Confederates before him near Jasper, and on the 7th of June [1862] appeared on the Tennessee River, opposite Chattanooga. With a little help, that key to East Tennessee and Northern Georgia might have been captured and held, but it was refused; and ten days afterward, when the Confederates, without a struggle, evacuated Cumberland Gap, the "Gibraltar of the Mountains," and allowed General George W. Morgan, with a few Ohio and Kentucky troops, to occupy it, Buell refused to march in at the open door, to the relief of East Tennessee, and the persecuted inhabitants of that loyal region were compelled to wait much longer for deliverance. The cautious Buell and the fiery Mitchel'

ORMSBY M. MITCHEL.

did not work well together, and the latter was transferred to another field

of duty. For a short time now there was a lull in the storm of war westward of the Alleghanies, but it was only the calm before a more furious tempest.

Let us now turn to a consideration of events on the coast of North Carolina, where we left Burnside and the accompanying naval force, preparing for more conquests. That expedition appeared in the Neuse River, below New Berne, on the evening of the 12th of March [1862], and early the next morning about fifteen thousand land troops went ashore, and marched toward the defenses of that city, which were in charge of a force under General Branch. At daylight on the 14th the Nationals moved to the attack in three columns, commanded respectively by Generals Foster, Reno, and Parke, the gun-boats in the river, under Commodore Rowan, co-operating. A very severe battle ensued, in which the Nationals were conquerors. Pressed on all sides by a superior force, the Confederates fled from the field across the Trent, burning the bridges behind them, and escaped, with the exception of the killed and wounded and two hundred made prisoners. The Nationals took posses

With the sanction of General Buell, Mitchel sent out an important expedition toward the middle of April. It was composed of twenty-two picked men, led by J. J. Andrews, and their duty was to destroy the railway between Chattanooga and Atlanta. They went in detachments to Marietta, in Georgia, where they joined, and at a station a few miles northward of that town they seized the train in which they were traveling, while the conductor and passengers were at breakfast, and started for Chattanooga, doing what damage they could to the road. They were pursued, and were finally so closely pressed that they abandoned the train and fled to the woods. Some escaped, some were captured, and nine of them, including Andrews, the leader, were hung.

2 Page 590.

3 The National loss was about one hundred killed and four hundred wounded. The loss of the Confederates, in killed and wounded, was less. The spoils of victory were important, consisting of the town and harbor of New Berne; eight batteries, mounting forty-six heavy guns; three batteries of light artillery, of six guns each; a number of sailing vessels; wagons, horses, and mules; a large quantity of ammunition and army supplies; the entire camp equipage of the Confederates, and much turpentine, rosin, and cotton. Most of the white inhabitants fled to Goldsboro', on the Weldon Railway.

sion of the city of New Berne, and then proceeded to attempt the capture of Fort Macon, at the entrance to the harbor of Beaufort. The expedition was intrusted to the command of General Foster, who effected a lodgment on Bogue Island, a long sand-spit on which Fort Macon stands, and from batteries which he planted there he began a bombardment of the fort on the morning of the 25th of April. Some gun-boats, under Commander Lockwood, participated in the attack. At four o'clock in the afternoon the garrison gave tokens of submission, and early the next day the fort and its occupants were surrendered to the Nationals. At the same time troops under General Reno were quietly taking possession of important places along the waters of Albemarle Sound and threatening Norfolk in the rear. At a place called South Mills, near Camden Court House, Reno's troops encountered the Confederates in a sharp engagement, and defeated them. Winton, at the head of the Chowan; Plymouth, at the mouth of the Roanoke, and Washington, at the head of the Pamlico River, were all seized and occupied by the National troops. Burnside now held almost undisputed sway over the coast region, from the Dismal Swamp nearly to the Cape Fear River, until called to the Virginia Peninsula, in July, to assist McClellan.

