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CHAPTER VI.

FORTRESS MONROE.

THE president had no lecture to bestow upon General Butler; but, on the contrary, compliment and congratulation. He urged him to accept the command of Fortress Monroe, and use the same energy in retaking Norfolk as he had displayed at Annapolis and Baltimore. After a day's consideration, the general said he was willing enough to accept the proffered promotion and the command of the fortress, if he could have the means of being useful there. As a base for active operations, Fortress Monroe was good; he only objected to it as a convenient tomb for a troublesome militia general. Could he have four Massachusetts regiments, two batteries of field artillery, and the other requisites for a successful advance? Not that Massachusetts troops were better than others, only he knew them better, and they him. Yes, he could have them, and should, and whatever else he needed for effective action. An active, energetic campaign was precisely the thing desired and expected of him, and nothing should be wanting on the part of the government to render such a campaign possible. This being understood, he joyfully accepted the commission and the command. General Butler's commission as major-general dates from May 16th, two days after his thunderous march into Baltimore. He is now, therefore, in reality, the senior major-general in the service of the United States. On that day, General McClellan and General Banks were still in the pay of their respective railroad companies; General Dix was at home; General Fremont was in Europe, attending to his private affairs.

May 20th, General Butler received orders from General Scott for is guidance at the scene of his future labors:

"You will proceed," wrote the lieutenant-general, "to Fortress Monroe and assume the command of that post, when Colonel Dimmick will limit his command to the regular troops composing a part of its garrison, but

will, by himself and his officers, give such aid in the instruction of the volunteers as you may direct.

"Besides the present garrison of Fortress Monroe, consisting of such companies of regular artillery, portions of two Massachusetts regiments of volunteers, and a regiment of Vermont volunteers, nine additional regiments of volunteers from New York may soon be expected there. Only a small portion, if any, of these can be conveniently quartered or encamped in the fort, the greater part, if not the whole area of which will be necessary for exercises on the ground. The nine additional regiments must, therefore, be encamped in the best positions outside of and as near the fort as may be. For this purpose it is hoped that a pine forest north of the fort, near the bay, may be found to furnish the necessary ground, and shade for some three thousand men, though somewhat distant from drinking and cooking water. This, as well as feed, it may be necessary to bring to the camp on wheels. The quartermaster's department has been instructed to furnish the necessary vehicles, casks, and draft animals. The war garrison of Fortress Monroe, against a formidable army, provided with an adequate siege train, is about 2,500 men. You will soon have there, inside and out, near three times that number. Assuining 1,500 as a garrison adequate to resist any probable attack in the next six months, or, at least, for many days or weeks, you will consider the remainder of the force, under your command, disposable for aggressive purposes and employ it accordingly.

"In respect to more distant operations, you may expect specific instructions at a later date. In the mean time, I will direct your attention to the following objects: 1st. Not to let the enemy erect batteries to annoy Fortress Monroe; 2d. To capture any batteries the enemy may have within a half day's march of you, and which may be reached by land; 3d. The same in respect to the enemy's batteries, at or about Craney Island, though requiring water craft; and 4th. To menace and to recapture the navy yard at Gosport, in order to complete its destruction, with its contents, except what it may be practicable to bring away in safety. It is expected that you put yourself into free communication with the commander of the U. S. naval forces in Hampton Roads, and invite his cordial co-operation with you in all operations, in whole or in part, by water, and no doubt he will have received corresponding instructions from the Navy Depart

ment.

"Boldness in execution is nearly always necessary; but in planning and fitting out expeditions or detachments, great circumspection is a virtue. In important cases, where time clearly permits, be sure to submit your plans and ask instructions from higher authority.

"Communicate with me often and fully on all matters important to the

service."

May 226. at eight o'clock in the morning, the guns of the fortress saluted General Butler as the commander of the post; and as soon as the ceremonies of his arrival were over, he proceeded to look about him, to learn what it was that had fallen to his share. In the course of the day, he made great progress in the pursuit of knowledge.

Fortress Monroe is a sixty-five acre field, with a low, massive stone wall around it; big, black guns peering through and over the top of the wall; and a mile and a half of canal wound round its base. Inside, are long barracks, hospitals, a little chapel, trees, avenues of trees, gardens, parade-grounds, green lawns, gravel walks; and, in the midst, surrounded by trees and garden, a solid, broad, slate-peaked mansion, the residence of the commander of the post. Old Point Comfort, broadening at the extremity, so as to form a peninsula, seems made to be the site of a fort, and such it must remain as long as man wages war. Whoever holds it, and knows how to use it, is master of Virginia and North Carolina; for it either commands or threatens, and can be used so as to control their navigable rivers, their harbors, and their railroad connections with the South. The Southern Confederacy, so called, must have it, or retire to the Gulf. Without it, the Confederacy is nothing; and the place can only be taken by a naval power superior to that of the United States, or by treachery. If it had been built with a prophetic view to the events of the last three years, the site could not have been better selected for the purposes of the United States. That it has not been used with all the effect it might have been, was not the fault of the new commandant, as shall soon be demonstrated.

