Part 8 (1/2)

[Footnote V: _Personal Mehtly ain was not frustrated even by the disasters of the night action It is distinguished from the unhappy fiasco of the year before by all the difference between a fitting and an unfitting time--by all that separates a clear appreciation of facts frout was driven up the river against his own judgible or permanent results In 1863 he went on his own responsibility, because he saw that in the then condition of affairs, with the ar at both ends of the line, the movement he made would not only be successful in itself, but would materially conduce to the attainnificant of his true ht that neither depreciation nor disaster shook his clear convictions of the i by Port Hudson was of consequence or not,” he wrote chaffingly in reference to so comments in a Southern newspaper, ”if Pollard's stohtly pinched for food as theirs at Port Hudson and Vicksburg have been since I shut up Red River, he would kno to value a good dinner and a little peace”

In soberer style he wrote to his honed to us, and all has worked well _My last dash past Port Hudson was the best thing I ever did_, except taking New Orleans It assistedand Port Hudson”

Farragut reain at the front; joining the vessels of his squadron lying near, but below, Port Hudson After entering Alexandria on the 7th of May, General Banks moved doith his army to the Mississippi, which he crossed five or six ur, of his coe, the two divisionsPort Hudson An assault was e operations were begun The mortar schooners and the Essex supported them by constant bombardment, and the navy furnished and uns

While contributing thus conspicuously to the ie, the most essential work of the navy, here as in the upper Mississippi, was in the maintenance of the communications, which holly by the river, as well as in assuring the safety of New Orleans, then stripped of all the troops that could be spared The danger of two points like Vicksburg and Port Hudson, both of such vital ied at the say of the Confederacy, and set in motion every armed man of whom it could dispose To divert and distract the attention of the Union generals, to induce them to abandon their efforts or diminish the forces at the front, no means were so ready nor so sure as an attack upon their coainst their base Tothe foundations of a building Here the navy removed every substantial cause of anxiety by its firuns were brought to sustain every point attacked Under such diligent guardianshi+p the barrier of the Mississippi reain be arrested and forced to surrender, such an occasional annoyance could not by the nified into a serious eneral, Richard Taylor, in command of the district west of the river, stripped all his posts to concentrate an effort along the right bank, which, by disturbing Banks, ht make a favorable diversion for Port Hudson; and loud talk wasa the citizens, still heartily attached to the Southern cause The powerful vessels kept before the city by Farragut effectually disposed of any chance of such an atteh much anxiety was felt by General Emory, in command of the station, and confident expectation was plainly discernible on the faces of the towns-people The Confederates, however, did for a season control the west side of the river, appearing before Donaldsonville and Plaquemine, where were posts of United States troops

These were saved by the prounboats, which followed the ut down in person, and elicited fro upon the west bank, inadequately sustained, heavy guns which, if they fell into the hands of the Confederates, ht convert a menace into a serious eht of June 27th, the ene party succeeded in entering the works, but the three gunboats which Farragut had stationed there opened so heavy a fire upon the supports that these broke and fled; and those in advance, being unsustained, were ut summoned his chief-of-staff, Captain Thornton A Jenkins, to relieve him at Port Hudson, as he felt his own presence necessary at New Orleans Jenkins started up in the Monongahela, a heavy corvette co in company two small transports with needed supplies The enemy, despite the repulse at Donaldsonville, rehborhood, and had established a battery of field-guns a few ahela was attacked and pretty severely handled for a few e and enterprise, was htly so These two affairs sufficiently indicate the character of the enemy's operations on the west bank of the Mississippi at this tirip of the Union army before Port Hudson, nor did they entirely cease with the surrender of the place That they did so little harions west of the river, was due to the navy, whosesurrendered on the 4th of July, 1863, and its fall was followed by that of Port Hudson on the 9th of the saut then wrote to Porter, and turned over to him the command in all the Mississippi Valley above New Orleans On the 1st of August Porter hi-shi+p, and the two admirals had an interview on the scene of their forut sailed in the Hartford for the North, to enjoy a brief respite fro autuh now sixty-two years old, he retained an extraordinary ay both physical and e the anxieties and exposure he had to undergo tell, and had drawn from him, soon after his return fro old fast, and need rest” On the 10th of August the flag-shi+p anchored in New York, after a passage of nine days

The ad year

His own shi+p, and her powerful sisters, the Richmond and Brooklyn, were in need of extensive repairs before they could be considered again fit for winter service in the Gulf The Hartford was in better condition than the other two, being uninjured below the water line, but the severe actions through which she had passed were proved by the scars, two hundred and forty in number, where she had been struck by shot or shell

CHAPTER X

MOBILE

1864

By the fall of the last and holds upon the Mississippi, and the consequent assertion of control by the United States Governreat water course, was accomplished the first and chief of the two objects tohich Farragut was to co-operate After manifold efforts and failures, the combined forces of the United States had at last sundered the Confederacy in twain along the principal one of those natural strategic lines which intersected it, and whichas they are able or unable to hold thements, the smaller was militarily important only as a feeder to the other Severed froed, the seceded States west of the Mississippi sank into insignificance; the fire that had raged there would smoulder and die of itself, now that a broad belt which could not be passed interposed between it and the greater conflagration in the East

