Andersonville Part 32

Next we ran through a turpentine plantation, and as the darky was pointing out where the still, the master's place, the "quarters," etc., were, Andrews managed to fish out of that bag and pa.s.s to me three roasted chickens. Then a great swamp called for description, and before we were through with it, I had about a peck of boiled sweet potatos.

Andrews emptied the bag as the darky was showing him a great peanut plantation, taking from it a small frying-pan, a canteen of mola.s.ses, and a half-gallon tin bucket, which had been used to make coffee in. We divided up our wealth of eatables with the rest of the boys in the car, not forgetting to keep enough to give ourselves a magnificent meal.

As we ran along we searched carefully for the place where we had seen the line-of-battle, expecting that it would now be marked with signs of a terrible conflict, but we could see nothing. We could not even fix the locality where the line stood.

As it became apparent that we were going directly toward Wilmington, as fast as our engines could pull us, the excitement rose. We had many misgivings as to whether our folks still retained possession of Wilmington, and whether, if they did, the Rebels could not stop at a point outside of our lines, and transfer us to some other road.

For hours we had seen n.o.body in the country through which we were pa.s.sing. What few houses were visible were apparently deserted, and there were no Towns or stations anywhere. We were very anxious to see some one, in hopes of getting a hint of what the state of affairs was in the direction we were going. At length we saw a young man-apparently a scout-on horseback, but his clothes were equally divided between the blue and the b.u.t.ternut, as to give no clue to which side he belonged.

An hour later we saw two infantrymen, who were evidently out foraging. They had sacks of something on their backs, and wore blue clothes. This was a very hopeful sign of a near approach to our lines, but bitter experience in the past warned us against being too sanguine.

About 4 o'clock P. M., the trains stopped and whistled long and loud. Looking out I could see-perhaps half-a-mile away-a line of rifle pits running at right angles with the track. Guards, whose guns flashed as they turned, were pacing up and down, but they were too far away for me to distinguish their uniforms.

The suspense became fearful.

But I received much encouragement from the singular conduct of our guards. First I noticed a Captain, who had been especially mean to us while at Florence.

He was walking on the ground by the train. His face was pale, his teeth set, and his eyes shone with excitement. He called out in a strange, forced voice to his men and boys on the roof of the cars: "Here, you fellers git down off'en thar and form a line."

The fellows did so, in a slow, constrained, frightened ways and huddled together, in the most unsoldierly manner.

The whole thing reminded me of a scene I once saw in our line, where a weak-kneed Captain was ordered to take a party of rather chicken-hearted recruits out on the skirmish-line.

We immediately divined what was the matter. The lines in front of us were really those of our people, and the idiots of guards, not knowing of their entire safety when protected by a flag of truce, were scared half out of their small wits at approaching so near to armed Yankees.

We showered taunts and jeers upon them. An Irishman in my car yelled out: "Och, ye dirty spalpeens; it's not shootin' prisoners ye are now; it's c.u.min' where the Yankee b'ys hev the gun; and the minnit ye say thim yer white livers show themselves in yer pale faces. Bad luck to the blatherin' b.a.s.t.a.r.ds that yez are, and to the mothers that bore ye."

At length our train moved up so near to the line that I could see it was the grand, old loyal blue that clothed the forms of the men who were pacing up and down.

And certainly the world does not hold as superb looking men as these appeared to me. Finely formed, stalwart, full-fed and well clothed, they formed the most delightful contrast with the scrawny, shambling, villain-visaged little clay-eaters and white trash who had looked down upon us from the sentry boxes for many long months.

I sprang out of the cars and began washing my face and hands in the ditch at the side of the road. The Rebel Captain, noticing me, said, in the old, hateful, brutal, imperious tone: "Git back in dat cah, dah."

An hour before I would have scrambled back as quickly as possible, knowing that an instant's hesitation would be followed by a bullet. Now, I looked him in the face, and said as irritatingly as possible: "O, you go to --, you Rebel. I'm going into Uncle Sam's lines with as little Rebel filth on me as possible."

