needed. The Price, rapidly sinking, was just able to reach the Arkansas shore, where she settled down a perfect wreck, in fifteen feet of water.

The Queen, clated with this triumph, turned upon her heel and made another rush at the Beauregard. The rebel accepted the challenge, and with equal alacrity hastened to the encounter. Head to head these massive ships, with steel-clad bows, each driven at a speed of nearly twenty miles an hour, plunged at each other, each striving to crush its adversary. By a skilful movement of the helm, the rebel evaded the menacing prow of the Queen, and struck his antagonist on the side. The blow made every timber strain and creak, hurled the ponderous guns from their places, shattered the massive engine in the hold, and opened a gaping wound, through which the water rushed in torrents. The Queen needs no second blow. She too has met the fate of war, and, seriously disabled, can take no further active part in the tremendous conflict. She still views the fight; but, most deplorable of all, the heroic Colonel Ellet, to whose patriotism and genius the nation owes a debt of gratitude which can never be repaid, struck by a bullet in the knee, fell upon the deck, having received a wound from which he never recovered.、

The patriot Monarch was now seen rushing headlong at the Beauregard, to avenge the death of the Queen. The Beauregard opened a vigorous fire upon her approaching assailant. The Monarch, scornfully, deigned no reply, but plunged on like a locomotive facing a hail-storm, and furiously striking the Beauregard, dashed in her bows. The flood of the Mississippi rushed in, and the wounded rebel settled rapidly down, and suddenly disappeared, ingulfed in the deep, dark waters.

In the mean time the gunboat fleet was not idle. The thunder of its guns was incessantly reverberating over the waves, and not an opportunity was lost to throw their heaviest metal, as rapidly as possible, upon the rebel fleet. Sharpshooters were also placed in every available position to pick off the gunners at their posts, and to strike every head or hand which for one moment was visible. One of the patriot gunboats, the Benton, getting a very fair chance, threw a fifty-pound shot, from a rifled Parrott, at the Lovell. The ponderous missile struck the rebel aft, just above the water-line, tearing open a large hole, and causing an explosion of the boiler. The water, rushing in like a torrent, in less than four minutes sunk the boat in seventy feet of water. The steamer, settling down into these depths, passed entirely out of sight, and the rapid current flowed unobstructed over the spot. Many of the crew were carried down in the boat. Some fifty, wounded and scalded, plunged into the stream, and, while struggling in the water, a few of them were rescued by boats sent instantly from the patriot flotilla for their relief. The current was so rapid that most of these unhappy men were swept into a watery grave. For a few moments the fury of the battle at that spot was forgotten, the attention of all being arrested by the fifty struggling men who covered the surface of the river. Friend and foe generously contended with each other in their efforts to rescue the sufferers. Elsewhere, however, the battle raged as mercilessly as before.

It was, as we have mentioned, a beautiful June morning. The river

was smooth and glassy as a mirror. There was not a breath of air to sweep away the smoke which now, in a dense sulphurous canopy, hung over the arena. The levée of Memphis was black with the crowd of human beings gazing upon this sublime spectacle. In vain they endeavored to pierce the gloom, where the flash of guns and the thunder of their explosions alone announced the terrible strife which was raging. From the commencement of the battle the rebel gunboats had been slowly falling back, crowded closely by the Union fleet. There remained to them only the Jeff. Thompson, the Bragg, the Sumter, and the Van Dorn. The storm of shot and shell from the patriot fleet fell so destructively upon the rebels that they could endure it no longer, and, turning on their heels, they sought safety in flight. The Thompson ran ashore, and the officers and crew, leaping over her bows, escaped into the woods. The crew had hardly escaped when a shell was thrown on board, which, exploding, set the ship in flames. There was no escape for the wounded. No one was left to describe their agonies as they writhed beneath the touch of the consuming fire. At length a spark reached the magazine, and, with a fearful explosion, the ship was blown into fragments. The Bragg, crippled, and hopeless of escape, vigorously pursued, also ran ashore, half a mile below. The crew escaped in the woods. The vessel was left in the hands of the victors. The same doom awaited the Sumter. The Van Dorn, of all the rebel fleet, was the only one to escape. Being a very swift boat, she paddled down the swift current of the stream so rapidly, that our fastest runners could not catch her, and the pursuit was soon relinquished.

