ing." Burnside explained that Longstreet had not entirely surrounded him, and that he had all the time been able to keep open communications with the country. "If I had known that," said Sherman, "I should not have hurried my men so fast.

Leaving part of his troops with Burnside, Sherman returned with the remainder to Chattanooga. Cold weather soon set in, and military operations came to an end for the season. Earthworks were thrown up and block-houses built at the different places to be held, and the tired soldiers went into winter quarters. Some of the block-houses built by them were very picturesque. They were constructed of heavy logs, with walls three or four feet thick, and had a lower story for cannon and an upper story with holes for musket firing. Underneath was a bomb-proof magazine for the ammunition.

CHAPTER XXXII.

THE MONITORS.

LOSS OF THE MONITOR.-THE MONTAUK AND THE NASHVILLE.-FORT MCALLISTER.-THE CONFEDERATES ATTACK THE FLEET OFF CHARLESTON. THE MONITORS ATTACK CHARLESTON. -THE NEW IRONSIDES.-CABLES AND TORPEDOES.-A TERRIBLE BOMBARDMENT.-LOSS OF THE KEOKUK.-CAPTURE OF THE ATLANTA.-NEW CONFEDERATE FLAG.-I DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR TORPEDOES.-GILLMORE AT CHARLESTON.-FORT WAGNER.-MEN EIGHTEEN FEET HIGH WANTED. THE SWAMP ANGEL.-SUMTER IN RUINS.-TAKING OF MORRIS ISLAND. -ASSAULT ON SUMTER.-LOSS OF THE WEEHAWKEN.-NEW BERNE ATTACKED.-LITTLE WASHINGTON.-RAIDS AND CONTRABANDS.-I'SE JUST SAM.

The sideth of armored vessels of the same kind, and by the

HE success of the Monitor had induced the government

to beginning of 1863 a number of them were on duty along the coast. The first Monitor had been lost at sea, but a few months after her famous fight, while on her way to Port Royal, where she had been ordered with two other monitors, the Passaic and Montauk. The three were being towed down the coast by steamers, and when off Cape Hatteras met a severe gale. The sea broke over the decks and pilot-houses of the iron-clads, and dashed in heavy masses against the bases of their turrets. This loosened the packing around the Monitor's turret, and she began to leak so badly that the crew had to work the pumps and to bale with buckets. At night the gale increased. A great wave would lift the vessel, and when she came down the flat under part of her deck would strike the water so heavily as to cause other leaks. Though the pumps were worked all the time, the water gained and put out the fires. Signals of distress were then made to the Rhode Island, which was towing her, and boats were sent. Part of the crew jumped in and were taken aboard the steamer. The rest crowded into the turret, for the water had driven them from below. The boats returned and most of the remaining crew got into them and were saved, but several were swept off by the waves and some others were so frightened that they would not leave the turret. At midnight her light was still seen from the Rhode Island, but a few minutes after it disappeared: the Monitor had gone to the bottom of the sea, only eleven months after she was launched. The

Passaic was nearly lost in the same storm, but by hard work the men succeeded in keeping her afloat, and she and the Montauk arrived safe at their destination.

In the following February (1863), the Montauk and several other monitors were lying in the mouth of the Ogechee, a river of Georgia, which flows into the Atlantic a little south of the Savannah River. A few miles up the river the Confederates had built an earthwork called Fort McAllister, to guard the bridge over which passes the railway running southward from Savannah, and to protect blockade-runners which might go in there. Near the fort lay the war-steamer Nashville, one of the privateers (page 140) fitted out by the Confederate government to prey on American commerce, waiting for a chance to run out. One day (Feb. 27) Commander Worden (the same who had fought the Merrimack), who was then in command of the Montauk, discovered that the Nashville was aground just above

the fort. The next morning Worden went up with his vessel and fired shells at her. The fort returned the fire, but, although the Monitor was hit several times, no damage was done. In a few minutes one of the Montauk's shells burst inside of the Nashville, setting her on fire. Her guns went off one after another, and in a little while her magazine blew up, leaving nothing of the vessel but a few charred timbers and the iron skeletons of her wheels.

Admiral Dupont, seeing how well the Montauk had stood the heavy fire, then determined to make an attack on the fort itself. The monitors Passaic, Montauk, Ericsson, Patapsco, and Nahant, and some schooners with heavy mortars on board, steamed up the river (March 3) and opened fire on the fort; but, on account of piles and other obstructions in the river, they could not get near enough to do much harm. The great

1863.]

NAVAL FIGHT.

389

shells tore up the sand around the fort and dismounted one of the guns in it, but no serious damage was done, and after wasting much ammunition the attempt was given up.

A short time before this (Jan. 31) two Confederate iron-clad gunboats, named the Palmetto State and the Chicora, had run out of Charleston before daylight and attacked the blockading fleet. They rammed and disabled with shells the Mercedita and the Keystone State, both of which, having holes through their steam-chests, were obliged to surrender; but as soon as day dawned the other Union vessels came in and the Confederates were forced to retreat into the harbor. Both the injured ves

sels were saved, but the Confederates proclaimed that the blockade had been raised, and invited foreign nations to carry on commerce with the port of Charleston. No foreign vessels thought it best to accept this invitation, and only blockaderunners, which had always run in when they could, continued to steal through the Union fleet whenever they saw a chance.

Preparations were then made for a naval attack on Charleston. It was not of much military importance, but as its inhabitants had begun the war there was a strong desire throughout the North to punish them, and it was hoped that the Union flag might take the place of the Confederate ensign on Sumter on the anniversary of its capture. In the beginning of April

the iron-clad fleet under Admiral Dupont was collected near the mouth of Charleston harbor. It consisted of seven monitors the Passaic, Weehawken, Montauk, Patapsco, Cattskill, Nantucket, and Nahant-the armor-plated frigate New Ironsides, and the Keokuk, a lighter armored ram, with two stationary turrets-that is, with turrets which did not turn round like those of the monitors. There were also some wooden gunboats. These vessels carried the heaviest armament which had ever before been used in naval warfare: the monitors carried each two to four 11 and 15 inch guns, while the great New Ironsides was armed with sixteen 11-inch guns and two 200-pounder Parrott guns. They carried in all thirty-two of these monster guns, but against them the forts could bring at least three hundred great cannons, some of them the most powerful English rifled guns.

The works defending Charleston were then much stronger than when Sumter was taken in 1861 (page 50). The old forts had been strengthened, new batteries had been built, and the

BARREL TORPEDO.

channels leading into the harbor had been obstructed by piles driven into the bottom, by chains and cables stretched across, and by torpedoes. Across the south channel was a row of piles in which had been left an opening wide enough for a vessel to go through; but woe to the enemy that tried the passage! On the bottom lay a mine of several thousand pounds of gunpowder, ready to be fired by electricity from the forts, which were connected with it by wires laid under water. Across the main ship channel, between Sumter and Moultrie, was stretched a great cable, buoyed up by empty barrels, which held up a network of smaller cables and lines below fastened to torpedoes. These torpedoes were made chiefly of common barrels fitted with pointed ends of solid wood and filled with gunpowder, and were to be exploded by electricity when a vessel became entangled in the network of ropes. Another kind of torpedo was made like a double can with the two tops fastened together. The lower can was filled with gunpowder, and the upper one, which was hollow, acted as a buoy to float it. Above the top was a rod with a head. If a vessel struck one of these prongs, some percussion powder would be fired within the can