The country around it, on the main land, is level; the soil, as Winthrop describes it, a fine fertile loam, easily running to dust as the English air does to fog; the woods dense and beautiful; the roads, miserable cart tracks; the cattle "scallawags," the people ditto; the farm houses dilapidated and mean; such dens as a northern drayman would have disdained, and a hod-carrier only occupied on compulsion. A country settled for two hundred and thirty years, but not as pleasant, nor as commodious, nor as popu lated, nor as civilized, as a county of Minnesota only surveyed ten years ago. But many of the people, though of incredibly contracted intelligence, were kind and hospitable, and, as events have

shown, brave and enduring. If life seemed stagnant in that region, there was in it a latent energy and force, which poor Winthrop did not suspect, but which, however misdirected, he would have been among the first to recognize. Life stagnant is not so fatal as life wasted of its raw material.

This huge fort was one of the hinges of the stable-door which was shut after the horse had been stolen, in the war of 1812. It had never been used for warlike purposes, and had been, usually, garrisoned by a company or two, or three, of regular troops, who paraded and drilled in its wide expanses with listless punctuality, and fished in the surrounding waters, or strolled about the adjacent village. Colonel Dimmick was the commandant of the post when the war broke out; a faithful, noble-minded officer, who, with his one man to eight yards of rampart, kept Virginia from clutching the prize. Two or three thousand volunteers had since made their way to the fortress, and were encamped on its grounds.

men.

General Butler soon discovered that of the many things necessary for the defense of the post, he had a sufficiency of one only, namely, There was not one horse belonging to the garrison; nor one cart nor wagon. Provision barrels had to be rolled from the landing to the fort, three-quarters of a mile. There was no well or spring within the walls of the fortress; but cisterns only, filled with rain-water, which had given out the summer before when there were but four hundred men at the post. Of ammunition, he had but five thousand rounds, less than a round and a half per man of the kind suited to the greater number of the muskets brought by the volunteers. The fort was getting over-crowded with troops, and more were hourly expected; he would have nine more regiments in a few days. Room must be found for the new comers outside the walls. He found, too, that he had, in his vicinity, an active, numerous, increasing enemy, who were busy fortifying points of land opposite or near the fort; points essential for his purposes. The garrison was, in effect, penned up in the peninsula; a rebel picket a mile distant; a rebel flag waving from Hampton Bridge in sight of the fortress; rebel forces preparing to hem in the fortress on every side, as they had done Sumter; rumor, as usual, magnifying their numbers tenfold. Colonel Dimmick had been able to seize and hold the actual property of the government; no more. Water being the most immediate necessity, General Butler di

rected his attention, first of all, to securing a more trustworthy supply. Can the artesian well be speedily finished, which was begun long ago, and then suspended? It could, thought Colonel de Russy, of the engineers, who, at once, at the general's request, consulted a contractor on the subject. There was a spring a mile from the fortress, which furnished 700 gallons a day. Can the water be conducted to the fortress by a temporary pipe? It can, reported the colonel of engineers; and the general ordered it done. Meanwhile, water from Baltimore, at two cents a gallon. To-morrow, Colonel Phelps, with his Vermonters, shall cross to Hampton, reconnoiter the country, and see if there is good camping ground in that direction; for the pine forest suggested by General Scott was reported by Colonel de Russy to be unhealthy as well as waterless. In a day or two, Commodore Stringham, urged thereto by General Butler, would have shelled out the rising battery at Sewall's Point, if he had not been suddenly ordered away to the blockade of Charleston harbor. Already the general had an eye upon Newport News, eleven miles to the south, directly upon one of the roads he meant to take by and by, when the promised means of offensive warfare arrived. Word was brought that the enemy had an eye upon it, too; and General Butler determined to be there before them. That rolling of barrels from the landing would never do; on this first day, the general ordered surveys and estimates for a railroad between the wharf and the fortress. The men were eating hard biscuit: he directed the construction of a new bake-house, that they might have bread.

The next day, as every one remembers, Colonel Phelps made his reconnoissance in Hampton and its vicinity-not without a show of opposition. Upon approaching the bridge over Hampton Creek, Colonel Phelps perceived that the rebels had set fire to the bridge. Rushing forward at the double-quick, the men tore off the burning planks and quickly extinguished the fire; then marching into the village, completed their reconnoissance, and performed some evolutions for the edification of the inhabitants. Colonel Phelps met there several of his old West Point comrades, whom he warned of the inevitable failure of their bad cause, and advised them to abandon it in time. The general himself was soon on the ground, and took a ride of seven miles in the enemy's country that afternoon, still eager in the pursuit of knowledge.

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