While Burnside and Rowan were operating on the coast of North Carolina, Sherman and Dupont3 were engaged in important movements on the coasts of South Carolina and Georgia, having for their first object the capture of Fort Pulaski, on Cockspur Island, near the mouth of the Savannah River. Batteries were planted on Big Tybee Island, under the skillful direction of General Q. A. Gillmore, so as to command the fort; and on the 10th of April [1862]

1 Burnside made his head-quarters at the fine old Stanley mansion in the suburbs of New Berne. Almost before the smoke of battle was dissipated, the Christian spirit of the friends of the government was made conspicuous in acts of benevolence. Vincent Colyer, a citizen of New York, and originator of the Christian Commission of the army, was with the expedition on an errand of mercy. Under the sanction of Burnside, he distributed to the sick and wounded the generous contributions of the loyal citizens of the North, and assumed a fostering care of the poor and ignorant colored people, from whose limbs the hand of the victor had just unloosed the shackles of hopeless slavery. He opened evening schools, and had over eight hundred eager pupils, when Edward Stanley, a North Carolinian, who had been appointed Military Governor of the State, making use of one of the barbarous slave-laws of that commonwealth, which made it "a criminal offense to teach the blacks to read," closed them. Stanley also made zealous efforts to return fugitive slaves to their masters; and the hopes of that down-trodden race in that region, which were so delightfully given in promises, were

suddenly extinguished. Stanley's administration was happily a short one.

The fruits of the victory were the fort and five hundred prisoners, the command of the important harbor of Beaufort, twenty thousand pounds of gunpowder, and a large amount of other ordnance stores.

3 Page 582.

The planting of these batteries, all things considered, was a wonderful feat of engineering skill. The island is a marsh, and the armament had to be carried over it on causeways built with great labor. "No one," said Gillmore, in his report, "can form any but a faint conception of the

General Hunter, then in command of the Department, summoned the garrison to surrender. It was refused, and thirty-six heavy rifled cannon and

FORT PULASKI CREACHED.

mortars, constituting eleven batteries, opened fire upon it. The bombardment continued until late the next day, when the fort was so shattered and its magazines so exposed to fiery missiles, that it was untenable. On the morning of the 12th, the fort, with its garrison of three hundred men and considerable spoil, was surrendered to the Nationals. The battle had been a hard-fought almost bloodless

but

one.

The victory was

important, for it enabled the Nationals to close the port of Savannah against blockade-runners."

While Gillmore and Viele were besieging Fort Pulaski, Commodore Dupont and General Wright were making easy conquests on the coast of Florida. They captured Fort Clinch, on the northern end of Amelia Island, early in February [1862], and this was the first of the old National fortifications "repossessed" by the government. The Confederates fled from the fort, and from the town of Fernandina near. They abandoned other forts along the coast in the same way, and the Nationals took possession of them. of gun-boats and transports, with troops, under Lieutenant Thomas Holdup Stevens, was sent up the St. John's River to capture Jacksonsville (March 11), and was successful. At about the same time Commander C. R. P. Rogers

herculean labor by which mortars of eight and a half tons weight, and columbiads but a trifle lighter, were moved in the dead of night over a narrow causeway bordered by swamps on each side, and liable at any moment to be overturned and buried in the mud beyond reach." The causeways were built of poles and planks, and the guns were placed in battery on heavy plank platforms.

Ten of the guns of the fort were dismounted; and so destructive of masonry had been the Parrott projectiles, that there was imminent danger of their penetrating the magazine. Some of these projectiles went through six or seven feet of solid brick wall!

2 The assailing troops were under the immediate command of General Viele. He had but one man killed. The spoils were, the fort, forty-seven heavy guns, forty thousand pounds of gunpowder, and a large supply of fixed ammunition and commissary stores.

We have seen [page 561] how the British government proclaimed its neutrality at the beginning. British subjects at once entered into the dishonorable business of violating the blockade, not only declared [page 560], but well sustained by force, and supplying the insurgents with arms, ammunition, and necessaries of every kind. Fast-sailing steamers were built for the dur pose, and painted a gray color, so as not to be distinguished in even a light fog. They frequently eluded the blockaders, and rendered great service to the enemies of our government.

took possession of St. Augustine; and the Confederates abandoned Pensacola and the fortifications on the main opposite Fort Pickens. Dupont returned to Port Royal at the close of March, and found Sherman in possession of Edisto Island, well up toward Charleston. And so it was, that before the first anniversary of the fall of Fort Sumter, the whole Atlantic coast, from Cape Hatteras to Perdido Bay, excepting the harbor of Charleston and its immediate surroundings, had been abandoned by the insurgents.