He pa.s.sed me without replying.

His day of shooting was past.

Descending from the cars, we pa.s.sed through the guards into our lines, a Rebel and a Union clerk checking us off as we pa.s.sed. By the time it was dark we were all under our flag again.

The place where we came through was several miles west of Wilmington, where the railroad crossed a branch of the Cape Fear River. The point was held by a brigade of Schofield's army-the Twenty-Third Army Corps.

The boys lavished unstinted kindness upon us. All of the brigade off duty crowded around, offering us blankets, shirts shoes, pantaloons and other articles of clothing and similar things that we were obviously in the greatest need of. The sick were carried, by hundreds of willing hands, to a sheltered spot, and laid upon good, comfortable beds improvised with leaves and blankets. A great line of huge, generous fires was built, that every one of us could have plenty of place around them.

By and by a line of wagons came over from Wilmington laden with rations, and they were dispensed to us with what seemed reckless prodigality. The lid of a box of hard tack would be knocked off, and the contents handed to us as we filed past, with absolute disregard as to quant.i.ty. If a prisoner looked wistful after receiving one handful of crackers, another was handed to him; if his long-famished eyes still lingered as if enchained by the rare display of food, the men who were issuing said: "Here, old fellow, there's plenty of it: take just as much as you can carry in your arms."

So it was also with the pickled pork, the coffee, the sugar, etc. We had been stinted and starved so long that we could not comprehend that there was anywhere actually enough of anything.

The kind-hearted boys who were acting as our hosts began preparing food for the sick, but the Surgeons, who had arrived in the meanwhile, were compelled to repress them, as it was plain that while it was a dangerous experiment to give any of us all we could or would eat, it would never do to give the sick such a temptation to kill themselves, and only a limited amount of food was allowed to be given those who were unable to walk.

Andrews and I hungered for coffee, the delightful fumes of which filled the air and intoxicated our senses. We procured enough to make our half-gallon bucket full and very strong.

We drank so much of this that Andrews became positively drunk, and fell helplessly into some brush. I pulled him out and dragged him away to a place where we had made our rude bed.

I was dazed. I could not comprehend that the long-looked for, often-despaired-of event had actually happened. I feared that it was one of those tantalizing dreams that had so often haunted my sleep, only to be followed by a wretched awakening. Then I became seized with a sudden fear lest the Rebel attempt to retake me. The line of guards around us seemed very slight. It might be forced in the night, and all of us recaptured. Shivering at this thought, absurd though it was, I arose from our bed, and taking Andrews with me, crawled two or three hundred yards into a dense undergrowth, where in the event of our lines being forced, we would be overlooked.

CHAPTER LXXIX.

GETTING USED TO FREEDOM-DELIGHTS OF A LAND WHERE THERE IS ENOUGH OF EVERYTHING-FIRST GLIMPSE OF THE OLD FLAG-WILMINGTON AND ITS HISTORY -LIEUTENANT CUSHING-FIRST ACQUAINTANCE WITH THE COLORED TROOPS-LEAVING FOR HOME-DESTRUCTION OF THE "THORN" BY A TORPEDO-THE MOCK MONITOR'S ACHIEVEMENT.

After a sound sleep, Andrews and I awoke to the enjoyment of our first day of freedom and existence in G.o.d's country. The sun had already risen, bright and warm, consonant with the happiness of the new life now opening up for us.

But to nearly a score of our party his beams brought no awakening gladness. They fell upon stony, staring eyes, from out of which the light of life had now faded, as the light of hope had done long ago. The dead lay there upon the rude beds of fallen leaves, sc.r.a.ped together by thoughtful comrades the night before, their clenched teeth showing through parted lips, faces fleshless and pinched, long, unkempt and ragged hair and whiskers just stirred by the lazy breeze, the rotting feet and limbs drawn up, and skinny hands clenched in the last agonies.

Their fate seemed harder than that of any who had died before them. It was doubtful if many of them knew that they were at last inside of our own lines.

