Adventure of the Mayflower. SHERMAN'S WINTER OPERATIONS. 395 The Enemy at Port Royal Ferry. Entrench only two balls cutting into | Beaufort, at the intersecthe steamer's upper words. tion of the Beaufort and She finally grounded when Coosaw rivers, was comnearing the ferry at Beaufort island, and lay manded by Confederate guns. there an hour in momentary expectation of ments were thrown up, and every preparation attack. Seeing her peril three boats, filled made to dispute any crossing at that point. with men from the New York Seventy-ninth On the last day of December an expedition (Highlanders) volunteers, put out to the res- designed to dislodge the enemy was started. cue. A section of a battery opened on the It was composed of four gunboats, under boats, but did not succeed in sinking them. general command of Captain Raymond RogThey reached the steamer in safety-the ers, and Stevens' brigade, with two additionRhode Islanders' howitzer, in the meantime, al regiments ordered up from Hilton Head. pitching shell into the rebels, keeping them This powerful demonstration caused the eneat a respectful distance. Reenforcements my to retire after a brief artillery skirmish. from the Eighth Michigan came up and leaving the ferry open to occupation at any effectually covered the steamer until she was time. The Confederates destroyed their works extricated from her peril. before retiring. Important Gunboat Reconnoissance. A series of important reconnoissances, projected by Commodore Dupont, occurred during the week, Dec. 15-22. It was executed by the gunboats Pawnee and Seneca, piloted by the little steamer Vixen, under command of Captain Boutelle, of the Coast Survey corps the expedition being under the direction of Commander Percival Dray- | ton, of the Pawnee. It proceeded up the coast to the mouth of the North Edisto river, where the negroes represented a strong battery to have been located. The work was discovered on Wardlaw island and fire opened on it; but, no answer being made, the small boats pulled ashore to find it deserted and partially destroyed. The gunboats penetrated several miles up the Edisto, discovering another silent fortification and securing a rebel schooner with her load of cotton and provisions. An encampment was found, from which four or five hundred brave defenders had fled ingloriously, leaving much camp and private property behind—all of which was appropriated, together with a store house filled with bacon and hominy. The work of observation continued up to Saturday, Dec. 21st, when the expedition returned to headquarters to report the enemy's sea coast defences all abandoned in the vicinity explored. The same week the South Edisto was visited to find it also abandoned. The enemy retained possession of the several positions guarding land approaches to the interior. Port Royal ferry, ten miles froin Sherman's Winter Operations. But, Sherman, referring to his operations during the winter, said: "Efforts were effectually made to isolate Pulaski from Savannah, and all the means we were able to bring to bear on that object were put to use. Had a few gunboats been able to get into the Savannah River, our batteries would have been erected on the mud flats in time to prevent the supplying of the fort with provisions, and thus insured its fall without the slow and expensive mode of bombardment. as it was, its fall was thereby hastened, and a threat upon Savannah, planned by Commodore Dupont and myself, which resulted in the quiet fall of Brunswick, Fernandina, St. Johns, and St. Augustine, materially assisted. The almost herculean task of collecting, landing, and setting up the immense siege armament on Tybee, was also successfully and energetically prosecuted and about completed." As the operations here referred to extended into the spring and summer of 1862, we leave their consideration to a future chapter. Two other expeditions were fully determined upon during September and October, namely: one upon New Orleans and one upon North Carolina. The command of the first was confided to Major-General B. F. Butlerthe other to Major-General Ambiose E. Burnside. They did not move, in force, however, until the winter was advanced; hence the record of their disasters and successes properly falls to a later date than that now under consideration. Bombardment at Bombardment at Pensacola Bay. Fort Pickens, which, all | batteries Lincoln, Cameron and Totten, principally the long summer,had frown- on the batteries adjacent to the Navy Yard, those of ed defiance at the half Battery Scott to Fort McRae and the lighthouse batcircle of Confederate batteries environing it, teries, and those of the fort to all. We reduced very finally opened its guns on the morning of perceptibly the fire of Barrancas, entirely silenced that in the Navy Yard, and in one or two of the Nov. 22d, with the intent of punishing the other batteries the efficiency of our fire, at the close rebels for their night attack on Wilson's of the day, not being the least impaired." Camp [see page 357] and for other indignities offered to the American flag. The steam frigate Niagara and the Richmond partici· pated, with instructions to draw the fire of Fort McRae and two batteries which enfiladed Pickens' parapet guns. During the entire day of the 22d, the bombardment was terrific —the entire line of the Confederate batteries and forts answering with the greatest fury, but with little or no damage to the fort or fleet. Colonel Harvey Brown, in command of the fort and out-lying batteries, had so well banked up the walls of Pickens with sand bags as to render the enemy's shot almost harmless. The Colonel thus chronicled his first day's work: November 22d, the bombardment continued, with great effect, though the two ships, owing to the fall of the tide, had to withdraw beyond working range. Pickens, however, did