
 from his scarred and shattered battlements a white flag. He 
 arranged with Capt. Drayton and Gen. Granger the surrender 
 of the fort and garrison, with all the honors of war, at two. 
 o'clock p. M., and at that hour the colors which he had fought 
 
 small. Every available man was sent from Mo- at" New Orleans, on August IStli, a letter to his 
 bile to Fort Gaines. The entrance of the fleet wife, in which he said that aU his oificers and 
 into the bay prevented their return to the city. men saw that they were cut off and surrounded 
 They were too few to make the proposed attacli, by an overwhelming force, and expressed them- 
 but were too many for the proper siege gar- selves decidedly in favor of surrender. He 
 risen of Fort Gaines, and for the unexplained denied that he had acted contrary to the express 
 precipitate surrender made by Col. Anderson of orders of General Page, and contended that the 
 a work which, faithfully defended, could have latter had only instructed him to do the best he 
 held the enemy before it at least as long as Fort could. He gave as a reason for not answering 
 Morgan. After firing a few shots. Col. Anderson. Page's signal that negotiations were then pend- 
 withoutautfiority,entered into negotiations \vith ing under a flag of truce and he had no right to 
 the enemy, and on the 7th inst , the Confederate communicate with him. " I expected," he wrote, 
 flag was lowered and the ensign of the euemy " to be ostracized, and as I could not maintain 
 raised and saluted. Gen Page reports that he the etiquette of the military code mthout ex- 
 visited Fort Gaines and used every proper means hibiting too much selfishness, nothing wasleft 
 to prevent its surrender. He could not with me but to consult the great natural and moral 
 propriety assume command at Fort Gaines, and law, which prompted me to do exactly as I did. 
 remain absent from his more important com- I mighthavegot out of the scrapebydemanding 
 mandatFort Morgan. He ordered Col. Anderson to be relieved, but I thought that would only 
 to be relieved from command, and forbade any make matters worse ; for had any other officer, 
 surrender unless the Federals should return even General Page himself, attemped to fight 
 with Col. Anderson to the fort. Nothing more that fort another hour, I feel satisfied that there 
 is known of this unfortunate affair." would have been mutiny and a really disgrace- 
 Col. Anderson wrote from the military prison f ul surrender at last." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 587 
 
 for until the last chance of beating off the enemy had vanished 
 gave place to the Federal ensign. ' 
 
 Gen. Page made several reports to Gen. Maury upon the 
 participation of Fort Morgan in the events occurring between 
 the 5th and 23d of August. In the report relating to the pas- 
 sage of the fort by the Federal fleet he says : 
 
 "The spirit displayed by this garrison was fine, the guns admirably 
 served, and aU did their duty nobly; though subjected to a Are which for 
 the time was probably as severe as any known in the annals of this war, 
 our casualties were slight. Pour of the enemy's fleet turned from the fire 
 they would have to encounter in passing, and assisted other vessels in an 
 enfilading fire from the gulf side during the action. As to the damage 
 inflicted on those which succeeded in passing I cannot speak definitely, 
 shot after shot was distinctly seen to enter the wooden ships; but, as was 
 evident, their machinery being protected by chains, no vital blow could 
 be given them there. Their loss in men, I am assured, was very great. 
 Four hundred and ninety-one projectiles were delivered from this fort 
 during the passage of the fleet. Our naval forces under Admiral Bu- 
 chanan fought most gallantly, against odds before unknown to history." 
 
 The report of Gen. Page of August 30th sets out in full 
 the defence of Fort Morgan, and is therefore appended: 
 
 " After the reduction of Gaines I felt confident that the whole naval 
 and land force of the enemy would be brought against Morgan, and was 
 assiduous in preparing my fort for as good a defence as possible. For the 
 state of the work I beg leave to refer you to Chief Engineer Sheliha's let- 
 ter to Headquarters' Department, of July 9th, from which time no mate- 
 rial changes or addition was made; and further to state, that it had been 
 demonstrated by the fire from the enemy that the enoiente of the fort (in 
 which was its main strength) protected the scarp of the main wall only 
 about one-half its height from cUrvated shot; and it was now in the power 
 
 1 Oiiicial correBpondence relating to the ca- Third. Private property, with the exception 
 
 pltulation of Fort Morgan: of arms, will be respected. 
 
 THE OAPlxuiulTloN '^ery respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 ■ P. Drayton, Captain U. S. N„ 
 
 Fort Mokgan, August 23d, 1864. q^ (Jj p^^ of Admiral Fabeagut, Commanding 
 
 Rear Admiral D. G. Fakragut, U. S. N., Ma^or Naval Forces 
 
 General Gobdoh Gkasgee, IT. S. A., Com- jj'_ Arnold, Srig. Gen. U. S. A., 
 
 Tnanding, etc. On t/ie part of General. Granger, Commanding 
 
 Gentlemen: The further sacrifice of life being United States Forces. 
 imnecessary, my sick and wounded suiTering 
 
 and exposed, humanity demands that I ask for '^'^^ acceptance. 
 
 terms of capitulation. Very respectfully. Fort Morgan, August 23d, 1864. 
 
 E. L. Page, Brig. Gen. C. S. A. Captain P. Drayton, C. S. N., and Brig. Gm. E. 
 
 Headquarters United States Forces, 1 Arnold, TJ. S. A., acting on the part, respec- 
 
 MoBlLB Bay, August 23d, 1864. J lively, of Admiral Farkagut and General 
 
 Ihave notified Admiral Farragut of your de- Granger. 
 
 ■sire to capitulate. Until his arrival hostilities Gentlemen: Your conditions in the commu- 
 
 will be suspended, when your proposal will be nication of to-day are accepted, but I have still 
 
 duly considered. to request that the terms asked with regard to 
 
 KespectfuUy your obedient servant, my sick be granted and inserted in the capitu- 
 
 G. Granger, Ma^or Gen. U.S. A. Com'dg. lation. t will be prepared to surrender at tuo 
 
 To Brig. Gen. E. L, Page, Com'dg at Fort Morgan. o'clock, and to embark as soon as possible. 
 
 THE TERMS OP^RED. ^Ttflitsrig. Gen. C. S.A. 
 
 CrENEBAL : In reply to your communication of 
 
 this date, received by Captain Taylor, asking for 
 
 terms of capitulation, we have to say that the Oficial report of Admiral Farragut: 
 
 only terms we can make are: Flag-Ship " Hartford," \ 
 
 First. The unconditional surrender of your- Mobile Bay, August 23d. 1864. f 
 
 self and the garrison of Fort Morgan, with all of Hon. Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy 
 
 the public property within its limits, and in the Sir : I have the honor to inform the Depart- 
 
 ■same condition that it is now. ment that on the evening of the 21st instant 
 
 Second. The treatment which is in conformity General Granger informed me that his batteries 
 
 with the custom of the most civilized nations would be ready to open on Fort Morgan at day- 
 
 towards prisoners-of-war. light the next morning. I accordingly gave 
 
588 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of the euemy to open fire from every point of the compass, and conse- 
 quently none of the casemates, ■without heavy traverses in their front, 
 would be safe; that it was manifest, by this concentration of fire, my 
 heavy gruns could be dismounted; and my making a protracted resistance 
 depended on my ability to protect my men from the heavy fire and hold 
 the fort from the flank casemates against an assault. With these views, 
 I employed my men day and night, most of the time under fire, in erect- 
 ing traverses to protect my guns on the main wall as long as possible, to 
 render the casemates selected for the sick and wounded secure, and to pro- 
 vide safe quarters for themselves in their rest from the arduous duties they 
 would have to endure. It was necessary also to put a large traverse at the 
 sally-port, which was entirely exposed. 
 
 ' Thus, absolutely to prevent the probability of Fort Morgan's being 
 reduced at the first test and onset by the heavy batteries of the enemy it 
 was necessary for my limited garrison (of some 400 effective) to labor to 
 effect a work equal almost in extent to building a new fort. 
 
 "On early morning of the 9th the enemy proceeded with monitors 
 and transports, and disembarked troops at Navy Cove, commencing at 
 once their first work of investment by land. 
 
 " The -new redoubt' (3,700 yards from the fort) from which the guns 
 had been withdrawn, and the work formerly known as ' Battery Bragg,' 
 were destroyed as far as possible by burning the wood-work. The build- 
 ings around the fort, hospitals, quarters, stables, etc., were also at the 
 same time fired and cleared away as much as possible. 
 
 "Two monitors, three sloops-of-war and several gunboats engaged 
 the fort for two or three hours— the wooden vessels at rather long range 
 —with no material damage apparent to either side. Soon thereafter a 
 flag of truce was reported from the fleet, and communicated to this effect; 
 
 '^Brigadier Gen. R. L. Page, Commanding Fort Morgan. 
 
 " Sir : To prevent the unnecessary sacrifice of human life which must 
 follow the opening of our batteries, we demand the unconditional surren- 
 der of Fort Morgan and its dependencies. 
 
 " We are, very respectfully, your obedient servants, 
 
 "D. (Br. Farbagut, Rear Admiral. 
 
 „ , . , " Gordon Grabtgeb, Major &en." 
 
 To which my reply said : 
 " Hear Admiral D. G. Fabragtjt, 
 " Major Gen. Gordon Granger, 
 
 ' ' Sirs : I am prepared to sacrifice life, and will only surrender when 
 I have no means of defence. I do not understand that while being com- 
 municated with under flag of truce, the Tennessee should be towed within 
 range of my guns. 
 
 " Respectfully, etc., 
 
 "R. L. Page, Brigadier Gen. C. S. A." 
 
 " From this time to the 16th, day and night, we were engaged by the 
 fleet, sometimes in a brisk fight of several hours' duration, at others in a 
 desultory firing, without any very effective damage being done to our fort, 
 
 directions for the monitors and the vessels with their fire. At 6 this morning an exi)108ion took 
 
 suitable guns to move up and be ready to open place in the fort, and at 6:30 the white ilag was 
 
 upon it with the army, displayed on the fort. I immediately sent Fleet 
 
 I had previously lauded four 9-inch guna and Captain Drayton to meet Genei-al Granger to ar- 
 
 placed them in battery under the command of range the terras for the surrender of the fort. 
 
 Lieutenant H. B. Tyson, of the Hartford, and These were, that the fort, its garrison, and all 
 
 manned tliem with crews taken from the Hart- public property should be surrendered uncon- 
 
 ford, Brooklyn, Richnumd and Lackawanna, in ditionally, at 2 o'clock to-day, to the army and 
 
 coujunction with the batteries of the army. At navy forces of the United States, 
 
 daylight, on the 22d, the bombardment began These terms were agreed to by Brigadier Gen- 
 
 f rom the shore batteries, the monitors and ships eral Richard L. Page, formerly a commander 
 
 inside the bar and outside, and a more magnifi- in the navy. 
 
 cent fire I think has rarely been kept up for I shall send the garrison, officers and men, at 
 
 twenty-four hours. once to New Orleans. 
 
 At 8:30 p. M, the citadel took fire, and the Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 general ordered the near batteries to redouble D. G. Fabragut, Rear Admiral. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 589 
 
 save a demonstration of the fact that our brick walls were easily pene- 
 trable to the heavy missiles of the enemy, and that a systematic, concen- 
 trated flre would soon breach them. On the 15th, three of the fifteen- 
 inch shells striking the right flank face of Bastion No. 4 breached the 
 ■wall, and disabled the howitzers therein. 
 
 "During this time a pretty continuous flre was kept up on the fort 
 from the Parrott guns in several batteries erected by the enemy; and in 
 the intervals of serving the guns my men were engaged in the work be- 
 fore mentioned, for their protection, in the anticipation of a vigorous 
 bombardment. The sharp-shooters in our front had become very num- 
 erous and active, and with these encircling us on the land, and the fire de- 
 livered from the fleet on the flanks, our guns had to be served with much 
 ■care and under great difBculty. 
 
 " The land forces of the enemy completed their flrst approach on the 
 flth and 10th across the peninsula; the second through the 11th and 13th; 
 the third, a bayou, near and parallel to gulf shore, 13th and 14th; their 
 first parallel 500 and 700 yards distant, 15th, 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th ; ap- 
 proaches on 30th and 31st to within 200 yards of our glacis. 
 
 " Such guns as I could use on this force I annoyed them with, especi- 
 ally at night, and to the extent possible retarded their work; though 
 nothing very effective could be accomplished in this way, as their work- 
 ing parties were all concealed in the sand hills, and when our flre was 
 concentrated on any one point they would merely, unseen, remove to 
 some other. 
 
 " To the morning of the 33d, our efforts were with the heavy guns 
 that bore on them to interfere with the investing approaches of the en- 
 «iny. The topography of our front, however, was to their advantage, 
 and they made a steady advance, covering it somewhat with an irregular 
 fire from the batteries already in position, and lining their works already 
 completed with sharp-shooters to pick off our gunners. 
 
 " At daylight the fleet was reported moving up to encircle us, and 
 shortly its batteries (in conjunction with those on land which numbered 
 thirty-six guns and mortars) opened a furious flre, which came from 
 almost every point of the compass, and continued unabated throughout 
 the day, culminating in increased force at sundown ; after which the 
 heavy calibres and mortars kept it up during the night. This flre disabled 
 all the heavy guns save two, which did not bear on the laud approach, 
 partially breached the walls in several places, and cut up the fort to such 
 an extent as to make the whole work a mere mass of debris. Their mortar 
 practice was accurate. 
 
 "Apprehensive, from the great effect already had on the walls, that 
 my magazines, containing now 80,000 pounds, were in danger in conse- 
 <iuence of the continuation of the bombardment in the night, with great 
 care and under continuous flre I had the powder brought out and flooded. 
 The guns in the water and lunette batteries, now unserviceable and in 
 jeopardy from the enemy, I ordered spiked and otherwise effectually 
 damaged; and all the guns on the main rampart dismounted by the flre 
 irpm the enemy were likewise destroyed, as of no further avail in defence. 
 Early in the night the wood-work of the citadel was flred by the mortar 
 shells and burned furiously for some hours; the enemy during the confla- 
 gration pouring in his missiles with increased vigor. With great efforts 
 the flre was arrested and prevented from extending around near the mag- 
 azines, which would have been in immediate danger of explosion. In the 
 gallant endeavor to prevent this disaster, I would especiallj^ mention 
 privates Murphy. Bembough and Stevens, First Tennessee regiment, for 
 great courage and daring displayed. 
 
 "At daylight on the 23d (all my powder had been destroyed), the 
 citadel was again set on flre in several places by shells and burned until 
 it was consumed. 
 
 " The report made to me now was that of the casemates which had 
 been rendered as safe as possible for the men, some had been breached. 
 
690 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 others partially (Capts. Johnston, Fisher and Hughes informed me that 
 another shot on them would bring down the walls of their company- 
 quarters), so that a resumption of the severe fire from the enemy would 
 in all likelihood inflict great loss of life, there being no bomb-proof in the 
 fort. The enemy's approach was very near the glacis. My guns and 
 powder had all been destroyed; my ' means of defence gone '; the citadel, 
 nearly the entire quartermaster's stores, and a portion of the commis- 
 sariat burnt by the enemy's shells. It was evident the fort could hold 
 out but a few hours longer under a renewed bombardment. The only 
 question was, hold it for this time, gain in the eclat, and sustain the loss 
 of life from the falling of the walls, or save life and capitulate? 
 
 " I capitulated to the enemy at two o'clock p. m., and though they 
 refused to insert it in the terms there was a full understanding, and I was 
 assured that my sick and wounded should be sent at once to Mobile by a 
 flag ef truce. This was not done. Considering the great exposure to 
 which the men were subjected, and the fact that shells frequently burst 
 among them when in the casemates, the casualties were unusually small. 
 The garrison in this severe test behaved well, and I would make little 
 distinction. Capt. J. Gallimard, engineer in charge, performed his duties 
 to my satisfaction. To the officers of the First Alabama battalion artil- 
 lery. Major J. T. Gee commanding, and of Capt. Cothran's company. 
 Twenty -first Alabama, I give my thanks for their promptness and alac- 
 rity in every duty ; and to Col. A. J. Jackson, commanding the First 
 Tennessee, and Capts. Johnston and Fisher and their brave companies of 
 that regiment, for very efficient service. To Capt. C. H. Smith, A. A. G., 
 and Capt. R. T. Thom, A. I. G., for prompt performance of all their du- 
 ties, I am under obligations; and to my aide-de-camp, Lieut. J. C. Taylor,. 
 I owe much for his promptness and energy and for his active and gallant 
 assistance throughout the operations." '■ 
 
 Farragut experienced much chagrin when he found that 
 Gen. Page had left him nothing but the battered walls of Fort 
 Morgan, the soaked powder and the disabled guns; and he 
 vented his disappointment in a report, in which he accused 
 the Confederate commander of destroying the armament and 
 ammunition of the fort after displaying tlie white flag. This 
 charge of a flagrant violation of the laws of civilized warfare 
 was totally unfounded. The report of Gen. Page and the 
 statements of his subordinate officers afford unimpeachable 
 evidence that he destroyed the property of the Confederate 
 government during the night of August 22d and 33d, previous 
 
 1 As soon aa Fort Morgan had sTirrendered form who called him hy name and whom he 
 Farragut sent out boats to rake the channel for recognized as Bnrke. " I looked at him with 
 toii)edoe8. Twenty-one were taken up and one surprise," Arnold says, "and did not recog- 
 ('xplodcd while being handled by the Federal nize him until he said : ' Lieutenant, don't you 
 Hoamon, killing one man and wounding thirteen, know me?' I then saw that it was Sergeant 
 of whom lour subsequently died from their in- Burke, and remarked ; ' What does this mean, 
 juries. There are 'sound reasons for the belief this uniform.' He replied : ' You now know 
 entertained by Confederate ofi&cerg that a Fed- what I have been at the past few weeks.' 'Yes,' 
 eral spy had penetrated within their hues, and I said, ' a spy.* He smiled, and said : * Lieut- 
 informed Federal commanders of their move- enant, if you want protection or aid you will get 
 ments and of the location of torpedoes. Lieut. it by reporting to General Canby. I made a list 
 G. A. Arnold, Assistant Enrolling Officer at Mo- of deserving citizens for bis use, and your name 
 bile in March, 1865, relates that there was fre- heads the list. Good-bye.' I have not seen 
 qiiently seen about Confederate headquarters Burke since, nor have I any knowledge of what 
 at that time a soldier known as Sergeant Burke, became of him. Burke was a sharp, intelligent 
 i>f tlie Army of EastTennessee.whoae ostensible American Irishman, and I now have reason to 
 business was to gather up all the men of that believe that he furnished Farragut with a great 
 army absent without leave and forward them to deal of valuable information." 
 their comuiands. Burke appeared to be very A Southern correspondent writing from Far- 
 zealous in the Confederate cause, but the day ragut's fleet at the time, said that the man who 
 after the suiTeuder Arnold was approached near laid the torpedoes in Mobile channel had been 
 Canby'a headquarters by a man in Federal uni- employed to take them up. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 591 
 
 to making any proposition to surrender; and there is not a 
 scintilla of evidence to support the assertion made by Farra- 
 gut, and reiterated by Admiral Porter in "The Naval History 
 of the Civil War," that any part of the destruction took place 
 after he had opened negotiations for capitulation. It was en- 
 tirely proper for him to cripple the fort prior to those negotia- 
 tions, and in so doing he made the last demonstration that 
 was permitted him of his fidelity to his government, for he 
 was thenceforward held a prisoner until the close of the war. 
 But if there were any doubt about the matter, it would be re- 
 moved by the decision of the Federal Council of War, con- 
 vened at New Orleans, September 1st, and consisting of Major 
 Gen. S. A. Hurlbut, Brig. Gen. James Totten, and Lieut. Com- 
 mander S. R. Franklin, U. S. N. , which sat for two weeks ex- 
 amining the charges against Gen. Page and reported that 
 no public property was destroyed after the white flag was 
 hoisted on the glacis of Fort Morgan. ' 
 
 With Forts Morgan, Gaines and Powell in their hands the 
 Federals had absolute control of Mobile Bay, but they made 
 no attempt for the time being to move against the city itself, 
 which was defended by an inner line of works, the principal 
 of which was Spanish Fort, on the eastern bank of the Apal- 
 achee River.'' Other defences were Fort Blake and Batteries 
 Huger, Tracy, Mcintosh and Gladden, the Tower battery, the 
 Alexis battery on Choctaw Point, and a line of piles and 
 torpedoes across the channel. It was anticipated that after 
 the surrender of Fort Morgan the Federals would push on 
 to the city, and Gen. Maury took command there in person 
 
 1 WMle Gen. Page was a prisoner in Fort La- competent to pronounce on the matter. I am 
 
 fayette, in December 1S64, he addressed the content to abide their opinion. Immediately 
 
 following to the editor of the New York TWfrziwe: after the capitulation of Fort Morgan, certain 
 
 "Sir : In your issue of yesterday was the fol- false and injurious reports were circulated, im- 
 lowing paragraph ; ' The rebel General Page, puting some irregularity and unfairness on my 
 captured near Fort Morgan, applied by letter part in the surrender of the work. By a coun- 
 lately to hia old classmate. Commodore Rodgers, cil of war, ordered by Gen. Canby, and com- 
 for assistance in getting exchanged.' The reply posed of of&cers of the Federal army and navy, 
 was; 'lean do nothing for you. You neither I was, after a most searching and protracted in- 
 defended your post like a man, nor surrendered vestigation, promptly and entirely acquitted of 
 like an officer.' all and every of these imputations. The opinion 
 
 "It does me great injustice; and though a and findings of this council were officially pub- 
 
 prieoner of war, in the hands of your govern- liehed in the New Orleans papers; and it would 
 
 ment, I do not hesitate so far to presume on have been agreeable to my desire to have had 
 
 your sense of right as to solicit a correction of the whole ' proceedings ' laid before the public, 
 
 the misstatements involved in the aforesaid which I yet hope at some future day may be 
 
 paragraph. The facts of the case are just these: done. 
 
 Some time ago, while Ul and suffering, I sent a "Your obedient servant, 
 
 private note to Commodore John Kodgers, an old " E. L. Page, 
 
 comrade and former friend, requesting him, if •'Brig. Gen., C. S. army. 
 
 he thought proper, to second an application I " Fort Lafayette, Dec. 27th, 1864." 
 had addressed to the Union authorities for a 
 
 parole or a transfer to a warmer climate (which 2 The streams entering into the bay of Mobile, 
 
 ti'ansfer I may add in parenthesis, the surgeon near the city, virtually form a delta system. The 
 
 of the post had stated to be essential to my Mobile Kiver is formed by the confluence of the 
 
 health). To this communication I have never Alabama and Tombigbee, and has below the city 
 
 received any reply (written nor verbal), nor has a branch called the Spanish Kiver. The Tensaw 
 
 any overpassed through the official channel of Biver branches off from the Alabama thirty 
 
 correspondence with the inmates of this prison. miles above the city, and empties into the bay 
 
 As to whether the fort, of which I had com- through two mouths, the Tensaw and the Blake- 
 
 mand, was properly fought and defended, this ly. The Tensaw and Spanish Rivers come to- 
 
 is a question on which it becomes not me to gether about a mile from the city, so that there 
 
 speak. My own government, and they with is shoal water navigation between all these 
 
 whom I shared the perils of the flght, are alone streams without entering the bay. 
 
-592 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 to superintend the defence. He brought together a force of 
 about 6,000 men, only 1,000 of whom had ever been under 
 fire. Brig. Gen. Higgins, who was in command of the harbor 
 defences, issued an order forbidding any officer commanding 
 any fort or battery in and around Mobile to hold any com- 
 munication, by flag of truce or otherwise, with the land or 
 naval forces of the enemy without authority from headquar- 
 ters. This prohibition was designed to prevent the examples 
 of Williams and Anderson from being imitated, and Gen. 
 Higgins added that " the forts and batteries of this command 
 must and shall be held to the last extremity." 
 
 The city probably had more women and children in it 
 than at any time since the war began, but they and the non- 
 combatants generally were removed in large numbers to the 
 interior towns, and the planters along the Tombigbee and 
 Alabama valleys were asked to send in all the provisions 
 they could spare, and to allow their negro slaves to work 
 upon the fortifications. All the male residents capable of 
 bearing arms were organized into military companies, and 
 the city was placed under martial law. The people were still 
 full of confidence in the future, and when the theatre was 
 opened in the first week of September numerous audiences at- 
 tended upon the dramatic performances. 
 
 Commodore Ebenezer Farrand, who had been in charge of 
 the naval station at Selma, was assigned to the naval com- 
 mand at Mobile in place of Admiral Buchanan, and Major 
 Gen. Frank Gardner was placed in command of the defences, 
 and Major Gen. J. M. Withers in command of all the reserves 
 of Alabama. Col. A. S. Herron was charged with the duty 
 of organizing the Louisianians and the battalion of employes, 
 and Col. T. J. Judge with that of organizing all other troops 
 that might respond to his call. 
 
 The squadron left to Farrand was only nominally formid- 
 able. It consisted of the Tuscaloosa, Huntsville, Nashville, 
 Morgan and Baltic. The two first-named were called iron- 
 clads, and were intended to be vessels of the same general 
 plan as the Tennessee, although smaller; but they were only 
 partly armored and their engines were still more defective 
 than that of their famous prototype, while neither had a full 
 complement of guns. The obstacles that impeded the Con- 
 federate government in the construction and eq^uipment of 
 men-of-war were daily growing in magnitude, and it was sadly 
 acknowledged to be out of the question to complete these 
 two ships. The Nashville was a side-wheel steamer, with 
 some little iron-plating upon her, the Morgan was Commander 
 Harrison's old ship and the Baltic was a small river boat. 
 There were at the Mobile wharves two uncompleted gunboats, 
 on which work never progressed beyond their hulls. 
 
 Farragut's lighter vessels and a couple of monitors passed 
 over Dog River Bar within a week after the 5th of August, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 593 
 
 and on the 15th reconnoitred around the mouth of Mobile 
 River, firing a few shots at the Tuscaloosa and Huntsville, 
 which were replied to by the Morgan. In the second week of 
 September he sent an expedition up Fish River, on the eastern 
 side of Mobile Bay, which destroyed the lumber-mills, salt 
 works, etc. , in that vicinity, before it was driven off by Col. 
 Murray at the head of a small force of Confederates with the 
 loss of one officer and two men killed. 
 
 These were the last operations around Mobile for six 
 months. The winter was spent in idleness by both Federals 
 and Confederates, but with the opening of spring the former 
 were enabled to spare from other fields of campaign any num- 
 ber of troops and ships for the final assault upon Mobile. 
 Charleston and Fort Fisher had succumbed to the power of 
 the Federal government and over Mobile alone of all the great 
 ports still fioated the fiag of the Confederacy. Rear Admiral 
 Henry K. Thatcher had succeeded Farragut" in the command 
 of the Federal fleet off the city and had had two more moni- 
 tors and several gunboats added to his strength, while Gen. E. 
 R. S. Canby, in command of the Federal army of the West 
 Mississippi, was given 50,000 troops with which to undertake 
 the investment of Mobile by land. 
 
 On March 21st, 1865, the movement against Mobile by land 
 and water was begun, it being first directed against Spanish 
 Fort on the east side of Tensaw River, the siege of which lasted 
 until April 8th, when the garrison was bombarded and starved 
 into evacuating it. Gen. Maury, in an account written within 
 the past few years, says : 
 
 " The defence of Spanish Fort was the last death-grapple 
 of the veterans of the Confederate and Federal armies. They 
 brought to it the experience of four years of incessant con- 
 flict, and in the attack and defence of that place demonstrated 
 every offensive and defensive art then known to war. It is not 
 too much to say that no position was ever held by Confederate 
 troops with greater hardihood and tenacity, nor evacuated 
 more skilfully after every hope of further defence had gone." 
 
 Spanish Fort was garrisoned by 2,100 men and FortBlake- 
 ly, flve miles above, by 2,600. Nearly 30,000 Federal troops 
 were engaged in the siege of the former, and when it was evac- 
 uated they were joined by some 12,000 more, and the whole 
 force went on to the attack on Blakely, which was abandoned 
 on April 11th. Gen. Maury had most ingeniously arranged 
 for the safety of these garrisons, when their positions should 
 become untenable, by constructing bridges across the marshes 
 and streams between them and deep water, so that when the 
 abandonment was made necessary the troops were marched 
 by this route to where steamers were held in readiness to 
 transport them to Mobile. 
 
 The Confederate gunboats were able to render but little 
 service in these operations on the eastern side of the Mobile 
 
594 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 waters, but they kept along the shore and did some occasional 
 execution upon the intrenched lines of the enemy. In this 
 work the Morgan was conspicuous. The Federal craft were 
 very actively employed, and no less than eight of them were 
 sunk by torpedoes. On March 28th, the monitors Winnebago, 
 Osage, Kickapoo, Chickasaw, and Milwaukee, and the gunboat 
 Octorara steamed toward Spanish Fort to shell a Confederate 
 transport, and as they were returning to the fleet the Milwau- 
 kee struck a torpedo, and in three minutes was on the bottom 
 in ten feet depth of water. All her people escaped to the other 
 vessels. She was one of the largest and strongest of the Fed- 
 eral iron-clads, having two turrets and two fifteen-inch and 
 two eleven-inch guns. The next day the deadly effectiveness 
 of the Confederate torpedo service was proved upon the Osage, 
 a turtle-back iron-clad, which was sunk on the edge of the 
 channel. Four of her crew were instantly killed, and six 
 wounded, of whom two subsequently died. The destruction 
 of these heavy ships caused much exultation among the Con- 
 federates, which found expression in salutes from Spanish 
 Fort and the guns of the Nashville. To the Federals the two 
 disasters, one following the other so closely, were depressing. 
 As they had swept the channel for torpedoes regularly, and 
 had taken up 1 30 within a few days previously, they concluded 
 that those which had wrecked the Milwaukee and Osage were 
 floating instruments of destruction let loose from the rear of 
 the Confederate obstructions to sweep down with the tide, and 
 with this fresh peril confronting them they doubled their vig- 
 ilance, a detail of boats being constantly on duty as torpedo 
 searchers. Notwithstanding these precautions, however, the 
 iron-clad Rodolph was sunk on April 1st, while towing a scow 
 with apparatus for raising the Milwaukee, and four of her 
 crew were killed and eleven wounded. Subsequent to the 
 surrender of Mobile, the gunboats Ida, Sciota and Althea, a 
 launch of the monitor Cincinnati, and a second launch were 
 blown up by torpedoes while on search duty, their combined 
 losses amounting to fourteen killed and wounded. Thus, be- 
 ginning with the destruction of the Tecumseh, the Confederate 
 torpedo service in the Mobile waters made the remarkable 
 record of sinking nine vessels, large and small, of the enemy, 
 and of killing 144 men and wounding twenty -five in addition 
 to the five killed and eight wounded in handling the torpedoes 
 dredged from the channel just subsequent to the capture of Fort 
 Morgan. Nowhere else in the Confederate ports did this service 
 accomplish such valuable results, and if the officers in charge 
 of it had possessed the material for manufacturing torpedoes, 
 primers and fuses that in every instance would have resisted 
 the action of the water, the calamities to the Federal ships 
 must necessarily have been much greater than they were. 
 
 Batteries Huger and Tracy had been evacuated on the 
 same day as Blakely (April 11th), and on the 12th Admiral 
 
THE CONFEDEEATB STATES NAVY. 595 
 
 Thatcher convoyed with his gunboats 8,000 troops under com- 
 mand of Gen. Granger to the front of Mobile, and sent in a de- 
 mand for the immediate and unconditional surrender of the city. 
 "Thecity," wrote Mayor R. H. Slough in reply, " has been evacu- 
 ated by the military authorities, and its municipal authority is 
 now within my control. Your demand has been granted, and 
 I trust, for the sake of humanity, all the safeguards which we 
 can throw around our people will be secured to them. " 
 
 When the fall of the city was seen to be inevitable, Com- 
 modore Farrand sunk the unfinished iron-clads Huntsville 
 and Tuscaloosa in the main channel of Mobile River, but by 
 moving through the Blakely and Tensaw the Federal gun- 
 boats avoided all the obstructions, and anchored with their 
 guns bearing upon the city. With the remainder of his squad- 
 ron, some river steamers, and several blockade-runners that 
 had been shut up at Mobile after the port was sealed, Farrand 
 started up the Alabama River, hoping to reach Selma, where 
 a further defence might have been made; but that city, and 
 the naval station, had been surrendered already to the Federal 
 land forces, and on April 27th was occupied by a Federal 
 squadron commanded by Lieut. Commander Harmony and an 
 army under command of Major Gen. Steele despatched from 
 Mobile. Commodore Farrand was now closely blockaded in 
 the Tombigbee River, and on the night of May 4th he made 
 to Admiral Thatcher written propositions for surrender, and 
 asked for a conference with the latter at which terms could be 
 settled upon. The two commanders met at Citronelle, a 
 point about twenty-five miles above Mobile, and Farrand's 
 proposals were accepted on the same basis as granted by Gen. 
 Grant to Gen. Lee, Gen. Sherman to Gen. Johnson, and Gen. 
 Canby to Gen. Richard Taylor, which last surrender was made 
 at the same place and time. The memoranduna of surrender 
 was as follows: 
 
 ^'Memorandum of the conditions of the surrender of the Confederate naval 
 forces serving under the command of Commodore Ebenezer Farrand 
 in the waters of the State of Alabama, made at Sidney, Alabama, May 
 4th, 1865. 
 
 " First: The officers and men to be paroled until dulj' exchanged, or 
 otherwise released from the obligations of their parole, by the authority 
 of the government of the United States. Duplicate rolls of all officers and 
 men surrendered to be made, one copy to be deUvered to the officer ap- 
 pointed by Acting Rear Admiral H. K. Thatcher, and the other retained 
 by the officer appointed by Commodore E. Farrand ; officers giving their 
 individual paroles, and commanders of vessels signing a like parole for the 
 men of their respective commands. 
 
 ''Second: All vessels of -war, their guns and equipments, all small- 
 arms, and ammunition and stores on board the said vessels, to be delivered 
 over to the officer appointed for that purpose by Acting Rear Admiral 
 Thatcher. Duplicate inventories of the property surrendered to be pre- 
 pared; one copy to be retained by the officer delivering, and the other by 
 the officer receiving it, for our information. 
 
 " Third: The officers and men paroled under this agreement will be 
 allowed to return to their homes, with the assurance that they will not be 
 
596 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 disturbed by the authorities of the United States so long as they continue 
 to observe the condition of their paroles and the laws in force where they 
 reside, except that persons residents of northern States will not be allowed 
 to return without special permission. 
 
 "Fourth: The surrender of property will not include the side-arms 
 or private baggage of officers. 
 
 "Fifth: The time and place of surrender will be fixed by us, respect- 
 ively, and will be carried out by officers appointed by us. 
 
 ' ' Sixth : After the surrender, transportation and subsistence to be fur- 
 nished by Acting Rear Admiral H. K. Thatcher for officers and men to the 
 nearest practicable point to their respective homes. 
 
 " H. K. Thatcher, 
 Acting Rear Admiral U. 8. N., Commanding West Ghilf Squadron, 
 
 " E. Fabband, 
 
 Flag Officer, Commanding C. S. Naval Forces in waters of Alabama.'''' 
 
 In accordance with these stipulations Lieut. Commanding 
 Julius Myers, the officer designated by Commodore Farrand, 
 on May 10th surrendered to Fleet Capt. Edv^ard Simpson, act- 
 ing for Admiral Thatcher, at Nanna Hubba Bluff, on the Tom- 
 bigbee River, the Nashville, the Morgan, the Baltic, the Black 
 Diamond and the Southern Republic, the last-named being an 
 unarmed steamer on which the stores from the naval station 
 at Mobile had been brought up the river under charge of Lieut. 
 Myers. Capt. Simpson's report states he paroled 112 officers, 
 285 enlisted men and 24 marines. The paroles and signatures 
 were as follows : 
 
 "We, the undersigned, prisoners of war belonging to the Confederate 
 naval forces serving under the command of Oommodore Ebenezer Farrand, 
 in the watei-s of the State of Alabama, this day surrendered by Com- 
 modore Ebenezer Farrand to Acting Rear Admiral Henry K. Thatcher, 
 United States navy, commanding the West Gulf squadron, do hereby give 
 our solemn parole of honor that we will not hereafter serve in the navy 
 of the Confederate States, or in any military capacity whatever, against 
 the United States of America, or render aid to the enemies of the latter, 
 until properly exchanged in such manner as shall be mutually approved' 
 by the respective authorities. 
 
 "Done at Nanna Hubba Bluff, on the Tombigbee River, Alabama, 
 this tenth day of May, eighteen hundred and sixty-five." 
 
 L. Rosseau, Captain. 
 Ebenezer Fai-rand, Flag-Offleer. 
 Charles W. Hays, Lieutenant. 
 Julius Myers, Lieutenant. 
 C. P. McGary, Lieutenant. 
 Charles E. Yeatman, Lieutenant. 
 F. Watlington, Lieutenant. 
 E. G. Booth, Ass't Surgeon. 
 N. E. Edwards, Ass't Surgeon. 
 Wm. W. J. Wells, Paymaster. 
 Robert C. Powell, Ass't Surgeon. 
 Wm. Fisk, Jr., Chief Engineer. 
 Albert P. Hulse, Secretary. 
 P. U. Murphey, Lieutenant. 
 J. E. Armour, Paymaster. 
 Lewis W. Munro, Surgeon. 
 E. Lloyd Winder, Lieutenant. 
 A. L. Myers, Master. 
 
 F. B. Dornin, Passed Midshipman. 
 J. S. Wooddell, Clerk. 
 
 John H. Pippen, Clerk. 
 John E. O'Connell, 2d Ass't Engineer. 
 W. B. Patterson. 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 Edward Cairy, Ass't Surgeon. 
 Jos. Preble, Acting Master. 
 
 G. W. Turner, Acting Master's Mate, 
 W. A. Gardner, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 G. E. Courtin, Paymaster's Clerk. 
 Edward P. Herssend. 
 
 Jos. L. Wilson, Paymaster's Clerk. 
 
 Jas. H. Mai?sh, Navy- Yard Clerk. 
 
 Benjamin G. Allen, Gunner 
 
 J. R. Shackett, Pilot. 
 
 G. H. Lindenberger, Mechanic. 
 
 W. D. Crawford. 
 
 J.H.Hunt,A.M.M., Com'g St'r Baltic. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 597 
 
 D. R. Lindsay, Naval Storekeeper. 
 Thos. G. Lang, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 D..B. Conrad, Fleet Surgeon. 
 Geo. H. Oneal, Ass't Paymaster. 
 J. M. Pearl, Ass't Paymaster 
 J. R. Jordan, 1st Ass't Engineer. 
 8. S. Herrick, Ass't Surgeon. 
 Howard Quigley, Ist Ass't Engineer. 
 H. 8. Smith, Gunner. 
 
 C. H. Mallery, Gunner. 
 
 J. M. Smith, Paymaster's Clerk. 
 George Newton, Sailmaker 
 Thos. L. Harrison, Lieutenant. 
 O. 8. Iglehart, Passed Ass't Surg. 
 
 D. G. Raney, Jr., 1st Lieut. M. C. 
 W. G. Craig, Master P. N. C S. 
 Jos. R. DeMahy, Master P. N. C. 8. 
 M. M. Seay, Ass't Pay'r P. N. C. S. 
 N. M. Read, Assistant Surgeon. 
 
 G. D. Lining, 1st Ass't Engineer. 
 J. R. Y. Fendall, 1st Lieut. C S. M. 
 A. P. Beinre, Passed Midshipman. 
 R. J. Deas, Passed Midshipman. 
 
 E. Debois, 2d Assistant Engineer. 
 M. M. Rogers, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 P. A. Lombard, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 Chas. A. JouUian, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 J. Fulton, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 
 G. W. Naylor, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 "Wm. Fink, Paymaster's Clerk. 
 
 F. B. Green, Master's Mate. 
 Avery S.Winston, M. Mate P. N. C. S. 
 John Curney. 
 
 Jos. M. Walker, Pilot. 
 
 W. L. Cameron, Paymaster's Clerk. 
 
 Lewis Williams, Engineer. 
 
 M. L. Shropshire, Act. 1st Ass't Eng'r. 
 
 J. V. Harris, Ass't Surgeon. 
 
 Benj. Herring, 1st Engineer. 
 
 Ira W. Porter, Acting Gunner. 
 
 B. H. Weaver, Acting Ass't Engineer. 
 
 J. W. Bennett, Lieut. Commanding. 
 
 G. A. Joiner, ^ Passed Midshipman. 
 
 Wm. Carroll, Passed Midshipman. 
 
 G. H. Wellington, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 
 Z. A. Offutt, Gunner. 
 
 J. P. Redwood, Clerk. 
 
 E. W. Johnston, Master's Mate, 
 
 James White, Master's Mate. 
 
 Wm. C. Dogger, Engineer. 
 
 Wm. P. A. Campbell, 1st Lieutenant. 
 
 Julian M. Spencer, 1st Lieutenant. 
 
 Jason C. Baker, 1st Lieutenant. 
 
 W. F. Robinson, 2d Lieutenant. 
 
 Robert F. Freeman, P'ss'd Ass't Sur. 
 
 G. W. Claiborne, Ass't Surgeon. 
 
 H. E. McDuflBe, Ass't Paymaster. 
 
 A. N. Bully, Master. 
 
 W. Youngblood, Chief Engineer. 
 
 John L. Rapier, 2d Lieutenant. 
 
 Wm. Pauntleroy, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 
 Geo. J. Weaver, 2d Ass't Engineer. 
 
 J. Thomas Maybury, Gunner. 
 
 S. H. McMaster, Paymaster's Clerk. 
 
 H. L. Manning, Master's Mate. 
 
 Joseph Fry, Lieut. Commanding. 
 
 Page M. Baker, Master's Mate. 
 
 John G. Blackwood, 1st Lieutenant. 
 
 Wm. H. Haynes, Gunner. 
 
 Hiram G. Goodrich, 3d Ass't Eng'r. 
 
 John Applegate, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 
 Edwin Weaver, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 
 Jacob H. Turner, Acting M. Mate. 
 
 Thos. A. Wakefield, Sd Ass't Eng'r. 
 
 J. D. Johnston, Commander. 
 
 W. W. Graves, Ass't Surgeon. 
 
 W. T. J. Kunsh, 3d Ass't Engineer. 
 
 Henry D. Bassett, Act. Constructor. 
 
 Besides the parole signed by the above commissioned and 
 warrant officers of the Confederate navy, there were four other 
 papers of the same character. Acting Fleet-captain Julius 
 
 1 Passed Midshipman George A. Joiner, "who 
 ■was officer of the deck of the Nctshville when she 
 was surrendered, was appointed in the C. S. 
 navy, .January 23d, 1863, and was stationed at 
 the Drewry's Bluff .batteries on the James Biver, 
 "Until the succeeding summer, when he was 
 ordered to a class on the school-ship Patrick 
 Henry, In the spring of 1864, he became aide to 
 Commodore W, H. Parker, in command of the 
 SAshmmd, and was also made signal of&cer. In 
 the movement to confront Gen. Butler's landing 
 at Bermuda Hundreds, in May. JVEr. Joiner com- 
 manded a howitzer in the naval contingent, and 
 afterward returned with his class to the school- 
 ahip, graduating in July, 1864: as No. 6 of the 
 class. In the detail of midshipmen then ordered 
 to report at Mobile, he and William Carroll, 
 now of Pine Bluff, Ark, were specially designated 
 as aides to Admiral Buchanan, but they did not 
 reach that city until after his capture. Mr. Joiner 
 ■was assigned to the iron-clad Huntsville, Lieut. 
 Commander Juhus Myers, and was present at the 
 
 various engagements of that ship with the Feder- 
 al batteries during Gen. Canby's investment of 
 Mobile. He was once slightly wounded, and, in 
 company with a sailor named Kelly, distinguish- 
 ed himself by replacing under the enemy's iire 
 the ensign of the ship, which had been shot away 
 in the course of an action in which her smoke- 
 stack was perforated fifty-seven times. When it 
 was decided to sink theHuntsviUeupon the evacu- 
 ation of Mobile Midshipman Joiner was left in 
 charge of the boat's crew that scuttled her, and 
 was the last person to leave the deck after cutting 
 the feed-pipes of the boiler. He then went to 
 duty on the Nashville, and on May llith, 1865, re- 
 ceived at the gangway of the vessel the Federal 
 officer, Lieut. Hamilton, sent to receive her sur- 
 render. Her colors had been struck, the officers 
 and crew gathered on deck as they were hauled 
 down and saluted them with raised caps while 
 tears flowed freely. Since the war, Mr. Joiner has 
 resided in his native town of Talladega, Ala., 
 where he is engaged in mercantile pursuits. 
 
598 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Myers gave parole on behalf of the Confederate seamen serv- 
 ing on a portion of the vessels; Lieut. Joseph Pry, commanding 
 the Morgan, gave parole on behalf of the 120 men of his ship; 
 Lieut. J. W. Bennett, commanding the Nashville, gave parole 
 for his 112 seamen; and Lieut. D. G. Raney, Jr., gave parole 
 for the twenty-four marines under his command. 
 
 In addition to the vessels surrendered by Commodore Far- 
 rand, the following river steamers in the inland waters of 
 Alabama fell into the hands of the Federals: St. Nicholas, 
 St. Charles. 0. W. Dorrance, Jeff. Davis, Admiral, Beindeer, 
 Cherokee, Marengo, Sumter, Waverly, Magnolia, Robert Wat- 
 son, Duke, Clipper, Senator, Commodore Farrand, and Two 
 Hundred and Ninety. The blockade-runners Heroine, Mary, 
 Bed Gauntlet and Virgin were also among the prizes. 
 
 So fell the curtain upon the defence of Mobile and the ad- 
 jacent waters. It had been conducted with matchless skill, 
 energy, and gallantry upon meagre resources, against an 
 enemy whose command of men, ships, guns and money was 
 measureless, and it ended without a blemish upon the honor 
 and bravery of the sailors and soldiers who so long held back 
 the enormously superior forces thundering at their gates. 
 
CHAPTER XIX 
 
 FLOEIDA WATEES. 
 
 THE naval operations in Florida waters during the war 
 were not perhaps as brilliant and far-reaching in their 
 character as those in some other parts of the Confed- 
 eracy, but they are not without a vivid historical inter- 
 est, and had a solid importance in connection with the whole 
 plan of attack upon the Southern sea-coasts and sea-ports. At 
 the opening of the war, the situation in Florida was not unlike 
 that in other Southern States. The Ordinance of Secession 
 declaring this State " a sovereign and independent nation," 
 was passed by a State Convention which assembled January 
 10th, 1861. On January 9th, a rumor of the intended seizure 
 of the Pensacola navy-yard, Warrington, by the Confederates, 
 reached the Federal authorities at the Pensacola works. 
 Lieut. Adam J. Slemmer, then in command of the harbor de- 
 fences, which consisted of Forts Barrancas, McRae and Pick- 
 ens, determined to concentrate his forces, ammunition, sup- 
 plies and arms at Fort Pickens, which, besides being the 
 strongest fort, commanded the entrance to the bay and the 
 other forts. The navy-yard, distant about two and a half 
 miles, was beyond the range of the guns at Fort Pickens. On 
 the morning of the 10th, the force under Lieut. Slemmer's 
 command was transferred to Fort Pickens by means of boats 
 from the U. S. steamer Wyandotte and the storeship Supply. 
 Fort McRae was abandoned, and about 23,000 pounds of pow- 
 der, together with a quantity of fuses and shot, were destroyed. 
 The guns at Barrancas were spiked, and were in that condition 
 when the Florida troops, under Col. Lomax, took possession 
 of the fort. 
 
 Pensacola Bay possesses rare properties as a harbor. It 
 is accessible to large vessels, the bar is near the coast, and the 
 channel across it short and easily passed. The harbor is per- 
 fectly land-locked and the roadstead very capacious. There 
 are excellent positions within for repairing, building and 
 launching vessels, and for docks and dock-yards. The supply. 
 
600 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of good water is abundant. These advantages, in connection 
 with the position of the harbor as regards tlie coast, induced 
 the U. S. government to select it as a naval station, and a 
 place of rendezvous and repair. 
 
 Pensacola Bay, fortified as it was, with all its ordnance in 
 position and properly garrisoned, was deemed impregnable, 
 except by long and hazardous siege by an overwhelming and 
 well appointed land force; and it was said by an enthusiastic 
 writer of the time, "could defy all the navies of the world 
 combined till it filled the harbor's mouth with the carcasses of 
 sunken ships." Fort Pickens is situated on Santa Eosa Island, 
 the west point of which is at the mouth of Pensacola Bay 
 and completely shuts out Pensacola from the sea. The fort 
 was a first-class pentagonal bastioned work, built of stone, 
 brick and bitumen, with covert ways, dry ditch, glacis and 
 outworks complete. Its walls were forty feet in height by 
 twelve feet in thickness, and were embrasured for two tiers 
 of guns in bomb-proof and one tier of guns open or en 
 barbette. The guns from this point radiated to every 
 point of the horizon, with flank and enfilading fire in the 
 ditches and at every angle of approach. The work was 
 begun in 1838 and finished in 1853. When on a war foot- 
 ing its garrison consisted of 1,260 soldiers. ' Its armament in 
 January, 1861, consisted of: in bastion 20 twenty-four-pound 
 howitzers; casemate, 3 forty-two-pounders, 64 thirty-two 
 pounders, 59 twenty -four pounders; in barbette, 24 eight-inch 
 howitzers, 6 eighteen-pounders, 12 twelve-pounders, 1 ten-inch 
 Columbiad mounted, and 4 ten -inch mortars in bad order. 
 Tlie possession of this work by the Confederates was, of course, 
 of the first importance, for unless they could occupy it, it would 
 secure to the U. S. troops a base of operations along the whole 
 gulf coast, and keep open a road into the heart of the South, 
 which could not be obstructed by any fixed fortifications. An 
 enemy holding Fort Pickens could rendezvous a naval force 
 there, and keep up a blockade of all the ports of the gulf, 
 unless it could be met on the sea. The fort was only ap- 
 proachable by land on one side, and, owing to the openness 
 of the country, which was but a barren bed of sand, a party 
 attacking from that quarter would be very much exposed. 
 
 Fort McRae, ' after its abandonment by Sleramer, was in 
 possession of the Florida troops. It was further seaward than 
 Fort Pickens, and was its vis a vis across the channel, guard- 
 ing the west side of the mouth of Pensacola Bay. A vessel 
 entering, then, must needs run the gauntlet of its guns before 
 approaching Fort Pickens, which, however, of itself effectually 
 closed the harbor against the admission of an enemy of even 
 very heavy force. Fort McRae was in poor condition, but was 
 nevertheless a strong water battery. Fort Barrancas, also 
 abandoned by Slemmer, was well built and a powerful defence 
 
 1 Correct name believed to be McCrea. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 601 
 
 of the entrance of the harbor, but neither its construction nor 
 position was adapted to resist a strong land attack. It stood 
 upon the same shore with Fort McRae, a mile and a quarter 
 farther up the bay. When the Confederate troops took pos- 
 session of this fortj Capt. O'Hara was put in command. He, 
 by the most untiring efforts, placed it in a proper state of 
 <iefence. It had a garrison of 300 regularly enlisted men of 
 "the army of the Confederate States. The guns were all 
 mounted,. and the troops well drilled as cannoneers. "- 
 
 The navy-yard is situated upon the same shore of the bay 
 with Forts McRae and Barrancas, about a mile and a half 
 above the latter. At the outbreak of the war, it was under 
 the command of Commodore James Armstrong ; the next 
 -oflScer in rank at the yard being Commander Ebenezer Far- 
 rand, who afterwards resigned and entered the C. S. navy. 
 The disposable force at the yard consisted of about seventy 
 sailors or "ordinary men," as they are termed, and forty- 
 eight marines, under the command of Capt. Joseph Watson. 
 There were also at the yard, subject to the commands of Com- 
 modore Armstrong, the U. S. storeship Supply, with two 30- 
 pounders and thirty-eight men, and the steamer Wyandotte, 
 with six 32's and eighty men. 
 
 On January 13th, 1861, the navy-yard was surrounded by 
 Florida and Alabama troops, under the command of Major 
 Wm. H. Cliase, formerly of the U. S. corps of Engineers, who 
 had been appointed major general by Governor Perry, of 
 IFlorida^ who demanded the surrender of the yard. Opposition 
 was worse than useless, as the navy-yard itself is so situated 
 "that no military man would think of defending it against a 
 large attacking force with the means at the commodore's com- 
 mand. The Florida and Alabama troops, numbering seven 
 •companies, with nearly five hundred men, rank and file, 
 arrived at the east entrance of the navy-yard ■ about eleven 
 -o'clock A. M., and there halted. Col. Lomax, accompanied by 
 Major Marks and Adjutant Burrows of an Alabama regiment, 
 and Col. R. L. Campbell, aide-de-camp to Gen. Ben. Chase, and 
 Capt. Randolph, late of the U. S. army, as also Capt. Farrand 
 of the yard, proceeded immediately to the office of Commo- 
 •dore Armstrong, commanding, for an interview, which was 
 promptly accorded by the venerable chief officer of the yard. 
 After the introduction of the distinguished parties, Col. Lo- 
 max read the order from the Governor of Florida, by author- 
 ity of which he demanded immediate possession of the yard 
 and its stores of every description. Commodore Armstrong 
 responded, his voice trembling with emotion as he announced 
 "that he relinquished his authority to the representative of the 
 
 1 The Savannah Bepuhlimn of the 10th of the Quincy Guard. The arsenal coTitains BOO,- 
 
 January. 1861, said: " A private letter received 000 rounds of musket cartridges, 300,000 rifle 
 
 yesterday from Bainbridf,'e informa us of the cartridges and 60,000 pounds of gunpowder, 
 
 ■occupation of the Chattahoochee arsenal, situ- There are no arms except such as is necessary 
 
 ■ated in Gadsden county, Florida, at the June- to defend the property against ordinary con- 
 
 iion of the Flint and Chattahoochee Kivers, by tiugencies." 
 
602 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 sovereignty of Florida. The order was immediately given by 
 Lieut. Renshaw to haul down the flag of the Union, which 
 was done; and instead thereof there was run up a flag of thir- 
 teen alternate stripes of red and white, and blue fieH with a 
 large white star, announcing the changed political condition 
 of the State. Everything was conducted in the most orderly 
 and respectful manner, attended with a degree of solemn in- 
 terest which was manifested upon the countenances of the hun- 
 dreds of citizens and soldiers present. Capt. Randolph was 
 placed in command of the yard. The magazine, containing a 
 large amount of ammunition, was taken by a detachment of 
 troops as soon as they arrived at the yard. The marines in the 
 barracks, to the number of thirty-six, were made prisoners, 
 together with the laborers and employes in the yard. The 
 wives and children of the command at Fort Pickens had been 
 previously conveyed on board the Supply. On the following 
 day the store-ship, under a flag of truce, proceeded to the 
 wharf of the navy-yard, where the laborers and marines were 
 taken on board, Commander Walke having given his parole 
 that they should be landed north of Mason's and Dixon's line. 
 Overtures had been made to the marines to join the State 
 forces, with the alternative of expulsion in case of a refusal. 
 The personal property of the force at Fort Pickens, belonging 
 to the ofiicers' wives, was under flag of truce conveyed on 
 board the Supply and taken North, arriving at B"ewTork, Feb- 
 ruary 4th, 1861. 
 
 In a letter to the New York Herald, dated at Pensacola 
 navy-yard, January 39th, 1861, Lieut. B. Renshaw, until a 
 short time before an officer in the U. S. navy, but who re- 
 signed and entered the C. S. navy, gave the following account, 
 of the circumstances attending the surrender of the navy- 
 yard: 
 
 " I have seen in your paper of the 23d inst. a statement, which jus- 
 tice to myself as well as to the naval service of the United States, in 
 which I had the honor of serving for thirty-three years, requires me 
 promptly to request you to correct. The statement referred to recited 
 that the Navy Department had received the resignation of Commander 
 Farrand, who was attached to the Pensacola navy-yard, and who was 
 among those who, in the name of ' Florida,' demanded its surrender, and 
 also that of Lieut. Kenshaw who gave the orders to haul down the flag of 
 the Union. 
 
 " I submit the following true record of the proceedings which attended 
 and resulted in the surrender of this navy-yard to the authorities of the 
 State of Florida, and I rely upon your sense of right to do me justice by 
 its publication in your columns : On the 13th instant. Flag-officer Arm- 
 strong, then commandant at the station, was informed that a commission 
 appointed by the governor of Florida, with a regiment of armed men, 
 were at the navy-yard gate, demanding the surrender of the place. Flag- 
 officer Armstrong directed Commander Farrand, the executive officer at 
 the yard, to conduct the commissioners to his office. The commissioners 
 came accordingly, escorted by Commander Farrand. Colonel Lomax, the 
 commanding officer of the forces on the expedition, with his staff, were 
 then sent for, and conducted to the flag-officer's office by Commander Far- 
 rand, to meet the commissioners, who then presented their credentials to 
 
THE CONFEDERATK STATES NAVY. 603 
 
 Flag-officer Armstrong, informing him that they had ah-eady taken pos- 
 sesion of the magazine, situated about a third of a mile distant from the 
 yard, and demanded the immediate surrender of the navy-yard and the 
 public property within. The veteran commodore declared, with deep 
 emotion, that although he had served under the flag of the United States, 
 in sunshine and in storm, for fifty years, loving and cherishing it as he 
 did his heart's blood, he would strike it now together with the blue pen- 
 nant, the insignia of his present command, rather than Are a gun or raise 
 his sword against his countrymen, especially in circumstances like the 
 present, when he was without means of defending his position, and when 
 an attempt to do so would result in a useless loss of life and destruction of 
 property. He accordingly ordered the executive officer, Commander 
 Parrand, to cause the flag of the United States, and the blue pennant, to 
 be hauled down; the order was passed, in accordance with usage in the 
 naval service, to the senior lieutenant (myself), under whose directions 
 the time-honored flags were hauled down. The descent was witnessed by 
 none in whose heart the regret and grief at the fate of our longly-beloved 
 Union were more deeply felt than in mine. I now became a prisoner on 
 parole, and remained so for several days, when I resigned my commission 
 in the U. S. navy, which I have held as a lieutenant for twenty years, 
 and tendered my services to the sovereign State of Florida, with whose 
 destiny, whether bright or adverse, I am fully identified." 
 
 After the seizure of the navy-yard, Braxton Bragg, form- 
 erly an officer of the U. S. army, was ordered to proceed to 
 Pensacola and take command of all the Confederate troops 
 there, and conduct the operations against Fort Pickens. The 
 situation in Florida, January 34:th, 1861, was such that there 
 was scarcely a doubt that all the strongholds in the State in 
 the neighborhood of Pensacola would within a week be in the 
 possession of the State troops. There was no one so familiar 
 with the fortifications at Pensacola as Gen. Chase, the com- 
 mander of the State forces, most of them having been planned 
 and built by him while in the United States service. While 
 investing Fort Pickens he determined to guard against the con- 
 tingency of a blockade of Pensacola, by providing a six months' 
 supply of provisions for the State troops, and making scaling 
 ladders and other preparations to attempt the capture of Fort 
 Pickens. Lieut. Slemmer, its commander, in reply to the com- 
 missioner who waited on him to know if he would surrender 
 the fort, said " that he had orders from his government to de- 
 fend the fort and that he would do so to the last extremity." 
 Lieut. Berryman, commander of the Wyandotte, kept his war 
 steamer at this time, (January 24th, 1861) continually moving 
 opposite the yard and signalizing to the commander at Fort 
 Pickens the movements of the troops. 
 
 After the surrender of the navy-yard the Buchanan ad- 
 ministration had, as early as January, sent out an artillery 
 force under Capt. Vogdes, on board the steam sloop-of-war 
 Brooklyn, to reinforce the garrison in Fort Pickens. The 
 vessel left Hampton Roads January 25th, and stopped at Key 
 West on the 31st. Oreat excitement existed in Florida, and 
 particularly in Pensacola, relative to the expected reinforce- 
 ments of the fort. Before the Brooklyn reached Fort Pickens 
 the Federal government entered into a truce with certain 
 
€04 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 
 
 Confederate leaders, to the effect that the U. S. government 
 would pursue a policy of inaction, provided the Confederates 
 ■would make no assault on the fort. Although this agreement 
 was unwritten, it was faithfully kept for a time by the U. S. 
 government, and as faithfully by the Confederates. Capt. 
 Vogdes' conamand was not permitted to land, but was detained 
 on board until after the expiration of Mr. Buchanan's term. 
 When the Brooklyn arrived at Port Pickens, the provisions 
 were allowed to be delivered at the fort, but she was not 
 allowed to enter the harbor of Pensacola, or to land troops at 
 the fort. Her commander was ordered to act strictly on the 
 defensive, and to give no pretext for hostilities. 
 
 When the change of administration took place on the 4th 
 of March, and Mr. Lincoln became President, he found the 
 government without extra means or authority to subdue the 
 Southern States. Commander Jenkins and Capt. Wm. F. 
 Smith, U. S. N. , were in the winter of 1861 attached to the Light- 
 house Board, the former as naval secretary, the latter as en- 
 gineer secretary. Both of these officers were impressed with 
 the danger which threatened Ports Jefferson and Taylor in 
 Florida, and which would, if no steps were taken to prevent 
 it, be likely to pass into the hands of the Confederates. They 
 communicated their apprehensions to Gen. Dix, at that time 
 Secretary of the Treasury, and their purpose to ascertain the 
 condition of things in that quarter. Their suggestions were 
 approved and Capt. Smith visited Tortugas and Key West 
 under the pretext of inspecting the lights. He went "to Dry 
 Tortugas and Port Taylor, saw their danger and satisfied him- 
 self as to what was best to be done for their safety. From his 
 communications the U. S. government saw that prompt action 
 was necessary to save the stations off the coast, but more im- 
 portant still was the need that Port Pickens should be relieved 
 and reinforced. Gen. Scott was much exercised and most 
 anxious that Vogdes' command should be disembarked, and he 
 applied to Secretary Welles for a naval vessel to convey a 
 bearer of dispatches and reinforcements from the war depart- 
 ment to Fort Pickens. The Crusader, Capt. Craven, and the 
 Mohawk, were selected to send to the gulf. After several days 
 of uncertainty caused by receiving no news from Pensacola, 
 an officer, worn-out and exhausted, arrived in Washington, 
 April 5th, with dispatches from Capt. Adams, in command of 
 the squadron off Pensacola. The officer announced himself 
 as Lieut. Gwathmey and unstrapping a belt from beneath his 
 garments delivered a package to the Secretary of the Navy, 
 containing the following letters: 
 
 " U. S. Frig-ate ' Sabine,' off Pensacola, April 1st, 1861. 
 " Sib : I have the honor to enclose a copy of a letter addressed to me 
 by Capt. Vogdes, U. S. A , who is here in command of some troops sent 
 outin January last to reinforce the garrison of Fort Pickens. I have de- 
 clined to land the men as Capt. Vogdes requests, as it would be in direct 
 violation of the orders of the Navy Department under which I am 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 605- 
 
 aotingr. The instructions from Gen. Scott to Capt. Vogdes are of old date 
 (March 12th) and may have been given without a full knowledge of the con- 
 dition of affairs here ; they would be no justification. Such a step is too 
 important to be taken -without the clearest orders from proper authority. 
 It would certainly be viewed as a hostile act, and would be resisted to 
 the utmost. No one acquainted with the military assembled under Gen. 
 Bragg can doubt that it would be considered not only a declaration, 
 but an act, of war. It would be a serious thing to bring on, by any pre- 
 cipitation, a collision which may be entirely against the wishes of the ad- 
 ministration. At present, both sides are faithfully observing the agree- 
 ment entered into by the U. S. government, and with Mr. Mallory and 
 Colonel Chase. This agreement binds us not to reinforce Fort Pickens, 
 unless it should be attacked or threatened. It binds them not to attack 
 it unless we should attempt to reinforce it. I saw Gen. Bragg on the 30th 
 ult., who reassured me the conditions on their part should not be violated. 
 While I cannot take upon myself, under such insufBcient authority as 
 Gen. Scott's order, the fearful responsibility of an act which seems to 
 render civil war inevitable, I am ready at all times to carry out whatever 
 orders I may receive from the Honorable the Secretary of the Navy. 
 
 "In conclusion, I beg you will please to send me instructions as soon 
 as possible that I may be relieved from a painful embarrassment. 
 
 " Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "H. A. Adams, Captain, Senior Officer present. 
 '■'■To the Hon. Gideon Welles, 
 
 " Secretary of the Navy, Washington, D. C." 
 
 " U. S. Frigate ' Sabine,' off Pbnsacola, April 1st, 1861. 
 " To Capt. H. A. Adams, Commanding Naval Forces off Pensacola. 
 
 " Sib : Herewith I send you a copy of an order received by me last 
 night. Tou will see by it that I am directed to land my command at the 
 earliest opportunity. I have therefore to request that you will place at 
 my disposal such boats and other means as will enable me to carry into 
 effect the enclosed order. Yours, etc., 
 
 " J. Vogdes, Captain First Artillery, Commanding.''^ 
 
 " Headquarters of the Army, Washington, March 12th, 1861. 
 
 "Sir: At the first favorable moment you will land with your com- 
 pany, reinforce Fort Pickens, and hold the same until further notice. 
 
 " Report frequently, if opportunities present themselves, on the con- 
 dition of the fort and the circumstances around you. 
 
 " I write by command of Gen. Scott. 
 
 " I am. Sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 " E. D. TowNSBND, Assist. Adjutant Gen. 
 "Capt. J. Vogdes, U. S. A., on board the U. S. Sloop-of-war '■Brooklyn,^ 
 
 " Off Fort Pickens, Pensacola, Florida." 
 
 The course of Capt. Adams caused great disappointment 
 in Washington. It was not understood. Mr. Lincoln, and his 
 Secretary of the IsTavy, knew of no written truce or orders of 
 the character mentioned in Capt. Adams' letter, and suspi- 
 cions were entertained of his fidelity to the government. In 
 justice to him, however, it may be stated that he faithfully 
 performed his duty and strictly obeyed the orders sent him. 
 Lieut. Washington Gwathmey, the bearer of Capt. Adams' dis- 
 patches, was a Virginian, deeply imbued with the theories 
 prevalent at the South, but, like all the naval officers from 
 the South, his opinions did not prevent him from faithfully 
 discharging the trust confided to him. A few days after his- 
 
606 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 arrival in Washington he sent in his resignation, which, how- 
 ever, was not accepted. He was dismissed, in accordance 
 with the petty policy of the new Administration, and soon 
 after entered the C. S. navy. 
 
 The day upon which Lieut. Gwathmey reached "Washing- 
 ton was the one upon which the expedition destined for the 
 relief of Sumter was to sail. It was feared, should the Con- 
 federates hear of it, that it would precipitate an attack upon 
 !Port Pickens before the garrison could be reinforced. It was 
 determined by the U. S. government that a special messenger 
 should be sent overland with positive orders to the Federal 
 forces at Pensacola, directing that the troops should be disem- 
 barked without delay. Lieut. John L. Worden, who after- 
 wards commanded the Monitor in Hampton Roads, was ap- 
 pointed to perform this duty. The order was made as brief 
 as possible, as the fact that he was a U. S. naval officer, pass- 
 ing through the South, not in sympathy with the people, 
 might cause him to be captured. It was as follows: 
 
 " [confidential.] 
 
 " Navy Dbpabtment, April 6th, 1861. 
 *' Capt. Hbnby a. Adams, commanding Naval Forces off Pensacola: 
 
 " Sir: Your dispatch of April 1st is received. The Department regrets 
 that you did not comply with the request of Capt. Vogdes to carry into 
 effect the orders of Gen. Scott, sent out by the Crusader, under the orders 
 of this Department. You will immediately, on the first favorable oppor 
 tunity after the receipt of this order, afford every facility to Capt. Vogdes, 
 by boats and other means, to enable him to land the troops under his 
 command, it being the wish and intention of the Navy Department to 
 co-operate with the War Department in that object. 
 "I am, sir, respectfully, etc., 
 
 " GiDBOisr Welles, Secretary of the Navy.''' 
 
 This order was given to Lieut. Worden unsealed; he com- 
 mitted it to memory before he reached Richmond, and then 
 destroyed it. He hastened on to Pensacola with the greatest 
 speed, reaching there on the 11th of April. He held an inter- 
 view with Gen. Bragg, stating that he had a verbal communi- 
 cation from Secretary Welles to Capt. Adams, and received 
 a pass to visit that officer. He communicated the orders to 
 Capt. Adams on the 12th of April, and that night the boats of 
 the squadron, under the command of Lieut. Albert N". Smith, 
 successfully landed the artillery company of Capt. Vogdes, 
 consisting of eighty-six men and a detachment of 115 marines. 
 The garrison in Fort Pickens, previously composed of only 
 eighty-three men, was reinforced, and for the time made se- 
 cure. 
 
 Gen. Bragg was to have made an attack upon Pickens the 
 night following that on which the fort was reinforced; but this 
 additional strength to the garrison defeated this project. 
 Lieut. Worden, immediately after delivering his message, 
 began his return journey by land. The Confederates, when 
 too late, came to the conclusion that this messenger, who had 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 607 
 
 come and gone so suddenly, was an agent of the government, 
 and that he had been instrumental in the landing of the Fed- 
 eral troops at Fort Pickens. A description of him was tele- 
 graphed to the Confederate government, and he was arrested 
 near Montgomery, Alabama, on the 13th. of April. The reason 
 assigned for the arrest was that he had violated a pledge given 
 to Gen. Bragg, and that he had been instrumental in reinforc- 
 ing Fort Pickens, contrary to an agreement with Capt. Adams. 
 The U. S. government held that Worden had given no pledge, 
 and that the agreement alluded to, instead of having been 
 made by Capt. Adams, was an unwritten truce, mentioned in 
 a communication of Secretaries Holt and Toucey, on the 29th 
 of January, addressed to the naval officers of Pensacola, and 
 Lieut. Slemmer in command at Fort Pickens. Indignation 
 was severe against Lieut. Worden, in the South, and he was 
 detained a prisoner for seven months at Montgomery. He was 
 then exchanged for an officer in the Confederate army, and 
 soon after appointed to the command of the Monitor, * 
 
 In regard to the communication of Secretaries Holt and 
 Toucey, referred to above, Gideon Welles, in the Galaxy for 
 January, 1871, says: 
 
 " The paper or document of Secretaries Holt and Toucey is the only 
 ■written recognition of the truce or agreement entered into with the rebels 
 
 1 W. H. Murdaugh, a distingiiisljed and gallant 
 ofl&cer in the C. S. navy, was in the winter and 
 spring of 1861 attached to the frigate Sabine off 
 Pensacola, Fla. The latter pttrt of the time he 
 was first lieutenant or executive officer The 
 Confederate flag was flying on Forts McEae 
 and Barrancas and the navy-yard. Fort Pickena 
 was under the TJ. S. flag and garrisoned by a 
 company of artillery commanded by Lieut. 
 Slemmer, U. y. A. The beet of feeling was 
 maintained by the officers of both sides. Boat 
 loads of Confederate officers would come to the 
 ships which were anchored outside the bar, and 
 were entertained, and good fellowship always 
 prevailed, and the U. 8 officers had the run of 
 Pensacola and the navy-yard. Capt. Henry 
 A Adams commanded the SabiTie and was the 
 senior officer afloat. Gen. Bragg and Com. 
 Tjagraham, the Confederate commanders, dined 
 with Capt. Adams on board the Sabine several 
 times. Tbis pleasant intercourse continued un- 
 til Fort Sumter fell, wnen Gen. Bragg cut off 
 communications with the squadron. On board 
 the Sabine was a battalion of U. S. artillery com- 
 manded by Gen. Vogdea, then a captain of ar- 
 tillery. Soldiers had been sent down to rein- 
 force the garrison of Fort Pickens, but upon 
 their arrival an agreement had been formally 
 entered into by the authorities at Washington 
 and the Confederate Government that the Con- 
 federates would not attack Fort Pickena, and 
 that the Federals would not reinforce it. This 
 compact was to be observed by the Federal 
 commanders, so that when their troops arrived, 
 instead of going into Fort Pickena, they were 
 put on board the Sabine, where they remained 
 about two months. Some two or three weeks 
 after Mr. Lincoln was inaugurated, a little 
 revenue cutter from Key Weat came in and 
 anchored under the counter of the Sabine. She 
 brought two army officers with dispatches for 
 Capt. Vogdea. Capt. Adama, with whom Capt. 
 
 Vogdea messed, gave up the cabin to them, he 
 and Murdaugh coming upon the deck. After 
 a little while, Capt. Vogdea also came on deck 
 with a paper in his hand, saying : " Captain, I 
 have received orders to land my command in 
 Fort Pickens." " From whom ?" asked Capt. A. 
 "From General Scott," replied Capt. V. " I do 
 not know Gen. Scott in this matter," said Capt. 
 Adams, " and you cannot land your men until 
 I get proper orders to that effect." "Do you 
 mean to say that your boats cannot land my 
 men?" inquired Capt. Vogdes. "Yes, I do," 
 returned Capt. Adams. "Then I shall charter 
 one or more of these fishing sloops that pass us 
 occasionally, and land my party," said Capt. 
 V. " No," said Capt. Adams, "you do not leave 
 this ship until I get proper ordera to that effect." 
 Mr. Murdaugh writea aa follows concerning 
 the events connected with the subsequent rein- 
 forcement of Fort Pickens : " Capt. Vogdes 
 asked Capt. Adams if he might send a bearer of 
 dispatches to Washington to tell the condition 
 of things. Capt. Adams readily consented, and 
 one of Capt. Vogdes' lieutenants was landed at 
 the navy-yard that night and took rail to Wash- 
 ington. Not very long after this, Lieut JohnL. 
 Worden, U. S. N., since the well-known com- 
 mander of the Monitor, came on board the 
 Sabine, having permission of Gen. Bragg to do 
 so. After being closeted with Capt. Adams for 
 awhile, I wae sent for. On entering the cabin, I 
 found Lieut. Worden writing at the table. Capt. 
 Adams asked me to remain, as he wanted me 
 to be a witness to something. When Lieut. 
 Worden had finished writing, he handed it to 
 Capt. Adams. It was an order for him to send 
 the army forces to Fort Pickens, and as many 
 marines as could be spared from the squadron 
 as soon as possible. At the bottom of the order 
 was a certificate signed by Lieut. Worden, say- 
 ing that, to the best of his knowledge and be- 
 lief, the order above was a verbatim copy of a 
 
608 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 ■which I remember to have seen, and of the existence of this document I 
 am not aware that any member of Mr. Lincoln's administration was in- 
 formed when orders were sent to reinforce Pickens. I never saw it nor 
 knew of it until after the receipt of Capt. Adams' letter of the 1st of 
 April. It has been asserted and denied that the administration of Mr. 
 Buchanan established an armistice, or entered into an arrangement with 
 the rebels by which the functions of the government to suppress insur- 
 rection and rebellion were suspended. Capt. Adams states the light in 
 which he and Gren. Bragg viewed the communication of Messrs. Holt and 
 Toucey, which I here insert: 
 
 " Washington, Jan. 29th, 1861.— Received at I 
 Pbnsacola, Jan. 29th, 1861, at 9 P. M. ) 
 " To Capt. James Gltnn, commanding the Macedonian: Capt. W. S. 
 Walker, commanding the Brooklyn, or other naval officers in com- 
 mand; and Lieut. Adam J. Slbmmeb, First Reg. Art. U. S. A., com- 
 manding Fort Pickens : 
 
 " In consequence of the assurances received from Mr. Mallory, in a 
 telegram of yesterday to Messrs. Bigler, Hunter and SlideU, with a request 
 that it should be laid before the President, that Fort Pickens would not 
 be assaulted, and an offer of such an assurance to the same effect from 
 Col. Chase, for the purpose of avoiding a hostile collision upon receiving 
 satisfactory assurances from Mr. Mallory and Col. Chase that Fort Pick- 
 ens will not be attacked, you are instructed not to land the company on 
 board the Brooklyn unless said fort shall be attacked or preparations be 
 made for its attack. The provisions necessary for the supply of the fort 
 you will land. The Brooklyn and other vessels-of-war on the station will 
 remain, and you will exercise the utmost vigilance and be prepared at a 
 moment's warning to land the company at Fort Pickens, and you and 
 they will instantly repel any attack on the fort. The President yesterday 
 sent a special message to Congress, commending the Virginia resolutions 
 of compromise. The Commissioners of different States are to meet here on 
 Monday, the 4th of February, and it is important that during their ses- 
 sion a collision of arms should be avoided unless an attack should be 
 made, or there should be preparations for such an attack. In either event 
 the Brooklyn and other vessels will act promptly. Your right and that 
 of the other officers in command at Pensacola freely to communicate with 
 
 dispatch which had been given by the Navy De- he was kept a prisoner at Montgomery for some 
 partment at Washington to be delivered to Capt. time. The report in the squadron was that when 
 Adams, That on his way through the Confeder- Worden asked leave to communicate with the 
 ate States he had reason to think that his dis- squadron. Gen, Bragg told him that he could do 
 patch might be taken from him; he therefore so if he was not a bearer of dispatches; that be 
 had opened it, committed its contents to mem- could not if he was. Commodore Ingraham, 
 oi-y, and destroyed it. I signed this certificate who was at Pensacola at the time of these oc- 
 as a witness. Capt, Adams gave me orders to currences, always maintained that Worden bad 
 have everything in readiness to land the men been treated badly , , . that he had done- 
 soon after nightfall. These facts are mentioned nothing to justify his imprisonment. On the 
 to show that although I was then what would 25th of April, I heard that Virginia had witb- 
 now be termed ' a rebel.' I was doing my duty drawn from the Union, and immediately put my 
 in the service from which I could not get away, resignation of my commission in Capt. Adams' 
 and by the authority to which I was amenable hands. Although a warm friend of mine, and 
 till my resignation had been accepted. That I willing to do me any favor, Capt, Adams consid- 
 was in no way suspected of any desire to neglect ered it his duty not to let me leave the squadron 
 duty, nor did I suspect myself of being capable until he could hear from Washington, So for six 
 of doing so, never mind how distasteful that weeks I had to do faithful but most disagreeable 
 duty. I had made all preparations for hoisting duty in the U, 8, navy. As a retura for an honor- 
 out the boats in the afternoon. Capt, Adams able coui-se of duty on my part, the TJ S, goveru- 
 thought he had better hoist them out for fear ment struck my name from the navy list, and 
 of delays, but I told him it would attract atten- when, after the war, I asked that my political 
 tion on shore; that they could be hoisted out disabilities might be removed, I was required 
 after dark, armed, and the men landed very to return to the Treasury one hundred and 
 soon after nightfall. Capt. Adams let me have twenty dollars which I had drawn for services 
 my way, and all went well, Worden went rendered before the receipt of my resignation, 
 ashore to return to Washington on that same my dismissal, of course, being antedated. About 
 afternoon. When it was known the next moi"n- four hundred and fifty dollars are yet due me 
 ing that forces had been thrown into Fort for services honorably discharged, I exchanged 
 Pickens, Gen. Bragg had Worden arrested, and from the Sabine to the storeship Supply in order 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 609 
 
 the government by special messenger, and its right, in the same manner, 
 to commnnicate with yourselves and them, will remain intact, as the 
 basis of the present instructions. 
 
 "J. Holt, Secretary of War. 
 
 " I. TouCEY, Secretary of the Navy." 
 
 " The construction which Capt. Adams put upon what he calls the 
 engagement made by Mr. Mallory and Mr. Chase with the U. S. govern- 
 ment, and which restrained him for four weeks from landing troops, will 
 be seen by the following extract from a letter written by him under date 
 of the 18th of March, and sent by Lieut. Gwathmey: 
 
 ■' The of&cers and men, as I mentioned in my letter of February 19th, 
 are kept in readiness to land at the shortest notice; but I have engaged 
 the assurances of Gen. Bragg, who commands the troops on shore, that he 
 will respect the engagement made by Mr. Mallory and Col. Chase with 
 the TJ. S. government, and will make no disposition for the attack of 
 Port Pickens. This engagement, you are aware, binds us not to reinforce 
 Port Pickens unless it is attacked or threatened. I could easily have 
 thrown any number of men in it almost any time within the last four 
 weeks.' 
 
 "This communication, written on the 18th of March, Capt. Adams 
 would not trust to the mails, but withheld for other conveyance; oppor- 
 tunities, however, were rare, and hence the delay in its reception." 
 
 Four days after fhe arrival of Lieut. Worden at Fort Pick- 
 ens with orders for the reinforcement of that fort, the trans- 
 port Atlantic arrived with Gen. Brown and his force and sup- 
 plies on board for the reinforcement of that post. Gen. Brown 
 found the place in a miserable condition for hostilities, and in 
 a "complete state of confusion, all requiring the labor of every 
 man in it." The Poivhatan arrived next day, the 17th of April, 
 but did not attempt to run the batteries and enter the harbor, 
 as had been designed by those who had dispatched the Pow- 
 hatan to Pensacola, the army and navy commanders being 
 opposed to it, as Fort Pickens was not strong enough to resist 
 
 to get home, and arrived in New York early in than themselves. Admiral Porter commanded 
 
 June. I Tvas indebted to the gallant Capt. the PouiSaiart in that squadron. He came there 
 
 Foote, U. S. N., to get out of the way of arrest with a plan for the holding of Fort Pickens, of 
 
 in New York, and so escaped customary impris- which I was entirely informed, yet he never 
 
 onment in Fort Warren. It may seem that questioned the propriety of my retaining the 
 
 much or all that I have written so far is irrele- position of executive officer of the flag-ship, 
 
 vant to the scheme in hand, hut it has a bearing Political harpies in Washington measured the 
 
 which I consider very important and one which honor of men by their own possessions in that 
 
 1 confess is very dear, and that is, the standing line. The officers of the U. S. navy.with only the 
 
 in the old navy of those who resigned both upon exception of some two or three of the whole body 
 
 and after they had tendered their resignations. that I ever heard of, were, up to the breaking 
 
 A Yankee pedlar spirit in those who happened out of the war, conservative men who believed 
 
 to be in power in the times of which I write, in the Constitution and the rights of the States, 
 
 brought forth a small and venomous expedient and greatly deplored a condition of things which 
 
 illegal and unjust, that of dismissing from the made it their duty to assist in coercing a por- 
 
 service instead of accepting these resignations. tion of their countrymen: nobly they did that 
 
 It was a mean spirit to seek to degrade honor- duty. At the risk of seeming egotistical, 1 wiU 
 
 able men, who, without one single exception mention, in concluding these remarks on the 
 
 that lam aware of, did faithful duty in the ser- status of Southern officers in the IT. S. navy, the 
 
 vice in which they were engaged until relieved fact that only a couple of years ago Admiral 
 
 of that duty by competent authority. Had I Mullaney, the last officer under whom I served 
 
 been the traitor they would have made me out in the old navy, spoke to a friend of his with 
 
 to he, a single line from me to Gen. Bragg, in- whom he had made acquaintance at a summer 
 
 forming him of the orders from Gen. Scott, to resort, of what he was pleased to term my 
 
 Capt. Vogdes, as narrated above, would have highly honorable conduct under very delicate 
 
 resulted in the immediate capture of Fort circumstances, and gave instances of it. After 
 
 Pickens. I am quite sure that it never entered all, he was only speaking of what any Southern 
 
 into the minds of any of the • loyal ' officers of officer would have done in like circumstances; 
 
 the large squadron off Pensacola, that I was less by accident I happened to be the man on the 
 
 loyal to the U. S. navy while doing duty in it occasion." 
 39 
 
610 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the fires of the Confederate batteries should the Powhatan pro- 
 voke an attack by entering. ' 
 
 The U. S. transport Philadelphia, Capt. Kittridge, sailed 
 for Fort Pickens. April 19th, and arrived there May %A. She 
 had on board a large cargo of arms and ordnance stores. She 
 approached within three-quarters of a mile of the fort and dis- 
 charged her cargo. During this time the Philadelphia lay 
 within range of the guns of Forts McRae, Barrancas and the 
 land batteries, but no disposition was manifested to attack 
 her. The garrison at the fort were working vigorously at the 
 traverses and all the salient points were well protected with 
 sand-bags. The mortars were planted and protected in like 
 manner. The Mohawk also landed heavy guns at Fort Pickens, 
 going up with several small boats and a scow in tow near the 
 fort, but outside the harbor. She lay within the range of guns 
 at Fort McRae, but no demonstration was made against her. 
 The fleet off Pensacola at the time consisted of the U. S. ship 
 Sabine, steam sloop-of-war Brooklyn, steam sloop Powhatan, 
 and steamer Water Witch; also the storeship Supply, trans- 
 port Illinois, steamer Wyandotte and schooner Oriental. The 
 Philadelphia left Fort Pickens in May, having on board Lieut. 
 Sleminer and his command on their way to Fort Hamilton, 
 New York. 
 
 May 4th, the schooner Oriental, Lieut. Brown command- 
 ing, overhauled two steamers that flew the Southern flag; but 
 as nothing contraband of war was found on them, they were 
 permitted to enter the harbor. On May 7th, two Confederate 
 vessels, bound from Mobile to Pensacola, were captured by the 
 Powhatan. They were taken possession of and searched, but 
 neither arms nor ammunition were found. They were laden 
 with provisions for Pensacola, and as they were private prop- 
 erty, Capt. Adams did not feel authorized to take them as 
 prizes, but permitted them to return to Mobile. 
 
 May 9th, a number of small vessels inside the harbor, 
 passed to and from the forts and Pensacola, taking down large 
 bodies of men and munitions of war. The blockade of the 
 port was proclaimed on the 6th of May, and was rigidly en- 
 forced. No vessels, except those in ballast, were permitted to 
 enter the harbor. 
 
 At Key West, Commodore Mervine created some anxiety 
 by the publication of the following proclamation : 
 
 " To all whom it may concern : 
 
 "I, William Mervine, Flag-officer, commanding the U. S. naval forces 
 composing the Gulf Squadron, give notice that by virtue of the power 
 
 1 On the 12th of March, 1801. at a Naval Gen- Navy, and he was found gwilfy by the court 
 
 eral Court Martial convened in WashinRton, of both charges. The following Bsnteuce was 
 
 Captain James Armstrong of the navy was tried pronounced against hiin: *' That Captain James 
 
 on the charge of neglect of duty and disobedi- Axmstroug be suspended from duty lor the 
 
 ence of orders and conduct unbecoming an nf&- term of five years, with loss of pay for the 
 
 cer, at the surrender of the navy-yard at War- firsthalf of said term, and be reprimanded by 
 
 rington, Florida. The charges were preferred the Honorable Secretftiy of the Navy in general 
 
 against him by direction of the Secretary of the orders." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 611 
 
 and authority in me vested, and in pursuance of the proclamation of his 
 Excellency, the President of the United States, promulgated under date 
 of April 19th and April 27th, respectively, an effective blockade of the 
 port of Key West, Florida, has been established, and will be rigidly en- 
 forced and maintained against any and aU vessels (pubUc armed vessels 
 of foreign powers alone excepted) which shall attempt to enter or depart 
 from said port of Key West, Florida. 
 " Given at Key West, June 8th, 1861. 
 
 " WlLliAM Mervine, 
 " Flag-officer Mississippi Qulf Blockading Squadron.''' 
 
 This order took the people of the town by surprise, for if 
 it was rigidly enforced they would be unable to 'feed them- 
 selves. The island was almost a barren, rock-bound desert, 
 and if vessels on their way from New York with supplies for 
 the merchants were ordered off, and the opportunity of leav- 
 ing the island taken from them, they were fearful of starving. 
 When this state of affairs became known to Commodore Mer- 
 vine he modified his proclamation as follows: 
 
 "The declaration of blockade of this port, made by me the 8th inst., 
 is so far relaxed in its terms as to allow legitimate trading between this 
 port and the ports of the loyal States. Trading between Key West and 
 the Island of Cuba, and any of the West India Islands, so long as it is 
 confined to lawful objects of commerce, may be carried on under such re- 
 strictions as may be imposed by the naval commander stationed ofll; this 
 port. 
 
 "Wm. Mervine." 
 
 A few days after the above publications, the collector of 
 the port of Key West, Charles Howe, issued the following 
 notice: 
 
 " By order of Commodore William Mervine, commanding the Gulf 
 Blockading Squadron, the masters and owners of all vessels and boats 
 are required to renew their registers or enrollments and licences on and 
 after this date, as they arrive in port, and take the oath of ownership, 
 according to law. 
 
 " And before any vessel or boat will be permitted to leave the harbor 
 of Key West, they must obtain a clearance and permit from the Custom 
 House, setting forth the object of their voyage, excepting pilot boats, on 
 their regular daily cruising grounds, which clearance and permit to be 
 approved by the officer in command of the port. And if any such vessel 
 or boat is found without such clearance, etc., they will be dealt with as 
 violating the blockade. By order as above, 
 
 "Chas. Howe, Collector^ 
 
 Several small trading vessels were captured, between the 
 1st and 24th of July, and the U. S. District Judge at Key 
 West was swift to condemn them as prizes. 
 
 On the 10th of May, 1861, the Confederate steamer Spray 
 captured oflE Cedar Keys, the U. S. naval schooner William 
 C. Atwater, Capt. Henry Allen commander. The Spray was 
 armed with small arms, and had a crew of thirty-one men. The 
 Atwater was taken to Appalachicola, where her officers and 
 crew of eight men were confined, until sent to Richmond and 
 exchanged. The Atwater was confiscated and sold at Appala- 
 chicola, and her name changed to the Lizzie Weston. She was 
 
612 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 loaded with 300 bales of cotton, and on the 17th of January, 
 1863, attempted to run the blockade, but was captured by the 
 U. S. gunboat Itasca, Lieut. Caldwell commanding. 
 
 The Confederates at this time had a small sand battery at 
 the West Pass entrance to Appalachicola, and eight guns were 
 mounted on the island of St. Vincent, with a garrison of 400 
 soldiers under the command of Col. Hopkins. 
 
 The gunboat R. R. Cuyler was blockading the entrance 
 to Tampa Bay. The U. S. steamship Montgomery appeared off 
 the West Pass bar on the 11th July, and on the 12th her com- 
 mander, Capt. Shaw, formally notified the city authorities of 
 the existence of the blockade. The port of St. Marks was not 
 blockaded until about the 1st of August, by the U. S. steamer 
 Mohawk. On the the 14th, she scuttled and sunk, across the 
 channel, where it was very narrow, a captured sloop. 
 
 In July, the steamer Massachusetts captured the schoon- 
 ers Fanny, Bassude and Three Brothers, of New Orleans, and 
 Olive Branch, of Mobile, and sent them as prizes to Key 
 West. When off Cedar Keys, they were recaptured by the 
 Florida forces, and Lieut. Sawyer and nineteen seamen taken 
 prisoners and sent to Tallahassee. 
 
 In September, Major French, the commanding officer at 
 Key West, issued the following order, which was a great 
 hardship to all those who sympathized with the South. Its pro- 
 mulgation caused a large number of the leading citizens of 
 the town to leave with their families, and take up their resi- 
 dence at Tampa and other towns in Florida: 
 
 Headquarters United States Troops, I 
 Key West, Pla., Sept. 6th, 1861. \ 
 
 ORDER NO. 82. 
 
 1. Within ten days from this date all male citizens of the Island of 
 Key West who have taken the oath of allegiance will send their names 
 to these headquarters to be registered. 
 
 2. Within thirty days from this date all the citizens of this island are 
 required to take the oath of allegiance to the United States. 
 
 3. At the termination of sixty days, all citizens of this island who 
 have failed and refused to take the oath of allegiance to the United 
 States will be removed from Key West. This will also apply to the fami- 
 lies of those who have left the island to .join the rebel forces. 
 
 Wm. H. French, Commander. 
 
 During the summer of 1861, the Confederate naval officers 
 at Pensacola were busily engaged in constructing batteries 
 and otherwise aiding the army officers in defending the port. 
 The batteries extended over a semi-circle of four and a half 
 miles. They commenced at the navy-yard and terminated at 
 the water battery, beyond McRae. At short intervals, for two 
 miles and a half, there was an uninterrupted line of batteries 
 along this semi-circle. A new battery was constructed one and a 
 Iialf miles from Fort Pickens, named the Quitman, consisting 
 of two thirty-two pounders and one howitzer. It was between 
 Fort Barrancas and Fort McRae, and commanded the eastern 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 613 
 
 entrance to the channel. Besides the two forts, there were 
 nineteen batteries on the Confederate side, between Pensacola 
 and Fort McRae. The batteries were masked, so that they 
 were not visible from the sea or bay, and had strong bomb- 
 proofs. There was a continuous line of batteries between the 
 navy-yard and Barrancas, and between Barrancas and 
 McRae. 
 
 The dry-dock, lying at the Warrington navy-yard, was re- 
 moved by the naval officers into the channel and partly sunk, 
 the object being to intercept the passage of vessels into the 
 bay in case of an engagement. A plan was afterward formed 
 to pump out the water, raise and float it further down to a 
 position opposite Fort McRae, where the channel was very 
 narrow, and where, if it were sunk, it would effectually bar 
 the passage inward of any vessel of size. It was afterwards 
 burned by the enemy. 
 
 On the 13th of September a boat expedition, consisting of 
 one launch and two cutters, with a force of about 100 men, 
 officers, sailors and marines, was fitted out by Commodore 
 Mervine of the U. S. flagship Colorado, to destroy the schooner 
 Judah, which laid off the Pensacola navy-yard, supposed 
 to be fitting out as a privateer, and to spike a gun in bat- 
 tery at the southeast end of the yard. Lieut. John H. Rus- 
 sell had charge of the expedition, and with Lieut. Blake was 
 to attack the schooner, while Lieut. John G. Sproston and 
 Midshipman Steele spiked the gun. 
 
 In his exaggerated official report of the affair. Commo- 
 dore Mervine, U. S. N., says: 
 
 " The attack was made on the morning of the 14th inst., at half-past 
 three o'clock. The schooner, named the Judah, was found moored to the 
 wharf, under the protection of a battery and field-piece, and to be armed 
 with a pivot and four broadside guns. Her crew were on her, and prepared 
 to receive our forces, pouring in a volley of musketry as the boat neared 
 the vessel. A desperate resistance was made from the decks of the schooner, 
 but her men were driven off on to the wharf by our boarders, where they 
 rallied and were joined by the guard, and kept up a continued fire upon 
 our men. 
 
 " In the meantime the vessel was set on Are in several places. That 
 which finally consumed her was lighted in the cabin by Assistant Engi- 
 neer White and a coal-heaver, Patrick DriscoU, who went as a volunteer. 
 She burned to the water's edge, and has since, while burning, been set 
 free from her moorings and has drifted down opposite Fort Barrancas, 
 where she sunk. -r ^^ j. 
 
 " Of the party assigned to the spiking of the gun, only Lieut. Sproston 
 and Gunner Boreton were able, after considerable search, to find it, the 
 party becoming separated in the darkness. No opposition was made to 
 their landing ; Midshipman Steele, with his command, had gone to the 
 aid of those on the schooner, where he performed valuable service. Very 
 fortunately, only one man was found in charge of the gun, and he imme- 
 diately levelled his piece at Lieut. Sproston, but was shot down by Gun- 
 ner Horton before he could obtain certain aim. Both pieces exploded 
 simultaneously. The gun, which was found to be a ten-inch Columbiad, 
 was immediately spiked, and, bringing off its tompion, these two officers 
 returned to their boat. 
 
614 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " The work proposed having thus been well and tlioroug;hly done in 
 the short space of fifteen minutes, and the whole force of the enemy in 
 the yard -reported by deserters as over 1,000 strong— being aroused, our 
 boats pulled away, and rallying at a short distance from the shore, fired 
 six charges of canister from their howitzers into the yard, with what re- 
 sult it is impossible to say. Three of the enemy are known to have been 
 killed, and our officers are confident the number is much larger. The 
 boats then returned to the ship, arriving there about daylight. 
 
 "But, sir, I am grieved to report that this brilliant affair was not un- 
 attended by loss on our side. I have to report as killed by shots from the 
 crosstrees of the schooner, while the boats were approaching. Boatswain's 
 Mate Charles H. Lamphere, and John R. Herring, seaman and captain of 
 the howitzer, two of the best men in our ship, and marine John Smith — 
 the first man to board the schooner, and who behaved most gallantly — 
 who was, by a sad mistake, having lost his distinguishing mark, killed 
 by one of our own men. We have wounded, probably mortally, sea- 
 man R. Clark and E. K. Osborn ; severely, nine other seamen. Capt. 
 Reynolds received a severe contusion on his shoulder, and Midshipman 
 Higginson had the end of his thumb shot off. Lieuts. Russell and 
 Blake had naiTOw escapes, the flesh of each being grazed by one or more 
 musket balls." 
 
 The U. S. blockading steamer Montgomery, Capt. T. Dar- 
 ragh Shaw, entered the harbor of Appalachicola, with another 
 steamer, on the afternoon of August 37th, and captured the 
 ship Finland and schooner New Plan, taking the masters and 
 crews of the vessels prisoners. Finding it diflBcult to secure 
 both vessels, the captors set fire to the Finland, but brought 
 the other away. 
 
