to glance at those that line the left-hand side. In the mean while, Fort Sumter at their nearest approach, are separated by an interval of a inile, formed by the entrance to the harbor; and, just in the mid-rises up conspicuously before us in middle of this passage, and right between the two points of land, stands Fort Sumter, built on an artificial island made in midchannel. Both Morris and Sullivan's islands are scarcely removed above the level of the sea; which, indeed, would probably invade and cover them, were it not that the margin of the islands on their sea-frontage is marked by a continuous, narrow strip of low sand hills, some five or six feet in height. Behind the second ridge of the islands, are alternate salt marsh, sand, and clumps of wood of live-oak, palmetto, and tangled tropical undergrowths. The whole coast of South Carolina and Georgia consists of a labyrinth of islands and islets of this character, round which reedy creeks and rivers wind. "With Sullivan's island on our right, we run the eye up to its upper or north end, formed by Breach inlet. Guarding this point, is Breach inlet battery-a powerful sand-work, having a circular, dome-like, bomb-proof magazine in its center. It is, however, three miles from the entrance of the harbor, and will not be able to molest our ships on their passage. Its chief value has been to aid blockade-runners; as it covers Maffit's channel (the passage through which the great majority of these craft run in) from the approach of our blockaders. At present, it will serve to oppose our landing troops at Breach inlet, should the attempt be made. Coming down along the shore of Sullivan's island, from Breach inlet, we next reach Fort Beauregard, a powerful sand battery, mounting very heavy guns, and situated on the turn of the island a little right of the 'Moultrie House' hotel, from which it is separated only by five intervening sea-shore houses. Next, to the right of the channel, up and opposite Fort Sumter, is Fort Moultrie, which has been. prodigiously strengthened by the Rebel engineers, both in its means of offense and of defense. Looking up the harbor and still to the right, the eye takes in the extensive line of works, en crémaillaire, called the Redan, and which has been formed by throwing up intrenchments on the line of the breakwater erected some years ago by the United States Government, for the protection of that portion of the harbor. Beyond the Redan, up near the head of the harbor, on an island, appears Castle Pinckney, in the vista, looking like the Battery in New York City as seen from the seaentrance. "So far as the eye can see, we have now exhausted the fortifications on the right hand side of the harbor. It now remains briefly From channel. We can see every brick in its 66 Passing now to the left-hand side of the harbor, on James island, we first have the Wappoo battery, near Wappoo creek, effectually commanding the embouchure of Ashley river and the left side of the city. Next, coming down, we have Fort Johnson; and, between it and Castle Pinckney, on an artificial island raised by the Rebels, on the middle ground,' is Fort Ripley. Coming down to Cumming's Point, directly opposite Moultrie, is the Cumming's Point battery, named by the Rebels Battery Bee, after the General of that name; south of Battery Bee, on Morris island, is Fort Wagner, a very extensive sand battery of the most powerful construction. Half-way down Morris island, again, from Fort Wagner, is a new sand-work erected by the Rebels since I surveyed the ground from the blockading fleet, a fortnight ago. Finally, down at Lighthouse inlet, which divides Morris from Folly island, is another fortification, guarding against an attempt at a landing at that point. Such is the formidable panorama the eye takes in, in sweeping around the harbor and its approaches." And now let the same observer depict for us the low, iron-backed turtles about to crawl up and try conclusions with these yawning craters of brick and stone and iron, so soon to burst into fierce and scathing eruption: THE IRON-CLADS' ADVANCE ARRESTED. 469 presented to the Rebels from their posts of outlook must have been one of portentous grandeur." "With respect both to the obstacles we are to meet, and the engines with which we are to meet them, every thing is novel and unprecedented. Comparison is simply impossible; for, where there are no points of resemblance, comparison is out of the ques-vanced in the prescribed order-to tion. "But can you imagine—if one were permitted to play with the elements of time and space-the shade of Nelson transferred from his gun-deck off Trafalgar, after but little over half a century, and placed on board of one of those iron craft before us? and can you imagine the sensations of that consummate master of all the elements of naval warfare as known in his day? He must be helpless as a child, and bewildered as a man in a dream. From his splendid three-decker, the Victory, carrying its hundred guns, and towering majestically on the water, which it rides like a thing of life, he finds himself imprisoned in an iron casing, the whole hull and frame of which is submerged in the water, the waves washing clean over its deck, and depending for its defensive power on a couple of guns of a caliber that would astonish him, placed in a circular tower, rising from the deck amidships. This turret is in thickness 11 inches of wrought iron, revolves on an axis by the delicate appliances of steam engineering, and contains the entire armament and fighting crew of the ship. The fire, the animation, the life, of an old-time naval fight, when men gave and took, exposed to plain view-when ships fought yard-arm to yard-arm, and human nature in its intensest exaltation appeared are here wholly out of the question, with the combatants shut up in impenetrable iron, and delivering their fire by refined process of mathematical and mechanical appliances. "Nor are the outward shapes of these craft less divergent from all that the world has hitherto seen of naval models than are their internal economy and fighting arrangements