The triumph of the Union fleet was entire. The exultation of the Union men on the levée at Memphis, in view of this glorious victory, could only be measured by the dismay which pierced the hearts of the secessionists. The National fleet now came to anchor before the city, and sent in a demand for its surrender. Memphis had no means of defence whatever, and it was immediately occupied by the Union troops. The engagement had lasted but little over an hour. Strange to say, the only casualties, of any importance, which had occurred to the National fleet, were the injury received by the Queen of the West and the wound of Colonel Ellet. The wound was so slight that it did not prevent him from continuing, at the time, his duties. It subsequently, however, proved more serious than was at first imagined. In less than three weeks, on the 21st of June, he died at Cairo. It is a singular fact that the only person on the National side killed in this terrible action was the one whose ingenuity in contrivance and bravery in action had so eminently contributed to the triumph of the 'Union arms. The loss on the side of the rebels could never be ascertained. It must, however, have been severe. About one hundred prisoners were taken.

Immediately upon the surrender of the city, Colonel Ellet sent four men ashore, who raised the United States flag over the post-office. There was one rebel flag left floating in the city, which could not be drawn down, as the ropes had been cut. A crowd of rebels gathered around it, and with such show of mob violence protected it, that two companies of soldiers had to be landed to disperse the crowd, before the pole could be cut down. In

the mean time the singular spectacle was presented of two hostile flags floating side by side. Colonel G. N. Fitch was appointed provost-marshal of the subjugated city. With great good sense, the Mayor of Memphis coöperated with Colonel Fitch in the maintenance of peace and order. Thus Memphis passed, from the hands of foul rebellion, back again under the protection of the National Government. Memphis is the most populous and important city between St. Louis and New Orleans. Its population, in 1860, was twenty-two thousand six hundred and twenty-five. It now became one of the most important National ports upon the Mississippi River.

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE INVESTMENT OF VICKSBURG.

(June, 1863.)

STRENGTH OF VICKSBURG.-VARIOUS PLANS. 1. THE CANAL. 2. LAKE PROVIDENCE. 3. MOON LAKE. 4. THE YAZOO.-THE MARCH THROUGH THE MORASS. RUNNING THE BATTERIES.— LANDING AT BRUINSBURG.-THE MARCH.-SUCCESSION OF BATTLES AND VICTORIES.—VICKSBURG INVESTED.

THE fall of Memphis inspired the National Government with new zeal to open our great National highway, the Mississippi River, from Cairo to the Gulf. The insolence of a few thousand rebels, residing at the mouth of the river, in endeavoring to wrest from the nation that most majestic stream upon whose tributaries hundreds of millions are to find their homes, is unparalleled in the records of man's audacity. A few months after the National flag was again floating over Memphis, an expedition was sent down the river to Vicksburg. It consisted of fifteen thousand men, who were conveyed in one hundred transports, accompanied by several gunboats. The expedition reached Vicksburg the last of September.

This city was situated on a high bluff, about four hundred miles above New Orleans. Here the rebels, who had escaped from Corinth, again rendezvoused. Upon these frowning cliffs they reared their boasted Gibraltar. Forts and batteries, with connecting curtains, and armed with the heaviest ordnance, and garrisoned by thirty thousand rebel troops, crowned the bluff for miles. General Sherman, under rather unfavorable circumstances, had made an attack upon Vicksburg by endeavoring to storm Chickasaw Bluffs. In this heroic attempt he had been bloodily repulsed. It hence became evident that the defensive works on the north of Vicksburg were so strong that they could not be carried by assault.

General Grant, who was intrusted with the command of this expedition, descending the river from Cairo with his transports, was north of the city, just beyond the reach of its guns. How could those massive batteries be passed? In front of Vicksburg the river makes a great bend in the shape of a horse-shoe, the city on the eastern shore at the toe. General Grant's first effort was to cut a canal across the isthmus, from the river above to the river below the city, so that the boats, with the army, could pass out of reach of the rebel shot.

Twelve hundred negroes worked, with a will, upon this ditch for weeks. But then came floods of rain, and the swollen torrent of the river broke in, before the works were completed, and the enterprise proved an utter failure. Another attempt was then made.