Again the kind-hearted boys of the brigade crowded around us with proffers of service. Of an Ohio boy who directed his kind tenders to Andrews and me, we procured a chunk of coa.r.s.e rosin soap about as big as a pack of cards, and a towel. Never was there as great a quant.i.ty of solid comfort got out of that much soap as we obtained. It was the first that we had since that which I stole in Wirz's headquarters, in June -nine months before. We felt that the dirt which had acc.u.mulated upon us since then would subject us to a.s.sessment as real estate if we were in the North.

Hurrying off to a little creek we began our ablutions, and it was not long until Andrews declared that there was a perceptible sand-bar forming in the stream, from what we washed off. Dirt deposits of the Pliocene era rolled off feet and legs. Eocene incrustations let loose reluctantly from neck and ears; the hair was a ma.s.s of tangled locks matted with nine months' acc.u.mulation of pitch pine tar, rosin soot, and South Carolina sand, that we did not think we had better start in upon it until we either had the shock cut off, or had a whole ocean and a vat of soap to wash it out with.

After scrubbing until we were exhausted we got off the first few outer layers-the post tertiary formation, a geologist would term it-and the smell of many breakfasts cooking, coming down over the hill, set our stomachs in a mutiny against any longer fasting.

We went back, rosy, panting, glowing, but happy, to get our selves some breakfast.

Should Providence, for some inscrutable reason, vouchsafe me the years of Methuselah, one of the pleasantest recollections that will abide with me to the close of the nine hundredth and sixty-ninth year, will be of that delightful odor of cooking food which regaled our senses as we came back. From the boiling coffee and the meat frying in the pan rose an incense sweeter to the senses a thousand times than all the perfumes of far Arabia. It differed from the loathsome odor of cooking corn meal as much as it did from the effluvia of a sewer.

Our noses were the first of our senses to bear testimony that we had pa.s.sed from the land of starvation to that of plenty. Andrews and I hastened off to get our own breakfast, and soon had a half-gallon of strong coffee, and a frying-pan full, of meat cooking over the fire-not one of the beggarly skimped little fires we had crouched over during our months of imprisonment, but a royal, generous fire, fed with logs instead of shavings and splinters, and giving out heat enough to warm a regiment.

Having eaten positively all that we could swallow, those of us who could walk were ordered to fall in and march over to Wilmington. We crossed the branch of the river on a pontoon bridge, and took the road that led across the narrow sandy island between the two branches, Wilmington being situated on the opposite bank of the farther one.

When about half way a shout from some one in advance caused us to look up, and then we saw, flying from a tall steeple in Wilmington, the glorious old Stars and Stripes, resplendent in the morning sun, and more beautiful than the most gorgeous web from Tyrian looms. We stopped with one accord, and shouted and cheered and cried until every throat was sore and every eye red and blood-shot. It seemed as if our cup of happiness would certainly run over if any more additions were made to it.

When we arrived at the bank of the river opposite Wilmington, a whole world of new and interesting sights opened up before us. Wilmington, during the last year-and-a-half of the war, was, next to Richmond, the most important place in the Southern Confederacy. It was the only port to which blockade running was at all safe enough to be lucrative. The Rebels held the strong forts of Caswell and Fisher, at the mouth of Cape Fear River, and outside, the Frying Pan Shoals, which extended along the coast forty or fifty miles, kept our blockading fleet so far off, and made the line so weak and scattered, that there was comparatively little risk to the small, swift-sailing vessels employed by the blockade runners in running through it. The only way that blockade running could be stopped was by the reduction of Forts Caswell and Fisher, and it was not stopped until this was done.