It next became the task of the Union forces to hold firained; while the greatthe Mississippi in offensive operations were transferred farther east, to drive yet another colue froia, to the Gulf or to the Atlantic seaboard How this neas performed under the successive leadershi+p of Rosecrans, Grant, and Sherman, does not fall within the scope of the present work Although the light steaood and often iion, the river work of Farragut's heavy sea-going shi+ps was now over In furtherance of the great object of opening the Mississippi, they had left their native eleation and hostile batteries, had penetrated deep into the vitals of the Confederacy This great achieveain seaward The formal transfer to Admiral Porter of the command over the whole Mississippi and its tributaries, above New Orleans, signalized the fact that Farragut's sphere of action was to be thenceforth on the coast; for New Orleans, though over a hundred miles from the mouth of a tideless river, whose waters flow ever doard to the sea, was nevertheless substantially a sea-coast city

As the opening of the Mississippi was the ut's orders, so did it also offer hihest qualities of a general officer which he abundantly possessed The faculty of seizing upon the really decisive points of a situation, of correctly appreciating the conditions of the proble whether the proper moment for action was yet distant or had already arrived, and ofwith celerity and adequate dispositions when the tiifts of the natural commander-in-chief had been called into play, by the difficult questions arising in connection with the stupendous work of breaking the shackles by which the Confederates held the Mississippi chained The task that still re of the Confederate seaports within the lih arduous and wearisome, did not make the same demand upon these more intellectual qualities The sphere was more contracted, reatin itself less coist It involved, therefore, less of the work of the enial to his aptitudes, and more of that of the administrator, to him naturally distasteful

Nevertheless, as the complete fulfilment of his orders necessitated the reduction of a fortified seaport, he found in this undertaking the opportunity for showing a degree of resolution and presence of mind which was certainly not exceeded--perhaps not even equaled--in his previous career At Mobile it was the tactician, the man of instant perception and ready action, rather than he of clear insight and careful planning, that is most conspicuous On the same occasion, with actual disaster incurred and i his fleet, combined with a resistance sturdier than any he had yet encountered, the adhest dee and stern determination which plucked victory out of the very jaws of defeat, the battle of Mobile Bay was to the career of Farragut what the battle of Copenhagen was to that of Nelson Perhaps wethe words of an eloquent French writer upon the latter event, the battle of Mobile will always be in the eyes of sealory[W]

[Footnote W: ”The can of the Baltic will always be in the eyes of sealory He alone was capable of displaying such boldness and such perseverance; he alone could face the immense difficulties of that enterprise and triumph over them”--Jurien de la Graviere, _Guerres Maritiut's departure for the North, in August, 1863, the blockade of the Gulf sea-coast within the lih technically effective, had for theor anchoring off the entrances of the ports Such a watch, however, is a very imperfect substitute for the iron yoke that is iateways for coh realized; and the purpose of Farragut, as of his Government, had been so to occupy the ports within his district At one tily that he did so hold the whole coast, except Mobile; but the disasters at Galveston and Sabine Pass quickly intervened, and those ports remained thenceforth in the hands of the ene properly so called--the entrance, that is, of blockaded Confederate harbors--was a s contraband trade carried on through the Mexican port Mataut's lieutenant, Commodore Henry H Bell, visited this remote and ordinarily deserted spot in May, 1863, he counted sixty-eight sails at anchor in the offing and a forest of smaller craft inside the river, so the outside shi+pping; to such proportions had grown the trade of a tohich neither possessed a harbor nor a back country capable of sustaining such a traffic Under proper precautions by the parties engaged, this, though clearly hostile, was difficult to touch; but it also became of comparatively little importance when the Mississippi fell

Not so with Mobile As port after port was taken, as the lines of the general blockade drew closer and closer, the needs of the Confederacy for the approaching death-struggle grew , and the practicable harbors still in their hands beca activity After the fall of New Orleans and the evacuation of Pensacola, in the spring of 1862, Mobile was by far the best port on the Gulf coast left to the Confederates Though ad harbor of Pensacola, it enjoyed the advantage over it of excellent water coe rivers with extensive tributary syste into its bay Thanks to this circumstance, it had beco next to New Orleans in the Gulf; and its growing co the developion of which Mobile was the natural port did not depend for its iricultural products; under somewhat favorable conditions it had developed soenerally very deficient, and which afterward found active employment in the construction of the Tennessee, the most formidable ironclad vessel built by the Confederates

