CHAPTER XLIII.

THE PREPARATIONS FOR ANOTHER ATTACK ON CHARLESTON-FORMIDABLE CHARACTER OF THE FORTIFICATIONS-THE CROSSING OF THE BAR-ORDER OF BATTLE PRESCRIBED BY ADMIRAL DU PONT-THE ATTACK-OBSTRUCTIONS IN THE HARBOR-THE TERRIBLE STORM OF FIRE THE NEW IRONSIDES UNMANAGEABLE-GALLANTRY OF THE COMMANDER OF THE KEOKUK, AND OF THE COMMANDERS OF THE MONITORS—THE KEOKUK RIDDLED AND SINKING THREE OF THE MONITORS DISABLED-WITHDRAWAL OF THE FLEET-RETURN TO PORT ROYAL ADMIRAL DU PONT'S ACTION JUSTIFIABLE-OTHER NAVAL ACTIONS ON THE ATLANTIC COAST AND IN THE GULF AND MISSISSIPPI RIVER-BATTLES AND SKIRMISHES ON LAND -IN THE DEPARTMENT OF THE CUMBERLAND, AT VARIOUS POINTS IN TENNESSEE AND KENTUCKY; IN THE DEPARTMENT OF MISSOURI, THE ATTACK ON THE SAM GATY; IN THE DEPARTMENT OF THE FRONTIER, AT FAYETTEVILLE, ARKANSAS, AND ITS VICINITY, AND IN THE DEPARTMENT OF THE GULF-EXPEDITION TO PASCAGOULA-THE BATTLES ON THE TECHEDESTRUCTION OF THREE REBEL IRON-CLADS, AND CAPTURE OR DESTRUCTION OF ELEVEN TRANSPORTS, AND TWO THOUSAND PRISONERS-COMPLETE ROUT of the rebels.

WHILE the reorganization of the army of the Potomac, under the ener getic management of General Hooker, was in progress, and all active movements were prohibited there by the condition of the roads, and at the West General Grant was carefully maturing the plans which were yet to culminate in the overthrow of the Rebel Gibraltar on the Mississippi, the Government had not been unmindful of that fountainhead of the Rebellion-Charleston-and was gathering at Port Royal its iron-clad ships for another, and it was hoped a more successful attack upon its strongly fortified harbor.

It was expected that the land forces would be able to participate in the attack, but they were not sufficiently strong in numbers for such a work, and it would have perilled the holding of the Department of the South, had they made the effort to do so, for which, as the event proved, there was no opportunity.

The appointed rendezvous for the fleet was in the North Edisto river; and thither, during the last week in March, and the first two or three days of April, it had been concentrating. The New Ironsides, the only broadside iron-clad of the navy, Commodore T. Turner commanding; seven monitors, viz: the Weehawken, Captain John Rodgers; the Passaic, Captain P. Drayton; the Montauk, Captain J. L. Worden; the Patapsco, Commander D. Ammen; the Catskill, Commander George Rodgers; the Nantucket, Commander D. M. Fairfax; the Nahant, Commander J. Downes; and the Whitney iron-clad the Keokuk, Lieutenant-Commander A. C. Rind, were all assembled there, as well as the Canandaigua, Housatonic, Huron, Unadilla, Wissahickon, and other wooden gunboats, and with nearly ninety of the other vessels of the blockading squadron, trans