. Battles and leaders of the Civil War : being for the most part contributions by Union and Confederate officers . time, and against repeated pro-tests on my part, depleting it of troops to reenforce other points. The approaches to Charleston were five in number: 1. The enemy couldland a large force to the northward, at or in the close vicinity of Bulls Bay,and from thence, marching across the country, could take possession of MountPleasant and all the north shore of the inner harbor. 2. A large force of theenemy could also land to the southward, destroy the Charleston and Savan-nah railroad,
. Battles and leaders of the Civil War : being for the most part contributions by Union and Confederate officers . time, and against repeated pro-tests on my part, depleting it of troops to reenforce other points. The approaches to Charleston were five in number: 1. The enemy couldland a large force to the northward, at or in the close vicinity of Bulls Bay,and from thence, marching across the country, could take possession of MountPleasant and all the north shore of the inner harbor. 2. A large force of theenemy could also land to the southward, destroy the Charleston and Savan-nah railroad, and invest Charleston in the rear. These two avenues ofapproach, however, were not likely to be adopted by the enemy, as thestrength of his land force woidd not have justified such an attempt, unaidedby his iron-clads and gun-boats. The cooperation of the Federal fleet waspossible for any one of the other three modes of approach, namely: JamesIsland, Sullivans Island, and Morris Island. 3. Of these, the approach by THE DEFENSE OF CHARLESTON. tut °*H.* ■JJ ^Corner % NT^H %| C/f A/^K%Q^L of: ^b .•vr --7 ^P. .4 - r 7-/ ^ < MAP OP THE SOUTH CAROLINA COAST. James Island was unquestionably the one to be most apprehended. The Con-federate troops stationed there were insufficient in number and had to defend a long, defective, and irregular line of works. The enemy, after overpow-ering them, could have constructed batteries which would have controlled theinner harbor, taken in rear our outer lines of defenses, and opened fire directlyagainst Charleston itself, thus forcing an almost immediate surrender. 4. BySullivans Island the approach was also a very important one. In taking it,Fort Sumter might have been silenced and the inner harbor thrown open tothe enemys iron-clad fleet. 5. The approach by Morris Island was, as after-ward proved, the least dangerous to us. It involved none of the contingen-cies threatened by the other modes of attack. It had always been my opinion,howeve
Size: 2371px × 1054px
Photo credit: © Reading Room 2020 / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, bookpublishernewyo, bookyear1887