For all these reasons the tenure of Mobile became a ut had from the first foreseen, they made active use of the respite afforded them by the unfortunate obstinacy of the Navy Depart him permission to attack after New Orleans fell The enterprise then was by no e of the Mississippi forts just effected; and once captured, the holding of the harbor would require only the sarrison the powerful masonry fort which commanded the main shi+p channel, supported by a naval force much less nu was therefore not open to the objection of unduly exposing the troops and shi+ps placed in unfortified or poorly fortified harbors, which received such a sad illustration at Galveston; but it was dropped, owing, first, to the preoccupation of the Govern the Mississippi, and afterward to the fear of losing shi+ps which at that time could not be replaced Hesitation to risk their shi+ps and to take decisive action when seasonable opportunity offers, is the penalty paid by nations which practise undue econoent to capture Mobile before the powerful ironclad then building was completed, the preparations of the defense were so far advanced that ironclad vessels were needed for the attack; and before these could be, or at least before they were, supplied, the Tennessee, which by rapid action ht have been forestalled like the similar vessel at New Orleans, was ready for battle Had she been used with greater wisdoht have added very seriously to the eut, after an absence of nearly six months, returned to his station in January, 1864, it ith the expectation of a speedy attack upon Mobile On his way to New Orleans he stopped off the bar, and on the 20th of Januaryto a littlethe entrance He then reported to the department that he was satisfied that, if he had one ironclad, he could destroy the whole of the enemy's force in the bay, and then reduce the forts at leisure with the co-operation of about five thousand troops ”But without ironclads,” he added, ”we should not be able to fight the enemy's vessels of that class with much prospect of success, as the latter would lie on the flats, where our shi+ps could not get at them By reference to the chart you will see how small a space there is for the shi+ps towith the ironclads, unless by getting within one or two hundred yards, so as to raiven by a refugee, that the ironclad Nashville would not be ready before March, and that the Confederate admiral announced that when she was he would raise the blockade ”It is depressing,” he adds, ”to see how easily false reports circulate, and in what a state of alarm the community is kept by the et one or two ironclads here, it would put an end to this state of things and restore confidence to the people of the ports now in our possession I feel no apprehension about Buchanan's raising the blockade; but, with such a force as he has in the bay, it would be unwise to take in our wooden vessels without thethere January 22d

It appears, therefore, that, regarded as a naval question, Farragut considered the tione by for an attempt to run the forts of Mobile Bay, and that it would not return until some ironclads were furnished him by the Department The capture of the forts he at no time expected, except by the same means as he had looked to for the reduction of those in the Mississippi--that is, by a combined military and naval operation In both cases the navy was to plant itself across the eneantlet of his guns It then remained for the land forces either to complete the investment and await their fall by the slow process of fae covered by the fleet Without the protection of the shi+ps in the bay, the arunboats of the enemy, and very possibly exposed to attack by superior force

Without the troops, the presence of the shi+ps inside would be powerless to co some supplies But in the two years that had very nearly elapsed since Farragut, if per of the works and the introduction of the ironclads had materially altered the question He was, it is true, misinformed as to the readiness of the latter The vessels that were dignified by that name when he first returned to his station, took no part in the defense, either of the bay or, later, of the city He was deceived, probably, from the fact that the Confederates themselves were deceived, with the exception of a feho had e of their real value; and consequently the reports that were brought off agreed in giving them a character which they did not deserve

An attack upon Mobile had been a cherished project with General Grant after the fall of Vicksburg It was to that--and not to the unfortunate Red River expedition of 1864--that he would have devoted Banks's ar it, of course, in concert with, so as to support and be supported by, the other great operations which took place that year--Sherainst Richmond It was to Mobile, and not to Savannah, that he first looked as the point tohich Sherman would act after the capture of Atlanta; the line fro which, by the control of the intervening railroad systeain be cleft in twain, as by the subjugation of the Mississippi For this reason chiefly he had, while still only commander of the Army of the Tennessee, and before he succeeded to the lieutenant-generalshi+p and the command of all the armies, strenuously opposed the Red River expedition; which he looked upon as an ex-centricrather to keep alive the war across the Mississippi, which would fade if left alone, and likely to result in the troops engaged not getting back in tiainst Mobile

As Grant feared, so it happened The expedition being already organized and on the point of starting when he became commander-in-chief, he allowed it to proceed; but it ended in disaster, and was the cause of forty thousand good troops being unavailable for the decisive operations which began two months later Not until the end of July could a force be spared even for the ut had to wait in order to attack to any purpose By the time the army in the Southwest, in the command of which General Canby relieved Banks on the 20th of May, was again ready to move, Sherman had taken Atlanta, Hood had fallen upon his coa, and the faut's battle in Mobile Bay therefore did not prove to be, as Grant had hoped, and as his passage of the Mississippi forts had been, a step in a series of grand military operations, by which the United States forces should gain control of a line vital to the Confederacy, and again divide it into two fragreat i Mobile fro a stop to all serious blockade-running in the Gulf, and crushi+ng finally the enemy's ill-founded hopes of an offensive movement by ironclads there equipped

[Illustration: Entrance of Rear-Adust 5, 1864

REFERENCE

1 Tecuo

4 Chickasaw