Before the war Wilmington was a dull, sleepy North Carolina Town, with as little animation of any kind as a Breton Pillage. The only business was the handling of the tar, turpentine, rosin, and peanuts produced in the surrounding country, a business never lively enough to excite more than a lazy ripple in the sluggish lagoons of trade. But very new wine was put into this old bottle when blockade running began to develop in importance. Then this Sleepy hollow of a place took on the appearance of San Francisco in the hight of the gold fever. The English houses engaged in blockade running established branches there conducted by young men who lived like princes. All the best houses in the City were leased by them and fitted up in the most gorgeous style. They literally clothed themselves in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day, with their fine wines and imported delicacies and retinue of servants to wait upon them. Fast young Rebel officers, eager for a season of dissipation, could imagine nothing better than a leave of absence to go to Wilmington. Money flowed like water. The common sailors-the sc.u.m of all foreign ports-who manned the blockade runners, received as high as one hundred dollars in gold per month, and a bounty of fifty dollars for every successful trip, which from Na.s.sau could be easily made in seven days. Other people were paid in proportion, and as the old proverb says, "What comes over the Devil's back is spent under his breast," the money so obtained was squandered recklessly, and all sorts of debauchery ran riot.

On the ground where we were standing had been erected several large steam cotton presses, built to compress cotton for the blockade runners. Around them were stored immense quant.i.ties of cotton, and near by were nearly as great stores of turpentine, rosin and tar. A little farther down the river was navy yard with docks, etc., for the accommodation, building and repair of blockade runners. At the time our folks took Fort Fisher and advanced on Wilmington the docks were filled with vessels. The retreating Rebels set fire to everything-cotton, cotton presses, turpentine, rosin, tar, navy yard, naval stores, timber, docks, and vessels, and the fire made clean work. Our people arrived too late to save anything, and when we came in the smoke from the burned cotton, turpentine, etc., still filled the woods. It was a signal ill.u.s.tration of the ravages of war. Here had been destroyed, in a few hours, more property than a half-million industrious men would acc.u.mulate in their lives.

Almost as gratifying as the sight of the old flag flying in triumph, was the exhibition of our naval power in the river before us. The larger part of the great North Atlantic squadron, which had done such excellent service in the reduction of the defenses of Wilmington, was lying at anchor, with their hundreds of huge guns yawning as if ardent for more great forts to beat down, more vessels to sink, more heavy artillery to crush, more Rebels to conquer. It seemed as if there were cannon enough there to blow the whole Confederacy into kingdom-come. All was life and animation around the fleet. On the decks the officers were pacing up and down. One on each vessel carried a long telescope, with which he almost constantly swept the horizon. Numberless small boats, each rowed by neatly-uniformed men, and carrying a flag in the stern, darted hither and thither, carrying officers on errands of duty or pleasure. It was such a scene as enabled me to realize in a measure, the descriptions I had read of the pomp and circ.u.mstance of naval warfare.

While we were standing, contemplating all the interesting sights within view, a small steamer, about the size of a ca.n.a.l-boat, and carrying several bright bra.s.s guns, ran swiftly and noiselessly up to the dock near by, and a young, pale-faced officer, slender in build and nervous in manner, stepped ash.o.r.e. Some of the blue jackets who were talking to us looked at him and the vessel with the greatest expression of interest, and said: "h.e.l.lo! there's the 'Monticello' and Lieutenant Cushing."

This, then, was the naval boy hero, with whose exploits the whole country was ringing. Our sailor friends proceeded to tell us of his achievements, of which they were justly proud. They told us of his perilous scouts and his hairbreadth escapes, of his wonderful audacity and still more wonderful success-of his capture of Towns with a handful of sailors, and the destruction of valuable stores, etc. I felt very sorry that the man was not a cavalry commander. There he would have had full scope for his peculiar genius. He had come prominently into notice in the preceding Autumn, when he had, by one of the most daring performances narrated in naval history, destroyed the formidable ram "Albermarle." This vessel had been constructed by the Rebels on the Roanoke River, and had done them very good service, first by a.s.sisting to reduce the forts and capture the garrison at Plymouth, N. C., and afterward in some minor engagements. In October, 1864, she was lying at Plymouth. Around her was a boom of logs to prevent sudden approaches of boats or vessels from our fleet. Cushing, who was then barely twenty-one, resolved to attempt her destruction. He fitted up a steam launch with a long spar to which he attached a torpedo. On the night of October 27th, with thirteen companions, he ran quietly up the Sound and was not discovered until his boat struck the boom, when a terrific fire was opened upon him. Backing a short distance, he ran at the boom with such velocity that his boat leaped across it into the water beyond. In an instant more his torpedo struck the side of the "Albemarle" and exploded, tearing a great hole in her hull, which sank her in a few minutes. At the moment the torpedo went off the "Albermarle" fired one of her great guns directly into the launch, tearing it completely to pieces. Lieutenant Cushing and one comrade rose to the surface of the seething water and, swimming ash.o.r.e, escaped. What became of the rest is not known, but their fate can hardly be a matter of doubt.