Turning again to Hampton Roads, we see General Butler there at the head of another expedition.' He had completed his recruiting in New England,' and on the 23d of February [1862] he received orders, as commander of the Department of the Gulf, to co-operate with the navy, first in the capture of New Orleans and its approaches, and then in the reduction of Mobile, Galveston, and Baton Rouge, with the ultimate design of occupying Texas. On the 25th of February he sailed from Hampton Roads with nearly 14,000 men; and thirty days later he re-embarked on Ship Island, off the coast of Mississippi, in the Gulf of Mexico. It was already in possession of National troops, under General Phelps, and a naval force was there under Commodores Farragut and Bailey. With these officers Butler arranged a plan of operations against New Orleans. A fleet of bomb-vessels

under Commander David D. Porter had been prepared to co-operate with the forces which rendezvoused at Ship Island, and early in April an extensive armament was in the Mississippi River, prepared to attack Forts Jackson and St. Philip, on the banks of that stream, at a sharp bend, seventy-five miles above the passes of the river into the Gulf.

General Mansfield Lovell, formerly a New York politician, was in command at New Orleans and of its defenses, among which were the forts just named." He and the people of that region supposed these defenses to be impregnable,"

D. D. PORTER.

and they rested in fancied security until late in April, when startling events undeceived them.

All things were in readiness for an assault on the forts on the 17th [April, 1862], and a battle with these fortifications began on the morning of the 18th,

2 Page 580.

1 Page 579. The fleets of Farragut and Porter comprised forty-seven armed vessels, eight of which were large and powerful steam sloops of war. Butler's troops, composed of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Michigan men, were borne on five transports.

Fort Jackson was built by the government. Fort St. Philip was an old Spanish work, which figured somewhat in the war of 1812. They were near each other, on opposite sides of the river. The general command of these, and other river defenses below New Orleans, was intrusted to General J. R. Duncan, formerly an office-holder in the city of New York.

A leading newspaper said:-"Our only fear is that the Northern invaders may not appear. We have made such extensive preparations to receive them, that it were vexatious if their invin.

Farragut commanding the squadron of gun-boats, and Porter the mortar fleet, the former being the chief officer. Soon perceiving but little chance for reducing the forts, Farragut made arrangements to run by them with his gun-boats. This was attempted on the night of the 23d, the mortar-boats keeping their position and covering the advance with their fire. It was a most perilous undertaking. Obstructions below the fort were first removed, and then, under the heavy fire of the Confederates, the squadron moved up the swift current (the Mississippi was full to the brim), and soon encountered a formidable fleet of rams and gun-boats lying just above the forts. One of the most terrific naval fights on record ensued,' in which Farragut and commanders Bailey and Boggs were most conspicuous. It resulted in victory for the Nationals. Within the space of an hour and a half after the National vessels left their anchorage, the forts were passed, the struggle had occurred, and eleven of the Confederate vessels, or nearly the whole of their fleet, were destroyed. The National loss was thirty men killed, and not more than one hundred and twenty-five wounded. All of Farragut's vessels which had passed the forts, thirteen in number, rendezvoused at the Quarantine, which was the first government property in Louisiana "repossessed" by the National forces.

While this desperate battle was raging, the land troops under Butler were preparing to perform their part in the drama. They were landed in the rear of Fort St. Philip, and in small boats they made their way to the Quarantine on the Mississippi [April 27] through narrow and shallow bayous Their appearance alarmed the Confederates, and a mutiny in the garrison of Fort Jackson, caused by their menace, compelled the surrender of the forts' Meanwhile Farragut had gone up to New Orleans with his fleet. He had been preceded by intelligence of disasters below, and there was a fearful panic in the city. Four millions of specie was sent away by the banks, and a vast amount of private property, with many citizens, was soon on the wing. cible armada escapes the fate we have in store for it." In and around New Orleans was a force of about 10,000 armed men. In order to deceive the people, it was given out by the authorities that there were more than 30,000 troops ready for the defense of the city; and the redoubtable Hollins was spoken of as "a Nelson in his way!"

1 66

Combine," said Major Bell, of Butler's staff, who was present, "all that you have ever

heard of thunder, and add to it all you have ever seen of lightning, and you have, perhaps, a conception of the scene." And all this noise and destructive energy-blazing fire-rafts sent down upon the current to destroy the National vessels; the floating volcanoes sending forth fire, and smoke, and bolts of death, and the thundering forts and ponderous rams-were all crowded, in the gloom of night, within the space of

a narrow river.

2

Among the vessels destroyed was the ram Manassas, which was set on fire, and went roaring down the stream. Finally, like a huge amphibious mon

ster, it gave a plunge, and disappeared in the turbulent waters.

The number of prisoners, including some taken at the Quarantine, was about 1,000. The entire loss of the Nationals, from the beginning of this contest until the capture of New Orleans, was 40 killed and 177 wounded.