 In October Gen. Yulee commanded at Fernandina, where 
 batteries had been erected and guns brought from St. Au- 
 gustine mounted. St. John's had a battery of five old guns ; 
 Nassau's battery mounted four old guns, and to bar the en- 
 trance to Brunswick there was a battery on St. Simon's Island 
 of three guns. On Jekyl Island there was a battery con- 
 structed of railroad iron and palmetto logs. There was a battery 
 on Amelia Island which commanded the channel to Cumber- 
 land Islands. Nearly all of these defences at Fernandina, 
 which were afterwards highly commended by Admiral Dupont 
 and some of the best officers of the Union army, were designed 
 and superintended by Lieut. Wm. A. Webb of the C. S. navy. 
 In March 1863, Fernandina was evacuated and most of the 
 Confederate property was removed. 
 
 On the 33d of November, the bombardment of Fort McRae 
 by the Niagara, and of Fort Barrancas and the navy-yard by 
 Fort Pickens, began. The object of the attack was to destroy 
 the navy -yard and to batter down the fortifications of the Con- 
 federates. The action resulted in the Federal forces making 
 terrible breaches in Fort McRae. reducing the village of War- 
 rington to ashes and setting fire three times to the navy-yard. 
 This the Confederates succeeded in extinguishing. The walls 
 of Fort Pickens were badly breached and the Niagara was 
 much damaged. The Richmond was obliged to haul out early 
 in the action, having received serious damage. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 615 
 
 Col. Harvey Brown opened fire from Fort Pickens on Jan- 
 uary 1st, 1863, upon the Confederate steamer Times while load- 
 ing coal at the Pensacola navy-yard. The fire was gallantly 
 responded to and continued all day from the batteries of Gen. 
 Bragg. The firing was kept up until three in the morning, but 
 as the guns from Fort Pickens did not respond, the fire from 
 the Confederate batteries was suspended. 
 
 For some time previous to 1862, the Confederates at Pen- 
 sacola were busily engaged in removing the commissary stores, 
 munitions of war, guns and everything of value from that 
 place. This having been completed, at midnight on May 9th, 
 
 DESTRUCTION OF PENSACOLA NAVT-TARD. 
 
 1862, the navy -yard, forts and public buildings were set on fire 
 and the town evacuated. All the public property, excepting 
 the custom house, was destroyed, but all moveable Confeder- 
 ate property was saved. When the enemy discovered what was 
 going on, they opened a furious bombardment, which was kept 
 up during the conflagration, but without doing much damage 
 to anybody at Pensacola. A correspondent of the Mobile 
 Begister, under date of May 10th, gives a brief but graphic de- 
 scription of the burning of the navy-yard, which we append : 
 
 "The scenes of last night closed the long campaign of Pensacola— of 
 its history you are sufficiently familiar. The order for the destruction of 
 the Warrington navy-yard, and all public property at that place and Pen- 
 sacola that could not be moved, was successfully carried into executionj 
 and thoroughly executed at the yard and Pensacola. 
 
616 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 "About 11:30 o'clock the signal toeing given toy Bvig. Gen. Thomas 
 Jones, in an instant the torch was applied at every point, and in a few 
 minutes the wood-work, gun-carriages, etc. , in Forts Barrancas and MoRae 
 and the hospitals, together with all the other touildings in the navy-yard 
 proper, in the villages of Woolsey and Warrington, were in flames. At 
 the same instant the torch was applied to the oil factory and all the govern- 
 ment touildings in thecity of Pensacola, also to the steamers at the wharf. 
 The scene was grand, thrilling, and subUme. The whole bay was as light 
 as midday, while the murky clouds overhead reflected back an apparently 
 liquid sea of fire. Port Pickens could be plainly seen, and its garrison 
 seemed to have suddenly aroused, astounded and surprised. In a short 
 while, however, Pickens opened with shot and shell. Our boys, not rel- 
 ishing the compliment, instantly returned it from one or two sinooth-toore. 
 44s and 33s, which quickly cleared the ramparts of Pickens of all sight 
 seers. Whether anybody was 'hurt,' is not known. Pickens seemed to 
 be, and must have been, perfectly ignorant of our movements, and from, 
 the heaviness of its fire was in a paroxysm of wrath and rage. 
 
 " The task of dismantling the forts and batteries, and the removal of 
 everything worth transporting, even to small bits of copper and lead, in 
 the face and very teeth of the enemy, was one of a most difficult and 
 delicate nature. This has been most admirably executed by Gen. Jones.. 
 The Federals can now take possession of an unhospitable sand beach." 
 
 The greater portion of the population of the city of Pen- 
 sacola, as v^ell as of the settlements above, on Blackw^ater 
 Creek and river, and on Escambia Bay, left their homes and 
 sought the interior with their negroes and such of their mov- 
 able property as they could transport. The Fulton, that was 
 on the stocks in the navy-yard, was burned, as was also the 
 iron-clad that was building on the Escambia River. 
 
 Early the next morning the Harriet Lane, a Federal war 
 steamer (afterwards captured at Galveston, Texas), came up 
 and anchored in front of the city, and the Commodore dis- 
 patched a messenger to the mayor of the city with the follow- 
 ing communication: 
 
 " U. S. Stbameb ' Harriet Lajstb,' off Pensacola, May 8th, 1863. 
 " Sir: I wish to confer with the aflthorities of this place, whoever 
 they may be, civil or military, in regard to preserving good order, in case 
 there should be any disposition to commit excesses on unoffending and 
 loyal citizens; and I wish to obtain information relating to late events 
 and the destruction of public property. 
 
 "I take this opportunity to say that any abusive or disrespectful 
 conduct from mobs or other parties in this town towards the persons toe- 
 longing to the naval vessels of the United States, will be treated as an 
 inimical act, and will be resisted as if it was assault and battery. 
 
 "No one need fear any interference with their rights or property as 
 long as they conform to good order. 
 
 " Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 " D. D. Porter, Commanding Mortar Meet." 
 
 To which the Mayor replied: 
 
 " Mayoralty of Pensacola, Pensacola, May 10th, 1862. 
 " Sir: Tour communication of the 8th inst., expressing a desire to 
 confer with the authorities of the city, is to hand. 
 
 " In reply, I would state that I am ready to confer with you, either 
 at my oflHce or on board your vessel, in regard to the subject matter of 
 your communication. Very respectfully, your otoedient servant, 
 
 '^' Francis B. Bobe, Mayor:' 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 617 
 
 On the same day a large force landed from the Federal 
 fleet and forts and took possession of Pensacola. 
 
 On June 13th, 1861, the Confederate vessel Forest King 
 was captured at Key West by the U. S. S. Crusader. The 
 Forest King entered the harbor for supplies, her commander 
 having been told by oflficers on the U. S. vessels Sabine, South 
 Carolina and Huntsville, that she could do so; but on enter- 
 ing she was seized and the vessel and cargo were sent to New 
 York. On the 11th of March, 1862, the town of St. Augustine 
 was surrendered to Commander C. R. P. Rodgers, of. the U. S. 
 flag-ship Wabash ; and on the 12th, Jacksonville was peace- 
 ably surrendered by the authorities to Lieut. T. H. Stevens, of 
 the gunboat Ottawa. This expedition of the South Atlantic 
 squadron resulted in the possession of the whole coast of 
 Georgia from South Carolina to Florida. The harbors were 
 good, and almost any vessel of size could enter and find safe 
 anchorage. This alone made the capture valuable to the United 
 States for the establishment of naval depots. 
 
 In May, 1863, the schooner Fashion, at anchor in the Chat- 
 tahoochee River, twenty -five miles above Appalachicola, was 
 loading with cotton, with the intention of running the block- 
 ade. She had received sixty bales, and was waiting to com- 
 plete her cargo, when information was conveyed to the block- 
 ading fieet off Appalachicola. The enemy sent nine launches 
 with armed men up the river, captured the schooner with the 
 cotton on board and towed her to the fleet. When the news 
 reached Lieut. Commander John J. Guthrie, of the C. S. gun- 
 boat Chattahoochee, at Blountstown, Fla., on May 30th, he de- 
 termined to pass the obstructions in the Chattahoochee, and if 
 possible steam down and relieve the Fashion. 
 
 The Chattahoochee was lying at anchor with only seven 
 pounds of steam on. Lieut. Guthrie ordered steam to be raised, 
 when in a few moments her boilers exploded with the most 
 disastrous results, sixteen persons being killed, many others 
 severely scalded, and the vessel sunk. The disaster happened 
 immediately after cold water had been put into the boilers. 
 A correspondent of the Columbus Sun says : 
 
 " The magazines of the ship -were within three feet of the boiler, and 
 the shell-room as near. As soon as the explosion oecui-red a panic com- 
 menced, the men jumped overboard, fearing the explosion of the maga- 
 zine and shell-rooms. At this point the gunner, Mr. John A. Lovett, in 
 the absence of the first lieutenant, took charge and displayed great energy 
 and courage in saving life and property and in reassuring the panic-stricken 
 men. 
 
 ' ' The ship was found to be filling, when the poor wounded and burned 
 sufferers were landed, together with the personal effects of the crew and 
 officers. It was raining and blowing very hard, and the bank was very 
 muddy upon which the wounded were landed. The poor fellows lay 
 writhing and groaning in the mud for some time before they could be got 
 to a cotton-gin near by. , , , , , 
 
 " The ship was hauled in near the shore and has sunk to her deck, 
 settling firmly on the bottom. The powder and shells are a total loss. 
 
618 THE CONFEDERA.TE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " The guns have been landed, and the nine-ineh and rifle are already 
 in position at a strong point, and although the loss of the vessel and the 
 brave men is much to be deplored, yet with the guns ashore, manned by 
 the splendidly-drilled crew of the late Chattahoochee, the river is much 
 safer than ever before. 
 
 "Midshipman Mallory died at the Ladies' Hospital, in this city, on 
 yesterday evening at five o'clock. He is the same gallant little fellow who 
 pushed his way first aboard the TJ. S. frigate Congress, at Hampton Roads, 
 after she had struck her colors to the Virginia." 
 
 Those killed by the explosion were: Midshipman Mallory, 
 Assistant Engineers Henry Fagan, Euclid P. Hodges and Fred- 
 erick W. Arents; Eugene Henderson, Paymaster's Clerk ; 
 W. B. Bilbro, Pilot; Charles H. Berry, Quartermaster; four 
 landsmen, tv*ro firemen, one coal-heaver and one seaman. 
 
 The officers of the Chattahoochee were : Lieutenant Com- 
 manding, J. J. Guthrie; Lieutenant, G. W. Gift; Surgeon, 
 H. W. W. "Washington; Assistant Surgeon, M. R. Ford; As- 
 sistant Paymaster, L. E. Brooks; Masters, H. H. Marmaduke, 
 James McC. Baker; Midshipmen, W. J. Craig, W. R. Mayhew, 
 C. K. Mallory; Passed Midshipman, Daniel Trigg; Engineers 
 — First Assistant, John W. Tynan; Second Assistant, Henry 
 Fagan; Third Assistants, John H. Dent, E. P. Hodges; Gun- 
 ner, John A. Lovett. 
 
 The Chattahoochee was a strong wooden gunboat of light 
 draft, and carried a battery of four broadside and two pivot 
 guns, one foward and one aft. She had made two efforts 
 previous to her explosion to attack the enemy's vessels off 
 Appalachicola, but each time her machinery became so de- 
 ranged she was obliged to retire. 
 
 When the Federals heard that she was sunk in the river, 
 disabled, they made an attempt to pass the obstructions at the 
 head of the narrows on the Appalachicola River to destroy 
 her. Her guns were mounted in battery on the river bank, 
 and steps were taken by Gen. Cobb to drive the enemy back. 
 A section of Echol's battery and other reinforcements were 
 sent down the river for her defence, and the enemy hearing of 
 the measures adopted did not make an attack, but abandoned 
 the enterprise. 
 
 In a short time the Chattahoochee was raised, her machin- 
 ery repaired, and under the command of Lieut. George W. 
 Gift' she did eflScient service in keeping the Chattahoochee, 
 Flint, and Appalachicola Rivers clear of the enemy. 
 
 In the spring of 1864, Lieut. Gift and his officers deter- 
 mined to make a desperate effort to capture one or more ves- 
 sels blockading Appalachicola. At this time the coast was 
 
 1 Lieut. Commander Gift was bom near Nash- ston and other distinguished officers from Cali- 
 
 ville, Tenn., on March Ist. 1833. In 1846 he was fomia. and entered the Confederate sei-vice, 
 
 aent to the Naval Academy at Annapolis, and first in the army and afterwards in the navy. He 
 
 after two years was assigned as midshipman to entered the navy on the 18th of March, 1862, and 
 
 tUe Pacific Squadron. He resigned from the was assigned to the iron-clad Arkansas, then 
 
 navy in 1862 and went to California, where he building at Memphis, Tenn. He was a brave 
 
 established a banking house at Sacramento. At and daring officer, and took a distinguished part 
 
 the breaking out of the war, he came overland in several gallant exploits of the war. He was 
 
 byway of Texas, with Gen. Albert Sydney John- one of the boarders that captured and burnt the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 610 
 
 blockaded by the U. S. steamers Somerset and Adela, and the 
 plans of the officers of the Chattahoochee were to board in 
 small boats one of these vessels, man her and attempt to 
 capture the other, and if successful, break the blockade, and 
 run the vessels into Mobile or burn them. About seven boats 
 were fitted with muffled oars, grapnels, incendiarj^ materials, 
 signal flags, lanterns, compasses, medical stores, provisions, 
 etc., and manned by the officers and crew of the Chattahoochee, 
 numbering about seventy men, and about twenty volunteers 
 from Company F, Bouneau's battalion of Confederate sol- 
 diers. The officers and men were armed with rifles, muskets, 
 shot-guns, revolvers and cutlasses, with over 1,000 rounds of 
 ammunition. Everything being made ready, the boats proceeded 
 down the Appalachicola River on their hazardous enterprise. 
 Pilots having been secured, when the boats arrived in St. 
 George's Sound, they proceeded across the bay to East Point, 
 to await a dark night before making the attack. The officers 
 of the party were : Lieut. Commanding, George W. Gift; 
 Passed Midshipmen, Samuel P. Blanc, Henry L. Vaughan, 
 George W. Sparks; Midshipmen, J. Thomas Scharf, Wm. S. 
 Hogue; Assistant Paymaster, Marshal P. Sotheron; Assistant 
 Surgeon, Marcellus Ford; First Assistant Engineer, Loudon 
 Campbell; Third Assistant Engineer, A. De Blanc; Master's 
 Mate, Carman Frazee; Volunteers: Colonel D. P. Holland, 
 aide to the Governor of Florida; Surgeon Cherry, first Georgia 
 regulars; A. G. Sparks, Signal Officer, and Capt. Blunt, in 
 command of the volunteers from Bouneau's battalion. 
 
 The expedition landed in the night at East Point, near 
 the east pass of St. George's Sound, which the U. S. steamer 
 Adela was blockading. The plan was to remain under cover 
 at this point until a favorable dark or stormy night, when the 
 party was to row to the blockading vessel, and attempt her 
 capture by boarding. Lieut. Gift and his men waited patiently 
 for a favorable opportunity to make the attack, but they were 
 doomed to disappointment. The nights were clear and the 
 sea smooth, and the dipping of the oars in the phosphorescent 
 water emitted a luminous light which shone brightly some dis- 
 tance beyond. In the meantime the provisions of the party gave 
 out, and it was necessary to secure a supply from the town; 
 Intelligence was also received from the Confederate scouts, 
 that information of the contemplated attack had been commu- 
 nicated to the enemy's vessels by Unionists in Appalachicola. 
 
 Under these circumstances Lieut. Gift determined to 
 abandon the enterprise and push across the sound and hasten 
 
 TJ. S. steamer Underwriter, at Newbem, N. C., and of hia death, on February Ht]2,1879, lie was editor 
 
 took a prominent part in the defence of the Ar- of the Napa City Reporter. He left a wife and 
 
 hangas in her various desperate struggles with four children. The writer was his executive 
 
 ■the Federal fleets on the Yazoo and Mississippi oflScer in the launch he commanded at the time 
 
 Hivers. He married Miss Shackleford of Florida the Underwriter was captured at Neivbem, and 
 
 while he was stationed on the Chattahoochee^ and was in command of his boat in St. George's 
 
 some time after the close of the war he returned Sound during his illness when cast on St. 
 
 to California and settled at Kapa. At the time George's Island. 
 
630 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 up the Appalachicola River, before the enemy knew of hi& 
 departure. 
 
 The Confederates embarked in their boats with the inten- 
 tion of crossing the sound to Appalachicola, but, as a storm 
 was approaching, only two of the boats — the one containing 
 Lieut. Gift, Midshipman Scharf and the volunteer officers, 
 and the other manned by ten soldiers — attempted to cross the 
 sound, while the others hugged the shore. The latter party, 
 under the command of Passed Midshipman De Blanc, reached 
 the town in safety, while the boat containing the soldiers was 
 swamped; but the men in it were rescued by Lieut. Gift, who 
 was driven fifteen miles across the sound to St. George's 
 Island. The storm raged for several hours, and the heavily 
 ladened boat of Lieut. Gift made vain efforts to reach the 
 town, from which direction the wind was blowing a terrible 
 gale. Lieut. Gift being taken suddenly ill, the command of 
 his boat devolved upon Midshipman Scharf. At this time the 
 boat was half filled with water, with seventeen men inside and 
 ten men from the swamped boat hanging on the outside, and 
 the sea washing over her. The boat was two miles from shore, 
 and all expected every moment would be the last. Finding 
 that it would be impossible to reach the town in the face of 
 the storm, Midshipman Scharf informed Lieut. Gift that their 
 only hope for safety was to turn round and go to sea before 
 the wind. The commander instructed him to do what he 
 thought best, and immediately Midshipman Scharf informed 
 his men of his determination. There was great fear of swamp- 
 ing in the trough of the sea in turning, but having confidence 
 in his judgment the crew were ready to obey his commands. 
 He ordered the boat to be lightened, and all the guns, ammu- 
 nition, baggage, lanterns, water-casks, etc., thrown overboard. 
 Six of the nearly exhausted men were taken in from the out- 
 side and stowed in the bottom of the boat. When everything 
 was ready the order was given and the boat was headed for 
 the Gulf of Mexico as a large wave struck under her quarter, 
 nearly lifting her out of the water. The four men, who were 
 still hanging on the outside, having become nearly exhausted, 
 were taken in the already over-ladened boat, and the storm- 
 driven Confederates proceeded to sea, hoping, if possible, to 
 reach St. George Island off the coast. When the boat ap- 
 proached St. George Island the breakers were heard roaring 
 over the beach, and the pilot gave up all hope of reaching the 
 shore in safety. The men prepared to swim for their lives 
 in the event of the boat being swamped by the breakers, by 
 throwing off all surplus clothing. Fortunately, the boat 
 passed through safely and reached the island, where the party 
 remained for two days in a starving condition, sustaining life 
 only by eating "palmetto cabbage," "alligators," oysters, etc. 
 
 In the meantime, the remainder of the boats reached Ap- 
 palachicola in safety, and took up quarters in the town, to 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 621 
 
 await intelligence from Lieut. Gift. The enemy meanwhile, 
 receiving information of the dispersing of the expedition, 
 landed a force and drove Midshipman DeBlanc and his com- 
 mand to the swamps. In his report, Lieut. Com. Wm. Budd of 
 the U. S. steamer Somerset, West Pass, St. George's Sound, 
 May 16th, 1864, said : 
 
 " I have the honor to report, that on the night of the 12th inst. I sent 
 the light-draft boats of this vessel and of the U. 8. schooner Chambers 
 to land a detachment of troops under command of Lieut. Hunter, 110th 
 New York Vols., a few miles below the town of Appalachicola. After land- 
 ing the troops the officer in charge of the boats (Acting -Ensign E. H. 
 Smith) -was instructed to proceed slowly along shore, so as to be in 
 communication with them during their march and approach to the town, 
 In the rear of which the whole force was to arrive at daybreak. Taking 
 two launches from this ship, I arrived in front of the place about the same 
 time, and discovered a force of about seventy or eighty of the enemy at- 
 tempting to embark in boats from the upper end of the wharves. The 
 rapid approach of the first launch caused them to abandon that project 
 aiid retreat through the town, which movement was hastened by a couple 
 of shells from our howitzer. They passed within a short distance of a por- 
 tion of our troops under Lieut. Hunter, who unfortunately thought that 
 they were part of his command, and permitted them to gain and escape 
 by the up-river road without molestation. We followed them about 
 two miles, but the density of the undergrowth and number of patlis lead- 
 ing through the woods in all directions rendering any further pursuit un- 
 wise and futile, we returned to the boats. 
 
 "Ascertaining that the commanding officer of the expedition (George 
 W. Gift, Lieutenant C. S. N.), was on the sound with about thirty men, 
 1 dispatched my boats and troops after him, but the. swiftness of his boat 
 and the approach of night enabled him to escape, having been chased by 
 our first launch, under command of Acting Ensign C. H. Brantingrham, 
 who captured one of his small boats and three of his party. * * * We 
 captured six of their boats (aU they had except one), four prisoners, a 
 quantity of small arms, (rifles, cutlasses, etc. ) 1,000 rounds of ammunition, 
 all their compasses, signal flags, blankets, haversacks, medical stores, etc. 
 They abandoned everything. * * * Had it not been for the unfortunate 
 mistake of the officer in command of our troops, we should have captured 
 or destroyed the entire force." 
 
 In a subsequent report dated May 31st, 1864, he said : 
 
 " I send down by the U. S. steamer Honduras, as prisoners, Thomas 
 McLean, Anthony Murray and James Anderson, citizens of Appalachicola. 
 These men were engaged in active co-operation with the enemy when cap- 
 tured. McLean enacted the role of a scout or spy. Mistaking our troops 
 for those of the enemy, he gave them information respecting my force and 
 position in front of the town on the morning of the 13th inst. Murray 
 and Anderson were acting as scouts for Gift, keeping open his communi- 
 cations and supplying him with provisions when he was absent from the 
 main body of his command. When taken, they were carrying soldiers 
 from the islands back to the main. Heretofore all of them have enjoyed 
 immunity from us as citizens. Their local knowledge makes them dan- 
 gerous to us and very useful to the enemy ; for the latter they act as 
 scouts, spies and pilots, and in this case they were caught in the act. 
 They pretend to have been forced into Gift's service, but I know them 
 well, and earnestly request that they will not be permitted to return to 
 Appalachicola. " 
 
 The enemy captured Andrew McCormick, Sergeant of 
 Company F, Bouneau's battalion, Napoleon Terry and Louis 
 
622 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Gay, privates, and Joseph Sire, Captain after-guard of the 
 Chattahoochee. 
 
 Before Midshipman DeBlanc and his command retreated 
 to the swamps, he sent Thomas McLean, Anthony Murray, 
 and James Anderson, citizens of Appalachicola, with a supply 
 of provisions to search the islands along the coast for Lieut. 
 Gift and his two boats' crews. The relief party found the 
 wrecked crews, and as soon as the storm abated they returned 
 with them to Appalachicola, where they learned for the first 
 time that their comrades had been driven from the town. 
 Lieut. Gift then hastened up the river to avoid the enemy, 
 who were searching the islands for him. He carried his boat 
 some distance up the river, then sank it in a bayou and 
 traveled over-land with his command until he joined the re- 
 mainder of his party above the obstructions in the Appalachi- 
 cola River. 
 
 Upon the abandonment of the river by the Confederates 
 the Chattahoochee was destroyed, together with the iron-clad 
 gunboat Columbus, which had been building for a long time 
 at Columbus, Ga., under the direction of Lieut. Andrew Mc- 
 Laughlin. A torpedo boat, nearly completed, was also 
 destroyed at Columbus, together with the navy -yard, machine 
 shops, etc. 
 
CHAPTER XX 
 GEORGIA WATERS. 
 
 FROM the time South Carolina seceded to the secession 
 of Georgia on January 19th, 1861, the relations of the 
 States with one another were peaceful. Neither the 
 Federal government, nor any competent authority, had 
 recognized the existence of a breach between sections of the 
 Republic outside of the competency of Congress and the Ex- 
 ecutive to heal. But day by day, Mr. Seward was piloting 
 the country with accelerating rapidity towards the "red 
 battle " issue which he declared would be the last act of his 
 "irrepressible conflict." 
 
 The first act that paved the way for open hostilities be- 
 tween members of a confederation which, only a few months 
 before, were bound together by ties it was fondly hoped could 
 never be sundered, was the uncalled-for, unwarrantable, 
 and illegal seizure of the property of Savannah merchants 
 in the harbor of New York. This grave and momentous 
 event in the progress toward civil war and military despot- 
 ism, occurred as early as the 22d of January, 1861. On that 
 day the republican Governor of New York assumed the re- 
 sponsibility of ordering the police of New York City to in- 
 vade vessels lying in the harbor, and to seize upon such wares 
 as, in their discretion, they might deem to be "contraband 
 of war." Superintendent Kennedy proceeded on board the 
 steamer Monticello, at Pier 13, North River, and seized 
 twenty-eight cases of merchandise, which were found to con- 
 tain 950 muskets. The seizure created the greatest excite- 
 ment in Savannah, to which port the Monticello was bound, 
 and immediately afterwards, ex-Senator Robert Toombs, of 
 Georgia, addressed a telegraphic dispatch to the Mayor of 
 New York, protesting against what had been done, and 
 alluding to the inevitable consequences of such lawlessness. 
 Mayor Wood disavowed participation in it, and declared 
 that it met with his own disapproval, and was reprobated 
 by the vast majority of the people of the city of New York. 
 
 (623) 
 
624 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 In a few days another dispatch was received by telegraph 
 by Governor Morgan of New York, from Governor Brown of 
 Oeorgia. The latter simply demanded that the property be- 
 longing to his citizens should be handed over to G. B. Lamar, 
 the president of the Bank of the Republic. Governor Morgan 
 replied by sending back a telegraphic answer that the subject 
 was too grave a one to reply to cursorily, and that he must 
 wait a more detailed communication from Governor Brown 
 by mail, before giving it his attention. " This was, of course," 
 says the New York Herald, of February 10th, 1861, " equiva- 
 lent to an endorsement of the robbery which the Metropolitan 
 police had committed, with an attempt at evasion, and to gain 
 time, similar to those which have characterized every public 
 leader of the Seward school of Massachusetts politics, since 
 the beginning of the crisis under which the country is laboring." 
 
 In retaliation for the illegal seizure by the New York 
 police, under pretence that they were contraband of war, of 
 goods belonging to individuals of that State, the authorities 
 of Georgia, on February 9th, seized, in Savannah, the barks 
 D. Colden Murray, the W. B. Kibhy, Golden Lead and Ad- 
 juster, and the schooner Julia A. Hallock. They were the 
 property of citizens of New York. This was the first act of 
 reprisal at the South, against aggression in the non-slave- 
 holding States, and it was tantamount to a decree of non- 
 intercourse. 
 
 "Every sober-minded, intelligent, patriotic American citizen [said 
 the New York Herald\ will be startled and alarmed by it, and will shrink 
 bade with horror from the prospect of blood, carnage and internecine 
 strife which it threatens to inaugurate. Gov. Brown will find an abund- 
 ant justification of the act he has ordered, in the responsibilities of his 
 position, and in the necessity of indemnifying private citizens, who are 
 his constituents, for an unwarrantable robbery committed by our police, 
 for which they could obtain no other redress. It is the very nearest thing 
 to the beginning of a civil war; but let the blame rest where it belongs, 
 upon the Republican Executive of the State of New York, whose atrocious 
 usurpation of powers that do not belong to him has led to such a sad 
 result." 
 
 The seizure of the vessels by the authorities of Georgia 
 also created considerable excitement in Washington among all 
 parties. In the House of Representatives, Hon. John Cochrane 
 offered a resolution calling on the Secretary of the Treasury for 
 information on the subject, but the proposition was objected 
 to and it went over to the following Monday. In the mean- 
 time, later in the day, the arms were restored to the agent of 
 the owners, or it was said they were, and the vessels seized in 
 Savannah were released. On the 23d of February Supt. Ken- 
 nedy refused to give up ten cases of the merchandise referred 
 to, until the legality of the seizure was determined by the 
 ' ' proper tribunals." This unjustifiable act roused the ire of the 
 Georgians, and Gov. Brown showed their spirit of retaliation 
 by holding three vessels belonging to New York, as a surety 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 625 
 
 for the safe return of their property which they contended had 
 been taken from them without any just cause or reason. The 
 vessels seized were the ship Martha J. Ward, bark Adjuster 
 and bark Harold. In consequence of the cargo of the bark 
 Adjuster belonging to the subjects of Great Britain, she was 
 released, but the other vessels seized in reprisal by the Georgia 
 authorities were advertised to be sold on the 25th of March. In 
 the meantime, on March 19th, in consideration of the release of 
 the arms by the New York police, the vessels seized in Savan- 
 nah were released. ' 
 
 At the release of the arms in the keeping of the police of 
 New York, the U. S. revenue oflBicers instituted a strict sur- 
 veillance over vessels leaving that port to prevent provisions, 
 ammunition and weapons of war from being forwarded to the 
 Southern States, and to stop suspected vessels that it was 
 thought might engage in privateering for the Confederacy. 
 The Secretary of the Treasury, in May, gave orders to the 
 Collector of St. Louis to examine the manifests of all vessels 
 sailing South, and Collector Barney of New York, and the col- 
 lectors of all ports north of the Potomac, were ordered to make 
 a careful examination of every vessel leaving their respective 
 ports. In this way a complete blockade was maintained in all 
 the collection districts. The revenue cutter Harriet Lane was 
 at first used for this purpose at the port of New York, but hav- 
 ing been called away, in accordance with the proclamation of 
 Mr. -Lincoln, to assist in the blockade of the Southern ports, it 
 became necessary to procure other vessels. Collector Barney 
 therefore impressed into the revenue service three of the ves- 
 sels engaged in the U. S. coast survey. These were located at 
 three different points to command the several outlets from the 
 harbor of New York. The Vixen was placed in Throgg's Neck 
 and guarded the passage from the East River into Long Island 
 Sound. On an average 120 vessels passed this point every day 
 during the flood tide in May, 1861, and each of these had to be 
 boarded and have their papers examined. The Corwin was 
 stationed inside the Narrows, where all the large steamers and 
 vessels of extensive tonnage pass out into the ocean. At least 
 fifty vessels a day were boarded at this point. The Bibb was 
 
 1 The following is a. copy of a letter sent by The before-mentioned indemnity read as fol- 
 
 the owners of the Martha J. Ward to Mr. Ken- lows : 
 
 nedy, which helped to bring about the desired j^ consideration that John A. Kennedy will, 
 
 result : at our request, deliver up ten cases of arms 
 
 J. A. Kennedy, Esq.: seized on board the steamer Monticello, a,nd in 
 
 Deae Sia: We are the owners of the ship consideration of one dollar to us paid, we here- 
 
 Marlha J. Ward, now under seizure at Savannah, by agree to pay all costs and damages and ex- 
 
 as stated, in reprisal for the arms seized by you. penses that may be recovered against him for 
 
 We have made every effort to save our property, euch seizure. Dated this 16th day of March, 
 
 valued at over $40,000, and find that without 1861. James E, Waed & Co. 
 
 your friendly aid, we shall be unable to do so, 
 
 and must submit to such enormous sacrifice. The above indemnity was required of the 
 
 If, in consideration of our unfortunate position, owners of the ship Martha J. Ward by Superin- 
 
 you will deliver the arms to us, we will indem- tendent Kennedy. Upon giving it, the arms 
 
 nify you against all damages and costs which were delivered to tlie owners of the ship, who 
 
 may be recovered against you for such seizure. transmitted them to Savannah to be delivered 
 
 James E. Wakd & Co. to Governor Brown. 
 40 
 
626 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 located at the mouth of the Raritan River, in the vicinity of 
 Perth Amboy, and prevented all suspicious looking vessels 
 from passing through Kill von Kull. No vessel was permitted 
 to pass without having a proper clearance, and also undergo- 
 ing an examination, where it was deemed necessary. The 
 surveyor also detailed officers to visit daily every vessel lying 
 at the wharves, and report the appearance of affairs every 
 twenty-four hours. In addition to this a coast-guard was de- 
 tailed on both sides of the river to prevent the loading of ves- 
 sels at night, and no vessel was allowed to leave between sun- 
 set and sunrise. The steam tug Mercury .was employed to ply 
 between New York and the revenue cutters. ' 
 
 These precautions were forced upon the Federal govern- 
 ment by the necessity of intercepting the very profitable trade 
 in war material for the South that was being carried on by 
 manufacturers, merchants and shippers in the North, who 
 suffered from an obsession of their "loyalty to the old flag" 
 that was coincident with the offer of Southern agents to pay 
 remunerative prices for anything in the line of guns, ammu- 
 nition, or army goods that might be useful to the nascent 
 Southern Confederacy. 
 
 " We have been accustomed [says Judge Cowley], to berate the 
 commercial classes of Great Bi-italn for exporting goods to the Confeder- 
 ate States in violation of the blockade; but probably more goods were 
 carried into the Confederate States through the instrumentality of mer- 
 chants in the United States than by all the merchants of Europe. More 
 secrecy was observed by those residing in New York who engaged in the 
 business than was observed in running the blockade of Mexico; but it is 
 none the less true that in the civil war, as in the Mexican war, the muni- 
 tions of war were furnished in very large quantities by the citizens of the 
 United States to the enemies of the United States.''-' 
 
 Mr. Greeley's well-known lament, in "The American 
 Conflict," over the greed of New York commercial men who 
 
 1 The following is a complete list of the vessels mond. D. & W. Cuvrie & Co.; 20, bark Noi'um- 
 
 ownedorxmrtly owned by reeidunts of the South- bega, New York, J. H. Brower & Co.; 21, bark 
 
 ern States which were seized l)y Surveyor An- Winefred, liichmond, J. Currie & Co.; 22, bark 
 
 drews. of the port of New York, in accordance General Green, Charles'n, W. G. Armstl'ong ; 23, 
 
 with the U. S. Confiscation Act of July 13th, bark Pioneer, Richmond, E. D. Voss i^ Co.; 
 
 1861: 24, brig Leni, Alexandria, Lambert ; 26, brig 
 
 No. 1, steamer Marion, belonging to N'ew York; Cyrus Starr, 26, brig Champion, Pictou, N. S., J. 
 
 owners orconsignees, Spoflford, Tileston iN; Co.; 2, Ketchune ; 27, brig Faunie Currie, Richmond, 
 
 steamer Koanoke, New York. N. Y. & Va. S.S. Co.; J. Currie ; 28, schooner Emily Kieth, New Or- 
 
 3, ship Ohio, N. Bedford. E. Howland : 4, ship leans, J. B. Lockwood; 29, schooner Ned, New 
 
 J. W. Fannin, New York, J. H. Browev & Co.; 6, York, E. S. Powell; 30, schooner Marshall. Rich- 
 
 ship W. B. Travis. New York, J, H. Brower&Co. ; mond, -J. Cnri'v, 31, schooner Crenshaw, Sich- 
 
 6, ship Wm. H, Wharton. New York, J. H. Brow- mond, D. & W. Currie ^; Co.; Zi, schooner Man- 
 
 er k Co.; 7, ship Crest of the Wave, Thomaston. Chester, Richmond. D. & W. Currie & Co ; 33, 
 
 M. R. Ludwig ; 8, ship St. Charles, New Y'ork, schooner Lynchburgh, Richmond, D. & W. 
 
 W. T. Frost; 9. ship Harriett, Boston, H. L. Currie & Co.; 34, schooner Haxall, Richmond, 
 
 Richardson & Co.; 10, ship Roger A. Hiern, New D. & W. Currie k Co.; 36, schooner Forest King, 
 
 York, J. & N. .Smiths Co.: 11, ship Trumbull, Fairhaven. Fish, Bobbins & Co.; 36, schooner 
 
 New York, J. & N. Smith 4: Co. ; 12, ship North Claremont, New York, H. Finch & Co ; 37, 
 
 Carolina, Norfolk, Hardy Bro.; 13, bark Clara schooner Ha'h M. Johnson, Greenport, John 
 
 Haxall, Richmond, J. Currie & Co.; 14, bark Wells. Recapitulatiou ; Steamers, 2; ships, 10; 
 
 Virginian. Richmond, D. Currie ; 16, bark Sally barks, 11 ; Brigs, 3 ; Schooners, 11. Aggregate 
 
 Magee. Richmond, D. Currie & Co.; 16, bark value, $750,000. 
 Mary Lucretia, New York. J. T. B. Maxwell ; 17, 
 
 bark Bounding Billow. Boston, A. Pickering & 2 "Leaves from a Lawyer's Life Afloat and 
 
 Co.; 18, bark Fame ; 19, bark Parthian, Rich- Ashore," p. 112. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 627 
 
 sacrificed patriotism to pelf, lends additional force to the observ- 
 ations of Judge Cowley in the same line of comment. These 
 dealings by Northern men in war material consigned to South- 
 ern ports were so open and flagrant early in 1861 that they were 
 denounced by Judge Smalley, then presiding in the U. S. Cir- 
 cuit Court for New York. On January 14th, in charging the 
 Grand Jury for the term, he delivered an address which has 
 not been preserved in any history of the war written from a 
 Northern standpoint, perhaps because it was too scathing a 
 criticism of the traffic which it became convenient to forget 
 when contractors afterwards found the most lucrative market 
 in their engagements with the War and Navy Departments of 
 the Federal administration. He spoke of their earlier busi- 
 ness as embodying "the highest crime known to the law of 
 any civilized country "—that of high treason— in furnishing 
 aid and comfort to an enemy in rebellion against the govern- 
 ment; and he extended the charge so far as to include within 
 the offence of misprision of treason all persons who, knowing 
 of the shipments of war material to the States which had se- 
 ceded, failed to give information thereof to the Federal au- 
 thorities. It is plain that he meant to throw out a drag-net 
 in which he might catch the money-seekers to whom Georgia 
 and other Southern States were so much indebted, but he 
 failed to intimidate them. They continued to sell the South 
 whatever it wanted until the firing upon Fort Sumter drew 
 the line against their Southern business, and then they plunged, 
 with equal eagerness, their arms elbow-deep into the over- 
 flowing treasury at Washington. '■ 
 
 Georgia — the "Empire State of the South" — was far re- 
 moved from the theatre of battle until the war was six months' 
 old. In the meantime she had sent thousands of fighting men 
 to the armies under Beauregard and Johnston in Virginia, 
 but had scarcely given to the establishment of a naval force 
 the consideration that it deserved. Her ordinance of secession 
 was passed on January 19th, 1861; but, by the order of Gov- 
 ernor Joseph E. Brown, the State troops took possession of 
 Fort Pulaski, a casemate and barbette fortification at the 
 mouth of the Savannah River, on January 7th, and within the 
 next three weeks all the U. S. military posts in Georgia were 
 surrendered by the officers in charge of them without inviting 
 the compulsion of shot and shell that was used in the argu- 
 ment with Major Anderson at Fort Sumter. The only U. S. 
 
 1 Charles Hallock, in an article on " Bermuda from New York labelled ' Paris,' and good old 
 
 and the Blockade," in the Galaxy for April, Irish whiskey from New Jersey; for there were 
 
 1867, speaking of the blockade trade at Ber- many articles that could be purchased cheaper 
 
 muda, says : " British goods were always in in the United States than in Europe, and the 
 
 great demand for the blockade-runners, for laws of trade are inflexible — * the longest pole 
 
 they would have no dealings with Yankees. breaks down the most persimmons.' And ao 
 
 Accordingly, in the shops could be found bush- quantities of the goods found place in blockade 
 
 els of Connecticut pins and cases of Maasachu- cargoes, to the great profit of shrewd specu- 
 
 eetts siloes marked 'London,' elegant felt hats lators at the North." 
 
628 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 vessel in the port of Savannah was the revenue cutter J. C. Dob- 
 bin, which on the night of January 1st was seized by a party 
 of citizens of Savannali dressed in civic clothes, but armed 
 with muskets and revolvers. They announced to the officer 
 in charge that they had come to take the vessel in the name 
 of the State of Georgia; as they numbered ten times as many 
 as his crew he made no resistance, and they raised the Pal- 
 metto flag, saluted it, sent the officers and crew below and 
 closed the hatches on them, and finally ran the vessel ashore. 
 The leader in the seizure was C. A. Greiner, who afterwards 
 went North, and on April 29th was arrested in Philadelphia 
 on a charge of having committed treason in the Dobbin affair 
 and in the subsequent capture of Fort Pulaski by the State 
 troops. 
 
 Succeeding this incident it was not until the advent of 
 Commodore Josiah Tatnall at Savannah, that public and offi- 
 cial attention was seriously turned toward naval affairs. ^ 
 Then the presence of an officer who had attained the highest 
 rank in the U. S. navy, compelled the authorities and the peo- 
 ple to think of what Georgia might do toward fighting the 
 battles of the Confederacy on water as well as on land. On 
 February 28th, Governor Brown accepted the tender of the ser- 
 vices of Commodore Tatnall to his native State, and appointed 
 him senior flag-officer in the navy of Georgia, which does not 
 appear then to have consisted of a ship or a gun. Tatnall's 
 commission was merely honorary until March, when he was 
 appointed a commander in the provisional navy of the Con- 
 federate States, and assigned to the command of whatever 
 navy existed or might be created in the waters of Georgia and 
 South Carolina. He was expected to form a marine force un- 
 der the Confederate flag, and Avith the material which he could 
 reach it was a task almost akin to making bricks without 
 straw. He eventually got together a semblance of a naval 
 flotilla by arming a river steamer and a few small tugs that 
 were lying idle at the Savannah wharves with whatever guns 
 he could pick up; and with this " Mosquito Fleet," as it was 
 called, he went into action against the massive frigates and 
 heavy gunboats of the enemy at the battle of Port Royal, only 
 
 1 Josiah Tatnall was born at the family estate nean. In 1828 he waa assigned to the corvette 
 of Bonaventure, near 8av;iuuiih, November 9th, Ene of the "West India squadron, after which 
 1795, and was appointed midshipman in the he made the surveys of the site of fortifications- 
 U.S.muy, April 1st, 181'2, and in August was or- on the Tortugas Reef, and in 1831 took com- 
 dered to the frigate ConsteUalion. He partici- mand of the schooner Grampus. In 1835 he 
 pated in the repulse of the British boat expe- escorted back to Mexico Gen. Santa Anna, who 
 ditiou by the battery on Craney Island, below had been captured by the Texans, and turnetl 
 Norfolk, which was manned by seamen, June over to the U. S. government. Three years later 
 22d, 1813, and subsequently served on the £/j'-r- he was commissioned commander, and placed in 
 vier, Consteltation and Ontario, all attached to charge of the Boston navy-yard, from which 
 the IMecliterrauean squadron. In April, 1818, he was detached to command the corvette 
 he was promoted lieutenant, and assigned to Fairfield; then to the Saratoga, and in 1846 to 
 the frigate Macedonian on the Pacific Station. the steam gunboat Spitfire, on which he served 
 In 1823 he was first lieutenant of the schooner daring the war witli Mexico. After being afeain 
 Jackal in Commodore Porter's squadron, ope- for two years in command of the Boston navy- 
 rating against the pirates in the West Indies, yard be was made captain in 1860, and ordered to 
 and frora 1824 to 1826, was on duty on the the steam frigate Saranac. Between that year 
 Gonsiiiution and Brandywine in the Mediterra- and 1857 he also commanded the Xtidependeniie 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 629 
 
 to be forced to retire before the swift and strong ships which 
 Commodore Dupont had sent to cut off or destroy his flotilla, ' 
 "but which failed to execute the duty with which they were en- 
 trusted. It was the one great drawback to the completeness 
 of the Federal victory at Port Royal that Tatnall did not per- 
 mit his squadron to be captured, but preserved it intact for 
 future operations. His instructions from the Navy Depart- 
 ment at Richmond, were to "distribute" it along the coast 
 from Port Royal to the sounds south of the mouth of the Sa- 
 vannah River, with the special purpose of rendering assist- 
 ance to vessels expected from England with munitions of war 
 for the Confederacy; but as there were many more sounds 
 than he had vessels, it does not appear on record that he was 
 able to " distribute" his force suflSciently to aid any of the in- 
 coming steamers. 
 
 Their success at Port Royal enabled the Federals to run 
 their light-draft gunboats into the sounds, rivers, inlets and 
 bays that intervene between the Sea Islands and the mainland 
 of South Carolina and Georgia, on the approaches to which the 
 Confederates had established earthworks without having 
 either the men or guns sufficient to arm them. Expeditions 
 were sent through Ossabaw, Warsaw, St. Helena and Cum- 
 berland Sounds all the way down to Fernandina, and as the 
 Confederates had no means of opposing the passage of these 
 squadrons, they retired from their weak fortifications as the 
 enemy drew nigh, and soon the latter were in possession of 
 the whole coast line southward from Port Royal except Sa- 
 vannah and the entrances thereto. Not being then pre- 
 pared to attack the forts — Pulaski, Jackson and Causton — 
 protecting the Savannah River, they advanced only as far 
 as Tybee Island, at the embouchure of the river, which 
 was occupied on November 24th, by Commodore John 
 Rodgers, with a squadron embracing the steamers Pocahon- 
 tas, Seneca, Flag and Augusta, mounting in all about 40 
 guns, including 11-inch shell guns, and 6-inch rifles. The re- 
 port of Flag-officer Dupont to Secretary Welles states that 
 Rodgers was sent to make "a preliminary examination of the 
 bars, and for the determination of the most suitable place for 
 sinking the proposed obstructions to the navigation of the 
 
 and the naval station on the lakes. In the chanan as commander of the naval defence of 
 
 latter year he was created flag-officer, and as- Virginia in March, 1862, but returned to Georgia 
 
 sumed command of the naval forces in the in July, and in March, 1863, was relieved from 
 
 East India and China seas. He assisted the the command afloat and limited to shore duty 
 
 Enghsh and French allied squadrons in their at the Savannah Station, and the work of naval 
 
 attack on the Chinese forts at the mouth of construction. He was paroled as a prisoner of 
 
 the Pei-ho, June 26th, 1869, and the next year war May 9th, 1866, and from 1866 to 1870 
 
 l)rought the Japanese Ambassadors to the resided in Nova Scotia, near Halifax. He then 
 
 United States. He was in command of the returned to Savannah in much reduced cir- 
 
 3iaval station at Sackett's Harbor, N. Y., when cumstances, and the city created for him the 
 
 ■Georgia seceded, and resigning from the U. S. oifice of Inspector of the Port, at a salary of 
 
 :navy was, on February 28th. 1861, appointed $1,200 yearly. His death occurred June 14th, 
 
 senior flag-officer of the navy of the State of 1871. 
 Georgia In March he accepted a commis- 
 sion as captain in the C. S. navy and the com- i See for particulars of Tatnall's fleet the nar- 
 
 xaand of the naval defence of Georgia and cative of the battle of Port Koyal in chapter 
 
 South Carolina. He succeeded Admiral Bu- upon South Carolina Waters. 
 
630 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 river." He was instructed to push his reconnoissance so far as 
 " to form an approximate estimate of the force on Tybee Island, 
 and of the possibility of gaining access to the inner bar." He 
 found the island abandoned,and placed a detachment in the only 
 fortified position, a martello tower, with a battery at its base, 
 but his vessels went no further up the stream; as, to use the. 
 language of Dupont, "the rebels themselves have placed 
 sufficient obstructions in the river at Fort Pulaski, and thus by 
 the co-operation of their own fears with our efforts the harbor 
 of Savannah is effectually closed." 
 
 The occupation of Tybee Island was not so uneventful as 
 the Federal naval commander represents it. Accounts printed 
 in the Savannah papers state that the enemy first shelled the 
 martello tower and the battery, and obtaining no response, 
 sent several hundred men in a long train of boats on shore. 
 After dark. Captain Read, C. S. A., commanding a company of 
 Irish volunteers in Fort Pulaski, crossed over to Tybee with a 
 squad of his men with the intention of burning the hospital, 
 but found the Federals too numerous around it to warrant him 
 in making the attempt. They were hunting for cotton and 
 rice, with which they expected to pay the expenses of the ex- 
 pedition; as thej' are said to have done at Port Royal and Beau- 
 fort, where they captured a very large quantity of these com- 
 modities. Captain Read burned the rice and cotton on several 
 plantations, and withdrew in safety to Cockspur Island, on 
 which Fort Pulaski is situated. Commodore Tatnall's four 
 steamers laid in Cockspur Roads near the fort, and on the 36th 
 he slipped his cables, and running down within range of the 
 enemy's gunboats, opened fire upon them. As they came on he 
 slowly moved backward, hoping to draw them within reach of 
 the guns of Pulaski, but they perceived his purpose and with- 
 drew from the engagement when they were still too far distant 
 from the fort for any of its shot to reach them. The skirmish 
 between Tatnall and the foe continued for an hour, and some 
 forty or fifty shots were exchanged, but the fire was ineffective 
 on either side. For several days afterwards the Federal gun- 
 boats pitched shells at long range towards Pulaski, but on 
 December 3d they evacuated Tybee and sailed to the north- 
 ward,, thus relieving the apprehensions which prevailed at 
 Savannah, that an attack upon the city was meditated then. 
 It was so fully expected that the Federal fleet would attempt 
 to fight its way up the river that every preparation was made 
 to receive it. General Robert E. Lee, then an engineer officer 
 in the military department, visited all the works, attended 
 personally to strengthening them and the posting of the garri- 
 sons, and made ready for the anticipated combat, but the 
 Federals had accomplished the business upon which they were 
 then bent and which did not include any serious fighting. 
 
 On December aeth Tatnall's squadron — consisting of the 
 steamers Savannah, fiag-ship. Commodore Tatnall ; Eesolute, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 631 
 
 Commander Jones ; Sampson, Commander Kennard ; the Ida, 
 and Bartow — made an excursion down the river which is not 
 recorded except in the biography of the Commodore, prepared 
 by Charles C. Jones, Jr. " With the view," the author says, 
 "to testing the range of some rifle guns lately received on the 
 station, and to afford his men some practice, the Commodore 
 attacked with his flotilla the enemy's blockading vessels then 
 lying in the mouth of the Savannah River. Retiring before 
 his fire, the enemy stood out to sea. After a pursuit of several 
 miles, and having demonstrated the inefficient character of 
 the guns, the Confederate flotilla returned to its anchorage." 
 
 The business which had brought the Federals to Tybee, 
 and which is alluded to in Commodore Dupont's report already 
 quoted from, was a part of the scheme of the Federal govern- 
 ment to permanently obstruct the entrances to several Southern 
 ports, of which Savannah was one, by sinking in the channels 
 the hulks of whaling ships bought from the thrifty mariners, 
 of the decadent Massachusetts ports. One portion of " the 
 stone fleet " was dispatched to Savannah after the reconnois- 
 sances by Commander Rodgers' boats had indicated the places 
 at which the hulks should be sunk to obstruct the entrances to 
 the harbor. The plan pursued was the same at Savannah as 
 at Charleston. The blockaders had failed to effectually close 
 these ports, and the notion of sealing them up by sinking ships 
 in the channels was the desperate expedient to which Mr. 
 Lincoln's government resorted. To Savannah were sent some 
 twenty of the hulks, which, after being loaded with stone, 
 were scuttled in the river near Tybee and in the navigable 
 water courses adjacent. This method of compensation for 
 the deficiencies of the legal blockade commanded immense 
 approbation at the North, and wafe somewhat more sucessful 
 at Savannah than at Charleston. ' What efiiect it produced 
 upon the great maritime powers of Europe has been spoken of 
 elsewhere in this work. The hulks sunk around Savannah 
 barred egress and ingress for a time, but in the end they were 
 washed out or burrowed deep in the sands, and the channels 
 were once more opened. 
 
 The campaign afloat and ashore in the Savannah vicinage 
 grew brisk as the old year gave way to the new. After the 
 Federals had closed up the river they were intent upon disT 
 covering a route into it above its mouth from Port Royal by 
 way of the inside passages, their primary aim being to take 
 Fort Pulaski in the rear. On Christmas day 1861. an exploring 
 
 1 " And i£ there be any more practical water seaboard cities of tlie South shall have beeu 
 
 approaches to Savannah, they can be treated in closed iip. The rebels will soon begin to re- 
 
 tbe same way. This done, there wiU be no need alize that the wiping out of all their seaboard 
 
 for vessels of our blockading squadron to be towns, the annihilation of their commerce, and 
 
 kept on duty there. A gunboat or two. to look the general distress and ruin which they have 
 
 in occasionally to see that there is no interfer- brought upon themselves, make their secession 
 
 ence with the barricade, is all that will be whistle altogether too expensive an affair, 
 
 necessary. The work then commenced will be Fools must be treated according to their folly." 
 
 continued until the water channels to all the — JV. Y. Herald, Nov. 29(A. 
 
633 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 expedition, under command of Lieut. Wilson, cliief of the U.S. 
 corps of Topographical Engineers, started from Hilton Head 
 and pushed through Calibogue Sound and the creeks back of 
 Dawfuskie, Turtle and Jones Islands, until they came out into 
 the Savannah River between Fort Pulaski and the city. On 
 the strength of their report of the practicability of the route 
 a stronger party was sent down to survey it. They found that 
 the entrances of the inlets into the river had been obstructed 
 by barriers of piles which must be removed before the gunboats 
 could get through. This was attempted by putting at the work 
 first a number of men who, obscured from the Confederate 
 sentinels by the tall reeds that grew thick and rank in the 
 marsh, sawed off piles near the edge of the water. Then light 
 draft steamers equipped with derricks and windlasses were 
 brought up, and under cover of the night they fastened chains 
 around the piles and dragged them up. They had nearly 
 cleared the passage before they were detected, but they were 
 finally observed by a sentry on duty at Pulaski. Word was sent 
 to Commodore Tatnall, who came down to the mouth of Wright 
 River with three gunboats and with a few shells drove off their 
 vsrorking parties. '■ 
 
 Thus foiled on the north side of the Savannah River, the 
 Federals went to the south side and discovered a new passage 
 leading from Warsaw Sound through Wilmington River and 
 St. Augustine Creek to the Savannah just below Fort Jackson; 
 and Dupont and Sherman mutually concluded that this was 
 the avenue that was most accessible for the consummation of 
 their project of reducing Fort Pulaski. Tatnall had foreseen 
 that an attack on the interior lines of communication would be 
 made, and, besides holding his squadron in readiness, he gave 
 his aid to the construction of a battery on a small island oppo- 
 site Fort Jackson, which, in honor of Dr. Cheves, who super- 
 intended its erection, was called Battery Cheves. A part 
 of its armament consisted of some long 32-pounder ship's 
 guns furnished by the Navy Department from the Norfolk 
 navy-yard upon the requisition of the Commodore. This 
 work enfiladed the approach by the river channel above Fort 
 Pulaski and its tenure and defence were confided to the 
 navy. Fire-rafts were also prepared, at Tatnall's suggestion, 
 and placed in the Savannah near Fort Jackson. One of these 
 ■rafts was completed by Christmas, on which day it, without 
 being ignited, floated down to the Tybee beach, near the 
 Federal position, where its appearance was explained by 
 a deserter from the Confederate lines, who, on coming into 
 the Federal camp, announced that he had cut its moorings 
 and allowed it to go down with the ebb tide. 
 
 1 This is the version of the affair published Northern paper from an incautious lettenvritten 
 
 "by the Savannah papers, but according to a by a Federal array officer to a relative exposed 
 
 statement contributed by Lieut. Thomas Hall, the scheme to the Confederates. Official re- 
 
 riag-officer Dupont's chief signal officer, to the ports that might be useful in clearing away the 
 
 " Annals of the War," a publication made in a doubt are lacking. 
 
J 
 
 s 
 
 
 
 a 
 
 SI 
 
 a 
 -< 
 w 
 
 33 
 SI 
 
 n 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 633 
 
 The attack on Fort Pulaski was not, however, attempted 
 as soon as the Federals opened' an inside passage. It had to 
 wait upon the designs of Commodore Dupont to take possession 
 of Fernandina by the route which carried him across the Sa- 
 vannah River to cross into Warsaw Sound. On January 36th, 
 1862, Fleet Capt. Charles H. Davis and Commander C. P. R. 
 Rodgers, with the gunboats Ottawa, Seneca, Isaac Smith, Po- 
 toinska, Ellen and Western World and the armed launches of 
 the frigate Wabash, accompanied by transports conveying 
 3,400 troops under the command of Gen. Horatio G. Wright, 
 passed into the Tybee, and as it was supposed by the Confed- 
 •erates that they meant to attempt a dash upon Fort Pulaski, 
 the garrison and the squadron were put in order to resist them. 
 On the 27th, Davis' gunboats came to anchor in Tybee Roads 
 within sight of the Confederate flotilla, which stood off in con- 
 tiguity to the fort. Davis had no intention of bringing on an 
 engagement at the time, and the Confederates probably would 
 not have provoked it if they had known that Fort Pulaski was 
 not immediately to be besieged. But under the belief that the 
 fort and the safety of Savannah were threatened, it became of 
 the utmost importance that the garrison in the fort should be 
 provisioned for a long siege. It could not be denied that the 
 possession by the enemy of the interior water courses virtu- 
 ally isolated the fort, and that it must either surrender or be 
 defended against the Federal ships and the batteries which the 
 ^Federals had established on Tybee Island after their return to 
 it about the middle of January. When Davis' squadron seemed 
 io menace it provisions were running short, and the quantity 
 ■of ammunition in the magazines was so small that it could not 
 hold out against a siege unless the commissariat was replen- 
 ished and a new supply of powder, shot, shell, etc. , brought in. 
 ■Commodore Tatnall was requested to convoy a six months' 
 stock of provisions and ammunition to the fort, and undertook 
 "to execute the task. He started down the river on January 
 38th with his flagship the Savannah, the steamer Resolute, 
 •Capt. Jones, and the steamer Sampson, Capt. Kennard, escort- 
 ing the steamer Ida, steamer Bartow and a scow laden with 
 the desired supplies. They were placed in a very peculiar po- 
 sition as they neared Fort Pulaski. On the northern side of 
 1ihe Savannah River was the Federal squadron commanded by 
 'Capt. John Rodgers, and on the south side that commanded 
 by Capt. Davis, both of which had their guns trained upon the 
 ■channel through which Tatnall must run down to the fort. 
 The distance between the two Federal squadrons was not over 
 three miles, and without any great elevation their guns would 
 •carry across the marshy islands which intervened. For Tat- 
 nall it was a veritable running of a gauntlet, in which the 
 ■chances were a hundred to one against his gunboats and their 
 convoy reaching the fort without being cut to pieces or sunk. 
 That they escaped such a fate was due to the blunder of the 
 
634 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Federals in foregoing the advantage which they had in hand, 
 in the hope of destroying the whole Confederate squadron at 
 one blow. Tatnall's order of movement down the river was- 
 with the transports in advance and the armed steamers a short 
 distance in the rear. He passed within range of the Federal 
 fleet without a shot being fired at him, Davis and Rodgers evi- 
 dently supposing that after they had let him get below they 
 would run into the. Savannah River, cut him off from the city, 
 and easily capture or sink all his vessels by their superior 
 force. But Tatnall did not propose to be caught that way. 
 After the transjports were beyond the range of the Federal 
 guns he left the Sampson to accompany them to the wharf of" 
 Fort Pulaski and headed the Savannah and the Resolute back' 
 up stream toward the enemy's ships. It will be understood 
 without further explanation, that he was prepared to venture 
 a flght with these two feeble vessels against the thirteen gun- 
 boats of the squadrons of Davis and Rodgers in order to pro- 
 tect the Sampson and her convoy. As he proceeded up the 
 river again the enemy attacked him ferociously, Davis on the 
 left and Rodgers on the right, and the singular spectacle was 
 presented of a triangular naval engagement in which the three 
 squadrons concerned were each in a different river, and each,, 
 in order to reach the enemy, was obliged to fire across land.. 
 Says the Savannah Republican of January 29th : 
 
 "No sooner had the two steamers turned their bows up stream, than 
 the Federal fleets, seeing they were about to be cheated, opened a terrifie 
 fire upon them, which was gaUantly returned. A regular battle ensued, 
 and for forty minutes the shot and shell rained around our little fleet, the 
 latter often exploding directly over them, and the solid shot passing within 
 a few feet of the men on deck. The fleet kept up a return fire with its rifled 
 cannon and other guns of long range, but with what effect could not be 
 aseeitained over the wide space of marsh that intervened on either side. 
 Many of the enemy's shot passed some distance over and beyond our ves- 
 sels. Strange as it may appear, not a vessel or man on our side was dam- 
 aged. The fleet rode safely through the fire, and the fort is now fully 
 provisioned for six months. * • » The return trip of the Sampson 
 and the two unarmed steamers was as perilous as that of their predeces- 
 sors. The Yankee fleets poured their iron haU and fire upon the little 
 craft, but with all steam up and hurling defiant shots at the enemy in re- 
 turn, they passed gallantly foj.- two miles or more under the missiles of the 
 enemy. * * « xhe Sampson passed through a terrible ordeal, but 
 without serious damage. She was struck by four English rifled shells, two 
 passing through her, a third lodging onher deck, and a fourth exploding 
 in her store-room, breaking up things around generally, but damaging 
 no one. Her machinery was unhurt and she plowed gallantly through. 
 In good time they all came up to their wharves and were welcomed by 
 the immense crowds that filled up the dock and balconies, throughout 
 the day." 
 
 A small torpedo corps had been organized and had 
 planted some torpedoes in the channels navigated by the Fed- 
 eral gunboats, but they failed to inflict any harm upon the- 
 enemy. Several were discovered on February 13th, by Lieut. 
 Bankheady in charge of boats surveying the river, who at first 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 635 
 
 supposed them to be empty tin cans. A further examination 
 satisfied him as to their real nature. They were buoyed in 
 tlie stream and connected by wires. Each can contained 
 thirty pounds of powder, and five cans were set in battery, 
 
 MAP 
 
 SnOIVlSE- THE DEEEXCES QE 
 WlLffllNCTON uth SAVAKHAH RlVERft. 
 
 CEOROIA. 
 
 the group being connected by wires. The firing apparatus 
 was a friction tube leading from the head of the can mto the 
 powder chamber. The arrangement was very defective, for 
 Federal gunboats and launches passed over the torpedo lm& 
 before it was discovered, without causing an explosion. 
 
•636 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The enemy improved the time by constructing on the 
 shore of Tybee, at Venus Point, and on Oakley Island, breach- 
 ing batteries for an attack on Pulaski, which had become ut- 
 terly isolated. Towards the end of February, Gen. Lee, com- 
 manding the military department, conferred with Tatnall 
 upon the possibility of relieving the fort, and they agreed 
 that it could only be accomplished by a successful assault on 
 the Federal battery at Oakley Island — a forlorn hope in' view 
 of the numbers of the Federal men-of-war and troops in the 
 near neighborhood. But while they did not differ in their 
 judgments that the attempt would be entirely too hazardous, 
 Tatnall came very near making it. The story, as told by his 
 biographer, is not devoid of interest: 
 
 "Stung [writes Mr. Jones] by some remarks attributed to Q-en. 
 Lee, and repeated by some one to the flag-officer, the latter determined 
 to lead his entire force in open boats in an assault upon the battery on 
 Oakley Island. Early on the morning preceding the night upon which 
 this assault was to be made, Gten. Lee, learning the flag-officer s determi- 
 nation, called at Commodore Tatnall's quarters in the city of Savannah, 
 and expressed a desire to see Capt. Tatnall of the marines, one of the 
 flag-officer's aides. To this officer Gen. Lee addressed himself very 
 warpily, and asked how he had best approach Commodore Tatnall in 
 order to attempt to dissuade him from making an attack prompted per- 
 haps by a wounded professional pride, and which if unsuccessful would 
 leave the river approaches to the city practically open to the enemy. 
 The aide responded: he believed the contemplated attack to be very des- 
 perate in its character; but, as it would be his duty to accompany the 
 flag-officer, such fact rendered it out of the question for him to take a step 
 toward preventing its execution. Subsequently the General sent a mes- 
 senger to the flag-officer asking a confidential interview. During that in- 
 terview Gen. Lee gave distinct utterance to his fears for the fate of Sa- 
 vannah in the event that the attack failed of the desired result. After 
 hearing the General, Commodore Tatnall so far modified his plans as to 
 •confess himself willing to be governed by the views of such officers of the 
 navy and army as he should assemble and consult in council." 
 
 This council met on the flag-ship Savannah on February 
 28th. It was composed of Lieuts. Commanding John Rut- 
 ledge, J. S. Kennard, J. Pembroke Jones, O. F. Johnston, 
 Wm. P. A. Campbell and Philip Porcher, of the navy, and 
 Major Edward C. Anderson, of the artillery. They made this 
 report to Tatnall: 
 
 " Having been requested by you to express our opinion as to the ad- 
 visability of an attack by the vessels of your squadron, assisted by 200 
 men of the army in boats," on the battery at Oakley Island, we report as 
 follows : 
 
 " ' The boats and vessels would be subjected to a heavy fire of grape 
 and canister at short range from the battery, supported by a cross-fire 
 from the gunboats and battery opposite, and we are of the opinion that 
 the result would in all probability be a failure, attended with great loss 
 of life and vessels. In that event, our present preparations for the de- 
 fence of Savannah would be thrown away, and a fearfully depressing 
 moral effect produced. Should such an expedition prove sttGcessful, it 
 would result in the spiking of a few of the enemy's guns and a slight re- 
 tardation in their advance, with such a loss of men and arms on our side 
 as in the result to decrease our means of defending Savannah, which we 
 deem the all-important object, both on shore and afloat.' " 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 637 
 
 The contemplated attack was consequently relinquished, 
 and Fort Pulaski was perforce left to its fate. ' On the morn- 
 ing of April 10th, Gen. David Hunter, the Federal commander, 
 summoned Col. Charles H. Olmstead, the commander of the 
 fort, to surrender. "I am here to defend the fort, not to sur- 
 render it," was the brief and plucky reply of Olmstead. He 
 withstood a savage bombardment of two days, and capitulation 
 was then decided upon after consultation with all the officers 
 of the garrison. 
 
 It need hardly be said that the fall of Fort Pulaski threw 
 Savannah into consternation, but it produced at least the one 
 good effect of stimulating the effort to provide a naval squad- 
 ron that would not be so feeble as the few steamers with 
 which Tatnall had performed his operations. He was sent on 
 March 26th, 1863, to Norfolk to take command of the Virginia 
 after the wounding of Commodore Buchanan in the battle 
 with the Monitor, and was succeeded at Savannah by Capt. 
 Richard L. Page. The history of the work done there to 
 create a formidable navy is rather one of effort than of 
 achievement, but whatever were its failures they must be 
 charged to the utter inability of the Confederacy to build the 
 vessels designed by their constructors. 
 
 Five Confederate steamers outside of the Mosquito Fleet 
 made matter for history in the waters of Savannah. They 
 were the Nashville, the Atlanta, the Georgia, the Savannah, ' 
 the Macon, and the Milledgeville. The Nashville was the first 
 vessel that was commissioned as a public armed cruiser of the 
 Confederate States. She was a fast side-wheel steamer and had 
 been originally purchased by the Confederate government to 
 convey abroad Messrs. Mason and Slidell, the envoys to Great 
 Britain and France. 
 
 In July, 1862, she ran into Savannah with a cargo of arms 
 and was thenceforth blockaded until her destruction, which 
 occurred eight months later during the attack of the Federal 
 iron-clad fleet upon Fort McAllister. This fortification was 
 situated on the Ogechee River, about sixteen miles south of 
 the mouth of the Savannah River, and six miles from Ossa- 
 baw -Sound. It stood on the mainland directly above the 
 river bank, and commanded the river for a mile and a half on 
 each side. The bluff upon which it was erected was known as 
 Genesis Point. In February, 1863, the Federal monitor 
 Montauk was sent into the Ogechee to renew the attack upon 
 the fort, at which time the Nashville was in the river waiting 
 an opportunity to run to sea. The report of Capt. George W. 
 Anderson, Jr., commanding Fort McAllister, dated February 
 28th, and relating the events of the day, says: 
 
 " At 7:35 A. M. three gunboats, one mortar-boat and an iron-clad came 
 in sight of our battery. The iron-clad anchored between 800 and 1000 
 
 1 This ahip was the iron-clad Savannah, and of the same name that served Commodore Tat-" 
 must be distinguished from the armed steamer nail as a flagship in the early days of the war. 
 
638 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 yards abreast of our battery, and directed her entire fire at the Rattlesnake 
 {Nashville),'- -which was aground about three-fourths of a mile from her. 
 * * * At 7:40 o'clock the Rattlesnake was set on fire— whether by her 
 commander (Capt. Baker) or by the shells of the enemy, I am unable to 
 say. If by Capt. Baker, I think it was entirely unnecessary, circum- 
 stances not demanding her destruction." 
 
 Capt. Baker did not deserve the implication of censure 
 contained in Capt. Anderson's report. He had been seeking 
 an opportunity to go to sea past the blockaders, and not think- 
 ing it safe to try to evade them on the Savannah River he had 
 resolved to try the Ogechee route, with the result of reaching 
 Fort McAllister just as the Federal fleet were making the at- 
 tack. He steamed a little to the north and west of the fort, and 
 in so doing ran hard and fast aground in a position affording 
 to the enemy as desirable a target as they could ask for. The 
 reports of Commodore Dupont and of Capt. Worden, the com- 
 mander of the Montauk, are fairly descriptive of her destruc- 
 tion, although, in obedience to the virulent and absurd theory 
 of Secretary Welles, they spoke of her as a ' 'privateer," notwith- 
 standing that they were well informed that she was a ship-of- 
 war of the Confederate States, and entitled to the privileges 
 of a belligerent nation already accorded by the United States, 
 Great Britain and France. Worden wrote : 
 
 " By moving up close to the obstructions in the river, I was enabled, 
 although under a heavy fire from the battery, to approach the Nashville, 
 still aground, within the distance of 1,300 yards. A few well-directed shells 
 determined the range, and I soon succeeded in striking her with 11-inch 
 and 15-inch shells. * * * i soon had the satisfaction of observing that 
 the Nashville had caught fire from the shells exploding in her in several 
 places, and in less than twenty minutes she was in flames forward, aft and 
 amidships. At 9:20 A. M. a large pivot -gun mounted abaft her foremast ex- 
 ploded from the heat, at 9:40 her smoke-chimney went by the board, and 
 at 9:55 her magazine exploded with tremendous violence, shattering her 
 in smoking ruins ; nothing remains of her." 
 
 Except for the destruction of the Nashville the attack on 
 Fort McAllister was sterile of beneficial results for the Federals. 
 In this and in other engagements the fort repulsed them, and 
 her cannoneers shared with those of Fort Sumter the honor of 
 demonstrating that the monitors could be whipped and driven 
 off by heavy ordnance and sharp-shooting gunners on shore. 
 
 While the Nashville was in quest of an opportunity to 
 escape to sea, the British steamship Fingal was being con- 
 verted into the Confederate iron-clad Atlanta in the harbor of 
 Savannah. She was a vessel bought in September, 1861, on 
 the Clyde, in Scotland, by Capt. James D. Bulloch, the Euro- 
 pean agent of the Confederate States. ' " She was," says Cap- 
 tain Bulloch, " a new ship; had made but one or two trips to 
 the north of Scotland, was in good order, well-found, and her 
 log gave her speed as thirteen knots in good steaming weather," 
 
 1 The ship was sometimes called the i2a«iesna/£:e, 2 "The Secret Service of the Confederate 
 
 Taut the official records of the C. S Navy Dept. States in Europe.'*— James D. Bulloch, pp. 109, 
 give her no other name than that of the iVas/m;^«. 151. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 639 
 
 Moreover, she was the first ship to attempt to run the block- 
 ade inward for the account of the Confederate government, 
 and her cargo was valuable enough to warrant the taking 
 the most perilous risks. It consisted of 10,000 Enfield rifles, 
 1,000,000 ball cartridges, 2,000,000 percussion caps, 3,000 cavalry 
 sabres, 1,000 short rifles and cutlass bayonets, 1,000 rounds of 
 ammunition per rifle, 500 revolvers and ammunition, a couple 
 of large rifled cannon and their gear, two smaller rifled guns, 
 400 barrels of cannon powder, and a lot of medical stores and 
 material for clothing. "No single ship," Captain Bulloch 
 states, "ever took into the Confederacy a cargo so entirely 
 composed of military and naval supplies, and the pressing 
 need of them made it necessary to get the Fingal off with 
 quick dispatch, and to use every possible effort to get her into 
 a port having railway communication through to Virginia, be- 
 cause the Confederate army, then covering Richmond, was 
 very poorly armed and was distressingly deficient in all field 
 necessaries." 
 
 The Fingal passed through many adventures in her first 
 voyage under Confederate ownership, of which Captain Bul- 
 loch has left an exciting narrative. The passengers beside 
 himself were Col. Edward C. Anderson, of the Confederate 
 army ; Messrs Charles Foster, and — Moffatt, two residents of 
 Charleston, who desired to return to their homes, and Dr. 
 Holland, an ex-surgeon of the U. S. army; For obvious reasons 
 the ship was kept under the British flag, which made it neces- 
 sary to employ a captain holding a Board of Trade certificate 
 to clear her outward, and to ship the crew in accordance with 
 the Merchant Shipping Law. The second officer was John 
 Low, who made a most honorable record in the Confederate 
 navy. About October 8th or 9th, 1861, the Fingal sailed from 
 Greenock, Scotland, with Messrs. Foster and Moffatt on board, 
 and with instructions to call at Holyhead, where Bulloch, 
 Anderson and Holland were waiting to join her. Running in- 
 to Holyhead on a dark and stormy night she collided and cut 
 down the Austrian brig, Siccardi. The character of her mis- 
 sion would not permit delay, and her three passengers going at 
 once on board, she was out of the harbor before the accident 
 was known to any one who would have had authority to stop 
 her, Bulloch first leaving on shore a letter for Eraser, Tren- 
 holm & Co., the Confederate financial agents in England, 
 which enabled them to trace the owners of the Siccardi, 
 and make proper compensation for the loss of that vessel. 
 On November the 2nd the Fingal arrived at St. George, 
 Bermuda, where she found the Nashville in port and re- 
 ceived from her a pilot, John Makin, for the Southern coast. 
 She had been cleared for Nassau, but was headed from 
 Bermuda for Savannah; and as this necessitated an under- 
 standing with the British crew, Bulloch called them aft, 
 explained that his true object was to run the blockade, and 
 
640 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 offered to put into Nassau if any of them objected to continu- 
 ing with the ship. They unanimously consented to go on with 
 the voyage, and he then told them that although the Fingal 
 still flew the British flag, he had her bill of sale in his pocket; 
 that he was empowered at any moment to take her from the 
 captain on behalf of the Confederate Navy Department, and 
 that if they would stand by him he would do this and be ready 
 to fight any U. S. blockading ship of equal strength that might 
 intercept him. Not a man backed out and he set them at work 
 to arm the ship. Two 4i-inch rifled guns were hoisted out of 
 the hold and mounted in the forward gangway ports; a couple 
 of boat howitzers were put in position on the quarter-deck; the 
 men were equipped with rifles and revolvers, and a few old 
 man-of-war's men among them were set to drilling their fel- 
 lows, and the peaceful merchantman was thus metamor- 
 phosed into a capable fighting ship. On November 13th 
 she came upon the Georgia shore in a dense fog, and while 
 Bulloch was reasonably sure that he was off Warsaw Inlet, 
 Pilot Makin did not wish to run in on any uncertainty. 
 He bore away for Savannah and made the entrance with- 
 out catching a glimpse of a blockader. The cargo of arms 
 was sent to the necessitous armies, and it was decided that the 
 Fingal should be loaded with cotton on account of the Navy 
 Department and that Captain Bulloch should endeavor to take 
 her back to England. He returned to Savannah on Novem- 
 ber 33d and found the ship empty and virtually blockaded in 
 the river by the enemy's gunboats and their occupation of 
 Tybee Island. The cotton and coal needed were slow in coming, 
 and he informed Secretary Mallory that if it was desired to send 
 the ship to sea haste should be made to run her out through 
 the Warsaw passage before that was closed by the Federals. 
 He was instructed to take command of the ship, load her with 
 cotton and resin, sail her to a British port and there transfer 
 the command to Lieut. G. T. Sinclair, C. S. N., who would go 
 out from Savannah with him. By December 30th, the cotton 
 was stowed away in her hold and she dropped down to Wil- 
 mington Island seeking an opportunity to evade the blockad- 
 ing fleet, being accompanied by Commodore Tatnall's squad- 
 ron. The Chatham artillery battalion, of Savannah, was sent 
 to Skidaway Island to assist in case there should be a conflict 
 with the Federals. On the 33d, the Fingal and the squadron 
 ran down near the enemy's gunboats, which they found in such 
 strong force that they were compelled to retire after an inter- 
 change of fire. Tatnall's flagship received a shell in her wheel- 
 house and was assisted off by the Resolute. It was too late 
 now to hope to get the Fingal out; every channel was vigi- 
 lantly patrolled by the enemy's gunboats, and a pilot sent out 
 to see if escape could be effected by way of the Romerly marsh 
 narrowly avoided capture, and reported that five ships-of-war 
 were watching for the Fingal in that locality. So close a 
 

 
 
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 W 
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 W 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 641 
 
 look-out warranted the suspicion that spies had informed the 
 Federals of her movements, a belief which was strengthened 
 by the desertion of two seamen who accompanied the pilot on 
 his search for an unguarded channel. Just at that time, too, 
 "the stone hulks were sunk in the approaches to Savannah, 
 and late in January, 1863, Capt. Bulloch reported to Secretary 
 Mallory that the port was closed and that he could see no 
 prospect of carrying the ship out. By the Secretary's orders 
 lie turned her over to Lieut. Sinclair and returned to Europe 
 by way of Wilmington. 
 
 Available no longer to the Confederacy as a cruiser or 
 Talockade-runner, the Fingal was converted into an iron-clad 
 of the familiar type followed in all the Confederate armored 
 ships. Her extreme length was 204 feet, breadth of beam 41 
 feet, draft of water 15 feet 9 inches. She was cut down 
 to the main-deck, which was widened amidships and overlaid 
 with a foot of wood and iron plating, and upon this founda- 
 tion was built the casemate, the sides and end inclining at an 
 angle of thirty degrees. The top of the casemate was fiat, 
 and the pilot-house rose above the roof about three feet. The 
 sloping sides and ends of the casemate were covered with four 
 inches of iron plates in two layers, secured to a backing of 
 three inches of oak and fifteen inches of pine. A ram was at- 
 tached to the bow, which was also fitted with a spar to carry 
 a percussion torpedo. Her armament was two 7-inch Brooke 
 guns on bow and stern pivots, and two 6-inch Brooke rifles in 
 broadside. The larger guns were so arranged that they could 
 Ibe worked in broadside as well as for fore-and-aft fire, and the 
 ship could therefore fight two 7-inch and one 6-inch piece on 
 •either side. When completed she was renamed the Atlanta, 
 and about the same time the iron-clad battery Georgia was 
 finished, but proved to be worthless on account of defects in 
 her construction. She was 260 feet in length and sixty feet 
 Ijreadth of beam, with a casemate twelve feet high. Her ma- 
 chinery was of very little use, and whenever she was moved 
 it was by means of tow boats. She carried seven guns and 
 was under the command of Lieut. J. Pembroke Jones, C. S. N. 
 The ladies of Savannah made large contributions to the cost 
 ■of building her, in the same manner that those of Charleston 
 aided the construction of the iron-clad Charleston. 
 
 Lieut. Charles H. McBlair, C. S. K, was first placed in 
 command of the Atlanta, which, on July 31st, 1862, first 
 showed herself to the Federal fieet. She steamed leisurely 
 down the Savannah toward Fort Pulaski and then returned to 
 the city. It is instructive to learn now of the alarm with 
 which the Federals regarded her. " Unless some monitor 
 oomes to our succor," wrote the correspondent of the New 
 York Herald, on August 2d, "the fair weather yachts now 
 reposing on the placid bosom of Port Royal Bay have before 
 them an excellent opportunity of learning what it is to be 
 11 
 
642 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 blown out of the water. The rebels have completed their ram. 
 It has been manned and armed and is now ready for sea." 
 
 There was no necessity at the time for the extraordinary 
 perturbation evinced by the Federals, as the Atlanta was 
 merely on her trial trip, which developed the fact that she 
 steered badly, in consequence of the increased draft caused by 
 her weight of armor and ordnance, and the alteration of form 
 resulting from the projecting overway, which extended seve- 
 ral feet below the water line. As a merchant ship, she had 
 made easily twelve knots an hour, but as an iron-clad six to 
 seven was the most that could be got out of her. Believing her, 
 however, to be a miracle of formidableness, the Federals 
 thereafter kept several monitors constantly in the vicinity of 
 Savannah, and on March 3d, 1863, again bombarded Fort 
 McAllister and were again repulsed. In the meantime the 
 Atlanta underwent some slight changes that failed to correct 
 her defects. The whole work of constructing her had been 
 entrusted to John A. Tift, and when Commodore Tatnall re- 
 turned to the naval command at Savannah in July, 1862, he 
 found that he was not permitted to have anything to do with 
 the building of the ship. " Mr. Tift," he wrote to Secretary 
 Mallory, " called at my office and showed me his authority from 
 yourself giving him the sole control of her construction, and 
 in reply to a question, he stated that it was intended that the 
 commandant of the station should have nothing to do with 
 her. I, of course, abstained from interfering in any shape 
 whatever." 
 
 In January, 1863, Tatnall proposed to attack the block- 
 aders with his fleet, but it was found impossible to get the At- 
 lanta through the south channel of the Savannah River, until 
 the obstructions placed there had been removed. The Navy 
 Department was urging him to make a demonstration against 
 the enemy, and his failure to do so was the cause of his re- 
 moval, in March, from the command afloat; but he was im- 
 peded by difficulties that were not fully appreciated at Rich- 
 mond, or generally in the South, where the people had accepted 
 the Northern opinion of the power of the Atlantaas an engine 
 of destruction, and were impatient that she should do some- 
 thing to realize their hopes that she would raise the blockade, 
 and perhaps bombard the Northern seaports. The old com- 
 modore's letter of April 34th, 1863, to Secretary Mallory, is a 
 cogent explanation of his intentions in January previous, 
 and his failure to execute them, although he wrote under a 
 sense of indignation at being removed from the command 
 of the squadron. When he resolved on the attack in Janu- 
 ary, a day was selected when the first high spring tide would 
 enable the Atlanta, which drew nearly sixteen feet of water, 
 to pass out of the Savannah; but when she dropped down to 
 the obstructions, it was only to be held back by the inability 
 of the engineer officers to remove them. It was actually a 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 643 
 
 month before the passage could be cleared, and Tatnall then 
 prepared to go through on the next spring tide, which oc- 
 curred on February 4th. By that date the monitor fleet had 
 gathered in Ossabaw Sound for the assault of Fort McAllis- 
 ter, and Tatnall anchored the Atlanta off the Causton's Bluff 
 forts, having been requested by Gen. Mercer to cover that 
 point from an attack by the enemy while a change was be- 
 ing made in the position of the guns of the forts. • Continu- 
 ing his letter to Mr. Mallory, the Commodore wrote that upon 
 the return of the Federal monitors to Port Royal, he took 
 his ship to the head of Warsaw Sound, with a view of run- 
 ning to sea when the enemy made the anticipated attack on 
 Charleston. 
 
 "In that event [he said], I had two projects in view— either to at- 
 tack him at Port Royal, should the force left there justify it, or, sweeping 
 the sounds to the south of the Savannah, push on to Key West in the 
 hope of surprising some of the enemy's vessels in that port. While at 
 this anchorage, however, and when the tides were at the lowest, two of 
 the enemy's iron-clads anchored in the mouth of the Savannah, where 
 none of that class had ever shown themselves hefore. They could in an 
 hour have attacked the Georgia, and, beyond a doubt, destroyed her, for 
 I could not have aided her. Nothing could have prevented this disaster 
 but ignorance of her force and condition. I ordered the return of the 
 ship to the Savannah as soon as possible, which could not be, however, 
 sooner than the 3d of April, and four days before that time I transferred 
 the squadron to Commander Page. It was my purpose not to have left 
 the Savannah River again until the enemy should have fully committed 
 himself in an attack on Charleston, and then to have gone to sea and exe- 
 cuted my plan." 
 
 Tatnall feared that the Atlanta would not be a match for 
 the monitors at close quarters, and his judgment was vindi- 
 cated by the events, and while he was ready to obey any posi- 
 tive orders given him by the government, he would not rush 
 into a conflict with them upon suggestions frona Mr. Mallory 
 that left him a latitude of action. Then Lieut. Wm. A. Webb, 
 C. S. N., was ordered to the command of the ship, the implied 
 condition of his appointment being that he should "do some- 
 thing" with her, and on June 17th, 1863, he got under way 
 before daylight and entered Warsaw Sound. Admiral Dupont 
 had sent the monitors Weehawken, Capt. John Rodgers, and 
 Nahant, Commander J. Downes, into the sound for the ex- 
 press purpose of meeting the Confederate ram. ' They were 
 two of the strongest vessels of their class, armored with ten 
 inches of iron on the turret and carrying two 15-inch and two 
 11-inch guns. Webb was desirous of fighting at close quarters, 
 as he thought that under such circumstances he might pierce 
 the monitor turrets or disable their guns with his rifled shot. 
 He was about 600 yards distant from the Weehawken when 
 the Atlanta went aground and was backed off with some diffi- 
 culty, but inside of five minutes she again grounded— this 
 
 1 Report of Admiral Dupont to Secretary Welles. 
 
644 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 time so hard and fast that the extreme exertions of her en- 
 gines were powerless to move her. ' In this position she was 
 at the mercy of the enemy. With the utmost deliberation the 
 Weehawken came up to within 300 yards and opened fire. The 
 first shot struck the Atlanta upon the side of her casemate, 
 knocking a hole in it and scattering over the gun-deck great 
 quantities of wood and iron splinters, wounding sixteen men 
 and prostrating forty more insensible from the shock. A 
 second shot struck the top of the pilot-house, crushing and 
 driving down the bars on the top and sides, wounding both 
 pilots and one helmsman and stunning the other helmsman. 
 Other shots smashed a port shutter and started the joint 
 of the casemate with the deck. Eight shots were fired from 
 the Atlanta, no one of which struck the Weehawken, and the 
 Nahant did not come into the fight at all. It was impossible 
 for Webb, with his ship fast on the bottom, to bring his guns 
 to bear, and in fifteen minutes it was manifest that the en- 
 emy's huge projectiles must soon pierce the casemate and 
 cause fearful slaughter. The Nahant was bearing down upon 
 him, and in a few moments would have joined her destructive 
 fire to that of her consort. Webb hoisted the white flag, sent 
 Lieut. J. W. Alexander to inform Capt. Rodgers that he had 
 surrendered, and made the following address to his crew: 
 
 "I have surrendered our vessel because circumstances over -which I 
 had no control have compelled me to do so. I Itnow that you started 
 upon this expedition with high hopes, and you have been disappointed. 
 I most earnestly wish that it had happened otherwise, but Providence, 
 for some good reason, has interfered with our plans, and we have failed 
 of success. You all know that, if we had not run aground, the result 
 would have been different, and now that a regard for your lives has in- 
 fluenced me in this surrender, I would advise you to submit quietly to 
 the fate which has overtaken us. I hope that we all may soon be returned 
 to our homes, and meet again in a common brotherhood." 
 
 The Federals made prisoners of 105 men (oflicers and 
 crew) of the Atlanta, including 28 marines. " With the excep- 
 tion of the wounded, they were sent to prison at Fort 
 Lafayette in New York harbor. The survey ordered by 
 Admiral Dupont reported that the ship could be easily repaired, 
 and she was sent to the navy-yard at Philadelphia, whence 
 she returned in February, 1864, to Fortress Monroe to form 
 one of the Federal North Atlantic squadron. 
 
 1 In a statement made to a Savannah paper, A. Webb, Commander; J. W. Alexander, i'irst 
 George W, Hardcastle, carpenter of the Jtlanta, Lieutenant ; Alphonse Barbot, Second Lieuten- 
 said that upon nearing the Weehawken Capt. ant; George H. Arledge, Third Lieutenant; 
 Webb asked the pilots if there was water enough Thomas L. Wragg, Master ; E. J. Freeman, 
 for the Atlanta to make a dash at hev. He was Passed Assistant Surgeon; E. J. Johnson, First 
 iuformedthatthere was,andbe tlienorderedall Assistant Engineer; William B. Micou, Pay- 
 steam up, in order to run into her and blow her master; William J. Morrell, Second Assistant 
 ■up with his torpedo. In a few moments after she Engineer; Leslie King, Second Assistant Engi- 
 had got under full steam she brouglit to upon a neer ; J. A. G. Williamson, Midshipman; J. A. 
 sand-bank and careened over, wblch rendered Peters, Midshipman; William McBlair, Master's 
 her guns useless, and placed the Atlanta at the Mate ; Thomas B. Travers, Gunner ; James 
 mercy of her two antagonists at short range. Thurston, First Lieutenant of Marines; G. W. 
 
 Carey, Paymaster's Clerk; James M. Fleetwood, 
 
 2 The list of officers was aa follows; William Pilot; J. 8. West, Second Assistant Engineer. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 645 
 
 It was felt throughout the South that the loss of the 
 Atlanta was a distressing blow to the Confederacy, and in 
 the thoughtless anger of the moment Lieut. "Webb and his 
 officers were harshly spoken of; for the unwarrantable public 
 reports of her fighting capacity had deluded thousands into 
 the opinion that nothing but treachery or incompetency could 
 prevent her from vanquishing the Federal monitors. The 
 newspapers, or some of them, had led the Southern people 
 astray in this matter, and those which had pronounced the 
 vessel the greatest achievement ever accomplished in the way 
 of a battle-ship held to their notion that she could not have 
 been properly defended. "It is painful to hear such a tale," 
 exclaimed the Richmond Examiner in commenting on the 
 early reports of the engagement, " nor is the pain alleviated 
 by learning that the unhappy commander, after making a 
 brief address to his crew of Georgians, in which he advised 
 them to be resigned, fainted away upon his quarter-deck." 
 But Lieut. Webb did not faint on his quarter-deck or anywhere 
 else, and his behavior on this occasion was as gallant and sea- 
 manlike as when he carried the cockleshell gunboat Teaser 
 into action on the James River. His stranded ship would have 
 become a slaughter-pen under a few more of the Weehawken's 
 shots; his men were demoralized, and he had lost the service 
 of his pilots. The crew were in no sense reliable. Out of 140 
 odd of' them only some two-score were indifferent sailors, the 
 remainder having been selected from Georgia infantry, and 
 without experience at sea or any knowledge of naval gunnery, 
 which may be a partial explanation of their failure to inflict 
 any punishment upon the enemy. 
 
 After the loss of the Atlanta efforts were made to build at 
 Savannah other and superior iron-clads under contract with 
 Mr. Willink, a proficient naval contractor. He built the Savan- 
 nah, an armored ship of the casemate type, and had the Mil- 
 ledgeville, another vessel of the same class, nearing comple- 
 tion when the city was evacuated; but although the former 
 was armed and manned she never saw any hostile service. 
 The blockade of the port continued uninterrupted. On August 
 8th, 1863, the Confederate steamer Robert Habersham, on duty 
 as a guard-boat, exploded her boilers, killing and wounding 
 many of her crew, and on November 8th the crew of a picket 
 boat in the Savannah River made a prisoner of their com- 
 manding officer, Master's Mate Samuel A. Brockinton, of the 
 Sampson, and deserted to the Federals. 
 
 The most spirited incident of the last year of the war in 
 Georgia waters was the capture of the U. S. gunboat Water 
 Witch, a fine side-wheel steamer, mounting four guns, and 
 having a crew of about eighty men. She was a favorite ship 
 in the navy, having taken part in the Paraguay war of 1855, 
 and fought in Commodore Hollins' attack on the fleet in the 
 Mississippi Passes in October, 1861. As a blockader she was 
 
646 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 very valuable on account of her speed and handiness. Her 
 station in 1864 was in Ossabaw Sound, south of the Savannah 
 River, and as after the withdrawal of the Federal monitors 
 from attacks upon Fort McAllister she was usually alone in 
 that locality, a plan was arranged to capture her or some other 
 one of the squadron on the coast by a boat expedition operating 
 at night. Capt. W. W. Hunter, ^ commanding the Confeder- 
 ate States' naval fox'ces afloat at Savannah, detailed seven 
 boats, fifteen officers and 117 men from the squadron, and 
 placed the expedition in charge of First Lieut. Thomas P. 
 Pelot, with Lieut, Joseph Price second in command. They 
 left the iron-clad Georgia on the afternoon of May 31st, and 
 were towed to the Isle of Hope battery, from where they rowed 
 to Beaulain battery, on Yernon River, where they camped for 
 the night. The next day scouts reported one of the enemy's 
 vessels at anchor in the Little Ogeechee River, close under Ra- 
 coon Key, and she was selected for attack. The report of 
 Lieut. Price to Flag-officer Hunter says: 
 
 "At 8 o'clock p. M., the expedition got under way and formed two 
 columns. Boats Nos. 1, 3, 5 and 7, composing the port column, Nos. 2, 4 
 and 6 the starboard column; Lieut. Thomas P. Pelot commanding, with 
 Second Assistant Engineer Caldwell, C. S. N., and Moses Dallas ^colored) 
 pilot, led in boat 1; Lieut Price, with Master's Mate Grray and. Second 
 Assistant Engineer Fabein, in No. 2; Midshipman Minor, with Master's 
 Mate Freeman, in boat No. 3; Midshipman Trimble, in boat No. 4; Boat- 
 swain Seymour, with Master's Mate Baccalay, in boat No. 5; Master's Mate 
 H. Grolder, with Assistant Surgeon Thomas, in boat No. 6; Master's Mate 
 
 ' Commodore William Wallace Hunter was naval officer. His subsequeut service was for 
 the son of Dr. George Hunter, a distint^iisbed yeara ou the West Indian and Pacific oceans. He 
 physician of Edinburgh, Scotland. Emigrating was the inventor in 1847 of a mode of propulsion 
 to America early in life, he rendered his adopted of vessels familiarly known as " Hunter's 
 country eminent service as an officer in the Re- Horizontal Wheel," which was applied to the 
 volution, and as a member of the society of the first iron ocean steamer of the U. S. This vessel, 
 Cincinnati. His eon, the subject of this sketch, which was called the Alleghany, was constructed 
 was bora in the city of Philadelphia, in 1803. at Pittsburgh, Pa., according to plans and de- 
 This was about the period of the purchase of signs originated by Hunter and under his per- 
 Loitisiana by the United States, and Dr. Hunter sonal supervision. The Alleghany was com- 
 was appointed by President Jefferson to take manded by the commodore for over seven years, 
 cliargt! of the new acquisition. The greater part She passed from Pittsburgh to the ocean, and 
 of his youtli was spent on the sea, and that, too, over the falls of the Ohio, her keel never touch- 
 contrary to the wishes of his father, who was ing the ground. She was a 1,040 ton vessel, and 
 then a man of wealth and position and who had her battery, which consisted of four 9-inch 
 planned for his son a far different line of pur- pivot-gnus, each weighing 10,000 pounds, had a 
 suit in life. He made many voyages to Europe range entirely around the compass without 
 on commercial vessels, and his first work ou changing the position of the vessel, 
 board ship was as cabin boy. Dr. Hunter be- lu 1861, he resigned his commission in the 
 coming satisfied that young Hunter was deter- U. 8. navy, being then in charge of the Baltimore 
 mined to adopt a seafaring life, wrote to hia station, and almost at the head of the list of 
 friend Hon. James Monroe, then President of commanders. Simultaneously with his resigna- 
 tiie United States, with regard to the boy, and tion in the U. S. navy, he tendered hia services 
 the result was that the future commodore was to the Southern Confederacy at Montgomery, 
 on May 1st, 18'i2, given an appointment as mid- and was immediately given the rank of captain, 
 Bhipmau in the U. 8. navy. He performed his with a station at New Orleans, embracing the 
 first service in the squadron of Commodore command of the coast of Texas to Mexico. Sub- 
 David Porter, which had been organized for the sequeutly he was ordered to the batteries of the 
 suppression of piracy in the West Indies. In Rappaha'nock, where he served four months ; 
 tbe course of that service he was captured by after which he was ordered to Richmond and 
 the pirates, but suceeded in securing hia es- thence to Savannah to command that station, 
 cape under circumstances which reflected the Nine vessels were under Commodore Hunter's 
 •.greatest credit on his courage and ingenuity. It command at Savannah, two of which were iron- 
 was under Commodore John Rodgers, then com- clads. After the surrender Commodore Hunter 
 manding the U. 8. naval forces in the Mediter- went to Virginia, where his family at the time 
 ranean, and on the flagsbip North Carolina, that were residing. He is now (1887) an honored 
 youDg Hunter acquired his chief training as a citizen of New Orleans, La. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 647 
 
 Eostler, with Assistant Surgeon Jones, in boat No. 7; and proceeded with 
 muffled oars to the spot where we supposed the enemy's vessel to be. On 
 arriving, we found that she had either shifted her anchorage or that we had 
 been mistalien as to her position. After searching in vain till nearly day- 
 light, Lieut. Pelot ordered Boatswain Seymour, with one man, to remain 
 on Racoon Keys as scouts, and the expedition to return to camp at Beau- 
 lain battery. 
 