We were ferried across the river into Wilmington, and marched up the streets to some vacant ground near the railroad depot, where we found most of our old Florence comrades already a.s.sembled. When they left us in the middle of February they were taken to Wilmington, and thence to Goldsboro, N. C., where they were kept until the rapid closing in of our Armies made it impracticable to hold them any longer, when they were sent back to Wilmington and given up to our forces as we had been.

It was now nearly noon, and we were ordered to fall in and draw rations, a bewildering order to us, who had been so long in the habit of drawing food but once a day. We fell in in single rank, and marched up, one at a time, past where a group of employees of the Commissary Department dealt out the food. One handed each prisoner as he pa.s.sed a large slice of meat; another gave him a handful of ground coffee; a third a handful of sugar; a fourth gave him a pickle, while a fifth and sixth handed him an onion and a loaf of fresh bread. This filled the horn of our plenty full. To have all these in one day-meat, coffee, sugar, onions and soft bread-was simply to riot in undreamed-of luxury. Many of the boys-poor fellows-could not yet realize that there was enough for all, or they could not give up their old "flanking" tricks, and they stole around, and falling into the rear, came up again for' another share. We laughed at them, as did the Commissary men, who, nevertheless, duplicated the rations already received, and sent them away happy and content.

What a glorious dinner Andrews and I had, with our half gallon of strong coffee, our soft bread, and a pan full of fried pork and onions! Such an enjoyable feast will never be, eaten again by us.

Here we saw negro troops under arms for the first time-the most of the organization of colored soldiers having been, done since our capture. It was startling at first to see a stalwart, coal-black negro stalking along with a Sergeant's chevrons on his arm, or to gaze on a regimental line of dusky faces on dress parade, but we soon got used to it. The first strong peculiarity of the negro soldier that impressed itself, upon us was his literal obedience of orders. A white soldier usually allows himself considerable discretion in obeying orders-he aims more at the spirit, while the negro adheres to the strict letter of the command.

For instance, the second day after our arrival a line of guards were placed around us, with orders not to allow any of us to go up town without a pa.s.s. The reason of this was that many weak-even dying-men would persist in wandering about, and would be found exhausted, frequently dead, in various parts of the City. Andrews and I concluded to go up town. Approaching a negro sentinel he warned us back with, "Stand back, dah; don't come any furder; it's agin de awdahs; you can't pa.s.s."

He would not allow us to argue the case, but brought his gun to such a threatening position that we fell back. Going down the line a little farther, we came to a white sentinel, to whom I said: "Comrade, what are your orders:"

He replied: "My orders are not to let any of you fellows pa.s.s, but my beat only extends to that out-house there."

Acting on this plain hint, we walked around the house and went up-town. The guard simply construed his orders in a liberal spirit. He reasoned that they hardly applied to us, since we were evidently able to take care of ourselves.

Later we had another ill.u.s.tration of this dog like fidelity of the colored sentinel. A number of us were quartered in a large and empty warehouse. On the same floor, and close to us, were a couple of very fine horses belonging to some officer. We had not been in the warehouse very long until we concluded that the straw with which the horses were bedded would be better used in making couches for ourselves, and this suggestion was instantly acted upon, and so thoroughly that there was not a straw left between the animals and the bare boards. Presently the owner of the horses came in, and he was greatly incensed at what had been done. He relieved his mind of a few sulphurous oaths, and going out, came back soon with a man with more straw, and a colored soldier whom he stationed by the horses, saying: "Now, look here. You musn't let anybody take anything sway from these stalls; d'you understand me?-not a thing."