removed from all previous modes. The majesty of a first-class man-of-war, with its lines of beauty and strength, on which the aesthetic instincts of ages have been expended, is here replaced by purely geometrical combinations of iron, in which the one paramount and all-controlling consideration is the resisting power of lines, angles, and surfaces. As they stretch in horrid file before us, along the shore of Morris island, awaiting the signal from the flag-ship to move, those nine ships, comprising the three different models represented by the Ironsides, the Monitors, and the Keokuk, one might almost fancy that some of the pachydermous monsters which palæontology brings to view from the dark backward and abysm of time' had returned in an iron resurrection; and the spectacle they At 123 P. M., our iron-clads ad be stopped directly by the anchor cable of the Weehawken, in the van, becoming fouled with iron grapplings protruding from the raft at her bows, wherewith she was expected to explode any torpedoes and clear away any obstructions she might encounter. An hour was spent in putting this right; and then our fleet moved on, in order: each vessel passing Morris island without evoking a shot from Fort Wagner or Battery Bee, and meaning to make the entrance of the harbor between Fort Sumter and Sullivan's island before the former, at 4:03 P. M., opened on the Weehawken the tremendous broadside of her barbette guns. And now there dawned upon our perplexed though undaunted commander a revelation of the great and insuperable difficulty of the attack. That our nine small though stanch vessels, mounting 30 guns in all, could last long under the fire which could be concentrated on them while lying close in front or east of Fort Sumter was not and could not reasonably be expected. It had therefore been determined, and was distinctly prescribed in Dupont's order of battle, that "The squadron will pass up the main ship channel without returning the fire of the batteries on Morris island, unless signal should be made to commence action. "The ships will open fire on Fort Sumter when within easy range, and will take up a position to the northward and westward of that fortification, engaging its left or northwest face, at a distance of from 1,000 to 800 yards; firing low, and aiming at the center embrasure." But there were other plans than ours to be taken into account. The enemy's engineers were quite as well aware as ours of the relative weakness of the north-west face of Sumter (which had never been completed -the fort being designed, indeed, to guard the harbor, but not against an offensive so formidable and persistent as ours), and had no idea of allowing our iron-clads to pass their heaviest batteries and concentrate their fire upon that quarter. Accordingly, when the Weehawken had come fully abreast of Sumter, and completely under the fire of Moultrie's and other batteries as well as hers, she found herself confronted by a stout hawser buoyed up by empty casks, stretching completely across the channel from the north-west angle of Fort Sumter to Moultrie, and festooned with nets, seines, cables, &c., attached to torpedoes below-all contrived, if the torpedoes failed to destroy any vessel which might attempt to break the hawser, at least to foul her propeller and deprive her crew of all command over her movements, leaving her to drift helpless and useless where a few hours at most must insure her demolition. Capt. Rodgers did not choose to squander his vessel so recklessly; and, after a brief hesitation, attempted to pass westward of Fort Sumter, between that and Cumming's Point: but this channel was found obstructed by a row of great piles, driven far into the earth and rising ten feet above the surface of the water; with another row stretching across its entire width a mile or so farther up the harbor; with still another behind this, backed by three Rebel iron-clads, all smoking and roaring in concert with the forts and batteries on every side. And now, as if our embarrassments were too trivial, the Ironsides is caught by the tide and veered off her course, refusing to mind her helm, and deranging the movements of her consorts: the Catskill and Nantucket running afoul of her on either side, and requiring a precious quarter of an hour to get clear again. This constrained Com. Dupont to signal the rest of the fleet to disregard the movements of the Ironsides, and take the positions wherein their fire would prove most effective. Thus directed, Lt. Rhind ran the Keokuk within 500 yards of Fort Sumter, and there held her, pouring in her hottest fire, till she was riddled and sinking; the Catskill and the Montauk being scarcely farther off. Let the observer already quoted depict for us the manner of serving the guns in those narrow, dim-lit caverns, the turrets of the monitors: "Could you look through the smoke, and through the flame-lit ports, into one of those revolving towers, a spectacle would meet your eye such as Vulcan's stithy might present. Here are the two huge guns which form the armament of each monitor-the one 11 and the other 15 inches in diameter of bore. The gunners, begrimed with powder and stripped to the waist, are loading the gun. The allowance of powder-thirtyfive pounds to each charge-is passed up rapidly from below; the shot, weighing four by mechanical appliances to the muzzle of hundred and twenty pounds, is hoisted up the gun, and rammed home; the gun is run out to the port, and tightly compressed;' the port is open for an instant, the captain of the gun stands behind, lanyard in hand'Ready, fire!' and the enormous projectile rushes through its huge parabola, with the weight of ten thousand tons, home to its mark." For half an hour thereafter, our sailors maintained the unequal and plainly hopeless contest-all of them under the fire of hundreds of the heaviest and best rifled guns that could be made, or bought, or stolen. The Rebel gunners had been direct OUR MONITORS REPULSED-THE KEOKUK SUNK. 471 ed by Beauregard, then in chief com- | boy might have crawled through, while her commander and 