 " On the next day (June 3,) at 9 o'clock P. M., we got under way and 
 proceeded to Racoon Keys, where we took on board our scouts, who re- 
 ported that one of the enemy's vessels was lying in Ossabaw Sound, about 
 three miles from where we then were. After waiting there until midnight 
 we were ordered to get under way and pull cautiously. The night 
 being dark and rainy, we got close aboard of her without being dis- 
 covered. On being hailed, Lieut. Pelot answered we were 'rebels,' and 
 gave the order to ' board ' her. The vessel having steam up at the time, 
 as soon as the alarm was given, commenced turning her wheels backwards 
 and forwards rapidly, thus thwarting the earnest efforts of Boatswain 
 Seymour and Master's Mate Rostler to get on board with the entire boat's 
 crew. 
 
 ■' The port column, led by Lieut. Pelot, boarded on the port side; star- 
 board column, led by Lieut. Price, boarded on the starboard side. In 
 coming alongside, the enemy's fire with small arms was quite severe; in 
 fact it was during that time, and while the boarding netting, which was 
 triced up, was being cut through, that the most of our loss in killed and 
 wounded was sustained. After a sharp hand-to-hand fight of some ten 
 minutes, the ship was taken. Lieut. Pelot was the first to gain the deck, 
 and while bravely fighting was shot and instantly killed. In his death 
 the country has lost a brave and gallant officer, and society one of her 
 highest ornaments. 
 
 " The command then devolved upon me, and I proceeded forthwith 
 to extricate the vessel from the position she was then in to avoid recap- 
 ture by the enemy. Our pilot having been killed before the boats reached 
 the side of the ship, I sought for the enemy's pUot and found that he was 
 too badly wounded to assist me, but finally procured one of the quarter- 
 masters, whom I compelled to pilot me to the upper end of Racoon Key, 
 where, at the top of high water, the ship grounded. I then found it neces- 
 sary to lighten her, which I did by throwing overboard some barrels of 
 heef and pork, a few coils of hemp rigging, the remainder of the chain, 
 which I had slipped as soon as we took the vessel, and lowering two of 
 the guns in the boats. On getting ashore I immediately landed the killed, 
 wounded and prisoners at Beaulain battery. At 4 o'clock P. M., having 
 in the meantime obtained a pilot from the shore, I succeeded in getting 
 off and anchored her at 7 o'clock p. M., under the guns of Beaulain bat- 
 tery above the obstructions, when Lieut. W. W. Games, C. 8. N., by your 
 order, arrived on board and assumed command. 
 
 " In the darkness and confusion on board it was impossible for me to 
 ohserve each and every man; but I willstate, with pride, every one, officers 
 and men, did their duty most gallantly. I would state, however, that I 
 owe my life to B. D. Davis, ordinary seaman of the C. S. steamer Savannah, 
 he having cut down every opponent when I was sorely pressed by them. 
 
 " Boatswain's Mate J. Perry, of the steamer Savannah, and Boat- 
 swain's Mate W. S. Johnston, of the steamer Sampson, rendered me most 
 valuable assistance in lightening the vessel and general duties on board. 
 The former, although severely wounded, remained on deck as long as he 
 could." 
 
 The Federal reports amplify the modest narrative of 
 Lieut. Price, and confer additional honor upon the officers 
 and men of the Confederate navy engaged in the capture of 
 the Water Witch. Acting Master's Mate E. D. Parsons was 
 in charge of the deck when the boats approached in the 
 
648 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 midst of the storm, flashes of 'lightning only casting illumi- 
 nation upon the scene. Whether Parsons was panic-stricken, 
 or merely lost his head in the confusion, is uncertain, but he 
 was charged in the reports of Lieut. Commanding Pendergrast 
 and Master Charles W. Buck with taking refuge below deck, 
 without giving the order to slip the cable and start the engine 
 or calling all hands to repel boarders. Pendergrast and Buck 
 were in their bunks, and when the fighting began rushed on 
 deck to find it already partly in possession of the enemy. Such 
 of the crew and officers as "had tumbled up from below were 
 opposing the Confederates with pistols and cutlasses, the latter 
 using similar weapons in a hand-to-hand desperate conflict. 
 Buck endeavored to train a howitzer upon them, but was 
 struck down before he could apply the primer. Pendergrast, 
 it is said, came face to face with Lieut. Pelot and their swords 
 crossed. Pendergrast received a cut which knocked him 
 senseless upon the deck, but at that moment Billings, the 
 paymaster of the Water Witch, caught a glimpse of the Con- 
 federate commander by the glare of the lightning, and shot 
 him dead. So well organized were the boarders, however, 
 that the loss of this able and gallant officer did not cause any 
 confusion or delay, Lieut. Price taking his place and leading 
 them on to victory. In a very short space of time they had 
 driven below most of the people of the Water Witch, a few of 
 whom, mostly officers, were continuing the fight in little de- 
 tached squads about the deck. The crack of pistol-shots and 
 the clash of sabres alone broke the silence of the night, for it 
 is the testimony in all the descriptions of the engagement that 
 after the first hail and answer there was an almost entire ab- 
 sence of the shouts and cheering usually characteristic of close 
 combat on shipboard. Lieut. Price was badly hurt by a sabre 
 blow on the head, but continued fighting on the quarter-deck 
 until he had cleared it, after which it was the task of an in- 
 stant to send his men below and secure his prisoners. The 
 condition of things he discovered there was discreditable te 
 the U. S. navy; he found scores of cowering men who courted 
 nothing so much as a chance to surrender, 
 
 "The men [wrote Lieut. Pendergrast in his report], seemed para- 
 lyzed with fear, and remained under the hurricane deck without giving: 
 the ofHoers the least support, though they were ordered out by Paymas- 
 ter Billings and Ensign HiU. I found it impossible to discover the where- 
 abouts of all the men, owing to the darkness, and there was but littlfr 
 opportunity for the officers to give many orders, as all were engaged in 
 combat the moment they reached the deck, and continued to fight until 
 struck down. I regret to say the watch below evinced no desire to come 
 on deck and defend the ship. Had the crew bat emulated the noble ex- 
 ample shown them by their officers, the result would have been different. 
 * * * I regret to say the engineers acted in the most cowardly manner. 
 They were the only officers who surrendered, and that to one man. Had 
 they obeyed my Orders to work the engine, the enemy would have been 
 unable to board us; but, so far from fighting the rebels, they surrendered 
 at the first summons, and thereby lost the ship." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 649' 
 
 This condemnation of the engineers is corroborated by- 
 Surgeon W. H. Pierson, who reported that when a Confede- 
 rate officer came into the ward-room, Engineer Genther called 
 out : " I surrender, we surrender, the ship surrenders." The 
 poltroonery of some of the officers and crew is stated to have 
 been in revenge for not having been sent home when they ex- 
 pected. For nearly all the men, their terms of enlistment had 
 expired, and they were dissatisfied because still detained on 
 the ship. But while Lieut. Pendergrast had so many excuses 
 to offer for his defeat, they neither lessened the merit of the 
 Confederate achievement nor satisfied his government. He 
 was tried by court martial for culpable inefficiency in the dis- 
 charge of duty in not taking proper precautions to secure his 
 ship against surprise and attack, was found guilty and was 
 sentenced to be suspended from duty for two years, on half- 
 pay, and with loss of rank from the date of suspension. 
 
 The fighting on the deck of the Water Witch was close 
 and deadly while it lasted. Besides Lieut. Pelot, the Confed- 
 erates lost in killed Pilot Moses Dallas (colored). Quarter-gun- 
 ner Patrick Lotin, and seamen W. R. Jones, James Stapleton, 
 and Crosby; while their wounded were Lieut. Price, Mid- 
 shipman Minor, Boatswain Seymour, Surgeon's Steward Har- 
 ley, and seamen J. R. Rice, J. Barnett, A. McDonald, E. J. 
 
 Murphy, E. Lee, A. "Williams, T. King, and Champion. 
 
 Of the Federals, two were killed and twelve wounded. Only 
 one man escaped from the ship. He was a negro named 
 Mcintosh, who jumped overboard in the darkness and swam 
 a mile to the south end of Ossabaw Island, where he was next 
 day picked up by the U. S. ship Fernandina. The alarm was 
 communicated to other blockaders, and Lieut. Price was thus 
 disappointed in his expectations that by remaining in the 
 sound with the Water Witch he might effect the capture of 
 other vessels that should come into those waters in ignorance 
 of her fate. Half a dozen Federal gunboats were sent in pur- 
 suit of her, but by placing a pistol at the head of the Federal 
 quartermaster whom he called upon to pilot her. Price brought 
 ner safely under the guns of Beaulain. The prisoners cap- 
 tured numbered 77. The wounded were attended by Dr. Pier- 
 son, the Federal surgeon, and Dr. C. Wesley Thomas, surgeon, 
 C. S. N. , of whom Pierson says in his report, that " should he 
 ever fall into our hands, I bespeak for him the courtesy due 
 to an honorable and gentlemanly adversary."^ The Water 
 
 1 Admiral Porter's "Naval History of the Although suck a practice as this existed to some 
 Civil War " accuses the Ooufederates of •' having extent during the war, there was no binding- 
 departed from the usages of war and practiced agreement between the belligerents concerning 
 unnecessary cruelty on their prisoners"— the it, and when Dr. Pierson's case was referred to 
 oficers and men of the Water Witch. This reck- Secretary Mallory he replied that the surgeon 
 less indictment has no other foundation than should be treated as any other prisoner of war 
 the fact that Surgeon Pierson • ' understood " when his attention on the Federal sick and 
 that there was an arrangement between the Fed- wounded in the Savannah hospital ceased. As 
 erals and the Confederates that medical officers to the treatment he and his patients met with 
 taken prisoners should, after attending to their there, he speaks for himself thus in his report 
 own wounded, and their being no necessity for to Admiral Dahlgren: " Mypatienta were placed 
 their further services, be allowed to depart. under my care at a hospital called the Savannah 
 
650 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Witch was enrolled in the Confederate naval force and was 
 destroyed when Savannah fell into the hands of the enemy. 
 
 With this incident, so thoroughly demonstrative of the 
 fearlessness and energy of the men of the C. S. navy, ended 
 the hostile activities in which they were permitted to engage in 
 the waters of Georgia. No more surprises of the blockaders 
 were possible ; their vigilance forbade another Water Witch 
 affair, and while the naval establishment was maintained at 
 Savannah, and the construction of iron-clads continued, no 
 opportunity again presented itself for attack or defence. The 
 remainder of the war history of the Georgia metropolis is 
 much like that of Charleston and Mobile — it could hold out in- 
 definitely against a foe approaching from the sea, but in its 
 landward rear it was open to the enemy. Unlike Charleston, 
 however, it suffered no Federal bombardment, and the naval 
 ofl&cers and men on the station did not enjoy the privilege of 
 their mates of Charleston of serving in the land batteries or 
 in combats around the city. The tedious routine of harbor 
 guard was their lot until December, when the march of Sher- 
 man's army threw against the city an irresistible power. Its 
 military defences on the land side consisted merely of some 
 slight earthworks, behind which were a few thousand of Gen. 
 Hardee's troops, and as there were no men to spare to reinforce 
 him, the evacuation of the city was an event not to be long 
 staved off. On December 10th, Secretary Mallory telegraphed 
 to Commodore Tatnall: " should Savannah fall do not permit 
 our vessels under construction or any of the public property 
 in your charge to fall into the hands of the enemy. Destroy 
 everything when necessary to prevent this." 
 
 On the 13th, Gen. Sherman captured Fort McAllister by 
 sending against it a division of his army, and on the 18th he 
 demanded from Hardee the surrender of the city, to which the 
 latter replied that be held his two lines of defence, was in com- 
 munication with his superior authority, and could hold out for 
 an indefinite period. The Confederate general was in_ fact 
 playing for time in which to save the public property or de- 
 stroy that which he could not carry away. Sherman resolved 
 
 Naval Hospital, under the charge of Surgeon Jef- nah, I tabled with the rebel surgeons in the 
 fery, C.S.N. This hospital was devoid of some hospital, and that during all my stay there, 
 of the luxuries which may be found in North- nearly six weeks, we had coflTee never, tea only 
 ern hospitals, but was airy and comfortable, about five or six times, butter about as often; 
 and the patients there received every care and and to the credit of the surgeons be it said that 
 comfort which the somewhat limited resources while they denied themselves the luxuries of 
 of the country permitted. I myself was treated tea at $30 to $40 per pound, they had it fur- 
 with gentlemanly consideration by Dr. Jeffery nished to our wounded, and generally fed them 
 and the assistant surgeons, as well as by the better than they fed themselves. Afterwards, 
 numerous rebel officers who frequently called at Charleston, our rations were somewhat bet- 
 there." As for the alleged semi-starvation of ter, the meal being bolted, and wheat flour and 
 prisoners at Macon, whither they were removed fresh beef being issued occasionally. At Macon, 
 from Savannah, Dr. Pierson speaks of the food as well as at Charleston, we had the opportunity 
 as being meagre in quantity and wretched tobuy of sutlerswithinourquarters." Thislan- 
 in quality, but immediately adds; "We were guage of Dr. Pierson is a complete exculpation 
 told by the guard, to console us, that this of the Confederate authorities from the accusa- 
 ration was the same as they got themselves, tion brought by Admiral Porter, who made no 
 and I think it likely enough that thoy quotations from the surgeon's report, although 
 told the truth. I kuow that while at Savan- he seems to have had it before him aa he wrote. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 651 
 
 on a siege or assault, as should be necessary, and as Dahlgren 
 had been informed that Commodore Tatnall meditated a dash 
 seaward with his squadron, he placed seven monitors in the 
 Savannah River and thereabouts to intercept him, while his 
 remaining ships cannonaded Battery Beaulain and other works 
 on the Ogeechee, Ossabaw and Vernon waters; which were 
 evacuated by the Confederates on the 21st. Sherman's army 
 had appeared before the earthworks on the land side of Savan- 
 nah on the 8th of December, and on the 10th some sharp fight- 
 ing occurred. Several strong assaults were made, in which 
 the Federals were signally repulsed. Attacks were intermit- 
 tently made and repelled until Hardee had perfected his plans 
 for the abandoment of the city. On the 30th the Confederate 
 iron-clad Savannah, Commander W. T. Brent, moved up the 
 river near Hutchinson's Island and vigorously shelled the en- 
 emy's left, while the batteries within range joined in with her 
 fire. This was done to cover Hardee's retreat and effected its 
 purpose. Under cover of this fire he crossed his troops to 
 Hutchinson's Island and thence by the Union causeway into 
 South Carolina territory. On the next day Sherman entered 
 Savannah and received the surrender of the city from Mayor 
 Arnold. 
 
 Commodore Tatnall had proceeded on the night of the 30th 
 to execute his orders regarding the ships and naval property 
 at the port. The Georgia was set on fire and blown up at the 
 moorings where for two years she had laid practically useless 
 for any purpose of warfare. The iron-clad Milledgeville, which 
 had recently been launched, was burned to the water's edge 
 and sunk in the middle of the river. A ship partially con- 
 structed was burned on the stocks at the yard of Kenston 
 Hawkes. The navy-yard and a large quantity of valuable 
 ship-timber were destroyed by fire, and the captured gunboat 
 Water Witch, Acting Master Vaughn, which had been lying 
 at Thunderbolt, was also burned. 
 
 While Sherman's army was surrounding Savannah, Com- 
 modore William Wallace Hunter, C. S. N., received instruc- 
 tions from Gen. Hardee to proceed up the Savannah River 
 with a sufficient force and destroy the Charleston and Savan- 
 nah Railroad bridge, to prevent Gen. Sherman from sending 
 a portion of his army across the river into South Carolina to 
 prevent the escape of the retreating Confederates from Savan- 
 nah. With his fiag-ship, the Sampson, and the gunboat Macon, 
 and a small transport steamer laden with supplies, Commodore 
 Hunter proceeded up the river to the bridge. On the 
 Georgia side of the river the smoking ruins along Sher- 
 man's line of march could be seen in every direction: Not a 
 single house was spared, not even a church. Vandalism 
 marked the progress of the Federal army, and along the river 
 banks were only encountered helpless women and children 
 fleeing from the enemy. The arson of the dwelling houses of 
 
652 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 non-combatants and the robbery of their property, extending- 
 even to the trinkets worn by women, made the devastation of 
 Sherman's army as relentless as savage instincts could suggest. 
 
 Arriving at his destination during the night, Commodore 
 Hunter sent armed boats with combustible materials on the 
 bridge and soon it was a mass of flames from one end to the 
 other. Remaining alongside to see it completely destroyed, 
 in the morning the gunboats proceeded down the river to take 
 position on the right of Hardee's lines at Savannah. The en- 
 emy having received intelligence of the return of the gun- 
 boats, lined the river bank with the heaviest of their artillery, 
 and as the vessels approached made every preparation for the 
 attack. They had secured the range at various bends in the 
 narrow stream, and only waited for Commodore Hunter to get 
 in the line of their fire before opening the engagement. Com- 
 modore Hunter had received notice from a refugee of the pre- 
 parations to attempt the capture of his vessels on their passage 
 down the river, and saw the enemy securing the range of the 
 river at various points. The crews were called to quarters and 
 final instructions given when the enemy opened fire at long 
 range with rifle shot. The gunboats withheld their fire until 
 they got nearly opposite, when a terrific fire was opened on 
 both sides. The Federal artillery being stationed on the high 
 bluffs had the advantage of position, and being light-rified 
 siege guns and field artulery could fire with great rapidity and 
 precision. Commodore Hunter's two small wooden gunboats 
 had their machinery and magazines exposed, and being within 
 a few hundred yards of the enemy, nearly every shot from 
 the latter took effect. As the gunboats approached nearer to 
 the batteries, the fire of the guns of the enemy, which lined 
 the river bank for some distance, was increased. In the hot- 
 test of the fight the little transport steamer became disabled 
 in her machinery, and she floated ashore and surrendered. The 
 Sampson and the Macon, although struck several times, con- 
 tinued the running fight for some time. The enemy, believing 
 the gunboats could not pass their batteries, sent several bat- 
 teries at full speed up the river to prevent their escape in that 
 direction. Commodore Hunter was directing the movements 
 of his vessels from the hurricane deck of the Sampson. Mid- 
 shipman Scharf, who had charge of the bow gun of the Samp- 
 son, observing the attempt of the enemy to prevent the escape 
 of the gunboats up the river, called the attention of the Com- 
 modore to the movements of the enemy, and he gave the orders 
 to retreat at full speed before the Federal batteries in his rear 
 could get into position. The Sampson and Macon were turned 
 up stream under a heavy fire, and with the aid of a barrel of 
 bacon in the furnaces, the boats soon steamed from under fire. 
 
 At this time there was a flood in the Savannah River, and 
 Com. Hunter concluded to make an attempt to pass the ob- 
 structions before Augusta, and reach that city. With his 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 653 
 
 -two gunboats he reached Augusta; his vessels being the 
 only ones saved of the Confederate navy at Savannah. At 
 Augusta several of the naval officers received orders to pro- 
 ceed to other points, but the majority of them, including 
 •Com. Hunter, were surrendered under Gen. Johnson's capitu- 
 lation. 
 
 When the Federal colors were raised upon the parapet of 
 Fort Jackson, below Savannah, on the afternoon of December 
 21st, the iron-clad Savannah was still in the river, and at once 
 hoisted her flag and opened fire upon the enemy. She contin- 
 ued this for several hours, shelling the troops in Fort Jackson 
 with sufficient vigor to drive them from their guns. Their 
 return fire inflicted no damage upon her, and during the re- 
 mainder of the day she displayed the Confederate colors in 
 "the face of the victorious Federals — the last emblem of the 
 Southern Confederacy to float in hostility over the waters of 
 Oeorgia. After dark Capt. Brent ran her over to the South 
 Carolina shore, when he was joined by Com. Tatnall. They 
 and the crew started on the march to Hardeeville, where the 
 retrea,ting Confederates were ordered to concentrate, first 
 ■applying a slow match to the magazine of the Savannah. A 
 little after ten o'clock she blew up with a tremendous explo- 
 sion. A flash of light occurred and then an immense column of 
 flames shot up in the air. The concussion shook the vessels 
 lying in Tybee Eoads, and made houses tremble for miles 
 around. 
 
 The Federals captured at Savannah 32,000 bales of cotton, 
 a large quantity of rice and some naval stores. They also 
 g;ot an uncompleted torpedo-boat and the small steamers 
 ^eauregard and General Lee, besides 150 pieces of ordnance 
 in the fortifications. It was not until the 23d of January, 
 1865, that they cleared the river of the obstructions that had 
 held back their ships. 
 
 While the naval defence of the port was marked by no 
 such stirring events as were enacted on the South Carolina 
 seaboard, it is a record on the Confederate side of persevering 
 and determined battling against adverse circumstances, some- 
 times brightened by victories against great odds. The work 
 of naval construction was more energetic and on a larger 
 scale at Savannah than in any other Confederate coast city, 
 l)ut it failed to achieve important results because it was not 
 ■concentrated. No other port was possessed of so many strong 
 iron-clads as the Atlanta, Georgia and Savannah; but the 
 flrst and last, which might have done good service for the 
 Confederacy, were not in existence at the same time, and the 
 Georgia was a marine abortion. It was the oft-told tale of no 
 money or material to build more than one good ship at a time, 
 and of the eventual bottling up of the squadron by the massive 
 iron-clads of the enemy. The torpedo service, so efficient at 
 Charleston and elsewhere, amounted to nothing at Savannah. 
 
654 THE CONFEDEEA.TB STATES NAVY. 
 
 A few explosive machines were placed near or in the obstruc- 
 tions of the river, but they were never heard from until the 
 Federals dug them up after the evacuation. Some were placed 
 in the neighborhood of Fort McAllister, but the only one that 
 did any duty exploded under the monitor Weehawken without 
 injuring her. 
 
 Yet there is nothing in the Confederate naval records in 
 Georgia waters derogatory to the professional merit, the gal- 
 lantry, or the fidelity of the officers and men of the service. 
 They deserved well of their country, and they were the peers 
 in every honorable attribute of those who worked and fought 
 where more prominent reputations could be made. 
 
CHAPTER XXI. 
 SOUTH CAROLmA WATERS. 
 
 FROM the sounding of the first note of the Civil War 
 a sentimental as well as practical interest was focused 
 upon the attack and defence of Charleston. It was 
 the metropolis, the embodiment of the intellectual power 
 and impetus of the commonwealth, whose political giants 
 had thirty years previously enunciated the doctrine of States 
 rights that underlaid the Southern movement of 1861 ; the 
 State which held that doctrine was the first to point the way 
 of independence ; it was virtually in arms almost as soon 
 as the election of Mr. Lincoln became a certainty, and in 
 its harbor the shot that became the signal for armies and 
 navies to rise, and battle -flags to tempt the breeze, was 
 fired. What wonder, then, that there prevailed throughout 
 the North a fierce and passionate hunger that it should be 
 conquered at any sacrifice of life and treasure, while Southern 
 men and women chained their hearts to its fate, and during 
 the two years of the siege the ragged Confederate veterans in 
 field and trench and camp asked first for the news from Charles- 
 ton ! In these sober days of peace the faithful history of the 
 battle fury that within twenty-five years past raged around the 
 spot where less than a century previous Sergeant Jasper had 
 fiung out the flag of the new-born American Republic in defi- 
 ance of British shot and shell, brings back the stirring niem- 
 ories of the long beleaguerment of ' ' the cradle of secession " 
 by ships and forts, the close and murderous conflicts on water 
 and on shore, the diapason of the guns that thundered through 
 more than six hundred nights and days, and the crimsoned 
 pictures of the blood that was shed. No intelligent American 
 can to-day pass the ocean gateways of the city without revert- 
 ing, as the keel under him cuts the tossing waves of the bay, to 
 the epoch when war held merciless sway over those beautiful 
 waters and men died for the flag under which they served. 
 
 The naval records of the war in South Carolina precede 
 the birth of the nation which Mr. Gladstone said that Jefferson 
 
 (656) 
 
056 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Davis created. When the Ordinance of Secession was passed 
 on December 20th, 1860, there were not wanting in Charleston 
 men whose thoughts had already been drawn toward the sub- 
 ject of naval offence and defence, and who were turning over 
 in their minds sundry projects of putting ships-of-war afloat. 
 After Major Anderson transferred the garrison of U. S. troops 
 from Fort Moultrie to Fort Sumter on the night of Christmas 
 Eve, and the talk at Washington and in the North was de- 
 voted to sending a naval expedition to his relief, their ideas of 
 meeting ships with ships could not but become more strongly 
 fixed; and before the provisional government of the Confed- 
 eracy was formed at Montgomery the palmetto flag had been 
 hoisted over vessels equipped for war purposes by the people 
 of South Carolina, and Governor F. W. Pickens had issued 
 commissions in the naval service of the State. The destruc- 
 tion of the records, when Sherman's army fired Columbia, 
 swept out of existence the ofiicial documents upon which a 
 full statement of these commissions, to whom issued and the 
 assignments to vessels, could be based, but newspaper files 
 and communications from the surviving officers supply the 
 -deficiency to some extent. 
 
 The U. S. government vessels in South Carolina waters 
 were taken possession of by authority of the State toward the 
 close of December 1860, but they were of such small value as 
 scarcely to be worth seizing. They comprised a venerable 
 revenue-cutter known as the Aiken; the schooner Petrel, a 
 relic of the Florida war ; the light-house tender Governor 
 Aiken, and the coast-survey schooner Crawford. They were 
 all sailing-vessels, and carried less than half a dozen light 
 guns among them all. A river steamer called the General 
 Clinch was bought in January 1861, and when mounted with 
 a couple of brass cannon was put into service as the first ship 
 of the South Carolina navy. 
 
 The report of Major Anderson of December 27th, 1860, 
 states that on that afternoon an armed steamer, two of which 
 had been watching Forts Sumter and Moultrie, between which 
 they had been passing to and fro, or had been anchored for 
 the preceding ten nights, took possession by escalade of Castle 
 Pinckney, Lieut. Meade, the U. S. officer in command, retiring 
 without resistance to Fort Sumter. 
 
 On January 10th, 1861, the New York agents of the New 
 York and Charleston steamship line were notified that their 
 steamship, the Marion, a side- wheel vessel of 800 tons burden, 
 which had that day arrived at Charleston, had been taken for 
 the service of the State by Governor Pickens' orders. The 
 fact was that the Governor had proposed to buy the ship with 
 the consent of the Charleston stockholders of the company, 
 and workmen were put on board to begin fitting her out for a 
 vessel-of-war; but they had done very little before it was de- 
 cided that she was not available for that purpose and she was 
 
THE COXFEDERATE STATES XAVY. 657 
 
 restored to her owners.' The anxiety of the South Carolina 
 authorities to establish a naval force was increased hv the 
 attempt of the Federal government to reinforce Fort Sumter, 
 the steamer Star of the West, with 200 troops on board, having, 
 on January 9th, been only prevented- from reaching the fort 
 by the guns of the batteries on Morris Island. Capt. John 
 McGowan, the commander of the steamer, in his report says, 
 after speaking of being fired upon from the island: 
 
 ' 'At the same time there was a movement of two steamers from near Fort 
 Moultrie, one of them to wins a schooner (I presume an armed schooner) 
 with the intention of cutting us off. Our position now became rather 
 critical, as we had to approach Fort Moultrie within three-quarters of a 
 mile before we could keep away for Fort Sumter. A steamer approaching 
 us with an armed schooner in tow and the battery on the island firing at 
 us all the time, and having no cannon to defend ourselves from the attack 
 of the vessek, we concluded that to avoid certain capture or destruction 
 we would endeavor to get to sea. * * • A steamer from Charleston fol- 
 lowed us for about three hours watching our movements." 
 
 The report of Lieut. Charles R. Woods, Xinth Infantry. 
 U. S. A., commanding the troops on the Star of the West, 
 states that the armed schooner was supposed to be the cutter 
 Aiken. 
 
 So it seems that three months before the war was begun. 
 South Carolina had provided herself with vessels that could 
 take some part in belligerent operations. It is also quite prob- 
 able that the idea of iron -plating for forts and ships was first 
 mooted in Charleston. In January, Col. C. H. Stevens, of the 
 2ith S. C. Regt., then a private citizen of Charleston, began the 
 erection of an iron-armored battery of two guns on Morris 
 Island. It was built of heavy yellow pine timber with great 
 solidity; it face was inclined at an angle of forty degrees and 
 was covered with bars of railroad iron.^ In this battery, which 
 participated in the bombardment of Fort Sumter, and as a 
 first experiment proved successful, we may clearly recognize 
 the germ of such armored ships as the Virginia and her con- 
 geners; but it does not follow that the designers of the Vir- 
 ginia were prompted by the device of Col. Stevens. In Europe 
 and America, speculations upon the possibility of sheathing 
 ships with shot-proof metal were rife in naval circles before 
 the war, and in France and England the topic had been dis- 
 cussed in a desultory way ever since the allied fleets of wooden 
 vessels had demonstrated that they could not endure the fire 
 of the Russian forts at Sevastopol, or so much as venture an 
 attack upon the defences of Cronstadt. Another invention 
 tried at Charleston came much nearer than Col. Stevens' con- 
 struction to the scheme of iron-clad ships. This was the float- 
 ing battery that performed an important part in the Sumter 
 
 ^ This ship waa afterwards bought by the Fed- Charleston line, and all were fitted out as 
 eral government, as were also the Coluwbia, armed cruisers for blockading purposes. 
 Jama Adger, South Carolina and MassachusetU. 
 
 all of which belonged to the New York and 2 " Charleston Year Book for 1883." 
 
 42 
 
658 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 bombardment. It was constructed of palmetto logs and arm- 
 ored with boiler iron, over which railroad iron was fastened. 
 The roof was bomb-proof and it mounted four heavy guns. 
 The plating was said to have been subsequently removed to 
 use on one of the iron-clad ships. The battery was designed 
 and Constructed by Lieut. J. R. Hamilton, of the C. S. navy. 
 
 Shortly after the secession of the State the South Carolina 
 Legislature passed a law, establishing the Coast and Harbor 
 Police, of which Capt. James H. North was placed in com- 
 mand. On January 33d, 1861, Wm. Gr. Dozier was appointed 
 lieutenant in this force, and on March 13th was ordered to re- 
 port for duty to Lieut. Thomas B. Huger on the steamer James 
 Grey. This" vessel was a large steam-tug and was rechristened 
 the Lady Davis. She was armed with a small English rifled 
 cannon, of the Whitworth patent, the gift of C. K. Prioleau, 
 a Charlestonian then residing in Liverpool. 
 
 In April Capt. W.J. Hartstein tookchargeof naval affairs 
 at Charleston with the rank of commander in the C. S. navy, 
 his squadron then consisting of the steamers Gordon, Lady, 
 Davis and General Clinch, the first named being his flag-ship. 
 On April 5th he issued an order to Lieut. Dozier, commanding 
 the Lady Davis, to prepare for sea immediately, taking on 
 board ten days' provisions and as much fuel as possible. What 
 was intended was manifest in the following instruction sent 
 to Dozier the succeeding day: 
 
 " The object of the present expedition under my command, consisting 
 of the Zady bavis, General Clinch and Gordon, is to guard the approaches 
 to this harbor from the sea and prevent a reinforcement of Fort Sumter. 
 You will therefore most rigidly obey all orders by signal or otherwise, using 
 the utmost vigilance and giving immediate notice of any vessel or boat 
 approaching. You will take station in Moftatt's Channel and keep always 
 within signal distance of this vessel (the Gordon) in main ship channel. 
 Economize your fuel, and if necessary to replenish it and if you are not able 
 to communicate with me, proceed to Stono and return as soon as possible. 
 If necessary to avoid the enemy, seek shelter under the guns of the near- 
 est battery or run for Stono Inlet or Bull's Bay or Charleston if possible. 
 If compelled to abandon your vessel, set her on fire to prevent her falling 
 into the hands of the enemy. Be particularly cautious at night to guard 
 against the approach or attack from boats, against which you will find it 
 convenient and useful to use your stem by running them down, having 
 small arms ready to i-epel boarders. Every morning at daylight get under 
 way with me and run as far as Bull's Bay under short steam and cruise to 
 and fro to observe any vessels in the bay or off shore for ten or. fifteen 
 miles, being certain to return to your station off the Moultrie house on 
 Sullivan's Island. From dark to daylight you will keep a boat, if the 
 weather is not bad, with two trusty men moving slowly between the Clinoh 
 in the Swash Channel and your vessel. Allow no lights, except signals, to 
 beshown; bealwaysready to get under way. Examine all vessels or boats 
 passing in and let none pass with an unusual number or anything suspic- 
 ious. Allow nothing to pass in except in dayUght ; if not certain of a 
 vessel's character follow her in past Sumter, keeping her closely observed." 
 
 Much interest attaches to the above order, because it is in 
 itself a lucid showing of the part which the naval forces were 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 659 
 
 preparing to take in the opening of the war by the bombard- 
 ment of Fort Sumter. The Confederate authorities were well 
 apprized of the expedition being fitted out at New York under 
 the command of Capt. G. V. Fox for the relief of Major An- 
 derson, and Capt. Hartstein was charged with the duty of 
 keeping watch for its advent. On April 10th, he wrote to 
 Beauregard that he had had under his charge during the pre- 
 ceding night, in addition to his three steamers, the Charleston, 
 while the Seabrook and Catawba were also out on guard service. 
 A noteworthy feature of this communication is its evidence 
 of his anxiety to begin the bombardment. " It is my opinion," 
 he stated, " that Sumter can be relieved by boats from vessels 
 •outside on any night as dark as the last, so if we have to take 
 it you had better be making a beginning. If a vessel-of-war 
 is placed off each bar when Sumter opens, I will lose all my 
 steamers, as there will be no escape for me. Therefore, before 
 :firing, these steamers should be called in. If the steamers are 
 to guard the entrances, please send them down before dark 
 that they may be positioned." 
 
 On April 11th Gen. Beauregard made his demand upon 
 Major Anderson for the surrender of Sumter, and in anticipa- 
 tion of the attack that would by daylight of the 12th follow a 
 negative reply, certain work was cut out on that day for the 
 naval service to perform. Lieut. Dozier was instructed to take 
 the Lady Davis into the harbor, place her in charge of his first 
 ofHcer and obtain from the Quartermaster's Department two 
 rafts, which he was to have towed as near as possible to the 
 southwest side of Fort Sumter and anchored. After dark he 
 was to set them on fire and withdraw, as soon as the Confeder- 
 ate batteries opened on approaching boats or vessels. " The 
 -object," Hartstein wrote, " is to place the rafts in such posi- 
 tions as to give the best light on the southwest side of Sumter, 
 that the gunners may see to fire upon a party disembarking 
 from vessels or boats. This service is very important, and 
 much is left to your good discretion. If the rafts burn out be- 
 fore daylight you must replenish and fire up, retreating as be- 
 fore." 
 
 Capt. Fox found that the bambardment had begun when 
 he arrived off the bar on the 12th inst. with the gunboats Po- 
 cahontas, Pawnee and Harriet Lane, and the troop-ship Baltic, 
 and he refrained from any effort to succor Major Anderson. ' 
 The presence of his vessels within view of the batteries was, 
 liowever,' disquieting to the Confederates, who expected them 
 . to make an attempt to enter. On April 13th Hartstein, writing 
 from Fort Moultrie, informed Gen. Beauregard that he would 
 
 1 Secretary Welles had ordered the steara frig- the Powhatan to attempt to land troops and sup- 
 
 -ate Powhatan to form part of the expedition, plies at Fort Sumter, and that without them he 
 
 but without his knowledge President Lincoln was powerless to execute the plans of relief, 
 
 dispatched her out of New Yorlc to relieve Fort Welles and Fox charged that the diversion of the 
 
 J^ckens under command of Lieut. D. D. Porter. Powfta^an to another purpose was brought abnut 
 
 J'ox claimed that he had relied upon the boats of by the secret machinations of Secretary Seward. 
 
660 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 reconnoitre them that night from a small boat, but he thought 
 that with good lookouts on duty and the channel lit up by th& 
 fire-hulks there was not any danger of their getting in. The- 
 Confederate gunboats did not enter the engagement, and such 
 of the naval officers as could be spared from them did duty on. 
 shore. Gen. Beauregard, in his report to Gen. Samuel Cooper, 
 Adj. Gen. C. S. A., spoke warmly of the meritorious services- 
 of ''the naval department, especially Capt. Hartstein, one of 
 my volunteer aides, who was perfectly indefatigable in guard- 
 ing the entrance into the harbor; Lieut. T. B. Huger, who was 
 also of much service, first as Inspecting Ordnance Officer of 
 batteries, and then in charge of the batteries on the south 
 end of Morris Island ; Lieut. Warley, who commanded the 
 Dahlgren Channel Battery; also the school-ship, which was- 
 kindly offered by the Board of Directors, and was of much 
 service; Lieut. Rutledge, who was Acting Inspector General 
 of Ordnance of all the batteries, in which capacity he was of 
 much service in organizing and distributing the ammunition - 
 Capts. Childs and Jones, Assistant Commanders of batteries." 
 Lieut. J. R. Hamilton. C. S. N., commanding the Point Battery 
 on Sullivan's Island and also the floating iron-plated battery, 
 was commended in Gen. R. S. Ripley's report for •' firing 
 with great precision and skill " to prevent the working of the 
 barbette guns of Sumter and dismount them. ' As soon as 
 the white flag was displayed from the fort on the 1.3th, Gen. 
 R. G. M. Dunovant, commanding on Sullivan's Island, sent 
 Capt. Hartstein and Surgeon Arthur Lynch, C. S. N., to ascer- 
 tain whether Major Anderson had surrendered, but they had 
 been preceded by members of Gen. Beauregard's staff, with 
 whom the terms were negotiated. On the same afternoon 
 Capt. Hartstein returned to the fort, in company with Major 
 D. R. Jones, Capt. Wm. Porcher Miles, and Capt. Roger A. 
 Pryor, to arrange with the Federal commander the means 
 most acceptable to him for his evacuation the following day. 
 In accordance with his desire, the Confederate steamers trans- 
 ferred him and his men to the U. S. transport Baltic, one of the 
 ships of Fox's squadron, and they sailed for New York.'' 
 
 Succeeding the surrender of Fort Sumter increased zeal 
 was shown in the formation of a navy. Commissions were 
 issued in May by Governor Pickens, making Thomas P. Pelot 
 
 1 On April 15th, Hon. L. P. Walker telegraphed 2 Before their departure Lieut. T. B. Huger 
 to Gen. Beauregard from Montgomery that if the addressed this communication to Gen. Beanre- 
 floating battery worked well he would order one gard : " These vessels of the enemy, which are 
 for Pensacola, and asked if Lieut. Hamilton causing \is some anxiety, and at any rate treat- 
 could go there to construct It. Gen. Beauregard ing us with great disrespect. J would like to have 
 answered that it worked well for enfilading, and the pleasure of driving off from ourport : and 
 that he wanted Hamilton for a few days. He if we cannot succeed in that at least luake them 
 decided to place it at Wappoo Cut for defence keep at a respectable distance. I volunteer for 
 against boats, and Hamilton suggested that its the service. If you will allow me to put the 
 armament should be changed to 8-inch siege rifled cannon on the Lady Davis, under my corn- 
 howitzers, and that he could make it further mand, I can go out and at long range ivy tlie 
 useful if he was authorized to enlist twenty-four effect of the shot on them. I think in this way 
 seamen, and Lieuts. Giimball and John H. In- I may be able to annoy them, if not drive 
 graham could be assigned to him. them off." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 661 
 
 lieutenant, Dr. J. N. Pelot surgeon, and J. J. Darcy second 
 .assistant engineer in the navy of South Carolina. Lieut. 
 Stockton was placed in command of the Lady Davis, and 
 from the Messrs. Eason's foundry at Charleston a large num- 
 ber of bolts was turned out to fit the Prioleau cannon. An- 
 other vessel then added to the navy was the schooner Helen, 
 ■Capt. Coste, which, with the schooner Petrel, Capt. Murden, 
 was ordered to stations along the coast. The declaration of 
 the blockade in May, and the speedy appearance before the 
 ■Southern ports of the fleets which the Federal government 
 was building or buying with an extravagant expenditure of 
 its illimitable treasury resources, spurred the Confederacy to 
 every exertion within its narrow means to repel invasion by 
 water. The authorities were urged to put in requisition 
 ■every harbor steamer, every sloop, schooner and pilot-boat 
 that could carry a gun, and nowhere was the demand for a 
 naval establishment more urgently made than in South Caro- 
 lina. Experience with the ironed floating battery in the at- 
 tack on Fort Sumter had been flattering to its efficacy, and 
 steps were taken to construct others on the same plan at vari- 
 ■ous points liable to attack, while the few steamers in Southern 
 ports were utilized for the hastily-improvised navy. 
 
 Blockade-running began quickly upon the establishment 
 -of the blockade, and the first prize captured by the Federals on 
 the So. Carolina coast was the ship General Parkhill, owned in 
 •Charleston, which was taken by the frigate Niagara, on May 
 15th, while endeavoring to make port homeward bound from 
 Liverpool. Upon observing her signals, two small Confeder- 
 ate steamers ran out of the harbor to assist her, but they 
 were too weak to cope with the Niagara and were constrained 
 to put back. In the early days of blockade-running some of 
 the craft engaged in the business were armed and commis- 
 isioned as privateers, or bore letters-of-marque from President 
 Davis, in order that while on their voyages they might strike 
 a blow at the enemy's commerce as occasion offered. Of this 
 class were the schooner Dixie and Capt. Hartstein's former 
 flag-ship, the Gordon, which when renamed the Theodora took 
 out from Charleston Messrs. Mason and Slidell, the Confeder- 
 ate envoys to Great Britain and France. 
 
 On October 11th, Messrs. Mason and Slidell left Charleston 
 in the Theodora to take the English mail steamer at some 
 point in the West Indies for their posts at London and Paris, 
 but the secret of their naovements was so carefully kept that 
 it was not until November 3d that the fact of their departure 
 was published in the city newspapers. Besides the two Con- 
 federate envoys the party comprised Mr. Macfarland, secre- 
 tary to Mr. Mason; Mr. Eustis, secretary to Mr. Slidell; Mrs. 
 Slidell, Miss Mathilde Slidell, Miss Rosine Slidell and Mrs. 
 Eustis. The steamer evaded the blockaders by sailing on a 
 ■dark and stormy midnight, and reached Nassau on the 13th, 
 
663 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 where the envoys had anticipated taking passage on the Eng- 
 lish steamer, but were deterred because they found that she 
 would stop at New York on the way to Liverpool. They con- 
 tinued on the Theodora to Cardenas and Havana, reaching the 
 latter port on the 17th with the Confederate colors flying. 
 Their reception there was most cordial, and the ladies of the 
 Cuban city presented Capt. Lockwood of the Theodora with a 
 handsome Confederate flag. The ship returned to Charleston 
 and the envoys started for Europe on the steamer Trent, which 
 was overhauled by the U. S. frigate San Jacinto, Capt. Charles 
 Wilkes, at sea, on November 8th, 1861, and the commissioners 
 taken out of the Trent. This outrage created the greatest 
 excitement in England, and to prevent a collision between the 
 two governments the United States gave up the commissioners 
 to the representatives of the British government authorized to- 
 receive them. They subsequently arrived safely in England. 
 A matter which created at the time an uproar that turned 
 out to be ludicrously disproportionate to its importance was 
 the effort of the Federals to close the port of Charleston, as well 
 as other sea-coast cities, with the celebrated "Stone Fleet." 
 Disgusted with the failure of the ships-of-war to stop blockade- 
 running, some of President Lincoln's advisers conceived the 
 brilliant scheme of sealing up the Southern ports by sinking 
 in their "channels hulks loaded with stone. The New England 
 whaling men had plenty of worn-out ships for which the gov- 
 ernment thus provided them a market, and some fifty or sixty 
 of such craft were purchased. Twenty vessels, carrying over 
 six thousand tons of stone, were brought to Charleston on De- 
 cember 20th. 1861, and scuttled in the channels, and the Fed- 
 erals exulted in the supposition that the blockade was effectual 
 at last. But such a barbarous mode of warfare as the attempt- 
 to close forever the avenues through which commerce must- 
 seek ingress to and egress from a seaport, brought from Eng- 
 land and France most emphatic expressions of condemnation. 
 The Ministers of those countries at Washington were instructed 
 by their governments to enter formal protests. Lord Lyons, 
 the British representative, was directed by Lord John Russell 
 to state to Secretary Seward that, in the opinion of her 
 Majesty's government, 
 
 " Such a cruel plan ■would seem to imply despair of the restoration of 
 the Union, the professed object of the war; for It never could be the wish of 
 the U. S. government to destroy cities from which their own country was 
 to derive a portion of its riches and prosperity. Such a plan could only 
 be adopted as a measure of revenge and of irremediable injury against an 
 enemy. Lord Lyons was further told that even as a scheme of embit- 
 tered and sanguinary war such a measure would not be justifiable. It 
 would be a plot against the commerce of all maritime nations, and against- 
 the free intercourse of the Southern States of America with the civilized 
 world." 
 
 The protest of France was of the same tenor, and when the- 
 French Chambers and the British Parliament met in Januarv 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 6§3 
 
 and February 1863, the subject was vehemently discussed. 
 While the Washington government might have remained in- 
 sensible to simple remonstrances from the European powers, it 
 was confronted with their strong disposition to declare illegal 
 a blockade that could not be maintained by ships afloat, and to 
 establish which it was needful to resort to practices not recog- 
 nized by the Treaty of Paris as legitimate between belliger- 
 ents. Mr. Seward's tortuous diplomacy was strained to post- 
 pone and prevent this dreaded declaration, and the official 
 correspondence was still in progress when the disputation 
 was suddenly terminated by the discovery that the stone fleet 
 scheme at Charleston was one of the blunders of the Federal 
 authorities. The sapient landsmen who invented it had never 
 counted upon the power of the tidal currents of the harbor, by 
 which some of the hulks were broken up and their fragments 
 washed away; others settled below the ever-shifting sands, 
 and such as remained in place helped, by concentrating the 
 currents jetty -fashion, to scour the channels deeper. Mr. Lin- 
 coln and his counsellors breathed easier after the forces of 
 nature extricated them from one of the most difficult dilemmas 
 in which they mired themselves by their inordinate craving 
 to disregard the laws of civilized warfare in hostilities against 
 the Confederacy. 
 
 The blockade had not been long declared by the govern- 
 ment at Washington before it was perceived that it could not 
 be maintained without a coaling, refitting and supply station 
 at some convenient point on the Southern coast, and a joint 
 military and naval expedition was formed under the com- 
 mand of Gen. Thomas W. Sherman and Commodore S. F. Du- 
 pont for the purpose of seizing such a location as might be 
 determined upon. After discussion upon the comparative adr 
 vantages of Fernandina, Bull's Bay and Port Royal, the mag- 
 nificent land-locked harbor of the latter caused it to be selected, 
 and in the last week of October the fleet of men-of-war and 
 transports rendezvoused at Fortress Monroe, from whence it 
 set sail on the 29th with sealed orders, which were not to be 
 communicated to the commanders of ships until they were at 
 sea. ' Commodore Dupont hoisted his flag on the frigate 
 Wabash, and his other fighting ships were the frigate Susque- 
 hannah, the sloops-of-war Mohican, Seminole, Paivnee and Van- 
 dalia, and the gunboats Unadilla, Ottawa, Paulina, Bien- 
 ville, Seneca, Curlew, Penguin, Augusta, B. B. Forbes and 
 Isaac Smith. This was a much more formidable force than 
 had attacked Hatteras Inlet in the preceding Aug.. the vessels 
 mounting in all about 175 guns, many of which were 11-inch 
 pieces. The troops numbered over 12,000, and were convoyed 
 
 1 Secret information of the destination of the eral Ripley at Charleston, and General Drayton 
 
 enemy had been obtained by the Confederate at Port Boyal: "I have just received iuform- 
 
 Bovemment On November 1st Acting Secre- atiou which I consider entirely reliable that 
 
 tary of War Benjamin telegraphed from Rich- the enemy's expedition is intended for Port 
 
 mond to (rovernor Pickens at Columbia, Gen- RoyaL" 
 
664 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 in fifty transports. It was the largest fleet that had ever been 
 under the command of an American officer. A severe gale 
 scattered the ships off Hatteras on Nov. 1st, but only one 
 transport was lost, and the fleet assembled off Port Royal on 
 the 5th, 6th and 7th. 
 
 The Confederate defences consisted of Fort Walker on 
 Hilton Head and Fort Beauregard at Bay Point, which form 
 respectively the western and eastern entrances to the harbor, 
 and are distant from each other nearly three miles. They 
 were exceedingly well-built earthworks and were rather heav- 
 ily armed, Fort Walker mounting 23 guns and Fort Beaure- 
 gard 18, a total of 41 ; but 22 of these were only 32-pounders 
 or lighter pieces, so that there were in fact but 19 guns nt to 
 cope with the at least 100 heavy rifles and shell-guns of the 
 Federal ships. Gen. Thomas F. Drayton was in command of 
 both posts, with his head-quarters at Hilton Head, and Col. R. 
 M. Dunovant had immediate command of Fort Beauregard. 
 The defences were garrisoned by about 2,000 men, but this 
 force was very deficient in trained artillerists, and a small 
 supply of shot and shell forbade much practice with the 
 larger guns. 
 
 From the time that Port Royal was menaced. Commodore 
 Josiah Tatnall had moved to its vicinity tlirough the sounds 
 the little squadron under his command in the Savannah River. 
 It comprised the river steamer Savannah (flag-ship), impro- 
 vised into a man-of-war, Lieut. J. N. Maffitt commanding, and 
 the armed tugs Resolute, Lieut. J. Pembroke Jones; Sampson, 
 Lieut. J. Kennard, and Lady Davis, Lieut. J. Rutledge. On 
 the morning of Nov. oth they were lying in the mouth of 
 Skull Creek, a short distance from Fort Walker. The editor 
 of the Savannah Republican, who had accompanied Commo- 
 dore Tatnall as a spectator, describes the subsequent events: 
 
 "The Monday after his arrival, he found the enemy, forty-four sail 
 strong, off the mouth of the harbor. Perceiving several of their vessels to 
 be engaged near the bar in taking soundings, he instantly, with his small 
 force, attacked them at a distance of but a mile and a half ; and, after a 
 cannonading of forty minutes, during which he succeeded in entrapping 
 three of the enemy's screw vessels under the Are of our batteries, finding 
 that he had to encounter Enghsh rifled guns, he retired inside the harbor. 
 
 " Tlie day after (Tuesday), he again engaged the enemy at long shots 
 for upwards of half an hour, apparently with some-effect; the flag-ship 
 Savannah receiving no further injury from the reception of two shots, 
 than a temporary one to her upper works, and the jemaining vessels of 
 the squadron receiving no hurt whatever. 
 
 " Early in the evening of this day we were all much gratified by the 
 arrival of Capt. Page, C. 8. N. , of Virginia, the seeontl in command to Flag- 
 officer Tatnall, of the Georgia and Carolina coast. This accomplished offi- 
 cer, whose reputation in the old service, to which he has long beenabright 
 ornament, is well known, was a most valuable addition to our force, and, 
 as events proved, to the army also, which is somewhat indebted to his 
 personal exertions for the satisfactory retreat made by them, when even 
 their usual bravery, most memorably displayed as it was, failed to quite 
 support them in their hour of need. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 665 
 
 " Every one on board the little fleet expected an attack from the ene- 
 3ny during the night, yet every officer and man of it was cool and collected. 
 Sensible of the fearful odds which, at any moment, they might be called 
 upon to encounter, and fully resolved to meet, as far as lay in their power, 
 any issue forced upon them with the spirit of ' true Southern sailors,' they 
 awaited, with courage in their hearts and resolve stamped upon their every 
 countenance, the approach of a foe to whom, from old association, they 
 took. pecuUar pride in showing themselves ready to stand by their cause 
 like men ' sans peur et sans reproche. ' But the American fleet did not at- 
 tempt an entranse, and morning dawn showed it to be in the position of the 
 day previous. Anolher twenty-four hours passed only to reveal the same 
 mysterious inaction on the part of the enemy. 
 
 "Thursday morning, however, at about half -past nine, their fleet was 
 seen to ' get under way' and stand into the haroor in the following order: 
 The Minnesota, 51, a screw, leading, the flag of Plag-officer Dupont at the 
 mizzen, closely followed by the paddle-wheel steam frigate Susquehanna, 
 15 ; the San Jacinto, 14, screw steam corvette, and a number of screw and 
 paddle pelters, mounting rifled guns, one of which towed in a sailing 
 'Jackass frigate,' not recognized by our officers with certainty, but sup- 
 posed to have been the Cumberland, 34. At nine o'clock, having got with- 
 in range, they opened quite a heavy fire upon the batteries, which was re- 
 turned by them with spirit. 
 
 " Flag-officer Tatnall ordered the anchor of the Savannah hove up 
 when the enemy had advanced to within a mile and a half of him, and 
 steaming up toward Hilton Head battery, took a raking position upon the 
 bow of the largest American frigate, then hotly engaging it, and opened 
 flre with his thirty-two's upon her, to which, however, she did not deign 
 immediately to reply. 
 
 " Our distance was too great (being that of a mile), and our guns were 
 of too Ught a calibre to enable us to do her much, if any, injury. Several 
 excellent shots were made by Midshipman B. Moses, commanding the after 
 .gun, but with what effect was, of course, impossible for us to determine. 
 AH this time the enemy's frigate was gradually nearing us for the double 
 purpose of enfilading iJhe battery and returning the respects of our little 
 vessel; but the Commodore, disliking to run unless under a fire, and that 
 a hot one, only gave the order to retreat when the frigate, rounding to, 
 •discharged her first gun at us, said the Susquehanna coimnenced a pursuit. 
 
 '■ We soon found the frigate to be rapidly gaining upon us, and that if 
 we were not in the meantime blown out of the water. Skull Creek was our 
 only haven of refuge from a prison in the great American metropolis. The 
 Minnesota, evidently disposed to return our attentions of the last two 
 days once and forever, discharged, at a distance of 800 yards, three broad- 
 sides in quick succession against our miserable cockle-shell, but thanks to 
 her poor gunnery and our luck, we were only hit once by an 11-inch shell 
 that entered our port wheel-house, carrying away bulk-heads and stanch- 
 ions, though hurting no one, from the fact that it did not explode, and lit 
 upon the starboard side of the gun-deck, passing within two feet of Capt. 
 Page, who was superintending the working of the forward gun. At this 
 juncture we were so close to the enemy's ships that their crews could, with 
 the naked eye, be distinctly seen ramming home the guns, and Plag-ofBcer 
 Tatnall, regretting his inability to return the high flown compliments of 
 Flag-officer Dupont in a more satisfactory manner, ordered his blue flag 
 dipped three times to him in token of his acknowledgments of the same. 
 
 " We reached Skull Creek in safety at about eleven o'clock and went 
 alongside of Seabrook's Landing, when the flag-officer instantly dispatched 
 our marines, under the command of Capt. G. Holmes, of Savannah, an 
 ■experienced officer, over the other side of the island to render assistance 
 to the fatigued garrison of the battery — Capt. Page, at the request of the 
 flag-officer, superintending the debarkation. 
 
 " They were followed an hour afterwards by Flag-officer Tatnall, Capt. 
 IPage and Midshipman Barron Carter, of Augusta - the flag officer's aide — 
 
666 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 who preceded all the available seamen of the steam gun-vessels Savannaft. 
 and Sampson, with some few marines of the latter vessel under the comr 
 mand of Lieut. Philip Poreher, of South Carolina, ordered to make speed 
 with all our naval ammunition to the battery which, at this time, appeared 
 to be hard pressed. 
 
 ' ' I accompanied the command of Lieut. Poreher to within a half mile 
 of the battery. Before reaching that point, however, the firing between 
 the battery and shipping had ceased, and the lieutenant, from the- 
 number of straggling soldiers en route to the landing ' in search of theii- 
 companie)^.' thought things not exactly as they should be, and so re- 
 marked, but he nevertheless kept on his course until informed officially 
 by an army officer of the garrison being in the enemy's possession, and 
 advised him to ' malie the best of his way back to his vessel.' This advice . 
 he partially followed by countermarching his men, in good order, at 
 common time. 
 
 " I, however, not being an active participant in the affair, but merely 
 a spectator, pushed further on to learn the fate of the flag-officer and 
 Capt. Holmes' command, and met them at a distance of a quarter of a 
 mile from the battery. Ca.pt. Holmes was missing. He, upon his near 
 approach to the fort, had gone in advance of his company to see how 
 matters stood and had not returned, when the Commodore, finding all to 
 be lost, and conceiving the captain to have been captured, ordered Lieut. 
 Raney, of Florida, the second in command, to follow after him with his 
 men to the steamer; to use his own words, ' feeling no fear for the success 
 of the retreat, or his personal safety, with so reliable an officer in his rear.* 
 
 " When we reached Seabrook's Landing the steamer Savannah had 
 left for the city to repair damages sustained in the engagement, but the 
 paddle gun- vessel Sampson, Lieut. Commanding Kennard, received us all 
 on board; and afterwards, at the request of certain army officers, many 
 of the volunteers who, most unfortunately, had not yet been able to find 
 their companies, and were consequently in much disorder. The embarka- 
 tion of these last was superintended by Capt. Page, and detained us until 
 late in the evening. 
 
 ******* 
 
 " Flag-officer Tatnall left the island, with the Resolute anci Sampson,. 
 at about 3 A. M. for Savannah, which he reached a little after daylight, 
 carrying with him as passengers many of the officers and men from the 
 captured garrison." 
 
 The Federal gunboats^with which Tatnall was first en- 
 gaged with his mosquito fleet were the Ottawa, Pembina, 
 Seneca, Curlew, Penguin, Pawnee and Isaac P. Smith. The- 
 skirmisli was continued for an hour at too great a distance for 
 much execution to be done, although the Jsaac P. Smith, the- 
 Ottawa and the Pembina were struck several times and por- 
 tions of their rigging cut away, while the Lady Davis received 
 a solid shot on the quarter. As Dupont's gunboats came under 
 the fire of Fort Beauregard they were shelled so smartly that 
 they retreated, the Confederate flotilla following and firing 
 upon them, the correspondent of the New York Herald wrote, 
 " as proudly and defiantly as if Commodore Tatnall had a- 
 hundred line-of-battle ships under his command." 
 
 At nine o'clock on the morning of the 7th, Dupont had 
 his sixteen ships formed in a main and a flanking column, 
 with the Wabash leading, and the battle opened. According- 
 to his plan, the vessels steamed in an ellipse between the two 
 forts, delivering their flre upon each as their broadsides were 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 667 
 
 brought to bear — a novel evolution, which, however, was- 
 favored by the situation of the contending forces. Tatnall's 
 squadron laid behind an imaginary line connecting the two 
 forts, and the commanders of the four gunboats constituting 
 the Federal flanking division were particularly instructed to 
 attack him if they saw an opportunity, ' He assisted the 
 forts as far as was within his power, slowly retreating, but 
 keeping within range, as the gunboats advanced upon him. 
 His fire was of some value in the first hours of the engage- 
 ment in occupying the attention of Federal guns that would 
 otherwise have been devoted to Walker and Beauregard, and 
 when too hard pressed by the overwhelmingly superior power 
 of the gunboats he withdrew to a safe position at the mouth 
 of Skull Creek. To have attempted close fighting with them, 
 would have been suicidal, and his toy steamers would hav& 
 been blown out of the water or sunk by the 11-inch shells if he= 
 had ventured it. 
 
 There could be but one ending of a contest so unequal as 
 that waged between Dupont and Drayton. During the battle 
 the former was reinforced by the steam frigate Pocahontas, 
 Commander Percival Drayton, brother of the Confederate 
 general, which also took part in the assault. The inexperi- 
 enced artillerists of the forts could rarely plant a shot in the 
 moving steamers, while the latter maintained an unceasing 
 rain of fire upon them. Speaking of Fort Walker, which was- 
 the main object of attack, Gen. Drayton's report says: 
 
 " Besides this moving battery, the fort was enfiladed by the gunboats- 
 anchored to the north off the mouth of Fish Hall Creek, and another on 
 the edge of the shoal to the south. This enfilading fire on so still a sea- 
 annoyed and damaged us excessively, particularly as we had no gun on 
 either flank of the bastion to reply with, for the 32-pounder on the right 
 flank was shattered by a round shot, and on the north flank, for want of 
 a carriage, no gun was mounted. After the fourth fire the 10-inch Colum- 
 biad bounded over the hurter and became useless. The 24-pounder rifle 
 was choked while ramming down a shell and lay idle during nearly the 
 whole engagement. * * * Two o'clock had now arrived, when I noticed 
 our men coming out of the fort, which they had bravely defended for four 
 and a half hours against fearful odds, and then only retiring when all but 
 three of the guns on the water front had become disabled and only 500- 
 pounds of powder remained in the magazine ; commencing the action with 
 230 men inside the fort, afterwards increased to 255 by the accession of 
 Read's Battery. These heroic men retired slowly and sadly from their 
 well-fought guns, which to have defended longer would have exhibited 
 the energy of despair rather than the manly pluck of the soldier." 
 
 At 3:30 P. M. a detachment of sailors hoisted the Federal 
 flag over Fort Walker, and at 3:35 the Confederates evacuatei 
 
 1 "In giving these instructions the flag-olBoer it (Tatnall's squadron) were poorly adapted for 
 
 stated that he knew Tatnall well; he was an offl- successfully opposing those advancing and now- 
 
 cer of coui-age and plan, and that it was not at -within fair range of the earthworks. Tatnall's. 
 
 all unlikely that in the heatof action and smoke were what were known as 'river steamers,' 
 
 of battle he would endeavor to pass out and de- extremely vulnerable, boilers and machinery- 
 
 Btroy the transports, and the vital duty of the fully exposed, and the guns carried, although, 
 
 flanking column was to take care of Tatnall rifled, were of inferior calibre."— "The Atlan- 
 
 and destroy his vessels if he attempted that tio Coast." By Eear Admiral Daniel Ammen_ 
 
 experiment. * * * The vessels compos-ng TJ. S. N. 
 
'668 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the works on Bay Point, Gen. Drayton retiring with all his 
 troops in safety into the interior, while Commodore Tatnall re- 
 turned with his flotilla to Savannah. The Federals had eight 
 men killed and twenty-five wounded on board the ships, and 
 the Confederate loss was as follows: killed in Fort Walker 10, 
 wounded 20; killed in Col. De Saussure's regiment 1, wounded 
 15; wounded in Fort Beauregard 13. Their victory gave the 
 Federals access to the inland waters between Charleston and 
 Savannah and confined Confederate naval operations on this 
 coast to those two ports and their vicinage. 
 
 An affair, the importance of which was vastly overrated 
 in the Federal reports, occurred on May 13th, 1862, when 
 Eobert Smalls, a slave, stole the steamer Planter out of 
 Charleston harbor and delivered her over to the blockading 
 fieet. These reports, and every account of the incident pub- 
 lished to this day by Northern writers, speak of Smalls as the 
 pilot of the Planter, and as having exhibited extreme daring. 
 Yet he was not the pilot of the vessel, and he took no extraor- 
 dinary risk, the ease with which he accomplished his under- 
 taking being due to the negligence of her officers, who were 
 Capt. Eobert Relyea, Pilot Samuel H. Smith and Engineer 
 Zerich Pitcher. On that day, in disobedience of Gen. Ripley's 
 orders that the ofiicers and crews of all light-draft steamers 
 should remain on board day and night, they had left the boat 
 in charge of the negro hands, of whom Smalls was one. Two 
 white men, a white woman, and the negro crew were privy to 
 his plot, and shortly after three o'clock, on the morning of 
 May 1.3th, they got up steam and stood down the harbor. As 
 the Planter was regularly used in the transportation of ord- 
 nance and .army stores, there was nothing in her movements 
 to excite the suspicions of the sentinels upon the fortifications, 
 and she was allowed to pass unchallenged. '■ Once outside the 
 line of fire, Smalls hauled down the Confederate ensign and 
 hoisted a white flag, and gave up the Planter to a Federal vessel 
 that was just about to fire upon her. The net result was that the 
 Federals acquired a small steamer, the two guns with which she 
 \yas armed, the four which had been put on her for transporta- 
 tion to the forts, the refugees, and a man (Smalls), who knew 
 all the intricate channels of the vicinity; while Smalls obtained 
 a notoriety which sent him to the South Carolina Legislature, 
 and then to Congress in the reconstruction era. He was 
 eventually convicted of receiving a $5,000 bribe as a legislator 
 and got a term of imprisonment for his offence, none of his 
 JSTorthern admirers, who had so applauded him in 1863, coming 
 forward to help him out of his trouble and disgrace. 
 
 In Nov. 1862, it was deemed advisable to take measures 
 toward the establishment of a naval construction and repair 
 
 1 The report of Major Alfred Rhett, com- the guard-boat Roing out. It was so reported 
 
 mandant at Fort Sumter, says that "at 4:15 to the officer of the day, and as it is by DO means 
 
 -o'clock this morning the sentinel on the parapet unusual for the gnard-boat to run out at that hour 
 
 -called for the corporal of the guard and reported no further notice was ttiken of the occurrence." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 669' 
 
 depot on the interior waters of South Carohna, where it would 
 not be affected by movements on the seaboard. Lieut. A. Bar- 
 bot, C. S. N., in compliance with instructions from Flag-officer 
 In graham, proceeded to Cheraw, Chesterfield County, on a 
 tour of inspection of feasible sites, and reported that a gun- 
 boat could be built at Society Hill Landing on the Pedee 
 River, from whence an average depth of eight feet by water 
 could be carried to the Georgetown entrance. Lieut. Van 
 Rensselaer Morgan' was sent into the vicinity to carry out 
 the project, and he soon had the " Pedee navy-yard," as it was 
 termed, under way. His force embraced a naval constructor, 
 a surgeon, a commissary, and about one hundred carpenters, 
 shipwrights and other workmen, most of them detailed from 
 the army. They went into the forests, cut the timber, rafted 
 it down the river, and soon laid the keel of a gunboat. Quite 
 a colony was formed at this point, but great difficulty was en- 
 countered in obtaining supplies from the surrounding country, 
 and if the gunboat was ever finished it performed no services- 
 that were noticed in official or other reports. 
 
 The history of the navy in South Carolina waters for the 
 most part of 1863 presents little beyond reconnoissances of 
 Federal positions. After their victory at Port Royal the en- 
 emy's gunboats pushed, up into the intricate maze of sounds 
 and inlets between that point and Charleston, and occasional 
 skirmishes took place between them and the Confederate 
 forces on shore, but the list of killed on both sides was not 
 lengthy. The principal point of advantage gained by the 
 Federals was the possession of Stono Inlet, into which" they 
 entered on May 29th, and thus secured an important base for 
 the future siege operations against Charleston ; but their 
 attempt to then gain a foothold on James Island was frus- 
 trated by their defeat at the battle of Secession ville. 
 
 On August 14th, the Federal gunboats Pocahontas and 
 Treaty made a raid up the Black River to Georgetown 
 with a view of capturing the C. S. steamer Nina. They took 
 alarm, however, at the reports of a large hostile force being 
 not far distant, and hurried out towards sea again with- 
 out effecting the object for which the expedition was de- 
 signed. On their way down the stream they were heavily 
 shelled from batteries on the banks and fired into by rifle- 
 men. The raid was entirely a failure. 
 
 > Van Rensselaer Morgan entered the Con- people of Norfolk and Portamouth.wlio swarmed 
 
 federate naval service in 1861, and in the fall of out in boats. He then established the navy-yard 
 
 that year commanded the floating battery at the on the Pedee River, and while engaged in build- 
 
 Norfollc navy-yard and the old sloop-of-war Ply- ing a gunboat there was detached and ordered 
 
 mmiUi. When the evacuation of the yard was to report to Commodore Ingraham at Charleston, 
 
 ordered from Richmond, he was directed to At the surrender of that city he hurried to the 
 
 have the latter vessel towed up to that city with Pedee navy-yard, and obtHining seven men from 
 
 supphes, but that being impossible on account the'coramandant, impressed into service enough 
 
 of the blockade of James River, instructions horses and wagons to transfer the ammunition 
 
 were given to him to set her on fire in the stream. in the yard to the railroad at Cheraw, from 
 
 He reluctantly complied, but not until he had whence it was sent on to Charlotte. He was sur- 
 
 thrown overboard the great quantity of provis- rendered and paroled with Flag-of&cer Forrest's- 
 
 ions on board, which were gathered up by the command at Greensboro, K. C., May Ist, 1865.. 
 
•670 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 On Jan. 30th, 1S63, the Confederates acquired a notable 
 .addition to the navy in Charleston waters by the capture of 
 the Federal gunboat Isaac P. Smith, which was cleverly trap- 
 ped in the Stono River above Legareville. The light-draft 
 steamers were in the habit of patrolling this stream, and Gen. 
 Beauregard, who had assumed command of the Dept. of South 
 Carolina and Georgia on Sept. 34th, 1862, saw that it might be 
 feasible to cut off some of them by masked batteries on shore. 
 Lieut. Col. Joseph A. Yates, First S. C. artillery, was detailed 
 to command an expedition of seven companies of artillery and 
 one of infantry, which on the day mentioned posted their guns 
 at convenient points along the river. The Smith was suffered 
 to pass above them, but when she endeavored to return the bat- 
 teries shelled her repeatedly, until at Legare's Point Place a 
 .shot disabled her machinery and she was surrendered, having 
 lost eight men killed and seventeen wounded. She was a very 
 swift steamer of 450 tons, mounting one rifled gun and eight 
 8-inch Columbiads. The Confederates renamed their prize the 
 Btono, adopted her into the fleet and kept her on active duty 
 around Charleston until the city was surrendered. Capt. H. J. 
 Hartstene, C. S. N., was placed in command of this prize. 
 
 Every nerve was being strained throughout 1862 to put an 
 iron-clad flotilla afloat, the State and the C. S. governments 
 working along parallel lines with kindred intensity of purposes. 
 Flag-officer Duncan K. Ingraham, who had been appointed to 
 the command of the naval forces in South Carolina, arrived in 
 Charleston early in the year, and one of his duties was to 
 superintend the construction of an armored ram. the keel of 
 which was laid in January. She was named the Palmetto State, 
 .and was ready for service the succeeding summer. Her iron- 
 plating was four inches thick, and her battery consisted of an 
 80-pounder rifle gun forward, a 60-pounder rifle aft, and one 
 8-inch shell gun on each broadside. 
 
 Two months after the keel of the Palmetto State had been 
 laid by the Confederate government, James M. Eason was in- 
 trusted by the State of South Carolina with the building of the 
 second armored ship under the authority of an act of the Gen- 
 eral Assembly appropriating $300,000 for constructing marine 
 batteries. _ This keel was laid in the rear of the Charleston 
 post-office in March 1862, the plans calling for a vessel 150 feet 
 long, 35 feet beam and 12 feet depth of hold. The armor con- 
 sisted of two layers of 2-inch iron plating, which on the case- 
 mate was laid upon a wooden backing of twenty -two inches 
 of oak and pine. The plating was continued on the hull for 
 five feet below the water-line and also covered the ram, which 
 was a very strong elongation of the bow. In August the ship 
 was launched, and before September her machinery and bat- 
 tery were on board and she was placed in commission as the 
 Chicora. Five hundred tons of iron were used in her armor, 
 and she was propelled by an engine thirty inches diameter of 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 671 
 
 cylinder and twenty-six inches stroke, driving a three-bladed 
 screw eight feet in diameter. Her battery consisted of two 9 inch 
 smooth-bore guns and f our of th e banded and rifled 32-pounders, 
 •each of which thus altered fired a 60-pound projectile. 
 
 We find in the Charleston Year Book for 1883 certain cor- 
 respondence, not elsewhere printed, that illustrates at once 
 the difficulties that stood in the way of the Confederate ship- 
 builders and the stubborn energy with which they pushed their 
 ■contracts to completion. Mr. Jno. L. Porter, naval constructor, 
 writing from Charleston, June 20th, 1862, to Mr. Eason, said: 
 
 "It affords me pleasure to state that the iron-clad gunboat and ram 
 ^hieh you are now building for the State Commission ot South Carolina, 
 After drawings and specifications made by myself, is a good job in all re- 
 spects, and of the very best material. She ■<vill compare with the very 
 best of these vessels in all respects, and will afford great protection to the 
 harbor of Charleston when completed. The work has progressed with 
 ^reat rapidity, and is in advance of the two boats of the same class now 
 being built at Wilmington; also the one being built for the C. S. navy at 
 this place. I was much gratified at the appearance of things about the 
 ship and the spirit with which everything seemed to move, and can only 
 hope you wiU soon finish her." 
 
 Yet, despite the speedy work which so gratified Mr. Porter, 
 Mr. Eason was sorely embarrassed by the lack of material, 
 3.nd on June 25th wrote to Secretary Mallory that he could 
 iinish his contract in advance if he could obtain the iron- 
 plating, but that he was then without one bar to work upon, 
 and begged to have supplies forwarded him from the mills. 
 When the vessel was finished in November, the State Marine 
 Battery Commission, whose members were Messrs. J. K. Sass, 
 •George A. Trenholm, C. M. Furman, W. C. Courtney and 
 W. B. Heriot, passed a resolution complimenting Mr. Eason 
 upon the promptitude and skill that he had displayed, and 
 tendering him $3,000 as compensation. He had built the 
 ■Chicora at the comparatively moderate cost of $263,892. 
 
 Mr. Eason, having a complete plant and organization of 
 workmen, and having proved his competency in this new line 
 ■of ship-building, was commissioned to construct a larger iron- 
 clad, and the keel of the Charleston was laid in Dec. 1802. 
 She was 180 feet long, 36 feet beam, and 12^ feet depth of 
 hold, and required 600 tons of iron plate for her four inches 
 •of armor and her ram. Her engine was 36 inches in diameter 
 -and her propeller wheel 8^ feet. Of her six guns, four were 
 Brooke rifles, carrying shot weighing from 90 to 110 pounds, 
 •and two were 9-inch smooth-bores. The boilers and engine, 
 placed in her by Mr. Eason, worked moderately well, and 
 she was in every respect the strongest and swiftest of the 
 •Confederate squadron in South Carolina waters, but it was 
 nine months from the time of the laying of her keel before 
 she was ready to be put in commission. ' 
 
 . 1 A portion of the amount of money required tribution of the ladies of Charleston. Judge 
 :for the building of the Charleston wag the cou- Charles Cowley, Judge Advocate of the Soutli 
 
G72 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The fourth of the iron-clads contracted for at Charlestoit 
 was named the Columbia. P. M. Jones was awarded by the 
 Confederate Navy Department the contract for the hull, and 
 Mr. Eason that for the plating and machinery, but the ship 
 was not completed when Charleston was evacuated. ^ 
 
 Like the Virginia^ the Mississippi, the Arkansas, the 
 Tennessee, and other Confederate iron-clads, all of which were 
 constructed upon the same general plan of an iron-plated 
 wooden hull supporting a more heavily armored battery case- 
 mate, the Palmetto State and the Chicora will always deserve 
 to figure prominently in the history of naval architecture, as 
 reflecting some degree of professional lustre upon the men who 
 designed and built them. Out of the still raging and yet un- 
 decided contention as to the piercingpower of steel projectiles 
 from 100-ton guns, the resistant quality of chilled steel armor 
 and the most available types of armored ships for offence and 
 defence, there has been developed a very unjust comparison 
 between the Federal turreted monitors and the Confederate 
 casemated ships unfavorable to the latter. According to these 
 critics the Confederate naval constructors were blunderers at 
 their business because their vessels were overcome in battle 
 by the turret craft, and the Federal constructors are exalted 
 to the pinnacle of fame because the monitors won victories 
 over the casemate type. It is self-evident that such compari- 
 sons and conclusions are wholly disregardful of the facts that 
 must be the foundation of any just and worthy balancing of 
 the merits of these two opposing classes of marine fighting 
 machines. If the Navy Depai-tment of the Confederacy had 
 had behind it an inexhaustible treasury upon which it was 
 privileged to draw at pleasure; if it had been permitted to 
 
 Atlantic Blockading Squadron, in his book. South, they were fairly officered, manned and. 
 " Leaves from a Lawyer's Life Afloat and armed. Their iron armor was four inches 
 Ashore, ' erroneously states that either the thick, and they were all of the type of the Vir- 
 Palmetto State or the Chicora ha-dheen " Tecentlj gima. The Palvietto State's of&cers. excepting 
 built by the proceeds of a great fair heM by the myself, all belonged to the Provisional navy^ 
 ladies of Charleston," and that "there was a but they were competent for the duty required 
 general demand on the part of the ladies who led of them, and performed it well at all times auA 
 society ill Chaiieston for a demoustrfttum by the under all circumstances. Her crew consisted. 
 Confederate navy commensurate with their owu of about 120meu: some of them were old sail- 
 efforts for that t-ause." He is referring lo the ors, and they were all efficient and reliable men. 
 breaking of the blockade by the Palmettn State Each of the iron-clads carried a torpedo fitted 
 and Chieora. but he confounds those ships with to the end of a spar some 15 or 20 feet long, pro- 
 the Cliarleslon, which was actually the vessel jecting from the bow on a line with the keel, 
 whose existence was so largely due to ihe efforts and so arranged that it could be carried either 
 of the patriotic women of the beleaguered city, triced up clear of the water or submerged five 
 who contributed their money, jewelry, and in or six feet below tbe surface. These vessels 
 some instancf-'s their silverware. They held were in a good state of discipline, and, so far 
 fairs and gave entertainments to increase the as their defective engines and bad plan of con- 
 fund, and Viecause the ship was so largely the struction allowed, were efficient vessels of war. 
 fruit of their work and generosity the Charleston Every night one or more of the iron-clads an- 
 was always known in the Southern Confederacy chored in the channel near Sumter for the pur- 
 aa "Tbe Ladies' Iron-clad Gunboat." pose of resisting a night attack on Sumter or 
 
 a dash into the harbor by the Federal vessels. 
 
 1 Capt. Jas. Henry Eochelle, who commanded Not long before the evacuation of Charleston, 
 
 the Palmetto State toward the close of the war, an iron-clad named the Columbia was launched 
 
 when that vessel with the Charleston and Chicora there, .-ihe had a thickness of six inches of iron 
 
 constituted the squadron, says in a recent letter on hor casemate, and was otherwise superior to 
 
 to the author: 'The iron-clads were all slow the other iron-clads. Unfortunately, the CoiMm- 
 
 vessels with imperfect engines, which required hia was bilged in consequence of the ignorance, 
 
 frequent repairing. For that day, and consid- carelessness or ti'sachf^ry of her pilot, and ren» 
 
 ering the paucity of naval resources in the dered no service whatever." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 673 
 
 fling away millions of money upon any experiments with 
 ships and guns that Secretary Mallory desired to make;' if it 
 had been possessed of half a dozen navy-yards equipped with 
 the most perfect plants that could be devised; if it had been 
 able to call a dozen private establishments into its service by 
 the temptation of fat contracts; if it had been so provided as 
 to avail itself of the products of unnumbered forges and mills 
 and gun foundries— if it had been endowed with all these ad- 
 vantages, each of which was possessed by the Federal govern- 
 ment, it would only have stood upon even ground with its 
 opponent: but with its poverty in ship-yards, in machinery, 
 in mills, in mechanics, and in experience, it relatively accom- 
 plished much greater results than did the North. The case- 
 mate type of ship grew out of its necessities and limitations, 
 for that was the easiest and cheapest class to build in a country 
 where there were no means of constructing the enormous hulls 
 and engines fitted to support and propel the thousands of tons 
 of 10-inch and 13-inch armor which the Northern builders piled 
 upon their later monitors. It was an ingenious and wise 
 adaptation of means to an end; and it would be a reckless 
 assertion to say that the Confederate ships would still have 
 been inferior to the monitors if they had carried the same 
 thickness of plating, the same engine power and the same 
 weight of ordnance. To sum up this brief diversion into a 
 still pending question, it must be remeinbered that the most 
 powerful ships of the great European navies partake of both 
 the casemate and the turret plans — perhaps rather more of the 
 former than of the latter; for the so-called citadel iron-clads, 
 upon which England and Italy in particular have spent enor- 
 mous sums, are the evolution of the casemate design, which 
 is especially prominent in the Benhow, the latest of the Eng- 
 lish vessels. The revolving turret has practically been aban- 
 doned everywhere, not even the United States proposing to 
 use it in the new navy now under process of construction, 
 while Congress has refused large appropriations to complete 
 the unfinished vessels of that type. In the essential qualifi- 
 cation of rapidity of fire, the broadside batteries of the case- 
 mate ships were far superior to the guns of the turreted 
 monitors, as the Federals discovered with the New Ironsides 
 at Charleston, which came very much nearer to the designs 
 
 1 Chief Engineer Alban 0. Stimers, U. S. N., in was worth about what it would bring for junk, 
 
 the spring of 1863, made designs and detailed There are no ofBcial reports as to what Mr. Sti- 
 
 drawings for twenty-one light-draft monitors mers' experiment cost the Federal government, 
 
 that theoretically were superior to all their pre- but the amount must have been nearly or quite 
 
 decesBors. "When the first one, the CAiwio, was as many millions as the Confederacy spent upon 
 
 launched at Boston, her hull, without guns or all the iron-clads that it ever got afloat. No 
 
 machinery, was but three inches out of water, Confederate naval constructor made any blun- 
 
 while according to Stimei-s' calculations it Bhoxild der that may be mentioned in comparison with 
 
 have had fifteen inches freeboard. He was just the wonderful Stimers' monitors, nor did any of 
 
 a foot wrong in his specifications for displace- the Southern ship-yards turn out iron-clads like 
 
 ment, but his designs had passed through the the Galena and Keokuk, on each of which large 
 
 Navy Department without any discovery by its sums were expended, while the former was shot 
 
 experts of his blunders. The other twenty mon- through and through in engaging the Drewry's 
 
 iters of the same type were in rarious stages of Bluff batteries in the James Biver, and the latter 
 
 completion, and the whole unique collection was easily sunk by the guns of Fort Sumter. 
 13 
 
674 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of the Confederate constructors than to those of John Erics- 
 sou, and was for general fighting uses a much more service- 
 able ship than any of the monitors. On any fair discrimination 
 the Southern builders may fearlessly rest their claims to pro- 
 fessional honors. 
 
 There were no maritime operations of importance in 
 Charleston harbor during 1862, but as that year drew to its end- 
 ing signs were not wanting of preparations to take the offen- 
 sive against the Federal fleet; whose people, excepting those 
 of the unlucky Isaac P. Smith, had had nothing more serious 
 to engage their attention than the pursuit of blockade-runners 
 or an occasional artillery due] with the outer forts. The uni- 
 form of the Confederate navy became more conspicuous about 
 the streets, workshops and wharves, drafts were made upon 
 tlie receiving ship Indian Chief to fill up the crews of the Pal- 
 metto State and Chicora, and Commodore Ingraham^ and Gen. 
 Beauregard were in long and frequent consultation. A list of 
 the officers of the navy then on duty at Charleston is as follows: 
 
 '*C. S. iron clad Palmetto State: Flag:-officer, D. N. In^aham, com- 
 manding squadron ; Lieut. Commander, John Rutledge ■-, Lieuts. W. H. 
 Parker, Philip Porcher, Greorge S. Shyrock, Robt. J. Bowen ; Master, 
 F. T. Chew ; Surgeon, A. M. Lynah ; Paymaster, John S. Banks ; En- 
 gineers : Chief M. P. Jordan; Assistants, J. J. Darcy, William Ahern, John 
 
 1 Commodore Duncan N. Intiraham was born 
 at Charleston, Dec. 2d, 1802. aud was descended 
 from a line of naval warriors, his father, Na- 
 thaniel Iiigrabam, having foucht under Capt. 
 Paul Jones in Le Bon Homme Ridiard in the des- 
 perate battle with the British frigate Serapis in 
 1779. By intermarriage he wan connected with 
 some of the most distinguished officers of the 
 British navy, among whom were Capt. Marryat 
 the novelist, and Sir Edwfifd Belcher, who com- 
 manded an exploring expedition around the 
 world, and the expedition sent in 1853 to the 
 Arctic regions in search of Sir John Franklin. 
 Commodore Ingraham's wife was Miss Harriet 
 H X/aiirens, of So. Car., granddaughter on the 
 ]iaternal side of Henry Laurens, President of 
 the Contiuentiil Congress and Commissioner with 
 Franklin and Jay to negotiate the treaty of peace 
 with Great Britain, which was signed at Paris. 
 Nov. 30th, 1782. Her maternal grandfather was 
 John Rutledge, Governor of S, C. dnrins the Rev- 
 olution, member of the Continental Congress, 
 and, by the appointment of President Washing- 
 ton, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Com- 
 modore Ingraham entered the TJ. S. navy as 
 midshipman in 1812, and in 1813 was ordered 
 for service in the frigate Congress, on the Brazil 
 stfition. When she returned to the Portsmouth, 
 N. H., navy-yard she was blockaded by British 
 ships, and Midshipman Ingraham was transfer- 
 red to the sloop-of-war Madison on Lake Ontario. 
 After the close of the war with England he served 
 successively on the brig Boxer, the sloop-of-war 
 Hornet, the schooner Revenge, and the frigate 
 Macedonian, and was present at the transfer of 
 Florida from the Spanish to the American flag. 
 In 1825 he was promoted to lieutenant and m 
 1838 tu commander, and during theMexican war 
 commanded the brig Somers in the blockade of 
 the Mexican ports. From 1850 to 1852 he was 
 commandant of the Philadelphia navy-yard, 
 after which he was assigned to the sloop-of-war 
 *S'(. Louis, and joined Commodore Stringham'a 
 
 squadron in the Mediterranean. With this ship 
 he performed dn exploit the lame of which ranji 
 round the world, and which was the boldest 
 deed done to assert the inviolability of American 
 citizenship since the United Stiites went to war 
 with England to protect her marine from the so- 
 called "right of search." Thi.swas the historic 
 Kostza affair. Martin Kostza, by birth a Hun- 
 garian, and an Austrian subject, took part in the 
 Hungarian revolution against the empire in 
 184:8-49, and when it was suppressed was among 
 those who took refuge in Turkey, where the 
 government refused to surrender them to An=- 
 tria. Kostza came to New York in company with 
 Louia Kossuth, and on July 31st, 1852, took the ini- 
 tiatory steps to become an American citizen by 
 naturalization. In 1853 he made a trip to Smyrnji , 
 Asiatic Turkey, on business, and on June 21st 
 was kidnapped by Greek mercenaries hired by 
 the Austrian consul, and confined in irons on the 
 Austrian man-of-war Huzzar. At this critical 
 moment Ingraham came into the harbor with 
 tbe SI. Louis and addressed a communication to 
 Mr. Brown, American charge d'affaires at Con- 
 stantinople, notifying him of the circumstances 
 and asking advice as to his action. Before an 
 answer could be received the Austrian reprer 
 sentative at Smyrna ordered the Huzzar to sail 
 with Kostza for an Austiian port on June 29th. 
 but Ingraham halted him by clearing hia ship 
 for action, bringing his batteries to bear on tbe 
 Huzzar &uA the two Austrian mail steamere that 
 had in the meantime arrived, and giving the 
 Austrian captain notice that he would open fire 
 if any attempt was made to remove Kostza be- 
 fore a reply was received from Constantinople. 
 The Austrian hastened to assure him that the 
 prisoner should not be sent away, and thus In-; 
 graham's resolute attitude prevailed, although 
 the Austrian force was strengthened on July Ist, 
 by the arrival of another ship-of- war, which made 
 it far superior to the 5^. Louis. The next day Com- 
 mander Ingraham received letters from Mr. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 675 
 
 C. Johnson; Midshipmen, C. F. Sevier, W. P. HaniiJton, C. Gary; Boats- 
 wain, Thos. Wilson ; Gunner, Greorge M. Thompson ; Pilots, G. D. Glad- 
 don, Andrew Johnson. C. S. ironclad Chicora : Capt. J. R. T acker ; 
 Lieuts. George H. Bier, Wm. T. Glassell, Wm. H. Wall ; Master, A. M. 
 Mason ; Acting Master, John A. Payne ; Passed Midshipman, Jos. P. 
 Claybrooke; Midshipmen, R. H. Bacot,i Palmer Saunders, Roger Pinckney; 
 Surgeon, Wm. Mason Turner ; Engineers, First Assistant, Hugh Clarke; 
 Second Assistant, J. W. Toombs; Third Assistants, William F. Jones, J. J. 
 Lyell; Gunner, E. R. Johnson; Carpenter, James F. Weaver; Acting Pay- 
 master, Ed. A- West; Pilots, Thomas Payne, Jas. Aldert. 
 
 Besides the above the following officers were assigned to 
 the Charleston naval station: 
 
 *' First Lieut. N. K. Van Zandt ; Surgeon, W. F. Patton; Paymaster, 
 Henry Myers ; Master, W. B. Porter; Midshipman, W. P. Hamilton; En- 
 gineer, Virginius Freeman; First Ass't Engineers, M. P. Jordon, C. H. 
 Levy; Sailmaker, M. P. Beaufort. 
 
 On January 31st, 1863, occurred the famous breaking of 
 the blockade by the iron-clads Palmetto State and Chicora, an 
 event which demonstrated the power of those vessels and the 
 gallantry of the officers and men of the Confederate navy. 
 CoL Alfred Roman, author of **The Military Operations of 
 General Beauregard," assigns to the latter the credit of initi- 
 ating this bold and successful enterprise. " Gen . Beauregard," 
 
 Brown, stating thatKostza was an American cit- 
 izen and entitled to the protection of the flag, 
 whereupon iDgraham went on board the Huzzar 
 and laid down the ultimatum that the prisoner 
 miiBtbe sent on shore by four o'clock that after- 
 noon. He again prepared his ship for battle and to 
 the protest of the Austrian captain returned no 
 answer save a repetition of his demands. As 
 four o'clock approached the populace crowded 
 the shore in expectation of witnessing a fight ; 
 butthe Austriaus, although they were also stand- 
 ing to their guns, weakened and a compromise 
 was arranged by which Kostza was transferred 
 to the care of the French consul pending the 
 settlement of the question between the Austrian 
 and American governments. Austria made a 
 demand upon the United States for the sur- 
 render of the refugee as an Austrian subject ; 
 but President Pierce and Hon. Wm. M. 
 Marcy, Secretary of State, fully justified 
 Ccimraander Ingrabam's action, and Mr Marcy 
 answered the Austrian Minister with a full as- 
 sertion of Eostza's status as an American citizen, 
 and demanded that the Emperor should take 
 measures to restore Kostza to the same condition 
 he was in when arrested. Austria ate the leek 
 and he was placed on an American bark bound 
 to this country. When Ingraham arrived in the 
 United States in 1855, his name was on every 
 tonguej Congress passed a resolution requesting 
 the President to present him with a gold medal; 
 a gold medal was also presented to him by a 
 great meeting of the citizens of New York ; other 
 testimonials were sent him from various Amer- 
 ican cities ; and the working people of England 
 presented him, by penny subscription, with a 
 superb chronometer and a finely engraved letter. 
 His conductat Smyrna, and its endorsement by 
 the administration, had formulated a policy for 
 the protection of American citizens that has ever 
 Bince been maintained. 
 
 In 1855 Commodore Ingraham was appointed 
 Chief of the Bureau of Ordnance and Hydro- 
 
 graphy in the Navy Department, which posi- 
 tion he retained until .August, 1860, when 
 he was ordered to the command of the frigate 
 Richmond^ the flagship of the Mediterranean 
 squadron. At the breaking out of the civil war 
 lie returned to the United States, in January, 
 1861, and resigned his commission. He entered 
 the service of the Confederate States on March. 
 26th, 1861, and at Montgomery, Ala., was made 
 a member of the board to consider the water de- 
 fences of the Confederacy. He was afterwards 
 placed in charge of the Pensacola navy-yard, 
 and continued in command until its evacuation, 
 when, he was ordered to command the naval 
 forces on the coast of South Carolina, with, 
 headquarters at Charleston. 
 
 1 Lieut. Richard H. Bacot entered the U. S. 
 naval academy by appointment from South Car- 
 olina in Sept. 1859, and resigned on Dec. 10th, 
 i860, the date of the meeting of the convention 
 of his native State, that passed the ordinance of 
 secession. On Jan. 1st, 1861, Grov. Pickens com- 
 missioned him instructor of Artillery, to drill 
 the troops in the fortifications of Charleston at 
 the heavy guns, and he also served in the S. C. 
 coast police in the guard steamers off Fort 
 Sumter. He entered the C. S. navy as soon as 
 his class was reached in the order of appoint- 
 ment and was assigned to the steamer Resolute, 
 Capt. J. P. Jones, at Savannah. In April 1862, 
 he was ordered to Memphis to duty on the iron- 
 clad ArkaTisas, but before the year was out was 
 transferred to South Carolina waters, where he 
 served in the Chicora and Charleston until be 
 was detached to command one of the launches 
 in the capture of the Federal gunboat Under- 
 writer in North Carolina. During the later months 
 of the war he was on duty on the iron-clad 
 Neitse in Eastern North Carolina. At this time 
 (1887) Lieut. Bacot is U. S. Ass't Engineer em- 
 ployed in the improvement of the Missouri 
 River. 
 
676 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 says Col. Eoman, '•'advised a night attack by the Confederate 
 rams against the wooden fleet of tlie enemy, and felt sure that 
 the blockade might be thus raised, or at any rate that consid- 
 erable damage could thus be effected." Flag-officer Ingraham 
 heartily accorded with the suggestion, and about eleven o'clock 
 on the night of January 30th, he left the harbor on the Pal- 
 metto State, Lieut. Com. John Rutledge, and in company with 
 the Chicora, Com. John R. Tucker, followed by the three 
 steam tenders General Clinch, Etowan and Chesterfield. Be- 
 fore five o'clock the next morning they were over the bar and 
 in the haze of the early dawn; the Palmetto State stood for 
 the nearest blockader, which proved to be the Mercedita, a 
 large gunboat, carrying seven heavy guns, which had just 
 returned from a chase, and was consequently in trim for ac- 
 tion. Lieut. Com. Abbott was in charge of her deck, Capt. 
 H. S. Stellwagen having retired to his cabin. She was taken 
 completely by surprise, no one of her officers anticipating that 
 a Confederate commander would have the temerity to attack 
 the greatly superior force of the blockading squadron. The 
 watch on deck hailed the stranger, and was answered "This 
 is the Confederate States steamer Palmetto State." Almost 
 on the moment of giving the reply the Palmetto State plunged 
 her ram deep into the quarter of the Mercedita, and fired 
 from her bow-gun a shell which went through the enemy's 
 boiler, and exploded on the other side of the ship, tearing a 
 great hole in her planking. Two men were killed by the shell 
 and many more were scalded by the escaping steam. Capt. 
 Stellwagen had not fired a gun during the encounter, and he 
 now appeared on his quarter-deck to announce to Com. Ingra- 
 ham the surrender of his ship. The latter demanded that a 
 boat be sent aboard, and one came under command of Lieut. 
 Abbott, who gave the name of the ship, stated that she was 
 in a sinking condition, and begged for relief. Several men of 
 his boat's crew were nearly destitute of clothing, and it was 
 learned that the Mercedita had been run down so suddenly 
 that all her people, except the watch on duty, had not had time 
 to dress before they found the ship going down under them. 
 The '-account of an eye-witness," printed in the Charleston 
 Courier, says: 
 
 "Lieut. Abbott begged Com. Ingraham to take the men with him 
 on board the Palmetto State, as in their haste to come to us they had 
 neglected to put the plug in their small boat, and it was only kept 
 afloat by the strenuous efforts of the men bailing. He also stated that 
 the water in the Mercedita had, at the time of his leaving, already risen 
 as high as the engine floors. Com. Ingraham regretted that he could 
 not comply with the request, as he had no room to accommodate them 
 on board his vessel, and no small boats or any other means of afford- 
 ing them relief." 
 
 As subsequent events showed, the Federal ship was in no 
 immediate danger of going to the bottom, but all hands had 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 677 
 
 been panic-stricken, and thought of their personal safety be- 
 fore any other consideration. 
 
 On the demand of Com. Ingraham, Lieut. Abbott, as the 
 representative of Capt. Stellwagen, and speaking for all the 
 officers and crew of the Mercedita, gave his parole of honor 
 that they would not "take up arms against the Confederate 
 States during the war, unless legally and regularly exchanged 
 as prisoners of war," and he was permitted to return to his 
 ship, on which four men had been killed, and three wounded. 
 Other vessels of the fleet assisted her to Port Eoyal for 
 repairs. 
 