He then went out. Andrews and I had just finished cooking dinner, and were sitting down to eat it. Wishing to lend our frying-pan to another mess, I looked around for something to lay our meat upon. Near the horses I saw a book cover, which would answer the purpose admirably. Springing up, I skipped across to where it was, s.n.a.t.c.hed it up, and ran back to my place. As I reached it a yell from the boys made me look around. The darky was coming at me "full tilt," with his gun at a "charge bayonets." As I turned he said: "Put dat right back dah!"

I said: "Why, this don't amount to anything, this is only an old book cover. It hasn't anything in the world to do with the horses."

He only replied: "Put dat right back dah!"

I tried another appeal: "Now, you woolly-headed son of thunder, haven't you got sense enough to know that the officer who posted you didn't mean such a thing as this! He only meant that we should not be allowed to take any of the horses' bedding or equipments; don't you see?"

I might as well have reasoned with a cigar store Indian. He set his teeth, his eyes showed a dangerous amount of white, and foreshortening his musket for a lunge, he hissed out again "Put dat right back dah, I tell you!"

I looked at the bayonet; it was very long, very bright, and very sharp. It gleamed cold and chilly like, as if it had not run through a man for a long time, and yearned for another opportunity. Nothing but the whites of the darky's eyes could now be seen. I did not want to perish there in the fresh bloom of my youth and loveliness; it seemed to me as if it was my duty to reserve myself for fields of future usefulness, so I walked back and laid the book cover precisely on the spot whence I had obtained it, while the thousand boys in the house set up a yell of sarcastic laughter.

We staid in Wilmington a few days, days of almost purely animal enjoyment-the joy of having just as much to eat as we could possibly swallow, and no one to molest or make us afraid in any way. How we did eat and fill up. The wrinkles in our skin smoothed out under the stretching, and we began to feel as if we were returning to our old plumpness, though so far the plumpness was wholly abdominal.

One morning we were told that the transports would begin going back with us that afternoon, the first that left taking the sick. Andrews and I, true to our old prison practices, resolved to be among those on the first boat. We slipped through the guards and going up town, went straight to Major General Schofield's headquarters and solicited a pa.s.s to go on the first boat-the steamer "Thorn." General Schofield treated us very kindly; but declined to let anybody but the helplessly sick go on the "Thorn." Defeated here we went down to where the vessel was lying at the dock, and tried to smuggle ourselves aboard, but the guard was too strong and too vigilant, and we were driven away. Going along the dock, angry and discouraged by our failure, we saw a Surgeon, at a little distance, who was examining and sending the sick who could walk aboard another vessel-the "General Lyon." We took our cue, and a little shamming secured from him tickets which permitted us to take our pa.s.sage in her. The larger portion of those on board were in the hold, and a few were on deck. Andrews and I found a snug place under the forecastle, by the anchor chains.

Both vessels speedily received their complement, and leaving their docks, started down the river. The "Thorn" steamed ahead of us, and disappeared. Shortly after we got under way, the Colonel who was put in command of the boat-himself a released prisoner-came around on a tour of inspection. He found about one thousand of us aboard, and singling me out made me the non-commissioned officer in command. I was put in charge, of issuing the rations and of a barrel of milk punch which the Sanitary Commission had sent down to be dealt out on the voyage to such as needed it. I went to work and arranged the boys in the best way I could, and returned to the deck to view the scenery.