11 of her crew were wounded, five of them severely. She was at length compelled to draw off, mortally injured, and, limping away down the coast of Morris island to Lighthouse inlet, she had barely been relieved of her wounded, when, at 8 P. M., she sunk the last of her crew jumping into the sea as she went down, leaving only the top of her smoke-stack above the surface of the water. Three hours earlier, Com. Dupont, seeing half his vessels disabled, while Sumter, though somewhat damaged," was still vociferous and belligerent as ever--gave the signal for retiring; which was willingly, though not swiftly, obeyed. mand at Charleston, to fire very deliberately and with careful aim; yet 160 shots per minute were counted: and one of our commanders declared that the great iron bolts of the enemy crashed upon the decks and sides of our vessels in succession as rapid as the ticks of a watch. Most of these, of course, rebounded or glanced off, and were added to the pavement of the harbor; but even these often left ugly mementoes of their hasty visit; while the attentions of some were far more impressive. The Nahant carried off thirteen ugly bruises; one of them made by a shot which struck her pilot-house, knocking out several of its bolts, one of which wounded all three of the inmatescaptain, pilot, and quartermaster— the last fatally. Four of her crew were injured by a similar injury to her turret. The Passaic had as many wounds-one of them from a shot which passed through the 11inch plates of her turret, and then had force left seriously to damage her pilot-house beyond. The Nantucket had, among others, a knock on her turret which so deranged it that her port could not be opened thereafter. The Ironsides had one of her port shutters shot away; and the Catskill was struck by a bolt which tore through her deck-plating forward, and still had force to break an iron beam beneath it. But the Keokuk, though not the strongest among them, had dared most and suffered most. She was struck 90 times, had both her turrets riddled, with 19 holes through her hull; some of them so large that a ""Half a dozen pock-marks show conspicuous; while a huge crater is formed in the para The iron-clad attack on Fort Sumter and its adjuncts was a failurenot a disaster. We lost few men, and but one vessel; for all but the Keokuk were susceptible of easy repair; while the expenditure of ammunition was many times greatest on the side of the Rebels, and one that they could not afford so well as we could. It was computed that 3,500 shots were fired by them that day; the value of which was hardly to be measured by Confederate currency in its then advanced stage of decomposition. Two guns on Fort Sumter were disabled, and one was burst; while they had but few men injured and only one killed. But their exultation over our repulse was unbounded: Beauregard, for once, hardly going beyond the average sentiment in averring, in his general order, that "the happy issue" of this conflict had "inspired confidence in pet near the eastern angle," reports Mr. Swinton aforesaid. will be complete." the country that our ultimate success after in South Carolina under Hunter; save that Col. Montgomery, with 300 of his 2d S. C. (negroes) on two steamboats, went " 25 miles up the Combahee river, burnt a pontoon-bridge, with some private property, and brought away 727 very willing slaves-all that they could take, but not nearly all that wished to be taken. The 2d S. C. recruited two full companies out of 'the spoils.' Gen. Hunter had a supporting force of some 4,000 men, under Gen. Truman Seymour, carefully concealed behind a thicket of palms just below Lighthouse inlet, with pontoons, guns, &c., all ready to rush across to Morris island and attack the Rebel forces stationed thereon-either party screening its position and numbers by the usual picket-firing at the front. When it was made manifest that Dupont was worsted, Adjutant Halpine was sent with all haste to Seymour with orders to desist: so no useless slaughter on land intensified the bitterness of our failure on the water. The Rebels say that a blockaderunner in the harbor during the fight ran out through our fleet during the ensuing night, unperceived or unsuspected; and it is certain that our gunboat George Washington, reconnoitering next day," up Broad river, having got aground, was at tacked by a party of Rebels, who succeeded in throwing a shell into her magazine and blowing her up; killing 2 and wounding 8 of the 3d R. I. Artillery. 46 The Fingal, a British-built blockade-runner, which had slipped " into Savannah with a valuable cargo of arms, and been loaded with cotton for her return, found herself unable, especially after the fall of Pulaski, to slip out again; and, after many luckless attempts, was unloaded, and iron-clad into what was esteemed a high state of warlike efficiency—14 months having been devoted to the work. She was now christened the ATLANTA, and, wafted from the wharves of Savannah by a breeze of prayers and good wishes, moved down the inlet known as Wilmington river into Warsaw sound, attended by two gunboats and intent on belligerency. Meantime, two poor Irishmen, tired of the Confederacy, had escaped to Hilton Head, and there revealed the character of the craft and the nature of her seaward errand. Hunter's Adjutant, Halpine, a brother Irishman, who had wormed out their secret, by the help of a fluid which seldom fails to unloose the Celtic tongue, at once sped the information to Dupont; who forthwith dispatched the Weehawken and the Nahant to Warsaw sound, wherein the Cimarone alone had Dupont, like most old sailors, was naturally partial to fighting on deck, and not a lover of iron-clads. The issue of this struggle ripened his distrust into detestation. He had failed, with 1,000 men and 30 guns, to take, at the first effort, what was probably the best fortified seaport on earth, defended by at least ten times his force in men and metal; and he utterly refused to repeat the experiment. There were no movements there- been previously stationed. 44 April 8. 4 June 2. 46 Nov. 12, 1861. |