 The Palmetto State was then headed further to sea, where 
 the Chicora was in vigorous combat with several of the Fed- 
 eral ships, and within an hour the two rams engaged the 
 Quaker City, the Ottawa, the Keystone State, the Unadilla, 
 the Augusta, the Stettin, the Flag and the Memphis. None of 
 these gunboats were taken unawares, as the Mercedita had 
 given the alarm by burning signal lights, but not one seemed 
 desirous of coming to close quarters with the rams, although 
 all could have done so by their superior speed. Commander 
 Tucker, of the Chicora, thus was not so fortunate in employ- 
 ing his ram upon the foe as his companion had been. The 
 '•account of an eye-witness" says of the movements of the 
 Chicora, after passing the Palmetto State, at work upon the 
 Mercedita : 
 
 " Keeping on our course, we proceeded to within fifty yards of the 
 vessel on the left, and then gave her a shot from our bow-gun, the block- 
 ader at the time being under full headway. We rounded-to and gave her 
 the full benefit of our broadside guns and after-gun. She immediately 
 rang her bell for fire, and made signals of distress to the rest of the fleet. 
 The last seen of her by Signal-ofiBcer Saunders, she was stem down, very 
 low in the water, and disappeared very suddenly. This vessel is supposed 
 to have gone down. Notwithstanding the Chicora immediately steamed 
 towards her, nothing could be discovered of the vessel. 
 
 "The Chicora, proceeding farther out to sea, stood northward and 
 eastward, and met two vessels apparently coming to the relief of the 
 missing steamer. We engaged them. One of them, after Bring a few 
 guns, withdrew. Standing to the northward, about daybreak, we steamed 
 up to' a small side-wheel two-masted steamer, and endeavored to come to 
 close quarters. She kept clear of us, driving away as rapidly as possible, 
 not however without receiving our compliments, and carrying with her 
 four or five of our shots. Shortly after, the steamship Quaker City and 
 another side-wheel steamer came gallantly bearing down upon the 
 Chioora and commenced firing at long range. 
 
 " Neither woiild permit our boat to get within a respectable distance. 
 Two of our shots struck the Quaker City, and she left apparently per- 
 fectly satisfied, in a critical condition. Another side-wheel two-masted 
 steamer with walking beams now steamed towards the Chicora, coming 
 down on our stern. Capt. Tucker perceiving it, we rounded-to and pro- 
 ceeded until within about five hundred yards, when the belligerent 
 steamer also rounded-to and gave us both broadsides and a shot from her 
 pivot-gun. We fired our forward pivot-giin with an incendiary shell, and 
 struck her just forward of her wheel-house, setting her on fire, disabling 
 and stopping her port wheel. This vessel was fired both fore and aft, 
 and volumes of smoke observed to issue from every aperture. As we 
 
678 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 neared her, she hauled down her flag and made a signal of surrender, but 
 still kept under way with her starboard wheel, and changing her direc- 
 tion. This was just after daybreak. We succeeded in catching this ves- 
 sel, but having surrendered, and the captain supposing her boilers struck 
 and the escaping steam preventing the engineers from going into the 
 engine-room to stop her, ordered us not to fire. She thus made her escape. 
 After this vessel had got out of our reach, to the perfectly safe distance 
 of about three miles, she fired her port rifled gun, again hoisted her flag, 
 and setting all sails, firing her rifled guns repeatedly at us as she left. 
 The (Jhicora now engaged six more of the enemy's vessels at one time- 
 three side-wheel steamers and three propellers — all at long range. Dis- 
 covering that the flag-boat Palmetto State had ceased firing and was 
 standing in shore, orders were given to follow her. On our return, we 
 again came across a three-masted bark-rigged vessel, which we engaged, 
 firing our guns as we passed, striking her once or twice. We then kept 
 on our course to the bar, having sustained no damage in the action nor a 
 single casualty on board. The last ship mentioned above kept firing at 
 ns until we got out of range, and we giving them our return compliments. 
 One of the blockaders was certainly sunk. We engaged her at the distance 
 of only one hundred yards, and ahe settled down with her stern clear 
 under water. 
 
 " The Chicora anchored in Beach Channel at 8:30 A. M., and arrived 
 at her wharf in the city about six o'clock, receiving a salute from all the 
 forts and batteries as she passed on her return. The number of shots fired 
 by the Chicora during the whole engagement was twenty-seven, mostly 
 incendiary shells. Lieut. Glassell commanded the forward pivot-gun | 
 assisted by Midshipman R. H. Pinckney; Lieut. W. H. Wall, the after- 
 pivot ; Master Mason, the starboard broadside ; Master Payne, the lar- 
 board broadside. The different divisions were commanded by First Lieut. 
 G. H. Bier and Lieut. J. C. Claybrook, assisted by Midshipman R. H. Ba- 
 cot and Signal-ofBcer Saunders." 
 
 The ship which hauled down her colors was the Keystone 
 State, Com. LeRoy, who supposed his vessel to be sinking. 
 One of the Chicora's shells had set fire to her forward hold 
 and another had destroyed her steam chimneys, filling all 
 the forward part of the vessel with steam. She had twenty 
 men killed, and as miany more wounded. 
 
 Having accomplished the object of his expedition, Com. 
 Ingraham signalled a return to Charleston, not one ship of 
 the blockading squadron being then in sight from the pilot- 
 house of the Palmetto State, all having made off to escape 
 the fate of the Mercedita and Keystone State. No injury 
 was done to either of the rams, not a man was hurt on them, 
 and when they arrived back in the harbor they were in con- 
 dition for another battle. , 
 
 The reports of Com. Ingraham and Com. Tucker, which 
 are appended, will be read with interest: 
 
 "Office Naval Station, Charlfston, Feb. 2d, 1863. 
 " Sir: I have the honor to inform you that upon the night of the 30th 
 ultimo, I left the wharf at this place, in company with the steam-ram 
 Chicora, Com. John R. Tucker, at 11. 15 p. M., and steamed slowly down to 
 the bar, as, from our draft, we could not cross until high water. At 4.30 
 A. M. we crossed the bar, with about a foot and a half to spare, and soon 
 after made a steamer at an anchor. Stood directly for her, and directed 
 Jjieut. Commanding Rutledge to strike her with our prow. When quite 
 near we were hailed: " What steamer is that? Drop your anchor; you 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 679 
 
 -will be into us.'' He was informed that it was the Confederate steamer 
 Palmetto State. At this moment we struck her, and fired the seven-inch 
 gun into her, as he gave an order to fire. I then inquired if he surren- 
 dered, and was answered in the affirmative. I then directed him to send 
 a boat on board, which was done. After some delay, Lieut. Commanding 
 Abbott came on board and informed me that the vessel was the U. S. 
 steamer Mercedita, Com. Stellwagen, and that she was in a sinking con- 
 dition, and had a crew of 158 all told, and wished to be relieved ; that all 
 his boats were lowered without the plugs being in, and were full of water. 
 At this time the Chieora was engaged with the enemy, and the alarm was 
 given. 
 
 " I knew our only opportunity was to take the enemy unawares, as 
 the moment he was under way, from his superior speed, we could not close 
 with him. I then directed Lieut. Commanding Rutledge to require from 
 Lieut. Commanding Abbott his word of honor for his commander, officers 
 and crew that they would not serve against the Confederate States until 
 regularly exchanged, when he was directed to return with his boat to his 
 vessel to render what assistance he could. I then stood to the northward 
 and eastward, and soon after made another steamer getting under way. 
 We stood for her and fired several shot at her; but as we had to fight the 
 vessel in a circle to bring the different guns to bear, she was soon out of 
 our range. In this way we engaged several vessels, they keeping at long 
 range and steering to the southward. Just as the day broke we made 
 a large steamer (supposed to be the Powhatan),^ on starboard bow, with 
 another steamer in company, which had just got under way. They stood 
 to the southward under full steam, and opened their batteries upon the 
 Chieora, who was some distance astern of us. I then turned and stood to 
 the southward to support the Chieora it necessa,ry, but the enemy kept 
 on his course to the southward. I then made signal to Com. Tucker to 
 come to an anchor, and led the way to the entrance of Beach Channel, 
 where we anchored at 8:45 A. M., and had to remain seven hours for the 
 tide, as the vessel cannot cross the bar excepting at high water. * * * 
 
 " The sea was perfectly smooth, as much so as in the harbor; every- 
 thing was most favorable for us, and gave us no opportunity to test the 
 sea qualities of the boats. The engines worked well and we obtained a 
 greater speed than they had ever before sustained. 
 
 " I cannot speak in too high terms of the conduct of Com. Tucker 
 and Lieut. Com. Rutledge; the former handled his vessel in a beautiful 
 manner, and did the enemy much damage. I refer you to his official 
 report. Lieut. Com. Rutledge also fought the Palmetto State in a manner 
 highly gratifying to me. Every officer and man did his duty nobly, and 
 deserve well of his country. 
 
 "We had but little opportunity of trying our vessels, as the enemy 
 did not close, and not a single shot struck either vessel. I am highly in- 
 debted to Com. Hartstene, who gallantly volunteered to take charge of 
 three steamers with fifty soldiers on board, who accompanied us in ease 
 we should need their services; but they could not get over the bar. but 
 joined us after daylight at the North Channel, and rendered us their as- 
 sistance in getting through the channel, which is very narrow. 
 
 " Of the conduct of Mr. Gladden, the pilot of the Palmetto State, I 
 cannot speak in too high terms; he was perfectly cool under the great re- 
 .fiponsibility he had in taking the vessel over at night with so great a 
 draft, and during the action rendered me great assistance in pointing out 
 the vessels as we approached them in the uncertain light. 
 "I am, sir, very respectfully, 
 
 "Your obedient servant, 
 
 "D. N. INGRAHAM, 
 
 ''Flag-officer Commanding. 
 "Son. 8. R. Mallort, Secretary of the Navy, Richmond, Va." 
 
 1 Commodore Ingraham was mistaken in the to the Federal official reports, was then coaling 
 name of this ship, as the Powhatan, according at Port Royal. 
 
680 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 " Confederate States Steamer ' Chicoba,' Jan. 31st, 1863. 
 
 " Sir: In obedience to your order, I got under way at 11.30 p. m., yes- 
 terday, and stood down the harbor in company with the Confederate 
 States steamer Palmetto State, bearing your flag. We crossed the bar at 
 4:40 A. M., and commenced the action at 5.20 A. M., by firing into a 
 schooner-rigged propeller, which we set on fire, and have every reason to 
 believe sunk, as she was nowhere to be seen at daylight. We then en- 
 gaged a large side- wheel steamer, twice our length from us on the port 
 bow, firing three shots into her with telling effect, when she made a run 
 for it. This vessel was supposed to be the Quaker City. We then engaged 
 a schooner-rigged propeller and a large side-wheel steamer, partially crip- 
 pling both, and setting the latter on fire, causing her to strike her flag ; at 
 this time the latter vessel, supposed to be the Keystone State, was com- 
 pletely at my mercy, I having taken position astern, distant some 200 
 yards; I at once gave the order to cease firing upon her, and directed 
 Lieut. Bier, First Lieutenant of the Chicora, to man a boat and take 
 chargeof the prize, if possible to save her; if that was not possible, to 
 rescue her crew. While the boat was in the act of being manned , I dis- 
 covered that she was endeavoring to make her escape, by working her 
 starboard wheel, the other being disabled. Her colors being down, I at 
 once started in pursuit, and renewed the engagement. Owing to her 
 superior steaming qualities, she soon widened the distance to some 200 
 yards. She then hoisted her flag, and commenced flring her rifled guns; 
 her commander, by this faithless act, placing himself beyond the pale of 
 civilized and honorable warfare. We next engaged two schooners, one 
 brig, and one bark-rigged propeller, but not having the requisite speed 
 were unable to bring them to close quarters. We pursued them six or 
 seven miles seaward. During the latter part of the combat, I was engaged 
 at long range with a large bark-rigged steam sloop-of-war; but in spite 
 of all our efforts, was unable to bring her to close quarters, owing to her 
 superior steaming qualities. At 7:30 A.M., in obedience to your orders, 
 we stood in shore, leaving the partially crippled and fleeing enemy about 
 seven miles clear of the bar, standing to the southward and eastward. At 
 8 A. M., in obedience to signal, we anchored in four fathoms water off the 
 Beach Channel. 
 
 " It gives me pleasure to testify to the good conduct and efficiency of 
 the officers and crew of the " Chico7-a." I am particularly indebted to 
 the pilots, Messrs. Payne and Aldert, for the skillful pilotage of the 
 vessel. 
 
 " It gives me pleasure to report that I have no injuries or casualties. 
 "Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 ■'J. E. Tucker, Commander C. 8. N. 
 
 '■' Flag-officer T). N. Ingraham, C. S. N., commanding Station, Charles- 
 ton, s. e." 
 
 This intrepid exploit of the Confederate squadron fell like 
 a thunder-clap on the North and woke the Federal govern- 
 ment from its comfortable indifference as to the provvess of the 
 Southern officers and the efficacy of their ships. While the 
 Northern newspapers heaped invective upon the Washington 
 authorities, and Admiral Dupont and his subordinates, for per- 
 mitting Ingraham and his two small vessels to catch the great 
 Federal armada off its guard and play havoc with it, there 
 arose also a vociferous demand for official contradictions of 
 the reports of the most serious injuries inflicted upon the fleet; 
 and statements meant to minimize the Confederate victory 
 were soon prepared under the supervision of Secretary Welles 
 and his coadjutors. President Lincoln's administration had 
 
CAPTAIN DUNCAN N. INGRAHAM, 
 
 CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 081' 
 
 tremendous stakes at issue. There was the popular fury at 
 the North to be allayed by creating the belief that the Federal 
 disaster was an accident that could not have been provided 
 against, and that the Confederates were favored by circum- 
 stances over which they had no control ; there was the repu- 
 tation of the navy to be upheld, and the European powers 
 were to be convinced of the falsity of the Confederate claim 
 that the blockade had been raised for any period, however 
 brief. It was an hour of anxiety and doubt at Washington, 
 for on shore and at sea, in Jan., 1863, misfortunes had ac- 
 curnulated on the Federal arms, and the elections of the pre- 
 ceding October and November had been strongly adverse to 
 the war policy of the administration. As fast as the reports 
 belittling the Confederate success at Charleston could be 
 written up they were rushed into print for circulation through- 
 out the North. And they difPered so irreconcilably from the 
 reports of Ingraham and Tucker, that they merit review before 
 we proceed to the consideration of the diplomatic questions 
 springing out of the dispersion of the blockading fleet. 
 
 At the outset of the controversy over the facts of the bat- 
 tle the Federals possessed a fictitious advantage, because they 
 could prove that the Confederate commanders erroneously re- 
 ported that they had sunk one or ntiore of the enemy's ships. 
 But if it is remembered that the fight took place about dawn 
 of a foggy January morning, that Lieut. Abbott gave Com- 
 modore Ingraham to understand that the Mercedita was in 
 peril of sinking, and that when the Keystone State escaped 
 after striking her colors she was heeled far over, any impar- 
 tial critic must admit that Ingraham and Tucker, who made 
 their reports on the same day that the action took place, 
 were entirely justified in their opinion that these two 
 vessels had gone down. The strenuous insistence by the 
 Federals that Commodore Ingraham had made or sanctioned 
 reports which he knew to be false in this respect, was con- 
 vincing evidence that they were exceedingly perplexed to but- 
 tress a weak case and resorted to an undignified evasion. 
 
 Com. Ingraham, whose conscientiousness no officer who 
 had served with him during his illustrious career in the old 
 navy would call in question, was fully persuaded that he had 
 broken the blockade, and so reported to Gen. Beauregard 
 upon his return to Charleston. The latter, a soldier versed in 
 statecraft, knew that if this claim could be sustained by the 
 consuls of European nations at Charleston, and if their govern- 
 ments would act upon such representations by declaring the 
 blockade raised, Charleston would be an open port for the 
 transaction of commerce, and the reception of war material 
 for the Confederacy, until the United States had established 
 a fresh blockade in accordance with the laws of nations. 
 But before the consuls could be asked to pass their judg- 
 ment upon the status of affairs, it was proper to make public 
 
682 THE CONFEDERA.TE STATES NAVY. 
 
 proclamation of the situation, and on January 31st the fol- 
 lowing was issued: 
 
 " Headquabtkbs, Land and Naval Forces, ) 
 
 "Charleston, S. C, January 31st, 1863. f 
 
 " At about five o'clock this morning, the Confederate States naval 
 
 force on this station attacked the U. S. blockading fleet oft the harbor of 
 
 the city of Charleston, and sunk, dispersed, or drove off and out of sight 
 
 for the time the entire hostile fieet. 
 
 "Therefore we, the undersigned, commanders respectively of the 
 C S. naval and land forces in this quarter, do hereby formally declare the 
 blockade by the United States of the said city of Charleston, S. C, to be 
 raised by a superior force of the Confederate States from and after this 
 31st day of January, A. B. 1863. 
 
 "G. T. Beaubboard, General Commanding. 
 
 "D. N. INGBAHAM, 
 
 " Flag-officer Commanding Naval Forces in South Carolina. 
 " Official.— TsoMXs Jordan, Chief of Staff.'" 
 
 Hon. Judah P. Benjamin, Confederate Secretary of State, 
 was advised of this proclamation by telegraph, and on the 
 same day he addressed the subjoined communications to the 
 consular representatives of the European powers in the Con- 
 federate States : 
 
 "Department of State, Richmond, Jan. 31st, 1860. 
 
 "Sir: I am instructed by the President of the Confederate States 
 of America to inform you that this government has received an ofHoial dis- 
 patch from Flag-officer Ingraham, commanding the naval forces of the 
 Confederacy on the coast of South Carolina, stating that the blockade of 
 the harbor of Charleston has been broken by the complete dispersion and 
 disappearance of the blockading squadron, in consequence of a successful 
 attack made on it by the iron-clad steamers commanded by Flag-officer 
 Ingraham. During this attack one or more of the blockading vessels 
 ■were sunk or burnt. 
 
 " As you are doubtless aware that, by the law of nations, a blockade 
 when thus broken by superior force ceases to exist, and cannot be subse- 
 quently enforced unless established de novo, with adequate forces and 
 after due notice to neutral powers, it has been deemed proper to give you 
 the information herein contained for the guidance of such vessels of your 
 nation as may choose to carry on commerce with the now open port of 
 Charleston. 
 
 "Respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "J. P. Benjamin, Secretary of State.'" 
 
 Also, on the same day, Gen. Jordan addressed the follow- 
 ing communication to Eobert Bunce, consular agent of Great 
 Britain; Baron de St. Andre, consul of France, and Senor 
 Francisco Munez Moncada, consul of Spain at Charleston: 
 
 " I am instructed to call your attention officially to the fact that the 
 Confederate States naval forces on this station this morning, about the 
 hour of 5 o'clock, attacked the U. S. blockading squadron off the harbor of 
 Charleston, at their habitual place of anchorage, and after a brief engage- 
 ment sunk, dispersed or drove off, and out of sight for the time, the whole 
 hostile fleet. And I am further instructed to call your attention to the fact 
 that this summary destruction of the fleet of the United States, constitut- 
 ing the blockading force of this harbor, by the superior force of the Con- 
 federate States, operates as an en tire defeasance of the blockade of the port 
 of Charleston and of its operation. The rule of public law requiring that 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 683 
 
 there should be a notification of a new blockade before foreign nations 
 can be affected with an obligation of observing it as a blockade still exist- 
 ing, it is deemed necessary to give you now this formal notification of the 
 fact. Should you desire, 1 shall be pleased to place at your disposal a 
 steamer for the purpose of satisfying yourself of the unobstructed con- 
 dition of this port." 
 
 Baron de St. Andre and Senor Moncada accepted the 
 invitation, and on the afternoon of January 31st they accom- 
 panied Gen. Ripley, on the steamer General Clinch, on a visit 
 of inspection, as far as the bar. Mr. Bunce did not accom- 
 pany them, because earlier in the day he had gone to the same 
 locality iri the British corvette Petrel, which was in the harbor 
 sX that time. The three consuls were back in the city that 
 night, and at a joint conference concurred in the opinion that 
 the blockade had been legally raised. ' Mr. Bunce strengthened 
 this conclusion with his assertion that on the Petrel he had 
 gone five miles beyond the usual anchorage of the blockaders 
 and could see nothing of them with marine glasses, in which 
 positive declaration he was confirmed by the statement of the 
 captain and other officers of the Petrel. 
 
 The French and Spanish consuls were not quite so em- 
 phatic, in their official replies to Gen. Jordan, as they are re- 
 ported to have been at the conference on the night of January 
 31st. Senor Moncada wrote the next day to Gen. Jordan : 
 
 "I take pleasure in replying to your communication of the 31st of 
 January, respecting the notification of the raising of the blockade at 
 Charleston by the naval forces of the Confederate States. I should inform 
 you that I remitted a copy of the same communication to his Excellency 
 the Minister Plenipotentiary, at Washington. I thank you for your kind 
 •offer in placing a steamer at my disposal, so that I might go and satisfy 
 myself as to the condition of the port. Having gone out in company with 
 the French consul, and arrived at the point where the Confederate naval 
 forces were, we discovered three steamers and a pilot-boat returning. I 
 must also mention that the British consul at this port manifested to me 
 verbally, that some time subsequent to this naval combat not a single 
 blockading vessel was in sight." 
 
 Diplomatic caution is observable in the statement which 
 Senor Moncada committed to paper for himself and for Baron 
 <ie St. Andre, but Mr. Bunce chose to assume a larger responsi- 
 bility, regardless of what might be the results of his bold 
 avowal of his convictions. The Spanish and French consuls 
 Tuight as well have coincided with him for all the good that 
 their temporizing attitude did them in the judgment of the 
 Federal government and the Northern people. Because they 
 did not certify that the vessels which they saw beyond the bar 
 were blockading ships, and because they did not declare that 
 the blockade was not broken, they were included by the North- 
 ern newspapers and the authors of the Federal official re- 
 ports in the unsparing condemnation thrust upon Beauregard, 
 
 ^ The Charlestoti newspapers of February Ist records concerning it in existence, but it has 
 are the authority for this statement of the con- been accepted by all historians of the war that 
 elusions of the meeting. There are no oflBcial the consuls united in this declaration. 
 
684 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Ingraham, Jordan, Tucker, Rutledge and Bunce, as the makers 
 of wilfully false reports. 
 
 A steamer was at once dispatched from Charleston to 
 Nassau to place in the British mail from the latter point dis- 
 patches conveying to Messrs. Mason and Slidell information 
 of the raising of the blockade, in order that they might, if 
 possible, secure acknowledgments from the governments of 
 England and France to that effect. Mr. Mason's correspond- 
 ence with Earl Russell, British Minister of Foreign Affairs, 
 which related to the dispersion of the blockaders at Galveston 
 as well as at Charleston, epitomizes the history of the refusal 
 of England to accept the Confederate view. In a communica- 
 tion of Feb. 16th, Mr. Mason said: 
 
 "I have the honor to submit, therefore, that any alleged pre existing 
 blockade of the ports aforesaid was terminated at Galveston the 1st day 
 of January last, and at Charleston on the 31st of the same month ; a prin- 
 ciple clearly stated in a letter I have had the honor to receive from your 
 lordship, dated on the 10th instant, in the following words : ' The driving 
 off a blockading force by a superior force does break a blockade, which 
 must be renewed de novo, in the usual form, to be binding upon neutrals '— 
 a principle uniformly admitted by all text writers on public law, and es- 
 tablished by decisions of Courts of Admiralty." 
 
 Lord Russell's only immediate reply was an acknowledg- 
 ment of the receipt of the note, and on Feb. 18th Mr. Mason 
 again wrote to him, this second communication having ref- 
 erence also to a note from Lord Russell on Feb. 10th, in 
 which he replied to questions concerning the interpretation 
 placed by her Majesty's government on the declaration of the 
 principles of blockade agreed to in the Convention of Paris. 
 This construction was far from being satisfactory to Mr. 
 Mason or President Davis, Mr. Mason saying in the communi- 
 cation of the 18th that: " It is considered by him [Davis] 
 that the terms used in that convention are too precise to ad- 
 mit of being qualified — or perhaps it may be more appropriate 
 to say revoked — by the super-additions thereto contained in 
 your lordship's exposition of them." The point made by Lord 
 Russell to which Mr. Davis took exception was thus set forth 
 by the former: 
 
 " It appears to be sufBciently clear to her Majesty's government that 
 the declaration of Paris could not have been intended to mean that a port 
 must be so blocliaded in all winds, and independently of whether the com- 
 munication might be carried on of a dark night or by means of small, low 
 steamers or coasting craft creeping along the shore." 
 
 In other words, the British government stood out inflex- 
 ibly against the doctrine advanced by Mr. Davis and Mr. 
 Mason, that the habitual evasion of a blockade by the ships of 
 neutrals should be regarded in law as nullifying it; and Lord 
 Russell also refused "to admit that the blockade had been 
 raised by the events of Jan. 31st. On Feb. 19th he informed 
 Mr. Mason that "the information which her Majesty's govern- 
 ment have derived from your letter and from the public 
 
THE CONFBDEKATE STATES NAVY. 685 
 
 journals on this subject is not sufficiently accurate to admit of 
 their forming an opinion, and they will accordingly, by the 
 first opportunity, instruct Lord Lyons (British Minister at 
 Washington) to report fully on the matter." 
 
 On Feb. 37th, Lord Russell went a little deeper into the 
 question by writing to Mr. Mason: 
 
 " I have already, in my previous letters, fully explained, to you the 
 views of her Majesty's government on this matter; and I have nothing 
 further to add in reply to your last letter, except to observe that I have 
 "not intended to state that any number of vessels of a certain build or ton- 
 nage might be left at liberty freely to enter a blockaded port without 
 vitiating the blockade; but the occasional escape of small vessels on dark 
 nights, or under other particular circumstances, from the vigilance of a 
 competent blockading fleet, did not evince that laxity in the belligerent 
 ^hich enured^ according to international law, to the raising of a block- 
 ade." 
 
 The people of Charleston publicly celebrated the victory 
 •of the Palmetto State and Chicora by a ceremony, on Feb. 3d, 
 at St. Philip's Church, at which the Te Deum was sung, some 
 of the officers and crews of the ships attending and receiving 
 •conspicuous attention for the gallant services they had per- 
 formed. The raid had the effect of hurrying the efforts of the 
 Federal government to place the largest possible number of 
 iron-clads in the waters where the wooden vessels had proved 
 ;so vulnerable to the attacks of Ingraham's squadron; and 
 Dupont soon had under his command the broadside frigate 
 JSfew Ironsides, mounting fourteen 11-inch Dahlgren guns, 
 two 150-pounder rifles and two 60-pounder rifles; the Ericsson 
 monitors Weehaivken, Passaic, Montauk, Patapsco, Catskill, 
 Nantucket and Nahant, and the Whitney monitor Keokuk. 
 which was a turtle-back armored floating battery with two 
 flxed turrets. The monitors carried 15-inch and 11-inch guns 
 and 150-pounder Parrott rifles. It was with this fleet that 
 Dupont determined to attempt the reduction of Fort Sumter 
 and to bombard or run past the other fortiflcations, and thus 
 •capture the city. In order that, if the opportunity served, his 
 wooden ships might take part in the engagement, the Canan- 
 daigua, Housatonic, TJnadilla, Wissahickon and Huron were 
 constituted the reserve and were held in readiness outside 
 the bar. 
 
 The land defences of Charleston were as perfect as the 
 ■engineering skill and the resources of the Confederacy could 
 make them. They had been planned and constructed under the 
 direction of Gens. Beauregard and R. S. Ripley, and embraced 
 three lines of fortifications and three lines or circles of fire, each 
 converging or crossing so as to command the channels. Fort 
 Sumter was the centre of the first line, and on the south it was 
 ■continued to Battery Gregg and Fort Wagner on Morris Island. 
 On the north side a row of defences stretched along the shore 
 of Sullivan's Island, beginning with the new battery at the 
 inner point and comprising successively, in a direction toward 
 
686 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the bar, Battery Bee, Battery Marion, Fort Moultrie, Battery 
 Rutledge, Fort Beauregard, four small detached batteries and 
 Fort Marshall, which latter was the outer limit of the line. If 
 an enemy had passed this circle of fire he would have been ex- 
 posed to the second circle, which consisted of Fort Johnson, 
 Battery Cheves, Battery Wampler, Battery Glover, and some 
 minor earthworks on James Island southeast of the city; Fort 
 Ripley, in the Folly Island channel; Castle Pinckney, on 
 Shute's Folly Island; one battery on Hog Island, and two on 
 Mt. Pleasant, on the northern side of the inner harbor. The 
 third circle embraced the fortifications in the city and on the 
 banks of the Cooper and Ashley Rivers. Within the munici- 
 pal limits were the King Street Battery, White Point Battery, 
 Vanderhorst Wharf Battery, Frazier's Wharf Battery and the 
 Half -Moon Battery. These and two earthworks at the Cal- 
 houn and Laurens Street wharves extended from the southern 
 point of the city around the Cooper River front. On the Ash- 
 ley River side were Battery Waring and two forts near either 
 end of the Savannah Railroad bridge. Torpedoes were thickly 
 sown in the main channel, as well as in the Swash, the North 
 and Beach channels, and all the way up in Rebellion Roads, 
 the Folly Island channels, and in the entrance to Cooper and 
 Ashley Rivers. A line of rope, pile, log and chain obstruc- 
 tions was stretched across the channel from Cumming's Point 
 to Fort Sumter and Mount Pleasant, and was arranged with 
 openings to allow the passage of blockade-runners and the 
 Confederate squadron. 
 
 Dupont's attack was made on April 7th, 1863, with the 
 New Ironsides and the eight monitors. 
 
 While the battle was being fought, the Chicora and Pal- 
 metto State remained with steam up a little in the rear of a 
 line drawn from Fort Sumter to Cumming's Point. Commo- 
 dore Ingraham was prepared, in accordance with an under- 
 standing with Gen. Beauregard, to take a share in the fighting 
 if the Federal fleet should pass the guns of Sumter and Morris 
 Island, in which case he was to attack ; but Dupont's defeat 
 by the forts gave his men no harder work than standing to 
 their guns for three hours. 
 
 On the night of their repulse the commanders of the Fed- 
 eral iron-clads were called into consultation with Admiral 
 Dupont on his flag-ship. It was his purpose to renew the 
 attack the next morning; but, after listening to the verbal re- 
 ports of those officers as to the crippled condition of the moni- 
 tors, he gave up any such idea. 
 
 Before and after the breaking of the blockade, Beauregard 
 and Ingraham had thought it of importance that the rams 
 should be utilized in other localities than Charleston harbor 
 without passing outside the bar. On December 2d, 1863, Major 
 Harris, then chief of engineers, was instructed to cut a chan- 
 nel in Wappoo River, between the Ashley and the Stono, to 
 
T.HE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY 687 
 
 allow the squadron to operate in that direction; and after the 
 frustration of the attack on Sumter, the presence of the moni- 
 tors in the outer harbor, without even a timber-guard around 
 them, was like a welcome to an assault by torpedo boats. The 
 torpedo service had been legalized by an act of the Confede- 
 rate States Congress in October, 1863, and Major F. D. Lee 
 had been placed in charge of it at Charleston. More than two 
 months previous to the attack on Fort Sumter, a plan had been 
 mooted at the Navy Department, by which it was hoped to 
 disable the monitors, or perhaps capture them with all hands 
 on board. It was probably suggested by the plan formed by 
 Admiral Buchanan after the battle of Hampton Roads, when 
 he had determined that if he had another engagement with 
 the original Monitor, she should be boarded, and attempts 
 made to block the turret with iron wedges, throw hand gren- 
 ades down the turret openings and cover her hatchways and 
 ventilators with blankets and tarpaulins in the hope of smoth- 
 ering the crew. Even that looked like a desperate scheme, 
 but it was a crude project in comparison to that which it was 
 proposed to undertake at Charleston. Mr. Mallory did not 
 need to be informed that among the Confederate officers and 
 seamen any number could be had that were required to vol- 
 untarily >endeavor to carry out his wishes; for there was 
 rather an excess than a lack of impetuous daring in the ser- 
 vice which could only find exercise in adventures outside of 
 the routine of warfare. 
 
 At a meeting of a board of officers at Richmond, it was 
 decided to equip a special expedition for the work of de- 
 stroying the monitors in Charleston harbor. Secretary Mal- 
 lory selected to command it Lieut. William A.Webb, 0. S. N., 
 and issued the following order: 
 
 " Navy Department, Richmond, February 19th, 1863. 
 ''Lieutenant Wm. A. Webb, G. 8. If. : 
 
 " Sir : Should it be deemed advisable to attack the enemy's fleet by 
 boarding, the following suggestions are recommended for your consider- 
 ation : 
 
 Means of Boarding the Enemy. 
 
 " First- Row-boats and barges, of which Charleston can furnish a 
 large number. 
 
 , " Second— Small steamers, two or three to attack each vessel. 
 
 " Third— The hull of a single-decked vessel without spars, divided 
 into several water-tight compartments by cross bulkheads, and with 
 decks and hatches tight, may have a deck-load of compressed cotton so 
 placed on either side, and forward and aft, as to leave a space fore and 
 aft in the centre. A light scaffold to extend from the upper tier of cotton 
 ten or fifteen feet over the side, and leading to the enemy's turret when 
 alongside the iron-clad, and over which it can be boarded, at the same 
 time that boarding would be done from forward and aft. TDhis could be 
 made permanent or to lower at will. 
 
 " The boarding force to be divided into parties of tens and twenties, 
 each under a leader. One of these parties to be prepared with iron 
 wedges, to wedge between the turret and the deck ; a second party to 
 cover the pilot-house with wet blankets : a third party of twenty to 
 throw powder down the smoke-stack or to cover it ; another party of 
 
'688 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 twenty provided with turpentine or cauiphine in glass vessels, to smash 
 over the turret, and with an inextinguishable liquid fire to follow it ; an- 
 other party of twenty to watch every opening in the turret or deck, pro- 
 vided with sulphuretted cartridges, etc., to smoke the enemy out. Light 
 ladders, weighing a few pounds only, could be provided to reach the top 
 of the turret. A rough drawing illustrative of this design is enclosed. 
 " I am, respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "S. R. Mallory, Secretary of the Navy.'" 
 
 Webb proceeded to Charleston with about thirty officers 
 and men, and with much trouble collected a few cutters and a 
 lot of canoes and skiffs, which were fitted with poles twenty 
 feet long, at their stems, each pole carrying a 60-pound torpedo. 
 " It was not at all uncommon" says Capt. W. H. Parker, " to 
 see a sailor rolling down to his boat, when they were called for 
 exercise, with a quid of tobacco in his cheek and a torpedo 
 slung over his back ; and when it is recollected that each tor- 
 pedo had seven sensitive fuses which a tap with a stick or blow 
 with a stone was sufficient to explode and blow half the street 
 down, it can readily be believed that we gave him a wide 
 berth." 
 
 An organization of the special service was effected quickly 
 after the arrival of its personnel at Charleston. A small 
 steamer called the Sumter was procured to lead the boats, and 
 Lieut. W. C Dozier ' was placed in command of it with officers 
 and crew arranged as follows, for an attempt to smother the 
 monitors: 
 
 Stack Men. 
 T. S. Wilson, Capt., 0. S. N., in charge: I. A. Mercer, Sergt. Bottle 
 and Sulphur : Hugh Aird, Pat'k Hart, Wm. Bell, Stephen Caul. Blankets 
 and Powder : Henry Calvin, Jas. Gorgan, Thos. Crilley, Theodore Davis. 
 Ladder, Bottles and Sulphur: Richard McGregor, John Barratt. Axe: 
 W. A. Bassant, Anthony Cannon. Plateman: S. C. Curtis. 
 
 I Wm. G. Dozier was appointed to the U. S. fi'om Pensacola to New Orleans for the defence 
 navy from South Carolina, and in the autumn of of that city, and on September 2d was appointed 
 1860 was lieutenant and acting-master of the to the command of the steamei* Pamlico, cruis- 
 frigateiZicAmond.oftheMediterraneau squadron. ing in the lower MisBisaippi. After making aev- 
 The indications of the secession of his native eral requests to the Navy Department to be 
 State prompted him to obtain leave of absence transferred to South Carolina because of the in- 
 to return home and tender his resignation. He vasion of his native State, and these applica- 
 reacbed New York on the day that South Caro- tions being refused, in March, 1862, he sent in 
 lina passed the ordinance of secession, and the bis resignation, which, under date of the 24th, 
 next day his resignation was accepted by Mr. Secretary Mallory declined to accept, but or- 
 Toucey, Secretary of the Navy. His services dered him to report for duty to Flag-of&cer In- 
 ■were accepted by his State, and he was ap- graham at Charleston. In this letter the Secre- 
 pointed to the coast and harbor police, in tary wrote that the Department desired to man- 
 which he remained until transferred to the ifest its appreciation of his services and its 
 C. S. navy. While in the State service he was desire to retain them. In. Charleston Harbor 
 sent to Baltimore to purchase vessels suitable he commanded the steamer ffitnfres* and there- 
 for gunboats, but succeeded only in procuring ceiving ship Indian Chief, and was afterwards 
 the tug James Gray, which afterwards became assigned to command of the special expedition 
 the Lady Davis. He was on duty in Charleston designed to operate with toi-pedo boats against 
 Harbor until the fall of Fort Sumter, and ac- the Federal iron-clads He commanded the 
 companied Capt, Hartstene to the fort to take naval battalion during the military operations 
 part in the surrender, beingassigned to the task on James Island in August, 1864. Subsequently 
 of hoisting the Confederate colors after Major he was appointed executive oiflcer of the C. S. 
 Anderson had saluted his flag and hauled it steamer Chickamauga, and participated in her 
 down. On April 19th he was appointed in- cruises and engagements at the battle of Fort 
 •spector of the first lighthouse district, extending Fisher. After the fall of Wilmington, he took 
 from the northeastern boundary of South Car- part in the defence of Drewry's Bluff, on the 
 ■olina to St. Augustine, from which he was de- James River, and was paroled at Appomattox 
 tacbed on July 13th, and ordered to report to Court House. In 1869 he removed to Calif ornia, 
 ■Commander L. Rousseau at New Orleans In and in August, 1866, was appointed postmaster 
 August he was engaged in transporting guns at Rio Vista, in that State. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 689 
 
 TURRBTMEN. 
 
 S. M. Roof, Capt. C. S. A., Vol., in charge : A. D. Jean, Sergt. Bottle 
 and Stdphur : O. Haekabon, C. Backman, M. B. Buff, C. Blackwell, P. P. 
 Clarke. Cleavemen, Bottles and Sulphur : J. J. Chanus, J.J. Dooley, H. H. 
 Bankman, J. K. Dooley. Wedge and Hammermen : B. E. Gabell, S. 
 Gregores, J. A. Gregores, E. Human. Sailmen, Bottles and Sulphur : Paul 
 Hutts, S. M. Hutts, A. Howard, J. Hook, W. Leach. 
 Hatch and Ventilator Men. 
 
 J. J. Hook, Lieut. C. 8. A., Vol., in charge ; D. 8. Griflath, Corporal. 
 Bottles and Sulphur : G. D. Lacombs, F. M. Mathios, 8. Miller, J. Mack, 
 M. Hutts. Tarpaulin, Hammer and Nails : 8. B. Parr, H. Pool, J. Pool. 
 
 8EAMBN. 
 
 John Berry, with grapline; John Cronan, with grapline. 
 
 There were on this one steamer 46 men assigned to the 
 work outlined in Secretary Mallory's instructions, and about 
 50 more. Lieut. Webb having been reinforced by a detach- 
 ment of sailors from Wilmington, they were distributed among 
 the spar-torpedo boats that were to assist in the undertaking. 
 Although it was under the supervision of Lieut. Webb, Lieut. 
 Dozier was personally charged with the execution of the pro- 
 ject. Webb addressed him a letter on March 23d, saying . 
 
 " You are selected in this important expedition to carry out the designs 
 of the Navy Department, and you will be careful to preserve order and 
 enforce strict obedience at all hazards. Be careful to select the coolest 
 and best men under your command to discharge the torpedoes; and should 
 the iron-clads pass the batteries, the first and main object is to destroy 
 them by means of torpedoes; failing in which you will immediately board 
 them, and carry into effect the programme herewith enclosed. ' You will 
 keep a vigilant watch upon your leader, and follow his motions. If you 
 do not gain a foothold upon the first iron-clad, you will sheer off, and at- 
 tack the next in order. After the first attack is made, confusion in some 
 degree may follow, when, I trust, your own judgment may be equal to the 
 contest." 
 
 In March, Flag-officer Ingraham was relieved by Com- 
 modore Tucker, who assumed command of the vessels afloat, 
 with his flag on board the Chicora, Com. Ingraham retaining 
 command of the station. On April 9th, Gen. Beauregard, Com. 
 Tucker and Lieut. Webb held a conference, and resolved that 
 the torpedo expedition should be put in motion at once. Ex- 
 ecutive officer Parker, of the Palmetto State, relates that on 
 the next day he was appointed by Tucker to command it, and 
 received an order on Webb for the boats, the attack to be made 
 on the night of the 10th, on the three monitors lying furthest 
 up in the channel. He selected six cutters with their officers 
 and crews, but later in the day changed the plan, because he 
 concluded it would be better to take all the torpedo boats and 
 attack the entire fleet of monitors. " Upon further reflection,'" 
 he wrote to Webb, " after the discussion with yourself and 
 Captain Tucker, I think it would be preferable to attack each, 
 of the enemy's iron-clads now inside the outer bar, with at least 
 two of your spar-torpedo row-boats, instead of the number 
 
 ^ The programme contained in Secretary Mallory's letter. 
 44 
 
690 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 already agreed upon. I believe it to be as easy to surprise at 
 the same time all the iron-clads as a part of them." 
 
 Beauregard's suggestions were that all the boats should 
 rendezvous on the first calm night at the mouth of the creek 
 in the rear of Cumming's Point, and coast along the beach of 
 Morris Island to a point nearest the enemy's position, where 
 Gen. Ripley would station a picket to show proper lights and 
 guide their return. Having reached the designate^ point of 
 the beach, they should form line of attack and place torpe- 
 does in position, and should attack by twos the New Ironsides 
 or any monitor they should encounter on their way out, an- 
 swering to the enemy's hail, " Boats on secret expedition," 
 or " Contrabands." After the attack each boat should make 
 for the nearest point on shore, where it could be stranded in 
 case of pursuit, or return to the Cumming's Point rendezvous. 
 
 The night of April 12th was fixed for the expedition, and 
 in the evening Capt. Parker had the ofiicers detailed for it in 
 conference with him in the cabin of the Stono, where written 
 orders were given that each commander must explode his tor- 
 pedo against a monitor before returning to Charleston. Fif- 
 teen boats were drawn up alongside the Stono with torpedoes 
 and the smothering devices, and the intention was to drop 
 down with the tide and reach the hostile fleet by midnight, 
 the moon not rising until 1 a. m. Everything was in readiness 
 for the start when Commodore Tucker came on board to an- 
 nounce that the monitors had left the bar, some going to Port 
 Royal for repairs and others to the North Edisto. It is prob- 
 able that some of them made a narrow escape from destruc- 
 tion; for, with the favoring conditions that prevailed, the 
 supposition may rationally be entertained that against a por- 
 tion of them the torpedoes or the apparatus for smothering 
 their crews would have prevailed. The officers and men of 
 the expedition, as a rule, were sanguine of some degree of 
 success, although Capt. Parker has since confessed that he 
 entertained many apprehensions because the boats were frail 
 and leaky and the crews inexperienced. But, granting that 
 these drawbacks existed, they more sharply define the intre- 
 pidity and zeal of the men who were ready to go to sea "in 
 half -swamped skiffs and canoes " to fiing themselves upon the 
 most powerful squadron afloat. 
 
 " The Ironsides was still with the blockaders, however," 
 writes the author of the '"Military Operations of Gen. Beau- 
 regard," "and as Gen. Beauregard looked upon her as our 
 most dangerous antagonist, he determined to strike her a 
 blow — destroy her, if possible — and so raise the blockade on 
 that occasion as to forbid all denial of the fact. Capt. Tucker 
 was again ready to execute Gen. Beauregard's plan, which 
 had assumed much larger proportions than heretofore; when, 
 at the eleventh hour, as it were, a telegram was received from 
 the Navy Department at Richmond ordering back to that city 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 691 
 
 the officers and men of the ' special expedition,' who had been 
 sent to aid in the defence of Charleston, and under whose 
 charge— our own iron-clad boats joining in — was to have been 
 placed that hazardous but very tempting enterprise. Gen. 
 Beauregard did all he could to retain their services, but with- 
 out success." 
 
 The project for the destruction of the iVew Jrojisides called 
 for four or five harbor steamers and blockade runners, each 
 to tow four torpedo-boats, and to be followed by the Palmetto 
 State and Chicora. So soon as the first line of steamers could 
 well distinguish the lights of the blockaders without them- 
 selves being seen, the torpedo-boats were to be cast loose — the 
 two first on the left, to attack the first light in that direction; 
 the next two the second light; the third two the third light, 
 and so on towards the right, thus using them as skirmishers 
 in battle. Immediately after their charge the gunboats were 
 to follow, making directly for the position of the New Iron- 
 sides, and sinking her as soon as practicable. The small boats 
 were to make for the nearest point of shore immediately after 
 their attack, and then retire to the protection of the forts, 
 while the Palmetto State and Chicora "will," said Beaure- 
 gard's orders, "remain outside long enough to effectually 
 raise the blockade in such a way that it cannot this time be 
 gainsaid;" but they were not to expose themselves to the mon- 
 itors if the latter should return to the bar. 
 
 Col. Eoman's assertion that this effort to break the block- 
 ade was defeated by an absolute recall of the special expedi- 
 tion is misleading when so broadly made, and without quali- 
 j&cation. On April 18th, five days after the issue of Beaure- 
 gard's instructions, Lieut. Webb notified Lieut. Dozier that he 
 (Webb) had been " authorized by the Secretary of the Navy to 
 turn the comniand over to him." Dozier informed Mr. Mallory 
 on the same day that he had assumed the command, and that 
 the expedition then consisted of eleven officers (most of whom 
 were inexperienced) and forty odd men fit for duty. He re- 
 quested that if the organization was to be kept up an older 
 and more experienced officer than himself should be put in 
 command. The expedition was evidently not dissolved, for 
 on the 21st Flag-officer Tucker ordered him to have the best of 
 his torpedo-boats prepared, and their crews organized for im- 
 mediate service, as "information just received renders it im- 
 portant that no time be lost." On the 25th, Tucker wrote to 
 Dozier, "the Secretary of the Navy having ordered the men 
 and officers of the special expedition to remain here, you will 
 take charge of it, and organize it as before." On May 8th, 
 Dozier was instructed by him to have four boats thoroughly 
 equipped and manned for torpedo service and supplied with 
 cooked provisions for three days for an expedition in charge 
 of Capt. Parker. On July 2d, eighteen sailors of the special 
 expedition, who had served under Lieut. Dozier since April 
 
693 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 24th, addressed him a petition that he would exert his influ- 
 ence to keep the small party together under his command, ' 
 they being perfectly satisfied as long as they remained under 
 him. "But," they continued, "we do not wish to be placed 
 with the Stono's crew. We have understood that we were 
 kept here for the purpose of manning the new torpedo-boat 
 which is now building, and it is our wish to be placed on. 
 board of her with you as our commander. We have submitted, 
 to the selection that was made when there was every pros- 
 pect of making money by running the blockade in the C. S. 
 steamer Stono. We were then satisfied to serve for the small 
 sum of money which was allowed us by the government, and 
 now that there is some hopes of this new boat being finished 
 pretty shortly, we earnestly solicit your influence as regards 
 keeping us together for that boat." 
 
 Indeed, the title and form of the special expedition sur- 
 vived all through the summer of 1863, and although its 
 original aim of destroying the monitors had been abandoned, 
 it was still relied upon as one of the potent safeguards of 
 Charleston. Thus, on Aug. 17th, Lieut. Dozier received- 
 orders from Com. Tucker to have everything under his com- 
 mand made ready for action without the least delay; the 
 torpedo steamers to be kept under banked fires and ready to 
 operate should the enemy run past Fort Sumter. A week 
 later he was again directed to have torpedo boats in readiness 
 alongside the Indian Chief, the receiving ship, and it was not 
 until Sept. that his men were distributed for general service 
 on the torpedo steamers and the gunboats. 
 
 The order of May 8th to Lieut. Dozier to have four torpedo- 
 boats equipped for immediate service was the result of a 
 reconnoissance of the monitors in the North Edisto River by 
 Capt. Parker,^ who, after surveying them in their positions, 
 made up his mind that they were vulnerable to a torpedo- 
 attack by way of Bohicket Creek. With Dozier's four boats 
 and one each from the Palmetto State and Chicora he 
 started from Charleston on the 10th in tow of an army tug for 
 a part of the route, which was to be up the Ashley River to 
 Wappoo Creek, through Wappoo Creek into the Stono, thence 
 to the Wardmelaw and into the North Edisto. Instead of 
 fastening the torpedo poles to the stems they were carried 
 about six feet below the keels of the boats, where they could 
 be let go by keys when it was desired to have them explode. 
 Lieut. W. T. Glassell was second in command. They reached 
 White Point on the North Edisto on the night of the 10th, and 
 the next day Gen. Hagood agreed to co-operate with his troops 
 in the movement. After nightfall the boats were rowed into 
 
 1 The signers were William Mothersead, Bart- ley, Wm. Smith, John Berry, Garret Hunt, Josialx 
 
 let A. Grimes, A. S. Speekins, AUf^ustua Eleison, Noble, Daniel Bummigan and Joseph Gosh. 
 William H. Clapdore, Henry D. Eggens, Peter S. 
 
 Evans, Noel Sames, Banister Dowdry, Tylor 2 " Recollections of a Naval Officer," by Capt. 
 
 Eobinson, Emmerson Walker, Thomas S Buck- Wm. Harwar Parker. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 693 
 
 Bohicket Creek, passing the monitors without being detected, 
 and the party hauled the boats under the bank and spent the 
 night in a deserted mansion. Soon after daybreak on the 13th, 
 Olassell's coxswain reported that one of his best men was 
 missing — •& man who had accompanied Glassell in the torpedo 
 movements in Charleston harbor and was thoroughly posted 
 on the arrangements. 
 
 Scouts were sent out and a picket who had occupied the 
 ■church steeple at Rockville during the night came in and re- 
 ported that about dawn he had seen a boat from one of the 
 monitors pull into the marsh and take a stake from it. "That 
 ' stake ' was our man," said Capt. Parker. " He had made a 
 straight wake for the fleet, waded through the marsh to the 
 water's edge, and waved his hat for a boat to take him on 
 board." 
 
 It was plainly indicated by the movements of the Federal 
 vessels that the deserter had revealed everything concerning 
 the expedition, ^ and as its success depended upon a surprise it 
 could be carried no further. Parker obtained wagons from 
 Gen. Hagood, and mounting his boats upon them, struck 
 across the country to the Stono River, where he launched the 
 boats and returned by Wappoo Creek to Charleston. 
 
 Many changes were taking place in the personnel of the 
 Charleston naval station, and between April 1863 and Sept. 1864, 
 the following officers were on duty on the ships or ashore : Com- 
 manders, T. T. Hunter, I. N. Brown, and James Henry Rochelle; 
 Lieuts. John Rutledge, A. F. Warley, George H. Bier, Philip 
 Porcher, W. G. Dozier, W. T. Glassell, E. C. Stockton, W. H. 
 Wall, Clarence L. Stanton, John Payne, Henry W. Raj', W. H. 
 Ward and C. H. Hasker ; Assist. Surgeons, W. M. Turner, J. P. 
 
 Lipscomb, A. M. Moff att, Henderson and Daniel E. Ewart ; 
 
 Chief Engineer, C. S. Tombs ; Engineers, Charles Levy, John 
 Tucker, Charles Tucker, Clark and W. F. Jones ; Mid- 
 shipmen, D. M. Lee, Palmer Saunders, Clarence Cary, John 
 Waller, T. J. Phelps, J. Thomas Scharf, Roger Pinkney, C. F. 
 
 Sevier, and Williams ; Lieut, of Marines, A. S. Berry ; 
 
 Flag-officer's Secretary, Edward West. In addition to the 
 , Chicora and Palmetto State, the squadron embraced the Torch, 
 an unfinished vessel fashioned after the order of the rams, but 
 never iron-plated, and but little used owing to some fault of 
 ■construction. ^ The Stono and the Juno were doing guard-boat 
 duty, from which they were relieved in order to run the block- 
 ade with cargoes of cotton on account of the Confederate 
 government. The Stono, under command of Com. James Henry 
 Rochelle, sailed from Charleston for Nassau on this errand on 
 
 1 Capt. (now Eear Admiral) Amnien "was the 2 This information concerning the Torch is 
 
 «euior officer at the ^orth Edisto. To Capt. contained in a communication from Lieut. Clar- 
 
 ^arker, after the war, he stated that the de- CTice L. Stanton to theauthor. The name 01' the 
 
 ^erter had given Mm very accurate information vessel does not appear in any official record of 
 
 of the programme of the torpedo expedition. operations around Charleston. 
 
694 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the night of June 5th, 1863, but having nothing with which, 
 to make steam except soft coal and coke, she was soon dis- 
 covered by the blockading squadron on account of the sparks 
 which rolled from her smoke-stack. Rochelle endeavored to 
 regain Charleston harbor, but the pilot of the steamer ran her 
 on the breakwater ledge of rocks near Fort Moultrie. It was 
 found impossible to get the vessel off and she went to pieces 
 on the reef, but by Rochelle's promptitude and energy every- 
 thing on board was saved. 
 
 Some time in the autumn of 3 863 the Juno ran the block- 
 ade, also bound for Nassau with cotton, but foundered the day 
 after leaving port, and all hands except Pilot Payne and a 
 fireman were lost. After being adrift in a small boat 48 hours, 
 the two survivors were picked up by an English vessel and 
 taken to Liverpool. Among the officers lost were Lieut. Philip 
 Porcher, who was in conimand, and Engineer Charles Tucker, 
 son of Flag-officer Tucker. The crew and officers of the Juno 
 were volunteers from the fleet. 
 
 On July 6th Dahlgren relieved Dupont in command of the 
 Federal naval forces off Charleston ; his iron-clads returned to 
 the bar on the 10th, and then began that long and terrible 
 siege of the defences and of the city by the navy and army 
 that was in itself fruitless, and that only terminated when 
 General Sherman entered it by the back door late in February, 
 1865. 
 
 Naturally the thoughts of Beauregard turned toward an 
 attack on the monitors by the Confederate iron-clads and tor- 
 pedo boats, during the severe attack on Forts Wagner and 
 Gregg. On July 18th he wrote to Com. Tucker: 
 
 " I believe it to be my duty to acquaint you -with the fact that I con- 
 sider it of the utmost importance to the defence of the works at the en- 
 trance of the harbor that some effort should be made to sink either the 
 Ironsidesov one of the monitors now attacking the works on Morris Island, 
 not only because of the diminution thus effected in the enemy's means of 
 offence, but because of the great moral effect that would inevitably result 
 from such an occurrence. The stake is manifestly a great one, worthy of 
 so small a risk. For its accomplishment, one vessel such as fh&Juno, pro- 
 vided with the spar-torpedo, with two or three officers and a few men, it 
 is believed would be as effective at night for the end in view as a flotilla 
 of vessels so arranged of the same class. " 
 
 The Juno was not available at the moment for the purpose 
 for which Beauregard had designated her, and Tucker replied 
 that in any event he could be of no assistance, owing to the- 
 excessive draft of his iron-clads, their low speed and the short 
 range of their guns, which could not be sufficiently elevated 
 because of the small size of the port-holes. The project rested 
 for a brief space of time, and in the meanwhile a spirited af- 
 fair took place, on Aug. 7th, in the creek between James and 
 Morris Island, that resulted in the capture of a Federal barg& 
 and its crew. For several nights it was known that the enemy 
 had been posting pickets in the marsh for the purpose of 
 
THE CONPEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 695 
 
 observing Confederate movements at Oumming's Point and 
 giving notice to Gillmore's batteries when to open fire on the 
 transports conveying the reliefs to Fort Wagner. An expedi- 
 tion was formed to drive off or capture these pickets, and on 
 the night of Aug. 7th Lieuts. A. F. Warley and John Payne 
 started off with two boats' crews of men from the Chicora and 
 Palmetto State. They were met below Fort Johnson by Capt. 
 Sellers of the 25th S. C. regiment, with two boats and a de- 
 tachment of thirty men, and the combined force went into the 
 creek, where it was soon sharply engaged with the Federals. 
 An exhilarating skirmish ensued, the result of which was that 
 one of the Federal boats made off and the other was captured 
 by Payne and Warley. Lieut. Payne found that he had made 
 a prisoner of Master John Haynes, of the U. S. navy, with 
 whom were taken a sergeant and ten men. Two of the enemy 
 were killed and five wounded in this affair. 
 
 On the following night, Aug. 8th, Commodore Tucker 
 went on board the Juno and ordered Lieut. Porcher to set out 
 on a reconnoitering tour of the harbor. Porcher had ten of 
 his crew armed with rifles, and their instructions were to fire 
 upon any of the Federal picket boats that might be encoun- 
 tered. Steaming cautiously along below Morris Island the 
 Juno came upon and took by surprise the first launch of the 
 frigate Wabash, which had on board a crew of twenty-three 
 men and a twelve-pounder howitzer, while the steamer was 
 unarmed save for her riflemen, her two guns having been re- 
 moved when she was put in trim for a blockade-runner. Por- 
 cher did not hesitate for that reason, but ran down the launch, 
 and his onslaught was so swift and sudden that the crew at- 
 tempted no defence. A dozen threw themselves into the sea; 
 five were drowned and seven swam to other picket boats, 
 by which they were rescued. The remainder surrendered and 
 Porcher took possession of the launch and brought eleven 
 prisoners to Charleston. He was highly complimented by 
 Flag-officer Tucker, and the fine launch and her gun came into 
 good use against their former owners. ' 
 
 These naval pastimes soon gave way to naore serious busi- 
 ness. Most of the boat expeditions and scouting parties had 
 been sent out with a view to discovering the possibilities of a 
 torpedo attack upon the New Ironsides, which was niore trou- 
 blesome to Fort Wagner than all the monitors combined, her 
 quick-firing broadsides of 11-inch shell guns being far more 
 annoying than the slow discharges from the turret vessels. 
 As she laid usually about 1,000 or 1,300 yards from the Morris 
 Island beach and well out into the main ship channel, and the 
 
 1 Admiral Dahlgren complained to Gen. Beau- from information received from tUe C. S. naval 
 regard that the men of the launch were fired ofttcer in command at the time, that the men 
 upon from the Jwno while they were struggling were not fired at in the water. 1 highly appre- 
 in the water. The communication having heen ciate your desire to conduct the war upon civil- 
 referred to Commodore Tucker, he replied to ized principles, and it affords me great pleasure 
 Dahlgren : " I am happy to he able to state, to join in so laudable a desire." 
 
C'.IG THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Federals had not yet learned the caution of protection against 
 torpedoes by booms and nettings, the provocation to blow her 
 up was irresistible to the experts, who, as Capt. Parker says 
 of Commodore Tucker and himself, " had torpedo on the 
 brain.'" None of the torpedo steamers which Maj. Lee was 
 constructing had been completed; but by authority of Secre- 
 tary Mallory he obtained the transfer of an unfinished hull on 
 the stocks at Charleston, which was designed for a gunboat, 
 or rather floating battery, as she was not arranged for any 
 motive power, but was intended to be anchored in position. 
 In a report to Gen. Beauregard, he said that he completed this 
 hull and placed in it a second-hand and much- worn engine 
 that he obtained in Savannah. Despite her tub-like model and 
 the inefficiency of her engine, Capt. Carlin, master of the 
 blockade-runner Ella and Annie, took charge of her in an 
 attack against the New Ironsides on the night of August 31st. 
 Besides a few seamen, he had with him eight men of the First 
 Regt. S. C. Art'y, who had offered to go along to protect the 
 boat from an assault by the Federal picket launches, which 
 swarmed thick in the lower harbor. The steamer was in such 
 bad order that she could only be kept afloat by bailing as she 
 moved out to the Federal anchorage. She was furnished with 
 a spar designed to carry three torpedoes of 100 pounds each. 
 The lateral spars suggested by Beauregard Capt. Carlin de- 
 clined to use, as they would interfere very seriously with the 
 movements of the vessel, which, even without them, could 
 with the utmost difficulty stem the current. The boat was 
 almost entirely submerged, and painted gray like the block- 
 ade-runners, and, like them, made no smoke by burning an- 
 thracite coal. The niglit selected for the attack was very 
 dark, and the New Ironsides was not seen until quite near. 
 Capt. Carlin immediately made for her, but her side being 
 oblique to the direction of his approach, he ordered his steers- 
 man, who was below deck, to change the course. This order 
 was misunderstood, and, in place of going ''bow on" as was 
 proposed, she ran alongside of the Neiv Ironsides and entan- 
 gled her spar in the anchor chain of that vessel. In attempting 
 to back, the engine hung on tlie centre, and some delay oc- 
 curred before it was pried off. During this critical period, 
 Capt. Carlin, in answer to threats and inquiries, declared his 
 boat to be the Live Yankee, from Port Royal, with dispatches 
 for the admiral. This deception was not discovered until after 
 Carlin had backed out and his vessel was lost in the dark- 
 ness. ' 
 
 Little has been said of the part that the squadron took in 
 the defence of Wagner, but to the share of its officers and men 
 fell much labor that was difficult and dangerous while holding 
 
 1 The Nev) Ironsides was incapacitated from is related elsewhere iu the Chapter on Tor- 
 sharing in future movementB against the Con- pedoes. The hlowiug np of the Housatonic 
 federate defences by an attack made upon by a torpedo is also described in the same 
 her by Lieutenant William T. Glassell, which chapter. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 697 
 
 •out no prospect of decisive battle or glory. As the siege grew 
 hotter the commands on duty in the fort were relieved every 
 three daya by fresh troops brought down in boats through 
 Vincent's Creek, on the north side of the island; and this con- 
 stant changing of the garrison, together with the necessity of 
 conveying provisions, ammunition and even potable water to 
 the post and bringing off the wounded, established what might 
 be almost called a ferriage line on the creek. But it was a 
 ferry operated in the hours of the night and in the presence of 
 imminent peril by the naval force detached from the Confeder- 
 ate vessels. A flotilla of Federal launches scoured the waters 
 as close as they dare go to the batteries, and signals were ar- 
 ranged by which they could direct the fire of their ships upon 
 any indicated point. As early as July 30th, they secured the 
 range of Cumming's Point, on which they threw shells each 
 night. Previously the light-draft Confederate steamers could 
 run in on that edge of tlie island, but when it was closed to 
 them the only means of communication was by row-boats 
 across the creek, and at this work the sailors and their com- 
 manders toiled until Wagner was evacuated. They were equal 
 to the demand upon them, and they never lost a man except 
 on the night of August 4th, when a small boat conveying 
 Major W. F. Warley, a wounded officer of the Second S. O. 
 Art'y, to Charleston, was captured by a Federal launch belong- 
 ing to a flotilla that was attempting an attack by surprise on 
 Battery Gregg. The prize, however, was not worth what it 
 cost the enemy, for the firing upon the boat aroused the gar- 
 rison of Gregg and defeated the object of the expedition. Idle- 
 ness was enforced upon the Confederate iron-clads during the 
 siege, as to pit them against the Federal fleet would have been 
 only to throw them away; but as we have already seen the tor- 
 pedo service was busy. A loss that occui-red was that of the little 
 steamer Sumter, which in passing Sullivan's Island was sunk 
 by the batteries there in the belief that she was a hostile vessel. 
 She was then transporting troops for Morris Island to the city, 
 and by the blunder five men were killed, others wounded and 
 twenty drowned, while some 600 were saved by the navy 
 barges. 
 
 Heroic endurance was all that remained to the besieged 
 at Battery Wagner. Even a sortie toward the enemy was de- 
 nied them, for an ingenious system of torpedo mines, to be 
 exploded by the tread of persons walking over them, had been 
 established by the Confederates in the narrow causeway on 
 that side of the fort. Soon after dark, on the night of Sept. 5th, 
 the Federal sappers had pushed around the east and south 
 front so as to completely mask the guns. The long and heavy 
 bombardment had so torn and cut down both scarp and 
 -counterscarp as to render the mounting of the parapets by a 
 storming party comparatively easy. Powerful calcium lights, 
 placed on monitors at a safe distance abreast the fort, turned 
 
698 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 night into day, blinding the defenders, giving light to the 
 sappers, and enabling the Federal artillerists and sharp- 
 shooters to fire with as much precision as in broad sunshine. 
 That night they again moved to the attack of Battery Gregg- 
 by boats, but were beaten off by its guns. This was the last 
 of the Confederate triumphs on Morris Island, which had been 
 held for fifty-seven days under the furious cannonade. On 
 the 6th. Col. L. M. Keith, then in command at Wagner, in- 
 formed Beauregard that the garrison would be sacrificed un- 
 less boats were sent to take them away that night, and the 
 latter gave minute instructions for the evacuation of Morris- 
 Island, to effect which the services of the navy were called into 
 such important requisition that to it is mainly due the proper 
 execution of the movement. The Chicora and Palmetto State- 
 took up positions just after dark near Fort Sumter, their guns- 
 bearing on Cumming's Point and to the eastward of it. Trans- 
 port steamers were stationed as near Cumming's Point as pru- 
 dence would permit, to receive the men from the small boats- 
 in which they were to leave the island. There were forty of 
 these boats, manned by oarsmen from the squadron, the whole- 
 commanded by Lieut. Ward, C. S. N., with whom were asso- 
 ciated Lieut. Clarence L. Stanton, Lieut. Charles H. Hasker, 
 Lieut. Odenheimer, Midshipman D. M. Lee, and other officers. 
 Immediately after dark the movement was begun, and was- 
 made quietly and in admirable order, the majority of the men 
 being under the impression that they were about to be relieved, 
 as usual, after having served their turn of duty in the fort. 
 They embraced details of the 35th S. C. regt., 37th Georgia, 
 38th Georgia, and 1st S. C. As soon as the infantry had left 
 Cumming's Point, Capt. H. R. Lesesne, commanding Battery 
 Gregg, spiked his guns and embarked his men. Capt. T. A. 
 Huguenin, of the 1st S. C, was left to remain in Wagner for 
 a short time with twenty-five men to keep up a slow fire to- 
 deceive the enemy while the embarkation was going on, and 
 to lay the train to burst the 10-inch gun and blow up the mag- 
 azine. Capt. Lesesne was to make the preparations for a simi- 
 lar explosion at Gregg, and finding that his fuse was burning- 
 more rapidly than he calculated, he re-entered the magazine 
 and cut off the lighted end, so as to give time for the arrival 
 of Huguenin with the rear-guard from Fort Wagner; and 
 when they were seen approaching he relit it, as it had been in- 
 tended that the two explosions should be as nearly simultane- 
 ous as they could be. The whole party, except Capt. Hugue- 
 nin, who had fallen to the rear with a wound in his knee, then- 
 embarked in the boat commanded by Lieut. Odenheimer. 
 About- this time the Federal barges were swarming around 
 Cumming's Point and commanded the adjacent waters, and 
 Lieut. Odenheimer put boldly out to sea under the fire of their 
 boat howitzers. As they skirted the beach they were hailed 
 by Capt. Huguenin, who waded out to his armpits, and was 
 
THE CONFEDEPATE STATES NAVY. 69^ 
 
 drawn into the boat by one of Odenheimer's men. The Fed- 
 erals threw grape and canister hot and quick at the boats and 
 captured two, one of which was commanded by Lieut. Hasker, 
 and made prisoners also of nineteen of the seamen and twenty- 
 seven soldiers. Lieut. Stanton's boat returned in the direction 
 of the enemy under a heavy fire and rescued John Brown, a 
 seaman from the Chicora, who had jumped overboard from 
 one of the captured boats. 
 
 Under all the circumstances of difficulty and peril which 
 attended the evacuation in the face of an overwhelming numer- 
 ical force it was wonderfully well done. " The operation," 
 Beauregard had said in his order, " is one of the most delicate 
 ever attempted in war ; coolness, resolute courage, and judg- 
 ment and inflexibility on the part of officers, obedience to orders- 
 and a constant sense of the necessity for silence on the part of the 
 raen.areessentialforcomplete success and the credit whichmust- 
 attach to those who deserve it." " To the admirable discipline 
 of the crews of the barges," wrote Maj. Gilchrist, '"is mainly due 
 the success of the embarkation. Their boats kept abreast, with 
 the length of an oar from the gunwale to the blade separating 
 them. The oars thus interlocked never touched or interfered 
 with each other. As each detachment left, other boats grounded 
 on the beach to receive their load, and thus silently and 
 without confusion the embarkation was accomplished." 
 
 Fort Sumter having been converted into an infantry- 
 post, and mounting but a single gun. Major Stephen Elliott 
 was placed in command of it with 200 troops, and Com. 
 Tucker stationed his iron-clads between Sullivan's Island and- 
 the fort for the purpose of assisting to protect the latter, and 
 dispute the passage of Dahlgren's fleet into the harbor. On, 
 September 7th the Federal admiral summoned Sumter to- 
 capitulate and received the reply, " come and take it." He and. 
 General Gillmore were then meditating an assault upon it f ronx 
 small boats, laboring under the false impression that there 
 would be little trouble in seizing it since its artillery fire had 
 ceased, and after he was so peremptorily answered by Elliott- 
 he communicated with Gillmore by signals, and announced 
 the attack for the night of September 8th. The Confederate- 
 signal officers were able to interpret these signals and Elliott 
 was saved a surprise. ' 
 
 About 2 o'clock on the afternoon of the 8th, Lieut. 
 Clarence L. Stanton was officer of the deck of the Chicora. A 
 signal officer named Daniels stood near him and was watch- 
 ing some signalling being made from Dahlgren's flag-ship. 
 
 1 This knowledge of tlie Federal code was ob- a study of tlie signal flags taken from the wreck or 
 
 lained by shrewd strategy. A trap was laid for the K&okuk, and by some adroit qiTestiouing he 
 
 one of their signal pickets in the Florida district, drew all the essential secrets of the code out of his 
 
 and he was captured and brought to Charleston. quondam comrade, and soon was as familiar with 
 
 In confinement with him was placed Capt. Pliny tbemaa any Federal ofl&cer. TbeConfederatesig- 
 
 .Bryan, Assist. Adjt. Gen. on Beauregard's staff, nal service men were taught Wie system andwere= 
 
 disguised in the Federal uniform, and passing able to read any of the messages that passed be- 
 
 -himself off as a prisoner. Capt. Bi-yan had made tween the ships or between tbem and the sliore.- 
 
700 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Turning suddenly to Stanton, he said: "Fort Sumter will be 
 attacked to-night." "How do you know?" asked Stanton. 
 " I have just read," he replied, "a message from the flag-ship 
 for a boat from each ship, commanded by a lieutenant, to 
 assemble at the flag-ship at 10 o'clock for such an attack." 
 Stanton reported the information to Com. Tucker, who in turn 
 transmitted it to Gen. Beauregard, and effective preparations 
 were made to repel the assault. With the single exception of 
 the fiasco of their second attempt to carry Fort Wagner by 
 storm, it was the most mortifying defeat which the Federals 
 had suffered in Charleston waters. They approached the fort 
 about 10 o'clock on the morning of the 9th in five divisions of 
 boats containing in all about 450 or 600 sailors and marines, 
 whom Admiral Dahlgren says were picked men. Com. T. H. 
 Stevens was in command, and Lieut. Com. E. P. Williams, 
 Lieuts. Remey, Preston and Higginsonand Ensign Craven had 
 charge of the respective divisions. Coming on in gallant 
 style, the boats were beached and the assailants sought modes 
 of entrance to the fort on the southern and southeastern faces. 
 Then the hitherto silent sand-heap blazed with the fire of 
 musketry and hand grenades, while the Chicora from a few 
 hundred yards' distance poured in canister and shrapnel, and 
 Fort Johnson and the Sullivan's Island batteries swept the 
 narrow beach on which the landing had been made. It was 
 an understanding between the Confederate commanders that 
 they should not spring the trap until the mice had walked 
 into it, and their agreement could not have been more suc- 
 cessfully executed. Not even Dahlgren's "picked men" 
 could endure the withering cross-fire that struck at them in 
 front and on both flanks. " The enemy," says the report of 
 Lieut. Com. Williams, "sunk or disabled all iny boats by shot 
 or by bricks thrown from the walls. Finding it impossible to 
 get over the walls, I ordered the men to shelter themselves in 
 the holes made by our shells. The enemj^ kept up a constant 
 fire on us, throwing hand-grenades, bricks, fire-balls, and 
 other missiles amongst us. Hoping something might be done 
 for our relief, I would not surrender, but some of the men 
 from Lieut. Bradford's boat, behaving been mortally wounded 
 in landing, surrendered, and were ordered around on the left 
 to come into the fort. I stopped these and ordered them 
 under the walls. Soon finding I was only losing my men 
 without gaining anything, on a consultation with the officers 
 I surrendered, and was shown inside the fort, where we were 
 courteously treated by Maj. Elliott." 
 
 By the quickness of the Federals in taking shelter close 
 under the walls of Sumter they lost only three men killed, but 
 Elliott made prisoners of thirteen officers and 102 men and 
 captured four boats and three stands of colors. One of the 
 flags was that which had been hoisted on Sumter in 1861 by 
 Maj. Anderson, and which he had taken to New York with 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 701 
 
 him after the evacuation, where it had excited the utmost en- 
 thusiasm and been a powerful stimulus of the war fever. It 
 had been intrusted to the boat expedition in expectation that 
 they would replace it where it had once waved. 
 
 On Sept. 10th, Lieut. James H. Rochelle, C. S. N., arrived 
 from Richmond with 130 officers and men, who were ordered 
 to Charleston for harbor service, and reported to Commodore 
 Tucker. Two days later all row-boats, barges, etc., not re- 
 quired for military purposes, were turned over by Gen. Ripley 
 to Lieut. Rochelle to be used for transportation and guard duty 
 in the harbor. On Oct. 30th, orders were issued to Tucker, 
 Ripley and Gen. Hagood to arrange with Maj. Elliott some 
 signal, which, when given by the latter, would notify the iron- 
 clads and the batteries on Sullivan and James Islands to 
 sweep with their fire every point of approach to Fort Sumter, 
 the bombardment of which was steadily kept up. There were 
 apprehensions at the time of a concerted attack upon the de- 
 fences of Charleston by the Federal fleet and army, and 
 Tucker's squadron took positions that would enable them to 
 command the face of James Island. In case the enemy's iron- 
 clads should endeavor to remove the obstructions between 
 Sumter and Moultrie, the Chicora and Palmetto State were to 
 assail them from the vicinity of Fort Sumter, and if they at- 
 tempted to run into the harbor. Tucker was to meet them in 
 the rear of the second line of defence. They did not, however, 
 make the expected movement, and for the remainder of the 
 year one of the few incidents that broke the monotony of the 
 siege was Gen. Gillmore's effort on the night of Nov. 19th to 
 surprise and capture Sumter. He sent in some 300 men in 
 barges, and Dahlgren had an additional force of some 200 
 sailors in boats upon the scene, but they were discovered when 
 within 300 yards of the fort and made off under a fire which 
 wounded a few of their men. ' 
 
 After nightfall on Feb. 26th, 1864, the first cutter of the 
 Federal steamer Nipsic, under command of Acting Master's 
 Mate J. H. Kitching, was on picket about 150 yards from 
 Fort Sumter, where it was discovered by a barge from the 
 Palmetto State. The officer in charge of the Confederate boat 
 brought the enemy within his reach, by a series of hails that 
 led the latter to suppose that it was one of his own launches, 
 and then opened a fire which almost instantly compelled him 
 to surrender. Kitching and five men of his crew were taken 
 prisoners. Lieut. G. C. Wiltse, of the monitor Montauk, was^ 
 in the immediate vicinity with another armed Federal boat, 
 but refrained from going to the assistance of Kitching. 
 
 Early in 1864, the new iron-clad, Charleston, was added to 
 the Confederate squadron, and Com. Tucker transferred his 
 flag to her from the Chicora, She was commanded by Com. 
 
 ^ Dahlgren wrote in Ms journal that the approached, by the barking of a dog that was 
 garrison of Sunater were aroused, as the boats in the fort. 
 
702 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Isaac N. Brown ; Com. Thomas T. Hunter was assigned to the 
 Chicora, and Com. James H. Rochelle to the Palmetto State, * 
 
 On March 23d, a boat party of Federals that endeavored 
 to cut out the steamer Little Ada, in the Suwanee River, 
 near McClellanville, were iiandsomely repulsed by her own 
 men, aided by a body of troops on shore. The enemy, who 
 were under the command of Acting Master E. H. Sheffield, of 
 Ihe Winona, were allowed to come on board the steamer, 
 which they found deserted by her crew; but while they were 
 ■endeavouring to raise steam in her boilers, with the view of 
 ■carrying her off, the crew and a small company of artillerists 
 xirove them off with a sharp fire from a masked battery of 
 three field-pieces on the adjacent bank. 
 
 On July 4th, 1864, the Confederate naval force was engaged 
 in repelling the attack of the Federals upon Fort Johnson and 
 Battery Simkins, on James Island. Early in the morning the 
 127th N. Y. reg't, the 52d Penn., and a detachment of sixty 
 men from the 3d R. I. artillery, all under the command of Col. 
 William Gurney, embarked in boats from Morris Island with 
 the expectation of taking these Confederate positions by sur- 
 prise. Misadventure attended the undertaking from the start. 
 Judge Cowley, who has written a clear narrative of the event, 
 says that Col. Gurney, without the knowledge of his command, 
 remained on Morris Island, and in his absence the command 
 devolved upon Col. Hoyt, of the Penn. regiment, who, how- 
 ever, seems not to have been aware of the fact. He was sep- 
 arated from his command and taken prisoner. Lieut. Col. 
 Conyngham, then the senior officer of the Federals, looked 
 -about for Hoyt, and became a prisoner himself. *' Then," says 
 -Judge Cowley, ''ensued confusion, baffiing description. One 
 
 1 James Henry Eochelle was appointed an act- he resigned his commission April 17th, 1861, 
 ing midshipman in the tJ. S. navy September while his ship was at the Norfolk navy-yard. 
 ■9th, 1841, and after six months' service at sea While awaiting the action of the department 
 received a warrant as midshipman, bearing the upon his resignation he was placed in a very 
 .-same date as his actinR appointment. During painful position by the false alarm of an attack 
 the war with Mexico he sewed on the sloops-of- on the navy-yard by the Virginia forces. ■' I 
 war Falmouth and Decatur in the Gulf, and took had resolved," Capt. Rochelle writes " that I was 
 ■part in the capture of Tuxpan and Tabasco. He bound to obey the command of the Virginia 
 reported to the Naval Academy November 13th, Convention and leave the navy of the United 
 1847, and graduated on July 10th, 1848, his war- States, and here was the probability of myhav- 
 rant as passed midshipman assigning bim that ing to do the very thing I had resigned my com- 
 rank from August 10th, 1847. After duty in the mission to escape from doing. I cannot say, 
 Mediterranean squadron on the frigate Constiiu- however, that the situation caused any hesita- 
 .twn, steamer Alleghany, steamer Princeton and tion on my part. As long as I was on duty as a 
 frigate /ndeppnticnce, he was ordered to the store- lieutenant in the U. S. navy I was fully deter- 
 ehip Southampton, which formed part of Com- mined to do that duty, and in case of necessity 
 dore Perry's expedition to Japan in 1863. On woiild have stood to my guns." To be relieved 
 his return to the United States he was assigned from this embarrasflingposition,he obtained per- 
 to the coast survey, and on the steamer Corwin mission from Flag-ofBcer Pendergrast to leave 
 and schooner Madison, the latter of which was the Cumberlaiid, and on May 2d was appointed 
 for some time in his charge, assisted in thesur- lieutenant in the Virginia navy, and on the 29th 
 Tey of the New York Harbor, Casco Bay and was ordered to command the gunboat Teaser. His 
 ITlorida Reef. On September 14th. 1855, he was commission as lieutenant in the 0. S. navy was 
 promoted to master, and ou the next day was issued June 6th, and until June 27th he corn- 
 commissioned lieutenant. He was assigned to manded tUe gunboat Jacfcsow at Memphis, when 
 the steamer Southern Star in the Paraguay expe- he was ordered to the Patrick Hefnry, then fitting 
 ■dition, commanded by Flag-officer W. B. Shu- out at Richmond, as executive of&cer. He par- 
 iDrick, and was on the steam-frigate i^Wwi when ticipated in the subsequent operations of the 
 .she was wrecked on the coast of Florida. His James River squadron, including the battle of 
 final service in the U. 8. navy was on the sloop- Hampton Roads and the repulse of the Federal 
 ^ot^^ff^v Cumbm-land in the home squadron, and vessels at Drewry's Bluflf, shortly afterwhich he 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 703 
 
 company of the N. Y. regiment, and the R. L artillerymen 
 landed unobserved within fifty yards of Fort Johnson. They 
 were soon discovered by the garrison, but upon one volley be- 
 ing fired, some officer gave the order to retreat to the boats, 
 and thus this opportunity to capture these important works 
 was lost. The Confederate force then on James Island was 
 small, some reports putting it as low as 150. Our loss in killed, 
 wounded and captured must have exceeded the whole number 
 of men in the two forts assailed; for we lost 137 enlisted men 
 and six officers." 
 
 It is well to place stress upon this Federal account of an 
 affair to which they attached so much importance, for the 
 garrison in Fort Johnson principally consisted of men from 
 Com. Tucker's squadron, and it was this little band that poured 
 in the fire that demoralized the Federals. It was one of their 
 very many achievements in the vicinity of Charleston, in con- 
 nection with which they have heretofore escaped mention, but 
 for which other branches of the service received the honors. 
 The remark becomes wearying that the absence of Confede- 
 rate records consigns to oblivion the names of the sailors who 
 did one or the other gallant thing, but the repulse of the as- 
 sault upon Fort Johnson was so brilliant an exploit, that it is 
 a marked misfortune that the men who accomplished it must 
 remain anonymous. On the part of the enemy, the movement 
 was most shrewdly planned by Gen. Schimmelf.ennig, and if it 
 had succeeded might have decided the fate of Charleston then, 
 as Admiral Dahlgren reported to Secretary Welles. The salva- 
 tion of Fort Johnson depended that morning on the steadiness 
 of the handful of seamen and their officers in its garrison, 
 and they were worthy of the reliance placed upon them. ' 
 
 "waa transferred to the command of the gunboat member and for a time president of the Com- 
 
 ^ans&mtmd, and thence to the steamer Stono, mission. During hia sojourn in Peru they sur- 
 
 "which was preparing to run the blockade at veyed 3,393 statute pailes of the courses of the 
 
 ■Charleston. The jS'iono was discovered by the Fed- Amazon and Meayali Rivers and their affluents. 
 
 «ral8 in the bay and in attempting to regain the They encountered many hardships, and were 
 
 -city was wrecked on the rocka near Fort Moultrie, much annoyed by the Indians, who on two occa- 
 
 June 5th, 1863. Resuming command of the sions attacked them with considerable spirit. 
 
 Nansemond, Oapt. Rochelle continued on the In the autumn of 1874 Captain Rochelle was 
 
 James River until September 6th, when he was ordered to New York to assist Commodore 
 
 sent to Charleston to organize the flotilla of John R. Tucker, President of the Commission, 
 
 £uard-boat8. On April 2d, 1864, he was ordered in the preparation for publication of charts 
 
 to the command of the iron-clad Palmetto State, of the surveys, but the financial troubles of 
 
 Temaining on that duty until the evacuation of Peru, then nearing her war with Chili, stopped 
 
 Charleston, when he was dispatched to Wil- the work, and in April, 1877, the Commission 
 
 ^nington in command of a detachment of about was dissolved. Since then Captain Rochelle has 
 
 300 officers and men of tbe Charleston squadron, resided in his Virginia home and has held no 
 
 ■and co-operated with the army in the defence of public position except that of honorary com- 
 
 that city. From Wilmington he was ordered to mander of the Southampton Camp of Confed- 
 
 Teport at Richmond as commandant of the erate veterans 
 midshipmen of the C. S. naval school, and after 
 
 the evacuation guarded the specie and bullion of i Lieut. Wm. G. Dozier on August 26th received 
 
 "the treasury to its transfer to the army at Ab- the followingfrom Flag-officer Hunter: "I have 
 
 "beville. 8. C. When paroled after the downfall received a letter from Major Gen. Sam Jones, 
 
 of the Confederacy he remained at hia home in commanding the Department of South Carolina, 
 
 Southampton Co., Va., until June 19th. 1871, Geoj^ia and Florida, in which he expresses his 
 
 ■when he accepted a position tendered him by high appreciation of the services rendered by 
 
 the government of Peru as a member of the the naval battalion under your command during 
 
 Peruvian Hydrographical Commission of the the recent military operations on James Island, 
 
 Amazon. He joined the Commission at Ignitos, and it affords me great pleasure to inform you 
 
 I'eni, and was employed in surveying the upper of it, and request that you will communicate it 
 
 Amazon River and its tributaries. He was senior to the command." 
 
704 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Other engagements occurred about the same time in 
 whicii the Confederate navy grasped at the opportunities to 
 distinguish itself. On June 20th Dahlgren was notified that 
 the Confederates were preparing for a simultaneous movement 
 on the blockade inside and outside in order to cover the exit of 
 a large quantity of cotton, and sent two of his cruisers to the 
 vicinity of Port Royal, where his lines were weakest. At the 
 same time he arranged with Gen. Foster for a combined army 
 and navy movement into the Stono, and to cut the Charleston 
 and Savannah railroad, in order to prevent the movement of 
 Confederate troops by that route. Foster, Schimmelfennig 
 and Hatch were to land with 7,000 men, and Gen. Birney, with 
 3,000 more, was to go up the North Edisto and destroy the rail- 
 way. Dahlgren accompanied them on July 2d with the moni- 
 tors Lehigh and Montauk, and the gunboats Pawnee, 
 McDonough and Racer, while the gunboats Dai Ching, Waiu- 
 sutta and Geranium were sent into the North Edisto to help 
 Birney. The latter, however, was driven back after some 
 desultory fighting, and on the 4th the whole force of 10,000 
 men, with the monitors, gunboats and mortar-schooners, wa& 
 assembled in the Stono, the troops being in position on John's 
 Island. It was determined to make an attack from this 
 direction on the Confederate works on James' Island, but Fos- 
 ter, after reconnoitering them, judged that they were too 
 strong to carry by storm. But Dahlgren could not resist the 
 allurement of an encounter with Battery Pringle, and on July 
 5th he opened on it from the two monitors, two gunboats and 
 a couple of mortar- vessels. 
 
 The guns of Battery Pringle were manned by the men of 
 the Confederate squadron, and before the day was over the 
 Federal vessels retired down the river to cover the retreat of 
 Foster's troops. They had failed to make any impression upon 
 Pringle, and had received very much the worst of the engage- 
 ment. The Montauk's deck was shattered by a shot, and two 
 of her men were badly wounded. As a rule, the fire of the^ 
 Confederate seamen in the land batteries was quite accurate, 
 and on this day it was especially telling. For the reason 
 that they were not permitted to engage the monitors in their 
 own ships, it was always a source of gratification to them to 
 hammer them from the fortifications. 
 
 On Dec. 21st, two boats and their crews from the Federal 
 steamer Dai Ching were captured in the Stono by a Confeder- 
 ate force, and on the last day of Irhe year two of the picket 
 launches in Charleston harbor were gathered in by the active 
 Confederate patrols. 
 
 In Jan. 1865, the monitors were exceedingly brisk in their 
 movements around the entrance to the harbor, and to render 
 their ingress still more perilous the Confederate engineers 
 planted sixteen large torpedoes just in front of the rope ob- 
 structions. Dahlgren had instructed the commanders of the 
 
COMMANDER JAMES H. ROCHELLE. 
 
 CONFEDERATE STATER NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 705 
 
 monitors to examine the channels carefully, as he was medi- 
 tating an attack on the defences in conjunction with Sher- 
 man's army then advancing northward, and on the night of 
 -the 15th the Patapsco was the picket iron-clad. She was steam- 
 ing slowly about between Sumter and Moultrie, covering the 
 operations of the scout boats that were hunting for the ob- 
 structions with grapnel drags, when suddenly there was a 
 shock, a sound of explosion, a cloud of smoke on the port side, 
 and in less than half a minute her deck was under the surface 
 of the water. The torpedo had struck the vessel under the 
 overhang and had lifted the deck. The first impression of 
 Lieutenant Sampson, the executive officer, was that she 
 had been hit by a shot, but the column of water and smoke 
 which immediately shot up convinced him of the real nature 
 •of the explosion. So quickly did the Patapsco go down 
 that, although a dozen boats were within a few hundred 
 yards, only forty -seven of her 109 officers and men escaped 
 drowning. 
 
 The concluding months of the war in these waters were 
 the reverse of fortunate for the U. S. ships. On Jan. 26th, the 
 gunboat Dai Ching was proceeding up the Combahee Eiver to 
 co-operate with an army movement, and in the neighborhood 
 of Tar Bluff came upon the Confederate battery. In endeavor- 
 ing to turn the ship she grounded, and for seven hours a brisk 
 artillery duel was kept up with the battery. She was struck 
 thirty times with shot and shell, her guns disabled and her 
 machinery shot through and through . Her commander, Lieut. 
 J. C. Chaplin, abandoned and set fire to her and retreated in 
 his boats, with the loss of a cutter and crew who were made 
 prisoners, and nine men wounded. 
 
 On March 1st, the steamer Harvest Moon, flag-ship of Ad- 
 miral Dahlgren, was sunk by a torpedo while returning from 
 Georgetown to Charleston. She was then in Georgetown Bay. 
 
 It only remains now to follow up the army and navy 
 operations of the Federals attendant upon the evacuation of 
 Charleston and the coincident proceedings of the Confederates. 
 After its pertinacious and lofty resistance from the inaugura- 
 tion of the war to all the forces on sea and land that the enemy 
 could bring against it, it was nevertheless doomed when Sher- 
 man's army started toward it along the sea coast from the 
 south. It had literally been worn out; the troops that had 
 held it against superior power had been mostly drawn off to 
 the armies of Lee or Johnston, and though its batteries still 
 forbade entrance to the enemy from the water front, it was 
 vulnerable to them from the rear. Since the latter part of 
 November, 1864, Dahlgren had been co-operating with Sher- 
 man, who by the 34th of Jan., 1865, was at Pocotaligo, on the 
 Charleston and Savannah railroad, while the Federal admiral 
 had collected all his vessels near Charleston to keep the rivers 
 clear of torpedoes and light batteries, so that his transports 
 
706 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 could reach certain points and supply the wants of the Fed- 
 eral armies. On Feb. 7th, Sherman was within fifty miles of 
 Charleston; and on the 11th and 17th, monitors and gunboats 
 were sent into Bull's Bay and the South Edisto River to assist 
 him in case of opposition. On the latter date a naval force 
 went into Stono River to assail the Confederate works on that 
 side, and Gen. Schimmelfennig moved on the front of Charles- 
 ton from Cole's Island. The naval battery on Cumming's 
 Point was ordered to open on Sullivan's Island and fire con- 
 tinually through the night. Contiguous batteries were put in 
 operation, and the monitors would have participated but for 
 their failure to receive orders. During the night a few guns 
 were fired from Fort Moultrie, but the main body of the Con- 
 federates had left it at eight p. m. and on the morning of the 
 18th the Federal scouts found it and all the other defences on 
 Sullivan s Island evacuated. The scouting oflBcer, Acting 
 Master Gifford, with the two tugs on duty, entered the harbor, 
 touching at the various fortified points and at Mount Pleasant, 
 where the intendant and wardens tendered their submission. 
 Castle Pinckney was also first entered by a naval officer, the 
 other defences, including Fort Sumter, Fort Johnson and the 
 lines of works around the city, having been taken possession 
 of by military detachments. Gen. Hardee, C. S. A., who had 
 succeeded Gen. Jones in command of the Department of South 
 Carolina, Georgia and Florida, had moved off all his troops 
 without encountering the enemy. The officers and men of the 
 squadron had been sent off in detachments, the first, which 
 consisted of about 300 men, under command of Capt. Rochelle, 
 having been dispatched several days previously to Wilming- 
 ton to take part in the defence of that place. Lieut. Bowen, 
 executive officer of the Palmetto State, was left behind with a 
 squad, charged with destroying that vessel and the Charleston 
 and Chicora. He set fire to them, and in a few hours they ex- 
 ploded. Commodore Tucker, Commanders Brown and Hunter 
 and other officers, with the remainder of the seamen, went 
 North, and in the last battle fought by the army of Gen. Lee 
 the gallant officers and crews of the Charleston naval station 
 were reunited at Saylor's Creek in Virginia. 
 
 The Federals captured the iron-clad Columbia, and the 
 steamers Mob, Lady Davis and Transport, and three torpedo 
 boats of the David type. The Columbia they found on the rocks 
 near Fort Moultrie, where she had run aground on January 
 12th. They raised and repaired her, and on May 35th she 
 arrived in Hampton Roads, having been towed around by the 
 Vanderbilt. She was 216 feet lon^, 51 feet beam and 15 feet depth 
 of hold,»and was plated with six inches of armor on her shield or 
 casemate, which was pierced for eight guns. During her 
 passage north she exhibited excellent sea-going qualities, and 
 probably if she had been completed earlier in the war, and it 
 had been the good fortune of Commodore Tucker to put her 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 70? 
 
 into battle with the enemy's iron-clads, she would have proved 
 her first-class fighting qualities. 
 
 At last the Federal government had possession of Charles- 
 ton, and the defences upon which it had concentrated attacks 
 second in magnitude to none endured by any sea-coast city 
 of the Southern Confederacy. In all the history of the war upon 
 the sea-board the operations around Charleston easily take first 
 place. The progress of the siege, the changing tides of victory 
 and defeat, the novel experiments in the opposition of forts to 
 iron-clad fleets, the development of heavy ordnance, the evo- 
 lution of torpedo warfare in these waters, were studied with 
 the most profound interest by the civilized world; but of more 
 import than all the technicalities of the strife was that un- 
 quenchable fire of patriotism and fortitude that never burned 
 brighter in the hearts of the people, and the defenders of the 
 illustrious city, than when they were overcome by numerical 
 force. 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 VIRGINIA WATERS— (Concluded). 
 
 ALMOST from the day of the establishment of his position 
 at Yorktown, in March, 1862, Gen. J. Bankhead Magru- 
 der, commanding the Confederate Army of the Penin- 
 sula, had endeavored to impress upon the Navy Depart- 
 ment the wisdom of his views regarding the employment of 
 the squadron in hostile operations in support of his move- 
 ments; and even after the impossibility of sending the Vir- 
 ginia into the York River had been authoritatively pointed 
 out to him, he called for the services of the Patrick Henry, 
 Jamestown, and other gunboats to assist in preventing the 
 army of McClellan from crossing Warwick River, which 
 formed a portion of his line of defence. On April 16th, his 
 dispatch to Secretary of War Randolph acknowledged the 
 arrival of the Teaser, a small tug carrying one 32-pounder 
 rifle, and commanded by Lieut. Hunter Davidson, in the 
 Warwick ; and on the 19th, Commodore Tatnall sent the 
 Jamestown, Lieut. Barney, and the Raleigh, Lieut. Alexander, 
 up the James River to protect Magruder's flank. These ves- 
 sels, with the Patrick Henry, Capt. John R. Tucker, and the 
 Beaufort, had been assembled at the mouth of the James 
 River by April 21st, the squadron being under command of 
 Capt. Tucker, and from that time until the evacuation of York- 
 town and Norfolk it had no work to do, except that the Teaser 
 was of service to Gen. Magruder on the Warwick River, and 
 that Capt. Thomas Jefferson Page and Capt. Frederick Chatard 
 were employed in the defensive works on shore. Magruder's 
 report of May 3d to Adj. Gen. Cooper has this paragraph: 
 
 " That accomplished oflScer, Capt. T. J. Page, of the navy, 
 successfully applied the resources of his genius and ripe expe- 
 rience to the defence of Gloucester Point. * * * My thanks 
 are due to Capt. F. Chatard, ' of the navy, for valuable services 
 
 ^ Frederick Cbatard, bom in Baltimore, May served on the Brazil, West Indies and Pacific 
 17th, 1807, entered the U. S. navy in November, stations, and participated in the Seminole war as 
 1824, and made his first cruise on the Medi- lieut. of the sloop-of-war Vandatia. During the 
 tcrranean in the North Caro/ina, 74, bearing the war with Mexico he was attached to the frigate 
 broad pennant of Com. John Rodgers. He also Jjidependence, Commodore Shubrick'a flag-ship, 
 
 (708) 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 709 
 
 as inspector of batteries, and to Lieut. Col. Noland, late of the 
 navy, the efficient commander of the batteries at Mulberrv 
 Island Point." ^ 
 
 After the abandonment of Yorktown (May 3d), and that 
 of Norfolk, the squadron moved up the James River. Two 
 other gunboats, the Nansemond and Hampton, which had been 
 built at the Norfolk navy-yard, were sent to Richmond in ad- 
 vance. " These vessels," Capt. W. H. Parker writes, " had 
 saw-mill engines, and when they got under way there was 
 such a wheezing and blowing that one would suppose all 
 hands had been attacked with the asthma or heaves." Two 
 fine gunboats, nearly finished, were burned at the Norfolk yard 
 because there was not time to put their engines into them ; 
 Parker had been assigned to the command of one and Lieut. 
 John Rutledge to that of the other. 
 