the work quite well enough. Fort McRae was silent; hence, all the strength of the heavy guns was spent upon the Navy Yard, Fort Barrancas and the intervening batteries. The Colonel's report stated: "About three o'clock fire was communicated to one of the houses in Warrington, and shortly afterwards to the church steeple, the church and the whole village being immediately in rear of some of the rebel batteries, they apparently having placed them purposely directly in front of the largest and most valuable buildings. The fire rapidly commuHaving invited Flag Officer McKean to co-ope- nicated to other buildings along the street until rate with me in attacking the rebels, and to which probably two-thirds of it was consumed; and about he gave a ready and cordial assent, I, on the mornthe same time fire was discovered issuing from' the ing of the 22d, opened my batteries on the enemy, back part of the Navy Yard, probably in Wolcott, a to which, in the course of half an hour, he respond- village to the north and immediately adjoining the ed from his numerous forts and batteries extending yard, as Warrington does on the west. Finally it from the Navy Yard to Fort McRae, a distance of penetrated to the yard, and as it continued to burn about four miles, the whole nearly equi-distant brightly all night I concluded that either in it or in from the fort, and on which line he has two forts-Wolcott, many buildings were destroyed. Very McRae and Barrancas--and fourteen separate bat-heavy damage was also done to the buildings of the teries, containing from one to four guns, many of them being ten-inch columbiads and some twelve and thirteen-inch sea coast mortars, the distance varying from two thousand one hundred to two thousand nine hundred yards from this fort. At the same time of my opening, Flag Officer McKeen, in the Niagara, and Captain Ellison, in the Richmond, took position as near to Fort McRae as the depth of wa ter would permit, but which unfortunately was not sufficiently deep to give full effect to their powerful batteries. They, however, kept up a spirited fire on the fort and adjacent batteries during the whole day. My fire was incessant from the time of opening until it was too dark to see, at the rate of a shot for each gun every fifteen or twenty minutes, the fire of the enemy being somewhat slower. By noon the guns of Fort McRae were all silenced but one; and three hours before sunset this fort and the adjoining battery ceased fire. I directed the guns of yard by the avalanche of shot, shell and splinters showered unceasingly on them for two days, and being nearly fireproof, built of brick and covered with slate, I could not succeed in firing them, my hot shot nor shells having no power of igniting them." The destruction of the town and Navy Yard was quite complete; while the lesson taught the enemy in dismantling their supposed-tobe impregnable works, served to convince the Confederate Government of the folly of keeping up their guard over Pickens. Lieutenant Slemmer's watchfulness and bravery had saved the fortress at the only moment when it could have been seized: after its re enforcement [see pages 57-67–110] it passed forever from Confederate reach so long as loyal men manned its guns. CHAPTER II THE MASON-SLIDELL ARREST. PARTICULARS OF THE AFFA I R AND THE OFFICIAL PAPERS IN THE CASE. Importance of the PERHAPS no event of the war created a sensation so profound as that caused Captain Wilkes. ceeded overland to Havana. The steamer by the arrest of the rebel commissioners, was received with great honors on her arrival Messrs. Mason and Slidell. This act at once | at the Cuban capital. A public reception opened the whole question of belligerent was given her at the Tacon theatre and a rights, the right of seizure on the high seas Confederate flag presented. The ambassaand the responsibilities of nations to nations dors were waited upon, on their arrival, by by maritime usage, law and treaty. Its story H. B. M. consul, Mr. Crawford, in full dress, ever will possess an intrinsic interest from its and by him were introduced to the Capnovel and exciting circumstances; while the tain General. They remained in Havana but questions involved must render it a prece- a brief period, awaiting the departure of the dent to which all future authorities will refer English mail steamer Trent, which was to for law and international rights. We shall sail Nov. 7th, for St. Thomas, where they give it, therefore, such consideration as its were to take passage for Europe. importance deserves. Captain Charles Wilkes, of the U. S. steam sloop of war, San Jacinto, being at Cienfuegos, on the southern side of Cuba, on his return from a long cruise off the coast of Africa, heard of the presence of the rebel ministers. He at once resolved to cut off the return of the Theodora as well as to sieze the ambassadors on the high seas. In his report he gave to the Secretary of the Navy his reasons for seizure, and his authority therefor. Acting as he did without precedent or direct orders, he had to study the peculiar case in all its bearings, fruitful as he knew it must be of excitement and of "notes" between the Governments of the United States and Great Britain. He stated his procedure as follows: To forward the cause of The Rebel Mission. the Confederate Govern- | ment at the Courts of Great Britain and France, Jefferson Davis commissioned James M. Mason of Virginia and John Slidell of Louisiana as special ambassadors. These persons sailed for Cardenas, Cuba, in the steamer Theodora, which passed out of Charleston harbor on the night of October 12th, safely eluding the blockade. The fleet steamer Nashville passed out the previous night, to draw off any watchful cruiser which might be hovering around—it having been given out by the Confederate press that the Commissioners were