Wilmington is thirty-four miles from the sea, and the river for that distance is a calm, broad estuary. At this time the resources of Rebel engineering were exhausted in defense against its pa.s.sage by a hostile fleet, and undoubtedly the best work of the kind in the Southern Confederacy was done upon it. At its mouth were Forts Fisher and Caswell, the strongest sea coast forts in the Confederacy. Fort Caswell was an old United States fort, much enlarged and strengthened. Fort Fisher was a new work, begun immediately after the beginning of the war, and labored at incessantly until captured. Behind these every one of the thirty-four miles to Wilmington was covered with the fire of the best guns the English a.r.s.enals could produce, mounted on forts built at every advantageous spot. Lines of piles running out into the water, forced incoming vessels to wind back and forth across the stream under the point-blank range of ma.s.sive Armstrong rifles. As if this were not sufficient, the channel was thickly studded with torpedoes that would explode at the touch of the keel of a pa.s.sing vessel. These abundant precautions, and the telegram from General Lee, found in Fort Fisher, stating that unless that stronghold and Fort Caswell were held he could not hold Richmond, give some idea of the importance of the place to the Rebels.

We pa.s.sed groups of hundreds of sailors fishing for torpedos, and saw many of these dangerous monsters, which they had hauled up out of the water. We caught up with the "Thorn," when about half way to the sea, pa.s.sed her, to our great delight, and soon left a gap between us of nearly half-a-mile. We ran through an opening in the piling, holding up close to the left side, and she apparently followed our course exactly. Suddenly there was a dull roar; a column of water, bearing with it fragments of timbers, planking and human bodies, rose up through one side of the vessel, and, as it fell, she lurched forward and sank. She had struck a torpedo. I never learned the number lost, but it must have been very great.

Some little time after this happened we approached Fort Anderson, the most powerful of the works between Wilmington and the forts at the mouth of the sea. It was built on the ruins of the little Town of Brunswick, destroyed by Cornwallis during the Revolutionary War. We saw a monitor lying near it, and sought good positions to view this specimen of the redoubtable ironclads of which we had heard and read so much. It looked precisely as it did in pictures, as black, as grim, and as uncompromising as the impregnable floating fortress which had brought the "Merrimac" to terms.

But as we approached closely we noticed a limpness about the smoke stack that seemed very inconsistent with the customary rigidity of cylindrical iron. Then the escape pipe seemed scarcely able to maintain itself upright. A few minutes later we discovered that our terrible Cyclops of the sea was a flimsy humbug, a theatrical imitation, made by stretching blackened canvas over a wooden frame.

One of the officers on board told us its story. After the fall of Fort Fisher the Rebels retired to Fort Anderson, and offered a desperate resistance to our army and fleet. Owing to the shallowness of the water the latter could not come into close enough range to do effective work. Then the happy idea of this sham monitor suggested itself to some one. It was prepared, and one morning before daybreak it was sent floating in on the tide. The other monitors opened up a heavy fire from their position. The Rebels manned their guns and replied vigorously, by concentrating a terrible cannonade on the sham monitor, which sailed grandly on, undisturbed by the heavy rifled bolts tearing through her canvas turret. Almost frantic with apprehension of the result if she could not be checked, every gun that would bear was turned upon her, and torpedos were exploded in her pathway by electricity. All these she treated with the silent contempt they merited from so invulnerable a monster. At length, as she reached a good easy range of the fort, her bow struck something, and she swung around as if to open fire. That was enough for the Rebels. With Schofield's army reaching out to cut off their retreat, and this dreadful thing about to tear the insides out of their fort with four-hundred-pound shot at quarter-mile range, there was nothing for them to do but consult their own safety, which they did with such haste that they did not spike a gun, or destroy a pound of stores.

CHAPTER Lx.x.x.

VISIT TO FORT FISHER, AND INSPECTION OF THAT STRONGHOLD-THE WAY IT WAS CAPTURED-OUT ON THE OCEAN SAILING-TERRIBLY SEASICK-RAPID RECOVERY -ARRIVAL AT ANNAPOLIS-WASHED, CLOTHED AND FED-UNBOUNDED LUXURY, AND DAYS OF UNADULTERATED HAPPINESS.