 McClellan was at this time advancing up the peninsula, 
 between the York and James rivers, and the Federal fleet at 
 Fortress Monroe was made ready to support his " on to Rich- 
 mond" movement hj taking possession of the James, and 
 destroying the Confederate squadron. 
 
 Occasional resistance was offered to the progress of 
 Federal ships up the river by the Confederate batteries and 
 squadron. On May 8th, they halted two hours at Fort Boy- 
 kin, Isle of Wight Co., and shelled the works, which re- 
 sponded until the Confederate commander, Capt. John U. 
 Shivers, was ordered to withdraw after spiking his guns and 
 burning his quarters. They next attacked, on the same day. 
 Fort Huger, at Hardy's Bluff, and after an engagement last- 
 ing from 11 A. M. to 3 p. M. passed on out of the range of its 
 guns, having in vain endeavored to drive the defenders, who 
 were commanded by Capt. J. M. Maury, C. S. N., out of the 
 works. At Rock Wharf and Mother 'Line's Bluff, on May 
 9th, the Patrick Henry and Jamestown assisted the shore de- 
 fences in their fire upon the Galena, Aroostook and Port 
 Royal, and did not retire until the batteries had been silenced 
 by the enemy. At Little Brandon, on the 12th, they were 
 prepared to co-operate with the batteries, but the Federal 
 gunboats ran past the latter and were too powerful for 
 Tucker to think of fighting unaided. Near James' Island he 
 
 and in a merchant brig called the Brighion, which He was sent to the Manassas fortifications to drill 
 
 had been hired by the Commodoro and armed, the men in the use of their guns, and next took 
 
 participated in the capture of Ma2a.tlau, and command of the batteries on the Potomac at 
 
 blockaded Manzanilla. He was then variously Evansport, which blockaded Washington and 
 
 employed as first lieut. of the f dgate Columbia cut off supplies. Thence he was transferred to 
 
 on' the Pacific station, lieut. commanding of service in the Drewry's Bluff batteries, and later 
 
 the sloop Lexingtorit and lieut. of the Columbus, on to the command of Gen. J. B. Magruder on 
 
 74. On receiving his promotion to commander, the peninsula, where he acted 'as chief of heavy 
 
 be was assigned to command the sloop-of-war artillery and constructor of batteries. On page 
 
 Saratoga^ and co-operated with Com. Paulding 507 of the " OfiBcial Reports of Battles," pub- 
 
 in the capture of Gen. Walker's fimbustering ex- lished by order of the Confederate Congress, 
 
 pedition in Nicaragua. When the civil war began appearsthefollowingfromGen. Magruder: "My 
 
 •he was in command of the receiving ship Perm- thanks are due to Capt. Chatard of the navy, for 
 
 sylvania. His sympathies turning strongly valuable services as inspector of batteries." At 
 
 toward the South, he resigned bis commission the close of the war Capt. Chatard removed to 
 
 and tendered his services to the Confederacy. St. Louis, where he still resides. 
 
710 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 was joined by the remainder of his force. He had in effect 
 decoyed the Federals a long distance up the river in a chase 
 after him, during which they had neglected to pay judicious 
 attention to the danger of leaving Confederate shore batteries 
 in their rear occupied and in fighting shape. This appears 
 confessed in the dispatch of May 14th, from Com. L. M. Golds- 
 borough to Secretary Welles informing the latter that Rodgers 
 had reported to him that ' ' he was unable to resist the five gun- 
 boats of the enemy above him because the Galena would inev- 
 itably be grounded in passing the bar, and thus leave only the 
 Aroostook and Port Royal to resist them." "Notwithstand- 
 ing," Goldsborough added, " my orders to Lieut. Com. Jefifers 
 to reduce all the enemy's works on the James Eiver as he went 
 along, spike their guns and blow up their magazines, and thus 
 leave the river entirely open, so that supplies of any sort might 
 be forwarded without diflBculty, he has not carried them out; 
 and I now am informed that "two of their works on James 
 Eiver — one at Rock Wharf Landing and the other at Harden's 
 or Mother Line's Bluflf — both between here [Hampton Roads] 
 and our vessels up the James River, must be taken before the 
 river can be navigated by our supply vessels." 
 
 But the Federals did not need to do any more fighting at 
 these points. They had only been held by the Confederates 
 because their temporary retention was in accordance with the 
 military plan of campaign on the peninsula being wrought 
 out by Johnston and Lee, which involved the detention of the 
 Federal fieet in the river for a brief period and an eventual 
 sturdy stand against them at Drewry's Bluflf, where was to be 
 fought the most serious engagement that had taken place upon 
 the river. A dispatch from Gen. Lee, March 32d, to Gen. Ma- 
 gruder, announced that obstructions were being placed in the 
 James at that point, and on May 8th, Capt. Tucker was in- 
 structed to remove thither the heavy guns that had been 
 placed in battery at Mulberry Point and Jamestown. On the 
 9th Gen. Lee reported: " In addition to the three guns origin- 
 ally at Drewry's Bluff several navy guns have been mounted, 
 and every exertion is being made to render the obstructions 
 effective and the battery commanding them as formidable as 
 possible." Capt. Ebenezer Farrand, C. S. N., was placed in 
 charge of the battery, and Lieut. T. J. Page, C. S. N., com- 
 manded another heavy battery at Chapin's Bluff, a few miles 
 lower down and on the opposite bank of the river. On May 
 15th, Capt. S. S. Lee was ordered to relieve Capt. Farrand 
 and arrived on the scene while the battle was being fought. ' 
 
 Drewry's Bluff is an elevation of an average height of 200 
 feet on the right bank of the James River a little more than 
 
 1 Sydney Smith Lee was bom in 1806, at Cam- strong tendency towards a naval career he was 
 
 den, N. J,, while his father, a member of Con- appointed midshipman in tlxe U. S. navy when 
 
 gress from Virginia, was attending the sessions but a little more than fourteen years of age, in 
 
 of that body, which were then being held in which his services were continuous and distin- 
 
 Philadelphia. His early inclinations showing a guished for over forty years. He commanded a 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 711 
 
 seven miles below Richmond. The rise from the stream is 
 rather precipitous, and the river at that point is less than a 
 mile wide, making it suitable for the placing of obstructions 
 ■to bar the passage of an enemy. So obvious were the advan- 
 tages of the locality for defence that the construction of a 
 strong earthwork was determined upon as soon as it became 
 evident that the aim of the Federals was directed toward Rich- 
 mond, and the building of the fort was entrusted to Capt. A. 
 L. Rives, an engineer officer of the Confederate army. When 
 the naval force was summoned to aid in the defence of the po- 
 sition an additional battery was constructed, or the fort was ex- 
 tended, by counter-sinking the naval guns on the brow of the 
 hill, and cribbing them with logs to prevent caving by the fire 
 of the enemy. Bombproofs were thrown over these pits, and 
 the guns were mounted on navy carriages with all the tackle 
 used upon a man-of-war, and all the trees that might obstruct 
 the range of fire were cut away. Nine guns were mounted in 
 the defences, the heaviest of which was a ten-inch Columbiad, 
 and the others were Brooke rifles, landed from Capt. Tucker's 
 squadron. The steamers Jamestown, Curtis Peck and North- 
 ampton, and several sloops and schooners were sunk in the 
 channel to strengthen the obstructions, which were stretched 
 across the river above the fort and consisted of piles driven 
 into the bottom and filled in with logs, stones and iron rubbish, 
 leaving only a narrow and intricate passage close under the 
 guns of Fort Drewry. * 
 
 Capt. Tucker had superintended the construction of the 
 naval battery, and had mounted upon it the guns landed from 
 the Patrick Henry and Jamestown. It was manned by the 
 officers and crews of the Patrick Henry, Jamestown and Vir- 
 ginia, included among whom, in addition to Capt. Tucker, 
 were Lieuts. James Henry Rochelle and Francis Lyell Hoge, 
 and Midshipman Carroll, of the Patrick Henry ; Lieut. Com. 
 Mcholas Barney and Acting Master Samuel Barron, Jr., of the 
 Jamestown ; Lieuts. Catesby Roger Jones, John Taylor Wood 
 and Walter R. Butt, of the Virginia, and Lieut. Hunter 
 Davidson. There were in addition about a score of men who 
 
 steam vessel of war in the conflict with Mexico ordered to the Norfolk navy-yard, and after 
 
 and was prominently engaged at the siege of its evacuation was placed in command of the 
 
 Vera Cruz, where his brother, the future Gen. fortifications at Drewry's Bluff, on the James 
 
 Robert E. Lee, also won renown as an engineer JBiver. His further duty to the Confederacy 
 
 ■and artillery of&cer. Capt. Lee was command- was discharged mainly as chief of the Bureau 
 
 -ant of the U. 8. naval academy at Annapolis for of Orders and Detail at Eichmond. He died 
 
 three years and for the same space of time was at Biohland, Stafford Co., Va., July 22nd, 1869. 
 
 in charge of the Philadelphia navy-yard. He He was the father of the eminent Confederate 
 
 -commanded the flag-ship Mississippi in Com. General Fitzhugh Lee, now the Governor of 
 
 M. C. Perry's expedition to Japan, and when the Virginia. 
 -Japanese ambassadors came to this country Capt. 
 
 Lee, Capt D. G. Farragut, and Lieut. D. D. Porter i The fort took its name from being built upon 
 
 were appointed the Naval Board to receive and the property of Capt. A. Drewry, C. S. A. To the 
 
 entertain them in the United States. The last Federals it was known as Fort Darling, and in 
 
 duty he performed in the U, S. navy was as chief their reports tl;e engagement is styled the battle 
 
 -of the Bureau of Coast Survey at Washington. of Fort Darling. On some of the old maps of 
 
 On the withdrawal of Virginia from the Federal James River the location is called Darling's 
 
 Union he resigned his commission, sold all his BluflF, but the site of the fort had passed into 
 
 possessions of every kind and offered his ser- the possession of the Drewry family many years 
 
 "Vices to the Confederate government. He was previous to the war. 
 
712 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 had come through from the fleet on the Lower Mississippi after 
 its dispersion by Farragut. These latter had been brought ta 
 Norfolk and thence up the James by Lieut. Robert B. Pegram 
 and Master's Mate F. W. Dawson, ' who had met them while- 
 they were themselves approaching New Orleans to go on duty 
 there, and had returned North. 
 
 After passing with so little difficulty the defences lower- 
 down the river, the Federals felt some confidence that they 
 would make their way to Richmond without encountering any 
 resistance that they could not overcome. The pressure that 
 was being exerted upon Secretary Welles, to have the navy 
 perform some startling exploits, had found voice in a public 
 meeting at Boston on March 29th, in which his removal from 
 office was demanded of President Lincoln, because of his in- 
 competency; and it was a matter of common newspaper report 
 that he had given his commanders of fleets and stations to un- 
 derstand that the news of some creditable achievements in 
 Southern waters would be exceedingly welcome to the Ad- 
 ministration and the North. Flag-officer Goldsborough, com- 
 manding the North Atlantic squadron, was more than willing- 
 to oblige Mr. Welles, and manifested a sublime faith in his- 
 ability to reach the Confederate capital while McClellan was 
 wearily struggling in the marshes of the peninsula. On May 
 13th he wrote to Mr. Welles : 
 
 " The Monitor and Stevens {Naugatuek) have both gone up the James- 
 River, with orders from me to reduce all the works of the enemy as they 
 go along, spike all their guns, blow up all their magazines, and then get 
 up to Richmond, all with the least possible delay, and shell the city to 
 a surrender. With the above works reduced, I can keep our vessels sup- 
 plied with coal, ordnance stores, provisions, etc., without difficulty." 
 
 On the other hand, there were evidences of a slight trepi- 
 dation in Richmond, outside of official and military and naval 
 circles, that the powerful Federal iron-clads and gunboats 
 
 1 Francis W. Dawson was a native of England, then assigned to duty in the James River squad- 
 bom in London, May 17th, 1840. Hefeltadeep ron, but after the battle at Drewry's Bluff re- 
 interest in American politics, and when the signed his naval commission and enlisted as a 
 news of the fall of Fort Sumter was received private in the Purcell artillery battery. At the 
 in London, he resolved to take passage for battle of Mechanicsville, June 26th 1862, he was. 
 America and serve the Southern Confederacy. badly wounded, and for his bravery on the field 
 No opportunity offered until the steamship iVasA- was promoted to lieutenant. In August he was 
 niZ/e arrived at Southampton, when he presented commissioned first lieutenant, and for nearly 
 to Lieut. Com. Pegram letters of introduction, two years was assistant ordnance officer of Long- 
 !ind asked the privilege of returning to the South street's corps. He was taken prisoner at the 
 on his ship. He was so youthful that Pegram battle of South Mountain, in September, 1862, 
 refused to encourage him to leave his own land andexcbangedintime to takepartin thebattleof 
 for war in a distant and alien country ; but Daw- Fredericksburg. In May 1864 he was promoted to 
 son was too much in earnest to accept such a be captain of artillery and made ordnance officer 
 dismissal. Takingadvantage of Pegram's absence of Gen, Fltzhugh Lee's division, in which capacity 
 from the ship a few days before she was to sail he served until the end of the war, receiving 
 on her return voyage, he assumed a seaman's wounds at the battles of Harrisonburg andFive 
 garb and was enlisted by her lieutenant. During Forks. He entered journalism as a reporter of 
 the homeward run he earned the favor of Lieut. the Bichmond Examiner in the autumn of 1865, 
 Pegram and the other oificers by his good con- and a year later was assistant editor of the- 
 duct, and immediately after running the block- Charleston Meroury, In 1867, he and E. R. 
 ade at Beaufort, N. C, he was appointed master's Riordan bought an interest in the Charleston 
 mate in the C. S. navy upon tiie recommend- News, and in 1873 purchased the Charleston 
 ation of his commander. He was first ordered Courier, and consolidated the two papers as the 
 to duty at Norfolk, and thence to New Orleans, News and Courier, a journal which has won 
 but before he could reach that city it had fallen an enviable place in the newspaper world by ita 
 into the hands of Farragut and Butler. He was honesty, liberality and enterprise. 
 
CAPTAIN SIDNEY S. LEE, 
 
 CONTEDEEATE STATES NAVY. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 713 
 
 could force a passage up to the city. On the morning of May 
 15th the following communication was published by the Rich- 
 mond Dispatch, under the heading of " Save Richmond ": 
 
 " I -will be one of 100 to join any party, officered by determined and 
 resolute officers, to board the "whole fleet of gunboats and take them at 
 all hazards, to save this beautiful city from destruction. I am not a resi- 
 dent of this State, but of the Confederate States, and if such a scheme 
 can be got up, my name can be had by applying at this office." 
 
 The suggestion struck the editor so favorably that he en- 
 dorsed it thus : 
 
 "A DASHING BNTEBPRISB. 
 
 "It -will be seen by an advertisement in to-day's Dispatch that a propo- 
 sition is made to organize a party for the purpose of boarding and 
 capturing the Yankee gunboats now endeavoring to make their way up 
 James River to our city. That such a feat may be accomplished by bold 
 and determined men, is not to be doubted ; and surely the invaders will 
 not be allowed to possess themselves of the capital of the Old Dominion 
 without opposition." 
 
 There was no necessity for anxiety for the safety of the 
 capital. On the morning that the boarding plan was proposed, 
 Capt. Tucker and his sailors and an artillery battalion under 
 the command of Capt. Drewry, C. S. A., stood behind the guns 
 at Drewry's Bluff, and riflemen were concealed in pits on the 
 left bank of the river, while the Confederate squadron laid 
 ready for action just in the rear of the obstructions. The plan 
 of battle had been arranged in Richmond and the orders de- 
 livered at Drewry's Bluff by Lieut. Chas. M. Fauntleroy. 
 
 At 7:30 o'clock the three Federal iron-clads, Monitor, 
 Naugatuck and Galena, followed at some distance by the 
 wooden gunboats Aroostook and Port Royal, steamed up to 
 open the ball. Capt. Rodgers led in the Galena, and handled 
 his vessels so perfectly as to draw forth the following tribute 
 from Master Hasker, C. S. E"., who commanded a gun on the 
 bluflf: " The attack on the part of the Galena, I think, was one 
 of the most masterly pieces of seamanship of the whole war. 
 She was brought into action in the coolest manner; indeed, 
 she was brought to and sprung across the channel in a much 
 more masterly way than T have often seen at mere target 
 practice. She steamed up to within 700 or 800 yards of the 
 bluff, let go her starboard anchor, ran out the chains, put her 
 head in shore, backed astern, let go her stream anchor from 
 the starboard quarter, hove ahead, and made ready for action 
 before firing a gun. I could not but admire this manoeuvre, 
 although executed to bring death or wounds to so many of my 
 brave comrades." 
 
 The skill with which the Federal ships were manoeuvred 
 and fought brings into increased prominence the honors which 
 the Confederate sailors and soldiers won in the battle. As the 
 enemy's vessels came up the river they suffered severely from 
 the sharp-shooters in the rifle-pits, under the command of Lieut. 
 John Taylor Wood, C. S. N., who picked off many of their 
 
714 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 men in spite of the steady fire of grape and shrapnel with which 
 the ships endeavored to silence this annoying and constant 
 fusilade. The Galena ran within 600 yards of the batteries 
 before firing a gun and then opened vigorously, the fight last- 
 ing from 7:45 to 11:05 A. M. It was conducted with the great- 
 est spirit on both sides, but the Federals were virtually beaten 
 within two hours after it had begun. In accordance with the 
 orders of Capt. Tucker, the Galena received most of the at- 
 tention of the Confederate gunners, and the experienced artil- 
 lerists whom he had brought from his ships did splendid exe- 
 cution with their rifled ordnance. Almost every shot found 
 its mark. " We fought the enemy for almost four hours," wrote 
 an ofiicer, " and such a perfect tornado of shot and shell, right, 
 left, front, rear, and on top of us, never was seen before. It 
 was an awful sight to see our killed and wounded, some with 
 an arm or leg blown off, some entirely disembowelled." 
 
 The action was still young when it was revealed that the 
 Galena was not the sort of iron-clad to be proof against a 
 plunging fire directed by the competent cannoneers who were 
 making a target of her. They had her range perfectly, and 
 drove shot after shot from the Brooke rifles through her iron 
 skin and its backing. " Balls came through," said Capt. 
 Eodgers, in his report, " and many men were killed with frag- 
 ments of her own iron. One fairly penetrated just above the 
 water-line and exploded in the steerage. The greater part of 
 the balls, however, at the water-line, after breaking the iron, 
 stuck in the wood. The port-side is much injured — knees, 
 planks and timbers started. No shot penetrated the spar-deck, 
 but in three places are large holes — one of them about a yard 
 long and eight inches wide, made by a shot which, in, glanc- 
 ing, completely broke through the deck, killing several men 
 with fragments of the deck plating." 
 
 Thirteen men were killed and eleven wounded on this 
 ship, and yet Capt. Rodgers states that after this heavy loss, 
 and the riddling of the vessel, he only drew out of the action 
 because he had fired 383 shot and shell, and expended all his 
 ammunition except six charges for his Parrott rifies. It seems 
 a foregone conclusion that a much longer exposure to the Con- 
 federate fire would have sunk the Galena. She did not obtain 
 a great amount of assistance from her consorts. The Monitor 
 first passed ahead, but found that from the position she took 
 her guns could not be sufficiently elevated to reach the fort, 
 and she then came into line with the Galena, and kept 
 up fire until the baffled squadron retreated. Aware of 
 the uselessness of attempting to penetrate her imper- 
 vious armor by his guns, Capt. Tucker let her severely 
 alone, and she was struck but three times, no shot causing 
 any more injury than a slight bending of her plates. Nobody 
 was hurt on board of her. The Parrott rifled gun of the Nau- 
 gatuck burst at the seventeenth fire, and she dropped out of 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 715 
 
 "the engagement with two men wounded. The wooden gun- 
 boats took no considerable part in the engagement. Once the 
 Fort Royal steamed into fair range of the fort, but retired on 
 being struck by a shell that slightly wounded her commander, 
 but she and the Aroostook were found very useful in towing 
 into a position of safety the two crippled iron-clads. 
 
 The badly -battered fleet headed for City Point to repair 
 damages, bury their fourteen dead and provide for their eight- 
 een wounded, the parting salute being given them by Lieut. 
 J. T. Wood, C. S. N., who had been stationed on the bank with 
 a party of sharp-shooters. He was so close to the Monitor as 
 she passed down, that he called out to an officer in her pilot- 
 bouse: " Tell Capt. Jeffers that is not the way to Richmond." 
 The Confederate victory had been won at comparatively small 
 cost. Midshipman Carroll, of the Patrick Henry, was killed 
 while acting as signal officer and aide to Com. Farrand. The 
 total loss of the Confederates was seven killed and nine 
 wounded. Michael McMore, one of the Virginians crew, was 
 "the only member of the naval force, besides Mr. Carroll, killed, 
 but five of Capt. Drewry's artillerymen were killed. Eight of 
 the latter were wounded, as was also W. Johnson, gunner's 
 mate of the Virginia's crew. The casualties among the sea- 
 men were caused by a shell from the Monitor, which, early in 
 the day, burst in an embrasure of the fort and disabled a gun, 
 that, however, was quickly repaired and became the most ef- 
 ficient piece in the action. 
 
 Reports of eye-witnesses of the engagement published in 
 the Southern newspapers were rather brief. The Richmond 
 JDispatcks correspondenj; told, the story thus: 
 
 "The enemy fired rapidly, many of his shots striking our works, his 
 shells flying and bursting around us, cutting down quite a number of 
 trees near us, but doing our guns no injury, and killing and wounding 
 •only some thirteen or fourteen of our men. We struck the Monitor and 
 GMena again and again, and I think from the manner in which they 
 seemed to recoil at our heavy shot, that something about them must have 
 been put out of place. The &alena began to run first, apparently much 
 crippled. We continued to fire upon them as they retreated, amidst 
 loud cheers from our boys. * * * Our men stood to their guns with 
 the greatest bravery and determination. Capts. Tucker and Barney, of 
 the Patrick Henry and Jamestown, and Capts. Drewry, Jordon and Pres- 
 ton, of Chesterfield, Bedford and Lynchburg, have command of the guns 
 here. They have seen something of the enemy's Chinese gongs before, 
 and, I presume, will not be easily driven from their position by the loud 
 noise the enemy can -make with his guns. Let the good citizens of Rich- 
 mond be quiet. We do not intend the enemy to reach Richmond this way. 
 
 In his official report Com. Farrand said: 
 
 "The enemy came up the river at half-past six A. M., the Galena 
 ahead, the Monitor and a small iron steamer, a side-wheel, and a smaller 
 gunboat following in succession. . , , . 
 
 " When about four hundred yards from our obstructions our batteries 
 opened fire upon the Monitor and Galena. They did not reply until the 
 Galena had placed herself directly athwart the channel. After which she 
 and the Monitor opened a brisk fire, the other vessels keepmg under way, 
 
716 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 and at about from a quarter to a mile lower down and so close under the- 
 opposite shore that only four of our guns could bear upon them. Our fire 
 was mostly directed upon the Galena, only occasionally paying a compli- 
 ment to the others. 
 
 " Several of our shots at long range passed through and through them, 
 and they soon dropped out of range. The small iron-clad and the side- 
 wheel gunboats were badly crippled. We turned our attention to the 
 Galena — nearly every one of our shots telling upon her iron surface— at 
 11 o'clock A. M., one of the Patrick Henry's eight-inch solid shot passed 
 into her bow port. Immediately the smoke rushed out of her own ports, 
 showing, evidently, that she was on fire. We gave her three hearty cheers 
 as she slipped her cables and moved down the river. Our pickets heard 
 her captain say to one of the other gunboats, that she was " in a sinking 
 condition. 
 
 " Our sharp-shooters did good service, picking off every man who 
 showed himself. 
 
 " There is no doubt we struck them a hard blow. The last that was 
 seen of them they were steaming down the river. 
 
 "Every officer and man discharged their duties with coolness and de- 
 termination, and it would be doing injustice to many if I should mention 
 or particularize any. Capt. Drewry and his men fought their guns with 
 great effect." 
 
 As stated by Com. Farrand, the service done by the sharp- 
 shooters was a feature of the battle. Lieut. John Taylor 
 Wood, C. S. N., reported as follows to Lieut. Jones concern- 
 ing that duty performed by his men from the squadron: 
 
 " Hearing on the evening of the 14th inst, that the enemy were but a 
 few miles of coming up, I crossed to the north bank with a small party of 
 sharp-shooters armed with Enfield rifles, and proceeded down to Chapin's 
 Bluff. The gunboats were in sight below, lying in a position not easy to 
 assail them, for both banks were low. They were examining the shores 
 very closely with their small boats as well as all drift wood, evidently on 
 the look out for infernal machines. I had several shots at them at long 
 range— they threw as many well-directed shells. Night approaching, I re- 
 turned to this place, leaving my men at the request of the commanding offi- 
 cer of a battery of the Washington artiUery, with him as a covering party. 
 
 " Early on the morning of the 15th I returned and soon after met CoL 
 Stewart with a regiment of infantry. I told him where my men were, and 
 that it was the best place for us all ; he said that he learned from a num- 
 ber of soldiers that the enemy were landing and was afraid of being cut 
 off. We afterwards followed and met down to the river, about twenty 
 men. The Washington artillery and Dabney artillery were both on the 
 bank, but as the enemy came up left without firing a shot, dreading a 
 landing. I assured them there was no danger of it, and that I would 
 keep below them and give them early intelligence of what was going on. 
 I distributed the men along the high bank with orders to each one to 
 select his position and harass the enemy. For three hours an incessant 
 fire was kept up on their vessels. Two or three times everybody was 
 driven from the guns on board the wooden ships. They replied with 
 their heavy guns, boat guns and small arms. We followed tnem down 
 the river for a mile or more." 
 
 Another party of sharp-shooters was the battalion of ma- 
 rines commanded by Capt. John D. Simms, of the C. S. marine 
 corps, who reported": 
 
 " On the 15th inst. the enemy's gunboatshavingmade their appearance 
 near the battery at Drewry's Bluff, I stationed my command on the bluffs 
 some two hundred yards from them, to act as sharp-shooters. We immedi- 
 ately opened a sharp fire upon them, killing three of the crew of the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 717 
 
 Galena certainly, and no doubt many more. The flre of the enemy was 
 materially silenced at intervals by the flre of our troops. It gives me much 
 pleasure to call your attention to the coolness of the oflBcers and men un- 
 der the severe flre of the enemy. The companies composing my battalion 
 -were commanded by Capts. A. C. Van Benthuysen and J. E. Meiere." 
 
 Secretary Mallory wrote to Com. Farrand that " the 
 thanks of the country are due to yourself, your officers and 
 your gallant men," and added: "The enemy has retired, but 
 to return with a larger force; and the sacred duty of confront- 
 ing and repelling his advances upon the river is devolved upon 
 the navy. The country expects much from your command, 
 and I feel assured that it will do its duty and nobly sustain the 
 character of the navy." 
 
 When Congress met it extended its compliments to the 
 victors by the passage of the following: 
 
 '■^Resolved by the Congress of the Confederate States of America, That 
 the thanks of Congress are eminently due, and are hereby most cordially 
 tendered to Commander E. Farrand, senior oflacer in command of the 
 combined naval and miUtary forces engaged, and Capt. A. Drewry, senior 
 military officer, and the officers and men under their command, for the 
 great and signal victory achieved over the naval forces of the United States 
 in the engagement on the 15th day of May, 1863, at Drewry's Bluff -, and the 
 gallantry, courage and endurance in that protracted flght, which achieved 
 a victory over the fleet of iron-clad gunboats of the enemy, entitle all wht 
 contributed thereto to the gratitude of the country. 
 
 " Resolved further, That the President be requested, in appropriate 
 general orders, to communicate the foregoing resolution to the officers and 
 men to whom it is addressed. 
 
 "Approved September 16th, 1863." 
 
 Although the name of Capt. S. S. Lee, who had been, on 
 May 15th, ordered to relieve Com. Farrand, does not appear 
 in the official dispatches, he rendered much service in the de- 
 fence of the position. Finding that the engagement had com- 
 menced when he arrived at Drewry's Bluff, he refrained f roin 
 taking command, but contented hirhself with acting in co-op- 
 eration with the officer whose place he had been sent to fill. 
 As a matter of fact, there was a slight confusion in regard to 
 the forces, and command at the fort. On the 14th, Secretary 
 of War Randolph had ordered Gen. Huger to send from Peters- 
 burg to Drewry's Bluff four companies of light troops, and 
 Oen. Mahone's brigade, Mahone to assume command upon his 
 arrival. By some mischance Gen. Mahone did not arrive at 
 the Bluff until the 16th, but he was preceded thither and to 
 Chapin's Bluff by eight companies of heavy artillery belong- 
 ing to his command. The instructions of Gen. Lee to Gen. 
 Mahone contemplated co-ordinate action between the army 
 and navy, but the latter professed a doubt as to who should 
 •exercise the supreme authority at the post. He was informed 
 that the work was placed in immediate charge of the navy 
 and that the President was "unwilling to disturb the arrange- 
 ment with the Navy Department now existing," further 
 than to insure to Mahone the general control of military 
 
718 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 operations. Mahone still protested that he " would not be re- 
 sponsible for any co-partnership authority;" and that, although 
 there had been no difficulty between the two arms of the ser- 
 vice, "interferences had occurred in the prosecution of the 
 works to the prejudice of the common object." The trouble 
 was settled by Gen. Huger, Mahone's superior officer, taking 
 personal command of the position; and on June 13th, Capt. 
 T. J. Page, C. S. N., was appointed colonel of artillery, and 
 appointed to the command of the batteries at Chapin's and 
 Ball's Bluff. Capt. Lee continued to exercise control at Drew- 
 ry's Bluff, and under his supervision the obstructions in the 
 river were completed. 
 
 There was no year of the war during which Confederate 
 seamen did not find upon the broad expanse of Chesapeake 
 Bay, and its many tributaries between the Potomac and 
 the ocean, opportunities for naval raids and skirmishes that 
 included numerous daring exploits and inflicted much annoj^- 
 ance upon the enemy. The bay being a highway of communi- 
 cation between the North and Fortress Monroe and Washing- 
 ton, and serving also for operations which comprised 
 Baltimore and Annapolis within their scope, it was obvious 
 that any measures which could interrupt or embarrass its 
 navigation by Federal vessels would be of service to the Con- 
 federate cause, and the first to suggest itself was the destruc- 
 tion or disabling of the light-houses. In April, 1861, the lights 
 of Cape Henry and Cape Charles and all those on the sea- 
 ward side of Hampton Roads were extinguished by volunteers 
 from among the population of the seaside counties of Va., ex- 
 cept that of the Willoughby Spit Light-ship, which was only 
 kept burning under a guard from the sloop-of-war Cumber- 
 land. During the same month an expedition — the sole infor- 
 mation regarding the personnel of which is the statement of a 
 Richmond paper, that it was " a party of gentlemen organ- 
 ized under the Act of Congress for the creation of a volunteer 
 navy " — ran down to Smith's Island, near the mouth of the 
 Potomac, captured the light-ship by boarding and took it into 
 the Great Wicomico River. On May 16th, Gen. Butler sent 
 an armed steamer after the vessel and recaptured it after a 
 sharp fight with a body of Southern troops on shore. In the 
 last week of April, the schooner George M. Smith was made a 
 prize off the capes of the Chesapeake, by the Cumberland. 
 She had on board a cargo of field-guns andcarriages, shipped 
 for a Southern port, by some Northern merchants not too pat- 
 riotic to sell material of war to the Confederacy when there 
 was no apparent danger of being detected by Federal spies. 
 
 Quite a number of privateers, of which no record remains, 
 were sent out of the rivers of Virginia into the bay during the 
 summer, and were at least useful in running the Federal 
 blockade with recruits, small arms and ammunition for the 
 Confederate troops south of the Potomac. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 719 
 
 On Nov. 28th, 1862, Lieuts. Wood and Lee, C. S. N., were 
 cruising in the Chesapeake with a boat's crew from the steamer 
 Patrick Henry. Below the mouth of the Rappahannock they 
 found the fine ship Alleghanian, hailing from New York, and 
 bound from Baltimore to London, which had come to anchor 
 in the prevailing storm. She was quickly boarded by the 
 boat's crew, and Lieut. Wood informed her captain that his 
 ship was a prize and he and his people were prisoners. They 
 made no resistance, and were transferred to their own boats, 
 and the ship set on fire, after the Confederates had selected 
 from her stores such articles as they desired. In the darkness 
 one boat's crew of prisoners managed to escape, but the re- 
 mainder and the officers were sent to Richmond as prisoners. 
 The ship and her cargo were valued at $200,000, which was a 
 total loss to her owners and consignees. In making this suc- 
 cessful dash, Lieuts. Wood and Lee passed close to several 
 gunboats of the enemy, and one of them, the Crusader, was 
 only a few miles distant when they captured the Alleghanian. 
 
 With exploits of this character in these waters in 1863 the 
 name of John Yates Beall is indissolubly associated. Early 
 in the year he suggested to Secretary Mallory a project for 
 privateering on the Chesapeake and Potomac, and receiving the 
 sanction of the government he was commissioned acting mas- 
 ter in the C. S. navy. He and an officer of the navy then 
 on the retired list on account of ill-health set about organizing 
 an expedition, and among their first recruits secured Bennett G. 
 Burley, a young Scotchman, who was pressing a submarine 
 torpedo battery upon the attention of the Navy Deparment, 
 and another Scotchman named John Maxwell. They started 
 from Richmond about April 1st with nine or ten men, but for 
 some months accomplished nothing more important than dis' 
 persing a camp of negroes in Elizabeth City Co. within ten 
 miles of Fortress Monroe. The young officer alluded to then 
 left the expedition to accept a commission in the army, and 
 Beall was left in sole command. His force was increased to 
 about twenty, provided with open boats, and it was his aim to 
 become the " Mosby " of the Chesapeake, burning light-houses, 
 severing submarine telegraph wires, capturing transports 
 and steamers and otherwise harassing the enemy. Matthews 
 Co. was his rendezvous and base of operations. In July he 
 sent a squad under Roy McDonald to seize a steamer plying 
 between Cherrystone and Fortress Monroe, but they missed 
 her and returned after cutting l^he U. S. telegraph cable across 
 the Chesapeake. About the 1st of Aug. Beall and all his men 
 crossed to the eastern shore of Va. and made a wreck of the 
 light-house at Cape Charles. On Sept. 18th they started from 
 Matthews Co. on the most enterprising project they had un- 
 dertaken. The party were divided into two crews, Beall 
 commmanding one in the Swan and assigning McDonald to 
 the charge of the second in the Raven. Near Cape Charles 
 
720 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 they made prizes of the Northern sloop Mary Anne and two 
 fishing vessels, and ran them into Watchapreague Inlet on 
 the eastern shore, near where, on the night of Sept. 31st, during 
 the heavy equinoctial gale, their boats almost swannped by 
 the high sea, they boarded the schooner Alliance, bound from 
 Philadelphia to Port Royal, S. C, with a valuable cargo of 
 sutler's stores. The captain of the schooner showed fight, but 
 was brought under control and his vessel captured. Leaving 
 her at anchor with a prize crew, Beall sallied out in his boats 
 1;he next night and took the schooners Horseman, Pearsall and 
 Alexander, which he scuttled, and returned with his prisoners 
 to the Alliance, on board of which he placed them and his 
 crews and sailed to Cobb's Island. Here he paroled the prisoners 
 of the Mary Anne and the fishing smacks and sent McDonald 
 to Matthews Co. with the others. Because of the value of the 
 <;argo of the Alliance, he determined to run her up the Pianka- 
 tank River, from whence he might transport the stores to 
 Richmond; but the pilot grounded the schooner in the mouth 
 of that river, where Beall burned her. He saved some of the 
 .stores, however, and got with them into Richmond, where 
 their sale netted a handsome dividend for his party, his 
 agreement with Secretary Mallory being that they should re- 
 ceive no pay, but were entitled to all they could legitimately 
 capture. 
 
 They had accomplished so much with so small a force, 
 that an exaggerated notion of their numbers was entertained 
 at the Federal headquarters, and a regiment of infantry, two 
 of cavalry, a battalion of artillery, and three gunboats were 
 sent into Matthews Co. to operate against the squad of twenty. 
 McDonald and two of the men were made prisoners on Octo- 
 ber 5th; Beall and the remaining sixteen narrowly escaped, 
 and on account of the hot pursuit he disbanded the party and 
 returned to Richmond. He reassembled them in a few weeks, 
 a,nd about November 10th returning to his boats, which he 
 had left concealed, crossed the bay once more to the Accomac 
 shore, where he captured a schooner. Daylight coming on, 
 he sent a squad of his men with one boat to conceal them- 
 selves, while he and six others remained on the prize. Accom- 
 panying him at that time was Acting Master Edward 
 McGuire, C. S. N. The party sent out endeavored to make 
 a landing, but were ambushed by a large detachment of the 
 Federal coast guard, who extorted from one of their number 
 a betrayal of the whereabouts of Beall. Gen. Lockwood, the 
 Federal commander on the eastern shore, armed a flotilla of 
 boats and captured Beall and his comrades on board their 
 prize. They were taken to Drummondtown, November 15th, 
 and from thence to Fort McHenry. On the passage, Beall 
 tried to induce his men to attempt the seizure of the steamer, 
 but they prudently declined, and it was well they did, for in 
 the hold were concealed a company of Federal troops. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 721 
 
 It was the determination of the Federal authorities to 
 place Beall and his command on trial as pirates, although he 
 held a regular commission in the navy of the Confederate 
 States and his men were properly enlisted. It is impossible to 
 discover any charges upon which they could have been con- 
 victed by an impartial court and jury. Their captures were 
 lawfully made of vessels owned by citizens of the power with 
 which the Confederate States were at war, and in no instance 
 had they transgressed the rights of a belligerent nation, 
 which had already been recognized by the United States. 
 During their six weeks of imprisonment at Fort McHenry they 
 were ironed and treated to gross indignities. Upon receiving 
 information of their hardships and danger. President Davis 
 promptly ordered Lieut. Com. E. P. Williams, Ensign Benj. 
 H. Porter and fifteen seamen of the U. S. navy made prison- 
 ers in Charleston harbor, to be placed in similar close confine- 
 ment at Eichmond and held as hostages for the treatment of 
 Beall and his party as prisoners-of-war. Such summary 
 retaliation instantly brought the government at Washington 
 to terms; the manacles were stricken from the limbs of the 
 Confederate captives, and nothing more was heard of trying 
 them for piracy. Beall was forwarded along with other offi- 
 cers from Fort McHenry to City Point on March 20th, 1864, 
 where he remained until May 5th, when he was duly exchanged 
 and returned to Richmond. The balance of the party, including 
 Beall's brother, William, were not exchanged until the fol- 
 lowing October. 
 
 The capture of the transport steamer Maple Leaf was one 
 of the enlivening incidents of 1863, She was chartered by the 
 U. S. government from her owner, who was also her captain, 
 and on July 7th started from Fortress Monroe for Fort Dela- 
 ware, with 93 Confederate officers who had been taken prison- 
 ers on the Mississippi, and sent east for confinement. The 
 ranking officer was Col. A. K. Witt, of the 10th Ark. regt., and 
 he, with Lieut. Semmes, and others of the prisoners, had con- 
 ceived a scheme to take possession of any vessel upon which 
 they might be placed. They were in charge of a Federal lieu- 
 tenant and sixteen men. After getting out to sea at night, 
 the lieutenant arranged his guard in three reliefs, the men not 
 on duty stacking their arms, and he retired to rest. Col. Witt 
 and Lieut. Semmes, seeing the opportunity, had arranged that 
 one of their men should be on the upper deck, and at a given 
 signal tap the bell, while the officers generally should cluster 
 around the guard so far as they might do so without exciting 
 suspicion. When the bell struck, the stacked muskets were 
 seized by the men in the secret, the guard was overpowered 
 without a shot being fired, and in five minutes Col. Witt was 
 in command of the Maple Leaf, and the Federal soldiers be- 
 came the prisoners. Col. Witt desired to run the steamer to 
 Nassau, and turn her over to the Confederate agents there; 
 
 46 
 
722 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 but her captain protested that she would never be able to 
 make the ocean voyage, although he offered to steer for any 
 other point the colonel might designate. It was then decided 
 to make for the coast of North Carolina, which was reached 
 ten miles below Cape Henry, and seventy of the Confederate 
 oflBcers landed, the remaining twenty-three, who were wounded 
 men, being left on board. It was proposed at first to take 
 them off and disable the engine of the boat, but upon the plea 
 of the captain that she represented his fortune, and that he 
 would take the wounded men direct to Fort Delaware, no harm 
 was done her. He repaid this leniency by returning, as quickly 
 as steam could carry him, to Fortress Monroe, and informing 
 Gen. Dix of the affair. Cavalry were sent out after the bold 
 seventy, but they reached the Confederate lines without 
 further adventure. 
 
 On March 6th, 1864, another of the Chesapeake Bay sur- 
 prise parties took place. Lieut. John Taylor Wood, of the 
 Confederate navy, and Capt. Thaddeus Fitzhugh, of the 5th 
 Va. cavalry, who was at his home in Matthews Co. on fur- 
 lough, gathered together a party of fifteen men, and crossed 
 the bay in open boats to Cherrystone harbor on the eastern, 
 shore. Running in at night, and taking the precaution of cut- 
 ting the telegraph wires, they captured the Federal cavalry 
 pickets, and waited in concealment for larger game. It came 
 in the shape of the U. S. dispatch boat Tolas, which arrived 
 during the night from Fortress Monroe, and was promptly 
 seized. Before morning another dispatch steamer, the Titan, 
 came in too, and also fell into their hands as a prize. The 
 cavalry guard and the crews of the two steamers outnum- 
 bered them three to one, but they acted with such swiftness 
 that their pistols were at the heads of each batch of the en- 
 emy before the latter could fire a shot. Warehouses on the 
 wharf containing commissary stores valued at $50,000 were 
 given to the flames. By the orders of Lieut. Wood the torch 
 was also to be applied to the Tolas, but the captain offered 
 to bond his vessel for $10,000, and when he executed the doc- 
 ument she was spared, and he and his crew were released on 
 parole. The raiders then embarked in the Titan, taking with 
 them the cavalrymen whom they had captured, and steamed off 
 for the Piankatank River, which they reached during the day. 
 Several gunboats were sent in pursuit of them, and after run- 
 ning up to Freeport, and removing from their prize everything 
 of value they set her on fire. Both the captured steamers were 
 fine new vessels that cost $40,000 each to build. 
 
 These daring expeditions from the western shore of Vir- 
 ginia determined the Federals to strike at their source, and 
 on April 18th, Capt. Foxhall A. Parker entered the Rappa- 
 hannock River with the Potomac fiotilla and destroyed a 
 large amount of navy material which the Confederates had 
 accumulated there, including ship timber and boats. He, 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 733 
 
 however, failed in the principal purpose of his foray, which 
 was to make inmates of Northern prisons of the venture- 
 some raiders; and finding that the river was dangerously 
 sown with torpedoes, he made his way out. About the mid- 
 dle of May, he returned with several vessels equipped with 
 torpedo searchers, and with their aid and by marching sea- 
 men along shore to look for pits from which infernal ma- 
 chines might be exploded, he reached Fredericksburg with- 
 out the loss of a boat. At Powatt's Island he sent into the 
 country a strong party of sailors, who encountered Acting 
 Masters Burley and Maxwell, with nine men. Although the 
 Confederates were so greatly in the minority, they made a gal- 
 lant fight, which did not end until Maxwell and six of his men 
 had been killed, and Burley and the others made prisoners. 
 
 In April, 1865, Capt. Fitzhugh, who was associated with 
 Lieut. Wood in the capture of the Tolas and Titan, carried to 
 success an equally adventurous undertaking within sixty 
 miles of Baltimore and under the noses of the enemy. Pass- 
 ing into Maryland with his band, he placed all except a dozen 
 in hiding on the Chesapeake shore near the mouth of the 
 Patuxent River, and with the dozen proceeded in disguise, on 
 April 4th, to the steamboat wharf at Fair Haven and took 
 passage on the steamer TTarriet Deford for Baltimore. When 
 the vessel was well out in the stream they threw off their dis- 
 guises and revealed themselves in the uniform of the Confed- 
 eracy. Taking possession of the steamer they headed her 
 down the bay and by signal brought from on shore their com- 
 rades, after which they returned to Fair Haven and landed 
 the passengers and most of the crew. They then laid their 
 course again down the Chesapeake with the intention of 
 capturing any governnaent vessel they might be able to over- 
 come or one of the large steamers of the Baltimore and Nor- 
 folk line, which were then carrying large numbers of officers 
 and men to and from the army, and were frequently laden 
 with stores of much value and sometimes paymasters' safes. 
 About midnight the steamer Louisiana of that line_ was 
 sighted. AH lights on the Harriet Deford were extinguished 
 and Capt. Fitzhugh 'prepared his men for boarding, but a 
 heavy gale was blowing, the seas were running high, and he 
 found it impossible to get the Deford, which was of but 160 
 tons burden, up to the large vessel, which thus escaped cap- 
 ture. The next day the alarm had spread all over the bay, 
 and knowing that the Federal gunboats would be after him he 
 took her into Dimer's Creek and destroyed her. 
 
 The last privateering exploit in the Chesapeake was the 
 capture of the schooner St. Marys off the mouth of the 
 Patuxent on April 6th, 1865, by Lieut. Commander John C. 
 Brain, who burned the vessel on the Virginia shore. Much 
 obloquy was visited upon the heroes of these adventures by 
 the Federal commanders in their reports, and although the 
 
734 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Washington government did not dare, for fear of retaliation, 
 to renew the Beall experiment of treating as pirates any of 
 them who were captured, the Northern newspapers never 
 spoke of their achievements as anything else than " piracy." 
 But the term was simply employed in vindictiveness and with- 
 out warrant. The enterprises of Beall, Wood, Brain and Fitz- 
 hugh were sanctioned by the rules of civilized warfare, which 
 permitted them, as officers of the Confederate navy or army, 
 to seize the property of citizens of a hostile government or to 
 destroy it. They scrupulously refrained from interference with 
 the personal property of individuals, and in the case of the 
 Harriet Deford, for instance, every passenger was sei on shore 
 without harm or loss. ''Pirates" would have cleaned their 
 pockets out as thoroughly as Sherman swept the homes of 
 Georgia, or Sheridan those of the Shenandoah valley. 
 
 In the cotemporaneous chronicles of the advance of the 
 Federals upon Richmond in the spring and summer of 1862, 
 the battle of Drewry's Bluff was made a minor affair in com- 
 parison with the clash of the grea.t armies of Lee and McClel- 
 lan upon the peninsula; but the revelations of later days, the 
 present knowledge of the conditions of invasion and defence 
 as shown in the historical writings of the commanders of 
 opposing fleets and armies, raise it to the rank of an engage- 
 ment upon which the fate of Richmond depended when it was 
 fought. The dispatch of May 13th, in which Flag-officer 
 Goldsborough promised Secretary Welles the capture of Rich- 
 mond, was not ridiculous at that date; absurd as it proved to 
 be, it was founded on possibilities that might have been 
 realized if the Federals had been quick enough to seize them. 
 If their fleet of iron-clads and gunboats had started up the 
 James River on the 10th of May, when it was known at Fort- 
 ress Monroe that they were no longer threatened by the Vii-- 
 ginia, they might have passed Drewry's Bluff with very little 
 more trouble than they met with at Day's Point or at the other 
 Confederate batteries which, as we have seen, they silenced 
 or passed. They could have easily covered the distance 
 between Newport News and Richmond in 34 hours, and on 
 any day before the 13th of May they would have found at 
 Drewry's Bluff only an uncompleted line of obstructions, 
 a battery mounting but three guns, and the opposition of the 
 Confederate squadron of flimsy gunboats that they could have 
 blown out of the water in a few moments of a close fight. But 
 they lagged behind and passed in inaction their opportune 
 moment, and when they did approach Richmond, Drewry's 
 Bluff was a strong defensive work, whose guns, to employ the 
 language of Lieut. Constable, the commander of the Nauga- 
 tuck, "were manned by the best artillerists in the world- 
 seamen commanded by officers late of the navy of the United 
 States." It was Tucker and his sailors who saved Richmond, 
 and these few hundred men were .iust then more precious as 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 725 
 
 guardians of the city than the splendid army that warded off 
 the assaults of McClellan. 
 
 Eichmond was not unconscious of her salvation, nor was 
 she unappreciative of the importance of the creation of a 
 stronger naval force than that which constituted the squadron 
 under the command of Com. Tucker. There was never at any 
 time an indifference in Virginia to the prominence which 
 should be given the navy in the defence of the Confederacy, and 
 the battles in Hampton Roads of the ship which bore the 
 name of the State were an incentive to the prevailing ambi- 
 tion that the bosom of the James should bear iron-clad ships 
 over which the Confederate ensign should float. This preg- 
 nant desire gave birth to the Richmond, the first fully-armored 
 ship that the South put afloat on the James River. The vessel 
 was consecrated from the laying of her keel with the ardent 
 hopes of a community around which the battle lines were 
 drawn. On March 17th, 1863, Col. Blanton Duncan caused to 
 be published in the Richmond Dispatch an appeal for funds 
 with which to build an iron-clad ship, under the supervision 
 of officers designated by the Navy Department, to be presented 
 to the government upon its completion. He instanced the ex- 
 ample of the women of South Carolina and Georgia, who were 
 endeavoring to raise a fund for a similar purpose and appealed 
 to the patriotism of the " rich men in our community who can 
 afford to give from $500 to $5,000 each and not miss it," and 
 offered to head a subscription list with his individual gift of 
 $3,000. The first response was made by Charles M. Wallace, 
 who enrolled himself as a contributor in the sum of $1,000, and 
 then Milton P. Jarnagin telegraphed from Athens, Tenn., 
 a subscription of $500. Next the venerable Edmund Ruifin 
 pledged himself to add $500 to the fund, and after him came 
 Edmund Ruffin, Jr., with a subscription of $1,000. Col. Ed- 
 mund Fontaine requested that his name should be inscribed 
 on the list for $1,500, and then the matter was taken up by the 
 devoted women of Virginia, and eventually it was mainly 
 through their patriotism and self-sacrifice that the project was 
 consummated. Their organization began at Williamsburg, 
 and is set forth in the following letter from that historic Vir- 
 ginia town printed in the Richmond Dispatch of March 28th : 
 
 " To THE Editor: Please state in your paper that the ladies of Wil- 
 liamsburg, Va., impressed with the importance of every effort to defend 
 our country, have organized a society for the purpose of building an iron- 
 clad gunboat to aid in protecting our coast from depredation and our 
 capital from an attack by water. Their efforts so far have been crowned 
 with signal success, and it is to be hoped that, with like enthusiasm, their 
 countrywomen throughout the State will at once form similar societies 
 for the purpose of obtaining funds for this object, which, if promptly un- 
 dertaken and actively carried out, may prove of incalculable benefit to 
 our State and country. 
 
 "By the energy, industry and patriotism of the women of Virginia, 
 and the influence they can wield over those who are able to contribute to 
 so laudable a design, a fund may soon be collected suflBlcient to place upon 
 
726 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 our waters a valuable ally of the mail-clad Virginia, the best defence of 
 our harbors and rivers from the attacks of an insolent enemy, whose 
 naval power has already inflicted heavy blows upon our coasts. 
 
 "The ladies of Williamsburt;, therefore, earnestly invite the co-opera- 
 tion of their sisters throughout the State, and i-ecommend the immediate 
 adoption'of such means as may secure the desired result. Contributions 
 from societies or individuals may be forwarded to either of the following 
 ladies: Mrs. Judge B. Tucker, Mrs. W. W. Vest, Mrs. Ro. Saunders, Mrs. 
 Thos. Ambler, Mrs. Jas. Semple, Mrs. C. W. Coleman, Mrs. Dr. William- 
 son, Mrs. Cornelia Jones, Mrs. Isabella Sully." 
 
 The " Ladies Defence Association " was then formed at 
 Eichmond, with Mrs. Maria G. Clofton, president; Mrs. General 
 Henningsen, vice-president, and Mrs. R. H. Maury, treasurer. 
 At its meeting on April 9th an address, prepared by Capt. J. S. 
 Maury, ' was read by Rev. Dr. Doggett. In this address it was 
 eloquently stated that the first efforts of the association would 
 be " directed to the building and putting afloat in the waters 
 of the James River a steam man-of-war, clad in shot-proof 
 armor; her panoply to be after the manner of that gallant 
 ship, the noble Virginia." Committees were appointed to 
 solicit subscriptions, and so much encouragement was received 
 that the managers of the association called upon President 
 Davis for sanction of its purpose, which he gladly gave ; and 
 it was announced that the keel of the vessel would be laid in 
 a few days, that Com, Farrand would be in charge of the 
 work, and that he would be assisted by ship-builder Graves. 
 
 Words can but inadequately represent the energy with 
 which the women of Virginia undertook this work, or the 
 sacrifices which they made to complete it. That their jewels 
 and their household plate, heirlooms, in many instances, that 
 had been handed down from generation to generation and 
 were the embodiments of ancestral rank and tradition, were 
 freely given up, is known. " Virginia," said they in their 
 appeal, "when she sent her sons into this war, gave up her 
 jewels to it. Let not her daughters hold back. Mothers, 
 wives, sisters ! what are your ornaments of silver and gold in 
 decoration, when by dedicating them to a cause like this, you 
 may in times like these strengthen the hand or nerve the arm, 
 or give comfort to the heart that beats and strikes in your 
 defence ! Send them to us." 
 
 The organization, moreover, did not confine itself to urging 
 upon the women of the State that this was particularly their 
 contribution to the maintenance of the Confederacy. It solic- 
 ited materials, tools and metals. '•' Iron railings," the address 
 
 1 John S.Maury held the rank of lieuteuant in the Confederate evacuatioti of Norfolk, he was 
 the U. S. navy previous to the outbreak of the ordered to Drewry's Bluff, and then to the corn- 
 war, and in April, 1861, waa stationed on the mand of the gunboat iianyj^n. He subsequently 
 sloop-of-war Cumberland, at Norfolk. He resigned commanded the iron-clad Richmond, from which 
 his commission , and entering the 0. S. navy, was he was detached to duty in the ordnance bureau 
 made lieutenant and assigned to duty at the Nor- in the city of Eichmond, where he remained 
 folk navy-yard after t had been abandoned by the until the evacuation, and was paroled at Dan- 
 Federals. He waa employed there in fitting out ville. Since the war he bafi resided .n Baltimore, 
 the vessels of the Confederate squadron and in where he has been engaged in the insurance 
 transporting guns to Southern porta. After business. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 737 
 
 continued, "old and new, scrap-iron about the house, broken 
 plough-shares about the farm, and iron in any shape, though 
 given in quantities ever so small, will be thankfully received if 
 delivered at the Tredegar works, where it may be put into the 
 furnace, reduced and wrought into shape or turned into shot 
 and shell." A friendly invasion of the tobacco factories was 
 made by a committee of ladies consisting of Mrs. Brooke 
 Gwathm.ey, Mrs. B. Smith, and Mrs. George T. Brooker, and 
 the owners cheerfully broke up much of their machinery that 
 was available for the specified purpose. Mrs. R. H. Maury, 
 treasurer of the association, took charge of the contributions 
 in money, plate and jewelry ; the materials and tools were sent 
 to Com. Farrand, and an agent, S. D. Hicks, was appointed to 
 receive the contributions of grain, country produce, etc. , that 
 were sent in by Virginia farmers to be converted into cash. 
 By the end of April the construction had reached an advanced 
 stage ; President Davis and Secretary Mallory had con- 
 gratulated the Ladies' Association upon the assured success 
 of its self-allotted task, and by the sale of articles donated to 
 a public bazaar or fair, almost a sufficient sum to complete the 
 ship was secured. ' 
 
 The Richmond was completed in July, 1863, and although 
 detailed descriptions are lacking, all mention made of her is 
 unanimous that she was an excellent ship of her type. Capt. 
 Parker says that " she was a fine vessel, built on the plan of 
 the Virginia. She was not so large, and her ends were not 
 submerged. She carried a bow and stern pivot, and two 
 guns in broadside." Federal prisoners coming out of Rich- 
 mond made many efforts to catch a glimpse of her as she laid 
 at the dock and brought North such exaggerated reports of her 
 size and strength that the Federals christened her " Merrimac 
 No. 2." She gave the Federal commanders an opportunity 
 to see for themselves what she was like on July 30th, when 
 she steamed down to Drewry's Bluff, near where the enemy's 
 squadron was lying. The Galena and Monitor, according to 
 the letter of a correspondent of the Philadelphia Inquirer, 
 hurried off to Harrison's Landing to inform Flag-officer 
 Wilkes' that the dreaded "Confederate rams" were coming 
 down the river. Wilkes made no great hurry to provoke an 
 action. On board his flag-ship, the Wachusett, he proceeded in 
 the direction of Drewry's Bluff, followed by the Monitor, the 
 Galena and six gunboats. With this strong squadron he was 
 vyilllng to try the issue of battle with the Richmond, but she 
 
 1 Just previous to this time there had been re- church. The total weight of the bells was 1623 
 
 ceived at the Ordnance Office, Eichmond, a ten- pounds. „ , ^ j, 
 
 ■derofthe church bells of Marietta, Ga., to be 2 Capt. Charles Wilkes, of San Jaomto and 
 
 -cast into cannon, which was accepted. The let- Trent fame, had been appointed to the command 
 
 ter making the offer was signed by Rev, E. Porter of the Federal fleet on the James Eiver. He was 
 
 Talmer pastor of the Presbyterian church; chosen for that command because of an expect- 
 
 Kevi T. B. Cooper, pastor of Baptist church; ation on the part of the Federal admmistration, 
 
 Eev. Samuel Benedict, rector of St. James that he would inaugurate a policy of hard and 
 
 Protestant Episcopal church and Rev. Alexander heavy fighting against the land and naval forces 
 
 •Graham, pastor of the Methodist Episcopal of the Confederacy. 
 
728 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 had retired up the river and he refrained from drawing the 
 fire of the batteries on the Bluflf. 
 
 The Federal knowledge of the fighting capacity of the 
 Richmond was by this time tolerably accurate. By their cap- 
 ture of the little gunboat Teaser they had come into the pos- 
 session of papers that fairly described the ship. This capture 
 was effected on the afternoon of July 4th. Balloon reconnois- 
 sances were then practiced by both armies ; and thp Teaser, 
 under command of Lieut. Hunter Davidson, had gone down 
 into Turkey Bend with a balloon on board, which it was pro- 
 posed to send up in order that an observation might be made 
 of McClellan's positions at City Point and Harrison's Landing. 
 The Teaser got aground, and while thus situated was dis- 
 covered by the Federal gunboat Maratanza, a ship carrying 
 several 9-inch Dahlgren guns. Davidson could not retreat, so 
 he opened fire upon the Maratanza with his two small guns, 
 a 9-pounder and a 32-pounder rifle. He put a shot into the 
 wheel-house of the Maratanza, but by her answering fire a 
 shell was exploded in the boiler of the Teaser, and Davidson 
 and his crew abandoned their vessel. They escaped to shore, 
 but left behind them their balloon and papers that the Fed- 
 erals claimed contained valuable information, including par- 
 ticulars concerning the Richmond and her armament. Lieut. 
 Davidson, in reporting the loss of his vessel, requested a 
 court of inquiry, which Secretary Mallory did not see fit to 
 grant. " The Department," the Secretary wrote, " does not 
 deem an inquiry as to the loss of the Teaser, by a court, neces- 
 sary, nor does it attach blame to yourself, your officers or 
 crew in consequence thereof. Your conduct under the cir- 
 cumstances was judicious and creditable to the service." 
 
 To a Confederate officer, Lieut. James Barry, who had 
 served both afloat and ashore, was due the invention and con- 
 struction of an iron-clad railway battery. He and some of 
 his men, members of the Norfolk United artillery, had served 
 on the Virginia in Hampton Roads ; and when the Confede- 
 rate army was drawn behind the railroad lines around Rich- 
 mond he conceived the project of, as the Richmond newspap- 
 ers styled it, the " Dry Land Merrimac." Upon a double set 
 of car-trucks he built a firm floor, upon which he erected an 
 armor-plated casemate similar to that of the Confederate iron- 
 clads, and mounted in it one of the Brooke banded and rifled 
 guns so admirably adapted to flring either shot ot shell. It 
 was on several occasions brought into action on the York 
 River railroad in the neighborhood of Fair Oaks and Savage's 
 Station, and did commendable service as long as the enemy 
 were on the line of the road. Railway batteries are now a part 
 of the equipment of all armies, but it is probable that the one 
 built by Lieut. Barry was the flrst to go into actual service. 
 
 Under Wilkes as flag-officer the Federal fleet on the 
 James was considerable strengthened, and when McClellan's 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 723' 
 
 shattered army was driven upon Harrison's Landing after the 
 seven days of battle it materially served to protect him from 
 further Confederate assaults ; but no desire was manifested, 
 to again try conclusions with the batteries on Drewry's Bluff. 
 The fleet suffered from several minor conflicts in which Con- 
 federate army and navy men took part. On May 19th the 
 surgeon, chief engineer, signal officer, and a boat's crew from 
 the gunboat Wachusett, went ashore at City Point. Leaving 
 six men in the boat, the others went into the town and were 
 captured by a scouting party of Confederates, who afterwards 
 fired upon the boat and killed or wounded all but one man of 
 the six. At Watkins Bluff, on June 20th, the gunboat Jacob 
 Bell, while going up the river to meet the Monitor, came 
 within the fire of a masked battery that crippled her. Her 
 pilot-house was carried away, her port wheel and upper works^ 
 shot off; but the arrival of the Monitor saved her from capture. 
 
 During the night of July 25th-26th, 1862, the fleet of Fed- 
 eral transports and supply ships near Harrison's Landing were 
 awakened by a bold invasion by a boat's crew embracing Cor- 
 poral Cocke, Thomas Martin, William Daniel, Alexander 
 Dimitry and William Williams. Martin, an old seaman, was 
 the virtual leader of the party, who stole into the midst of the 
 vessels in a small boat and picked out for attack a large 
 schooner, the Louisa Rives, of New York, loaded with army 
 stores. The barking of a dog on the schooner revealed their 
 approach, but they went ahead, although two gunboats were 
 but a few hundred yards distant. Martin jumped upon the 
 deck, followed by his comrades, and to prevent the captain 
 from giving an alarm, they told him they had come to arrest 
 him by orders of Gen. McClellan. Tumbling him into their 
 boat, they set fire to the cabin, and as they pulled for the shore 
 the schooner broke into flames and her crew saved themselves 
 in her boats, while the gunboats slipped their cables and began 
 a search for the party, who were by that time out of reach. 
 
 There was no cessation of the apprehensions of the cor- 
 respondents of Northern papers that the Merrimac No. 2 was- 
 coming out to engage the Federal fleet. On the night of July 
 .29th, Gen. Pendleton, Chief of Artillery, C. S. A., brought sev- 
 eral field batteries down to the shore between City Point and 
 Drewry's Bluff, from which he shelled the Federal vessels, and 
 under the supposition that the Richmond would make an attack; 
 under cover of this fire, the Monitor, Galena and the gunboats- 
 were hastily advanced to confront her. The 15th of Aug. was- 
 set as the day by which Flag-officer Wilkes was to reduce 
 Drewry's Bluff and annihilate the Confederate squadron, but 
 it passed without any demonstration on his part, and with the 
 retirement of McClellan's army from Harrison's Landing com- 
 parative quiet was restored to the James River. The only 
 addition made to the Confederate squadron meantime was the 
 Drewry, Lieut. Com. W. H. Parker, a gunboat mounting one 
 
730 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 large rifle gun at the bow, which was protected by an iron shield 
 in the form of a V. Com. French Forrest was placed in com- 
 mand of the squadron, which toward the close of the year con- 
 .sisted of the Richmond, Patrick Henry, Nansemond, Hampton, 
 Beaufort, Raleigh and Drewry. Two gunboats that were 
 being built on the Pamunkey River had been destroyed by the 
 Federals in May, and in November they burned another gun- 
 boat that was on the stocks in Mobjack Bay, Matthews Co. 
 
 The year 1863 was the quietest of the war upon the James 
 E,iver. In July the Federal iron-clad fleet, which then com- 
 prised several monitors, hovered around Fort Drewry, but did 
 not open fire upon it. On August 4th the most important 
 event of the year upon the river occurred. Maj. Gen. Foster, 
 Brig. Gen. Nagle, Brig. Gen. Potter and their staffs started 
 from Fortress Monroe with a strong squadron for a reconnois- 
 sance of Fort Drewry. Their vessels were the monitor Sanga- 
 mon and the gunboats Commodore Barney and Cohasset. Near 
 Varina, about five miles below Drewry's Bluff, they reached 
 a. line of torpedoes that had been planted by Lieut. Hunter 
 Davidson, C. S. N., who had been placed in charge of this 
 branch of defence and had brought it to a state of remarkable 
 ■efficiency by his inventions and supervision. His torpedoes 
 were connected by A^ires with electric arrangements on shore 
 by which they could be exploded, and he, with one or more 
 of the members of his torpedo corps, would daily visit the 
 lines in the steam launch that had been set apart for his use 
 -and see that charges, fuses and firing apparatus were in relia- 
 ble working order. Despite, however, all his carefulness, on 
 this occasion the torpedoes failed to realize all that had been 
 expected of them. ' The Sangamon and the gunboats were close 
 upon the line of the machines when an attempt was made 
 from the shore to fire them. Only one exploded, and that was 
 nearly under the keel of the Commodore Barney, but a little 
 too far forward to exert its greatest force upon her. Her bow 
 was lifted high in the air, planking and timbers were torn 
 from her side, and she seemed to disappear in the commotion 
 of the waters, but by her violent careening so much heavy 
 material went overboard from her spar-deck that thus light- 
 ened she righted herself. Twenty oi her crew were washed 
 off the deck, but all except two were rescued by boats from 
 the consort vessels. "This explosion," said Lieut. Davidson's 
 report of Aug. 6th, " panic-struck the enemy, as their shrieks 
 and cries could be heard a long distance, and effectually ar- 
 rested their progress up the river, not one of their vessels pass- 
 ing our position at any time." There were 500 lbs. of powder in 
 the torpedoes, which Lieut. Davidson alludes to as being of 
 the tank pattern; and, perhaps not desiring to make any closer 
 acquaintance with others like it. Gen. Foster deferred until 
 a more auspicious hour his reconnoissance of Fort Drewry. 
 The squadron of observation put back down the river, and at 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 731 
 
 Deep Bottom, on the following day, steamed unawares within 
 range of a Confederate artillery and infantry force masked 
 liehind the thick forest growth of the river bank. The already 
 •crippled Commodore Barney received a shell in her boiler, the 
 engine of the Cohasset was damaged by a solid shot, and only 
 the impenetrable turret-ship came out of the fight unscathed. 
 " The officers don't want to try it over again," wrote a seaman 
 ■of the Barney in a letter that found its way into print, " and I 
 don't blame them." 
 
 The lethargy that prevailed on the James in 1863, gave 
 way the next year to extreme military and naval activity, 
 -and from May, 1864, to the close of the war, momentous 
 events succeeded each other in swift and stirring procession. 
 In that month the Confederate squadron ready to resume 
 belligerent operations was the most formidable of which the 
 navy was possessed. There had been added to it the iron- 
 clad Virginia, a vessel of the same type as her famous name- 
 sake, minus the submerged ends; but plated with six inches 
 of armor on the sides of her casemate, and eight inches on 
 the ends. Her battery consisted of two 6-inch and two 8-inch 
 Brooke rifled guns, so placed that three could be fired in 
 laroadside. Another recruit to the squadron was the iron-clad 
 Fredericksburg, but she was a much weaker ship, having but 
 four inches of armor. She also carried four guns, all 6-inch 
 rifles. The iron-clad Richmond was still on duty, as were 
 the gunboats previously mentioned as constituting the naval 
 force in 1863. Com. John K. Mitchell relieved Capt. French 
 Forrest in the command of the squadron; theVirginia^as com- 
 manded by Com. R. B. Pegram, the Richmond by Lieut. Com. 
 W. H. Parker, and the Fredericksburg by Com. T. R. Rootes. ' 
 
 On May 5th, 1864, Gen. B. F. Butler effected the transfer of 
 the Federal army of the James from the York River to Bermuda 
 Hundreds under the protection of four monitors, the iron-clad 
 Atlanta, captured near Savannah, and seven gunboats. One 
 •duty assigned to the latter was the dragging of the river for 
 torpedoes, but on the 6th the gunboat Commodore Jones rested 
 near Four and a Half Mile Creek, directly over one of Lieut. 
 Davidson's tank machines which was connected by a wire 
 with a galvanic battery secreted in a pit on shore and operated 
 ^aJ three of the subordinates of his corps. At the proper 
 moment they transmitted the spark, the 400 pounds of powder 
 which the machine contained exploded, and the enemy's ves- 
 sel was literally blown into fragments. More than half her 
 crew were killed or wounded by the concussion or were thrown 
 into the river and drowned. Her total loss was stated to be 
 75 out of a ship's company of 130. Fifty were killed outright 
 -and the mangled portions of their bodies were mingled with 
 the splinters of the vessel that thickly strewed the surface of 
 
 1 Lieut. Com. Parker "waB for much of the time and was several times transferred , from that 
 311 cominand of the schoolship Patrick Henry, vessel to the Ridimond, and vitx versa. 
 
732 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the water. On the next day the gunboat Shawsheen was de^ 
 stroyed in the same manner near Turkey Bend, and all of her 
 people not killed were made prisoners. 
 
 The Federals obtained some recompense for these losses. 
 When the Commodore Jones was destroyed, a boat from an- 
 other gunboat put for the shore and there captured Acting- 
 Master P. W. Smith, C. S. N. , and Jeffries Johnson, a private of 
 the submarine battery service, who were in charge of the tor- 
 pedoes. The captors at once examined them as to the loca- 
 tion of other infernal machines, and while Master Smith 
 courageously refused to betray his cause by giving the infor- 
 mation which would enable the enemy to avoid them. Private 
 Johnson is said by the report of the Federal fleet captain to- 
 have weakened when he was placed in the forward gunboat 
 searching for torpedoes, and to have told all he knew concern- 
 ing the points where they were laid down by Commander 
 Davidson. From his revelations the Federals were enabled 
 to take up a number of the explosive machines and make- 
 more rapid progress up the river. They found that each of 
 the pits, in which a man was stationed to fire torpedoes, con- 
 tained a simplified form of the Bunsen electric battery, from, 
 which insulated wires led under ground and under water to- 
 the tank that held the powder, and conducted the spark that 
 fired the charge. Within a month the Federals moved twenty 
 torpedoes from the river, one containing a charge of 1900 lbs. 
 of powder. What destruction they might have caused but for 
 the treachery of one man is beyond the bounds of speculation. 
 
 The movement of Butler's army to Bermuda Hundreds 
 was made known at Drewry's Bluff "on May 5th by messages- 
 from the Confederate signal men. It was seen that the post 
 was in danger of an attack from the land side. Lieut. Col. 
 Terrett of the marine corps was commander of the position,, 
 but in his temporary absence he was represented by Maj. 
 Frank Smith. Cora. Mitchell and Capt. Pegram were also 
 away, and Capt. W. H. Parker was the senior officer on the 
 river. Very few troops were at the fort, and Capt. Parker 
 took on shore all the men that could be spared from the squad- 
 ron and assisted Maj. Smith to man the inner line of defences, 
 their force being too weak to hold the outer line. They sent 
 dispatches to Gen. Lee and to Richmond asking for reinforce- 
 ments, and remained in arms all night expecting an attack 
 that they knew they were too feeble to resist. Gen. Bushrod 
 Johnson arrived with his brigade at daylight, but was com- 
 pelled to move in obedience to orders, and in the afternoon 
 the alarm was given that the enemy were close at hand. Pro- 
 visions and ammunition were thrown into the fort, and Capt. 
 Pegram, who had returned to the Bluff, arrayed the squadron 
 so that it might render all possible aid to the defence, but 
 Butler never came. It was his one opportunity to capture 
 Drewry's Bluff, which within the next twenty-four hours was. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 733 
 
 teavily reinforced. On the 16th Gen. Beauregard drove But- 
 ler back to Trent's Reach, and by erecting a strong battery at 
 the Hewlett House held him in that safe position and obtained 
 an additional command of the river. 
 
 Torpedoes were attached to the bows of all the vessels of 
 the Confederate squadron now, and they were frequently 
 •drilled with them. At the end of May the obstructions were 
 sufficiently removed to permit the vessels to pass through, and 
 they went through and anchored off Chapin's Bluff. An 
 ■engagement with the Federal fleet was immediately expected, 
 and on May 30th Admiral Lee, the Federal commander, sent 
 the following dispatch to Secretary Welles : 
 
 "A deserter from the rebel \esse\-of-yr&v Hampton, reports to-day that 
 "the enemy have now below Drewry's Bluff three iron-clads, six small gun- 
 boats, plated with boiler-iron, each mounting two guns of 6-inch and 4- 
 inch bore, all fitted with torpedoes, and nine fire-sMps, fitted with com- 
 bustible material, with which they propose to attack the fleet in James 
 Kiver, at as early a moment as practicable, by sending down their flre- 
 £hips first, followed by the iron-clads and other vessels." 
 
 So impetuous a desire had been expressed by tlie Federal 
 authorities for an engagement between their fleet and the Con- 
 federate vessels, that it is impossible to underrate the surprise 
 felt when it became known that the Federals were obstruct- 
 ing the river at Trent's Eeach, by sinking hulks in order to 
 prevent the Confederate squadron from coming down. The 
 official correspondence of Gen. Butler, Adm. Lee and Secretary 
 Welles, contained in the latter's report for 1864, irresistibly 
 establishes the conclusion that, if the Federal commanders 
 were anxious to try the gage of battle with Com. Mitchell's 
 squadron, their confidence in their ability to win a victory was 
 not shared by their superiors. Adm. Lee was informed early 
 in June that the passage of the river was to be barred, and on 
 the 7th he entered his protest to the Navy Department: 
 
 ' ' The navy, " he said , " is not accustomed to putting down obstructions 
 ^before it, and the act might be construed as implying an admission of 
 superiority of resources on the part of the enemy. The object of the 
 operation would be to make the river more secure against the attempts of 
 "the enemy upon our vessels by flre and explosive rafts, followed by tor- 
 pedoes and iron-clad vessels and boats. * * * Of course myself and officers 
 desire the opportunity of encountering the enemy, and feel reluctant to 
 discourage his approach. But the point of embarrassment with me is the 
 consequences that would follow a failure of the campaign should the novel 
 plan of the enemy succeed in crippling the monitor force." 
 
 Adm. Lee's object was to place the responsibility of obstruct- 
 ing the river entirely upon Gen. Butler, and thus acquit the 
 navy of erecting a barrier against an action with the Con- 
 federate squadron, but the wily military lawyer was altogether 
 too shrewd to permit the burden to be placed upon his 
 shoulders. On June 2d, he had written to the Admiral: 
 
 " I have no difficulty as to the point at which we desire to secure the 
 river. It is the right of my line near Curtis' house at the ravine, but 
 "whether the river should be secured by obstructions or by vessels, or a 
 
73i THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 disposition of your obstructions or of the vessels of your navy, neither my- 
 self nor my engineers have any right to feel ourselves competent to giv& 
 our opinion. The vessels are wholly at your service, but upon your 
 judgment, not mine, must rest their use.'' 
 
 This clever strategy threw upon the Admiral the onus of 
 deciding whether he vvould rely upon the fighting qualities of 
 his fleet to protect the army lines, or vs^hether he would resort 
 to obstructions for protection. He appealed the question to 
 Mr. Welles, but meanwhile gave Butler a non-commital 
 answer, in which he said : 
 
 " The first consideration with me is the necessity of holding this river 
 beyond a peradventure for the great mUitary purposes of Gen. Grant and 
 yourself. In consulting my own desires, 1 would do everything to induce, 
 and nothing to prevent, the enemy from trying to assert their strength in 
 a pure naval contest, which in my opinion would give us a naval victory. 
 The only contingency of such a battle is the unknown effect of the novel 
 instruments of war — torpedo vessels — which are to be employed by them, 
 and which, as the attacking party, give them perhaps an advantage which 
 might possibly balance our certain superiority in all other fighting material. "■ 
 
 This diplomatic fencing between the army and the navy 
 was brought to a termination by Gen. Grant himself. On 
 June 11th, Secretary Welles replied to Adm. Lee by declining 
 to decide the question of the obstructions and referring it- 
 back to the discretion of the latter, but before Lee received 
 this answer Grant had been badly defeated at the battle of 
 Cold Harbor, and was rushing his army across to the south 
 side of the James. He did not elect to take the chances of the 
 Federal ships being driven out of the river by Com. Mitchell, 
 and he issued his peremptory orders that the hulks already 
 provided should be scuttled to form the obstructions on Trent's 
 Reach Bar. This was done, and when booms and cables were 
 stretched between them the river was closed. The navy was at 
 any rate saved from the discredit of voluntarily seeking protec- 
 tion from its antagonist, and Mr. Welles was allowed the lati- 
 tude of boasting in his next annual report of what it might 
 have done if it had not been overruled. 
 
 The Federal fleet available for an engagement embraced 
 the first-class monitors Saugus, Tecumseh, Canonicus and On- 
 ondaga, mounting 11-inch and 15-inch guns, and 160-pounder 
 rifles, and some dozen of heavily-armed gunboats, while the 
 Confederate force that could be depended upon for effective 
 work was really limited to the three iron-clad rams and Da- 
 vidson's torpedo-boat; but still Grant was not willing that 
 there should be a naval action, even with the odds so favorable 
 to the Federals. Until the obstructions were so far finished 
 as to make it evident that the enemy would not accept his 
 challenge to a combat Com. Mitchell remained near Trent's 
 Reach, and then withdrew to Drewry's Bluff. Loth, however, 
 to abandon all effort to disturb the enemy, he established a 
 naval battery on the hill at Hewlett's House, from which, by 
 firing across the neck of land around which the river makes 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 735' 
 
 one of the many great curves that intervene between City- 
 Point and Richmond, he might hope to reacli the fleet in 
 Trent's Reach. Manning this work with some of his seamen, 
 his iron-clads were instructed to co-operate from a position on 
 the north side of Dutch Gap, and the gunboats to remain close 
 at hand for any assistance feasible for them to render. The 
 Virginia, Fredericksburg, and the gunboats got into position 
 on the morning of June 21st, but the Richmond was delayed 
 in consequence of a wheel-rope parting, and fouling the pro- 
 peller; and did not arrive at the scene of action until after- 
 noon. The naval battery opened fire briskly upon the moni- 
 tors at 10:30 A. M. and the squadron joined in the work, the 
 vessels being concealed from the view of the Federals by the 
 trees. It was an artillery duel at moderately long range that 
 was not of serious effect to either party concerned. The mon- 
 itor Saugus was struck once and the Canonicus twice by shot' 
 from the battery, but the damage was trifling; 329 projectiles 
 were fired by the monitors, and the sole result was to silence 
 one gun in the naval battery. Mitchell's vessels were not 
 once struck, and the firing was discontinued at sunset. 
 
 The squadron was not again engaged until August 13th, 
 when a portion of it participated in harassing the working 
 parties on the canal which Gen. Butler was building at Dutch 
 Gap for the purpose of opening a new route from below Hew- 
 lett's Battery to the upper reach of the James River. From 
 time to time" the pick and shovel brigade on this useless pro- 
 ject of the commander of the Federal army of the James had 
 been shelled by the guns of the naval battery at Howlett's so 
 severely that from a dozen to a score was the daily average 
 of casualties among them; but on the 13th they were attacked 
 with a more definite purpose. At 5 A. m. the Virginia and. 
 Fredericksburg opened fire from a position about a mile dis- 
 tant, while the Richmond and several of the gunboats dropped 
 down to Cox's Reach, and with the battery on Signal Hill and 
 at Howlett's took part in the cannonade. The Federal monitor 
 Saugus, and the gunboats Mackinaw and Delaware, endeavored 
 to protect the working parties by firing upon the Confederate 
 vessels, but their fire was altogether unproductive of results. 
 As the Confederate squadron was partially hidden from the 
 enemy by a wooded bluff, the guns of the latter could only be 
 aimed by directions from the masthead of the Mackinaw, and 
 in fact were so elevated that it was only by chance that they 
 could hit their mark. The Virginia was struck twice and the 
 Fredericksburg once, but suffered no damage beyond the start- 
 ing of a few bolts. They paid no attention to the enemy's 
 vessels, but all day long maintained a slow and accurate fire 
 upon the laborers in the canal, with the result, according to 
 the Federal reports, of killing and wounding thirty men. 
 
 While a demonstration of this character seemed, standing 
 alone, to be aimless, it was, in truth, an incident of the policy 
 
736 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of annoying the Federals that produced beneficent conse- 
 quences. It compelled the detention of a powerful iron-clad 
 fleet in the James that might otherwise have been detached 
 for operations against Southern ports, and it constantly trou- 
 bled Gen. Grant concerning the security of his all-important 
 line of communication by water, The authorities at Wash- 
 ington thought that the monitors could be withdrawn from 
 the James for operations against Charleston or Fort Fisher, 
 but when they proposed to strip Adm. Lee of this element of 
 his force, his vigorous remonstrance was so energetically sup- 
 ported by Grant that the administration was obliged to recede 
 from its purpose. " Whilst I believe," wrote Grant on June 
 Sth to Lee, " we will never req^uire the armored vessels to meet 
 those of the enemy, I think it would be imprudent to with- 
 draw them. * * * They stand a constant threat to the 
 •enemy, and prevent him taking the offensive. There is no 
 disguising the fact that if the enemy should take the offensive 
 ■on the water — although we would probably destroy his whole 
 James Eiver navy — such damage would be done our shipping 
 and stores, all accumulated on the water near where the con- 
 flict would begin, that our victory would be dearly bought. " 
 Lee's reasoning was in accordance with that of Grant. He 
 "told Mr. Welles that the application of a few torpedoes would 
 •clear a passage through the barricade, and proposed the ques- 
 -tion: "What, if the draft of the rebel iron-clads allow them 
 to pass the bar in Trent's Reach, would become of the commu- 
 nications of the army if our iron-clads were withdrawn?" 
 They were not withdrawn, and the sleep of the General and 
 the Admiral was not haunted by the spectre of Com. Mitch- 
 ell's squadron sinking and burning the James River armada. 
 
 Making use of another period of inaction on the river, 
 Acting Masters John Maxwell and Hines and three men from 
 the squadron on Sept. 17th went into Warwick River with 
 an open boat and captured the Federal schooner Jane F. 
 Durfee and her officers and crew, numbering eight persons. 
 The vessel was bonded and her people paroled. This exploit, 
 successfully performed so far within the enemy's lines, re- 
 flected much credit upon those engaged in it. 
 
 The most severe test to which the squadron had been sub- 
 jected was that which they experienced on October 23d, 1864, 
 in an encounter with a new battery at the Boulware House on 
 the left bank of the river, nearly two miles below Chapin's 
 Bluff, and connecting with the fortification on Signal Hill. 
 These works had been erected by the Federals since their cap- 
 ture of Fort Harrison on September 19th, and their arma- 
 ment included several 100-pounder Parrott rifles. They were 
 masked until the morning of the engagement, when the forest 
 growth in front of them was cut away and they were revealed 
 within practicable range of the Virginia, Richmond, Fred- 
 .ericksburg, Hampton and Drewry, lying near Cox's Landing. 
 
THE dONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 737 
 
 The small gunboats, which were not calculated to withstand 
 the fire of the heavy Federal ordnance, moved out of their 
 reach, not however before Lieut. Alexander's vessel, the 
 Diewry, received a shell which struck one of her gun car- 
 riages, wounding two men severely and three slightly. Com. 
 Mitchell, with his flag-ship, the Virginia, passed down to 
 within 500 yards of the battery, signalling Capts. Maury and 
 Bootes to follow with the Richmond and Fredericksburg) and 
 for two hours they maintained so steady and well-directed a 
 fire that the replies of the enemy grew slower and then nearly 
 ceased, whereupon the squadron, which had almost exhausted 
 their ammunition, returned toward Drewry's Bluff. It was 
 admitted by the correspondents of Northern papers that the 
 aim of the Confederate gunners was remarkably precise, shell 
 after shell bursting in the earthen face of the battery and 
 driving the men from their pieces. This being the first test of 
 the resisting quality of the casemates of the ships under a 
 close fire of heavy rified guns, the result was of much prac- 
 tical importance and interest. It was encouraging except in 
 the case of the Fredericksburg, the weakest of the three ves- 
 sels. Capt. Rootes had gallantly exposed her to the sharpest 
 of the enemy's fire, and as the Federal officers had acquired 
 from deserters an acquaintance with the details of the several 
 ships, their thickness of plating and weight of battery, it is 
 rather more than conjecture that they intentionally ham- 
 mered the Fredericksburg harder and more frequently than 
 they did her stronger consorts. Her comparatively vulner- 
 able casemate was struck several times, and although the 
 wooden backing was not penetrated a few plates were started 
 and bolt-heads knocked off ; yet there was no damage done 
 that incapacitated her from continuing the battle, and she 
 emerged from the ordeal in better trim than could have been 
 expected. The only loss in men suffered was on this vessel, a 
 shell that exploded immediately upon the grating of the roof 
 of the casemate wounding seriously two and slightly four of 
 her crew. With the Virginia it was demonstrated that her 
 thick armor was proof against the 100-pound conical bolts 
 from the enemy's rifles. She was hit by seven projectiles, no 
 .one of which did more than make a slight indentation in the 
 six inches of iron. Not a bolt was started, and she came out 
 of the engagement as tight and sound as when she went into 
 it. Nearly the same thing may be said of the Richmond, ex- 
 cept that she was more frequently struck and that her smoke- 
 stack was shot away. 
 
 This affair offered the four Federal monitors an enticing 
 opportunity to engage the Confederate squadron if their com- 
 manders were spoiling for a fight. As we have seen, Adm. Lee 
 had already indicated that the obstructions on Trent's Eeach 
 bar could be removed, with little trouble or loss of time, suffi- 
 ciently to make a gateway for the passage of vessels, and as the 
 
738 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 nearest Confederate battery was 2,000 yards distant it could 
 not have materially interfered with their working parties 
 making the opening. Com. Mitchell, whom his associates in 
 the old navy knew as an officer who would not have declined 
 such an engagement, remained in the vicinity of Dutch 
 Gap quite long enough to have permitted the monitors to come 
 up to him, but they did not stir from their moorings. It is no 
 impeachment of the courage of their officers that the vessels 
 were held off; but it is another fragment of evidence that the 
 supreme Federal authorities were cautiously averse to an 
 honest fight with the Confederate ships. All through the 
 autumn of 1864 the latter were most of the time below the ob- 
 structions at Drewry's Bluff and in the attitude of challenging 
 the enemy to a combat that was never accepted, notwith- 
 standing the asserted confidence of Gen. Grant and Adm. 
 Lee that the Federals would be victors in a naval battle. The 
 Admiral does, indeed, in his dispatches speak of the channels 
 above Trent's Reach being too shallow for his vessels, but the 
 monitors were of no deeper draft than the Confederate iron- 
 clads, and in the negro boatmen who had flocked to him he 
 possessed as capable and skillful pilots as any on the river. 
 
 On Dec. 7th the Richmond again came down within a mile 
 of Trent's Reach, the Virginia and Fredericksburg following, 
 and challenged Fort Brady, a Federal work on the right bank 
 of the James, to a shelling match. It was nearly sunset when 
 the firing began, and it ceased with the approach of darkness. 
 The Richmond was rapped on her casemate with a big rifle- 
 bolt, but it did no harm, and none of the other ships were hit. 
 
 The closing naval event of the year upon the James and 
 contingent waters was the disastrous Federal expedition to 
 Rainbow Bluff, on the Roanoke River, on which occasion 
 Lieut. Davidson's torpedo inventions made a flattering record 
 for him. Five steamers composed the expedition, which on 
 the evening of Dec. 9th came to anchor near Jamesville. The 
 gunboat Otsego, fitted with a torpedo catcher, was exploring 
 for infernal machines, but she failed to detect two that ex- 
 ploded directly under her and blew her whole bottom out. On 
 the next day the gunboat Bazely was also sunk by a torpedo, 
 and the river was found to be so full of them that the flotilla, 
 now reduced to three vessels, fell back with all the speed that 
 it could make. On the way out of the river the steamers were 
 attacked by sharp-shooters from the shore and almost disabled 
 before they reached the James. Some twenty men were lost 
 by the torpedo explosions and the fire of the sharp-shooters. 
 
 We are nearing the finale of the James River squadron, 
 but before it shared in the fate which overtook the Confederate 
 States its ships and its men were to do their part in the heroic 
 struggles of the perishing Confederacy. The gloom that over- 
 spread the South when the dawn of 1865 introduced the ulti- 
 mate months of the war was nowhere darker than over the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 739 
 
 horizon of Richmond, and with the ponderous weight of 
 Grant's armies pressing upon the enfeebled lines of Lee, mili- 
 tary resistance was fast giving way. Yet one hope remained 
 —that if the squadron could pass down the James, it might 
 disperse the Federal fleet at City Point and there destroy 
 Grant's base of supplies; Gen. Lee's veterans might pursue 
 this advantage by an attack in mass upon the military lines 
 that were being tightened around Richmond and even break 
 them at any important points— that if all this could be accom- 
 plished the throttling grasp of the enemy would be shaken off, 
 the capital would be relieved and new strength gained for the 
 further struggle. It was the mission of the navy to begin the 
 execution of this bold and brilliant programme, which had 
 been planned in conferences between Flag-officer Mitchell and 
 Gen. Lee. To the unflinching spirit of Mitchell, chafing at 
 the forced inaction of his ships, it came as the most welcome 
 incident of his career upon the James. 
 
 The circumstances that prevailed in the third week of 
 January seemed to be a harbinger of success. Their suspicions 
 of a naval raid from the direction of Richmond lulled by their 
 confidence in the security of the obstructions, which had been 
 planted with torpedoes, the Federals had sent to the attack on 
 Fort Fisher all their monitors except the Onondaga, or Quint- 
 ard battery, as it was sometimes called, a powerful double-turret 
 vessel, mounting two 15-inch guns, and two very heavy rifles ; 
 but for all her formidable character she could scarcely be 
 forced into a fight, as the sequel showed. A flood in the river 
 was awaited to afford the Virginia plenty of water in which 
 to rnanoeuvre, and the outlooks were instructed to report the 
 indications of a freshet, which, it was believed, might wash 
 out the Federal booms stretched across Trent's Reach. The 
 high water came on January 23d, and all day the ice was run- 
 ning out in great fields and hummocks. That night Lieut. 
 C. W. Read, in command of naval Battery Wood, sent Master's 
 Mate Billups and two men down the river in a dug-out to ex- 
 amine the obstructions, and received from Billups the report 
 that, after carefully sounding, he had ascertained that for a 
 width of 80 feet there was a depth of 14 feet through the 
 obstructions, which were only closed by a large spar lying 
 diagonally across the entrance. Read went at once to Gen. 
 Pickett's headquarters and reported the result of the observ- 
 ations. Gen. Pickett directed him to hasten to Petersburg and 
 advise Gen. Lee. Gen Lee asked him if he thought the channel 
 sufl&ciently wide and deep to admit the passage of the Con- 
 federate iron-clads. He replied that he had no doubt of it, and 
 that at any rate it might be tried. Gen. Lee ordered him to go at 
 once to the Secretary of the Navy and ask that the iron-clads 
 be sent down that night. He rode as fast as possible to Rich- 
 mond, and went to see Mr. Mallory and explain everything to 
 him. Without the least hesitation the latter wrote an order to 
 
740 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Flag-ofRcer Mitchell, directing him to move as soon as possible 
 if he deemed it practicable. 
 
 Lieut. Read delivered the orders to Com. Mitchell at 3 P. M. 
 of the 33d, and the commanders of the iron-clads were promptly- 
 directed to prepare for the movement. They were Lieut Dun- 
 nington, of the flag-ship FiVg-mm; Lieut. Kell, of the Richmond, 
 and Lieut. Sheppard of the Fredericksburg. The remainder of 
 the squadron comprised the gunboat Drewry, the torpedo boat 
 Torpedo, and the torpedo launches Scorpion, Wasp and Hornet, 
 as it was contemplated that torpedoes should be employed 
 against the Federal vessels. Capt. Read was placed in com- 
 mand of the launches. His narrative of the expedition says : 
 
 "Just after dark we got under way and proceeded down the river, 
 the wooden gunboats and the torpedo-boats being placed on the star- 
 board side of the iron-clads. The night was dark and very cold. We 
 passed three or four miles in range of the enemy's batteries and were not 
 discerned, the Federal pickets being all under cover in their rifle-pits 
 around the fires. When we arrived near the obstructions, Capt. Mitchell 
 brought the fleet to anchor. He then went in the Scorpion, with 
 Plag Lieut. Graves and myself. We went down and sounded through the 
 obstructions, which verified the report that Billups had made. While we 
 were sounding, the Federal picket boat discerned us and gave the alarm. 
 As the enemy occupied both banks, a heavy fire of big guns, field-pieces 
 and musketry was opened on us, and a perfect rain of missiles swept 
 over our heads. Capt. Mitchell was the coolest man under fire that I ever 
 saw ; he stood by the man at the lead, and was not satisfied until sound- 
 ings had been made many times across the gap in the obstructions. The 
 spar that was lying diagonally across above the opening of the obstruc- 
 tions, was anchored at each end. A few licks with a cold chisel set it 
 adrift. We then went on board the Fredericksburg, which was the 
 lightest draft of the iron-clads. Capt. Mitchell ordered Sheppard to get 
 under weigh, which was soon done, and Capt. Mitchell himself took the 
 ship through the obstructions. He then returned to the Virginia in the 
 Scorpion. When we went on board the Virginia, we found that she had 
 been anchored too close to the north shore and had grounded. The 
 Richmond was in the same condition. The tugs were pulling at those 
 two ships, but could not move them. The firing from the southern shore 
 was now tremendous and much more accurate than at first. The Confed- 
 erate batteries had opened all along the line. About 4 o'clock next 
 morning Capt. Mitchell sent me down in the Scorpion with orders to the 
 Fredericksburg to return. I found Sheppard about a mile below the ob- 
 structions, and piloted the ship up the river and anchored her close by the 
 iron-clads aground near the Confederate battery at the Howlett House." 
 
 The grounding of the Virginia and Richmond was the 
 virtual collapse of the enterprise, the successful consummation 
 of which was balanced upon a quick dash upon the enemy 
 and a surprise. While Mitchell was on his way to the Fred- 
 ericksburg Lieut. Sheppard, puzzled to account for the failure 
 of the other ships to follow him through the obstructions, had 
 sent Master E. T. Eggleston to look for them, but before the 
 latter found them the flag-officer had communicated with the 
 Fredericksburg and ordered her return, as stated by Lieut. Read. 
 
 The break of day disclosed the Confederate squadron re- 
 assembled in Trent's Reach directly under the guns of Fort 
 Parsons, which opened upon them a tremendous fire from 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 741 
 
 rifled guns and mortars. Shortly a shell pierced the Drewry 
 and shattered her, but her people had been just previously re- 
 moved to another vessel. Next the torpedo launch Wasp was 
 smashed by a shot, and the other wooden steamers took 
 shelter under a bank where the missiles could not reach them. 
 Several projectiles struck the iron-clads, but did not pierce 
 their armor or at all impair their fighting capacity. But a 
 more dangerous enemy was at hand. The monitor Onondaga, 
 which had at first retired down the river upon discovery at 
 daylight of the proximity of Mitchell's squadron, came up 
 again at nine o'clock, and brought her 15-inch guns to bear 
 on the Virginia and Bichmond, which were still helplessly 
 grounded. ' 
 
 They endeavored to reply, but their batteries could not be 
 worked from the embarrassing position in which they were 
 situated, and when the port shutters were opened to allow a 
 gun to be run out the musketry fire from the Federal infan- 
 try on the high land of the right bank of the river was so fierce 
 as to prevent any accurate aim. The same cause interfered 
 with the gunners of the Fredericksburg, and the small number 
 of shots which they succeeded in discharging passed ineffec- 
 tively by the Onondaga. Her position was on the broadside 
 of the Virginia, and she planted a 15-inch solid shot squarely 
 above the after-port of the flag-ship, knocking a clear hole 
 through her armor and wood backing and sending in a whirl 
 along the gun-deck huge iron fragments and wooden splinters 
 that killed six and wounded fourteen of the crew. Luckily 
 she was floated by the rising of the tide and moved out of 
 the range of shot that would pierce any armor then placed 
 on a ship. The Richmond got off at the same time. She 
 had been less exposed than the flag-ship and was not injured. 
 