to sail in her. [The Nashville arrived at Southampton, England. November 21st, with a valuable cargo of cotton. On the 19th she met and burned the American ship Harvey Birch-throwing her crew in irons, but releasing them on English soil. She disposed of her cargo and refitted at her leisure in Southampton. Her case is referred to in the foot note, page 356.] The Theodora reached Cardenas in safety, from "When I heard at Cienfue gos, on the south side of Cuba, His Statement of the of these Commissioners having Havana, and would depart in the English steamer His Statement of the Case. Captain Wilkes' State ment of the Case. Sir Wm. Scott and other Judges | Ministers to France and Engof the Admiralty Court of land, but inasmuch as they had Great Britain, which bore upon not been received by either of the rights of neutrals and their responsibilities. these Powers, I did not conceive they had immunity “The Governments of Great Britain, France and attached to their persons; and were but escaped Spain having issued proclamations that the Confede- conspirators plotting and contriving to overthrow rate States were viewed, considered and treated as the Government of the United States, and they were belligerents, and knowing that the ports of Great therefore not to be considered as having any claim Britain, France, Spain and Holland, in the West to the immunities attached to the character they Indies, were open to their vessels, and that they thought fit to assume. were admitted to all the courtesies and protection Vessels of the United States received, every aid and attention being given them, proved clearly that they acted upon this view and decision, and brought them within the international law of search and under the responsibilities, I therefore felt no hesitation in boarding and searching all vessels of whatever nation, I fell in with, and have done so. "The question arose in my mind whether I had the right to capture the persons of these Commissioners-whether they were amenable to capture. There was no doubt I had the right to capture vessels with written dispatches; they are expressly referred to in all authorities, subjecting the vessel to seizure and condemnation if the captain of the vessel had the knowledge of their being on board. But these gentlemen were not dispatches in the literal sense, and did not seem to come under that designation, and nowhere could I find a case in point. "That they were Commissioners I had ample proof from their own avowal, and bent on mischievous and traitorous errands against our country-to overthrow its institutions and enter into treaties and alliances with foreign States, expressly forbidden by the Constitution. They had been presented to the Captain General of Cuba by her British Majesty's Consul General, but the Captain General told me he had not received them in that capacity, but as distinguished gentlemen and strangers. "I then considered them as the embodiment of despatches, and as they had openly declared themselves as charged with all authority from the Confederate Government, to form treaties and alliances tending to the establishment of their independence, I became satisfied that their mission was adverse and criminal to the Union, and it therefore became my duty to arrest their progress and capture them, if they had no passports or papers from the Federal Government, as provided for under the law of nations, viz: That foreign ministers of a belligerent on board of neutral ships are required to possess papers from the other belligerent to permit them to pass free.' 'Report and assumption gave them the title of "As respects the steamer in which they embarked, I ascertained in the Havana that she was a merchant vessel plying between Vera Cruz, the Havana and St. Thomas, carrying the mail by contract. "The agent of the vessel, the son of the British Consul at Havana, was well aware of the character of these persons, that they engaged their passage and did embark in the vessel; his father had visited them, and introduced them as Ministers of the Confederate States, on their way to England and France. They went in the steamer with the knowledge and consent of the captain, who endeavored afterwards to conceal them by refusing to exhibit the passenger list and the papers of the vessel. There can be no doubt he knew they were carrying highly important despatches, and were endowed with instructions inimical to the United States. This rendered his vessel (a neutral) a good prize, and I determined to take possession of her; and, as I mentioned in my report, send her to Key West for adjudication, where I am well satisfied she would have been condemned for carrying these persons, and for resisting to be searched; the cargo was also liable, as all the shippers were knowing to the embarkation of these live despatches, and their traitorous motives and actions to the Union of the United States. "I forbore to seize her, however, in consequence of my being so reduced in officers and crew, and the derangement it would cause innocent persons, there being a large number of passengers, who would have been put to great loss and inconvenience as well as disappointment from the interruption it would have caused them in not being able to join the steamer from St. Thomas for Europe. I, there fnre, concluded to sacrifice the interests of my offi cers and crew in the prize, and suffered the steamer to proceed after the necessary detention to effect I the transfer of these Commissioners, considering had obtained the important end I had in view, and which affected the interests of our country, and interrupted the action of that of the Confederates. "I would add that the conduct of her Britannic Majesty's subjects, both official and others, showed but little regard or obedience to her proclamation, ay aiding and abetting the views and endeavoring |