When we reached the mouth of Cape Fear River the wind was blowing so hard that our Captain did not think it best to venture out, so he cast anchor. The cabin of the vessel was filled with officers who had been released from prison about the same time we were. I was also given a berth in the cabin, in consideration of my being the non-commissioned officer in charge of the men, and I found the a.s.sociations quite pleasant. A party was made up, which included me, to visit Fort Fisher, and we spent the larger part of a day very agreeably in wandering over that great stronghold. We found it wonderful in its strength, and were prepared to accept the statement of those who had seen foreign defensive works, that it was much more powerful than the famous Malakoff, which so long defied the besiegers of Sebastopol.

The situation of the fort was on a narrow and low spit of ground between Cape Fear River and the ocean. On this the Rebels had erected, with prodigious labor, an embankment over a mile in length, twenty-five feet thick and twenty feet high. About two-thirds of this bank faced the sea; the other third ran across the spit of land to protect the fort against an attack from the land side. Still stronger than the bank forming the front of the fort were the traverses, which prevented an enfilading fire These were regular hills, twenty-five to forty feet high, and broad and long in proportion. There were fifteen or twenty of them along the face of the fort. Inside of them were capacious bomb proofs, sufficiently large to shelter the whole garrison. It seemed as if a whole Township had been dug up, carted down there and set on edge. In front of the works was a strong palisade. Between each pair of traverses were one or two enormous guns, none less than one-hundred-and-fifty pounders. Among these we saw a great Armstrong gun, which had been presented to the Southern Confederacy by its manufacturer, Sir William Armstrong, who, like the majority of the English n.o.bility, was a warm admirer of the Jeff. Davis crowd. It was the finest piece of ordnance ever seen in this country. The carriage was rosewood, and the mountings gilt bra.s.s. The breech of the gun had five reinforcements.

To attack this place our Government a.s.sembled the most powerful fleet ever sent on such an expedition. Over seventy-five men-of-war, including six monitors, and carrying six hundred guns, a.s.sailed it with a storm of shot and sh.e.l.l that averaged four projectiles per second for several hours; the parapet was battered, and the large guns crushed as one smashes a bottle with a stone. The garrison fled into the bomb-proofs for protection. The troops, who had landed above the fort, moved up to a.s.sail the land face, while a brigade of sailors and marines attacked the sea face.

As the fleet had to cease firing to allow the charge, the Rebels ran out of their casemates and, manning the parapet, opened such a fire of musketry that the brigade from the fleet was driven back, but the soldiers made a lodgment on the land face. Then began some beautiful cooperative tactics between the Army and Navy, communication being kept up with signal flags. Our men were on one side of the parapets and the Rebels on the other, with the fighting almost hand-to-hand. The vessels ranged out to where their guns would rake the Rebel line, and as their shot tore down its length, the Rebels gave way, and falling back to the next traverse, renewed the conflict there. Guided by the signals our vessels changed their positions, so as to rake this line also, and so the fight went on until twelve traverses had been carried, one after the other, when the rebels surrendered.

The next day the Rebels abandoned Fort Caswell and other fortifications in the immediate neighborhood, surrendered two gunboats, and fell back to the lines at Fort Anderson. After Fort Fisher fell, several blockade-runners were lured inside and captured.

Never before had there been such a demonstration of the power of heavy artillery. Huge cannon were pounded into fragments, hills of sand ripped open, deep creva.s.ses blown in the ground by exploding sh.e.l.ls, wooden buildings reduced to kindling-wood, etc. The ground was literally paved with fragments of shot and sh.e.l.l, which, now red with rust from the corroding salt air, made the interior of the fort resemble what one of our party likened it to "an old brickyard."

Whichever way we looked along the sh.o.r.es we saw abundant evidence of the greatness of the business which gave the place its importance. In all directions, as far as the eye could reach, the beach was dotted with the bleaching skeletons of blockade-runners-some run ash.o.r.e by their mistaking the channel, more beached to escape the hot pursuit of our blockaders.