 Flag-officer Mitchell summoned a council on board the 
 Virginia, of the commanders of vessels, at noon. Lieut. Read 
 states, as he was the junior, his opinion was asked first. He 
 advised an immediate attack on the Onondaga, while the 
 squadron had the advantage of daylight for passing through 
 the obstructions, and for striking her with the torpedoes, and 
 trying the effect of steel-pointed shot upon her turrets. The 
 opinions of the other officers were divided, some preferring 
 to wait until after dark; but the decision was to resume hos- 
 tilities at 9 p. M., at which time the Virginia headed down 
 the stream with the Scorpion on her port side, followed by 
 the Richmond and Hornet, and the Fredericksburg in the 
 rear. As the squadron arrived opposite the Point of Rocks, 
 a bold bluff half a mile above Trent's Reach Bar, a blazing 
 
 • Capt. Parker, of the Onmdaga, -was tried his ship, but he was found guilty and sentenced 
 by court-martial on the charges of keeping out to be dismissed from the navy of the United 
 of this danger, to which he should have exposed States. Secretary Welles disapproved the sen- 
 himself and failing to do his utmost to over- fence on the ground of technical irregularity In 
 take and capture or destroy a vessel of the the findings of the court, but Capt. Parker was 
 enemy. His defence was that he only retired relieved of his command and placed on the re- 
 down the river to obtain room in which to work tired list. 
 
743 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 calcium light that threw a broad glare over the river was 
 turned upon them from a Federal battery, and simultane- 
 ously the forts broke the murky night with the flashes of 
 scores of guns trained upon the channel. The pilot who was 
 conning the Virginia from the roof of her casemate lost con- 
 trol of himself and rushed for the comparative safety of the 
 pilot-house. Once there, he declared that it was impossible 
 to steer the ship from the small eye-holes in the house, and 
 that he could not have from them a broad enough field of 
 vision to take her through the obstructions. The expedition 
 had reached its end. Com. Mitchell gave the signal for re- 
 treat, and in a few hours the squadron was at anchor near 
 Chapin's Bluff. 
 
 The Federals strengthened the obstructions in the river 
 after this episode, and added two monitors to the fleet as a 
 safeguard against another such raid. It vsras the expiring 
 effort of the Confederate squadron that had just been frus^ 
 trated by untoward influences not to be foreseen or averted, 
 but the withdrawal of the ships was not accepted by some 
 sternly venturesome spirits among their officers as the final- 
 ity of all projects for assailing the enemy upon the water. 
 Torpedo operations were still possible; and by the use of this 
 favorite weapon, which in the Confederacy had been devel- 
 oped to a state of efiiciency previously unknown to the world, 
 the clutch of the enemy might be shaken off where it bore 
 hardest. 
 
 On the morning of February 10th, 1865, a party of about 
 100 ofiicers and men in the uniform of the C. S. navy assem- 
 bled for inspection at Drewry's Bluff. The weather was bit- 
 terly cold, and as the arms and equipments were inspected it 
 was easily seen that serious work and imminent peril were to 
 be encountered by the close attention given to the examination 
 of weapons, and the expression of the men, who, in those stir- 
 ring times, were familiar with danger and hardships. The 
 detachment was under the command of Lieut. C. W. Read, 
 and the other oflBcers were Lieut. W. H. Ward, Master W. F. 
 Shippey, Passed Mipshipmen Scott and Williamson, all of the 
 navy, and Lieut, of Marines Crenshaw. Lieut. Read had or- 
 ganized the expedition, which embraced ninety seamen and 
 marines, which was to effect in one way what the squadron 
 had failed to do in another — to gain possession of the river 
 and compel Grant to abandon his position at City Point. The 
 details of the plan were to carry torpedo-boats on wheels to a 
 point beyond the Federal left wing, near Petersburg, ' cross 
 the Blackwater River, launch the boats upon the James, below 
 City Point, capture any passing tugs or river steamers, fix the 
 torpedoes to them, ascend the river and blow up the monitors. 
 These destroyed and the obstructions removed, the Confederate 
 
 1 "A Leaf from My Log -Book." Master Society Papers, Volume XII., 1884, pages 416- 
 W. P. Shippey, C. S. N. Soutliorn Historical 421. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 743 
 
 iron-clads could make short work of the wooden gun-boats, 
 and the James would be open from Richmond to Hampton 
 Roads. Master Shippey, the only chronicler of the expedition, 
 has told how it was conducted, and why it failed. His narra- 
 tive runs thus : 
 
 " The boats were placed in chocks on four wagon-wheels, torpedoes, 
 poles and gear inside, and each drawn by four mules. One Lewis, a vol- 
 unteer officer of the navy, had been sent ahead to reconnoitre, and was 
 to meet us at the ford of the Blackwater and pilot us to the James. How 
 he fulfilled his engagement will be shown in the sequel. This man Lewis 
 was mate of an American ship lying in Norfolk harbor at the time of the 
 secession of Virginia, and had left his ship to join the Confederates, had 
 served faithfully in the army, been wounded at Bull Run, transferred to 
 the navy and commissioned as acting lieutenant, and was considered 
 worthy of trust and confidence. 
 
 "Our first day's march brought us to Gen. Anderson's headquarters, 
 the right of our army, where we encamped that night, and, breaking 
 camp early the following morning, we struck out from our picket Une to 
 gain the old .Jerusalem plank road. Our march was in three detach- 
 ments, the advance under Read and Ward, about one hundred yards 
 ahead of the wagon train ; Crenshaw, with his marines, about the same 
 distance in rear of them, and Shippey commanding the centre, with the 
 wagon train. Fortunately, we met no stragglers or foraging parties of 
 the enemy, and were not disturbed, and after a good day's march we 
 bivouacked in good spirits and very tired. The following day's march 
 was without incident worthy of mention, an occasional false alarm or 
 seeking the cover of woods to screen us from chance observers. Indeed, 
 we were out of the line of travel ; the Federals did all their business at 
 City Point, and there was little more to attract any one to this part of the 
 country than to the Siberian deserts. 
 
 "During the night the weather turned very cold, and our poor, tired 
 fellows lay close to the fires. The following morning we took up our 
 march in the face of a storm of sleet, and we had to stop after a few hours, 
 the sleet being so blinding that our mules could not make headway, be- 
 sides the road being frozen and slippery. We took shelter in an old 
 deserted farmhouse only a few miles from our rendezvous on the Black- 
 water, once, doubtless, the happy home of some Southern family, now 
 ■changed into the rude scenes of a soldiers' bivouac. 
 
 " While resting and ' thawing ' out here by the warmth of bright fires 
 in big fireplaces, impatiently awaiting the breaking up of the storm and 
 anxious to continue our journey, a young man in gray uniform came in 
 and informed us that our plan had been betrayed, and that Lewis was at 
 the ford to meet us, according to promise, but accompanied by a regiment 
 of Federals lying in ambuscade and awaiting our arrival, when they were 
 to give us a warm reception. Had it not been for the storm and our hav- 
 ing to take shelter, we would have marched into the oet spread for us, 
 and most likely all have been killed, or suffered such other worse punish- 
 ment as a court-martial should inflict. 
 
 " This young man had been a prisoner of war at Fortress Monroe, and 
 from his window heard the conversation between Lewis and the' Yankee 
 officer, in which the former betrayed us, and the plan to capture the 
 whole party, and having perfected his plans of escape, resolved to put 
 them in execution that night, and, if possible, frustrate his designs by 
 ^ving us information of his treachery. 
 
 "After a hurried council of war, it was decided that we should go 
 back about a mile and find a hiding place in the woods, efface our tracks, 
 and remain concealed, while Lieut. Biead should make a reconnoissance to 
 eatisfy himself that things were as bad as had been reported, and if, 
 indeed, we would have to return to Richmond without accomplishing our 
 ■object. Accordingly, we hitched up and filed out into the road and took 
 
744 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 it back, and when we thought we had gone a safe distance, turned into 
 the woods and camped. Read taking leave of us, disguised, and saying he 
 would rejoin us the next day, when if he did not by sunset we were to 
 conclude he was captured and make our way back to Richmond. The 
 night passed drearily away, the weather being very cold and we afraid to 
 make fires for fear of exposing our situation should they be already on 
 the hunt for us, as we had no doubt they would be as soon as they discov- 
 ered we were not going into their trap; and the following day, though 
 but a short winter one, seemed endless, so great was our anxiety for our 
 leader, who had thrust his head into the lion's jaws. At length, about 4 
 p. M., Read 'made his appearance in camp, cool and collected as ever, and 
 told us that what we had heard was true, and gave orders to hitch up, 
 form line and retreat. The enemy's cavalry was already scouring the 
 country in search of us, and every road of retreat was guarded. We 
 marched by night, avoiding main roads, and during the following day 
 halted and concealed ourselves in the woods. 
 
 " Headed off at one turn, we took another and pursued our way, re- 
 solved to sell our lives dearly should the enemy fall upon us. Every path 
 now seemed guarded, and our retreat apparently cut off, when an old 
 gentleman in citizen's clothes and a ' stove-pipe ' hat on, who had joined us 
 as guide, determined to take us through the water of the Appomattox, 
 and thus ' take soundings' on them. There was a horseshoe bend in the 
 river, which, by fording, we could pass through between their pickets and 
 reach our picket-lines. This was decided upon, and our guide marched 
 us to the ford. It was not a pleasant prospect, that of taking water with 
 the thermometer hanging around freezing point, but it was better than 
 falling in the hands of Yankees, so of the two evils we choose the least. 
 My teeth chatter yet to think of that cold wade through water waist deep, 
 covered with a thin coat of ice, but we passed it successfully, wagons and 
 all, and then double-quicked to keep from freezing ; our clothes freezing 
 stiff on us as we came out of the water. 
 
 "We had now the inside track of our pursuers, and leaving them 
 waiting for us to march up one of the many roads they had so welL 
 guarded, made our way back towards our lines, which we reached 
 safely, without loss of a man, wagon or miule. 
 
 "The results accomplished by this expedition were nothing, but I 
 thought it worthy of a place in history, because of the effort. Our flag 
 waved in the James River two months after the events I have endeavored 
 to describe, but of the hundred and one men who composed this expedi- 
 tion, fully seventy-five were in the naval hospital in Richmond, suffering 
 from the effects of their winter march, on the sad day on which we 
 turned our backs upon that city." 
 
 Rear Adm. Semmes w^as appointed to the command of the 
 James River squadron, and entered upon his duties on the 
 18th of February, 1866. As reorganized, the vessels and their 
 commanders were the Virginia, Capt. Dunnington; Richmond, 
 Capt. Johnson: Fredericksburg, Capt. Glassel; .Hampton, Capt. 
 Wilson; Nansemond, Capt. Butt; Roanoke, Capt. Pollock; 
 Beaufort, Capt. Wyatt; Torpedo, Capt. Roberts. The squad- 
 ron was not heavily manned, many of its officers and men 
 having been detached to the naval brigade, which, under 
 command of Com. John Randolph Tucker, was distributed ia 
 the fortifications on Drewry's Bluff and in Battery Brooke, 
 Battery Wood and Battery Semmes. 
 
 Accustomed to the rigid discipline of the navy which he 
 had enforced on the Alabama, Semmes was not prepossessed 
 by the condition in which he found the squadron, although he 
 
ADMIEAI. RAPHAEL SEMMES, C. S. N. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 745 
 
 could not but recognize that it was an unavoidable conse- 
 quence of the foreshadowed triumph of the Federals. The 
 personnel of the crews had lost its distinctive naval character, 
 and with the exception of the principal officers and about half 
 a dozen sailors in each ship, the men were drawn from the 
 army. Demoralization prevailed and desertions were frequent. 
 
 "Sometimes [the Admiral -wrote], an entire boat's crew would run 
 off, leaving the officer to find his way on board the best he might. The 
 strain upon them had been too great. It was scarcely to be expected of 
 men, of the class of those who usually form the rank and file of ships' com- 
 panies, that they would rise above their natures, and sacrifice themselves 
 by slow but sure degrees, in any cause, however holy. The visions of 
 home and fireside, and freedom from restraint, were too tempting to 
 be resisted. The general understanding, that the collapse of the Confed- 
 eracy was at hand, had its influence with some of the more honorable of 
 them. They reasoned that their desertion would be but an anticipation 
 of the event by a few weeks. "^ 
 
 The evacuation of Charleston and Wilmington and the 
 destruction of Confederate vessels at those places, released three 
 hundred officers and men of the navy, who were ordered to 
 duty at Richmond and assigned to the batteries near Drewry's 
 Bluff. With this addition the naval brigade became a large 
 and important force, and the familiarity of its men with the 
 handling of great guns was apparent in the bombardments 
 that were the most common occurrences on the lines around 
 Richmond during Feb. and March, 1865. ^ The men were also 
 organized into companies by the commanding officer, Com. 
 Tucker, and drilled as infantry. Among the officers on duty 
 with the brigade at the time were Capt. T. T. Hunter, Lieuts. 
 W. G. Dozier, Clarence L. Stanton, M. M. Benton,' W. H. 
 Ward, F. N. Roby, D. M. Trigg, C. R. Mayo, W. L. Bradford, 
 Gwathmey, Marmaduke and Gardner; Lieut, of Marines A. S. 
 Berry, Master's Mate Charles Hunter, and a large contin- 
 gent of midshipmen. The same causes which had sent these 
 many seamen and their officers from the Southern ports to 
 Richmond had also multiplied the Federal naval force in the 
 
 1 ■■ Memoirs of Service Afloat." Gaines at Mobile. After passing an examination. 
 
 ,_..,._-_„_ , .. ,, _,. ,„„. he was promoted to be master and assigned to 
 
 SLient W. H. Murdaugh wntes: "The last service on the captured ship Harriet Lane at 
 
 time I saw Gen. Lee was in the Office of Detail Galveston: thence to the Weii at Shreveport, 
 
 ill the Navy Department at Eichmond. He came l^ and thence to duty at Richmond in Nov. 
 
 m from the Secretary's oface, and m replying jggg. ^^j j^ passing through Mobile he was de- 
 
 to a question from Com. Forrest and Lieut. twined by Adm. Buchanan and placed iu charge 
 
 Arthur Sinclair, whether they could do anything of equipping the Tennessee. He was commis- 
 
 for him," he replied: " You can do a great deal, sjoned as lieutenant in 1863. and in May, 1864,, 
 
 I want navy ofacers. they are the best heavy ^^^ assigned to command of the gunboat 
 
 artillerists we have. I went to see the President jja^ewft of the James River sciuadron. Iu July 
 
 last night to ask for them, and I have just come ^^ ^^^ j^jg ^^ew participated in the Point Look- 
 
 from the Secretary of the Navy to whom I made ^^^ expedition. He next served on the Talla- 
 
 the same request." Jumee, and then ta torpedo operations at Charles- 
 
 3 Mortimer Murray Benton was bom at Cov- ton. On the evacuation of that city he was or- 
 
 ingtou Ky. Feb. 18th, 1841, and entered the dered to Drewry's Bluff, commanded a com- 
 
 U. S. navv as midshipman at the naval academy pany of the naval brigrade and was made pris- 
 
 at Annapolis in Sept. 1858. In April, 1860. he oner at the battle of Saylor's Creek. In 1869 he 
 
 resigned, and in June, 1861, was appointed lieu t. was ordained deacon, and the next year priest, of 
 
 of engineers in the Ky. State Guard. Feb. 1862, the Protestant Episcopal Church, and is now 
 
 he received a commission as midshipman in the (1887) rector of the Parish of the Advent, Louis- 
 
 C. S. navy, and was ordered to the gunboat viUe. 
 
746 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 James, where had been concentrated the most of the vessels 
 that were previously engaged in operations on the coasts of 
 North and South Carolina. The assembling of this imposing 
 and mighty fleet seemed to forbode an attack upon the capi- 
 tal by water, but as Adm. Semmes says, Eichmond was secure 
 on that side. No fleet of the enemy could have passed his three 
 iron-clads moored across the stream in the only available 
 channel, with obstructions that would hold it under the fire of 
 the ships and the flanking batteries; and if Adm. Porter, the 
 new commander upon the river, ever thought of such a move- 
 ment he never attempted it. _ The remainder of the winter 
 passed slowly and tediously into the spring, and Semmes' 
 visits to the Navy Department for instructions or suggestions 
 from the government resulted merely in permission to him to 
 do about as he pleased. It may be presumed that if the rest- 
 less and intrepid sailor who carried the Alabama into a dozen 
 seas had found any employment for the James River squadron 
 the barnacles would not have gathered upon his hulls, but the 
 opportunities for action were numbered with the past. He has 
 himself told how, as he sat in his cabin, on board theVirginia, 
 in' March, and studied upon the maps the approach of Sher- 
 man, and knew of the reinforcement of Grant by the army of 
 Sheridan, the prospect was to him hopeless enough. Rich- 
 mond was invested by 160,000 men, and Lee defended it with 
 '33,000 ragged and half-starved troops, with which he was com- 
 pelled to guard an intrenched line of 40 miles in length, extend- 
 ing from the north side of the James River, below Richmond, 
 to Hatcher's Run, south of Petersburg. In all military history 
 there is recorded no more stubborn and skillful defence of a 
 beleaguered city, but it could not last much longer. The fate 
 of Richmond was decided on the morning of April 3d, when 
 Grant broke through the Confederate lines at Petersburg. 
 Adm. Semmes was at dinner on the Virginia that afternoon 
 when he received this message from the Navy Department: 
 
 "Confederate States op America, I 
 
 " Executive Office, Richmond, Va., April Sd, 1865. f 
 "'Rear ADvaRAli'RAFiiAEL,SBMMTSS,Commanding James Biver Squadron: 
 " Sir : Gen. Lee advises the government to withdraw from this city, 
 and the officers will leave this evening, accordingly. I presume that Gren. 
 Lee has advised you of this and of his movements, and made suggestions 
 as to the disposition to be made of your squadron. He withdraws upon 
 his lines toward Danville this night ; and unless otherwise directed by 
 Gen. Lee, upon you is devolved the duty of destroying your ships this 
 night, and with all the forces under your command joining Gen. Lee. 
 Confer with him, if practicable, before destroying them. Let your peo- 
 ple be rationed, as far as possible, for the march, and armed and equipped 
 for duty in the field. Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 
 
 "S. R. MiajjORX, Secretary of the Navy." 
 
 The enemy being only a few miles distant it was impera- 
 tive that the Admiral should conduct his movements with care- 
 ful secrecy. At nightfall he got the squadron under way and 
 ran up to Drewry's Bluflf, intending to blow up the iron-clad§ 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 747 
 
 there, throw their crews on the wooden gunboats, and proceed 
 in the latter to Manchester, opposite Richmond, on his way to 
 join Gen. Lee. But these plans he was compelled to change 
 when, an hour or two after dark, the flames that lit up the 
 horizon on the north side of the James revealed to him that 
 the army was burning its quarters as it left the intrench- 
 ments. Concealment on his part was no longer practicable. He 
 made his preparations for burning the fleet, flrst serving out 
 arms, provisions and clothing to the men who were to ex- 
 change the decks for the shore. The various occupations 
 occupied them until a late hour. It was between two and 
 three o'clock on the morning of April 3d before the crews of 
 the iron-clads were all safely embarked on the wooden gun- 
 boats and the iron-clads were well on fire. The little squadron 
 of wooden boats then moved off up the river by the glare of 
 the burning iron-clads. " They had not proceeded far before 
 an explosion like the shock of an earthquake took place, and 
 the air was filled with missiles. It was the blowing up of the 
 Virginia, the late flag-ship. The spectacle was grand beyond 
 description. Her shell-rooms had been full of loaded shells. 
 The explosion of the magazine threw all these shells, with 
 their fuses lighted, into the air. The fuses were of different 
 lengths, and as the shells exploded by twos and threes, and 
 by the dozen, the pyrotechnic effect was very fine. The ex- 
 plosion shook the houses in Richmond and waked the echoes 
 of the night for forty miles around." 
 
 At one of the bridges across the James the boats were de- 
 tained until after sunrise on account of the draw being down 
 to allow of the passage of troops. Then the Admiral landed 
 his 500 sailors in the midst of the troops and civilians hurrying 
 away from the forsaken city. The wooden gunboats were 
 fired and, wrapped in flames, floated down the stream, while 
 he asked himself what he was to do with his seamen, loaded 
 down with pots and pans, mess-kettles, bags of bread, chunks 
 of salted pork, sugar, tea, tobacco and pipes. His orders were 
 to join Gen. Lee, but he did not know where to find him, he 
 was without transportation, and it was as much as his men 
 could do to stagger under their loads. Fortunately, he found 
 at the railroad depot a small locomotive and some cars, and 
 the steam engineers from the squadron soon had the former 
 in running condition and a train made up ; but while still 
 directly opposite Richmond the engine stuck on an up-grade ; 
 it was not strong enough to pull the train. Another locomo- 
 tive was discovered in the railroad shops, and after it was 
 hitched on the two drew the train off at the rate of six miles 
 an hour. It reached at midnight of April 4th the city of Dan- 
 ville, having passed Burksville Junction an hour and a half 
 before Sheridan's cavalry tore up the rails. Here the Admiral 
 found President Davis and Secretary Mallory, who ordered 
 him to form his command as a brigade of artillery for the 
 
748 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 occupation of the defences around Danville, his own rank to 
 be that of brigadier general. He arranged with Capt. Sidney 
 Smith Lee and Adjt. Gen. Cooper for the transformation of his 
 sailors into soldiers. Only 400 men were left him, but these 
 he broke in two skeleton regiments, appointing Capts. Dun- 
 nington and Johnston their colonels. Midshipman Semmes 
 was assigned to a position on the staff; Mr. Daniel, the Admiral's 
 secretary, became the other aide, and Capt. Rutt was appointed 
 Assistant Adjutant General. Admiral Semmes writes: 
 
 " We remained In the trenches before Danville ten days ; and anxious 
 and weary days they were. Raiding parties were careering around us in 
 various directions, robbing and maltreating the inhabitants, but none of 
 the thieves ventured within reach of our guns. Lee abandoned his lines 
 on the 3d of April, and surrendered his army, or the smalt remnant that 
 was left of it, to Grant, on the 9th, at Appomattox Court-House. The 
 first news we received of his surrender came to us from the stream of 
 fugitives which now came pressing into our lines at Danville. It was 
 heart-rending to look upon these men, some on foot, some on horseback, 
 some nearly famished for want of food, and others barely able to totter 
 along from disease. It was, indeed, a rabble rout. Hopes had been 
 entertained that Lee might escape to Lj^nchburg, or to Danville, and 
 save his army. The President had entertained this hope, and had issued 
 a proclamation of encouragement to the people before he left Danville. 
 But the fatal tidings came at last, and when they did come we all felt 
 that the fate of the Confederacy was sealed." 
 
 These fatal tidings were the melting away of Gen. John- 
 ston's army and its dispersion in accordance with the terms 
 arranged between that commander and Gen. Sherman at 
 Greensboro' on May 1st. This agreement included the ad- 
 miral's command, which he dispersed on the same day. 
 
 While the flag-officer afloat was making his way out of 
 Richmond and to Danville, as just described, with the men of 
 the squadron, Com. Tucker's naval brigade evacuated the posi- 
 tions at Drewry's Bluff on April 3d, and was attached to Gen. 
 Custis Lee's division of Gen. Ewell's corps, which formed the 
 rear-guard of the Confederate army on the retreat from 
 Richmond. It was the post of danger, and never in any of 
 the great emergencies of the war did the sailors win brighter 
 renown than during this . perilous march and at the battle 
 of Saylor's Creek. From the 3d to the 6th of April they were 
 allowed no rest and were without food; the spring rains and 
 the passage of troops, wagons and artillery had. mired the 
 roads knee-deep; clouds of the enemy's cavalry hovered 
 around them and swooped down upon their flanks; but they 
 tramped on, maintained a compact organization and responded 
 quicklj^ to the orders of commanders. Upon no portion of the 
 dwindling army did the sufferings of the retreat fall heavier 
 than upon this little plucky band, and none bore them with 
 more fortitude. The story of their conduct at Saylor's Creek 
 is an illustrious ending of their history. 
 
 That last of the great battles of the war was fought 
 on April 6th. Ewell's depleted ranks were enveloped by the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 749 
 
 masses of Sheridan's infantry and cavalry, and came to a 
 stand at the creek for their final resistance to the overwhelm- 
 ing thousands of the enemy. The naval brigade held the 
 right of the line, where it repulsed two assaults of cavalry and 
 one of infantry with its firm formation and rapid, steady fire, 
 the Federals splitting on its front and going to the right and 
 left of it. In one of the dashes of the cavalry, Gen Ewell and 
 his staff were captured, and he passed the order of surrender 
 to his troops, whose line, except that held by the sailors, had 
 been pierced by the Federal charges. The naval brigade and 
 300 marines, under command of Maj. Simmons, were holding 
 precisely the same position then which had been assigned 
 -them in the morning. Com. Tucker was informed that Ewell 
 had ordered a surrender, but refused to believe it. The brigades 
 of infantry on either side of him had ceased firing, but with 
 the remark, "I can't surrender," he ordered his men to con- 
 tinue the engagement. Gen. Wright, the commander of the 
 Federal Sixth corps, had directed the fire of a dozen batteries 
 upon him, and a mass of cavalry were making ready to ride 
 him down, when he was informed for the second time, by 
 Lieut. Clarence L. Stanton, C. S. N., who was on staff duty, 
 of the surrender, and he followed the example of the infantry. 
 He had continued the fighting fifteen minutes after they had 
 lowered their arms, and the naval colors were the last to be 
 laid down. The bravery of the sailors was observed along the 
 Federal lines, and when they did surrender the enemy cheered 
 them long and vigorously. ' 
 
 The salutations of the foe to the men who " didn't know 
 when to surrender," brought to a close the history of the navy 
 •of the Confederate States upon the waters of Virginia. Un- 
 •consciously. Com. Tucker and his three hundred sailors had 
 emphasized with a force beyond the limitations of language to 
 convey, the part which this branch of the service had borne 
 through the years when Virginia was the great fighting ground 
 of the war. They had given the final proof of the strength of 
 the convictions which enrolled them under the Southern colors, 
 and of their unswerving fidelity in the painful hour of irresist- 
 ible disaster. They had sought every opportunity to fire a 
 shot or strike a. blow for the liberties of their States ; they had 
 unflinchingly obeyed orders leading them into combat against 
 outnumbering enemies ; andfr6m they day when the Virginia 
 swept Hampton Koads to that upon which they stood in em- 
 battled line at Saylor's Creek they made an unsmirched record 
 as hard and honest fighters, obedient subordinates and loyal 
 patriots. 
 
 iCa.pt.W.H. Parker says in his "Recollections recalled to his memory the battle of Saylor's 
 
 -of a Kaval Officer," that Com. Tucker told him Creek. Wrightsaid he remembered with what 
 
 ■afterwards that he had never Ijeen in a land obstinacy one portion of the Confederate line 
 
 battle before, and supposed that everything was had been held, and could not account for it 
 
 going on well. Some years after the war Lieut. until he found that it had been held by- 
 
 Mayo, then in command of a Chesapeake Bay sailors who did not know when they were 
 
 -steamer, had Gen. Wright as a passenger and whipped. 
 
CHAPTER XXIII, 
 THE TORPEDO SERVICE. 
 
 ON July 7th, 1861, occurred the earliest instance of the use 
 of torpedoes in the war between the States, in an attempt 
 to destroy an enemy's vessel. The effort was directed 
 against the Federal squadron in the Potomac River at 
 Aquia Creek, the torpedoes consisting of oil casks which buoyed 
 c-ylinders of boiler-iron containing the explosive material. 
 Fuses led from the casks into the cylinders, and each pair of 
 oasks was connected by a rope in order that, going down 
 stream with the tide, they would bring up against the bows of 
 an enemy's ship, the cylinders would swing against her side 
 and the explosion would take place. The apparatus was sent 
 down by the Confederates on the ebb tide, but being observed 
 from the squadron, a boat's crew extinguished the fuses and it 
 was harmlessly secured. In the latter part of July the Federals 
 found adrift in Hampton Roads a barrel of powder so arranged 
 with a floating line, that if the line fouled the anchor chains 
 or the wheel of a ship it would fire a percussion cap placed 
 upon the powder. This was probably the invention of some 
 Confederate at the Norfolk navy-yard, and had been rendered 
 innocuous by the leakage of the barrel. 
 
 Subaqueous and subterranean infernal machines came 
 into use about the same time. During January, 1863, in some 
 experiments on the Mississippi River with a submarine tor- 
 pedo, the Confederates blew up an immense flat-boat " so high 
 that only a few splinters were heard from; " and on entering 
 Columbus, Ky.,in March, the Federals found pear-shaped iron 
 casks three feet long, and half as much in diameter, filled with 
 grape, canister and powder, buried in mines under the river 
 bank, and having an electric firing arrangement communi- 
 cating with stations in the town. Other torpedoes (called the 
 pronged torpedoes), were picked up in the river. On February 
 13th, 1862, the U. S. gunboat Pembina discovered in the 
 Savannah River, near the mouth of the Wright River, a 
 battery of five tin-can torpedoes anchored by grapnels and 
 
 (760) 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 
 
 751 
 
 connected with wires, which by 
 the tension exerted upon them 
 by the contact of a passing ves- 
 sel would fire friction tubes (can- 
 non primers) inserted in the 
 head of each powder chamber. 
 One of these machines was ex- 
 ploded that night when a convoy 
 of artillery was but 300 yards 
 distant, and this induced the 
 Federal commander to suspect 
 that some of them were con- 
 nected by galvanic wires with 
 Fort Pulaski. Torpedoes of this 
 description were placed in large 
 numbers in the rivers along the 
 Southern coast. Another pattern 
 was the " frame torpedo," which 
 so seriously delayed Burnside's 
 progress up the Neuse River, in March 1863, and was used in nar- 
 row channels both for obstruc- 
 tion and destruction. They were 
 thus described: 
 
 " Three heavy pieces of timber, 
 placedin the position, at the bottom of 
 which was placed a box filled with old 
 iron, stones and other heavy materi- 
 als, was sunk in the river, and then 
 inclined forward at an angle of forty- 
 five degrees by means of ropes and 
 weights. This heavy frame was capped 
 by a cylinder of iron, about ten inches 
 in diameter. Into this was fitted 
 a shell; which was heavily loaded, 
 resting on a set of springs, so ar- 
 ranged that the least pressure on 
 the cylinder would instantly dis- 
 charge the shell by means of aper- 
 cussion cap ingeniously iDlaced." 
 
 THJi PKONGED TORPEDO. ^ 
 
 A FRAME TORPEDO. 
 
 A FRAME TORPEDO. 
 
 1 A, iron rod armed with prongs to fasten upon 
 bottom of boats going up-stream and act upon B, 
 a lever connecting with trigger to explode a cap 
 and ignite powder. C, canvas bag cfontaining 70 
 lbs. powder. D, anchors to hold torpedo in place. 
 
 This torpedo consisted of a stout sheet-iron 
 cylinder, pointed at both ends, about 5J4 feet 
 long and 1 loot diameter. The iron lever was 
 
 35^ feet long, and armed with prongs to catch in 
 the bottom of a boat. This lever was constructed 
 to move the iron rod on inside of cylinder, thus 
 acting upon the trigger of the lock to explode 
 the cap and fire the powder. The machine was 
 anchored, presenting the prongs in such a way 
 that boats going down-stream should slide over 
 them, but those coming up should catch. 
 
752 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 In the retreat of the Confederates from Williamsburg, Va., 
 in May, 1862, Gen. G. J. Rains, subsequently chief of the tor- 
 pedo service, arranged some ordinary shells beneath the road 
 and fitted them with sensitive primers. A body of Federal 
 cavalry suffered severely from the explosion of these primitive 
 torpedoes as they rode over them, and Gen. McClellan com- 
 plained of what he styled this " most murderous and barbar- 
 ous conduct." Gens. Joseph E. Johnston and Longstreet 
 forbade Rains to use these implements of warfare, and the 
 question was referred to Mr. Randolph, Secretary of War, 
 Avho decided that torpedoes must only be used in a parapet or 
 on a road to repel assaults or check the enemy, or in a river or 
 harbor to drive off blockading or attacking fleets. After the 
 battle of Seven Pines, Gen. Lee suggested to Rains the em- 
 ployment of torpedoes in the James River. The latter was 
 
 
 U. S. lEON-CLAD •' CAXBO " {BLOWN tJP BY CONFEDEBATE TOBFEDO). 
 
 placed in charge of the submarine defences, and claims to have 
 put in position, at Drewry's Bluff, the first submarine torpedo 
 made. Lieut. Hunter Davidson, C. S. N., lays claim to not only 
 the first successful application of electrical torpedoes, but also to 
 liaving established the system upon the James River. Capt. 
 M. F. Maury,C. S. N., was the predecessor of Davidson in charge 
 of the work, but went to Europe before it was far advanced, 
 where he continued his experiments and invented an ingenious 
 method of arranging and testing torpedo mines, which he was 
 about to put into use at Galveston against the blockaders when 
 Gen. Lee surrendered. Still another claimant to early opera- 
 tions with electric torpedoes is Lieut. Beverley Kennon, C. S. N., 
 who writes that he experimented with devices of his own on 
 Lake Ponchartrain in August, 1861. He also states that at 
 Vicksburg, in the autumn of 1862, he gave torpedo instruction 
 to Acting Master Zedekiah McDaniel, C. S. N., who, with Act- 
 ing Master Francis M. Ewing, subsequently blew up the U.S. 
 iron-clad gunboat Cairo in the Yazoo River. The expedition 
 
THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 753 
 
 to which that vessel belonged was under the command of 
 Lieut. Com. Thomas O. Self ridge, U. S. K, and embraced also 
 the Pittsburg, Marmora, Signal and ram Queen of the West. 
 On December 13th, 1862, the vessels were a little below Haines' 
 Bluff, where McDaniel and Ewing were stationed in charge of 
 the torpedoes. Two were fired without doing any damage, but 
 the third exploded under the Cairo's bow and sent her to the 
 bottom in 12 minutes. The torpedo which accomplished this 
 was a large demijohn inclosed in a woodeii box and fired with 
 a friction primer by a trigger line leading to torpedo pits on 
 shore. It was the first instance of the destruction of a vessel- 
 of-war engaged in active warfare by a torpedo. 
 
 In October, 18G2, the "Torpedo Bureau" was established 
 at Eichmond, under the charge of Brig. Gen. G. J. Rains, and 
 the "Naval Submarine Battery Service" was organized under 
 command of Capt. M. F. Maury, who relinquished it to Lieut. 
 Hunter Davidson. An act of Congress, April 21st, 1863, pro- 
 vided that the inventor of a device by which a vessel of the 
 enemy should be destroyed should receive 50 per cent, of the 
 value of the vessel and armament, and the general appro- 
 priation bill of May 1st, 1863, embraced an item of $20,000 for 
 this branch of the public service, to be expended under the 
 direction of the Navy Department, which was the first ap- 
 propriation of the kind. By the act of February 17th, 1864, 
 $100,000 was appropriated for the construction of submarine 
 batteries, and by the act of June 13th, 1864, $350,000 was ap- 
 propriated for the same purpose. Legislation, however, was 
 not as prompt as it should have been. ' 
 
 Torpedo stations were established at Richmond, Wilming- 
 ton, Charleston, Savannah and Mobile, with sub -stations at 
 other points. The men of the corps were sworn to secrecy and 
 granted extraordinary privileges on account of the perilous 
 and arduous nature of the service. Several boats engaged 
 in laying torpedoes were destroyed with all their crews by 
 accidental explosions. 
 
 The spar torpedo was an important invention which played 
 a conspicous part in this service of the Confederacy. Many 
 such machines were left by the Confederates at Charleston 
 and Richmond when those places were evacuated. Some were 
 cylindrical-shaped copper vessels with convex ends for boats 
 and tugs; others were larger and were shaped like an egg, the 
 ■butt being carried forward to bring the greater power of the 
 charge nearest to tke object to be destroyed. All were in- 
 tended to be operated at the extremity of a pole or spar pro- 
 jecting from the stem of the torpedo boat or other vessel. 
 
 This spar was attached to the vessel by a goose-neck, 
 fitted to a socket bolted to the bow, near the water-line. 
 
 1 "Tor three years the Confederate Congress acclamation, and $6,000,000appropriated,buttoo 
 
 legislatedonthissubject.abillpassingeaohhouBe late, and the delay was not shortened by this 
 
 alternately for an organized torpedo corps, until enormous appropriation." Gen. G J. Rains, So. 
 
 the third year, when it passed both houses with Historical Sodely Papers, Vol. III., Nos. S-6, p. 266. 
 
 40 
 
754 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES KAVT. 
 
 Guys from the spar to the side of the vessel kept the spar 
 in its position when the torpedo was submerged for an attack, 
 and it was lowered and raised by 
 tricing lines and tackles. Usually 
 seven fuses made to explode by con- 
 tact were fixed to each torpedo. Gen. 
 Beauregard and Com. Wm. T. Glas- 
 sell, C. S. K, ' state that the spar tor- 
 pedo was designed by Capt. Francis D. 
 Lee of the engineer corps, on duty 
 at Charleston, and Glassell mentions | 
 that after seeing the device success- 
 fully tested there, he endeavored to 
 induce Com. Ingraham, flag-officer at 
 Charleston, to equip a flotilla of such 
 boats for oper- 
 ations against 
 the blockaders. 
 But Ingraham 
 did not believe 
 in what he 
 called ' ' new- 
 fangled no- 
 tions," and it 
 was only by the 
 aid and at the 
 expense of 
 Geo. A. Tren- 
 holm that Glas- 
 sell at last fitted 
 out some row- 
 boats with the 
 spar-torpedoes. 
 He obtained 
 volunteers for 
 
 an expedition, but the flag-officer re- 
 fused to sanction it, on the ground that 
 his rank and age did not entitle him to 
 the command of more than one boat. 
 8PAB TOBPEDo. = Finally, Glassell started out with one 
 
 SPAB TORPEDO. 2 
 
 1 Oommander W. T. Glaasel was a lieutenant 
 in the U. S. navy, and returned from Ohina in 
 the ifaW/ord in the summer of 1862. Immediately 
 upon his arrival in Philadelphia, (August 6th, 
 1862), he was informed that he must take a new 
 oath of allegiance or he sent to Fort Warren. 
 He refused to take this oath, on the ground that 
 it was inconsistent with one he had already 
 .taken to support the Constitution of the United 
 States. Ho was'kept in Fort Warren eight months, 
 and then exchanged as a prisoner of war, on the 
 banks of the James Blver. Being actually placed 
 in the ranks of the Confederate States, be 
 entered the navy as lieutenant, his commission 
 being dated August 5tb, 1862, the same day on 
 
 ■which he was sent to Fort Warren. He received 
 orders to report for duty on the iron-clad Chicora 
 at Charleston, and participated in the attack upon 
 the Federal blockading fleet. He died at Los 
 Angelos, California, on the 28th of January, 1879. 
 
 2 This class of torpedo was generally used on 
 all the Confederate gimboats. The braces were 
 intended to support the weight of the torpedo, 
 particularly when lifting out of water. 
 
 3 This class of torpedo was among the first 
 used. It was a soda water copper tank supported 
 by iron straps, and had five chemical orsensittve 
 fuses projecting from the upper half of the 
 hemispherical surface. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY, 
 
 75$ 
 
 row-boat and a crew of six men, 
 and approached the Federal 
 frigate Powhatan at one o'clock 
 in the morning. He was aiming 
 to strike her with his torpedoes 
 when one of his men, from ter- 
 ror or treason, backed his oar; 
 the others gave up in despair; a 
 boat put out from the enemy's 
 ship; and thus thwarted Glas- 
 sell cut the torpedo loose and 
 returned to Charleston. 
 
 On February 38th, 1863, the 
 monitor Montauk destroyed the 
 C. S. cruiser Nashville in the 
 Ogechee River, Ga. ; and as she 
 was returning to her anchorage a tor- 
 pedo exploded under her. By running 
 her upon a mud-bank and stopping the 
 hole blown in her hull, she was saved 
 from sinking, but she was retired from 
 service for a month 
 ,>• while repairs were 
 being made. This 
 disaster and the loss 
 of the Cairo made 
 
 SPAK TOKPEDO. 1 
 
 THE ELECTBIC TOBPEDO. 
 
 the Federal naval commanders ex- 
 ceedingly cautious about venturing 
 into waters where the presence of 
 torpedoes was suspected; and the 
 government applied to Capt. Erics- 
 son, the constructor of the Monitor, 
 to furnish something to remove or 
 destroy the submarine batteries. 
 The next vessel to suffer was the U. S. 
 iron-clad ram Baron DeKalh, which' 
 was completely destroyed on the 
 Yazoo River, July 32d, 1863. The 
 torpedo which sunk her was anchored 
 in the channel, and burst under her 
 when she struck it in passing over. 
 On August 8th, as the U. S. steamer 
 Commodore Barney was descending 
 the James River an electric torpedo, 
 fired from the shore, was exploded 
 just astern of her. She was badly 
 disabled, and some men were washed 
 from her deck and drowned; and but 
 
 1 This form of '• ram torpedo " was taken from 
 the Iron-clad CAaWestora.atCharleBton.S.C. It was 
 jaade from a strong wood cask, and had 7 sensi- 
 
 tive fuses. It contained about 150 lbs. of fine pow- 
 der, and "vvas fixed on the end of an iron spar about 
 30 f t.long.attached to the bow near the water iine» 
 
756 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 for the fact that the electric 
 battery had acted slowly, she 
 would have been destroyed. 
 
 The electric torpedo repre- 
 sented in the diagram afforded 
 the best protection to the wires, 
 and brought the charge very 
 near the object to be destroyed. 
 It was made of |-inch boiler 
 iron and filled with fine pow- 
 der. Two wires connected it 
 with the electric battery on 
 shore, the conductor being 
 covered with gutta percha, the 
 submerged ends being addi- 
 tionally protected 
 by a covering of 
 tarred hemp, and 
 weighted with 
 chain. The torpe- 
 do was anchored 
 
 THE DBIFT TOKPEDO. 
 
 THE DRIFT TORPEDO. 
 
 to bolts (C and D), and castings were bolted 
 , to the ends (A and B), the former to cover 
 ^ and protect the circuit wires. ' 
 
 The drift torpedo gave the Federals in 
 James River great annoyance. It was a 
 tin case containing about 70 pounds of 
 powder. A number of wires from the 
 friction fuse led from the powder to small 
 pieces of drift-wood on the surface of the 
 water. The torpedo was floated at the 
 proper depth by a line fastened to a float- 
 ing log. The torpedo was turned adrift at 
 night, with the view of fouling the trigger 
 lines by the propellers of the enemy's ves- 
 sels. In January, 1863, one of these tor- 
 pedoes was picked up by the U. S. gunboat 
 Essex in the Mississippi River. 
 
 On August 17th, 1863, the Federals 
 picked up in Light-house Creek, Charleston 
 harbor, a torpedo made of three metallic 
 cases, on the upper side of which were 
 delicately arranged hammers connected 
 with cords. The cords were to catch on a 
 vessel, when the cases would swing against 
 her, the hammers would fall on percussion 
 caps, and thus the explosion would be 
 caused in the powder chambers under the 
 caps. Another style of torpedo that the 
 
 1 " Barnes Submarine Warfare," p. 77. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 757 
 
 Federals discovered around Charleston they christened "devil 
 fish." These were about four feet long, very slender, and 
 shaped like a fish. A number were fastened together by lines 
 of wire which would explode their fuses on becoming entangled 
 with the bows of vessels. On November 14th, Capt. Gansevoort, 
 of the U. S. iron-clad Roanoke captured a machine floating 
 down the James River that looked like a big lantern gone 
 adrift. The wick was fixed to communi- 
 cate with a combustible substance sup- 
 posed to ignite by friction, and from it a 
 tube ran down to a can containing about 
 35 lbs. of powder. There were several of 
 these torpedoes similarly constructed and 
 lashed together. 
 
 In November, 1863, a number of the 
 keg torpedoes invented by 
 Gen. Rains were taken up off 
 Charleston by the Union fleet. 
 Lager-beer barrels were con- 
 fiscated everywhere in the 
 Confederacy for making these 
 instruments, and when calked 
 and pitched, loaded with from 
 35 to 120 pounds of powder, 
 capped with friction fuses and 
 moored in a channel, they 
 
 A E£G lOBPEDO. 
 
 A BAFT TORPEDO. 1 
 
 proved excellent for defence, causing the loss of more vessels 
 than any other kind used by the Confederates. Six vessels and a 
 steam launch were blown up by them in Mobile waters, between 
 March 38th and April 18th, 1865; and they also destroyed the Con- 
 federate steamers Ettiwan and Marion in Charleston harbor, 
 having drifted from their moorings into the navigable channel. 
 Another design was a raft torpedo, such as was secured 
 by the U. S. gunboat Gertrude, westward of the main channel 
 
 1 A — The open top of the box. B— The iron 
 tank. C— Brass tube. D — Iron-rods connecting 
 from tube to the end of the raft. By F— Parts of 
 spars morticed to the runners of raft. G — The 
 
 runners on which the box lay, ff— The mooring. 
 I — Tube with iron rods attached. J— The place 
 where the warp was cut. K, L — Braces across 
 the top. 
 
758 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 in Mobile Bay, Jan. 30th, 1864. The moorings were cut by an 
 officer in charge of a boat who found on the raft a box five 
 feet long, four and a half feet wide and four and three-fourths 
 feet high, inclosing a powder-tank two and one-fourth feet 
 square, and three feet high. 
 
 The U. S. frigate Neio Ironsides narrowly escaped destruc- 
 tion during the bombardment in Charleston harbor, April 7th, 
 1863, when she laid for an hour directly over a boiler-iron 
 torpedo containing 3,000 pounds of powder off Fort Wagner. 
 It was designed to be exploded from an electric battery on 
 shore, but every attempt to fire it failed, and the operator 
 was suspected of treachery, until it was ascertained that one 
 of the wires had been cut by an ordnance wagon passing 
 over it. In August the first attempt was made to destroy 
 this ship with a torpedo-boat. It was an improvised affair 
 made from the razeed hulk of a gunboat that had been 
 abandoned at Charleston before completion. Capt. Lee, of 
 the engineer corps, obtained it from Secretary Mallory, and 
 fixed a spar torpedo to the bow. Capt. Carlin, of the block- 
 ade-runner Ella and Annie, offered his services as commander 
 and a volunteer crew was obtained from the squadron. The 
 boat ran close aboard of the New Ironsides, but became en- 
 tangled with her anchor chains, and on being discovered 
 from the deck retreated into the harbor. On October 5th, 
 the second attack was attempted, and although the huge 
 iron-clad was not sunk she was so much injured as to be 
 withdrawn from the coast of South Carolina, and she 
 took no active part in the war afterward until the bonabard- 
 ment of Fort Fisher. The assault of October 6th was made 
 by a David, one of the double - ended steam torpedo craft 
 constructed in the Confederacy. They were of wood or iron, 
 forty to sixty feet long, and about seven feet in diameter at 
 the centre. The boiler was forward, the engine aft, and be- 
 tween them was a cuddy-hole for the captain, engineer and 
 whatever crew the boat might carry, and which was entered by 
 a hatchway. The torpedo was carried on a spar that protruded 
 from the bow, and which could be raised or lowered at will 
 by a line passing back into the cuddy -hole. A two-bladed pro- 
 peller drove the craft along. The torpedo was made of copper, 
 with a mechanical fuse, and carried from fifty to seventy 
 pounds of powder. When ready for action, the boat was so 
 well submerged that nothing was visible except her stunt 
 smoke-stack, the hatch-coaming and the stanchion upon 
 ■which the torpedo-line was brought aft. 
 
 Lieut. W. T. Glassell was placed in command of the first 
 David built, which had been constructed at private expense 
 by Theodore Stoney, of Charleston, and had under him C. 8. 
 Tombs, engineer of the iron-clad Chicora, James Sullivan, 
 fireman of the Chicora, and J. W. Cannon, assistant pilot of 
 the iron-clad Palmetto State. The night selected for the 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 759 
 
 expedition was slightly hazy, and shortly after nine o'clock the 
 David was within 300 yards of the New Ironsides, off Morris 
 Island, and making directly for her side, when she was discov- 
 ered by a sentinel. Without making any reply to his hail, 
 Olassell kept on and fired with a shotgun at the oflBcer of the 
 deck (Acting Master Howard), who fell mortally wounded. 
 The next moment the David struck the frigate, the torpedo 
 exploded, the little craft plunged violently, and a deluge of 
 water thrown up by the concussion descended on her smoke- 
 pipe and hatchway. Her fires were extinguished and her 
 machinery jammed. In the midst of a rattling fire of mus- 
 ketry from the New Ironsides, Glassell directed his men to 
 save themselves by swimming, as it seemed impossible that 
 the David could be made to move. After being in the water 
 
 Midship taction. 
 
 ■VIEWS OF A CONFEDEBATE "DAVID.' 
 
 himself more than an hour, he was picked up by the boat of a 
 transport schooner and handed over as a prisoner to Adm. 
 Dahlgren, who ordered him into confinement on the guard- 
 ship Ottawa. ' ■ ■, ■. 
 
 Engineer Tombs started to swim down the harbor with the 
 intention of catching the chain of the monitor, but changed 
 his mind when he saw that the David was afloat and had 
 drifted away from the frigate. ■ Swimming to her he found 
 Pilot Cannon, who could not swim, holding on for life. Tombs 
 got into the boat, pulled Cannon on board, fixed the engine, 
 started up the fire under the boiler and headed for Charleston, 
 where he arrived the next morning. The David bore the scars 
 ■of 13 bullet holes received from the small arms of the New 
 Ironsides. Sullivan, the fireman, saved himself by catching 
 the rudder chains of the frigate, from whence he was taken on 
 IJoard as a prisoner. 
 
 1 Lieut. W. T. Glaasell, Southern Historical Society Papers. Vol. IV., No. 5, Nov. 1877. 
 
760 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Upon examining the New Ironsides, it was found that the 
 torpedo exploded only three feet under water and against 4|- 
 inches of armor, and 27 inches of wood backing. By the ex- 
 plosion the ponderous ship was shaken from stem to stern. It 
 knocked down a bulkhead, started some timbers, and threw 
 two or three rooms into confusion. A marine was dashed 
 against the ceiling and his leg broken, while several other 
 men were slightly injured. The attack upon this ship made 
 such an impression on the Federal naval commanders, that, 
 every imaginable precaution was taken to guard against tor- 
 pedoes, and high steam was carried at night on all the vessels 
 so that they could move at speed upon the instant. 
 
 Lieut. Glassell was promoted to commander, and Engineer 
 Tombs to lieutenant for their participation in this affair. 
 Capt. M. M. Gray was in charge of the submarine defences of 
 Charleston at this time, and was exceedingly active in develop- 
 ing this mode of warfare. Sixty officers and men were then 
 on torpedo duty at that point. 
 
 The fish torpedo boat that destroyed the Federal gunboat 
 Housatonic off Charleston harbor was built at Mobile in 1863, 
 by Hundley & McClintock, and was arranged with a pair of 
 lateral fins by the use of which she could be submerged or 
 brought to the surface. Her motive power was a hand pro- 
 peller worked by eight men, and it was intended that she 
 should dive under a vessel, dragging a torpedo after her which 
 would explode on contact with the hull or keel of the enemy, 
 the "fish •' making off on the other side. She was provided 
 with tanks which could be filled or emptied of water, to increase 
 or decrease her displacement, but there was no provision for 
 a storage of air. During an experiment at Mobile she sank,, 
 and before she could be raised the whole crew were suffocated. 
 
 Beauregard, in February 1864, accepted this boat for use 
 at Charleston. Lieut. Payne, C. S. N., and a crew of eight 
 men were preparing to take her out for action one night when 
 she was swamped by the wash of a passing steamer and all 
 hands except Payne were drowned. Again she was raised 
 and once more sunk — this time at Fort Sumter wharf, when 
 six men were drowned, Payne and two others escaping. When 
 she was brought to the surface, Hundley took her into the 
 Stono River, where, after making several successful dives, 
 she stuck her nose into the mud and every soul on board per- 
 ished by suffocation. For the fourth time she was raised 
 and experiments were made with her in Charleston harbor. 
 She worked beautifully until she attempted to dive under the 
 receiving ship Indian Chief, when she fouled a cable and once 
 more she proved a coffin for every man within her. Divers 
 brought her up a week later, and Lieut. George E. Dixon, of 
 Capt. Cothran's Co. of the 31st Ala. Inf'y, asked permission of 
 Gen. Beauregard to try her against the Housatonic, a splendid 
 new ship-of-war, which lay in the North Channel off Beach 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 761 
 
 Inlet. Beauregard consented, but only on the condition that 
 she should not be used as a submarine machine, but operating 
 on the surface of the water and with a spar torpedo in the 
 same manner as the David. All the thirty or more men who 
 had met death in the "fish" were volunteers, but Dixon had 
 no difficulty in finding another volunteer crew ready to take 
 the same risks. They were Arnold Becker, C. Simpkins, James 
 A. Wicks, F. Collins, and — Ridgway, all of the Confederate 
 navy, and Capt. J. F. Carlson, of Capt. Wagoner's company 
 of artillery. It was a little before nine o'clock on the evening 
 of Feb. 17th, when Master J. K. Crosby, officer of the deck of 
 the Housatonic, detected the torpedo-boat, a scant hundred 
 yards away from the ship. It looked to him, he said, " like a 
 plank moving along the water," and before he decided to give 
 the alarm, he had lost the seconds in which he might have 
 saved his vessel. When he did pass the word, her cable was 
 slipped, her engine backed and all hands called to quarters; 
 but Dixon had closed on her and fired his torpedo on the star- 
 board side, just forward of her mainmast. A hole was knocked 
 in her side extending below her water line and she went down 
 in four minutes. Five of the Housatonic' s people were killed 
 by the shock or drowned; the remainder took refuge in the 
 rigging, from which they were rescued by other vessels of the 
 fleet. But the victory of the " fish " was fatal to herself and 
 her crew. Whether she was swamped by the column of water 
 thrown up by the explosion, or was carried down by the suc- 
 tion of the sinking Housatonic will never be known; but she 
 went under never to rise again, and the lives of all on board 
 were sacrificed. After the war, when the wrecks off Charles- 
 ton were removed, she was discovered lying on the bottom 
 about 100 feet from the Housatonic, with her bow pointing to 
 the latter. 
 
 A somewhat similar torpedo boat was dredged up in July, 
 1878, in the canal, near Spanish Fort, New Orleans. It had 
 undoubtedly been built by the Confederates and sunk when 
 they evacuated the city in 1863. 
 
 The next torpedo boat attack was directed against the 
 U. S. steamer Memphis in North Edisto River, S. C, March 6th, 
 1864, and was made by a David. It failed because the torpedo 
 boat was seen from the steamer in time to allow her to get 
 under way, and the David in running under her counter is 
 supposed to have broken the torpedo pole by coming into con- 
 tact with her screw. Although a heavy fire was aimed at the 
 David she escaped under cover of the night. 
 
 General Beauregard was deeply interested in a scheme to 
 construct at Charleston an iron-clad torpedo-ram on designs 
 prepared by Captain F. D. Lee. In 1863, the State of South 
 Carolina appropriated $50,000 to aid in building one or more 
 such craft ; but the Confederate Navy Department was sparmg 
 in granting assistance, preferring to expend its resources 
 
762 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 upon the iron-clad gunboats. Nevertheless, in Feb., 1863, the 
 vessel was ready to receive her iron plating and only $20,000 
 more was needed for her completion. That amount was never 
 obtained, and the incomplete torpedo-ram fell into the posses- 
 sion of the enemy when they found their way into Charleston, 
 On April 9th, 1864, Com. Hunter Davidson, in his steam 
 torpedo-boat, Torpedo, having made the run of 120 miles down 
 the James River from Drewry's Bluff, exploded a torpedo along- 
 side the U. S. steam frigate Minnesota, flag-ship of Rear-Ad- 
 miral S. P. Lee, at anchor off Newport News. This affair was 
 particularly daring, as the river swarmed with the enemy's 
 vessels, and a guard tug was lying by the Minnesota, but her 
 commander had allowed his steam to go down. Davidson 
 hit the great ship full and fair, but his torpedo charge was 
 only 53 pounds of powder and it failed to break in her sides. 
 A frame was shattered, planks started, several gun-carriages 
 broken, and a lot of stores damaged. The daring Confed- 
 erates got away without harm. 
 
 In March, 1864, amongst a lot of correspondence captured 
 from a Confederate mail-carrier on the Red River, was a letter 
 dated at Richmond, January 19th, and addressed by T. E. 
 
 Courtenay to Col. H. E. Clark, of the 
 7th Mo. Cav., C. S. A., in which the 
 writer spoke of certain torpedo in- 
 ventions of his own, and alluded to a 
 bill to be presented to the Confed- 
 erate Congress for the establishment 
 of a secret service corps for the 
 destruction of the property of the 
 enemy. One of these devices was 
 the "coal torpedo," which Lieut. 
 Barnes, U. S. N., in his book on 
 "Submarine Warfare," said "ap- 
 pears to be an innocent lump of coal, 
 but is a block of cast-iron with a core containing about ten 
 pounds of powder." When covered with a mixture of tar and 
 coal-dust, it was impossible to detect their character. They 
 could be placed in coal-piles on barges from which Federal 
 vessels took their supplies, and exploded with terrible effect 
 in their boilers. It was said that to this torpedo was traced a 
 number of mysterious explosions, including the destruction of 
 Gen. Butler's headquarters' boat, the Oreyhound, on the James 
 River, November 27th, 1864. 
 
 The machine which caused the great explosion at City 
 Point, on the James River, Aug. 9th, 1864, was a Confederate 
 clock-work torpedo — a box containing a quantity of powder, 
 and a clock arrangement set to fire a detonating cap at a given 
 hour. John Maxwell and R. K. Dillard, of the torpedo corps, 
 arrived at City Point in disguise, as laborers, and the former, 
 with the machine in charge, handed it to a man on a Federal 
 
 COAL TOBPEDO. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 763 
 
 CLOCK-WOBK TOBPEDO. 
 
 "barge, with the remark that the captain had told him to put 
 it on board. Maxwell retired to watch the effect. The clock- 
 work had been set to run an hour, and at 
 -fche end of that time the explosion occurred, 
 ■destroying several vessels loaded with 
 ordnance stores, and the warehouses on 
 the wharf, filled with army supplies, and 
 killing and wounding some fifty men. 
 
 The wharf -boat at Mound City, 111., 
 ■containing the reserve supplies of ammu- 
 nition and stores for Adm. Porter's fleet, 
 was blown up by a similar contrivance. 
 On April 1st, 1864, the U. S. army trans- 
 port Maple Leaf was totally destroved by 
 A floating torpedo, in the St. John's River, Fla. ; and exactly 
 abreast of the spot the transport steamer General Hunter 
 was blown up on the 5th of April, in the same way. Also, on 
 April 15th, the U. S. iron-clad Eastport was sunk in the Red 
 River, by a floating torpedo. On April 18th a bold effort was 
 made by the submarine corps in Charleston to destroy the 
 TJ. S. steam frigate Wabash, one of the blockaders, with a David, 
 lout they were discovered and fired into, and they retreated. 
 
 when Admiral Lee convoyed Gen. Butler's army up the 
 ■James River to Bermuda Hundreds in May, 1864, he organized 
 & torpedo picket division that in a few days secured eleven of 
 the Confederate "infernal machines;" but despite these pre- 
 cautions, the gunboat Commodore Jones was on May 6th 
 knocked into fragments at Deep Bottom by an electric torpedo 
 ■containing 2,000 pounds of powder, and exploded from pits on 
 shore by men of Com. Hunter Davidson's corps. Forty officers 
 •and men of the gunboat were killed. The men who fired the 
 torpedo ran from the pits ; one of them (Mr. Britten) was 
 killed by a shot from the Federals, and the other two were 
 made prisoners. Gen. Butler sent one of them to Lieut. 
 Homer C. Blake, comnaanding the gunboat Eutaw, with the 
 instructions : "If you can use him, do so ; if not, hang him." 
 ^lake handed him over to Lieut. Fyffe, who soon started up the 
 river with the prisoner lashed to the cutwater of his ship, " He 
 only went about 300 yards," Blake said, " when the man called 
 out: ' Stop, captain, for God's sake! There's a torpedo just over 
 there.' This one removed, it was not long before another was 
 pointed out by the terrified man, and so we cleared the channel." 
 
 At Dutch Gap, on the James River, the Federals would 
 sometimes pick up floating torpedoes sent against the fleet, at 
 the rate of a hundred a day. These torpedoes were suspended 
 in pairs to wooden buoys, and were connected by trigger-lines 
 which would explode them on contact with a ship ; but the 
 Federals guarded against them by putting out booms and 
 nettings in such a way that the torpedo floats were sheered 
 off and passed harmlessly by. 
 
764 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 The most dangerous torpedoes were stationary ones, planted 
 across the shallows at frequent intervals. They comprised a, 
 
 spar fastened by a universal joint to a 
 fixed block at the bottom of the river 
 and bearing the torpedo at its summit. 
 Swinging with the current and tide, 
 this torpedo was always kept at a uni- 
 form depth below the surface, and was 
 out of sight. The torpedo was studded 
 with sensitive caps, and no matter 
 where a ship touched it it would ex- 
 plode. They could not be grappled, 
 for, and it was only by good luck, care 
 and ingenuity that the Federals got 
 them out of the channel. 
 
 In May, 1864, the U. S. Potomac- 
 flotilla cleared the Eappahannock 
 River of torpedoes, taking up four and 
 exploding six. On the 9th of that 
 month, the transport Harriet A. Weed 
 was destroyed by a torpedo on the St. 
 John's River, ten miles below Jack- 
 sonville. Out of 44 persons on th& 
 steamer five were killed, and all the 
 remainder were more or less injured. 
 This was the third vessel lost in 
 the St. John's within sixty days in the 
 same manner, and on June 19th the 
 transport Alice Price was blown up 
 on the same stream by a torpedo. 
 Following the destruction of the Price 
 occurred the most fearful work of sub- 
 marine batteries during the war — the- 
 loss of the monitor Tecumseh, with 
 over 100 of her officers and men, dur- 
 ing Farragut's attack on the defences of Mobile Bay, August 
 6th, 1864. ' After the capture of the bay forts the city was 
 protected for nearly ten months from the Federal fleet by the 
 torpedo system in the channels of approach. Besides th& 
 Tecumseh, eleven U. S. vessels, men-of-war and transports, 
 were sunk by torpedoes in Mobile Bay; some of them after the 
 Confederates had evacuated the city. The Confederates had 
 at Mobile a torpedo-boat named the St. Patrick, with which 
 Lieut. Walker, C. S. N., on Jan. 37th, 1865, attacked the Federal 
 flag-ship Octorara; but the torpedo did not explode and no 
 damage was done. While the Federals were removing the 
 obstructions in Mobile Bay, on Aug. 25th, 1864, a torpedo ex- 
 ploded, killing five men and wounding nine. On Dec. 7th, 
 the U. S. gunboat Narcissus was sunk in the bay by a torpedo j 
 
 1 See Chapter on Alabama Waters. 
 
 A BOUTANT TOBPEDO. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 765 
 
 and in April, 18G5, a launch from the U. S. iron-clad Cincinnati 
 exploded a torpedo for which she was grappling, and three 
 men were killed. 
 
 In 1863 the U. S. government took up the idea of a torpedo 
 service, for which it had previously savagely denounced the 
 Confederates, and invited plans from inventors and mechanics. 
 In that year numerous torpedoes were placed in the Eoanoke 
 Eiver to prevent the Confederate ram. Albemarle from descend- 
 ing to attack the Federal gunboats in Albemarle Sound. Adm. 
 Dahlgren, in February, 1864, wrote to the Navy Department 
 that he " had attached more importance to the use of torpedoes 
 than others had done," and he suggested the oflfer of $30,000 or 
 $30,000 prize-money for the capture or destruction of a David. 
 Adm. Farragut had very little faith in torpedoes at first, but 
 on March 35th, 1864, he wrote to the Department from Mobile 
 Bay, that he would have torpedoes, and added : " Torpedoes 
 are not so agreeable when used on both sides ; therefore I have 
 reluctantly brought myself to it. I have always deemed it 
 unworthy of a chivalrous nation, but it does not do to give 
 your enemy such a decided superiority over you." 
 
 A spar torpedo was attached to the monitor Manhattan 
 for use during the attack on Mobile, but it was previously 
 carried away by heavy seas washing over the deck. 
 
 In the action of May 5th, 1864, between the Albemarle 
 and a fleet of U. S. gunboats, the Miami was rigged with a 
 spar torpedo, and endeavored to strike the Confederate ram, 
 but was unsuccessful, owing, as her commander stated, to the 
 clumsiness of his vessel. The most important event in the 
 use of the spar torpedo by the Unionists was the destruction 
 of the Albemarle, at Plymouth, N. C, Oct. 38th, 1864. Lieut. 
 W. B. Cushing, U. S. K, effected this achievement with a 
 ■steam launch that had originally been intended for the torpedo 
 picket service in Charleston harbor. He found the Albemarle 
 at the wharf, with a pen of logs around her, about 30 feet 
 from her side, and under a sharp fire from the ram and on 
 shore, he made a way through and over the logs, succeeded in 
 lowering his torpedo-pole, which projected twenty-eight feet, 
 against the side of the ram, and exploded the torpedo. A 
 large hole was broken under the water-line of the ram, and 
 she went down in a few minutes. Cushing's own boat was 
 swamped by the rush of water, and of his thirteen officers 
 and men, all but himself and one other were either shot, 
 drowned, or made prisoners. He escaped by swimming. 
 Lieut. A. F. Warley, C. S. N., commanding the Albemarle, 
 stated that the pickets gave no notice of the approach of the 
 enemy, and that the artillery stationed by the vessel for 
 protection gave no assistance. She was raised by the Federals 
 in April, 1865, and an Admiralty Court appraised her value at 
 1383,856, of which $79,954 was distributed as prize-naoney 
 among the men who destroyed her. 
 
766 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 A Federal gunboat expedition up the Roanoke River, Dec. 
 1864, came upon a nest of torpedoes opposite Jamestown. On th& 
 9th the " double-ender " Otsego, was destroyed by one of them ;; 
 on the next day the Bazely was sunk close by, and shortly af- 
 terwards Picket-boat No. 5, met the same fate ; and the expe- 
 dition was abandoned. These calamities were followed on 
 January 15th, 1865, by the destruction of the monitor Patopsco, 
 in Charleston harbor, while she was covering the boats en- 
 gaged in dragging for torpedoes. She struck one herself, and 
 went down like a pig of lead, carrying with her seven officers 
 and about sixty men. She had torpedo-fenders and netting^ 
 out at the time. Three boats, with drags, had preceded her, 
 searching to some depth the water they had passed over, while 
 steam-tugs and several boats were in different positions on her 
 bow. stern and quarter. 
 
 The channels of Cape Fear River, from Forts Fisher and 
 Caswell up to Wilmington, were carefully planted by the Con- 
 federates with electric and barrel torpedoes; and the operators 
 for the electric torpedoes were stationed with their firing ap- 
 paratus in the bomb-proofs of the forts. When Adm. Porter 
 and Gen. Butler, in the winter of 1864-65, were ordered to the 
 command of the Federal naval and military forces for the as- 
 sault on Fort Fisher, the latter conceived the notion of demol- 
 ishing the fort and " paralyzing " the garrison by the explo- 
 sion of the hugest powder-boat ever devised. Porter was an 
 unwilling party to the scheme, as he perceived its absurdity. 
 An old steamer, the Louisiana, was procured, and 180 tons of 
 powder placed on board, to be exploded by a time fuse that 
 would burn 90 minutes. She was towed in on the beach, within 
 400 yards of the fort, and her big display of fireworks went off 
 between one and two o'clock on the morning of Dec. 24th, with 
 the result of hurting nobody and scarcely disturbing the sleep- 
 ing men in the fort. At the time Midshipman Clarence Cary, 
 C. S. N., with others of the officers and crew of the C. S. 
 steamer Chickamauga, occupied a deserted hut a little way up 
 the beach outside the fort, and were nearer than the garrison 
 to the powder-boat, and yet they slept through the explosion 
 and "supposed its report," writes Mr. Cary, "no more than 
 that of a distant gun. Possibly the first ton or so of powder 
 ignited blew the remainder harmlessly into the sea, or 
 it may be the ship got adrift in the hour and half the 
 time fuse allowed her after she was abandoned, and thus 
 wreaked her expected havoc at some remote point, where 
 only the fish and sea-gulls, instead of sleeping men, were 
 within range." 
 
 After the capture of Fort Anderson, the Federals were 
 busy in removing the torpedo defences between that point 
 and Wilmington. On Feb. 20th, 1865, Adm. Porter says, "the 
 Confederates sent down 200 floating torpedoes from Wilming- 
 ton upon the fleet. One damaged the gunboat Osceola, and a 
 
THE CONrEDERATE STATES NAVY. 767 
 
 second blew to pieces a cutter from the Shawmut, killing and 
 wounding four men," Porter spread fishing nets across the 
 river to catch the torpedoes as they came down. 
 
 On Feb. 17th, 1865, the Confederate flag of truce steamer 
 Schultz, Capt. Hill, ran over a torpedo in the James Eiver, a 
 few miles above Cox's Landing, and quickly sank. Several 
 members of the Richmond ambulance committee were on 
 board, but were saved, and the only lives lost were those of 
 two of the guards and two firemen. Adm. Dahlgren's flag-ship, 
 the Harvest Moon, was destroyed by a torpedo in Georgetown 
 Bay, S. C, March 1st, with a" loss to him of everything on 
 board except the clothes he stood in. He was rescued by a 
 gunboat. On March 4th, the U. S. transport Thorn was blown 
 up in Cape Fear River, just below Fort Anderson; and on the 
 13th, the gunboat Althea met destruction on Blakely River. 
 Mobile, losing two men killed and three wounded. Suc- 
 ceeding the evacuation of Charleston by the Confederates, 
 the Federals picked up a hundred torpedoes in the harbor, 
 and in the Cooper and Ashley Rivers. One exploded on 
 March 17th under the U. S. survey steamer Bibb, and damaged 
 her engines. 
 
 The worst destruction in the concluding months of the 
 war was done around Mobile. On March 28th, 1865, the U. S. 
 monitor Milwaukee was destroyed in the Blakely river by a 
 buoyant torpedo, and the next day the monitor Osage was 
 sunk on Blakely Bar by a similar machine ; she lost two killed 
 and ten wounded. On April 1st the gunboat Rodolph was 
 blown up near the scene of the Milwaukee's catastrophe, with 
 a loss of four killed and eleven wounded. The U. S. gunboat 
 Scioto, on April 14th, was sunk off Mobile by striking a tor- 
 pedo, and had four men killed and six wounded. On the pre- 
 ceding day, the U. S. steamer Ida was destroyed below the 
 obstructions in Mobile Bay. On the 14th the cutter of the 
 iron-clad Cincinnati hit a torpedo in the bay with the usual 
 result, and on the same day the gunboat Itasca was blown 
 up ; five men were killed and six injured by these two dis- 
 asters. Late the same afternoon the steamer Eose was des- 
 troyed, and two men were killed and three wounded. A few 
 days later the transport St. Mary's was blown up by a torpedo 
 in the Alabama River, and the steamer Hamilton from New 
 Orleans, with the Third Mich, cavalry on board, was struck by a 
 torpedo in the Lower Gap channel entrance to Mobile, making 
 a wreck of the boat, and killing and wounding thirteen per- 
 sons. Thus in less than a month ten vessels of the Federal 
 Government, including two monitors, were destroyed by the 
 Confederate torpedo service, a fact that may be left to stand 
 alone as an evidence of its efficiency. 
 
 The last craft to suffer from a torpedo was the U. S. gun- 
 boat Jonquil, which was much injured on June 6th, 1865, by 
 an explosion in the Ashley River, near Charleston. 
 
768 
 
 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Now that torpedo warfare is recognised as legitimate by 
 all the nations of the world, history cannot omit to record 
 that the Confederate States were the first government to bring 
 it into existence as a formidable and practicable weapon. 
 The torpedo and the steam-ram were the valuable contribu- 
 tions to the science of war and its Implements which they 
 made during their brief existence. 
 
 United States Vessels Desteoted ok Injured by Con- 
 federate Torpedoes. 
 
 
 DcUi 
 
 
 Dec. 
 
 12, 
 
 '62.... 
 
 Feb. 
 
 28, 
 
 ■63.... 
 
 July 
 
 23. 
 
 *' .... 
 
 Aug. 
 
 8, 
 
 " .... 
 
 Sept. 
 
 ., 
 
 *' .... 
 
 Oct. 
 
 5. 
 
 " .... 
 
 Feb. 
 
 17. 
 
 '64.... 
 
 April 
 
 1, 
 
 •' .... 
 
 " 
 
 », 
 
 " .... 
 
 " 
 
 16. 
 
 " .... 
 
 " 
 
 16, 
 
 " .... 
 
 May 
 
 6. 
 
 " 
 
 " 
 
 9, 
 
 "* 
 
 June 
 
 19, 
 
 '« 
 
 Aug. 
 
 6. 
 g 
 
 ;;•••• 
 
 Nov. 
 
 27, 
 
 " .... 
 
 Deo. 
 
 7, 
 9, 
 10, 
 10. 
 
 ,t 
 
 Jan. 
 
 16, 
 
 u 
 
 Feb. 
 
 20, 
 20, 
 
 
 March 1, 
 
 " .... 
 
 '» 
 
 i. 
 
 " .... 
 
 " 
 
 12, 
 
 " .... 
 
 " 
 
 17, 
 
 " 
 
 K 
 
 20, 
 
 " .... 
 
 " 
 
 28, 
 
 • « 
 
 " 
 
 29, 
 
 " .. 
 
 April 
 
 1, 
 13, 
 
 "... 
 
 »» 
 
 14, 
 
 u, 
 u, 
 
 .» 
 
 June 
 
 a. 
 
 "... 
 
 Vessel. 
 
 Cairo, iron-clad 
 
 Moutauk, monitor 
 
 Baron DeKalb, iron-clad 
 
 Com. Barney, gunboat 
 
 John Farron, transport 
 
 New Ironsides, iron-clad. 
 Housatoruc, sloop-of-war. ... 
 
 Maple Leaf, transport 
 
 Minnesota, frigate 
 
 General Hunter, transport . . . 
 
 Eastport, iron-clad 
 
 Com. Jones, guuboat 
 
 H. A. Weed, transport 
 
 Alice Price, transport 
 
 Tecumseh, monitor 
 
 Several vessels 
 
 Greyhound, transport 
 
 Narcissus, gunboat 
 
 Otsego, gunboat 
 
 Bazely, gunboat 
 
 Launch No. 5 
 
 Patapsco, monitor 
 
 Osceola, gunboat 
 
 Launch, Shawmut 
 
 Harvest-Moon 
 
 Thorn, transport 
 
 Althea, gunboat 
 
 Bibb, coast survey steamer. . . . 
 
 Massachusetts, gunboat 
 
 Milwaukee, monitor 
 
 Osage, monitor 
 
 Rodolph, gunboat 
 
 Ida, tug 
 
 Scioto, gunboat , 
 
 Cincinnati, tug 
 
 Itasca, gunboat 
 
 Rose, gunboat 
 
 St. Mary's, transport 
 
 R. B. Hamilton, transport .... 
 Jonquil, gunboat 
 
 Place. 
 
 Yazoo River 
 
 Ogeechee River 
 
 Yazoo River 
 
 James River 
 
 Off Charleston 
 
 St. John's River 
 
 Newport News 
 
 St. John's River 
 
 Red River 
 
 James River 
 
 St. John's River 
 
 Mobile Bay 
 
 City Point, James River. 
 
 James River 
 
 Mobile Bay 
 
 Roanoke River 
 
 Charleston, S. 6 
 
 Cape Fear River 
 
 Georgetown, S. C 
 
 Cape Fear River 
 
 Blakely River 
 
 Charleston, S. C , 
 
 Blakely River 
 
 Mobile Bay 
 
 Blakely River 
 
 Mobile Bay, 
 
 Alabama River 
 
 Mobile Bay 
 
 Ashley River 
 
 Tonnage. 
 
 512 
 8U 
 612 
 613 
 
 1210 
 608 
 
 3307 
 350 
 800 
 642 
 290 
 320 
 
 1034 
 
 '900 
 101 
 
 974 
 
 844 
 974 
 
 646 
 403 
 
 1155 
 
 970 
 523 
 
 217 
 101 
 507 
 
 Injury. 
 
 Destroyed. 
 
 Serious. 
 
 Destroyed. 
 
 Disabled. 
 
 Serious. 
 
 Destroyed. 
 
 Serions. 
 Destroyed. 
 
 Sunk. 
 Destroyed. 
 
 Slight. 
 Destroyed. 
 
 Slight. 
 
 Destroyed. 
 
 Sunk. 
 
 Destroyed. 
 
 Serious. 
 
COLONEL LLOYD I. BEALL, 
 
 ClONFEDKBATE STATES MABINE CORPS. 
 
CHAPTER XXIV. 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES MARINE CORPS. 
 
 BY act of Congress of the Confederate States, March 16th, 
 1861, the establishment of a corps of marines was provided 
 for, and subsequent legislation of May; 30th enlarged its 
 numbers and elevated the rank of its principal officers. It 
 was, in fact, organized under the second act, whose provisions 
 were that it should consist of: " 1 colonel, 1 lieut. col., 1 major, 
 1 quartermaster with rank of major, 1 adjutant with rank of 
 major, 1 serg. -major, 1 quartermaster-sergeant, 10 captains, 
 10 first lieutenants, 20 second lieutenants, 40 sergeants, 40 cor- 
 porals and 840 privates, 10 drummers, 10 fifers and 2 musicians." 
 The pay and emoluments were the same as those of the 
 army, except that the paymaster and adjutant received the 
 same as the quartermaster, and seamen's rations were allowed 
 to enlisted men. Enlistments were for three years or the war; 
 recruits to receive a bounty of $50 and re-enlisted men $40. An 
 act of Sept. 24th, 1862, authorized the addition of 20 sergeants, 20 
 corporals, 20 drummers, 20 fifers and two principal musicians ; 
 and by an act of Oct. 2d, 1862, men enrolled for the army were 
 permitted to choose service in the marine corps or the navy. 
 
 Previous to the war the U. S. marine corps was an excep- 
 tionally fine and' well-disciplined body of men, and from it 
 came the nucleus of the corresponding establishment of the 
 Confederate service. Its headquarters were at the Washing- 
 ton navy -yard, and the following officers resigned and tendered 
 their swords to the Confederate Government : 
 
 Maj. Henry B. Tyler, of Va., adjutant of the corps; Capt. and Brevet 
 Maj. Geo. H. Terret, of Va. ; Capt. Robert Tansill, '■ of Va. ; Capt. Algernon S. 
 
 , 1 Capt. Tansill was on duty on the U.S. frigate ment. The States forming the Confederacy did 
 
 Confess, at Monte Video, when the inaugural not relinquish that right, and I believe each 
 
 address of President Lincoln was received State haa a clear and unquestionable right to 
 
 there. On May nth, 1861, he tendered his secede whenever thepeople thereof think proper, 
 
 resignation ; and in his letter, after stating that and the Federal government has no legal or 
 
 he had read the address' and that it seemed to moral authority to use physical force to keep 
 
 him that if the policy therein announced was them in the Union. 
 
 carried out civil war must ensue, added: "Entertaining these views, 1 cannot consci- 
 
 "In entering the public service Itook an oath entiously join in a war against any of the States 
 
 to support the Constitution, which necessarily which have already seceded, or may hereafter 
 
 gives me a right to interpret it. Our institutions, secede, either North or South, for the purpose 
 
 according to my understanding, are founded of coercing them back into the Union. Such a 
 
 npon the principles and right of self -govern- war, in my opinion, would not only certainly 
 49 (769) 
 
770 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Taylor, ' of Va. ; Capt. John D. Simms, of Va. ; First Lieut. Israel Greene, of 
 Va. ; First Lieut. John K. H. Tatnall, of Ga. ; First Lieut. Julius B. Meire, of 
 Md. ; First Lieut. Geo. P. Turner, of Va. ; First Lieut. Thos. S. Wilson, of 
 Mo.; First Lieut. Andrew J. Hays, of Ala.; First Lieut. Adam N. Baker; 
 Second Lieut. George Holmes, of Fla. ; Second Lieut. Calvin L. Sayre, of 
 Ala.; Second Lieut. Henry L. Ingraham, of So. Car., and Second Lieut. 
 Baker K. Ho-weU, of Miss. 
 
 Most of these officers arrived in Richmond by the time 
 that the seat of the Confederate government was transferred 
 from Montgomery to that city; and, with the exception of 
 Capt. Tansill and Lieut. Turner, they thenceforth served in 
 tlie C. S. marine corps. They met at Richmond, in Maj^ 1861, 
 more than a hundred men of their former command in the 
 Federal service, who fully shared in their enthusiasm for the 
 Confederate cause and had left their comfortable berths under 
 the old flag to risk their lives and fortunes in the yet untested 
 possibilities of the success of the South. 
 
 There had been no concert of action by which so many of 
 the former men and officers of the U. S. marine corps were as- 
 sembled at Richmond, but it was not an unfortunate accident 
 for the Confederacy that they did come together at that time. 
 They formed the skeleton of the organization that it was 
 desired to establish, and brought it into order and being with 
 a celerity that would have been impossible to unskilled hands. 
 
 The organization of the corps, which had begun at Mont- 
 gomery, was completed at Richmond. Col. Lloyd J. Beall,' a 
 
 and permanently destroy tbe Confederacy, but. who were arrested and imprisoned in con- 
 if successful, establish an unlimited despotism sequence of such resignation, and who sub- 
 on the ruins of our liberty. No personal con- sequently joined the navy and manne corps of 
 eideration or advantage, however great, can the Confederate States," should receive "leave 
 induce me to aid in a cause which my heart tells of absence, pay for and during the term of such 
 me is wrong, and I prefer to endure the most imprisonment, and up to the time of their 
 terrible hardships rather than to prosper in the appointment in the navy and marine corps of 
 destruction of tlie freedom of my country . And the Confederate States." 
 
 believing, sir, that it would be disingenuous in , Algernon S. Taylor had been an ofBcer of the 
 
 me to relain my commission until the govern- j. g ^ ^ J jggg transferred to the 
 
 sln''dtn7eXeTo^'?;;^rro"nsrd??itZ; T''zrk^s.TT^^^!^^TU^'o'ZiK 
 
 pi-ndentandiust to now tender my resignation *^Si ^SG? re'cffered' Ms^JSn'Sfon^Te 
 
 ''^ATSn'^of' L'^Cfn^Xi'^^nXL^- f--'-y °' t!^= Navy. It wa. no^taccepted, but 
 
 of Capt. Tansill was one of the many incidents S? i^™' '^{''?,'Z t"w*?S ""Tw' i*°"i Ir. 
 
 of the war that Northern historians' conscious S??l"'l' 5tL ; I^^l^'S,!^ , !.i!f„I^°.f it 
 
 StbouEh Ws sole offence corteteSi^UsM' '"'^"^^'^ "^ »™- ^^ *° establish a school of 
 pressi" n in his letter of resiSaUon of the ^st^otion ■'id mustering-in depot at Culpepper 
 reasoM tha^wrannted him to tto sten unon his ^ H., and after the amalgamation of the armyof 
 rrM^Nry^rk on"ugustthe'^23d^,°?86 I^^ ^'^e.^'b °°S'^^r^ Sta'f '"T'i I' 
 he was arrested by the order of Secretary WeUes ™ requested by Secretary Mallory to take 
 and placed in imprisonment in Fort Lafayette. ^^'"^ee of the quartermaster s and commissary s 
 No hearing or trial was ever granted him ; but ^f ^ ■^''°'t°' ""• ?'"','°'' ""^FV ^''.';."'^ '^S 
 on the day after sending him to prison Mr. ?^^^^°'- ?° remained in that position until 
 Welles forwarded him, not an acceptance of his *'^5 evacuation of Richmond, when he wa4 
 resignation,but the informaiion that;by direction "■''lered to send all has boota and papers by his 
 of the President, his name had been stricken "ssistant Lieut. Venable, to DanviUe, where they 
 from the roll of the U. S. marine corps. From weie destroyed. Maj. Taylor joined Lee's retreat- 
 Fort Lafayette, Capt. Tansill was transferred to '°S a™y. and surrendered at Appomattoi 0. H. 
 Fort Warren, Boston harbor, and was not 2 Colonel Beall, now approaching fourscore 
 released until Jan. 10th, 1862, when he was years, is a resident of Eichmond. His books 
 formally exchanged. The gross injustice dono and papers were destroyed by fire about the 
 him was recognized in an act of the Confederate close of the war, and in that disaster were lost 
 Congress of April 11th, 1863, which provided that many of the most valuable records of the corps. 
 '■ officers of the navy and marine corps who re- " The corps," he says, in a letter to the author, 
 signed friun the navy and marine corps of the "was composed of enlisted men, manyofwhom 
 United States in consequence of secession, and were old soldiers and commissioned officers, a 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 771 
 
 former officer of the U. S. army, was appointed commandant 
 with the rank of colonel. A commission as paymaster, with 
 the rank of major, was issued to Eichard Taylor Allison, who 
 had held similar rank and office in the U. S. navy. ' 
 
 Other commissions issued at Richmond, made Henry B. 
 Tyler lieut. colonel of the corps; Geo. H. Terret, major; Capt. 
 Greene, who captured John Brown, at Harper's Ferry, when 
 the U. S. marines attacked his fortress in the engine-house at 
 the arsenal, was made adjutant, with the rank of major ; Lieut. 
 Taylor became quartermaster, with the rank of major ; and 
 Simms, Tatnall, Holmes, Meire, Wilson and Hays, were ap- 
 pointed captains. Sayre and Howell were made lieutenants, 
 and the lists of that rank were subsequently filled up by ap- 
 pointments made from time to time. Capts. Thom and" Van 
 Benthuysen, and all the lieutenants, except Sayre and Howell, 
 were appointed from civil life, or from the army and navy, 
 while the other officers, with the exception of Col. Beall, came 
 from the U. S. marine service. 
 
 The corps remained in and around Richmond, practically 
 unbroken, until the summer of 1862. It was engaged in the 
 battle with the Federal iron-clads Monitor, Naugatuck and 
 Galena, at Drewry's Bluff, on May 15th, when its service at the 
 guns assisted the artillerists of the army and navy in the re- 
 pulse of those vessels. Major Terrett commanded the corps 
 on that occasion, and soon after detachments from it were or- 
 dered to other stations, and to vessels preparing for sea, or for 
 the coast defence. Because of the great lack of trained sea- 
 men in the Confederacy, the veteran marines were of ines- 
 timable value on board the ships to which they were attached, 
 and they were made use of in numerous capacities that em- 
 braced the duties of sailors. One squad of marines that fought 
 at Drewry's Bluff had previously formed a part of the ship's 
 company of the Virginia, and had helped work her guns in the 
 battles in Hampton Roads. They were under the command 
 of Capt. R. Thom, and remained with the ship until she was 
 destroyed. Other detachments served on the Sumter and the 
 
 number of whom had seen eerviee before in the commanding the Maryland troops in Baltimore, 
 U. S marine corps and elsewhere. The corps proffering his services. At the same time he 
 was thoroughly trained and disciplined, and in informed President Davis of what he had done, 
 all encounters with the enemy the officers and Owing to the interruption of railway travel 
 men were conspicuous for their courage and north of Baltimore, no oflficer could be imme- 
 good conduct." diately obtained to relieve him at the Washiug- 
 1 Hichard Taylor Allison is a native of Jef- ton navy-yard ; and, in compliance with the 
 ferson county, Ky., and removed to Baltimore request of Secretary 'Welles, he remained on 
 in 1815. In 1849 he was appointed paymaster in duty as paymaster until May 1st. His successor 
 the IJ. S. navy by his uncle. President Taylor. took charge on that date, and he did not discover 
 He served first in the Pacific squadron and on until the end of the war that the Navy Depart- 
 the coast of California ; then in the Japan expe- ment had not accepted his resignation, but had 
 dition, under Com. Perry, and next in the dismissed him from the service. As soon as he 
 squadron in the Chinese waters. Eelnming was reUeved he went to Bichmond and tele- 
 home in 1856, he was assigned to duty as in- graphed thence to President Davis, who sum- 
 spector of provisions at Washington, and after- moned him to Montgomery and appointed him 
 wards was appointed paymaster at the Wash- paymasterof the marine corps. He served in that 
 ington navy-yard. He occupied that position capacity until the close of hostilities and sur- 
 onApril20th, 1861, when he tendered his resigna- rendered with Gen. Johnston's army at Greens- 
 tion to Secretary Welles, being moved to that boro", N. C. Since then he has resided in 
 action by the occurrences of the previous day Baltimore, where he was honored with the 
 in Baltimore, and wrote to Gen. Geo. H. Stewart, position of clerk of the Superior Court. 
 
772 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Alabama during their cruises, and were commanded by Lieut. 
 B. K. Howell, who was highly commended by Capt. Semmes. 
 Lieut. James Thurston commanded the marine guard on the 
 Atlanta, during her brief and ill-starred career in the waters 
 around Savannah, and had charge, with his men, of a division 
 of the guns, in the short engagement in the Ogeechee that 
 ended with her surrender. When Adm. Buchanan took the 
 Tennessee out to fight Farragut's fleet in Mobile Bay, he had 
 on board a marine guard, under the command of Lieut. David 
 G. Raney, which was assigned to one of the gun divisions, and 
 was largely instrumental in the quick and efficient work with 
 her battery that inflicted such great damage upon the enemy. 
 In the same battle a detachment of marines, under the com- 
 mand of Lieut. J. R. T. Fendall, served on the gunboat 
 Gaines, and escaped to Mobile with the crew, after the vessel 
 was beached under the guns of Fort Morgan. At the defence 
 of Fort Fisher, Dec. 34th-25th, 1864, and Jan. 5th, 1865, a 
 body of marines participated. They were commanded by 
 Capt. A. C. Van Benthuysen, and Lieuts. Henry N. Doak and 
 J. Campbell Murdoch. Finally, such companies and detach- 
 ments of the corps as were not isolated at Mobile, or were not 
 away at sea, or had not been captured, were gathered around 
 Richmond in Feb. and March, 1865, and were then assigned to 
 the former positions of the marines in the fortifications on 
 Drewry's Bluff. Then they made up a part of the naval brigade, 
 under Com. John R. Tucker, and with the sailors held out at 
 the battle of Baylor's Creek, after Gren. Ewell had surrendered. 
 
 This mention is to be taken only as a scant index of the ser- 
 vices of the marines. Their inadequacy in numbers to the tasks 
 required of them necessitated the breaking up of the corps into 
 small detachments, and hence they participated in many actions 
 their share in which has not been recorded. The report of Col. 
 Beall, dated Oct. 30th, 1864, shows that the aggregate strength 
 of the corps then was but 539 men, of which number two cap- 
 tains, three lieutenants, and sixtjr-two privates were prisoners 
 in the hands of the enemy, and thirty-two recruits had recently 
 been received at the Charleston naval station from the con- 
 script camp near Raleigh, N. C. The report continues : 
 
 " The marine corps is distributed at the following naval stations : 
 Mobile, Savannah, Charleston, Wilmington, and at Drewry's Bluff ; also 
 on board of the three iron-clad steamers in the James River, and as 
 guards at the Richmond navy-yards. Marine guards have been assigned 
 to the armed steamers Tallahassee and Chickamauga, destined to operate 
 against the enemy's commerce on the sea. 
 
 "Since my last report the marines have been under the enemy's 
 fire at Drewry's Bluff and on the James River ; also in the land and naval 
 engagements near Mobile, on the 5th and 6th of August last. A marine 
 guard under the command of Lieut. Crenshaw was attached to the Con- 
 federate steamship Tallahassee during the late cruise, when much damage 
 was inflicted upon the enemy's shipping at sea. 
 
 "Upon all occasions when the marines have been called upon for 
 active service, they have displayed the promptness and efficiency of well 
 disciplined soldiers." 
 
CHAPTER XXV. 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVAL ACADEMY. 
 
 TO establish a naval school for the proper training of the 
 younger officers of the Confederate navy was a project 
 to which Secretary Mallory had given much thought 
 from the time of his entrance upon the duties of nis 
 office ; but although such an institution was amply authorized 
 by a section of an act of Congress approved March 16th, 1861, 
 which provided that the naval laws of the United States not 
 inconsistent with the act be applied to the navy of the Con- 
 federate States, it was not until 1863 that steps to form the 
 academy were taken. Acting midshipmen had previously 
 been appointed, and by an act of Congress approved April 
 21st, 1863, their number was limited to 106 and that of passed 
 midshipmen to twenty. On March 23d, 1863, Mr. Mallory laid 
 the foundations of the school by an order for the examination 
 by a board of officers of the acting midshipmen at the several 
 stations in seamanship, gunnery, ntiathematics, steam engi- 
 neering, navigation, English studies, French, drawing and 
 drafting. Captains Sidney Smith Lee, Samuel Barron and 
 others were assigned to duty as examiners, and in the mean- 
 time Lieut. Wm. Harwar Parker ' was selected as commandant 
 of the school to be formed, and instructed to formulate regu- 
 lations for its government. The C. S. steamship Patrick Henry, 
 of the James River squadron, was chosen as the schoolship ; 
 a mast fully rigged with square yards was stepped in her for 
 
 1 Lieut. Parker was a son of Com. Foxhall linaSounds; had commanded the gunboat BeaM- 
 Parker, TT. S. N., and brother of Com. Foxhall fort at the battle of Hampton Koads, and was 
 A. Parker, IJ. S, N. "While one brother went executive ofacer of the iron-clad Palmetto State, 
 with the South, the other remained in the Fed- at Charleston, in the breaking of the blockade, 
 eral navy during the war, and attained distinc- Hie professional writings were used as text- 
 tion. Wm. H. Parker entered the U, S. navy in books at Annapolis and in the Confederate 
 1841, when he was 14 years old, and graduated Naval Academy. They were "Elements of Sea- 
 at the head of a class at the Naval Academy that mauship," " Harbor Boutine and Evolutions," 
 gave to the United States and Confederate States " Naval Tactics," " Naval Light Artillery Afloat 
 service more distinguished officers than any and Ashore," and " Remarks on the Navigation 
 other single class. Previous to the war between of the Coasts between San Francisco and Pan- 
 the States, he had attained high reputation as an ama." After the war he cbmmanded vessels of 
 officer and instructor, and held the position of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, was sub- 
 assistant professor of mathematics at the Anna- sequently President of the Maryland Agri- 
 polis Institution. In the Confederate navy he cultural College, and is now (1867) IT. S. consul 
 had taken part in the battles in the North Caro- at Bahia. 
 
 (773) 
 
774 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the practice of the midshipmen and quarters for them were 
 fitted up. On July 23d, 1863, Com. John M. Brooke, m charge 
 of the office of ordnance and hydrography at Richmond, who 
 had supervision of the establishment of the academy, "ap- 
 proved and recommended for adoption " the regulations pre- 
 pared by Lieut. Parker, and on their approval by Secretary 
 Mallory the naval school went into operation. 
 
 lii the fall of ] 863, the Navy Department selected the fol- 
 lowing academic staff : 
 
 Lieutenant W. B. Hall,' commandant of midshipmen; 
 Lieutenant Oscar F. Johnston, professor of astronomy, navi- 
 gation and surveying ; Lieut. Thomas W. W. Davies, assist- 
 ant ; Lieut. C. J. Graves, instructor in seamanship ; Lieut. 
 James W. Billups, assistant ; Lieut. Wm. Van Comstock, in- 
 structor in gunnery ; Master George M. Peek, mathematics ; 
 Master George W. Armistead, physics ; Master George A. 
 Pepley, French and German ; — Sanxey, infantry tactics ; 
 
 , sword master ; assistant surgeons, W. J. Addison, James 
 
 G. Bixley; paymaster, Wm. M. Ladd; second assistant engineer, 
 E. G. Hall; boatswain, Andrew Blakie; gunner, E. R. Johnson 
 (subsequently William F. Brittingham); sail-maker, William 
 Bennett. 
 
