390 EXPEDITION OF RENO. on the nineteenth, he marched forward to the accomplishment of his object. About noon he was attacked by the rebels, composed of a Georgia regiment and a portion of Wise's Legion. After a sharp engagement, the enemy was totally routed with heavy loss. Ours was one hundred and ten killed and wounded. In the evening, General Reno, hearing that the rebels had been heavily reinforced and were advancing to attack him, ordered a retreat. The jaded soldiers were roused from their bivouacs, and commenced their toilsome march back to their boats-making a forced march of forty miles in twentyfour hours. It was a night of great toil and suffering, and the force was in such a condition, that if it had been attacked it could scarcely have escaped total destruction. Fourteen of his wounded were left in the hands of the enemy who consequently claimed a victory. CHAPTER XXX. APRIL, 1862. SURRENDER-FIGHTING AT EMANCIPATIONISTS SIEGE OF FORT MACON-DIFFICULTIES ATTENDING IT-THE BOMBARDMENT- the mean time, Burnside, with his accustomed energy, himself clear of all embarrassments, and be able to perform the mission assigned him in the general campaign, the moment events at Richmond should reach the anticipated crisis. The difficulties attending his operations against it, may be gathered from the following description of the manner in which his heavy siege guns had to be transported from Newbern to near Beaufort and Morehead, cities in the vicinity of the fort. "There being no locomotives on the road between the two places, all the siege materials must be carried by steamer, fifteen miles, to the head of Slocum's Creek, and then hauled one mile to Havelock Station. At the latter place they were placed on platform and baggage cars, and by the aid of mules, slowly hauled to Carolina city, which was the head-quarters of General Parke. Here there was a turn out and short track leading to a wharf on the edge of Bogue Sound, where the guns, mortars and ammunition were received on board flat boats and conveyed across the sound to 392 ATTACK ON FORT MACON. Bogue's Beach, a distance of a mile and a half. When these heavy guns and other ponderous materiel were on board the flats, the labor of transporting them to the desired place of operations had just commenced. The sound is so shallow, for more than half the distance across, that it can easily be sounded by wading knee deep-a narrow channel, containing only some five or six feet at high water, intervening. Having reached the opposite shore at a point four miles due west from fort Macon, a wide marsh was to be crossed, in which the wheels of artillery carriages sunk to the hubs, and when this obstacle was crossed, a continuous line of sandy knolls was reached, extending to the fort. These sand hills were covered by a stunted growth of brush and briar, in which the wheels sunk to the axle, requiring a great force to move the massive loads." But these difficulties were at length all overcome, and the guns one by one were placed in position. Our skirmishers in the mean time, crept under the sand hills near the fort and annoyed exceedingly the garrison, which in vain endeavored to ascertain what Burnside was about. A man slung in halyards was kept swinging in mid air to detect our movements. but the work steadily progressed to its completion. On Wednesday, the twenty-third, Burnside arrived with two powerful floating batteries, and the fort was summoned to surrender. Colonel White was in command, and as if to give another, among the illustrations of the horrors of civil war, Quarter master Biggs, a former class mate of his, was sent with the demand. The most honorable terms were offered, and the commander, a noble, high-minded man, had he consulted his own feelings, would doubtless, in the hopelessness of his position, have pulled down his flag. But thinking it looked unsoldierlike to do so without a struggle, he declined. As soon as the flag returned, Burnside signaled the batteries to open fire. This was prevented, however, by THE BOMBARDMENT. 393 the appearance of a white flag from the fort, with a bag of letters, which the commander wished to be forwarded to their destination, evidently the messages which they thought might be the last they should send on earth. Friday morning, the day that the victorious Farragut, with the Stars and Stripes flying in the breeze, was standing boldly on towards New Orleans, the first gun from Captain Morris' battery, echoed along the beach. As the sullen reverberations died away, the inhabitants of Beaufort and Morehead flocked to the windows and balconies of their houses, to witness the fearful drama, whose closing scenes might leave many of their homes houses of mourning-for friends and relatives and sons and brothers were in the low structure far away, which was to be the target of our destructive batteries. Shot followed shot in quick succession, making the city shake on its sandy foundations, and soon after Flagler swelled the thunder from his battery of ten--inch mortars, and in quick succession, followed Lieutenant Prouty's eight-inch mortars, to the right and in advance, completing the horrible din. The man swinging from the flag-staff of the fort, quickly descended from his perilous watch, and soon the hitherto silent fort began to belch forth flame. The roar of the ocean as it rolled its waves steadily to the shore, furnished the refrain to this mighty music. The Parrott shells made destructive work, and whenever one smote the solid masonry, a cloud of black dust showed that it shivered whatever it struck. For over three hours shot and shell were rained from the' batteries, when at length the floating batteries got into position, and began to pour in an enfilading fire. The garrison, appalled at this concentric fire, fled to their casemates for shelter. For two hours the floating batteries kept up their bom bardment, rendering the fort too hot for flesh and blood to stand, and the rebels finally turned their guns upon them. 394 THE FORT SURRENDERS. A thirty-two-pound shot soon crashed through the Daylight gun boat, and others received similar damage, but without any loss of life. Only one man was wounded. But at length the sea had so risen under the stiff gale that was blowing, that the gunners could not keep their range, and the boats were hauled off. During this time, the three land batteries had taken a breathing spell, but now they commenced again. By two o'clock, every gun but two in the fort was deserted. At three, one of these was abandoned in terror, and a ten-inch columbiad alone kept up its melancholy fire. But it grew weaker and weaker, and a little after four, ceased altogether, when a white flag was run up. The fort was ours, with the loss of only one killed and two wounded that of the enemy, seven killed and eighteen wounded. Five hundred men were surrendered prisoners of war, together with all the armament and stores of the fort. The next morning, Colonel White repaired to the steamer Alice Price, on which was General Burnside, to surrender the fort in person. He found the General at breakfast, who received him very cordially, and invited him to take a seat at the table. He did so, and the two discussed their breakfast together as amicably, as though there had been no hard feelings or hard knocks between them. The garrison was allowed the same terms that had at first been offered, for though White was a rebel, he was a gallant and gentlemanly one, to whom, notwithstanding his misguided course, a generous and courteous treatment seemed due. The bombardment of these two forts proved conclusively that brick and stone can not stand before rifled artillery. The instruments of destruction have got in advance of the means of defense, and to restore their former relations, fortifications will have to be incased in iron. On the eleventh, Pulaski fell; on the twenty-fifth, Macon; and on the twenty-sixth New Orleans. Thus, within a sin |