Part 57 (1/2)

The use of steam, however, in naval warfare was as yet an untried element of force in the attacking fleet against sh.o.r.e batteries. That steam in wooden vessels could overcome the enormous advantage of the solidity and power of sh.o.r.e guns had been considered preposterous by military experts.

Jefferson Davis had utilized every s.h.i.+pbuilder in New Orleans to hastily construct the beginnings of a Southern navy. Two powerful iron-clad gunboats, _Louisiana_ and _Mississippi_, were under way but not ready for service. Eight small vessels had been bought and armed.

To secure the city against the possibility of any fleet pa.s.sing the forts at night or through fog, the channel of the river between Forts Jackson and St. Phillip was securely closed. Eleven dismasted schooners were moored in line across the river and secured by six heavy chains.

These chains formed an unbroken obstruction from sh.o.r.e to sh.o.r.e.

This raft was placed immediately below the forts.

There was no serious alarm in the city on the appearance of the fleet in the mouth of the river. For months they had been cruising about the Gulf of Mexico without apparent decision.

The people laughed at their enemy. There was but one verdict:

”They'll think twice before attempting to repeat the scenes of 1812.”

Not only were the two great forts impregnable but the sh.o.r.es were lined with batteries. What could wooden s.h.i.+ps do with such forts and guns? It was a joke that they should pretend to attack them. Their only possible danger was from the new iron-clad gunboats in the upper waters of the river. They were building two of their own kind which would be ready long before the enemy could break through the defenses from the North.

When Farragut stripped his fleet for action and moved toward the forts on the sixteenth of April, New Orleans was the gayest city in America.

The spirit of festivity was universal. b.a.l.l.s, theaters, operas were the order of the day. Gay parties of young people flocked down the river and swarmed the levees to witness the fun of the foolish attempt of a lot of old wooden s.h.i.+ps to reduce the great forts.

The guns were roaring now their mighty anthem. s.h.i.+ps and forts--forts and s.h.i.+ps. The batteries of Farragut's mortar schooners were hurling their eleven-inch sh.e.l.ls with harmless inaccuracy.

The people laughed again.

For six days the earth trembled beneath the fierce bombardment. The fleet had thrown twenty-five thousand sh.e.l.ls and General Duncan reported but two guns dismantled, with half a dozen men killed and wounded. The forts stood grim and terrible, their bristling line of black-lipped guns unbroken, their defenses as strong as when the first shot was fired.

On the evening of April twenty-third, the fire of the fleet slackened.

Farragut had given up the foolish attempt, of course. He had undertaken the impossible and at last had accepted the fact.

But the people of New Orleans had not reckoned on the character of the daring commander of the Federal fleet. He coolly decided that since he could not silence the guns of the forts he would run past them with his swift steam craft and take the chances of their batteries sending him to the bottom.

Once past these forts and the city would be at his mercy.

He must first clear the river of the obstruction placed below the forts.

Farragut ordered two gunboats to steal through the darkness without lights and clear this raft. The work was swiftly done. The task was rendered unexpectedly easy by a break caused by a severe storm.

At three o'clock in the morning of the twenty-fourth, the lookout on the ramparts of the forts saw the black hulls of the fleet, swiftly and silently steaming up the river straight for the mouths of their guns.

The word was flashed to the little nondescript fleet of the Confederacy lying in the smooth waters above and they moved instantly to the support of the forts.

The night was one of calm and glorious beauty. The Southern skies sparkled with jeweled stars. The waning moon threw its soft, mellow light on the s.h.i.+ning waters, revealing the dark hulls of the fleet with striking clearness. The daring column was moving straight for Fort Jackson. They must pa.s.s close under the noses of her guns.

They were in for it now.

The dim star-lit world with its fading moon suddenly burst into sheets of blinding, roaring flame. The mortar batteries moored in range, opened instantly in response--their eleven-inch sh.e.l.ls, glowing with phosph.o.r.escent halo, circled and screamed and fell.

The black hulls belched their broadsides of yellow flame now. From battlement and casemate of forts rolled the thunder of their batteries, sending their heavy shots smas.h.i.+ng into the wooden hulls.

Through the flaming jaws of h.e.l.l, the fleet, with lungs throbbing with every pound of steam, dashed and pa.s.sed the forts!