 The staff remained almost intact until the school perished 
 with the Confederacy. In the summer of 1864, Lieut. 0. F. 
 Johnson relieved Lieut. Hall as commandant of midshipmen 
 in order that the latter might devote more attention to the in- 
 struction of the classes, and in November, Lieut. B. P. Loyall 
 relieved Lieut. Johnson. The only other change of import- 
 ance was that later Com. James Henry Rochelle was ordered 
 to the school as commandant of midshipmen and executive 
 officer. As far as the exigencies of war would permit, the or- 
 ganization, studies and discipline of the school were modeled 
 upon the curriculum of the U. S. Naval Academy. Cadets 
 were appointed by members of Congress from their respective 
 districts and by the President from the Confederacy at large, 
 and the school began work with fifty acting midshipmen. 
 
 1 Lieut. Wilbum B. Hall was appointed to the was cut off by the United States ships-of-war and 
 U. S. naval academy from Louisiana in 1855 and batteries, ininning in under a terrific fire from 
 graduated at the head of his class. In 1861 he Federal guns in broad daylight and through a 
 ■was attached as acting ilag-lieutenant to Com. line of thirteen vessels. He marched the crew 
 Inman, commanding the squadron on the Afri- of the Harriet Lane across the State of Texas to 
 can coast, and at the outbreak of the war re- man the iron-clad Louisiana on Red River, and 
 turned to the United States in a captured slave- subsequently commanded the Webb, Savannah, 
 ship with 700 negroes on board. Lieut. Hall Drewry, Resolute and other vessels. He married 
 was ordered to take them back to Africa and de- the daughter of Com. Ingraham, the great grand- 
 liver them to the Liberian government. He then daughter of Henry Laurens, president of the 
 entered the Confederate service, for which he Revolutionary Congress, as well as of John Rut- 
 purchased and carried South from New York ledge. Governor, with power of dictator, of 
 the steamer Hunters He took this vessel into South Carolina, in the Revolution, and later 
 Charleston, March 18th, 1861, with the flag of Justice of the U. S. Supreme Court. He was 
 Georgia flying from her masthead. During the detached from the naval academy at his own 
 war Lieut. Hall aei-ved on and commanded vari- request Nov. 1864, and ordered to the iron-clad 
 ous vessels and at various stations. He was with Ckicora, at Charleston, S. C. Since the war 
 Com. Tatnall at the fall of Port Royal, in all the Lieut. Hall has served as major of engineers on 
 actions around Richmond, Charleston, and dur- the staff of the Khedive of Egypt, being selected 
 iug its siege, as well as in those around Savan- for that position by General W. T. Sherman, 
 nah and in its adjacent waters. He aided Tat- He is now (1887) a leading instructor in Balti- 
 nall to provision Fort Pulaski when that fort more. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 775 
 
 They were required to be not under fourteen or over eighteen 
 years of age, and on the roll were represented many of the 
 most distinguished families of the South. After passing a 
 physical examination and an examination on such elementary 
 studies as reading, writing, spelling and the four principles of 
 arithmetic, they became acting midshipmen and entered upon 
 their studies, which comprised six departments and twenty -two 
 branches. There were four annual courses and the midship- 
 men were arranged into four classes, each class pursuing one 
 of these courses. The studies of the fourth class embraced 
 practical seamanship, naval gunnery and artillery and infantry 
 tactics, arithmetic, algebra to equations of the first degree, 
 English grammar and descriptive geography; those of the third 
 class, practical seamanship, gunnery and artillery and infantry 
 tactics, algebra, geometry, plane and spherical trigonometry, 
 physical geography, history and the French language ; those 
 of the second class, seamanship and steam, gunnery and field 
 artillery, astronomy, navigation, application of algebra and 
 trigonometry to mensuration of planes and solids, political 
 science and French ; those of the first class, seamanship and 
 naval tactics, gunnery, infantry tactics, navigation, surveying, 
 French and Spanish. 
 
 The Academic Board held examinations in each June and 
 December, and the December examination was attended by a 
 board of visitors, composed of three captains and two com- 
 manders, who ascertained and decided upon the qualifications 
 of the midshipmen for promotion; and as rapidly as the latter 
 were deemed proficient they were ordered to ships, batteries 
 or other duty. But while the cadets of the U. S. Naval Acad- 
 emy were being trained far away from the scene of hostilities, 
 at Newport, R. I. , where it had been removed during the war, 
 those of the Confederate school received their professional ed- 
 ucation in the face of actual warfare, in which they were fre- 
 quently called from their studies to engage. The Patrick 
 Henry was usually stationed near Drewry's Bluff, the scene of 
 desperate fighting, and by the time they were sent to distant 
 service they were versed in the practice as well as the theory 
 of war. If the routine of a day was not broken by a sum- 
 mons to man the guns on shore, or do scouting, or take 
 part in boat expeditions, it was full of hard work on board. 
 The morning gun was fired at seven o'clock, and at eight a 
 breakfast of hard-tack and a decoction of sweet potatoes or 
 beans that masqueraded as coffee was served. Sick call, 
 studies and recitations occupied the hours until two o'clock, 
 and then came a dinner of salt -junk, perhaps a mess of 
 vegetables, and the inevitable corn-meal that became a sta- 
 ple article of diet when wheat-flour climbed toward $1,300 
 per barrel in Confederate currency. School exercises and 
 ■dress parade took up the remainder of the afternoon, and 
 the day ended with tattoo at 9:30, and taps at ten o'clock. 
 
776 THE Confederate states navy. 
 
 Near the close of the war, when it became necessary to have' 
 the boys on shore pretty much all the time to stand to the 
 guns, they occupied huts in the Drewry's Bluff batteries. It 
 was a truly unique education for them — school-boys one hour 
 and fighting men the next, dropping their books to take up- 
 their carbines and cutlasses, exchanging in a moment their 
 studies for places in the trenches a few hundred yards distant- 
 from those of the enemy — and amidst the stern and awful re- 
 alities of the final struggle around Richmond they retained 
 the happy, hearty, healthy spirit of brave boys and combined. 
 it with the courage and understanding of men. Such a train- 
 ing nourished and strengthened their finest qualities, and it i& 
 not remarkable that so many of them have since risen to posi- 
 tions of great honor and trust, and exemplified the virtues 
 and worthy ambitions of civil life. 
 
 The school had been in existence scarcely a year before 
 their mettle was tested and approved. This was in May, 1864, 
 when Gen. Butler landed his army at Bermuda Hundreds and 
 there were but 3,000 Confederates between the Appomattox 
 River and Richmond. Com. J. K. Mitchell, commanding the 
 James River squadron, threw his men into the fortifications^ 
 while the midshipmen were placed in the iron-clads, Lieut. 
 Parker taking one detachment to the Fredericksburg, and 
 Lieuts. Hall and Johnson another to the Virginia. The Hew- 
 lett House battery became the left fiank of Lee's army on the 
 James, and was itself defended by the ships. In the succeed- 
 ing engagements with the enemy's gunboats and monitors, 
 around the Hewlett House and Drewry's Bluff, the midshipmen 
 were landed under the command of Lieut. W. B. Hall, and 
 took part in several interesting skirmishes with the Federal 
 sharp-shooters. During all the summer of 1864, the young 
 academicians had more fighting than studying to do. Lieut. 
 Billups was left in command of the Patrick Henry, and the 
 midshipmen who remained on board were mostly employed in 
 directing scouting parties, leading the boat expeditions, and 
 working in the batteries. A lull in the heavier fighting along 
 the river that occurred in September permitted the resumption 
 of exercises on the schoolship under Lieut. Hall, and a month 
 later Lieut. Parker was relieved of the command of the Fred- 
 ericksburg and returned to the Patrick Henry; which, when, 
 the midshipmen occasionally took up their quarters on shore, 
 was moored first at Wilton and then at Rockets, on the water 
 front of Richmond. 
 
 When the fall of Richmond became imminent, Secretary 
 Mallory determined to transfer the naval school to some^ 
 point in the interior of the Confederacy. Lieut. Graves was 
 sent into North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia to ex- 
 amine concerning localities and buildings, but could only re- 
 port that the movements of the enemy prevented the selection 
 of any site to which the institution could safely be removed.. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 777 
 
 The protection of the bridge over the James River at 
 Wilton was entrusted to the midshipmen in the Patrick Henry, 
 and although then a part of the line of battle the routine of the 
 academy was kept up with some approach to regularity. The 
 sixty young men and their ten officers made up an admirable, 
 well-drilled, disciplined and efficient corps. Lieut. Parker had 
 his orders . to prepare the ship for sinking in the obstructions 
 of the river if necessary, and he rented a warehouse at the 
 corner of Franklin and 34th Streets in Richmond for the home 
 of the midshipmen, and the location of stores. This was 
 done in March 1865, but there was so little suspicion afloat 
 that Richmond was so soon to be evacuated, that he spent the 
 night of April 1st in the city, and it was not until the after- 
 noon of April 3d that he received the order to have the corps 
 and its officers at the Danville depot at 6 o'clock p. m., and 
 report to the Quartermaster General of the army. He directed 
 Lieut. Rochelle to execute the order, while he would remain 
 by the ship, expecting the corps to return within a few days. 
 In an hour or two he found out that the abandonment of the 
 capital was intended, and then leaving Lieut. Billups and ten 
 men to burn the ship, he joined the corps at the Danville 
 depot. Billups and his squad performed their duty, but in 
 the subsequent movements never overtook their comrades. _ 
 
 No higher compliment could have been paid the mid- 
 shipmen, than the final duty entrusted to them. It was the 
 guardianship of the train which contained the archives of 
 the Confederate Government and the specie and bullion 
 funds of the treasury. The corps left Richmond on the 
 evening of April 2d, and proceeded to Danville in charge 
 of the treasure, where Midshipman Raphael Semmes, Jr. 
 was detailed to the' staff of his father, the Admiral, and Mid- 
 shipman Breckenridge was made personal aide to his father, 
 the Secretary of War. From the 3d to the 9th the corps re- 
 mained at Danville, and then moved southward. Greensboro, 
 N. C., was reached on the 10th, and Charlotte on the 13th. 
 At Charlotte the money was transferred to the mint, but taken 
 out again when the escort started for Chester, S. C. At Ches- 
 ter the railroad was abandoned and a wagon train made up. 
 The gold was packed in small ^square boxes, and the silver in 
 kegs, and the road was taken for Newberry, S. C. Mrs. 
 Jefferson Davis and her child (now Miss Winnie Davis, the 
 "daughter of the Confederacy") had joined the escort at 
 Chester, and travelled in an ambulance to Newberry, where 
 they arrived on the 16th, and left on the cars the same day for 
 Abbeville, S. C. At Abbeville the treasure was transferred once 
 more to wagons, and on the 17th the midshipmen took up the 
 march for Washington, Ga., which was reached on the 19th, 
 and Augusta on the 20th. In all this toilsome, perilous, and 
 responsible march, Lieut. Parker was looking for President 
 Davis or some responsible officer of the Treasury Department 
 
778 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 to whom he could hand over his precious trust. Beside his 
 brave midshipmen, he had with him a company of good 
 men under Capt. Tabb, who had joined him at the Charlotte 
 naval station ; but this force was small in comparison with 
 the number of marauders he might at any time chance_ to 
 meet. The impoverished and ravaged country was swarming 
 with them — bummers, looters and deserters hanging on to the 
 rear of Sherman's army, half -starved Confederates rendered 
 desperate by suffering, roving bands of negroes, and all the 
 rabble that infested that war- swept region. They were to be 
 feared ; and moreover, great numbers of Federal cavalry were 
 riding on Sherman's flanks, and were on several occasions so 
 near to the treasure train that they might have swooped down 
 upon it. Its guards, as Parker knew and said, would have 
 died fighting around it ; but an attack by an overwhelming 
 force upon such a tempting prize as millions of gold and 
 silver was always possible ; and he was strongly urged to 
 divide the treasure among the men following him. But he 
 and the corps of midshipmen were inviolate in their sense of 
 duty, and when he placed the coin and bullion in the vaults 
 of a bank at Augusta, they were intact. He turned the 
 charge of the treasure over to a Treasury officer, whom he 
 found in that city, but the midshipmen continued to guard it. 
 They remained in Augusta during the armistice- between 
 Gens. Johnston and Sherman, Parker declining to obey an 
 order to disband the corps so long as they were responsible for 
 the safety of the treasure. On the termination of the armis- 
 tice they took the gold and silver out of the bank and returned 
 to Washington, Ga. , still searching for President Davis. Then 
 they struck off for Abbeville, where they arrived on April 
 29th. The treasure was stored in a warehouse, and President 
 Davis and his escort came into town the next day. Secretary 
 Mallory accompanied him, and by the Secretary's orders 
 Lieut. Parker turned the treasure over to the Acting Secretary 
 of the Confederate Treasury, who directed it to be delivered 
 to Gen. Basil Duke, who commanded the cavalry detachment 
 escorting Mr. Davis. Neither Lieut. Parker nor any of the 
 midshipmen or officers ever knew how much money there was 
 in the packages, which were not broken while in their charge. 
 The corps of cadet midshipmen was disbanded at Abbe- 
 ville on May 2d, 1865, though the orders did not so read, and 
 its members were never surrendered to the enemy or paroled. 
 The order issued to each man simply said : 
 
 "Abbeville, S. C, May 2d, 1865. 
 " Sib : You are hereby detached from the Naval School and leave is 
 
 f ranted you to visit your home. You will report by letter to the Hon. 
 ecretary of the Navy as soon as possible. Paymaster Wheliss will issue 
 you ten days' rations, and all quartermasters are requested to furnish you 
 transportation. 
 
 "Respectfully your obedient servant, 
 
 " Wm. H. Parker, Commanding. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 779 
 
 To have dismissed them so shabbily as indicated in the 
 above order would have been a shameful reward for their 
 faithful and arduous service, and at the intercession of Capt. 
 Parker and a committee of five cadets, Postmaster General 
 Eeagan obtained the sum of $1,500, which gave $40 in gold to 
 each midshipman, upon the receipt of which they started for 
 ■their respective homes in the distant States of the Confed- 
 eracy. The high esteem in which President Davis held the 
 corps of cadet midshipmen was manifested by him when in- 
 formed at Abbeville by Capt. Parker that the corps had been 
 disbanded by the order of Secretary Mallory. "Captain," he 
 said, "I am very sorry to hear it," and repeated the regret 
 several times. Upon being told that the corps had been dis- 
 banded on the peremptory order of the Secretary, the President 
 replied : " Captain, I have no fault to find with you, but I am 
 very sorry Mr. Mallory gave you the order." The very great 
 regret of the President was accounted for when his escort of 
 four skeleton brigades of cavalry were seen. Though there 
 were many in the command ready to follow and defend the 
 President, yet demoralization had entered there too. Arms 
 were being sold or thrown away, and it was apparent that but 
 little reliance could be placed upon that escort. Hence the 
 regret with which he learned that the young men, the sons of 
 the leaders of the cause, organized, educated and trained to 
 the discharge of duty, had been scattered, and could no longer 
 guard and protect him in his proposed journey to the trans- 
 Mississippi. 
 
 Though the Confederate Naval Academy produced no 
 record of its usefulness, yet the young men who were taught 
 upon the decks of the Patrick Henry learned valuable lessons 
 of self-reliance and duty, which in after life made them, 
 without an exception, earnest, thoughtful, law-abiding men. 
 Among those midshipmen we recall the names of Colonel 
 Morgan, after the war a captain in the Egyptian army and 
 subsequently consul general in Australia ; Windom K. Mayo, 
 commander of steamers and collector of customs at Nor- 
 folk, Va. ; Jeff. Davis Howell,' who lost his life in the brave 
 
 1 Jefferson Da-rts Howell was born at Natchez, had struct, when he was borne to his bed. I 
 
 Mississippi, in 1846. His father, William Burr would also recommend him to your notice." 
 
 HoweU, born in New Jersey, was appointed an At the close of the war in May, 1816, Lieut, 
 
 ensign and third lieutenant in the 15th Regiment Howell was retained in the artillery branch of 
 
 of the U. S. Inf , on August the 19th, 1813. He the service, but decUned the honor, aud soon 
 
 was promoted to second lieutenant in March, after resigned. He married Margaret Graham 
 
 1814, and served throughout the war of 1812- Kemp, native of Virginia. She was the daughter 
 
 U. While serving as an ofhcer of marines in of Col. Kemp, of Natchez, Miss., where Mr. 
 
 MoDonough's victory on Lake Champlain, on HoweU resided for many years; he afterwards 
 
 Tjoard the ship Saratoga, Lieut. HoweU greatly removed to New Orleans, where he was appomt- 
 
 dletinguished himself. Captain White Youngs, ed deputy surveyor of the port. He had eleven 
 
 of the 15th Inf. commanding a detachment of chUdren, Jefferson Davis HoweU being the 
 
 acting marines, in his report to Com. McDonough youngest. He was named after Hon. Jefferson 
 
 -thus mentions him : "Second Lieut. William Davis, who had married his sister on February 
 
 H. Howell, 16th Inf., in the U. S. ship Saratoga, 26th, 1845. . . . x. 
 
 rendered me every assistance; notwithstanding Jefferson Davis HoweU ™ educated at Bur- 
 
 liiB haviu" been confined tor ten days of a fever, lington, N. J., Washington, D. C, and Richmond, 
 
 vet atthecoramencementof the action, he was Va. He was of an active and adventurous 
 
 found on deck, and continued untU the enemy temperament, and hke most young men in the 
 
780 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 discharge of duty when the Pacific mail steamship which he 
 commanded was wrecked ; the Hon. C. K Breckenridge, at 
 present a member of the U. S. House of Representatives; 
 Colonel J. T. Scharf, the author of this work, land commis- 
 sioner of Maryland, commissioner of the IJTational Exposition 
 
 Soutb, shared in the excitement just preceding 
 the outbreak of the war between the States. He 
 was well versed in the political history of the 
 time, and his convictions as well as his sympa- 
 thies induced him to espouse the cause of the 
 Southern States. Though but sixteen years of 
 age he entered a military organization in New 
 Orleans, and after faithfully servingin the army, 
 on February 24th, 1863, he received an appoint- 
 ment as midshipmau in the navy of the Con- 
 federate States, and was ordered on board the 
 fichoolship Patrick Henry, then lying at Drewry's 
 Bluff, James River, to stand an examination. 
 Letters of recommendation being required from 
 his previous commanders, they were obtained. 
 All of these spokein the highest terms of praise 
 of his gallant and meritorious conduct in the 
 military service, his uniform good behavior and 
 the promptness and faithfulness with, which he 
 discharged all the duties required of him in 
 cauip and elsewhere. After passing his examin- 
 ation. Midshipman Howell was ordered to 
 Charleston, S. C, where he performed hard ser- 
 vice during the winter of 1863-64, in picket-boat 
 duty, between Fort Sumter and Morris Island. 
 "While engaged in this arduous and exposed ser- 
 vice, he captured an armed picket-boat of the 
 enemy engaged in the same duties ; assisted in 
 laying a number of torpedoes in Charleston 
 harbor, and aided in placing a raft of lege around 
 Fort Sumter to prevent anotber assault. After 
 the evacuation of < harleston in 1865, Midship- 
 man Howell was assigned to the artillery with 
 the rank of lieutenant in the naval brigade of 
 Adm. Semmes, formerly the commander of the 
 C. S. steamer Alabama. He was captured, par- 
 roled, and joined his sister, Mrs. Jefferson Davis, 
 at Washington, Ga., and was with her at the 
 time of the capture of President Davis. He waa 
 imprisoned at Fort McHenry for several months, 
 and upon being released weut to Savannah, 
 Ga., where he was again imprisoned. From 
 thence he joined his brother in Canada, and 
 accompanied him to England. Returning to the 
 United States by way of Portland, Me., he was 
 again arrested and sent to Fort "Warren, where 
 he was detained for a few weeks and then finally 
 released. He returned to Canada, and from 
 thence went to New York to find himself with- 
 out means or employment. Scorning to live on 
 his friends, he went to sea before the mast, and 
 made seve al voyages to Bordeaux, the Cape de 
 Verde Islands, and elsewhere in the Atlantic. 
 His devotion to duty and his thorough com- 
 petency were soon recognized, and he speedily 
 rose to thpi rank of mate. "While serving in this 
 capacity, in some evolution of the ship he 
 was so injured as to compel liim to remain 
 ashore for sevei-al months. He then accepted a 
 position upon the staff of the New York News. 
 Tiring of an inactive life ashore, he obtained a 
 berth on board the Paciflo mail steamer Ariel as 
 quartermaster, and sailed from New York in the 
 fall of 1869, for China ; thence he returned to 
 San Francisco. During his brief residence in 
 that city, he served asflrstofflcer on the steamers 
 John L. Stephens, Ajax and Orijlamme. Speedily 
 rising in rank, his first command was the 
 Idaho, and thereafter was given charge success 
 Ively of the steamers Moses Taylor, Pelicai\, Cali- 
 
 foi-nia, Nevada, Los Angelos, and lastly the ill- 
 fated Pacific. 
 
 On February 23d, 1874, Capt. Howell was a. 
 passenger on board of the Los Angelos; on her 
 voyage from San Fi'ancisco to Victoria the 
 steamer broke her propeller shaft, the helm, 
 refused to do its duty, and no human agency 
 could be brought to dispel the discouraging- 
 forebodings which pressed upon the 160 pass* 
 engers, and officers and crew who were on board. 
 Tossed about by the waves without a sign of 
 release from their agonizing situation, and drift- 
 ing towards the dreaded breakers, all hands 
 were in despair. At this critical moment Capt. 
 Howell volunteered to take his chances of life 
 or death in his effort to make the land and reach 
 Astoria, where it was known aid would he 
 rendered immediately. With a boat's crew he 
 bravely pushed through the raging sea and 
 landed on the beach above Tillamook, walked to- 
 Astoria, obtained a tug which came to the rescue 
 of the disabled vessel and towed her into port. 
 The passengers on the Los Angelos, mindful of 
 the great service they owed to Capt. Howell, for 
 the heroism he displayed in saving their hves, 
 tendered him the f oUowing complimentary reso- 
 lutions : 
 
 " "Whereas, Capt. Jefferson D. Howell, by noble 
 deeds of daring succeeded in reaching Astoria, 
 after we had supposed he had lost his own hfe in 
 the vain endeavor to save us f-rom a terrible 
 death, therefore : 
 
 Resolved — That we return our thanks to the 
 Giver of all good for sparing the life of our noble 
 benefactor, thus enabling him to reach a haven 
 wherein succoy to ourselves was speedily ren- 
 dered. 
 
 Besolved-^Thtit the action of Capt. Howell in 
 this matter entitles him to our most sincere grat- 
 itude, and that we hereby pledge and express to- 
 him that thankfulness of human hearts which is 
 more precious than gold, more enduring than 
 diamonds, in the tender regard which we bear 
 for him, and shall ever hold towards him. so 
 long as memory shall dwell within its sacred, 
 tabernacle." 
 
 Talented, brave and true, and whether serv- 
 ing before the mast or in command of a crowded 
 steamship, always the same courteous and chiv- 
 alric gentleman, Capt. HoweU was beloved by 
 all who came in contact with him. No man was 
 ever more ready to take up the cause of the de- 
 fenceless than he, and bis friends can recall 
 many instances of the liberality with which he 
 disposed of his hard-earned salary in acts of 
 generosity. In the course of conversation on 
 his last voyage from Victoria, he gave an ac- 
 count of how he became a communicant of 
 the Episcopal Church. It seems, as he parted 
 from his mother for along voyage, he promised 
 to be confirmed the first opportunity. Ere the 
 opportunity occurred she was in her grave, but 
 he was not the man to forget his vow. He was 
 confirmed by Bishop Potter, in New York. 
 "While relating the circumstance, he said, with 
 honest pride: "Since my confirmation I have 
 never done anything that conflicted with those 
 solemn vows ;" and all who know him will bear 
 testimony that such was the life of this Chris- 
 tian gentleman. His was an Anglo-Saxon fac& 
 
MIDSHIPMAN JEFFERSON DAVIS HOWELL. C. S. N. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 781 
 
 at New Orleans; William P. Hamilton/ of South Carolina, 
 and R. H. Fleming, a Presbyterian clergyman of prominence 
 in Virginia. F. C. Morehead, late commissioner general of 
 the New Orleans Exposition and president of the National 
 Cotton and Planters' Association, was another of the young 
 middies of the Patrick Henry, as well as Clarence Cary, a 
 lawyer of high standing in New York and a gentleman of fine 
 literary attainments ; the Rev. J. G. Minnegerode, J. De B. 
 Northrop, Preston B. Moore, William A. Lee, nephew of Gen- 
 eral R. E. Lee ; John H. Inglis, a son of the late Judge Inglis, 
 president of the South Carolina Secession Convention of 1860, 
 and many others of equal distinction. 
 
 -of the highest type, with high brow, fair hair, 
 and laughing blue eyes. He combined the 
 tenderness of a woman with the courage of a 
 man. His httle room was hung about with the 
 portraits of his friends, and in the centre was an 
 ivory miniature of his dead mother, whom he 
 adored. 
 
 The last act of Capt. Howell was worthy of 
 his life. The steamer Pacific was foundered in 
 -a gale off Cape Flattery, near Victoria. The 
 survivors of the wreck report that Capt. Howell 
 was drowned from a raft on which some of the 
 unfortunate passengers and crew had taken ref- 
 uge, and that he was the last man to leave the 
 ship. A writer giving an account of the diaas- 
 ^r, says : *' When one of the occupants of the 
 raft, a woman, was swept away, what did Howell 
 do, though the sea was ninning mountain high, 
 -and experienced sailor as he was, he knew that 
 once from his support he was lost forever ? He 
 acted as evei?y one was sure he would act, and 
 at the cry of a perishing woman, plunged in to 
 "her assistance, sacrificing his own life in the 
 same locality where, seven short months before, 
 'by another act of heroism he saved the lives 
 of 150 persons aboard the steamer Los Angelos, 
 which would have gone ashore among the 
 breakers, had he not volunteered his successful 
 a.s8istance." 
 
 1 Capt. Wm. P. Hamilton, son of Col. Paul 
 Hamilton, and Catherine A. Campbell, was bom 
 in Beaufort, 8. C, Oct. 11th, 1846, and died May 
 ■3, 1875. He was a great-grandson of Hon. Paul 
 Hamilton, who was secretary of the navy under 
 President Madison, and great-nephew of Archi- 
 Taald Hamilton, U. S. N., who served under 
 Decatur. In Aug. 1861, William P. Hamilton 
 received an appointment as midshipman in 
 the C. 8. navy, and served on the Lady Davis, 
 under laeut. Com. John Butledge, at Port 
 Boyal. He was subsequently stationed on the 
 .steamer Nashville, until the summer of 1862, 
 
 when he was ordered to Richmond to stand 
 his examination on the Patrick Henry. He grad- 
 uated as passed midshipman, and was ordered 
 to tbe Palmetto State, at Charleston. He partici- 
 pated in the attack on the XT. 8. steamer Mer- 
 cedita, and the Federal blockading fleet, and 
 served in the navy with distinguished gallantry 
 in the defence of Charleston. In April, 1864, he 
 was ordered to the t&io. Albemarle, at Plymouth, 
 N. C, and took a conspicuous part in the fight 
 with the Federal gunboats at that place. He 
 returned to Charleston, and served there 
 until the close of the war. After the war he 
 worked his passage to England, on the bark 
 Nvtjield. During the voyage the crew were 
 stricken down with the yellow fever, and his 
 cousin, ex-midshipman P. Hamilton Gibbs, died. 
 There were not sufficient hands on board to man 
 the vessel, and the helm was lashed and the 
 bark allowed to run before the wind, until 
 some of the sick were convalescent She 
 finally arrived at Liverpool, when W. P. Ham- 
 ilton shipped as a seaman on the West Indian, 
 in the South American trade. Upon his return 
 he passed an exanaination, and received a cer- 
 tificate as second mate in the British merchant 
 service. He first served on the John Eraser d: 
 Co., and subsequently wag appointed mate of 
 the Royal George. After each trip from Liv- 
 erpool to the East Indies, he was promoted, 
 until he became master of the ship. In 1872 
 he returned to Charleston, where he married. 
 Finding that his wife could' not endure the 
 long voyages to Bombay and Calcutta, he left 
 the Indian service after a year, and went 
 to the Mediterranean. The following year he 
 commanded the Clyde steamer Atlas, running 
 between New York and the West Indies, but 
 the rapid changes of climate impaired his 
 health, and Jan. 1875 he came home to die. 
 Capt. Hamilton was a gallant, amiable, cour- 
 teous and model officer, and his career proved 
 him to be a model man. 
 
CHAPTER XXVI. 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES CRUISERS. 
 
 IN many respects the most interesting chapter of the history 
 of the Confederate navy is that of the building and opera- 
 tion of the ships-of-war which drove the merchant fiag of 
 the United States from the oceans and almost extirpated 
 their carrying trade. But the limitations of space of this vol- 
 ume forbid more than a brief review of the subject. The func- 
 tion of commerce-destroyers is now so well admitted as an attri- 
 bute of war between recognized belligerents by all the nations of 
 the world, that no apology is necessary for the manner in which 
 the South conducted hostilities upon the high seas against her 
 enemy, and while the Federal officials and organs styled the 
 cruisers " pirates" and their commanders " buccaneers," such 
 stigmatization has long since been swept away along with 
 other rubbish of the war between the States, and their legal 
 status fully and honorably established. We have not the space 
 for quotations from Prof. Soley, Prof. BoUes and other writers 
 upon this point, but what they have said may be summed up 
 in the statement that the government and agents of the Con- 
 f edei-acy transgressed no principle of right in this matter, and 
 that if the United States were at war to-day they would strike 
 at the commerce of an enemy in as nearly the same manner 
 as circumstances would permit. The justification of the Con- 
 federate authorities is not in the slightest degree affected by 
 the fact that the Geneva Tribunal directed Great Britain to 
 pay to the Federal government $15,600,000 in satisfaction for 
 ships destroyed by cruisers constructed in British ports. 
 
 Eleven Confederate cruisers figured in the "Alabama 
 Claims" settlement between the United States and Great 
 Britain. They were the Alabama, Shenandoah, Florida, Tal- 
 lahassee, Georgia, Chickamauga, Nashville, Retribution, Sum- 
 ter, Sallie and Boston. The actual losses inflicted by the Ala- 
 bama ($6,547,609) were only about $60,000 greater than those 
 charged to the Shenandoah. The sum total of the claims filed 
 against the eleven cruisers for ships and cargoes was $17,900,633, 
 
 (782) 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 783 
 
 all but about $4,000,000 being caused by the Alabama and Shen- 
 andoah. The tribunal decided that Great Britain was in no 
 way responsible for the losses inflicted by any cruisers but the 
 Alabama, Florida and Shenandoah. It disallowed all the 
 claims of the United States for indirect or consequential losses, 
 which included the approximate extinction of American com- 
 merce by the capture of ships or their transfer to foreign flags. 
 What this amounted to is shown in the "Case of the United 
 States " presented to the Tribunal. In this it is stated that 
 while in 1860 two-thirds of the commerce of New York was 
 carried on in American bottoms, in 1863 three-fourths was car- 
 ried on in foreign bottoms. The transfer of American vessels 
 to the British flag to avoid capture is stated thus: In 1861, 
 vessels 126, tonnage 71,673; in 1862, vessels 135, tonnage 64,578; 
 in 1863, vessels 348, tonnage 252,579; in 1864, vessels 106, ton- 
 nage 92,052. Commanders of the Confederate cruisers have 
 avowed that the destruction of private property and diversion 
 of legitimate commerce in the performance of their duty was 
 painful in the extreme to them; but in their wars the United 
 States had always practiced this mode of harassing an enemy 
 and had, indeed, been the most conspicuous exemplars of it 
 that the world ever saw. 
 
 The cruisers built or purchased in England for the Confeder- 
 ate navy, were the Florida, Alabama, Shenandoah and Rappa- 
 hannock. The latter never made a cruise, and the others were 
 procured for the government by James D. Bulloch, ' naval 
 agent, in the manner hereinafter stated in the sketches of 
 those vessels. He also had constructed in France the armored 
 ram Stonewall, whose history is told in succeeding pages. His 
 instructions from the administration of President Davis were 
 to avoid breaches of the neutrality laws of foreign Powers. 
 He was most careful to adhere to this precept, and the com- 
 plications which occurred were due, not to his infraction of 
 
 1 Capt. James D. Bulloch was born in Georgia war, being transferred to several different ships 
 
 and entered the U. S. navy as midshipman, at as the necessities of the service required He 
 
 an early age, in the vear 1839, and was ordered was acting master of the schooner Shark at the 
 
 lit once to join the frigate Jlnited States, at time of her cruise to the Columbia Elver and 
 
 Boston, and cruised in that ship on the coast, to was in her when she was wrecked on the shoals 
 
 NewYorkandtoNorfolk,Va.,andwastheretrans- nff the mouth of thatriver. He returned to the 
 
 terred with all the officers and crew to the frigate U. S. in the Lexington m June, 1849, and after 
 
 Potomac. He proceeded in the PoUrmac to the three months leave was ordered for duty on the 
 
 Brazil station and served in her and the sloop- coast survey, and was actively employed for 
 
 of-war Decatur until 1842, when at his own re- more than two years. 
 
 quest he was ordered to the line of battle ship When Congress subsidized the Law Ime of 
 Delaware, a day or two before the Decatur steamers for the mail route to Cahtornia it was 
 sailed for the U. S , on the termination of her made a condition that the ships should be corn- 
 cruise. He served during the famous cruise of manded by naval officers. Under that condition 
 the Delaware in the Mediterranean Sea under he was ordered as first officer of the U. S. mail 
 the late Com Charles Morris, and returned to the steamer Georgia, commanded by Lieut, (now 
 U. S. in her in March, 1844. After a short leave Admiral) D. D. Porter, and succeeded Porter in 
 of absence he was ordered to the 120-gun ship the command of that vessel. Shortly after this 
 Pennsvlvania at Norfolk, and in Aug., 1844, a company was formed m New York to run a 
 was sent to the naval school, which was then line of mail steamers to and from Cuba, New 
 in Philadelphia. He passed No. 2 of his class in York and New Orleans. Bulloch was given a 
 June 1845 and was ordered direct from the special furlough by the Secretary of the Navy 
 naval school to the supply ship Erie, at New to command a steamer m that service, and 
 York. He proceeded in that ship to the Pacific commanded m succession the B/ocfc Wamor, 
 station and served in the squadron on the coast Cahawlia. De Soto and SiemmHe. He resigned 
 of California during the whole of the Mexican his commission as heutenant in the U. S. navy 
 
784 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 their regulations, but to the shifting policy of the British and 
 French governments. When he began to procure men-of-war 
 in England, he was sustained by the opinion of counsel that 
 he acted within the bounds of the law if they were iiot sent 
 out armed and equipped, and this position was sustained by 
 the decision of her Majesty's Court of Exchequer m the Alex- 
 ■andra case; which, in brief, was, that the subjects of a neutral 
 power had as much right to sell to a belligerent ships as they 
 had to sell any other munitions or implements of warfare. This 
 was the only decision ever made during the war by a British 
 <;ourt, upon the subject, and it justified the proceedings of 
 Capt. Bulloch, although it was practically overruled by the 
 detention of Confederate ships by order of the government. 
 
 Bulloch, however, was successful in getting all his vessels 
 to sea, except the Laird rams, whose history may be related in 
 advance of that of the cruisers. He contracted in March, 1862, 
 with Messrs. Laird, of Birkenhead, for two iron-clad, double 
 turret rams, each to cost £93,750, exclusive of magazines 
 and battery. They were to be plated with from 4i to 5i 
 inches of armor, and carry in each turret two 9-inch rifled 
 guns. With them it was expected to break the blockade of 
 the Southern ports, and lay some of the Northern cities under 
 ransom. In January, 1863, when they were more than half 
 completed, intimation was made by Lord Russell, British 
 Foreign Secretary, that he was aware of their destination, 
 although Bulloch had contracted for them in his own name, 
 and as a private individual, and that they would not be per- 
 mitted to go to sea unless he was satisfied that they were the 
 property of a government not at war. Bulloch then nego- 
 tiated with the Messrs. Bravay, bankers, of Paris, to pur- 
 chase the vessels, under the pretence that they were intended 
 for the Khedive of Egypt, and transfer them at sea to agents 
 ■of the Confederacy. As the Bravays had about that time re- 
 ceived an order from the Khedive to buy iron-clads, the 
 arrangement seemed plausible enough ; but Earl Russell — 
 prompted by Mr. Adams, the American Minister — insisted 
 that the transaction was not what it appeared to be. The 
 
 ■while in command of tbe last named Bhip, the Secretary of the C. S. navy and were given 
 at the breaking out of the war between the as the reasons for his selection. His original 
 States. He offered liis sei-vices to the Confederate acceptance of duty in England was made con- 
 government at Montgomery, and was appointed ditional upon being ordered to command one of 
 to special service in Europe, being taken into the the first cruisera built, but his services as the 
 C 8. navy with the rank of commander. His agent of the navy there were ao important that 
 duties in Europe are recorded in the work, en- Secretary Mallory refused to permit Mm to go 
 titled "The Secret Service of the Confederate to sea, insisting that no other individual could 
 States in Europe." During his career in the U.S. he intrusted with the work' which he was per- 
 uavy he performed an unusual amount of forming in Europe. In 1863 Capt. Bulloch urged 
 active sea service, having been only fourteen upon Mr. Mallory his right to command one of 
 months unattached during the first twelve years, the Birkenhead rams, and while the Secretary 
 and he had the somewhat remarkable fortune to acceded to his request he agaiu pressed him to 
 serve in every class of war veesel from a schooner consider the confusion which must follow his 
 of ten guns to the ship-of-the-line of eighty and removal from the special agency of the Depart- 
 over, and while in the mail service superintended ment and requested him to sacrifice personal 
 the construction of two of the ships commanded ambition for the good of the country. These 
 by him. considerations prevailed with Oapt. Bulloch, 
 These varied experiences were tliought to fit who remained in Europe, and is now (1887} still 
 liim for the special duties assigned to him by a resident of Liverpool. 
 
^ 
 I 
 
 o 
 
 i5 
 O 
 P5 
 
 1-4 
 
 O 
 
 izi 
 O 
 O 
 
 M 
 
 » 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 785 
 
 Emperor Napoleon was appealed to by the Messrs. Bravay, 
 to intervene and request the release of the rams as the 
 property of subjects of France, but he refused to take any 
 steps. On Oct. 9th, 1S63, the vessels were seized by the 
 British authorities, and suit was instituted for their forfeit- 
 ure. The case, however, was never pushed, and the rams 
 were sold to the British Admiralty, and enrolled in the navy 
 as the Scorpion and the Wivern, The Admiralty paid for them 
 £3Q,000 in excess of the contract price; and while the loss of 
 such formidable ships was a severe disappointment to the Con- 
 federate government, the money was much needed at the time, 
 and was beneficially applied to other purposes of the navy. 
 
 The Sumter. — In April, 1861, at the instance of Com. 
 Kaphael Semmes, ' chief of the C. S. Light-house Bureau, Sec- 
 retary Mallory directed the Naval Board at New Orleans to 
 purchase the screw steamer Habanaj the name was changed 
 to the Sumter, and on the 18th of the month Com. Semmes was 
 ■ordered to the command of the vessel, with the following officers : 
 Lieuts. John M. Kell, R. T. Chapman, John M. Stribling and 
 Wm. E. Evans; Paymaster Henry Myers; Surgeon Francis L. 
 
 1 Raphael Semmes, a most famous commander 
 in th,e Confederate navy, was bom in Charles 
 County, Md., Sept. 27th, 1809, and was descended 
 from one of the Catholic families who came 
 from England iu the second quarter of the seven- 
 :teenth century under the auspices of the Lords 
 Baltimore aud assisted in the establishment of 
 Teligious liberty on the shores of the Western 
 Continent. President John Quincy Adams ap- 
 pointed him a midshipman in the U. S. navy in 
 1826, but he did not enter upon active service 
 until 1832, the intermediate yeai-s being spent in 
 naval study at Norfolk, and.during his furloughs, 
 in reading law with his brother. Samuel M. 
 Semmes, at Cumberland, Md., a practicing at- 
 torney iu that city. Hie tastes for literature and 
 the law were almost as strong as for the sea 
 and at the outset of his career it seems to have 
 been a question with him whether to continue 
 in the navy or devote himself to the peaceful 
 life of a counsellor and author. He had to mate 
 hia decision in 1821, when, after returning from, 
 bis first cruise he was admitted to the bar, and 
 it was to remain a seaman. In 1837 he was pro- 
 moted to be a lieutenant, and in 1842 removed 
 his home to Alabama. At titie beginning of the 
 war with Mexico he was made flag-lieutenant 
 under Com. Conner, commanding the squadron 
 in the Gulf, and in the siege of Vera Cruz he 
 commanded one of the naval batteries on shore. 
 He was in command of the U. S. brig Somers on 
 the blockade of the Mexican coast when, in 
 chasing a suspicious vessel, the brig was knocked 
 down by a gale of wind and most of her crew 
 were drowned. Lieut. Semmes was rescued, 
 and after the declaration of peace he served for 
 several years as inspector of light-houses on the 
 Gulf coast. In 1855 he was promoted to the 
 rank of commander, and in 1858 was assigned to 
 •duty as_ secretary of the light-house board at 
 "Washington. In his intervals of leisure he 
 wrote " Service Afloat and Ashore during the 
 Mexican War," a spirited and valuable contribu- 
 tion to the history of that conflict. Upon the 
 aecession of Alabama, Feb. 15th, 1861, he re- 
 signed his commission in the V. 8. navy and re- 
 3)orted to Mr. Davis at Montgomery, who in- 
 50 
 
 Btructed him to return North and endeavor to 
 procure mechanics skilled in the manufacture 
 and use of ordnance and rifle machinery, the 
 preparation of fixed ammunition and of percus- 
 sion caps. He was also to buy any war material 
 that he might be able to procure. Going North, 
 at Eichmond he inspected the Virginia State 
 arsenal and the Tredegar Iron Works with a 
 view to their future use for casting cannon, 
 shotand shell; and was in Washington on March 
 4:th, where he witnessed the preparations for the 
 inauguration of President Lincoln. At Washing- 
 ton ne examined the machinery of the arsenal and 
 conferred with mechanics whom he desired to in- 
 duce to go South. Within the next three weeks he 
 made a tour through the principal work-shops 
 of New York, Conn, and Mass. and found that 
 Northern manufacturers were ready to sell him 
 anything in the line of weapons and ammuni- 
 tion that the South asked for. He purchased 
 large quantities of percussion caps in New York, 
 which were sent to Montgomery without any 
 disguise, and made contracts for batteries of 
 light artillery, powder and other munitions of 
 war, and succeeded in getting thousands of 
 pounds of powder shipped to the South. One of 
 his contracts was for the removal to the Southern 
 States of a complete set of machinery for rifling 
 cannon, with the requisite skilled workmen to 
 put it in operation. Adm. Semmes always re- 
 fused to betray the names of the thrifty Northern 
 merchants who entered into these bargains and 
 dined him at their residences. "It would be a 
 quasi breach of honor," he wrote, '* to disclose 
 their names, as they dealt with me pretty much 
 a^ conspirators against their government are 
 wont to deal with the enemies of their govern- 
 ment—secretly and with an implied confidence 
 that I would keep their secret." It was safe 
 with him even after they took the pay of the 
 Federal government with as much avidity as 
 they had displayed in accepting the money of 
 the South. While in New York he received a 
 letter from Secretary Mallory, dated from Mont- 
 gomery, March 13th, requesting him to investi- 
 gate the possibilities of purchasing swift, light- 
 draft steamers for the Confederate naval service, 
 
786 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Gait; Midshipmen William A. Hicks, Richard F. Armstrong, 
 Albert G-. Hudg;ins, John F. Holden, • and Joseph D. Wilson. To 
 these before sailing were added the followin.s: : First Lieut, of 
 Marines B. K. Howell; Engineers Miles J. Freeman, Wm. P. 
 Brooks, Matthew O'Brien. Simeon W. Cmnmings; Boatswain 
 Benj. P. Mecaskey; GunnerT. C. Cuddy; Sailmaker W. P. Beau- 
 fort; Carpenter Wm. Robinson; Captain's Clerk W. Breedlove. 
 The S'Uinter was a ship of 437 tons register, 184 feet long, 
 30 feet beam, 12 feet depth of hold, barkentine rigged; -her 
 speed was from nine to ten knots an hour; she could carry 
 coal but for eight days' steaming, and was slow under sail 
 alone on account of her propeller dragging. On April 22d 
 Com. Semmes took charge of the ship, and occupied nearly 
 two months in fitting her out for service and mounting the 
 battery, which consisted of an 8-inch shell gun pivoted amid- 
 ships and four light o'3-pounders in broadside. A crew of com- 
 petent seamen was enlisted from the many merchant vessels 
 laid up at Xew Orleans, and on June 3d the ship was put in 
 commission as a vessel-of-war of the Confederate States. 
 
 but conld discover none siiitible for the pur- 
 pose. His mission in the North comijleted, be 
 rcLnrnert to Montgomery on April 4th to find 
 that he had been commissioned commander in 
 tlie navy of tlie Confederate Statt^a and placed in 
 char;_fe of the light-house bureau, which he re- 
 linquished within two weeks ti> go to New Or- 
 leans and fit the Sumter out fur sea. After the 
 blockade of that ship at Gibralter by two U. S. 
 men-of-war and hia sale of her, he went to Eng- 
 liind and thence to the Azores, whex-e he took 
 eoniniJind of the Alabama, havin;,' in the mean- 
 time been promoted to the rank of laptain. His 
 career m that ship is elsewhere debi-iibedin this 
 hittury. Upon her loss in the battle with the 
 Kearsarge he returned to Enplaiid.and in London 
 was presented by officers of the British army 
 and navy with a supei'b sword ti> replace that 
 wliich life bad ca.st into the sea frnm the deck of 
 bis sinking ship. The invitations to subscrip- 
 tions were issued from the. Junior United Ser- 
 vice Club, and were addressed to " tientlemen 
 wishing to participate in this testimonial to un- 
 flinching laatriotism and naval daring " Admi- 
 ral Anson and Capt. Bedford Pim of the British 
 navy, were the chief movers in the affair. To 
 keep company with t le sword, a noble English 
 lady presented Capt. Senimes witli a large Con- 
 federate flag, wrought with her own hands from 
 tUe richest silk. On Oct. 3d, 1864, after a tour 
 upon the continent he sailed J'rom England for 
 HiiA'ana. from whence he reached Bagdad, a 
 Mexican i^ort on the Gulf, and paysingnp throujili 
 Ti.'xas and Louisiana, i-eacbed Shi'cvep'ut on 
 Nov 27th. Public ovations awaited him along 
 the route and he was everywhere lionized. 
 CroHsing the Mississippi in a small skiff, in 
 danger of capture from the Federal gunboats, he 
 arrived on the east bank, and after a short stay 
 at his home in Mobile, was appointed rear-aduii- 
 ral in the Provisional navy and ordered to tlie 
 coniinand of the James RiVf-r squadron, with 
 wliich he guarded the water approaches to Ricii- 
 mond, until the city was evacuated. At Greens- 
 boro". N. C. on May 1st, 18(35. he participated in 
 the capitulation of Gen Johnston's ariiiy, takiug 
 the precaution to sign himself in the articles of 
 parole as " rear admii-al, C S. N. and brigadier 
 general, C. S. A." — a wise foresight which proved 
 
 available when it was afterwards claimed that 
 he had deceived Gen. Hartsnff, wJio acted for 
 Gen. Sherman, and that Hartsuff was unaware 
 that he was extending parole to the commander 
 of the Alabama. Dispersing his men, Adm. 
 Semmes went to his Mobile home and opened 
 an office for the practice of law. There, on 
 Dec. 15th, 1865, he was arrested by a squad of 
 U. 8. marines in pursiiance of an order of Secre- 
 tary Welles, and was imprisoned, first in the 
 navy-yai-d and then in the marine corps barracks 
 at Washington. His seizure was in obedience to 
 the Northern cry for the visitation of the death 
 punishment upon " the pirate," and the pretext 
 was, as stated by Mr. Speed, Attorney General 
 of the United States, his liabiliry to trial as a 
 traitor, which he had evaded by his escape after 
 the destruction of the Alabama. From his prison 
 he wrote to President Johnson a letter claiming' 
 immunity for all past deeds under the militai-y 
 convention to which he w;is a party at Greens- 
 boro' and the siibsequent quarrel between Mr. 
 Johnson and the Republican majority of Con- 
 gress interrupted any proL-eedings looking to his 
 trial. He was released under tbe third of the 
 President's amnesty proclamations, after four 
 months of confinement, and, in May, 1866, was 
 elected judge of the Probate Court of Mobile 
 County, but an order from President Johnson 
 forbade bim to exercise the functions of the 
 office. He then became the editor of a daily 
 newspaper in Mobile, which he gave up to ac- 
 cept a lu'ofessorial chair in the La. Military In- 
 stitute. For a short time euhsequently he was 
 engaged in journalism, but returned to Mobile 
 and tbe practice of law, in which he was occu- 
 pied to the date of his de-ith, Aug. 30ih, 1877. 
 Besides tbe narrative of the war with Mexico he 
 published, in 1852, -'Tlie Campaign of General 
 Scott in the Valley of Mexico ;" in lh(;4. "The 
 Cruise of tbe Alabama and Su7n(er," and in 
 1869, "Memoirs of Service Afloat during the 
 War between tbe Slates." 
 
 1 Midshipman Holden was drowned in the 
 Mississippi River, May 18th. 1861, by the swamp- 
 ing of a boat in which he was carrying out an 
 anchor frnin the receiving ship Three of the 
 seamen of tbe Sumter lost their lives at the aam& 
 time. Mr. Holden was from Louisburg, Tenu. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 787 
 
 Com. Semmes' instructions from Secretary Mallorj'- were 
 " to do the enemy's commerce the greatest injury in the shortest 
 time," and on June 30th he started to go to sea, choosing Pass 
 k I'Outre for his exit from the Mississippi into the Gulf of 
 Mexico, as the sloop-of-war Brooklyn, the fastest of the Fed- 
 eral blockading vessels on the station, had gone a few miles 
 off to overhaul a strange sail. The Sumter was well through 
 the pass before she was detected by the Brooklyn, which im- 
 mediately gave chase, and on account of the ' ' foaming " of 
 her boilers the Sumter was at one time in so much danger of 
 being captured that her commander prepared to throw over- 
 board his military chest and public papers. This trouble was 
 soon obviated, however, and with increased speed she drew 
 away from the enemy, who abandoned the pursuit about four 
 o'clock in the afternoon. On July 3d, while running along the 
 
 CONFEDERATE STEAM CB0ISEK " SUMTER." 
 
 Cuban coast, the Sumter made her first capture, which proved 
 to be the bark Golden Socket, of Maine. Her crew were taken 
 off and the vessel burned. The next prizes were the brigan- 
 tines Cuba and Machias, laden with neutral cargoes; and 
 Semmes headed for Cienf ugos, Cuba, with them in tow, his in- 
 tention being to discover whether Spain would follow the ex- 
 ample of Great Britain and France by closing her ports to the 
 prizes of the belligerents. Being compelled to cast off the Cuba, 
 he ordered Midshipman Hudgins, who was in command of the 
 prize-crew, to follow him into port. They parted company, 
 and the crew of the Cuba overpowered the prize-crew, recap- 
 tured the vessel and took her into New York, where the Sum- 
 ter's men were first committed on a charge of piracy, but were 
 subsequently exchanged. 
 
 The Sumter took into Cienfugos six prizes, but was refused 
 permission to leave them there to await the decision of a Con- 
 federate Court of Admiralty, and they were subsequently re- 
 dehvered to their original owners. Semmes next cruised down 
 
788 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the Spanish Main, going as far south as Maranham, Brazil, 
 and then made sail for Martinique. He made a number of 
 prizes going southward, but in fifty-five days, between Maran- 
 ham and Martinique, he fell in with but two vessels bearing 
 the flag of the United States. The captures and burnings 
 which he had accomplished since leaving New Orleans were 
 fast driving the enemy's commerce from the ocean or forcing 
 the transfer of his bottoms to neutrals. On November 13th, 
 1861, the Sumter proceeded to St. Pierre to coal, but before the 
 work could be completed the U. S. gunboat Iroquois, Capt. 
 J. S. Palmer, arrived in the harbor. Several times during the 
 night the Iroquois steamed around the Sumter, as if desirous 
 of attacking, but fearful of doing so in the French waters of 
 Martinique, and Semmes beat to quarters and ran out his 
 guns. Capt. Palmer addressed to the Governor of Martinique 
 a protest against a vessel " engaged in pirating upon the com- 
 merce of the United States " being permitted to coal at the 
 port, and asked that she be directed " to leave the protection 
 of the French flag and the immunities of a French port." The 
 Governor replied that he would not refuse an anchorage to "a 
 vessel belonging to the States of the South " and tendered the 
 same hospitalities to the Iroquois ; but required the latter, if 
 she proposed to establish a blockade of the Confederate vessel 
 to go outside of the marine jurisdiction of France. The French 
 man-of-war Acheron came around from Port de France, and 
 Capt. Palmer was informed that if he remained in the harbor 
 he would not, under international law, be permitted to leave 
 until twenty-four hours after the departure of the Sumter. He 
 arranged with the captain of the American schooner Wind- 
 ward, moored in the harbor, to notify him by signals if she 
 sailed, and kept up a constant communication with the shore 
 by boats, in violation of the laws of nations, which required 
 that if he wished to communicate he must bring his ship to 
 anchor, when, of course, the twenty-four hour rule would attach. 
 After being blockaded nine days, Semmes determined to 
 attempt an escape to sea from the greatly superior enemy, and 
 selected the night of October 23d. At the sound of the eight 
 o'clock gun from the fort, the vessel steamed oflf. Semmes 
 was quite well aware that he was being watched from the 
 schooner Windward, and that she was to notify the Iroquois 
 by burning two lights if he went south and one light if he 
 went north. Consequently he steered south until the two lights 
 were shown and then halted under the shadow of the mountains, 
 which run abruptly to the sea. The Iroquois, in obedience 
 to the signals, went off southward at a furious pace, while the 
 Sumter doubled and stood to the northward. ' Capt. Palmer 
 had done his utmost to capture her, and because Semmes 
 had outwitted him some of the Northern newspapers bullied 
 the Secretary of the Navy into relieving him of his command. 
 
 1 " Memoirs of Service Afloat During the War Between the States." 
 

THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 789 
 
 Com. Semmes' intention now was to cross the Atlantic 
 and cruise in European waters. Off the island of Dominica, 
 on Nov. 2oth, he captured the ship Montmorenci, and ransomed 
 her on a bond for $20,000, payable to the President of the Con- 
 federate States, her cargo being coal shipped on English ac- 
 count. On the way across the ocean three prizes were taken. 
 
 On Jan. 4th, 1862, the Sumter anchored in the harbor of Ca- 
 diz, Spain, and the next day Semmes received a peremptory 
 order from the military governor to proceed' to sea within 
 twenty -four hours. To this he replied that it was the duty of 
 Spain to extend to his ship the same hospitality that she would 
 extend to the ships of the opposite belligerent; that his vessel 
 was crippled, and that he had forty-three prisoners on board, 
 whom he desired to hand over to the consul of the United 
 States. In pursuance of orders from Madrid the prisoners 
 were landed, and the Sumter was permitted to make at Car- 
 racca, eight miles east of Cadiz, barely such repairs as would 
 suffice to keep her afloat. On Jan. 17th, Semmes was served 
 with a peremptory order to depart within six hours, and as he 
 had not been permitted to coal, he had barely sufficient fuel 
 to take the ship to the British port of Gibraltar, whither he 
 decided to proceed. 
 
 Between Cadiz and Gibraltar the Sumter made two prizes, 
 and reached the latter port January 19th, 1862. On Feb. 3d, 
 Com. Semmes received funds from Mr. Mason, Confederate 
 envoy at London, but when he attempted to purchase coal he 
 found that the merchants had closed the market against him, 
 and an application for supplies from the government yard 
 was denied. Then he sent Paymaster Myers and Thomas J. 
 Tunstall, ex-U. S. consul at Gibraltar, to Cadiz, to buy a sup- 
 ply. The French steamer on which they took passage for 
 Cadiz made a stop at the Moorish town of Tangier, where 
 they were arrested by the local authorities on the requisition 
 of the U. S. consul. By the consul they were turned over to the 
 commander of the Federal naval forces at Algesiras, who 
 sent them to the United States in irons. 
 
 The Sumter was now blockaded at Gibraltar by the Federal 
 steamers Tuscarora, Kearsarge and Chippewa, and as she 
 could obtain no coal, Semmes decided, after consultation by 
 telegraph with Mr. Mason, to lay her up. All hands were 
 paid off ; the officers took passage for London, and the sail- 
 ors were discharged. Midshipman R. F. Armstrong and act- 
 ing master's mate J. T. Hester were left in charge of the 
 vessel with ten men; and about April 13th or 14th, Com. Semmes 
 started for London, from whence he sailed for the Confederacy, 
 but was overtaken at Nassau by orders to return to England 
 and take command of the Alabama. The Sumter's cruise had 
 lasted six months, during which time she had captured eight- 
 een vessels, of which eight were burned, and the remainder 
 were released or bonded, with the exception of one, that was 
 
700 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 recaptured. She was sold by auction at Gibraltar, in Dec. 
 1862, and was bought by a Liverpool merchant for $19,500, 
 battery and all, who changed her name to the Gibraltar. The 
 commander of the Federal steamer Chippewa avowed his 
 purpose to capture her if she ventured out of the harbor, but 
 did not risk attempting such an outrage upon the British flag, 
 which she now carried. In July, 1863, she ran the blockade 
 into Wilmington, N. C, and returned to Liverpool in Dec. 
 with a cargo o'f cotton. After the war the U. S. government 
 entered suit in the admiralty court, at London, for the recov- 
 ery of the ship as a prize, but the case was decided in favor 
 of her owners, and she was eventually lost in a gale in the 
 ISTorth Sea, not far from where the Alabama was sunk. 
 
 The Florida. — The first of the Confederate steam cruis- 
 ers built in England was constructed by William C. Miller & 
 Sons of Liverpool, under contract with Capt. J. D. Bulloch, 
 naval agent of the Confederate States, and bore the dock-yard 
 name of the Oreto. In March, 1862, she was ready to go to 
 sea, and English officers and crew were engaged to take her 
 out as an unarmed ship in order to avoid infringement of the 
 neutrality regulations. She sailed from Liverpool, March 23d, 
 having on board, as a passenger. Master John Lowe, C. S. N., 
 who was instructed to deliver the vessel at Nassau to Capt. 
 J. N. Maffitt. Her guns, equipments and stores were dis- 
 patched to the same port in the steamer Bahama. The Oreto 
 arrived at Nassau April 28th, and between that date and 
 Aug. 1st was twice seized by the British governor on the 
 complaint of the U. S. consul that she was intended for the 
 Confederate service, but the admiralty court could only decide 
 from the evidence submitted that she was properly docu- 
 mented as British property, and ordered her release. At Nas- 
 sau her armament was placed on a schooner, which the Oreto 
 met about Aug. 10th, at Green Cay, sixty miles distant. There 
 it was transferred to the steamer, which was regularly com- 
 missioned as a ship of v^ar, and the name changed to Florida. 
 Her battery embraced two 7-inch and four 6-inch Blakely 
 rifled guns. Maffitt had but eighteen men in all on board, in- 
 cluding Lieut. J. M. Stribling, Acting Master W. L. Bradford 
 and Midshipmen Bryan, Floyd and Sinclair. The yellow fever 
 broke out among them, and in five days the working force was 
 reduced to one fireman and four deck hands. The ship was 
 run into Cardenas, Cuba, in a desperate plight, and there 
 Capt. Maffitt was stricken with the disease. Before he re- 
 covered, the 'Florida was summoned to Havana by the cap- 
 tain general. She was still far from being fully equipped or 
 manned, and because of the stringency of the Spanish regula- 
 tions Maffitt determined to run into Mobile. On Sept. 4th, 
 1862, she was off the bar, and hoisting the British colors stood 
 toward the three blockading vessels. Deceived by her ensign 
 they allowed her to come up to them before ordering her to 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 791 
 
 stop. The only response was the substitution of the Confede- 
 rate for the British flag; the Florida received the broadside 
 ■of the Federal sloop-of-war Oneida within pistol range, and 
 for two hours the little ship was pelted by the enemy, until 
 she found shelter under the guns of Fort Morgan. Two shells 
 had passed through her, and her rigging was badly cut up, 
 -and one man was killed and seven wounded. Maffitt came 
 out of his sick berth to handle the ship, and during the whole 
 war there was no incident in which bravery and energy were 
 more brilliantly displayed. 
 
 The Florida was fully fitted out and manned at Mobile, 
 and on the night of Jan. "loth, 1863, made her escape to sea, 
 although the blockading fleet had been strengthened with 
 a view to her capture, and she was vainly pursued by one fast 
 gunboat, the R. B. Cuyler, Under steam and sail (her screw 
 could be lifted clear of the water, when it was intended that 
 she should go under sail alone) she outran the enemy. She 
 was now officered as follows: 
 
 Lieut. Commanding, James Newland Maffitt; Lieutenants, S. W. 
 Averett,! J. L. Hoole, C. W. Read, S. Gr. Stone; Midshipmen, R. S. 
 Ployd, G. D. Bryan, J. H. Dyke, Gr. T. Sinclair, and W. B. Sinclair;^ Chief 
 Endear, A. M. Spidell; Assistants, Chas. W. Quinn, Thos. A. Jackson, 
 JE. H. Brown ; Surgeon, Frederick Gfarrettson ; Paymaster, Lynch. 
 
 In a few days the Florida made the west end of Cuba, and 
 ■captured her first prize, a small brig, which was burned. Put- 
 ting into Havana, she remained 48 hours, taking in coal, and 
 on Jan. 25th arrived at Nassau, having taken two more prizes 
 in the meantime. Capt. Wilkes, commanding the U. S. " fly- 
 ing squadron " in the West Indies, was assiduously hunting 
 
 1 Samuel W. Averett, now one of the princi- doned and permission had been given to the 
 
 pals of Roanoke Female College, Danville, Va., men of the floating battery to save themselves 
 
 graduated from the U. S. naval academy in in any way they could, or to follow their com- 
 
 1859 and served on the aloop-of-war Wyoming mander in bis efforts to reach Gen. Mackall's 
 
 in the Pacific squadron until about April 1st, camp, sixteen Alabamians asked Lieut. Averett 
 
 1861, when he resigned in consequence of the to lead them to their comrades there, the others 
 
 call of Gov. Letcher, of Virginia, upon her sons preferring to attempt escape in small boats, two 
 
 in the army and navy to give in their allegiance or three together, down the river and by rafts 
 
 to their native State. Homeward bound by way across Reel Foot Lake, and many of them suc- 
 
 of Havana, he, with the late Gen. R. B. Garuett ceeded. Averett and the Alabamians reached 
 
 and Engineer Geo. D. Lining of the Wyoming, Mackall's camp, and were included in the eur- 
 
 took passage from that port in July on the render of April 8th, 1862. He was exchanged at 
 
 achooner Adelaide, and after evading a Federal Vicksburg in August, and soon thereafter re- 
 
 sloop-of-war, entered Femandina in safety. On ported for duty on the C. S. steamer Florida, of 
 
 reporting to the Navy Department at Richmond, which he was made executive officer, serving aa 
 
 Mr. Averett was commissioned lieutenant, C. S. such until May, 1864, when he was ordered 
 
 N., and ordered to duty at New Orleans, where home for rest and recuperation. He expected 
 
 he commanded the Watson, and was subse- to return to the ship with other officers and 
 
 ■quently executive officer of the steamer Jackson money, but the state of his health forbade him 
 
 and of the steamer Gen. Polk. At a later date from engaging in active duty afterward, 
 he was in command of the floating battery New 
 
 Orleans at Island No. 10. He knew the channel 2 Midshipman W. B. Sinclair was drowned off 
 
 of the Mississippi above and around the island the capes of the Delaware, July 10th, 1864, while 
 
 tolerably well, aud the nature of the defences in command of a boat that swamped in trans- 
 
 thoroughly, and when asked by Flag-officer ferring stores from a prize to the Florida. He 
 
 HoUins whether he thought the Confederate gave up to a seaman the oar upon which he was 
 
 position could be passed by Adm. Foote's fleet, sustaining himself, and thus sacrificed his own 
 
 he replied confidently that if it attempted the life. The Confederate government issued a 
 
 passage by day some of the vessels would go general naval order reciting hia conduct in 
 
 through safely, while others would be destroyed, terms of the highest praise, and directed that 
 
 but a vessel might run through on a dark night the order be read upon the quarter-deck of all 
 
 without receiving a shot in her hull. When the vessels in commission, with the colors at half 
 
 :foi'tifications on the main-land had been ahan- mast. 
 
792 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 for the Florida. Reasoning that as the Florida had just ob- 
 tained coal at Nassau, she would not, under the neutrality 
 laws, be allowed to coal at another British port for three 
 months, Wilkes concluded that she must go the French island 
 of Martinique for another supply of fuel, and sent his ships oflf 
 in that direction, to look for her. She had really gone to Bar- 
 badoes, where, upon Capt. MaiEtt's statement that his fuel 
 had been exhausted from stress of weather, he procured 90' 
 tons of coal on Feb. 24th. Cruising to the southward, a halt was 
 made at Green Cay, to paint the ship, and on the day after 
 leaving that island the U. S. gunboat Sonoma was sighted. All 
 hands were called to quarters, but although the Florida was 
 slowed down, the enemy, according to a statement made by 
 Lieut. C. W. Read, kept at a distance, and at the approach of 
 night the Florida went on her course. Off the Windward 
 Islands she had a long chase after the clipper ship Jacob Bell, 
 from Foo Chow, China, for New York, which she caught and 
 burned. The vessel, and her cargo of tea, silks, etc., was 
 valued at $1,500,000, the most valuable single prize taken by 
 any Confederate cruiser. Pernambuco, Brazil, was reached 
 on May 8th, and the Florida cruised along the meeting of the 
 great routes of commerce off that coast, taking many prizes. 
 Near there, Maflfitt made a tender of the prize brig Clarence, 
 whose career will be subsequently related, and then worked 
 his way back to St. George's, Bermuda, where he arrived July 
 16th, 186.3. He had destroyed 14 prizes, and bonded three. ' 
 
 On July 25th, the Florida sailed from Bermuda, and after 
 capturing the ships F. B. Cutting (bonded) and Avon (burned) 
 arrived at Brest, France, Aug. 23d, where she remained six 
 months in a government dock refitting and recruiting. Capt. 
 MafRtt's health was broken, and he was relieved of command, 
 by Com. Joseph N. Barney, who was also seized with illness, 
 and about Jan. 4th, 1864, Lieut. Charles Manigault Morris" 
 was ordered to the command of the cruiser. He got to sea 
 frorn Brest on Feb. 12th, and went to the West Indies, but 
 finding no valuable quarry there made a descent upon the 
 coast of the United States. On July 10th, thirty miles off the 
 capes of the Delaware, he captured the U. S. mail steamer 
 Electric Spark, from New York for New Orleans, which was 
 scuttled after transferring her people and passengers to a 
 passing English vessel. Other prizes taken in this dash were 
 the Harriet Stevens, Oolconda, Margaret Y. Davis and Mond- 
 amin. Morris then crossed the ocean to Teneriffe, and cruised 
 
 1 The term bonded or ransomed means that mxilated on the cruisers, and for whom they 
 
 the captain of the captured ship, on condition could find no accommodation, 
 of the release of the vessel, signed a bond for " Lieut. 0. M. Morris resigned from the U. S. 
 
 himself and the owners, to pay a stipulated navy when Georgia seceded, and being appointed 
 
 sum to the President of the Confederate lieut. in the Confederate service was ordered to 
 
 States at a fixed date (usually six months) after command of the gunboat Huntress at Savannah, 
 
 the ratification of a treaty of peace between the After doing ordnance duty and being in charga 
 
 United States and the Confederate States. A of the Savannah rendezvous, he was ordered to 
 
 prize was bonded when her cargo was owned Europe for duty on tlie Birkenhead rams, but 
 
 by neutral parties, or when it was desired to was detailed to the command of the F/orida, in. 
 
 use her to carry to port the prisoners who aocu- which he remained until her capture at Bahia. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 793 
 
 back leisurely toward Brazil, capturing the B. F. Hoxie,Cair- 
 aissanne, David Lapsley, Estelle. George Latimer, Southern 
 Rights, Greenland, Windivard, William C. Clark and Zelinda. 
 
 The Florida anchored at Bahia, Brazil, Oct. 4th, and 
 found in port the U. S. steam corvette Wachusett, Capt. Napo- 
 leon Collins. Relying implicitly upon the protection of a neu- 
 tral power, Morris drew the loads from his guns and gave his 
 crew liberty on shore by watches. On the night of Oct. 6th 
 he was himself in the town with nearly half the ship's com- 
 pany, leaving her in charge of Lieut. Thomas K. Porter and 
 some eighty officers and men. At three o'clock on the morning 
 of the 7th, the Wachusett rammed her on the starboard quar- 
 ter, fired two shots from her battery, poured in a volley from 
 small arms and demanded her surrender. The Florida's peo- 
 ple on deck replied with pistols and muskets and some fifteen 
 of the crew jumped overboard, of whom nine were either 
 drowned or were killed by being fired upon from the Wachu- 
 sett, while they were trying to swim to the land. Lieut. Por- 
 ter surrendered his defenceless ship and the Wachusett towed 
 her out to sea without giving him any chance for communica- 
 tion with Capt. Morris. The only Brazilian vessel present was 
 a small sloop-of-war, and although she and the fort fired a few 
 shots at the Wachusett the latter paid no attention. The Flor- 
 ida was sent to Hampton Roads as a prize. 
 
 So gross an outrage upon a neutral government was ut- 
 terly indefensible and the United States made no attempt to- 
 defend it. The demand of Brazil that the Florida be returned 
 intact to her protection at Bahia with all the prisoners on 
 board was conceded, and then to avoid this reparation a con- 
 temptible and violent fraud was resorted to. While she was 
 lying in Hampton Roads she was " accidentally " struck by 
 an army transport, and then, to avoid any more such " acci- 
 dental" collisions, she was moored in a secluded locality 
 above Newport News, and an engineer and two assistants 
 placed on board. On the morning of Nov. 38th she sank at 
 her moorings, and the United States escaped the humiliation 
 of returning her to Brazil. We have not the space to intro- 
 duce reports of this disgraceful business, but no fair man can 
 study them without reaching the conviction that the sinking 
 of the ship was an act deliberately committed by those in 
 charge of her in pursuance of instructions or intimations from 
 very high Federal authority. Admiral Porter, who was then 
 in command at Hampton Roads, goes far to confirm this belief 
 by the manner in which he speaks of the affair in his " Naval 
 History of the Civil War." It is tolerably well apparent that 
 the engineer in charge of the ship opened the water-cocks in 
 her hull and purposely left her to go to the bottom. 
 
 The captured officers were sent in succession to prison at 
 Point Lookout, Washington and Fort Warren. They were 
 brutally treated and were not set free until Feb. 1st, 1865. 
 
794 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Then they were compelled to sign an agreement to leave the 
 United States within ten days of their release, and were turned 
 into the streets of Boston 'without a dollar, but managed to 
 secure passage to Europe. 
 
 The Clarence, Tacony and Archer. — On May 6th, 1863, 
 the Florida captured, off the Brazilian coast, the brig Clar- 
 ence, of Baltimore, and converted her into a Confederate 
 cruiser. Lieut Charles W. Read was placed in command, and 
 selected as his subordinate officers from the Florida's comple- 
 ment, Quartermaster Billups, Boatswain's mate Matthewson, 
 and Quarter-gunner Pride, who were made master's mates. 
 Engineer Brown was also taken on board, and 16 men of the 
 Florida's crew. The only armament was a 6-pounder boat 
 howitzer, but with some spare spars Read constructed several 
 Quaker guns that frightened some of the American merchant 
 skippers whom he overhauled. He dipped his colors to the 
 Florida, and squared away north and east. Off Cape Hatteras 
 he captured the first prize, the bark Whistling Wind, bound 
 to New Orleans with army stores. That, and a few more 
 prizes, the Kate Stewart, Mary Alvina and Mary Schindler, 
 were burned, and the Alfred H. Partridge was bonded off the 
 capes of the Delaware, to land the prisoners. The next prize 
 was the fine bark Tacony, and as she was a much swifter ves- 
 sel than the Clarence, the crew and battery were transferred 
 to her, and the Clarence was destroyed. Read now proceeded 
 along the coast of New England, capturing and burning with 
 immense vigor. His prizes were the Ada, Arabella, Byzan- 
 tium, Elizabeth Ann, Florence, Ooodspeed, Isaac Webb, Z. A. 
 Macomber, Marengo, Ripple, Rufus Choate, Shattemuc, Um- 
 pire and Wanderer. On June 35th, 1863, the schooner Archer 
 was captured and converted into a cruiser in place of the Tacony, 
 which was destroyed. Read desired to capture a steamer, make 
 a raid down the coast, and run into Wilmington, N. C. ; and 
 learning from captured fishermen that the only armed ves- 
 sel at Portland, Me., was the revenue cutter Caleb Cushing, 
 he decided that she would be of use to him in the execution of 
 his project. On June 37th he sailed into Portland harbor in 
 his peaceful appearing schooner, without molestation, and after 
 dark he took the cutter by boarding, securing her crew below 
 deck. Going out of the harbor at dawn of the 38th, with the 
 Archer and the Cushing, the wind failed, and the Boston 
 steamer passed in, having on board Capt. Merriman, of the 
 TJ. S. revenue marine, who had been ordered to Portland to 
 take the cutter in search of the Tacony. The first known 
 in Portland of the cutting-out of the Cushing was Merri- 
 man's report that he had seen her going to sea ; and Maj. 
 AndrbW, commandant at Fort Preble, organized a recapturing 
 expedition of troops and citizens in two steamers, and three 
 tug-boats. At 11 o'clock in the morning they overtook the 
 Cushing and Archer. Read opened fire on them from his 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 795 
 
 guns, but by making wide detours, they hemmed him in, 
 and kept out of cannon range. He then took to his boats, 
 after setting a slow match to the magazine of the cutter, 
 which soon blew up. Surrounded by the enemy, he suri-en- 
 dered, and they towed the Arch'er into the harbor. The pris- 
 oners were charged with piracy, but were finally exchanged. 
 
 The Nashville. — The C. S. cruiser Nashville, a fine, swift 
 side-wheel steamer of about 1,300 tons burden, was built by 
 Northern owners for the trade between New York and Char- 
 leston, and was seized by the Confederate authorities at the 
 latter port when she entered it after the capture of Fort Sum- 
 ter. She laid idle until it was decided that she should take 
 Messrs. Mason and Slidell on the first stage of their journey 
 to Europe, and when this intention was revoked, she was sent 
 out as a Confederate States ship-of-war with the following 
 oflBcers, all of the naval service : Robert B. Pegram, lieut. 
 ■commanding; Charles M. Fauntleroy, first lieut.; John W. 
 Bennett, second lieut.; Wm. C. Whittle, Jr., third lieut. ; John 
 H. Ingraham, master; John L. Auchrim, surgeon; Richard 
 Taylor, paymaster; James Hood, chief engineer, and midship- 
 men Dalton, Sinclair, Cary, Pegram, Hamilton, Thomas and 
 McClintock. She was armed with but two 18-pound er brass 
 guns, mounted on her forecastle deck, and her crew never 
 numbered more than forty men. On the night of Oct. 31st, 
 1861, the ship ran the blockade out of Charleston, and after 
 stopping a few days at Bermuda headed across the Atlantic, 
 and on Nov. 19th captured in the entrance of the British chan- 
 nel the ship Harvey Birch,ot New York, homeward bound from 
 Havre. The passengers and crew were taken off and paroled 
 and the ship burned. On the 21st, the Nashville arrived at 
 Southampton, where the prisoners were landed, and enjoyed 
 the distinction of being the first war vessel to fly the flag of the 
 Confederate States in the waters of England. 
 
 On Jan. 8th, 1862, the Federal steamer Tuscarora arrived 
 in port, and her commander, Capt. Craven, established so close 
 a watch of the Nashville that he was warned by the govern- 
 ment officers to beware of violating the neutrality laws. This 
 blockade of the Nashville continued during the month; but in 
 the last week of January the Tuscarora moved ofl: to the Isle 
 of Wight, and Capt. Pegram demanded of the admiralty that 
 in accordance with the law she be detained in British waters un- 
 til twenty -four hours after his own vessel had sailed. The rule 
 was enforced on Capt. Craven, and the Nashville went to sea 
 on Feb. 3d, and reached Bermuda on the 20th, where she 
 picked up a pilot, who agreed to take her into Beaufort, N. p. 
 On the passage the schooner Eohert Gilfillan, of Philadelphia, 
 was made a prize and burned. The Nashville evaded the 
 blockading ships at Beaufort by a daring trick, and ran in on 
 Feb. 28th. Capt. Pegram found that the Confederate govern- 
 ment had sold the vessel to private parties in Charleston, and 
 
796 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 he left her at Moorehead City in charge of Lieut. Whittle; but 
 before the new owners could arrive to take possession it be- 
 came necessary to run the blockade outward to save her from 
 capture by Burnside's expedition. This feat was gallantly 
 accomplished by Whittle under a heavy fire from the enemy, 
 on March 17th. Finding it impossible to get into Charleston 
 through the blockading fleet, he took the ship to Georgetown, 
 S. C. , and turned her over to the purchasers, Fraser, Trenholm 
 & Co. They employed her in running the blockade, and on 
 her first trip to Nassau she was placed under the British flag 
 and her name changed to the Thomas L. Wragg. As a block- 
 ade-runner the steamer was exceedingly successful, and al- 
 though several times sighted by Federal ships got away from 
 them by her speed; but in the summ.er of 1862, she ran into 
 Warsaw Sound, Ga., and before a return cargo could be ob- 
 tained, the enemy bottled her up with a flotilla of gunboats. 
 She was then fitted out as a cruiser and re-christened the Rat- 
 tlesnake. While watching a chance to run out of the Ogechee 
 River, Feb. 37th, 1863, she grounded in Seven Mile Reach, 
 above Fort McAllister, and the next day was attacked by the 
 Federal monitor Montauk, which soon set her on fire with 
 shells, and she burned until the flames reached her magazine 
 and blew her into fragments. 
 
 Yacht America. — At the beginning of the war, the Con- 
 federate government bought for $60,000 the famous schooner 
 yacht America, which had won the Queen's cup in the Cowes 
 regatta of 1852. The intention was to flt her out as a cruiser, 
 but she was blockaded in the St. John's River, Fla., by Federal 
 ships, and was there scuttled by the Confederates. She was 
 raised by the Federals and remained in the navy until after 
 the war, when the U. S. government sold her to Gen. Benj . F. 
 Butler, who still uses her as a yacht. 
 
 The Alabama. — While Capt. Bulloch was concluding the 
 negotiations for the construction of th.e Florida, m June, 1861, 
 he opened communication with the Messrs. Laird, proprietors 
 of extensive ship-yards at Birkenhead, opposite Liverpool, for . 
 the building of a small steam sloop-of-war, on a model which 
 he described with some -exactness. He paid them £47,500 for 
 the vessel, which was known in the yards as " No. 290," and 
 subsequently became the Alabama. On July 29th, 1862, she 
 steamed out of the Mersey, a few hours before the British For- 
 eign Oflice sent down orders to detain her on the complaint of 
 Minister Adams that she was a Confederate ship-of-war. Seven 
 days later she arrived at Terceira, in the Azores Islands, where 
 she was joined by the bark Agrippina, bringing her arma- 
 ment and stores, and the steamship Bahama, on which her 
 officers and most of her crew had come out from England. On 
 Aug. 24th she was formally commissioned as the Confederate 
 States cruiser Alabama, with the subjoined list of officers: 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 797 
 
 Captain, Raphael Semmes ; First Lieut, and Executive OflHcer, J. M. 
 Kell; Second Lieut., Richard F. Armstrong; Third Lieut., Joseph D. 
 Wilson ; Fourth Lieut., Arthur Sinclair; Fifth Lieut., John Lowe ; Sur- 
 geon, Francis L. Gait ; Asst. Surg., David H. Llewellyn ; Paymaster, 
 Clarence R. Tonge ; Captain's Clerk, Wm. B. Smith ; Lieut, of Marines, 
 Becker K. Howell ; Chief Engineer, Miles J. Freeman ; Asst. Engineers, 
 Wm. P. Brooks, 8. W. Cumings, Mather O'Brien, John W. Pundt ; Mid- 
 shipmen, Wm. H. Sinclair, Irvine S. Bulloch, Eugene Maffitt, Edwin M. 
 Anderson ; Master's Mates, George T. Fullam, James Evans ; Boatswain, 
 Benj. L. McCaskey ; Gunner, J. O. Cuddy ; Carpenter, Wm. Robinson ; 
 Sailmaker, Henry Alcott. 
 
 The Alabama was a vessel 330 feet long, 32 feet breadth of 
 beam, 1,040 tons burden. She was barkentine-rigged, and her 
 propeller was so constructed that it could be lifted out of the 
 water, and when this was done she was to all intents and pur- 
 poses a sailing ship. Under sail alone, with the wind abeam, 
 she occasionally nfiade 10 knots an hour, and her best perform- 
 ance was llj knots under sail and steam conabined. Her ar- 
 mament consisted of six 33-pounders in broadside, a 100-pounder 
 Blakely rifle in the forecastle, and a smooth bore 8-inch 
 ■shell gun abaft the mainmast. She made her debut as a war- 
 ship by plunging in among the American whaling fleet, that 
 between the early spring and October finds employment 
 around the Western Islands. On Sept. 14th, 1862, the Ala- 
 bama was off Fayal, and before the equinoctial gales drove 
 the whalers out of those waters he made prizes of a dozen of 
 them. Capt. Semmes selected for his next cruising ground the 
 Newfoundland Banks, and the track of the American grain ships 
 bound from the Eastern ports to Europe. He reached this sta- 
 tion October 3d, 1863, and began burning prizes, or ransoming to 
 carry away his prisoners those containing cargoes documented 
 as the indisputable property of neutrals. The first of the 
 wheat ships taken was the Brilliant, and the second the Emily 
 Farnham ; and the latter returning to New York under bond, 
 with the information that the Alabama was on the coast,a panic 
 was created in shipping circles. Between Oct 3d and 31st, 
 Semmes made sixteen captures, and then fell in with a num- 
 ber of ships whose cargoes were certified to be neutral property. 
 A prize court was convened in the cabin of the Alabama, and 
 upon its decision that the certificates were fraudulent, the ves- 
 sels and their ladings were burned. The Alabama ran down 
 to within 300 miles of New York, while the Federal men-of- 
 war were looking for her up on the Grand Banks. About Nov. 
 18th she put into Port de France, Martinique, when some of 
 the men, who had smuggled liquor on board, created the first 
 and only mutiny on the ship, which the commander promptly 
 suppressed by no severer measures than douching the guilty 
 ones with cold water. The U. S. frigate San Jacinto made her 
 appearance off the port while the Alabama was there, but the lat- 
 ter's speed enabled her to go to sea past her slow and clumsy 
 enemy. After coaling from a tender at Blanquilla, Venezuela, 
 .Semmes laid in wait between San Domingo andHayti, for one 
 
798 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 of the California treasure steamers bound from Colon to New- 
 York. On Dec. 7th, 1863, he captured the steamship Ariel, but 
 she was outward bound from New York, with some 500 women 
 and children among her passengers. As he could not take the 
 prize into any port, he was forced to release her on a ransom 
 bond for $261, 000, payable after the recognition of the indepen- 
 dence of the Confederate States. He got nothing from the 
 prize, except $9,500 in money that her safe contained, while he 
 might have captured a million if he had taken one of the 
 steamers bound into New York. 
 
 The Alabama next went into the Gulf of Mexico, with a 
 view of attacking the expedition known to be fitting out in 
 the North under Gen. N. P. Banks for a descent upon the 
 Texas coast, but Banks had gone into New Orleans and 
 Semmes found off Galveston a Federal squadron bombarding 
 that city. By concealing the identity of his ship and steam- 
 ing slowly off he decoyed a vessel of the enemy twenty miles 
 away, and then halted and cleared ship for action. To a hail 
 he responded first, "This is her Britannic Majesty's steamer 
 Petrel," and then " This is the Confederate States steamer 
 Alabama." She fired the first broadside at nine o'clock on the 
 night of Jan. 11th, 1863; the other ship replied valiantly, and 
 the engagement lasted just thirteen minutes. Closing in with 
 the foe Semmes found that he had defeated the U. S. gunboat 
 Hatteras, Lieut. Com. Homer C. Blake, and that she was in 
 a sinking condition. Blake asked for assistance, which was 
 so promptly rendered, that, although the Hatteras went to 
 the bottom within fifteen minutes after surrendering, every 
 man on board, including the five wounded, was transferred in 
 safety to the Alabama. Two men were killed on the Hatteras 
 and the Alabama had but one man wounded. The latter 
 steamed for Jamaica, and on Jan. 30th made the harbor of 
 Port Royal, where Semmes expelled from the service his pay- 
 master, Clarence R. Yonge, for debauchery. On Jan. 35th the 
 Alabama left Kingston for a cruise down the Brazil coast and 
 thence to the Cape of Good Hope. At the forks of the marine 
 roads, in the fair-way of commerce, he captured twenty-four 
 vessels, all of which were destroyed except the Conrad, which 
 was converted into the C. S. cruiser Tuscaloosa. Crossing the 
 Atlantic to the southern point of Africa, two more prizes were 
 taken, and on July a8th, 1863, the Alabama put into Saldanha 
 Bay. On this coast he captured only the bark Sea Bride, 
 which vessel, with her cargo, Semmes sold to an English 
 merchant, making the transfer at Angra Pequena, in the 
 Hottentot country, to avoid any fracture of the British neu- 
 trality laws. For the remainder of the year he cruised in 
 the Straits of Sunda, the China Sea and the Bay of Bengal, 
 with moderate success. Beating up the waters of the Atlan- 
 tic again, between Cape Town and the equatorial line on 
 the Brazil coast, only two more captures were made. The 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 799 
 
 ship Tycoon was taken on April 27th, 1864, and she was the 
 last of the long roll of the victims of the Alabama. 
 
 On June 11th, the cruiser came to anchor in the port of 
 Cherbourg, France, and three days later the U. S. steam cor- 
 vette Kearsarge, Capt. John A. Winslow, came across from 
 Southampton. The vessels fought their famous battle on 
 Sunday, June 19th. Thousands of people gathered on the 
 southern heights overlooking the British Channel to witness 
 the combat, and the French iron-clad Couronne, and the 
 English yacht Deerhound, owned and sailed by Mr. John 
 Lancaster, moved to and fro outside the line of fire. A brief 
 narrative of the affair is all that our limits will permit. 
 
 From the start the Kearsarge had some advantage over her 
 adversary. She was the faster ship and her seven guns threw 
 at a broadside 430 pounds of shot to 360 pounds thrown by the 
 eight guns of the Alabama. She obtained this superiority from 
 the two 11-inch pivot guns that she carried, and these pieces 
 decided the action. Moreover, her hull was protected by her 
 heavy chain cables hung up and down the sides. Semmes 
 claims that for this reason she was practically an iron-clad 
 and that Winslow took an unfair advantage of him. It is 
 true, however, that the Kearsarge was not hit so frequently 
 during the engagement as to make this a question of great 
 practical importance. She had 163 officers and men, and the 
 Alabama had 149. The annexed report of Capt. Semmes to 
 Secretary Mallory was dated from Southampton on June 21st, 
 and embraces most of the needful particulars of the battle. 
 
 " Southampton, June 31st, 1864. 
 " Sir : I have the honor to inform you, that in accordance with my 
 intention as previously announced to you, I steamed out of the harbor of 
 Cherbourg between nine and ten o'clock on the morning of the 19th of 
 June, for the purpose of engaging the enemy's steamer Kearsarge, which 
 had been lying off and on the port, for several days previously. After 
 clearing the harbor, we descried the enemy, with his head off shore, at 
 the distance of about seven miles. We were three-quarters of an hour in 
 coming up with him. I had previously pivoted my guns to starboard, 
 and made all preparations for engaging the enemy on that side. When 
 within about a mile and a quarter of the enemy, he suddenly wheeled, 
 and, bringing his head in shore, presented his starboard battery to me. 
 By this time, we were distant about one mile from each other, when I 
 opened on him -with solid shot, to which he replied in a few minutes, and 
 the action became active on both sides. The enemy now pressed his ship 
 under a full head of steam, and to prevent our passing each other too 
 speedily, and to keep our respective broadsides bearing, it became neces- 
 sary to fight in a circle ; the two ships steaming around in a common cen ■ 
 tre, and preserving a distance from each other of from three-quarters to 
 half a mile. When we got within good shell range, we opened upon him 
 with shell. Some ten or fifteen minutes after the commencement of the 
 action, our spanker-gaff was shot away, and our ensign came down by the 
 run. This was immediately replaced by another at the mizzen-masthead. 
 The firing now became very hot, and the enemy's shot and shell soon 
 began to tell upon our hull, knocking down, killing and disabling a num- 
 ber of men, at the same time, in different parts of the ship. Perceiving 
 that our shell, though apparently exploding against the enemy's sides, 
 
800 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 were doing him but little damage, I returned to solid-shot firing, and from 
 this time onward alternated with shot and shell. 
 
 "After the lapse of about one hour and ten minutes, our ship was as- 
 certained to be in a sinking condition, the enemy's shell having exploded 
 in our side and between decks, opening large apertures through which 
 the water rushed with great rapidity. For some few minutes I had hopes 
 of being able to reaeh the French coast, for which purpose I gave the ship 
 all steam, and set such of the fore-and-aft sails as were available. The ship 
 filled so rapidly, however, that before we had made much progress, the fires 
 were extinguished in the furnaces, and we were evidently on the point of 
 sinking. I now hauled down my colors, to prevent the further destruc- 
 tion of life, and dispatched a boat to inform the enemy of our condition. 
 Although we were now but 400 yards from each other, the enemy fired 
 upon uie five times after my colors had been struck. It is charitable to sup- 
 pose that a ship of war of a Christian nation could not have done this inten- 
 tionally. We now directed all our exertions toward saving the wounded, 
 and such of the boys of the ship as were unable to swim. These were dis- 
 patched in my quarter-boats, the only boats remaining to me ; the waist- 
 boats having been torn to pieces. Some twenty minutes after my fur- 
 nace fires had been extinguished, and when the ship was on the point of 
 settling, every man, in obedience to a previous order which had been 
 given the crew, jumped overboard, and endeavored to save himself. There 
 was no appearance of any boat coming to me from the enemy, until after 
 my ship went down. Fortunately, however, the steam yacht Deerhound, 
 owned by a gentleman of Lancashire, England — Mr. John Lancaster — who 
 was himself on board, steamed up in the midst of my drowning men, and 
 rescued a number of both officers and men from the water. I was fortunate 
 enough myself thus to escape to the shelter of the neutral flag, together 
 with about forty others, all told. About this time the Kearsarge sent one, 
 and then, tardily, another boat. Accompanying, you will find lists of the 
 killed and wounded, and of those who were picked up h j the Deerhound ; 
 the remainder, there is reason to hope, were picked up by the enemy, and 
 by a couple of French pilot boats, which were also fortunately near the 
 scene of action. At the end of the engagement, it was discovered by those 
 of our officers who went alongside of the enemy's ship, with the wounded, 
 that her midship section, on both sides, was thoroughly iron-coated ; this 
 having been done with chains, constructed for the purpose, placed per- 
 pendicularly, from the rail to the water's edge, the whole covered over by 
 a thin outer planking, which gave no indication of the armor beneath. 
 This planking had been ripped off, in every direction, by our shot and 
 shell, the chain broken and indented in many places, and forced partly 
 into the ship's side. She was effectually guarded, however, in this section, 
 from penetration. The enemy was much damaged in other parts, but to 
 what extent it is now impossible to say. It is believed he is badly crip- 
 pled. My officers and men behaved steadily and gallantly, and though 
 they have lost their ship, they have not lost honor. Where all behaved so 
 well, it would be invidious to particularize, but I cannot deny myself the 
 pleasure of saying that Mr. Kell, my first lieutenant, deserves great credit 
 tor the fine condition in which the ship went into action, with regard to 
 her battery, magazine and shell-rooms, and that he rendered me great as- 
 sistance, by his coolness and judgment, as the fight proceeded. The 
 enemy was heavier than myself, both in ship, battery, and crew ; but I 
 did not know until the action was over, that she was also iron-clad. Our 
 total loss in killed and wounded, is 30, to wit : 9 killed and 31 wounded." 
 
 It was subsequently discovered that ten of the Alabama's 
 people were drowned, including Surgeon D. H. Llewelyn. 
 She fired 370 shot and shell, of which only fourteen hulled 
 the Kearsarge, while twice as many inflicted damage on her 
 spars and rigging. There were two reasons for this compara- 
 tive ineffectiveness of the Confederate fire. The ammunition 
 
inuunuininmutiuiiitiiiiuiiiiiutiii'nii « 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 801 
 
 had been on board two years and had much deteriorated by 
 cruising in a variety of climates, and shells failed to explode. 
 But for this the Alabama might have won the fight, for in the 
 first half hour she drove an 8-inch percussion shell into the 
 enemy's hull near the stern-post, where its explosion would 
 perhaps have sunk her, but the cap was bad and the shell did 
 not burst. In the second place, Semmes had only a few good 
 gunners. The assertions that among the crew of the Alabama 
 were a great number of skilled artillerists from the British 
 navy were nonsense. He did have a few such men, but they 
 were a very small fraction to the mass, who had had no prac- 
 tice against an enemy .except in the engagement with the 
 Hatteras, and whom the little schooling they had in test fir- 
 ing upon some of the hulks at sea did not fit to cope with the 
 excellent crew that Winslow commanded. 
 
 The Tuscaloosa.— When Capt. Semmes converted the 
 captured bark Conrad, of Philadelphia, into the C. S. vessel-of- 
 war Tuscaloosa, near the Brazil coast, June 20th, 1863, he 
 placed Lieut. John Low in command, with Midshipman 
 George T. Sinclair as his first oflBcer, and the ships parted 
 company. They met again at the Cape of Good Hope in Au- 
 gust, where the U. S. consul demanded from the British gov- 
 ernor of the colony the surrender of the Tuscaloosa, on the 
 ground that she had not been condemned as a prize by any 
 admiralty court of any recognized nation. The Governor re- 
 plied that on his understanding she was entitled to be regarded 
 as a vessel-of-war, and on Aug, 14th she went to sea for a 
 ninety days' cruise in the South Atlantic, during which, of 100 
 vessels spoken, only one was under the American flag, and 
 she having an English cargo on board was bonded and re- 
 leased. On Dec. 36th, the Tuscaloosa returned to the Cape of 
 Good Hope and was seized by order of the British Foreign 
 Office, on the charge made by the American consul of viola- 
 tion of the neutrality laws in the sale of ia part of her captured 
 cargo of wool, which he alleged took place at the island of 
 Ichaboe within British jurisdiction. When Semmes arrived, 
 shortly afterward, he contended that the transactions in ques- 
 tion were conducted at Angra Pequena, outside of British ter- 
 ritory, and after the interchange of much correspondence the 
 upshot of the whole business was the following announcement 
 in Parliament by Lord Palmerston: 
 
 " The Tuscaloosa was seized, in the first instance, in consequence of 
 instructions sent out to the Cape, founded on a former supposed condition 
 of things. The Tuscaloosa was not in port when those instructions ar- 
 rived; but when she returned the governor, acting upon those instruc- 
 tions, seized her. Upon further representations, however, and a fuU con- 
 sideration of the case, it has been determined that there are no proper 
 grounds internationally for seizing her, and orders have been sent out to 
 set her at liberty." 
 
 What it all amounted to was a recognition by Great Brit- 
 ain of the legal right of Semmes to commission as a vessel-of- 
 war a prize captured on the high seas, and the name of the 
 
 61 
 
802 THE CONFEDEKATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 Tuscaloosa is more remembered for this diplomatic skirmish 
 than for any service as a commerce-destroyer that she per- 
 formed, as her prizes were but two in number. 
 
