. Battles and leaders of the Civil War : being for the most part contributions by Union and Confederate officers . o but to givethe order for the remaining boats to make the bestof their way to the fort. Through this misappre-hension all the good effects of Higginsons demon-stration were lost. On our way to the fort in thebarge, fairly flying under the strokes of the oars-men, we observed a large number of boats lyingon their oars; we hailed them and directed themto pull in, but as no sign of a movement wasmade by them, then,— or, indeed, during the wholeaffair,— we concluded that it was the a
. Battles and leaders of the Civil War : being for the most part contributions by Union and Confederate officers . o but to givethe order for the remaining boats to make the bestof their way to the fort. Through this misappre-hension all the good effects of Higginsons demon-stration were lost. On our way to the fort in thebarge, fairly flying under the strokes of the oars-men, we observed a large number of boats lyingon their oars; we hailed them and directed themto pull in, but as no sign of a movement wasmade by them, then,— or, indeed, during the wholeaffair,— we concluded that it was the army forceawaiting the result of our demonstration. As weneared Sumter we were hailed loudly by theenemy, but no answer was returned. Simultane-ously a rocket was sent up from the fort, and al-most as it exploded the air was filled with hissing,shrieking missiles from the James and SullivansIsland batteries, which seemed alive with fire,while an iron-clad was pouring grape and canisterinto the boats and sweeping the approaches to thegorge. The parapets and crown of Sumter were 50 THE BOAT ATTACK ON THE BOAT ATTACK ON FORT SUMTER. filled with men pouring a murderous fire down onour defenseless party, and heavy missiles and hand-grenades helped on the work of destruction. Be-fore this fire had fully developed, two boats fromthe Powhatan and others had effected a was subsequently learned, their crews andofficers were driven to shelter and taken these things were evidences of the enemysforeknowledge of our purpose and complete prep-aration to frustrate it. The corporals guardthat we were to have encountered proved to exceedour own numbers. Under these conditions but oneexpedient was left—to effect an early order to retire was accordingly given throughLieutenant Forrest, and was several times repeated. Admiral Dahlgren, who was watching the opera-tions from a boat in the distance, says in his jour-nal, Moultrie fired like a devil
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, bookpublishernewyo, bookyear1887