 The Rappahannock. — This ship was originally the dis- 
 patch boat Victor, of the British navy, and although a hand- 
 somely modelled screw-steamer of some 500 tons burden, proved 
 so defective that in 1863 the Admiralty ordered her to be sold at 
 auction, and she was bought by a representative of Capt. M. F. 
 Maury, C S. naval agent in England, under the pretence 
 that she was to be engaged in the China trade. The intention 
 was to fit her out as a cruiser at an appointed rendezvous, and 
 Capt. Campbell, C. S. N., was designated to command her. 
 Suspecting that she was destined for the Confederate service, 
 the British Foreign Office ordered her to be detained ; but on 
 Nov. 24th, 1863, a young Scotchman named Ramsey succeeded 
 in running her out from Sheerness, expecting to meet the 
 Georgia off the French coast, and receive the battery and am- 
 munition of the latter. Passing down the Thames, the brasses 
 of the Rappahannock blew out, and she drifted across the 
 Channel, and anchored off Calais. There she was docked for 
 repairs, and Lieut. Chas. M. Fauntleroy, C. S. E"., was ordered 
 to take command of her by Com. Barron, the naval agent of 
 the Confederacy at Paris. A board of survey found her ut- 
 terly unsuited for a cruiser, as she was slow under steam or 
 sail, could only carry eleven days' coal, and but six weeks' 
 provisions. The utmost use she ever was to the Confederacy 
 was to keep one or two Federal vessels off Calais, watching 
 her, to see that she did not go to sea. When the news of the 
 surrender of Gen. Lee was received, Lieut. Fauntleroy was 
 ordered to pay off the officers and crew, and turn the vessel 
 over to Capt. Bulloch. Fauntleroy appropriately called her 
 "The Confederate White Elephant." 
 
 The Georgiana.— In 1862-63 Messrs. Laird & Co. built 
 at Birkenhead for the Confederate States a fast and powerful 
 steamer called the Georgiana. She escaped from British juris- 
 diction under the pretence of being destined for the Chinese 
 service, and left Liverpool for Nassau Jan. 32d, 1863; the inten- 
 tion being to run the blockade into Charleston, where the ship 
 was to be armed and fitted out as a cruiser. After being de- 
 tained some time at Nassau she started for Charleston, but was 
 discovered by the blockaders off the port and her captain ran 
 her ashore, about March 30th, on Long Island beach, on the 
 South Carolina coast, to avoid capture. Strenuous efforts were 
 made by the enemy to get at hfer cargo, which was partly of 
 military stores and known to be very valuable, but the Con- 
 federates kept off their landing parties by bringing field bat- 
 teries to bear upon them. The Georgiana, however, was 
 knocked to pieces by their shells. Apart from her cargo, the 
 loss was a serious one to the Confederacy, as she was a much 
 faster and stronger ship than any one of its cruisers afloat and 
 would have made a superb man-of-war. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 803 
 
 The Georgia.— Capt. M. F. Maury, C. S. naval agent, 
 bought at Dumbarton, Scotland, March, 1863, a new iron screw- 
 steamer of 600 tons burden and 200 horse-power, named the 
 Japan, built for commercial service. April 1st she cleared from 
 Greenock in ballast for the East Indies, her crew of 50 men, 
 shipped at Liverpool, signing articles for a voyage to Singapore 
 and intermediate ports. Although she left Greenock in the con- 
 dition of an ordinary ship of commerce, her departure was 
 accelerated by a suspicion that the British authorities had re- 
 ceived knowledge of the uses for which she was designed, and 
 orders to detain her reached Greenock the day after she had 
 passed out of the Clyde. On the French coast, off Ushant, she 
 met by appointment the steamer Alar, from which she re- 
 ceived her guns, ordnance stores and supplies. The Confed- 
 erate flag was hoisted, the officers took charge, and the ship was 
 formally put in commission as the C. S. man-of-war Georgia. 
 Her officers, who had come out in the Alar, were Com. W. L. 
 Maury, First Lieut. Chapman, Second Lieut. Evans, Third 
 Lieut. Smith, Fourth Lieut. Ingraham, Passed Midshipman 
 Walker, Midshipman Morgan, Paymaster Curtis, Surgeon 
 Wheedon, Chief. Eng. Pearson. The Georgia was a swift and 
 powerful ship of her class, her battery consisting of five Whit- 
 worth guns, two 100-pdrs., two 24-pdrs. and one 32-pdr. Of the 
 seamen who had come out from Greenock and signed for a trad- 
 ing voyage, only thirteen consented to ship as man-of -wars- 
 men, and the remainder were sent back to England by the Alar, 
 and the crew of the Georgiawas filled up by men brought out in 
 that vessel. The cruiser's field of operations was the Atlantic 
 Ocean, but it had been already so well reaped of the enemy's 
 commerce by other Confederate ships that only the gleanings 
 were left to her; but in her short career she made prizes aggre- 
 gating in value $406,000. The first was the ship Dictator, taken 
 on April 25th and burned, and the Georgia ran across to Bahia, 
 Brazil, where she coaled and continued on to the Cape of Good 
 Hope, capturing on the way the ships George Griswold and Con- 
 stitution and the barks Good Hope and J. W. Seaver. She ar- 
 rived in St. Simon's Bay on Aug. 16th, and on the 29th set out 
 for a return to Europe. During this run she made prizes of the 
 ships City of Bath, Prince of Wales, John Watts and Bold Hun- 
 ter. She put into Cherbourg, France, on Oct. 28th, where Com. 
 Maury was detached on account of ill-health, and Lieut. Evans 
 was promoted to the command. Because of her insufficient sail 
 power, which necessitated frequent coaling, it was not deemed 
 worth while to continue her as a cruiser, and she was taken to 
 Liverpool, where she arrived on May 2d, 1864. There she was 
 dismantled and offered for sale, Edward Bates, a Liverpool 
 merchant, becoming her purchaser for the sum of £15,000. 
 This was done against the protest of Mr. Adams, the U. S. 
 Minister, who gave notice that his government would not rec- 
 ognize the transfer and requested Com. Craven, then m com- 
 mand of the U. S. frigate Niagara, lying in the port of Ant- 
 
804 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 werp, that he must endeavor to intercept and capture the con- 
 verted Confederate. Mr, Bates removed every vestige of war 
 fittings, effected a charter of the ship to the Portuguese govern- 
 ment; and on Aug. 8th, 1864, vsrith a British register and under 
 a British flag, she sailed from Liverpool for Lisbon. Off the 
 mouth of the Tagus River she was captured by the Niagara and 
 sent to Boston with, a prize-crew, where she was condemned 
 and sold as a lawful prize of the United States. Mr. Bates ap- 
 pealed to the British Foreign Office for redress, but was in- 
 formed that the case of the Georgia must go before the prize 
 court in the United States, and that he must be prepared to de- 
 fend his interests therein. He was fortunate enough, how- 
 ever, to recover £6,000 insurance money in the British courts. 
 The Ram Stonewall. — In 1862, Mr. Slidell, representative 
 of the Confederate States in France, received an intimation 
 from persons in the confidence of Emperor Napoleon III. that 
 the government would not interfere with the building of cruis- 
 ers in French ship-yards for the Confederacy; and when, in 
 March 1863, funds were provided by the negotiation of the 
 £3,000,000 loan, Capt. Bulloch, Mr. Slidell and M. Arman, a 
 member of the Corps Legislatif and proprietor of a large ship- 
 yard at Bordeaux, held consultations in Paris, at which M. 
 Arman renewed the a ssurances that such vessels-of-war could 
 be constructed and sent to sea with the connivance of his 
 government. Contracts were entered into with him for the 
 construction of four steam corvettes, two of which, as his own 
 yard was crowded with work, he tui-ned over to M, J, Voruz, 
 of Nantes, ^ On June 30th, Capt. Bulloch received information 
 of the passage by the Confederate Congress of an appropria- 
 tion of £3,000,000 for the construction of iron-clad ships-of-war, 
 and in accordance with the instructions of Secretary Mallory 
 entered into a contract with M. Arman to build a ship 172 feet 
 long, 33 feet breadth of beam, to steam 12 knots an hour, to be 
 plated amidships with 4| inches of iron, tapering to 3^ inches at 
 the extremities, to carry a 300-pdr. Armstrong rifle in a forward 
 turret and two TO-pdr. Armstrongs in an after-turret. The vessel 
 had a ram, and was so designed that she might enter the Missis- 
 sippi River, and a second ship was ordered on the same general 
 plan. In Nov, the corvettes and the iron-clads were more than 
 half finished, and the attention of the U, S, Minister at Paris, Mr, 
 Dayton, was attracted to them. He laid before the Emperor 
 proof that they were intended for the Confederate government; 
 and Napoleon, induced undoubtedly by considerations relative 
 to the war he was then waging in Mexico, and the probability 
 of the fall of the Confederacy, completely revoked the guaran- 
 tees that had been given Slidell and Bulloch, The builders were 
 notified that the iron-clads would not be permitted to sail, and 
 that the corvettes must not be armed in France, but might be 
 nominally sold to some foreign merchant, and dispatched as 
 
 ' When the French government changed ita to sea, M. Voruz sold these two corvettes to 
 policy, and forbade the Confederate ahlpe to go European powers. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 805 
 
 ^nn';^.^ijA''¥^''^ J^i-'®^^- '^", J^ly 9th' 1864, M. Arman an- 
 nounced that m obedience to the orders of the government he 
 had sold all six of the vessels. 
 
 The only one with which we have anything to do, as the 
 others never came into the possession of the Confederacy 
 was the iron-clad ram Sjphynx, one of the two armored ships 
 contracted for. M. Arman sold her to Denmark, then at war 
 with I'russia, but when she arrived at Copenhagen hostilities 
 had ceased and the Danish government was anxious to part 
 with the ship. Arrangements were made to transfer her to 
 the Confederate flag, and on Jan. 6th, 1865, she sailed from 
 Copenhagen, m charge of Capt. T. J. Page, C. S. K, who had 
 been appointed to the command. On the 24th she met at 
 the appointed rendezvous, off Quiberon, on the French coast, 
 the steamer City of Richmond, in command of Lieut. H! 
 Davidson, C. S, JST., which had been dispatched from London 
 with the remainder of her officers, crew and supplies. The 
 Confederate flag was hoisted on the ram, and she was chris- 
 tened the Stonewall. This is the full list of her officers: 
 
 Captain, T J Page ; Lieuts., R. R. Carter, Geo. S. Shryock, Geo. 
 A. Borchet, B. &. Read, Sam'l Barron, Jr.; Surgeon, B. W. Green : As- 
 sistMit Surg., J. W. Herty ; Paymaster, R. W. Curtiers ; Chief Eng., 
 S- \i^\'i°^^ ' Assistant Engs., W. H. .lackson and J. C. Klosh; Master, 
 W. W. Wilkinson-; Boatswain, J. M. Dukehart ; Gunner, J. B. King - 
 Master s Mate, W. H. Savage ; Paymaster s Clerk, Wm. Boynton ; Ser- 
 geant of Marines, J. M. Prior. 
 
 The Stonewall was found to have sprung a leak immedi- 
 ately after leaving Quiberon, and Capt. Page ran into Corunna. 
 and thence to Ferrol, Spain, where he was at first granted all 
 the dock-yard facilities, but was subsequently hurried off by 
 the Spanish authorities, on account of the protest of the 
 American Minister. In the first week of Feb. the Federal fri- 
 gate Niagara and sloop-of-war Sacramento, under command 
 of Com. T. T. Craven, ' anchored at Corunna, nine miles dis- 
 tant, from whence they could watch the Stonewall. The Ni- 
 agara was one of the fastest ships of the U. S. navy, and 
 carried a battery of ten 150-pounder Parrott rifles, while the 
 Sacramento mounted two 11-inch guns, two 9-incli guns and 
 one 60-pounder rifle. On March 24th, the Stonewall steamed 
 out of Ferrol, and cleared for action, in full sight of the en- 
 emy ; but to the surprise of Capt. Page, who fully expected an 
 engagement, they declined his challenge by remaining at an- 
 chor. He did everything he could to provoke an encounter, 
 standing on and off all day, and " flaunting her flags in his 
 face," as Craven wrote ; but the latter feared to attack, with 
 his superior force of two ships to one, and fifteen guns to three. 
 
 Finding that the enemy would not fight, the Stonewall bore 
 
 1 Com. Craven was brought to trial by court- not eufficieutly severe for the offense. On a 
 
 martial, on the charge of " failing to do his ut- revision of the proceedings, the court-martial 
 
 most to overtalie and capture or destroy a vee- made the same finding, which the Secretary 
 
 sel, which it was his duty to encounter." He again set aside, for the same reason and the ac- 
 
 was found guilty, and sentenced to two years' cused was restored to duty. His defence was, 
 
 suspension; but the Secretary of the Navy an- that it would have been imprudent for him to risk 
 
 nulled the sentence, on the ground that it was his wooden vessels against the iron-clad ram. 
 
806 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 away for Lisbon, Capt. Page's intention being to cross the 
 Atlantic, and attempt to strike a blow at Port Royal, which 
 was then supposed to be the base of Gen. Shermans ad- 
 vance through South Carolina. He reached Nassau on May 
 6th, and proceeded to Havana, where he learned of the end of 
 the war. The ship was surrendered to the Captain General of 
 Cuba, on the payment of $16,000, about the amount of wages 
 due the crew. That official offered Lieut. Carter, who con- 
 ducted the negotiations, $100,000, and then $50,000, but the 
 larger amounts were refused. The crew were paid off and 
 discharged, and the Spanish officials took charge of the ship. 
 In July, Spain voluntarily delivered her to the U. S. govern- 
 ment, by which she was subsequently sold to Japan. 
 
 The Tallahassee (Atlanta). — This vessel was a splendid 
 twin-screw, 14-knot blockade-runner, built on the Thames, 
 and after making several trips into and out of Wilmington 
 her name was changed from the Atlanta to the Tallahassee, 
 and she was commissioned as a C. S. ship-of-war under com- 
 mand of Com. J. T. Wood. ' The other officers were Lieuts. 
 W. H. Ward, M. M. Benton, J. M. Gardner; Acting Master, 
 Alex. Curtis; Engineers: Chief, J. W. Tyman; Assistants, 
 C. H. Leroy, E. G. Hall, J. F. Green, J. J. Lyell, H. H. 
 Roberts, R. M. Ross; Assist. Paymaster, C. L. Jones; Assist. 
 Surgeon, W. L. Sheppardson; Boatswain, J. Cassidy; Gunner, 
 
 Stewart; Master's Mate. C. Russell; Lieut, of Marines, 
 
 Crenshaw, with a crew of about 110 men. The battery con- 
 sisted of a32-pounder rifle, a lighter rifle and a brass howitzer. 
 On Aug. 6th, 1864, the Tallahassee went to sea from Wilming- 
 ton under the fire of the blockaders, whom the speedy ship 
 soon left behind. Her cruising ground was the Atlantic coast, 
 and when within 80 miles of Sandy Hook, on Aug. 11th, she 
 took her first prize, the schooner Sarah A. Boyce, of Egg Har- 
 bor, N. J., which she scuttled. In two days in these waters, 
 
 1 John Taylor Wood is a son of the late Sur- Vicksburg, on the Mississippi. He commanded 
 geon Gen. Robert C. Wood, of the U. S. army. the boat expeditions that captured the U. S. 
 His mother was a daughter of President Zach- gunboats Satellite and Reliance m the Kappahan- 
 ary Taylor, and sister of the first wife of nock River, and the Undervmter at Newberne, 
 Hon. -Jefferson Davis. He was born in N. C. He was promoted to post-captain for 
 Louisiana, and entered the U. 8. navy as mid- gallantry, and in Aug., 1864, took command of 
 ehipman in April, 1847, serving during the the Tallahassee for her cruise. He took part in 
 Mexican war in the Ohio and Brandywine. In the capture of Plymouth, N. C, and in the 
 1861 he was assistant professor of seamanship winter of 1864-65 was offered the command of 
 and gunnei-y at the U, S. naval academy. Re- the James River squadron, but declined it. On 
 signing bis commission, he entered the service April 2d, 1865, he delivered to President Davis, 
 of Virginia, and was at the Evansport batteries in St. Paul's church, Richmond, Gen. Lee's 
 during the blockade of the Potomac. He was dispatch announcing his withdrawal from 
 commissioned lieut. in the C. S. navy Oct. 4th, Petersburg, and the last Confederate cabinet 
 1861, and about the beginuing of Jan., 18G2, was meeting or covmcil was held in a house occupied 
 ordered to the Virginia at Norfolk, and partici- by Col. Wood's family at Greensboro', N. C. He 
 pated in the Hampton Roads battles'. In the was with Pres. Davis when the latter was cap- 
 engagements at Drewry's Bluff he commanded a tured at Irwiuevllle, Ga., May 10th, 1866, and 
 company of sharp-shooters that picked off many made his own escape by bribing the Federal 
 men on the Federal ships, and after the repulse guard. He joined Gen. Breckenridge the next 
 of the latter he was assigned to duty on the staff day, and they, with Col. Wilson, an aide to 
 of President Davis, with the rank of Col. of Mr. Davis, crossed Georgia into Florida, de- 
 cavalry. He organized numerous boat expedi- scending St. John's River to Jupiter Inlet in a 
 tions against the enemy on the Chesapeake Bay boat. At the inlet they obtained a second boat 
 and tributary waters, and inspected the water de- from some Federal deserters, with which they 
 fences of all points held by the Confederacy crossed to Cuba, making a landing at Cardenas, 
 upon the seaboard, as well as Port Hudson and Since the war, Col. Wood has resided at Halifax. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 807 
 
 the pilot-boat James Funk, brig Carrie Estelle, pilot-boat Wm. 
 Bell and schooner Atlantic were captured. The Funk was con- 
 verted into a tender under command of Acting Master Davis 
 and captured the bark Bay State, brig A. Richards and schooner 
 Carroll. All but the tender and Carroll were burned, and the 
 latter was bonded and sent to N. Y. with the paroled prisoners. 
 Her captain broke his oath by landing on Fire Island and tele- 
 graphing information to the Federal authorities that a Confed- 
 erate cruiser was within 60 miles of New York. Six or seven 
 gunboats were sent in pursuit and New York passed through 
 the throes of alarm and excitement. Com. Wood had formed 
 a project to dash upon the Brooklyn navy-yard and escape to 
 sea by way of Hell Gate after doing all the destruction possi- 
 ble; but this scheme was abandoned and the Tallahassee ran 
 to the eastward with the tender in tow. Off the eastern end of 
 Long Island the ship Adriatic was taken and burned, on Aug. 
 12th, and the bark Suliote was ransomed to land the prisoners. 
 The tender, being of no further use, was destroyed, and the 
 Tallahassee wound up this eventful day by capturing the 
 schooner Spokane, the brig Billow and the schooner Robert E. 
 Packer, which latter was sent off with prisoners. Within the 
 next few days the captures were the Mercy A. Howes, Olen- 
 ■avon, Lamont Dupont, Hoiuard, Floral Wreath, Restless, Sarah 
 B. Harris, Etta Caroline, P. C. Alexander, Leopard, Pearl, 
 .Sarah Louisa and Magnolia. In taking these prizes Wood had 
 made his way well up along the coast of Maine and played the 
 mischief with the N. E. fishing trade, and fully a dozen gun- 
 boats were added to the fleet already in pursuit of him. Going 
 toward Halifax for coal he captured the North America, Neva, 
 Josiah Achorne, Ellis and Diadem. All were destroyed ex- 
 cept those by which prisoners were sent to the nearest ports. 
 On Aug. 18th the Tallahassee arrived at Halifax and was 
 ■ordered away, after getting only enough coal to take her back 
 to Wilmington. She left Halifax on the 19th, and between 
 there and the Cape Fear River captured the brig Rowan and 
 was fruitlessly chased by Federal cruisers. On the 25th she 
 boldly ran into that river, fighting the blockaders as she 
 pushed through their midst until she dropped anchor under 
 the guns of Fort Fisher. She had burned 16 vessels, scuttled 
 10, bonded 5 and released 2. 
 
 Com. Wood was detached from the ship and was succeeded 
 in command by Lieut. Ward. Her name was changed to the 
 Olustee, and on Oct. 29th, 1864, she ran through the block- 
 ading fleet to sea, but not without sustaining some damage 
 from their shells. Off the capes of the Delaware she captured 
 and destroyed the bark Empress Theresa, schooner A. J. 
 Bird, schooner E. F. Lewis and schooner Qoodspeed. Near 
 Sandy Hook the ship Areole, brig T. D. Wagner and schooner 
 Vapor were made prizes and destroyed. Coal being nearly 
 ■exhausted, the Olustee went southward again, but halted on 
 Nov. 6th off Cape Charles in the hope of attacking some of 
 
808 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the U. S. transports hove to in the prevailing gale. Here she- 
 was detected by the gunboat Sassacus, which chased her until 
 she was lost in the darkness. On the 6th the Sassacus again 
 saw her and kept up an unsuccessful pursuit all day. The next 
 day the Olustee was 60 miles off Wilmington bar and steam 
 was allowed to go down for repairs to the engines. Three ves- 
 sels looking like blockade-runners hove in sight. They were 
 the captured blockade-runners Margaret and Jessie, the Lil- 
 lian and the Banshee, converted into Federal cruisers, and 
 were soon joined by the gunboat Montgomery. Ward first 
 headed the Olustee out to sea and then wore short round and 
 steered for Wilmington bar. All the vessels opened fire upon 
 her, but the Montgomery was the only one close enough to be 
 feared. She replied with her after gun, distanced her pur- 
 suers and got into Wilmington unharmed. Her battery was 
 taken out and she was renamed the Chameleon. Under the 
 command of Capt. John Wilkinson, C S. N. , she ran the block- 
 ade of the Cape Fear Eiver, Dec. 24th, while the Federal fieet 
 was bombarding Fort Fisher, and started for Bermuda to pro- 
 cure a cargo of provisions for Lee's army. On her arrival at 
 St. George's on the 30th, she was seized by the British authori- 
 ties on the demand of the U. S. consul, but she had been so 
 thoroughly " whitewashed " by an ostensible sale at Wilming- 
 ton that she was to all intents and purposes a merchant ship. 
 Laden with provisions, she sailed from St. George's Jan. 19th, 
 1865, but on arriving off Kew Inlet Wilkinson found it closed 
 by the fall of Fort Fisher and put back to Nassau. On Jan. 
 30th the Chameleon left Nassau for Charleston, but the block- 
 aders were too thick for her off that port, and to Nassau she 
 returned. When he learned of the evacuation of Charleston, 
 Wilkinson resolved to take the ship to England and arrived at 
 Liverpool, April 9th. She was seized and sold by the British gov- 
 ernment and was about to enter the merchant service under the 
 name of the Amelia when the United States entered suit for pos- 
 session. The court awarded the vessel to that government, and 
 she -was handed over to the consul at Liverpool, April 36th, 1866. 
 The Chickamaxjga.— In the autumn of 1864, the Confed- 
 erate Navy Department found, at Wilmington, the small 
 twin-screw blockade-runner Edith, which was commissioned 
 as a cruiser under the name of the Chickamauga, and with 
 Capt. John Wilkinson, C. S. N., in command, was equipped 
 to follow the example of the Tallahassee in a raid upon the 
 enemy's commerce along the coast. She carried a light spar- 
 deck battery of three rifled guns, and started to sea on the 
 night of Oct. a9th. She got out safely, and although pur- 
 sued by a gunboat the next day, outfooted her without trouDle. 
 Twenty-four hours afterwards she opened her record as a 
 commerce destroyer by capturing the bark Mark L. Potter, 
 and within two days she made prizes within fifty miles of 
 N. Y., of the bark Emma L. Hall, ship Shooting Star, and 
 bark Albion Lincoln. All but the Lincoln were burned, and 
 
n .1 .. 
 
 
 I ,1 ! 
 
 HAL 
 
 $f'W' 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. SO^ 
 
 she was bonded to land the paroled prisoners, her captain 
 promising to put into no nearer port than Fortress Monroe, 
 but he steered directly for N. Y. and gave the alarm. The 
 Chickamauga ran up to the entrance of L. I. Sound, and off 
 Block Island took and scuttled the schooners Otter Rock and 
 Good Speed. A gale frustrated Capt. Wilkinson's intention 
 of making an incursion upon the ports of the Sound, and 
 going out to sea he captured the bark Speedwell. He put 
 into St. George's, Bermuda, and by having the condenser con- 
 veniently disabled obtained permission from the authorities to 
 remain a week for repair. Under the neutrality laws, then 
 being strictly enforced, he was allowed only enough coal to 
 take the ship to the nearest Confederate port; but by offering 
 the British customs oflBcer all the alcoholic load that his hold 
 could contain, he was made oblivious to the fact that the 
 Chickamauga' s bunkers were being pretty well filled up with 
 coal. The supply was still too short to admit of further cruis- 
 ing, and the ship ran the blockade back into Wilmington, thus 
 closing her history as a belligerent upon the high seas. In the 
 defence of Fort Fisher her officers and crew took a very prom- 
 inent and distinguished part. After that disaster the Chicka- 
 mauga was taken up the river, and burnt and sunk. 
 
 The Shenandoah.— The last of the Confederate cruisers, 
 and the one that, with the exception of the Alabama, inflicted 
 .the largest total of injury upon the commerce of the United 
 States, was the Shenandoah, which was purchased by Capt. 
 Bulloch to supply the place of the vessel sunk by the Kear- 
 sarge. She was originally the British merchant steamer Sea 
 King, equipped with a lifting screw so as to be used under sail 
 alone and was fully rigged as a ship, and was very fast under 
 either sail or steam. The whaling fleets of the United States 
 were the largest portion of its commerce remaining, and this 
 cruiser was especially fitted out to swoop down upon them. 
 Bulloch paid £45,000 for the ship, buying her through the me- 
 dium of an English merchant captain named Corbett, who 
 was to transfer her upon the high seas. At the same time he 
 purchased the blockade-runner Laurel and loaded her at Liv- 
 erpool with the guns, stores, etc., for the cruiser, and the 
 Laurel also carried out to the rendezvous all the officers ex- 
 cept Lieut. Whittle, who went in the Sea King to make him- 
 self acquainted with her. She sailed from London and the 
 Laurel from Liverpool on Oct. 8th, 1864. The Sea King was 
 cleared for Bombay or any port in the East Indies, and the 
 Laurel for Nassau. On the 18th they rendezvoused off Fun- 
 chal, Madeira, and proceeded to Las Desertas, an uninhabited 
 island near by, and in two days the armament and war mate- 
 rial were transferred to the Sea King; Capt. James I. Waddell 
 hoisted her new colors and took command of her as the Con- 
 federate States man-of-war Shenandoah. The battery placed 
 on board consisted of four 8-inch smooth-bore guns, two Whit- 
 worth 33-pounder rifles and two 12-pounders. The most seri- 
 
810 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 ous obstacle that met the ship at the outset of her career was 
 the paucity of lier crew. Eighty seamen had shipped for the 
 pretended voyage to the East Indies, and but twenty -three 
 consented to remain under the Confederate flag; so that; in- 
 cluding her nineteen commissioned and warrant ofificers, the 
 ship had but forty-two men on board ; but the crew was soon 
 brought up to the requisite number by enlistments from the 
 prizes she took. The roster of officers was as follows : 
 
 "Lieut. Connnanding James Ivedell Waddell;' First Lieuts., Wm. C. 
 Whittle, John Grimball, S. Smith Lee, Jr., Francis T. Chew; Second 
 Lieut., Dabney M. Scales; Acting Master, J. S. Bulloch; Acting Chief Eng., 
 Mat. O'Brien; Passed Assist. Surgeon, C. E. Lining; Acting Assist. Pay- 
 master, W. Breedlove Smith; Passed Midshipmen, O. A. Browne; JohnT. 
 Mason; Acting Assist. Surgeon, F. J. McNulty; Engineers— First Assist., 
 W. H. Codd; Second Assist., John Hutchinson; Third Assist., ErnestMug- 
 gaffeney; Acting Master's Mates, C. E. Hunt, J. T. Minor, Lodge Colton; 
 Acting Boatswain, Geo. Harwood; Acting Carpenter, J. O'Shea; Acting 
 Gunner, J. L. Guy; Sailmaker, Henry Alcott; Second Carpenter, J. Lynch. 
 
 Capt. Waddell steered for Australia, and before arriving 
 at Melbourne, Jan. 26th, 1865, made prizes of the barks Alina, 
 Godfrey. Edward, and Delphine ; schooners Charter Oak and 
 Lizzie M. Stacey, and brig Susan, all of which were burned. 
 The steamer Kate Prince was ransomed, to take home the 
 prisoners, and the bark Adelaide was bonded. At Melbourne, 
 the Shenandoah was permitted to go into a private dock for 
 repairs, and then trouble with the colonial authorities arose, 
 on an allegation that Capt. Waddell had shipped a British sub- 
 ject in the port, in violation of the Foreign Enlistment Act. 
 He refused to allow his ship to be searched, and his assur- 
 ances that he had committed no breach of neutrality were 
 accepted. The Shenandoah left Melbourne Feb. 8th, 1865, in 
 excellent condition, and in three months passed from that far 
 southern latitude to the beginning of her destructive work 
 among the whalers in the Okhotsk Sea, Behring's Sea, and 
 tlie Arctic Ocean. Between June 22d and the 28th she cap- 
 tured, and either destroyed or ransomed, 24 ships. They were 
 taken in couplets, triplets and quartets, and it was necessary 
 to release and bond four of them, in order to get rid of the 
 numerous prisoners. The earliest prizes were the Edward 
 
 ^Capt. Waddell was bom in Pittsboro', N. C States, that he was not hostile to the Constitution 
 
 In 1824, and was appointed niidshipmau in the of the United States; that he venerated the flag 
 
 TJ. S. naval service on Sept. 10th, 18il. He was and wished that he might hazard life and limb 
 
 asMigned to duty on the U- S. ship Pemisylvanin, in its defence against some foreign foe. It has 
 
 -at Portsmonth. Va. A few months after he been said that one of the causes of his resigna- 
 
 entered npon the discharge of hiw duties he was tinn was that he was engaged to be married to 
 
 shot in the hip in a duel with another midship- Miss Iglehart, the daugliter of James Iglehart, 
 
 man, which caused liim to limp to the day of of Annapolis, whose family was strongly inclined 
 
 his death. After several years of sea service, to the South. He married this lady in Dec. 1861. 
 
 during which he was promoted to lieutenant, he His resignation at the breaking out of the war 
 
 was, in 1 858, made assistant professor of naviga- was not accepted, and he stands on the U. S. 
 
 tinn at the naval academy at Annapolis. In navy register of 1862 as "dismissed." In Feb., 
 
 IS-dO he was ordered to the East India squadron, 1862, he ran the blockade to Richmond and en- 
 
 and in 1861, when the war broke out, mailed his tered the Confederate navy. His commission as 
 
 resignation from St. Helena. His reason for re- first lieut. bears date March 27th, 1862. He was 
 
 signing was given by him in a letter published assigned to duty at Drewry's Bluff defences, 
 
 by him in Jan. 1862, as owing to his " unwill- Subsequently he had a command in Charleston 
 
 inpness to bear arms against liis father's home harbor, from which he was assigned to "special 
 
 and relatives in the seceded States." He declared service," and in 1864 ran the blockade to take 
 
 explicitly tliat he had no property in the seceded command of the C. S. privateer Shenandoah. 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 81]. 
 
 Casey, Hector, Abigail, Euphrates, Wm. Thompson, Sophia 
 Thornton, Jireh Swift, Susan and Abigail, and Milo, the lat- 
 ter being sent to San Francisco, with the prisoners. In the 
 next batch were the Nassau, Brunswick, Hillman, Waverly, 
 Martha 2d, Congress 2d, Favorite, Covington, James Maury 
 and Nile. The two last-named were converted into cartels, 
 and took the prisoners to San Francisco, and the others 
 were burned. On one occasion eight prizes were taken 
 in a lump, as they had gathered around the disabled ship 
 Brunsivick, and when the octette was fired, that hyperbo- 
 rean sea was lit up'with a wondrous mass of fire. This oc- 
 curred on June 38th, near the mouth of Behring's Straits, and 
 comprised the last war exploit of the Shenandoah. She cap- 
 tured in all 38 ships, 34 of which were destroyed, and four ran- 
 somed ; their total value was stated by the masters at $1,361,- 
 «83. "Waddell had faithfully executed the programme of ob- 
 literating the American whaling industry in those regions. 
 It will be seen that many of his captures were effected 
 after the close of the war, and in consequence, Secretary 
 Welles accused him of continuing his belligerent operations 
 when he knew that the armies of the South had surrendered. 
 That malicious charge has been easily and completely re- 
 futed. From prizes taken on June 23d, he received papers 
 containing the correspondence of the preceding April, between 
 Grant and Lee, relative to the surrender of the latter ; but 
 they also informed him that the seat of the Confederate gov- 
 ernment had been removed from Richmond to Danville, and 
 that Pres. Davis had issued a proclamation giving assurances 
 of the continuation of the struggle by the Confederacy. With 
 his knowledge of the condition of things in America thus 
 limited, Capt. Waddell had no right to suppose that the war 
 had ended, or to cease his hostile endeavors. The Shenandoah 
 came out of the Straits on June 39th, and while running towards 
 the California coast spoke, on Aug. 2d, the British bark Bara- 
 couta, 14 days out from San Francisco, from whose captam 
 Waddell learned of the capture of Pres. Davis, and the capitu- 
 lation of the remaining military forces of the Confederacy. 
 The Shenandoah's guns were at once dismounted, ports closed, 
 funnels whitewashed, and the ship transformed, so far as 
 external appearance went, into an ordinary merchantman. 
 Waddell decided to give the ship up to the British authorities, 
 and brought her into Liverpool on Nov. 6th, not a vessel hav- 
 ing been spoken during the long voyage from the North Pacific. 
 He turned her over to Capt. Paynter, commanding her Maj- 
 esty's ship Donegal, who placed a prize-crew on board, and 
 Waddell communicated with Lord Russell, British Secretary 
 for Foreign Affairs. In this letter he stated his opinion that 
 the vessel should revert, with other property of the Confeder- 
 acv to the U. S. government^ and that point was quickly set- 
 tlecl'- but Mr. Adams raised the usual question of "piracy' 
 against the officers and men of the ship, and there was also a 
 
812 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 liability to proceedings under the Foreign Enlistment Act, if 
 British subjects could be found on board. Mr. Adams wanted 
 the officers and crew held, he said, until he could procure evi- 
 dence from San Francisco, that Capt. Waddell knew of the 
 downfall of the Confederacy before his latest seizures of 
 American vessels ; but the law officers of the crown decided 
 that there was no evidence to justify their detention. On 
 Nov. 8th, Capt. Paynter had the roll of the Shenandoah called 
 upon her deck, and as not a member of the ship's company 
 acknowledged to being a subject of Great Britain, they were 
 discharged, and allowed to depart. Mr. Adams, however, con- 
 tinued to urge the arrest of Capt. Waddell, on charges of piracy; 
 and when rebuffed by the British government, he brought for- 
 ward an affidavit made by one Temple, who purported to have 
 sailed in the Shenandoah. He alleged that the crew were chiefly 
 British subjects, and Mr. Adams claimed that they should have 
 been held for violation of the Foreign Enlistment Act, but noth- 
 ing came of his efforts ; and he was, indeed, chiefly prompted by 
 a motive to make up the record that was subsequently presented 
 to the Geneva tribunal. Capt. Waddell and his officers were 
 never molested. The Shenandoah was sold by the U. S. to the 
 Sultan of Zanzibar, and in 1879 was lost in the Indian Ocean. 
 
 Braine's Capture of the Chesapeake and Roanoke. — 
 Before daylight on the morning of Dec. 7th, 1863, while the 
 steamship Chesapeake, Capt. Willetts, was off Cape Cod on 
 her regular trip between N. Y. and Portland, Me., she was 
 seized by John C. Braine, purporting to be a lieutenant of the 
 
 C. S. navy, and fifteen men; who had come on board the ship 
 at N. Y. as passengers. In the struggle the second engineer 
 was shot dead, and the first mate wounded. To Capt. Wil- 
 letts Braine exhibited an order from John Parker, captain of 
 the C. S. steamer Betribution (whose true name was V. G. 
 Locke), instructing him to capture the vessel, and naming as 
 his assisting officers First Lieut. H. A. Parr, Second Lieut. 
 
 D. Collins, and Sailing Master Geo. Rowson. Braine headed 
 the vessel for the island of Grand Menan, off the coast of 
 Maine, where he expected to meet Parker. The latter, how- 
 ever, who had left the Retribution at Nassau, some months 
 previously, was encountered on a pilot-boat in the Bay of 
 Fundy, and assumed command of the Chesapeake, sending 
 Capt. Willetts and the passengers and crew of the steamer to 
 St. Johns by the pilot-boat. The Chesapeake made for Shel- 
 burne, N. S., to coal, and from thence went to La Havre River, 
 where Parker sold her cargo of provisions and liquors to the 
 people on shore. A half-dozen Federal cruisers had been sent 
 after the Chesapeake, and one of them, the Ella and Annie, 
 came up with her in Sambro harbor, near Halifax. Parker and 
 his party escaped to the shore, leaving on the steamer only her 
 former engineer, whom they had impressed into their service, 
 and a couple of her hands. Lying near her was the British 
 schooner Investigator, on board of which the commander of 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 813 
 
 ihe gunboat found and arrested a man named Wade, one of 
 Parker's party. He took the Chesapeake into Halifax to turn her 
 over to the British authorities for adjudication, and there Wade 
 was aided to escape by a number of citizens who sympathized 
 with the Southern confederacy. The affair gave rise to in- 
 tense excitement, and several of Braine's men were arrested on 
 warrants issued by a local magistrate, who committed them 
 for extradition on a charge of piracy. Their names were 
 ■Collins, McKinnon and Seely. An appeal was taken to the 
 Supreme Court of the province; and on March 10th, 1864, 
 Judge Ritchie ordered their release on the grounds that no 
 proper requisition had been made for their extradition; that 
 piracy was not an extraditable offence; that a magistrate had 
 no jurisdiction over questions of piracy, and that the warrant 
 was bad on its face. In these legal proceedings the Confede- 
 rate States had been represented by Hon. J. P. Holcomb, who 
 made an inquiry into all the circumstances of the capture 
 of the Chesapeake, and reported to Mr. Benjamin, Confede- 
 rate Secretary of State, who disavowed the responsibility of 
 of his government for the acts of Parker and Braine. His de- 
 cision was founded on the facts that Parker (Locke) was a 
 British subject who had organized the expedition in a British 
 colony, and had assumed to issue commissions in the Confed- 
 erate service to British subjects without being himself in that 
 service : that it was doubtful whether either Braine or Parr 
 was a Confederate citizen, and that Braine had, in any event, 
 divested himself of the chajracter of an officer engaged in le- 
 gitimate warfare by selling portions of the cargo of the Chesr 
 apeake instead of navigating her to a Confederate port. Mr. 
 Benjamin also distinctlj^ disclaimed "all attempts to organize 
 within neutral jurisdictions expeditions composed of neutral 
 subjects for the purpose of carrying on hostilities against the 
 United States." " In his view the captors of the Chesapeake 
 were men "who, sympathizing with us in a righteous cause, 
 erroneously believed themselves authorized to act as bellig- 
 erents against the U. S. by virtue of Parker's possession of 
 the letter-of -marque issued to the privateer Retribution." 
 Although the Confederate government would not demand 
 the surrender to it of the men arrested by the provincial 
 authorities, as their actual offence was " disobedience to her 
 majesty's proclamation, and to the foreign enlistment law of 
 ■Great Britain," Mr. Benjamin stated that Pres. Davis was 
 " much gratified that the superior judicial authorities of New 
 Brunswick have rejected the pretensions of the consul of the 
 United States that the parties engaged in this capture should be 
 surrendered under the Ashburton treaty for trial by the courts 
 of the U. S. on charges of murder and piracy." The temptation 
 to the Confederate government to claim the Chesapeake as a 
 prize was avoided by the frank avowal of Mr. Holcomb, that 
 
 " It is morally certain that the home government would not, under 
 the circumstances, allow a claim for compensation for the surrender of 
 
814 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 the vessel by the judicial authorities, and I cannot but think that the 
 presentation of such a claim by our government, and its rejection— the 
 case being one, as all must admit, very doubtful both in law and morals- 
 would impair its public prestige and weaken the moral weight which might 
 attach to its interposition upon future and more important occasions." 
 
 As the offence of piracy would have been just as triable in 
 the British provinces as in the U. S., new warrants were issued 
 by the provincial courts for the arrest of the implicated men; 
 but they had been warned, and had placed themselves outside 
 the jurisdiction of those tribunals. In Jan. 1864, proceedings 
 were taken in the admiralty court at Halifax upon the disposi- 
 tion to be made of the Chesapeake. Judge Stuart refused to 
 consider the suggestion that the Confederate government might 
 make an application for the vessel, the seizure of which de- 
 clared to be piracy, and ordered her return to her owners. 
 
 After escaping from the British provinces in Dec. 1863, 
 Braine and Parr were next heard of in the capture of the 
 steamship Roanoke, of the Havana line. She left Havana on 
 Sept. 29th, 1864, and in passing out of the harbor received on 
 board a party of passengers provided with regular tickets and 
 passports properly vised. These were disguised Confederates 
 under command of Braine and Parr, and that night, when well 
 out at sea, they made prisoners of the officers, and took posses- 
 sion of the vessel. The ship's carpenter made a resistance and 
 was killed, and the second engineer was wounded. Braine took 
 §21,000 in money contained in the ship's safe and headed for 
 Bermuda, arriving at St. George's on Feb. 4th. Without enter- 
 ing the harbor he obtained coal and provisions from a brig that 
 came out to meet him, and going to sea again encountered the 
 British hrigMathilde, to which he transferred the crew and pas- 
 sengers of the Roanoke, who were landed at Bermuda. He 
 then set the steamer on fire, and went ashore on Bermuda with 
 his men. They were arrested by the British authorities, but 
 were released after a brief detention. 
 
 At the close of the war, Braine came into the United States 
 trusting to be protected by Pres. Johnson's amnesty proclama- 
 tion. In 1866 he was arrested in N. Y. on the old charges of 
 piracy and murder. He was subsequently released from the 
 custody of the U. S. government. 
 
 United States Vessels Destroyed by Confederate Cruisers, 
 by the nashville. 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Harvey Bircli 
 
 Robert GilfiUan 
 
 Character. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 Nov. 19. 186X.. 
 
 Ship 
 
 
 66,000.00 
 
 Feb. 26, 1862.. 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Peraonal property. ... 
 
 
 BY THE OLUSTEE. 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 Nov. 
 Nov. 
 Nov. 
 Nov. 
 Nov. 
 Nov. 
 
 3. 1864., 
 3, 1864 . . 
 3, 1864., 
 1, 1864., 
 3, 1864. , 
 3, 1864. 
 
 Navie of Vessel. 
 
 A. J.Bird 
 
 Arcole 
 
 E. F. Lewis 
 
 Empress Theresa . . . . 
 
 T. D. Wagner 
 
 Vapor 
 
 Character. 
 
 Schooner. ... 
 
 Ship.... .... 
 
 Schooner. . 
 
 Bark 
 
 Brig 
 
 Schooner..., 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Vessel, etc. 
 
 Cargo 
 
 VeBsel, etc 
 
 Cargo. 
 
 Value. 
 
 $24,869.00 
 18.000.00 
 
 30,bb6!66 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 815 
 
 BY THE ALABAMA. 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 9, 1862., 
 13, 186-2. 
 
 6. 1863. 
 2, 1863. 
 2, 1863. 
 
 7, 1862. 
 29, 1862. 
 14,1862. 
 
 March 1, 1863. 
 Oct. 3, 1862. 
 March 25, 1863. 
 Jan. 27, 1863. 
 
 21, 1862. 
 
 19, 1863. 
 
 11, 1863, 
 
 16, 1862. 
 
 26, 1862 
 
 Sept. 
 Sept. 
 Nov. 
 June 
 July 
 Dec. 
 Oct. 
 Sept. 
 
 Nov. 
 June 
 Nov. 
 Sept. 
 Oct. 
 
 April 26, 1863. 
 
 Oct. 
 
 Sept. 
 
 Oct. 
 
 Jan. 
 
 Julv 
 
 Feb. 
 
 Jan. 
 
 Nov. 
 
 Jan. 
 
 Dec. 
 
 May 
 
 7, 1862. 
 
 18, 1862. 
 3, 1862, 
 
 14, 1864 
 6, 1863. 
 
 21, 1863. 
 
 26, 1863. 
 
 18, 1863. 
 
 11, 1863, 
 
 26, 1863 
 
 29, 1863. 
 March 2, 1863. 
 May 26, 1863. 
 April 15, 1863. 
 March 26, 1863. 
 Oct. 23, 1862. 
 
 15, 1862. 
 2B, 1862. 
 
 2, 1862. 
 
 4, 1863. 
 11, 1862. 
 
 , 1863. 
 
 24, 1863. 
 March 23, 1863. 
 Dec, 6, 1862. 
 March 25, 1863 
 April 24, 1862. 
 Sept. 8,1862. 
 
 5, 1862. 
 21, 1863. 
 
 3, 1863. 
 30, 1862 
 
 March 15, 1863. 
 April 23, 1864. 
 Aug. 5,1863., 
 3, 1863. 
 
 25, 1863. 
 
 26, 1863. 
 
 7, 1862, 
 
 6, 1863., 
 
 8, 1862., 
 
 9, 1862 , 
 April 27, 1864. . 
 Dec. 5,1862.. 
 
 3, 1863.. 
 17, 1862. 
 
 27, 1863 
 
 7, 1862.. 
 9,1862.. 
 
 10, 1863 
 
 Oct. 
 
 Oct. 
 
 Nov. 
 
 April 
 
 Oct. 
 
 Aug. 
 
 Dec, 
 
 Sept, 
 Feb, 
 Feb, 
 Nov. 
 
 May 
 May 
 Deo. 
 Sept. 
 June 
 Nov. 
 Oct. 
 
 May 
 
 Sept. 
 
 Feb. 
 
 Oct. 
 
 Sept. 
 
 Nov. 
 
 JYame of Vessel. 
 
 Alert 
 
 Altamaha 
 
 Amanda 
 
 Amazonian 
 
 Anna F. Schmidt . 
 
 Ariel (bonded) 
 
 Baron de Castine 
 
 Benj. Tucker 
 
 Bethia Thayer 
 
 Brilliant 
 
 Charles Hill 
 
 Chastelaiue 
 
 Clara L. Sparks . . . , 
 
 Conrad 
 
 Contest 
 
 Courser 
 
 Crenshaw 
 
 Dorcas Prince 
 
 Dunkirk 
 
 Elisha Dunbar 
 
 Emily Farnum . . . . 
 
 Emma Jane 
 
 Express 
 
 Golden Eagle 
 
 Golden Rule 
 
 Harriet Spalding , . 
 
 Hatteras 
 
 Highlander 
 
 Jabez Snow 
 
 John A. Parks 
 
 Justina 
 
 Kate Cory 
 
 Kingfisher 
 
 Lafayette (1) ,. .. 
 
 Lafayette (2) 
 
 Lamplighter 
 
 Lauretta 
 
 Levi Starbuck 
 
 Louisa Hatch 
 
 Manchester 
 
 Martha Weiizell. . 
 
 Martabau 
 
 Morning Star 
 
 Nina 
 
 Nora 
 
 Nye 
 
 Ocean Eover 
 
 Ocmnlgee 
 
 Olive Jane .- 
 
 Palmetto 
 
 Parker Cook 
 
 Punjab 
 
 itockingham , 
 
 Sea Bride 
 
 Sea Lark 
 
 S. Gildersleeve 
 
 Sonera 
 
 Starlight 
 
 Talisman 
 
 Thomas B. Wales, 
 
 Tonawanda 
 
 Tycoon 
 
 Union 
 
 Union Jack 
 
 Virginia , 
 
 Washington 
 
 Wave Crest 
 
 Weather Gage 
 
 Winged Kacer , 
 
 Ckaracter, 
 
 Ship 
 
 Brig 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Steamer..,. 
 
 Brig 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Brig 
 
 Schooner. . 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Schooner. 
 Schooner. . 
 
 Ship, 
 
 Brig 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Gunboat , . 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Brig 
 
 Schooner. . 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Schooner. 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Schooner., 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Schooner . 
 
 Snip 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Schooner. . 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Schooner., 
 Ship 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Vessel and outfits. . . . 
 
 Brig, outfits, etc 
 
 Vessel and freight, .. . 
 
 Bark and charter 
 
 Dif. val. and ins 
 
 U, S. Treasury notes . 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Vessel, Outfit, etc 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Bonded r 
 
 Vessel and Cargo 
 
 Released 
 
 Vessel and charter. . . 
 Vessel and freight. . . 
 
 Vessel and freight. , 
 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 Released. .. 
 Vessel, etc.. 
 Bonded ... 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Vessel, etc. 
 
 Merchandise . 
 
 Vessel, etc , . 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Vessel, etc.. 
 
 Value. 
 
 Bonded — 
 Vessel, etc. 
 Bonded ... 
 Vessel, etc. , 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Vessel, etc , 
 
 Vessel, etc. . 
 
 62,000,00 
 6,000.00 
 
 104,442.00 
 97 665.00 
 
 350,000.00 
 
 261,000.00 
 
 0,000.00 
 
 70,200.00 
 
 40,000.00 
 
 164,000.00 
 28,450,00 
 10,000.00 
 
 69,000 00 
 122,815.00 
 7,000.00 
 33,869 00 
 44,108.00 
 25,000.00 
 27,000,00 
 
 "iadoaoo 
 
 121,300.00 
 
 61,000.00 
 
 112,000.00 
 
 160,000.00 
 75,965,00 
 72,881.00 
 70,000.00 
 7,000.00 
 28,268.25 
 24,000,00 
 
 110,337.00 
 36,025.50 
 
 117,600.00 
 32,800.00 
 
 203,962.50 
 82,260.00 
 
 164,000 00 
 
 97,628.00 
 61,750 00 
 
 80,000.00 
 
 31,127.00 
 
 98,820.00 
 
 131,712,00 
 
 43,208.00 
 
 18,431.00 
 
 25,399.86 
 
 52,000,00 
 
 105.000.00 
 
 100,000.00 
 
 550,000.00 
 
 62,783.00 
 
 46,545.00 
 
 4,000.00 
 
 139,135.00 
 
 245,625.00 
 
 80,000.00 
 
 88,559.78 
 
 1,500.00 
 
 77.000.00 
 
 30,074.00 
 
 60,000.00 
 
 44,000.00 
 
 10,000.00 
 
 160,000.00 
 
 BT THE 
 
 CALHOUN (A STEAMER PITTED OUT AT NEW ORLEANS). 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 JYame of Vessel. 
 
 Clmracter. Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 May .. 1861.. 
 
 John Adams 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Brig 
 
 
 May „ 1861,, 
 May 29,1861.. 
 
 Mermaid 
 
 
 Panama 
 
 
«16 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 BT THE PliOBIDA. 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 March 13, 
 
 1863.. 
 
 Aug. 
 
 20, 
 
 1863.. 
 
 Jau. 
 
 12, 
 
 1863.. 
 
 March 29 
 
 1864.. 
 
 May 
 
 6, 
 
 1863. . 
 
 April 
 
 17, 
 
 1863.. 
 
 Jan. 
 
 22 
 
 1863.. 
 
 May 
 
 13, 
 
 1863 . 
 
 July 
 Jau. 
 Aug. 
 May 
 July 
 July 
 
 10, 1864. 
 19, 1863. 
 
 6, 1863 
 18, 1864. 
 10, 1863. 
 
 8, 1864. 
 
 July 1,1864.. 
 April 23,1863.. 
 Feb. 12,1863.. 
 June 17, 1863. , 
 March 9, 1863. 
 July 9,1864. 
 March 13, 1863. 
 Sept. 26, 1864. 
 April 24, 1863. 
 
 July " 8,' 1863. 
 June 6, 1863 . 
 Aug. 22, 1863. 
 March 6,1863. 
 July 7,1863. 
 June 26. 1863. 
 July 8, 1863. 
 Jan. 22, 1863. 
 June 17, 1864. 
 June 10, 1864. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Aldebaran 
 
 Anglo Saxon 
 
 Arabella 
 
 Avon 
 
 B. F. Hoxie 
 
 Clarence 
 
 Common weali^h. ... 
 
 Corris Ann 
 
 Crown Point 
 
 David Lapsley 
 
 Electric Spark 
 
 EBtelle 
 
 Francis B. Cutting . 
 
 Geo. Latimer 
 
 Gen. Berry 
 
 Golconda 
 
 Greenland 
 
 Harriet Stevens 
 
 Henrietta 
 
 Jacob Bell 
 
 Kate Dye 
 
 Lapwing 
 
 Margaret T. Davis. . 
 
 M. J. Colcord 
 
 Mondamin 
 
 Oneida 
 
 Red Gauntlet 
 
 Bienzi 
 
 Soutbem Gross 
 
 Southern Eights — 
 
 Star of Peace 
 
 Sunrise 
 
 Vamum H. Hill.... 
 
 Wm. B.Nash 
 
 Windward 
 
 Wm. C. Clark 
 
 Zelinda 
 
 Character. 
 
 Schooner.. 
 
 Ship 
 
 Brig. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 Vessel, etc. 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Brig 
 
 Ship 
 
 Brig 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Steamer. . . 
 
 Brig 
 
 Ship 
 
 Schooner . . 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Schooner.. 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Sliip 
 
 Schooner.. 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Schooner. 
 
 Brig 
 
 Brig 
 
 Brig 
 
 Bark 
 
 Vessel, etc.. 
 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 Cargo 
 
 Personal property, etc. 
 
 Cargo, etc . . 
 Vessel, etc. 
 
 Bonded . 
 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 Personal property, etc, 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 Vessel and cargo . 
 
 Vessel and cargo . 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Vessel and cargo . 
 
 $22,998.00 
 
 'TO.bob'.OO 
 ' 352,6o6'.6o 
 
 166.000.00 
 12,000.00 
 
 10,600.00 
 
 57,049.60 
 
 1,500,000.00 
 
 77.000.00 
 
 760,000.00 
 
 60,000.00 
 70,000.00 
 
 BT THE TALLAHASSEE. 
 
 Wlien destroyed. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Character. 
 
 Pr(^erty destroyed. 
 
 V(Uue. 
 
 Aug. 12,1864.. 
 Aug. 11,1864,. 
 
 Adriatic 
 
 Ship 
 
 Brig 
 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 
 Atlantic 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Bark 
 
 
 
 Aug. 11.1864.. 
 Aug. 10,1864.. 
 Aug. 11,1864.. 
 
 Bay State 
 
 BiHoTV 
 
 
 
 Briff 
 
 
 
 Carrie Estelle 
 
 Briff 
 
 
 
 Ship 
 
 
 
 Aug. 11,1364.. 
 Aug. 10,1864.. 
 Aug. 16,1864.. 
 
 
 BriET 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Floral "Wreath 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Bark 
 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 
 Grlenavon 
 
 Croodspeed 
 
 Howard 
 
 
 
 Aug. 12,1864.. 
 Aug. 12,1864.. 
 Aug. 11, 1864. . 
 Aug. 14,1864.. 
 Aug. 14,1864.. 
 Aug. 17,1864.. 
 Aug. 13, 1864. . 
 Aug. 15,1864.. 
 Aug. 16,1864.. 
 Aug. 17,1864. 
 
 
 
 Bark 
 
 
 
 Pilot-boat 
 
 
 $24,000.00 
 
 James Littlefield 
 
 T H Howen . ... 
 
 Ship , . . 
 
 
 
 
 
 JoHiah Achorae 
 
 Lamont Dupont 
 
 
 
 8,000.00 
 
 Schooner i . 
 
 
 
 
 
 Mercy A. Howes 
 
 North America 
 
 P. 0. Alexander 
 
 Pearl 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ve'sBel' etc ..'.*,""!!!!! 
 
 !"*'""..... 
 
 Aug. 16,1864.. 
 Aug. 23,1864.. 
 Aug. 20,1864.. 
 Aug. 11, 1864 . . 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Parah A. Boyce 
 
 Sarah Louisa 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Aug. 12,1864.. 
 Aug. 11,1864.. 
 
 
 
 
 ■William Bell . .. . 
 
 Pilot-boat 
 
 
 24,000.66 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 BT THE YORK. 
 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Character. Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 Aug. 9,1861.. 
 
 George V. Baker.... 
 
 ... Schooner.. Recaptured 
 
 
OOMMAN])KK JAMES I. WADDELL. C. S. N., 
 
 COMMANDING THK '■ SHENAN130AH." 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 817 
 
 BY THE SHENANDOAH. 
 
 Wken destroyed. 
 
 May 27, 1866 
 
 Deo. 
 
 Oct. 
 
 June 
 
 Nov. 
 
 June 
 
 Jnue 
 
 Dec. 
 
 Nov. 
 
 Deo. 
 
 April 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 April 
 
 April 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 Nov. 
 
 Nov. 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 April 
 
 June 
 
 Nov. 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 i. 1864. 
 
 30. 
 
 26, 1865 
 
 6, 1864. 
 .28, 1865 . 
 
 28, 1866. 
 
 29, 1864. 
 8, 1864. 
 4. 1864. 
 1. 1865. 
 
 21, 1366. 
 28,1865. 
 26, 1865. 
 26, 1865. 
 
 1, 18S5. 
 
 1, 1865. 
 28. 1866. 
 28, 1865. 
 26, 1865. 
 28, 1865. 
 24, 1866. 
 
 12, 1864. 
 
 13, 1864. 
 28, 1865. 
 
 23, 1865. 
 28, 1865. 
 26,1865. 
 
 1, 1365 . 
 
 24, 1865. 
 10. 1865. 
 25,1865. 
 23, 1866. 
 
 22. 1866. 
 26, 1365. 
 
 Narae of Vessel. 
 
 AbiRail 
 
 Adelaide 
 
 Alrna 
 
 Brunswick 
 
 Catharine . . ^ 
 
 Charter Oak 
 
 Gongre-ss 
 
 Covington 
 
 Delpiiine 
 
 D. Godfrey 
 
 Edward 
 
 Edward Casey 
 
 Euphrates 
 
 Favorite 
 
 Gen. Pike 
 
 Gipsey , 
 
 Harvest.... 
 
 Hector 
 
 Fillmore 
 
 Isaac Howland 
 
 Isabella 
 
 James Manry 
 
 Jireh Swift 
 
 Kate Prince 
 
 Lizzie M. Stacey. . . 
 
 Martha 
 
 Nassau 
 
 Nile 
 
 Nimrod 
 
 Pearl 
 
 Sophia Thornton.. 
 
 Susan 
 
 Susan and Abigail . 
 
 Waverly 
 
 Wm. Thompson. . . 
 Wm. C, Nye 
 
 Character. 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark , 
 
 Schooner., 
 Schooner.. 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship, 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Schooner. 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark ... . 
 
 BriK 
 
 Bark 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bark ... 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Vessel, etc. 
 Bonded , . . 
 Vessel, etc. 
 
 Ransomed. 
 Vessel, etc. . 
 
 Ransomed. . 
 Vessel, etc. . 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Vessel, etc.. 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 Vessel, etc. . 
 
 BY THE SUMTER. 
 
 Value. 
 
 $74,669,00 
 
 24,000.00 
 
 95,000.00 
 
 16,272.00 
 
 26.174.00 
 
 15,000.00 
 
 90,327.00 
 
 43,764.00 
 
 76,000.00 
 
 36,000.00 
 
 20,000.00 
 
 109,58-2.70 
 
 168,638,60 
 
 130,000.00 
 
 'so.'oo'o'.ob 
 
 34,769.00 
 75,000 00- 
 71,461.75 
 115,000.00 
 87,7fi6.(]0 
 
 '61,960.00 
 
 ' '36,060,66 
 66,0011.00 
 89,424.50 
 25,600.00 
 29,260,00 
 10.000.00 
 70,000,00 
 5,436.00 
 
 226,848.37 
 84,665.00 
 
 105,093.75 
 62,087.60 
 
 BY THE TACONY (A TENDER OP THE FLORIDA 1. 
 
 Wher 
 
 destroyed. 
 
 26. 1861.. 
 5, 1861.. 
 
 26, 1861.. 
 
 5, 1861 . . 
 4. 1861.. 
 
 27, 1861.. 
 8,1361.. 
 
 3, 1361 . . 
 18, 1862.. 
 27,1861.. 
 26, 1861 . . 
 
 6, 1361.. 
 
 4, 1861.. 
 26, 1861.. 
 
 6, 1861.. 
 18, 1862.. 
 3, 1861.. 
 6,1361.. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Character. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 July 
 July 
 
 Abbie Bradford 
 
 Albert Adams 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Briff 
 
 Recaptured. ..... .. 
 
 
 Released 
 
 Released 
 
 
 Nov. 
 
 Arcade ..... ...... 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Brig 
 
 Brie 
 
 
 July 
 July 
 Oct. 
 
 Ben Danning 
 
 
 Cuba ... 
 
 
 
 Daniel Trowbridge . . . 
 
 Ebenezer Dodge 
 
 Golden Rocket 
 
 Schooner 
 
 
 
 Dec. 
 
 Bark 
 
 
 
 July 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bonded 
 
 $40,000.00 
 15,000 00 
 
 July 
 Sept. 
 July 
 July 
 Nov 
 
 Joseph Maxwell 
 
 Joseph Parkes 
 
 Louis Kilham ..... 
 
 Bark 
 
 Briff 
 
 Released 
 
 
 Released . 
 
 
 Bark . 
 
 
 
 Brig 
 
 Released 
 
 
 
 Bonded 
 
 20,000.00 
 
 July 
 
 Naiad 
 
 Brig 
 
 Released 
 
 
 Bark 
 
 
 
 Dec 
 
 Vierilance ............. 
 
 Ship 
 
 
 40 000 00 
 
 July 
 
 "WestWind 
 
 
 Released 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 When destroyed 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Character. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 .TuTifi 93 1863 
 
 Ada 
 
 Schooner 
 
 
 June 12 1863 
 
 
 Brig 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Ship 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Schooner...... 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bonded 
 
 Recaptured 
 
 Cargo 
 
 
 Jnnp 94 1863 
 
 Archer •- 
 
 
 .Tnnp Ifi 1863 
 
 
 
 June 22,1863.. 
 
 Elizabeth Ann 
 
 
 
 Bonded 
 
 
 June 23, 1863,, 
 June 20,1363.. 
 June 20, 1863 . . 
 
 June 22 1363 
 
 
 
 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bonded 
 
 
 L. A. Macomber 
 
 Schooner 
 
 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Schooner 
 
 
 
 JiiTip 99 1863 
 
 Ripple • 
 
 
 June 22,1863.. 
 June 24, 1863.. 
 Imifi 14- 1863 
 
 Rtifus Choate ...... 
 
 
 
 Ship 
 
 Bonded 
 
 
 
 Bi-ig 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 
 June 22,1863.. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 32 
 
818 
 
 THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 BY THE GEORGIA. 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 Oct. 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 April 
 
 June 
 
 June 
 
 Oct. 
 
 June 
 
 July 
 
 9, 1863. 
 2«. 1863. 
 25, 1863. 
 25, 1863. 
 
 8. 1863. 
 13, 1863. 
 — . 1803. 
 22, 1863. 
 16, 1863. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Bold Hunter ... . 
 
 City of Biith 
 
 Constitution ... . 
 
 Dictator 
 
 Geo. Griswold.. . 
 
 Good Hope 
 
 John Watt 
 
 J. W. Seaver 
 
 Prince of Wales., 
 
 Character. 
 
 Ship.. 
 Ship . . 
 Ship. 
 Ship . . 
 Ship.. 
 Bark. 
 Ship.. 
 Bark . 
 Ship.. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Vessel, etc.. 
 
 VessLl. etc. 
 VesHc^l. etc, 
 Bouded. ... 
 Vessel, etc. 
 Bonded 
 
 Value. 
 
 BY THE CLAUENCE (A TENDER OF THE FLORIDA). 
 
 Wlien destroyed. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Character. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 June 7 18(53.. 
 
 Alfred H. Partridge.... 
 
 Caleb Cushhig 
 
 Kate Stewart 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Cutler 
 
 Bonded 
 
 
 June 24 1803.. 
 
 
 
 June 12. 1863 , . 
 
 Schooner, 
 
 Brig 
 
 Schooner , , 
 
 VeBsel, etc 
 
 
 June 9 1863,. 
 
 Mary Alvina 
 
 Mary Schindler 
 
 $11,301.00 
 
 June 12, 1863.. 
 
 
 June 12, 18(53.. 
 
 Bavk 
 
 
 
 June 6, 1863,. 
 
 "WhistlinK Wind 
 
 Conrad (s. Tuscaloosa) 
 
 Bark . 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 BY THE JEFF DAVIS (FITTED OUT AT CHARLESTON, JUNE, 
 
 28, 1861). 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 Navie of Vessel. 
 
 Character. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 June .. 1861., 
 
 T>. C. Pierce 
 
 Bark 
 
 
 .. 1861.. 
 
 Ella 
 
 Schooner 
 
 
 
 
 July 16.1861,, 
 Aug, ., 1861.. 
 
 Enchantress. . . . 
 
 
 
 
 John Crawford 
 
 John Welsh 
 
 Ship 
 
 
 
 July 16,1861., 
 
 Brig 
 
 
 
 June . . 1861 . . 
 
 Rowena 
 
 Bavk 
 
 
 
 July 16,1861.. 
 
 S. J. Waring 
 
 Schooner 
 
 Brig 
 
 Recaptured 
 
 
 July .. 1861.. 
 
 W. McGilvery 
 
 
 BY THE WINSLOW (FITTED OUT AT 
 
 WIIiMHS^GTON" IN 
 
 1861). 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 CJiaracter. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 July 18, 1861 . , 
 
 Herbert 
 
 Schooner ...... 
 
 
 
 Aug. 4, 1861 . . 
 
 Itasca •• 
 
 Brie 
 
 
 
 July . . 1861 . . 
 
 Mary Alice 
 
 Schooner 
 
 
 
 July .. 1861.. 
 
 Priscllla 
 
 Schooner . , 
 
 
 
 July 16,1861.. 
 
 Transit 
 
 Schooner 
 
 
 
 
 
 BY THE CHICKAM 
 
 AUG A. 
 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Character. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 Oct. 29,1864,. 
 
 Albion Lincoln 
 
 Emma L. Hall 
 
 M.L. Potter 
 
 Shooting Star 
 
 Bark 
 
 
 
 Oct. 31,1864.. 
 
 Bark 
 
 Vessel etc 
 
 
 Oct. 30,1864.. 
 
 Bark 
 
 
 
 
 Bark 
 
 Vessel, etc 
 
 
 BY THE RETRIBUTION (A SCHOONER FITTED OUT IN CAPE FEAR RIVER). 
 
 Whi'U destroyed. 
 
 Feb. 19, 1863. 
 Jan. 31, 1863. 
 Jan. 10. 1863. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Emily Fisher., 
 
 Hanover 
 
 J. P. Ellicott. 
 
 Character, 
 
 Brig , 
 
 Schooner., 
 Brig. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Cargo 
 
 Vessel, etc. 
 
 Vtdue. 
 
 $9,352.26 
 11,630.00 
 
 BY THE BOSTON (A STEAMER CAPTURED IN JUNE, 1863). 
 
 When destroyed. 
 
 JVame of Vessel. 
 
 Character. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 June 12.1803.. 
 
 Lennox 
 
 Bark 
 
 Bark... 
 
 Cargo 
 
 
 June 12,1863.. 
 
 Texaua 
 
 
 BY THE KCHO. 
 
 Wlten destroyed. Name of Vessel. 
 
 Cliaracter. 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Value. 
 
 July 9.1862.. Mary E.Thompson.... 
 
 Brig 
 
 
 July 9,1862.. 
 
 Mary Goodell 
 
 Schooner 
 
 
 
 BY THE TUSCALOOSA (A TENDER OF THE ALABAMA). 
 
 Wlien destroyed. 
 
 Name of Vessel. 
 
 Character. 
 
 Sept. 13, ia6;j.. 
 July 31,1863.. 
 
 Living Age 
 
 Santee 
 
 Ship 
 
 Ship 
 
 Property destroyed. 
 
 Bonded,, 
 
 Value. 
 
 $150,000.00 
 
THE CONFEDERATE STATES NAVY. 
 
 819 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 EEGISTEE OP THE COMMISSIONED AND WARRANT OFFICEES OP THE PHOVISIONAl 
 NAVY OF THE CONFEDEBATB STATES TO JUNE 1, 1864, PEOM THE NAVY EEGISTEE. 
 
 Secretary, S. R. Mallory ; Chief Clerk, E. M. 
 Tidball; Clerka, Z. P. Moses, T. E. Buchanan. 
 T. J. Kapier, 0. E. L. Stuart; Messenger, T. J. J. 
 Murray. Offtce of Orders and Detail : Chief of 
 Bureau, J. K. Mitchell; Eegister, etc., J. S. Jones; 
 Chief Clerk, G. Lee Brent. OfBce of Ordnance 
 and Hydrography : Chief of Bureau, John M. 
 Brooke; Chief Clerk, J. P. McCorkle ; Clerk, 
 
 A. B. Upshur. Office of Provisions and Cloth- 
 ing : Chief of Bureau, John De Bree ; Chief 
 Clerk, T. C. De Leon. Office of Medicine and 
 Siirgery; Chief of Bureau, W. A. W. Spotswood; 
 Chief Clerk, C. N. Pennell. 
 
 Admiral : Pranklin Buchanan. 
 
 Captains : Samuel Barron, Raphael Semiues, 
 W. W. Hunter, E. Parland, J. K. Mitchell, J. B. 
 Tucker. T. J. Page, R. P. Pinckney, J. W. Cooke. 
 
 CoMMANDEKS: T. R. Rootes, T. T. Hunter, I. N. 
 Browne, E. B. Pegram, W. L. Maury, J. N. Maf- 
 fltt, J. N. Barney, W. A. Webb, G. T. Sinclair, 
 G. W. Harrison, J. D. Johnston, John Kell, W. T. 
 Glassell, H. Davidson. 
 
 First Lieutenants : Washington Gwathmey, 
 John Rutledge, Joel S. Eeunard, Charles M. 
 Morris, John S. Maury, Charles W. Hays, 
 Charles C. Simms, J. Myers, A. P. Warley, John 
 W. Bennett, J. H. Carter, W. H. Parker, J. 
 Pembroke Jones, Wm. H. Murdaugh, James H. 
 Eochelle, Robert D. Minor, James I. Waddell, 
 Joseph Fry, Charles P. McGary, Robert R. Car- 
 ter, John B. Hamilton, Oscar F. Johnston, John 
 R. Egglesten, R. T. Chapman Wm. P. Camp- 
 bell, B. P. Loyall, Wm. H. Ward, John W. Dun- 
 nington, Francis E. Sheppard, Wm. G. Dozier, 
 Wm. L. Bradford, Hamilton H. Dalton, Wm. E. 
 Evans, George E. Shryock, Thomas K. Porter, 
 Joseph W. Alexander, Charles J. Graves, Thos. 
 
 B. Mills. Wm. C. Whittle, Jr.; Wm. A. Kerr, 
 John Grimball, Wm. K. Hall, Samuel W. Aver- 
 ett, H. B. Claiborne, George A. Borchert, Hilery 
 Cenas, Walter A. Butt, Wm. Winder Pollock, 
 A. D. Wharton, Thomas L. Dorntn, Thomas L. 
 Harrison, James L. Hoole, Francis L. Hoge, 
 Edmund G. Reed, Charles W. Read, S. G. 
 Stone, Alphonso Barbot, Robert J. Bowen, 
 W. Gift, Thomas W. W. Davies, Patrick Mc- 
 Carrick. Wm. F. Carter, Wm. H. Wall, W. W. 
 Carnes, John H. Ingraham, Wm. Van Corn- 
 stock, Richard F. Armstrong, Albert G. Hud- 
 gins, Charles K. King, James H. Comstock, 
 James D. Wilson, Julian M. Spencer, Sidney S. 
 Lee: Samuel Barron. Jr., E. Canty Stockton. J. 
 McCaleb Baker, John W. Murdaugh, Mortimer 
 M. Benton, Charles L. Harralson, Sidney H. 
 MoAdam, Francis T. Chew, Alexander M. 
 Mason, Thomas L. Moore. Ivey Foreman, Wal- 
 ter O'Crain, Joseph Price, Alexander Grant, 
 Charles E. Yeatman, Charles B. Oliver, Charles 
 W. Hasker, Francis Watlington, John L. Phil- 
 lips, George H. Arledge, M. T. Clarke, John A. 
 Payne, Henrv W. Ray, Wm. E. Hudgins, John 
 P. Ramsay. H. B. Littlepage, Lewis E. Hill, Ed- 
 ward J. Means, Henry Roberts, Richard H. 
 Gale, Richard C. Foute, Francis M. Koby, 
 Henry H Marmaduke, John Lowe, Arthur Sin- 
 clair, Jr. ; Wm. W. Roberts, Edgar A. Lambert, 
 Otey Bradford, Joseph M. Gardner, Matthew P. 
 Goodwyn, Americus V. Wiatt, Thos. L. Skinner, 
 Charles Borum, J. V. Johnson, C. L. Stanton. 
 
 Second Liedtenants ; J. P. Claybrook, E. S. 
 Floyd, W. P. Mason, W. P.Eobinson, J. E. Price, 
 
 D. A. Telfair, Daniel Trigg, I. C. Holcome, 
 W.E. Dalton, A. S. Worth E, A. Camm.D. M. 
 Scales, J. T. Walker. S. S. Gregory, W. W. Eead, 
 
 E. H Bacot, E. J. McDermott, R. B. Larmour, 
 T. P. Bell, J. W. Billups. 
 
 Subgeons : J. W. B. Greenhow, W. D. Har- 
 
 rison, Wm. P. Carrington, Charles H.Williamson , 
 Arthur M. Lynah, Daniel B. Conrad, F. L. Gait, 
 W. M. Page, H. W. M. Washington, A. G. Garnctt. 
 
 Passed Assistant Surgkons ; Frederick Gar- 
 retson, J. W. Sanford, T. J. Charlton, C. E. Lin- 
 ing, M. P. Christian, R. J. Freeman, B. W. Green, 
 J. W, Herty, J. E. Lindsay, O. S. Iglehart. 
 
 -Assistant SnBGEONS: C. M. Morfltt, T. B. Ford, 
 E. R. Glbbs, B. G. Booth, Thos. Emory, W. M. 
 Turner, John De Bree, Marcellus Ford, W. W. 
 Graves, W. J. Addison, N. C. Edwards, S. S. Her- 
 rick, N. M. Read, John Leyburn. ,E. C. Powell, 
 R. C. Bowles, J. P. Lipscomb, W. C. Jones, W. 
 Sheppardson, C. M. Parker, C. W. Thomas, 
 H. B. Melviu, W. S. Stoakly.W.W. Griggs, J. P. 
 Tipton, G. B. Weston, G. N. Halstead. J. V. Cook, 
 J. O. Grant, Pike Brown. H. G. Land, G. W. Clai- 
 borne, J. M. Hicks, J. G. King, D. E. Ewart, Ed. 
 Claire, J. V. Harris, L. R. Dickinson, J. B. Ruth- 
 erford, G. A. Foote, N. K. Henderson, J. W. Bel- 
 ine, W. L. Warner, Robert Kuykendall, J. G. 
 Thomas, W. E. Bondurant, J. E. Moyler, Fred. 
 Peck, H. B. Paisy, J. E. Duffel, J. G. Bigley, 
 K. Goldborough. 
 
 Paymasters; Felix Senac, James O. Moore, 
 Richard Taylor, James E. Armour. 
 
 Assistant Paymasters: D. F. Forrest, W.B. 
 Micon, L.E.Brooks, J. S. Banks, J. J. McPher- 
 son, M. M. Seay, G. H. O'Neal, W. J. Eichardson, 
 P. M. DeLeon, Adam Tredwell. Edw. McKean, D. 
 
 C. Seymour, L. B. Reardon, W. H. Chase, H. E. 
 McDuffle, W. M. Ladd, S. S. Barksdale, S. S. 
 Nicholas, Chas. W. Keim. W. E. Deacon, T. G. 
 Eidgely, J. M. Pearl, L. M. Tucker, C. L. Jones. 
 W. B. Cobb, J. P. Wheliss, M. L. Southron, 
 Marsden Bellamy, B. M. Herriot, N. K. Adams, 
 W. A. Hearne, C. G. Pearson. 
 
 Masteks in Line op Promotion: S. P. Blanc, 
 G. D. Bryan, Wyndam E. Mayo, D. D. Colcock, 
 W. P. Hamilton, J. C. Long, H. L.Vaughan, J. M. 
 Pearson, H. S. Cooke, G. W. Sparks, W. J. Craig. 
 
 Masters Not in Line of Promotion: — John 
 Pearson, Lewis Parrish, A. Pacetty, Richard 
 Evans, P. M. Harris, John 0. Minor, C. W. John- 
 son, W. B. Whitehead, H. W. Perrin, B. W. 
 Guthrie, Charles A. MoEvoy, William D. Porter, 
 James W. McCarrick, Lewis Musgrave, Peter W. 
 Smith, G. Andrews, A. L. Myers, J. Y. Beall,, 
 
 D. W. Nash, Thomas L.Wragg, George M. Peek, 
 Henry Wilkinson, Julian Fairfax, G. A. Peple, 
 Levi G. White, Edward McGuire, John Maxwell, 
 Bennett G. Burley, S. Milliken, Seth Poster, 
 John L. Ahem, John Webb, B. J. Sage, Charles 
 Beck, Lewis N. Huck, G. W. Armistead, B. J. 
 Sherley, George W. Smith, John A. Curtis, Wil- 
 liam Collins, C. M. Hite, A. Eobinson, C. Linn, 
 John M. Gibbs, Henry Yeatman, C. E. Girardy, 
 W. Frank Shippey, Louis Gonnart, James Ca- 
 hoon, Charles E. Little, John E. Hogg, Joseph 
 
 E. DeMahy, H. D. Edinborough, Wm. A. Hines, 
 John C. Braine, W. B. Cox, Lemuel Langley. 
 
 Midshipmen — Third Class, Senior: P. H 
 Gibbs, W. N. Shaw. P. C. Morehead, George A. 
 .Toiner, Roger Pinckney, C. Cary, R. J. Deas, B. 
 Carter, C. P. Sevier, W. P. Clayton, W. K. Hale, 
 
 F. M. Berrien, Thomas O. Pinckney, A. O. 
 Wright, H. H. Scott, H. H. Tyson, P. B. Doonin, 
 P. H. McCarrick, P. M. Thomas, P. S. Hunter, 
 W. T. Carroll, D. M. Lee, J. B. Eatcliffe, C. 
 Meyer, James R. Norris, W. D. Goode, L. M. 
 Rootes, E. J. Crawford, L. D. Hamner, Thomas 
 Wherritt, E. M. Jones, D. B. Talbott, R, E. 
 Pinckney, H. J. Ellett, Raphael Semmes, Jr., 
 A. M. Harrison, O. S. Manson. E. B. Prescott. 
 
 Midshipmen — Third Class, Juniob; D. A. 
 Dixon, John T. Lomax, John A. Lee, George B. 
 Cloud, John H. Inglis, H. T. Minor, W. S. Hogue, 
 
S20 
 
 THE CONFEDERA.TE STATES NAVY. 
 
 J. D. Howell, John Johnson, Lewis Levy, J. G. 
 Atinnegerode, A. S. Doak, G. A. Wilkina, JohO 
 D. Trimble, J. De B. Northrop, Ricliard Slaugli. 
 ter, Eugene Phillips, H. J. Warren, John T. 
 Schari", W. A. Lee, A. T. Hunt, Preston B. Moore. 
 
 Midshipmen— FoTjiiTH Class: Wm. M. Snead, 
 W. J. Claiborne, W. S. Davidsou.W. D. Haldman, 
 J. C. Wright, M. J. McRae. W. H. Payne, B. S. 
 Johnson. F. S. Kennett, F. L. Place, C. R. Breck- 
 enridge. C. G. Dandridge, T. D. Stone. 
 
 Midshipmen : R. B. Fluyd, R. J. Moses, W. W. 
 Wilkinson, O. A. Browne, John T. Mason, Wm. 
 B. Smclair, James W. Pegram, J. H. Hamilton, 
 J. H. Dyke, V. Newton, G. D. Bryan, G. T. Sin- 
 clair. W. H. Sinclair. I. D. Bulloch, Eugene Maff- 
 itt. E. M. Anderson, J. A. Wilson. J. M. Morgan. 
 
 Chief Engineebs; Michael Quinu, Charles 
 Scbroeder, Henry X. Wright, James H. Toombs. 
 
 First Assistant Engineeks : G. W. City, C. H. 
 Levy. Loudon Campbell, G. D. Lining.W. J. Free- 
 man, H. B.Willy, Hugh Clark, M. P. Jordan, J.H. 
 Loper, W. T. Morrell, G. W. Tennant. Benj. Her- 
 ring, J. T. Tucker. W. Abern, J. R. Jordan, J. J. 
 Darcy, W. Youngblood, C. W. Jordan, E. A. Jack, 
 W. P. Brooks. 
 
 Second Assistant Engineeeb: E. G. Hall, 
 Isaac Bowman, J. F. Green, Junius Hanks, J. M. 
 Freeman, Jr., C. H. Collier, N. O'Brien, W. M, 
 Fauntleroy, Leslie King, J. L. Foster, R. J. Kil- 
 patrick, W, B. Brockett, J. C, Johnson, D. H. 
 Pritcbavd, J. C. O'Connell, E. H. Brown, J. H. 
 Dent, Johii Langdon, L. A McCarthy, J. S. West, 
 J. J. Lyell, John Hayes, Jos. Cardy, G. W. Cald- 
 well, Richard Finn, E. L. Dick, J. H. Baily. 
 
 Third Assistant Engineers: J. T. Doland, 
 R. J. Caswell.W. F. Harding, J. H Parker, F. G. 
 ^Miller, S. B. Jordan, J. K. Langborne, J. W. 
 Tnmlinson. H. H. Roberts, E. F. Gill, R. J. Hack- 
 ley. J. B. Brown, G. A. Bowe, A. De Blanc, C. C. 
 Leavetl. C. S. Peek, A. J. Schwarzmau, M. P. 
 Young, M. A. Newberry, B.F. Drago, Oscar Ben- 
 son, J. C. Phillips, W. A, Luddington, Wm. 
 Rogers, W. R. Doury, Peter Faithful, Donald 
 McDonald, W. B. Patterson, E. P. Weaver, M. J. 
 Cohen, J. T. Reams, R. S. Herring, J. W. Mc- 
 Grath, H. B. Goodrich, G. Wainwright, J. J. 
 Kerrish, John Applegate, J. N. Ramsey, J, B. 
 Weaver, R.E. Edwards, J. J McGrath, Wm. C. 
 Purse, T. O. McClosky, C. B. Thompson, R. J. 
 O'jSeal, J. F. Robinett, Achilles Lombard. J. P. 
 Miller. W. C. Tilton, A. P. Wright, C. W. Ridle, 
 W. H. Handy, G. H. Wellington, J. L. Mf Donald, 
 S. K. Mooers. R. J. Smith, J. J. Lacklison, B. H. 
 Bates, E. J. Dennigan, J. E. Vieruelson, E. T. 
 Homan, Holmes Ahei-n, Henry Discher, James 
 Carlon, J. H. Haly. 
 
 Boatswains : Lester Seymour, Thos. Ganley, 
 A, J. Wilson, Andrew Blakie, J. C. Cronin, John 
 Kavauaugh, Jas. Smith. W. J. Smith, H. J. Wil- 
 son, J. J. Ingrabam, John IMcCredie, Robt. Me- 
 Calla, Peter Taff. John Cassidy, John Brown. 
 
 Gunners: John Oweuw, John A. Lovett, Wm. 
 Cuddy, J. G. McCluskey, Z. A. Offutt, Wm. H. 
 Haynes, T. B. Travers, W. A. Flemming, G. M. 
 Thompson, E. R. Johnson, H, P. Schisano, E. G. 
 Williams. B. F. Hughes, Wm. Shelly, T. Baker, 
 W. F. Brittiiigham. C. Gormly, B. A. Barrow, W. 
 J. Ballentvuo, John Raabe. J. I. Mayberry, John 
 Waters, Hugh McDonald. C. E. Porter, H. L. 
 Smith, R. J. Webb, Ira W. Porter. 
 
 Carpenters: R. M. Baine, J. T. Rustic, J. M. 
 Burroughs, G. D. Fentress, Wm. B. Jarvis, R. J. 
 Meads. 
 
 Sail-makers : William Bennett, E. A. Maho- 
 ney, S. V. Turner, M. P. Beaufort. Geo. Newton. 
 
 Acting Masters' Mates : J. L. Ahem, Wm 
 McBlair, J.T. Mayberry, J. A. Riley ,T,T. Himter, 
 Jr., J. C. Young. W. G. Porter, T. B. BoviUe, T, 
 L. Wi-agg, G. Waterman, W. W. Skinner, J. Y. 
 Benson, J. T. Layton, T. J. Hudgins, W. Smith, 
 R. Benthall, A. E. Alberton, T. E. Gibbs. S. 8. 
 Foster, C. Russell, T. M. Hazlehurat, B. M. Fogar- 
 
 tie, J. C. Turner, C. B. Bohannon, G. Atchison, 
 S. A. Brockenton, J. A. Rosier, E. M. Skinner, 
 H. C. Barr, E. C. Parsons, J. A. Paschall, R. 
 Battle, E. P. Winder, J H. Turner, J. H. Hart, W. 
 U-. Fitzgerald, F. B. Green, G. N. Golder, L. S. 
 Seymour, W. M. Snead, W. D. Oliveira, W. N. 
 Brown, Edward W. Jordan. O. L. Jenkins, C. 
 Hunter, C. M. Selden, C. E. Bragden, P. M. Baker, 
 W. B. Littlepage, S. L. Simpson, L. L. Foster, R. 
 N. Spraggins, E. T. Haynie, J. J. Bronson, E. C. 
 Skinner. W. S. Forrest, W. R. Howie, C. E. Mc- 
 Blair, A. Campbcai,E. W. C. Mayhin, A. G.Hall, 
 J. R. Murray, W. R. Rowe, H. Gilliland. J. B. 
 Chisman. C. Neil, W. A. Lamkin, R. M. Carter, 
 A. McMillan, J. C. Graves, J. E. Ferral» R. Pree- 
 mai), P. Power. A. G- Corran, J. C. Hill, W. E. 
 Lester, T. S. Gray. M. J. Beebe, L. Pitta, J. J. 
 Whitehead, W. A. MarscLalk, R.Webb, T. Mason, 
 G. C. Lyon, J. M. Hazlehurst, C. F. Curtis, A. 
 W. Johnson, F. Marschalk, C. J. Yonge, P. G. 
 Webb, H. Hermier. L. Bowdoin, E. Smith, W. A. 
 Collier, C. Frazee, C. K. Floyd. 
 
 The following names of regular officers in the 
 Navy Register of January 1st, 1S64, are not 
 among those of the Provisional Navy in the 
 Register of June Ist, 186i: Captains— Lawrence 
 Rosseau, French Forrest, Josiah Tatnall, V. M. 
 Randolph, Geo. N. HoUins, D. N. Ingraham,Wm. 
 
 F. Lynch, Isaac S. Sterrett, S. S. Lee, Wm. C. 
 Whittle. Commanders — Robert D. Thorburn, 
 Robt. G. Robb, Murray Mason, C. H. McBlair, 
 A. B. Fairfax, Richard L. Page, Fred'k Chatard, 
 Arthur Sinclair, C. H. Kennedy, Thos.W. Brent, 
 Matthew F. Maui-y.Geo. Minor, H. J. Hartstene, 
 J. L. Henderson, W. T. Muse. C. F. M. Spotswood, 
 C. Ap. R. Jones. J. Taylor Wood. Commanders 
 FOR THE War: Jas. D. Bulloch, James H. North, 
 JohnM. Brooke. First Lieutenants— F. B.Ren- 
 Bhaw, C- B. Poiudexter, H. H. Lewis, P. W, Mur- 
 phy, John J. Guthrie, Van R. Morgan, Edward L. 
 Winder, John H. Parker, John Wilkinson, C. M 
 Fauntleroy, A. McLaughlin, A M. De Bree, N. H. 
 Van Zant, D. P. McGorkle, Wm. Sharp, Joa. D. 
 Blake, Thos. P. Pelot, Philip Porcher. Lieuten- 
 ants for the War— Joshua Humphreys, S. W. 
 Corbin. Jas. L. Johnson, Thos.W. Benthall, John 
 
 G. Blackwood, Wm. H. Odenheimer, Edward E. 
 Stiles. Surgeons— Jas. Comick,Wm. F. Pattou, 
 W. A. W. Spotswood, Lewis W. Minor, W. F. Mc- 
 Clenahan. John T. Mason, William B. Sinclair, 
 Richard Jeffery, Jas. F. Harrison, D. D, Phillips, 
 Chas. F. Fahs,Wm. E. Wysham. Paymasters— 
 John De Bree, Thos. R.Ware, Jas. A. Semple.John 
 Johnston, W. W. J. Kelly, Jas. K. Harwood, Geo. 
 H. Ritchie, Henry Myers, John W. Nixon. Mas- 
 ters IN Line of Promotion — Richard H. Bacot. 
 Masters not in Line of Promotion — Wm, H. 
 Carlon. Passed Midshipman — A. P. Beirne. 
 Engine ER -in-Chief— Wm. P.Williamson. Chief 
 Engineers— Jas. H. Warner, Thos. A. Jackson, 
 Virginius Freeman, E.W.Manning, H.A.Ramsey, 
 Wm. Frick, J. W. Tynan. First Assistant 
 Engineers— W. S. Thompson, W. P. Riddle. 
 Naval Constructors— John L. Porter, chief; 
 and J. Pearce, W. A. Graves, acting constructors. 
 
 The C. S. Navy Rejiister for January. 1864, 
 gives the following roster of the Marine Corps: 
 Colonel Commandant — L. J. Bcall. Lieutenant 
 Colonel— H. B. Tyler. Major— G. H. Terrette. 
 Paymaster with rank of Major — R. T. AlUson. 
 Adjutant with rank of Major — Israel Greene. 
 Quartermaster with rank of Major — A. S. 
 Taylor. Captains— J. D. Simms, J. R. F. Tatnall, 
 A. J. Hayes, G. Holmes, R. T. Thom, A. C. Van 
 Benthuysen, J. E. Meiereand T. S.Wilson. First 
 Lieutenants- C. L. Sayre, B. K. Howell, R. H. 
 Henderson, D. G. Raney. J. R. Y.Fendall, T. P. 
 Gwynn, J. Thurston, F. H. Cameron, F. Mac Ree. 
 Second Lieutenants— D Bradford, N. E. Vena- 
 ble, H. L. Graves, H. M. Doak, Albert S. Berry, 
 E. F. Neuville, D. G. Brent. J. C. Murdoch, S. M. 
 Roberts, John L, Rapier. 
 
INDEX 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Allegiance to TJ. S 12 
 
 Alabama, Commission 782 
 
 Arms in the South 15, 10, 24, 36, 132 
 
 Auction sales 470, 484 
 
 Admiralty courts 117, 432 
 
 Alexander, Col..' 116 
 
 Acquia Creek batteries 95 
 
 Alexander, J. W 167, 164, 187, 210, 377, 
 
 383, 389, 395, 044, 708 
 
 Arkansas Post 347, 348 
 
 Alabama 633 
 
 Arms in 16 
 
 Secession of 21 
 
 Organizing a Navy 534 
 
 Allison, E. T 771 
 
 Albemarle, Ram ...402,403,409, 765 
 
 Appalachicola, Expedition to 619 
 
 Arkansas, Earn 303, 314, 333 
 
 Arledge, G. H 644 
 
 Alabama. Cruiser 164, 782, 785, 789, 796 
 
 Vessels Cajjturedby 797, 798, 815 
 
 Averett, S. W 245,791 
 
 Atlanta, Eam 637,638, 644 
 
 Archer, Cruiser 792 
 
 Arsenals in the South 16, iS, 24 
 
 Arkansas, Secession Of 24 
 
 Aiken, Privateer : 86 
 
 Armstrong, K. F 421. 786, 797 
 
 Blanc, S. P 660, 619, 621 
 
 Baker, Page M...533. 540, 641, 643, 546, 649, 697 
 
 Bermuda 466 
 
 Battery Buchanan 418 
 
 Baton Eouge, Attempt to Capture 332 
 
 Barbot, A 308,311,550. 644, 669 
 
 Beaufort, Gunboat.... 167, 162, 164, 369, 392. 708 
 
 Baltic, Eam 660, 692 
 
 Barney, J. N 158, 187, 209, 216, 510, 708, 792 
 
 Brooke, J. M : 138, 145. 238 
 
 Borchett, G. A.. 550 
 
 Baker. J. M'C 539, 642, 545, 647, 618 
 
 Butt. W 154.208,744 
 
 Bnlloch, J. D 43,639, 783, 797, 802, 804 
 
 Benjamin, J. P 682 
 
 Bennett, J. W. 660, 656, 666, 675, 670. 579, 597, 795 
 
 Berrien ..421, 425 
 
 Baltimore and Ohio Eailroad 105 
 
 Bradford, "W. L ; 555,570,745, 790 
 
 Brent, W. T , 661, 653 
 
 Bowen, E. J 674, 706 
 
 Blockade of Southern Ports 65, 433, 436, 498 
 
 of the Potomac 94, 493 
 
 of the Mississippi Eiver 240, 274 
 
 Atlantic Coast 434 
 
 Key "West '. 611,612 
 
 Breaking at Charleston 677 
 
 James River 733 
 
 Eondbf Privateer 69 
 
 Bier. G. H 675, 693 
 
 Beauregard, Privateer 86 
 
 Bacot, E. H..' 675 
 
 BalTon, S 96, 109, 295, 371, 375,773, 802 
 
 Benton, M.M 746, 807 
 
 Buchanan, F..109. 154, 157. 166, 191. 228,421, 
 
 540, 649, 650. 651, 557, 560, 669, 583, 687, 772 
 Blockade Running.... 428, 471, 472, 481, 488, 491 
 
 Bean,I,'J.; 770 
 
 Brittingham, W.F ■- 774 
 
 Brown, N. 1 306, 311, 321, 322, 323, 333, 
 
 337. 340, 341, 693, 702 
 
 Beall, J.y 719,720, 721 
 
 Brain, J. C .....723, 813 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Bells for Cannon 727 
 
 Brcokenridge, C. B 777, 780 
 
 Buoyant Torpedo 764 
 
 Boston, "Vessels captured by 818 
 
 Billups, J. W 774 
 
 Borchert, G. A 806 
 
 Chicora, Eam,... 670, 671, 678, 691, 698, 701, 706 
 
 Cenas, H 650 
 
 Cook, H. S 398 
 
 Carr. John F. , Gunboat 497, 405 631 
 
 Charlotte, N. C 373 
 
 Cowley, C 476 
 
 Cbatard, F 99, 708 
 
 Cushing, "W.B 413,421, 765 
 
 Congress, Fi-igate 159, 165 
 
 Cotton, Gunboat 500, 603 
 
 Campbell, "W. P. A ,660,636, 802 
 
 Carter, K. R 143,481, 806 
 
 Chapman. R, T.. . " 263, 418, 420, 786, 804 
 
 Chameleon, Blockade-runner 490, 808 
 
 Charleston. .37, 48, 60, 66, 438,441,468,487,657, 661 
 
 Siege of 697 
 
 Defences of 685 
 
 Stone fleet , 435, 662 
 
 Mason and Slidell left 661, 684 
 
 Breaking blockade 674,683,684, 686 
 
 Attempt to captxire monitors 687 
 
 Evacuation of 707 
 
 Cary, Clarence.... 421, 422, 675, 693, 766, 781, 795 
 
 Cotton seizures 446 
 
 Cumberland, Frigate 159,166 
 
 Chattahoochee, Gunboat 48, 617, 622 
 
 Calhoun, privateer, "Vessels captured by 90 
 
 Coal 466 
 
 Cooke,J."W 140,389,391,392,395, 404, 408 
 
 Consuls at Charleston 682. 683 
 
 Cooke, H. F 140 
 
 Carter.J. H 630 
 
 Charleston, Ironclad 671, 706 
 
 Chickainauga, Cruiser..422, 463,688, 766, 782, 809 
 
 "Vessels captured by ... ; 818 
 
 Columbia, Ironclad 672, 706 
 
 Coaltorpedo 762 
 
 Cushing Caleb, Capture of 794 
 
 Confederate States 
 
 Organization of navy 27, 28, 33, 47 
 
 "Want of preparation for war 16 
 
 Navy offtcers. . 11,32,33,47.91.481,819, 820 
 
 Providing munitions of war , 28, 39, 61 
 
 Expenditures of 32 
 
 Blockad'e of ports 56 
 
 Recognized as belligerents 57 
 
 Foreign affairs 428 
 
 Admiralty courts 432 
 
 Blockade running 483 
 
 Marine Corps 769 
 
 Naval Academy 772 
 
 Torpedo Corps 753 
 
 Cruisers , 782 
 
 Commissioned and Warrant Officers C. S. N. 
 
 819, 820 
 
 Clarence, Cruiser, vessels captured by 794 
 
 Clock-work torpedo 1 763 
 
 Oomstock. "W. "Van 774 
 
 Chew, F. T 811 
 
 Cruisers, History of 282 
 
 Courts o£ Admiralty 432 
 
 Comstock, J. H." 573,575, 679 
 
 Chesapeake, Capture of 813 
 
 Davis. Jefferson 28, 63,69,68,75, 
 
 303, 487, 611, 645, 777, 778, 779, 807