BEAUFORT.--CAMPAIGN PLANNED AGAINST CHARLESTON
After the action of Port Royal Ferry, General Stevens continued to hold
Beaufort and the neighboring islands for five months, without the
occurrence of any military event of importance, chiefly occupied in
thoroughly drilling and disciplining his troops. Lieutenant Abraham
Cottrell, of the 8th Michigan, was added to the staff as aide. A
battalion of the 1st Massachusetts cavalry, under Lieutenant-Colonel
H.B. Sargent, was added to his command; also another section of Battery
E of the 3d artillery, Captain A.P. Rockwell's Connecticut light
battery, and a company of Serrell's New York engineers, under Captain
Alfred F. Sears, with a pontoon bridge equipment. His attention,
moreover, was largely taken up with other matters, not military, but
growing out of the peculiar conditions there. He caused the public
library, which has already been mentioned, with several fine private
libraries added to it, to be put in order, restored to the shelves and
catalogued, and thrown open for the use of the troops. Corporal Joseph
Matthews, Joseph Hall, and George Lispenard, of Company E of the
Highlanders, were busy at this work for several months. He intended that
the library, thus preserved, should be cared for and kept in the town
where it belonged, and restored to the inhabitants when they resumed
their allegiance and returned to their homes. But one day the treasury
agent, Colonel William H. Reynolds, presented himself, and demanded the
books as captured rebel property, to be sold for the benefit of the
government,--a demand which General Stevens indignantly and peremptorily
rejected. A month later the agent again appeared with a formal demand
from the Secretary of the Treasury for the library, indorsed by General
Sherman with an order to give them up. Even then General Stevens
suspended the order, and wrote a strong protest to General Sherman,
setting forth the vandal character of the proposed action, and urging
him to represent the matter in its true light to the government, and
secure the revocation of the order. But General Sherman was unwilling to
take such a responsibility, and there was no alternative but to give up
the books.
General Stevens disapproved the action of the government in sending such
treasury agents into the field, with independent authority to gather up
cotton and other property, as meddling with military operations,
encroaching on the authority of military commanders, and opening the
door for dishonest or over-zealous agents to plunder private property.
Such work, he declared, should be done by the army through the
quartermaster's department, and the captured property then turned over
to the Treasury Department.
Apprehensive that the numerous negroes within his lines might become
vagrant and burdensome unless brought under control and made
self-supporting, General Sherman issued an elaborate order, providing
for teaching them the elementary branches, and inducing them to plant
crops. The latter requirement General Stevens heartily approved, but he
seriously doubted the propriety of the former, and wrote General
Sherman, pointing out that to educate the blacks and raise hopes of
freedom in their breast would make their condition doubly hard in case,
on the suppression of the rebellion, they had to return to their
masters, and that the order, manifestly looking to freeing the slaves,
might alienate the support of the border States from the Union cause.
This view now seems reactionary, but it should be borne in mind that the
great mass of Union soldiers sprang to arms, not to free the slaves, but
to preserve the Union. Lincoln himself guided his course by the same
view of not alienating the border States, withholding his emancipation
proclamation until the progress of public opinion made it expedient.
Writes General Sherman in reply:--
"After all, my dear general, the government will do as it sees best
in this matter. My order can be reversed at its pleasure. But, of
myself, it would be doing some violence to my own views of duty to
make the change you desire in the system therein indicated. But
allow me to express to you my warmest thanks for the thoughtful and
considerate manner in which you have done me the honor to write.
Although we may differ in our views in one or two points,--both
admitted to be delicate ones,--it will not permit any change of my
exalted opinion of your talents and your personal character."
But the generals were only wasting time in discussing the negro problem,
for by the next steamer, early in March, there descended on the
Department of the South, like the locusts on Egypt, a swarm of treasury
agents and humanitarians, male and female, all zealously bent on
educating and elevating the "freedmen," as they immediately dubbed the
blacks. The irreverent young officers styled these good people the
"Gideonites," and were disposed to make all manner of fun of them; but
among the number were persons of the highest respectability and purest
motives, and they undoubtedly accomplished some good. They met with a
cold and ungracious reception from General Sherman, who declared that
their coming was uncalled for and entirely premature, and incontinently
packed them off to Beaufort to the care of General Stevens, thus washing
his hands of them.
The latter treated them with the utmost courtesy and kindness, assigned
them good quarters in town, and detailed a capable and gentlemanly young
officer, Lieutenant H.G. Belcher, of the 8th Michigan, to see to their
comfort and needs. He not only gave them every facility and assistance
in his power in their care of the blacks, but took a real interest in
their mission, talked and advised with the chiefs, and exerted a decided
and salutary influence in modifying some of their crude and extravagant
ideas, and bringing them down to judicious and practicable measures. It
is a curious fact that in several instances he had to curb the attempts
of some of the more zealous, who strove to work the blacks harder than
their old masters did. Always frank and outspoken in his opinions, and
differing widely from many of the views of these visitors, General
Stevens impressed them with his sincere and earnest sense of duty, and
won their gratitude and goodwill. Hon. Edward L. Pierce, the biographer
of Sumner, who was the chief agent, thus acknowledged their feelings and
obligations toward General Stevens:--
"General Stevens was an officer with whom subordination was a
controlling duty. The order for sending able-bodied negroes to
Hilton Head to be armed imposed on him an uncongenial service, but
he performed it faithfully and with dispatch, and even aided in the
selection of the officers to drill them. His preconceived opinions,
although he desired them humane treatment, were understood to be
unfavorable to an effort at the present time to raise them to
intelligent citizenship; but to the industrial and educational
movement to that end he offered no opposition, but gave to it in
good faith his official protection and aid, and the special agent of
the Treasury Department, who was charged with its direction, never
asked facilities which he denied, often more being granted than was
requested. The better part of the territory to which that movement
applied was under his command, and its friends will gratefully
remember him for his personal courtesies and honorable coöperation."
Mrs. Stevens also arrived on the same steamer to visit her husband, with
her youngest daughter, Kate, a beautiful and engaging little girl of
ten, and remained nearly a month. Their visit was a great solace to
General Stevens, and the last time he was to see them.
The Washington ladies, Mrs. Johnson and Miss Donelson, their neighbors
and warm friends for four years, came with the Gideonites, actuated by
benevolence. Other visitors were Mr. Caverly, whom General Stevens had
met in Washington, and his beautiful young wife. He was in the last
stages of consumption, and the general had him taken into his own
quarters and carefully nursed and cared for until his death. Hon. John
M. Forbes, of Milton, Mass., and his wife, whose son, William H. Forbes,
was an officer of the 1st Massachusetts cavalry, then at Beaufort, also
visited there that winter; and Hon. W.J.A. Fuller, of New York, an
eminent lawyer, and brother to Captain Charles A. Fuller, was another
visitor.
During all this time General Stevens was chiefly engaged in training and
disciplining his command. Besides company and battalion drills in the
forenoon, brigade drills were had four afternoons a week, usually in
some extensive cotton-field below the town, and occasionally these
drills were varied by movements through timber, bridging and crossing
streams, or overcoming other obstacles, the three arms being exercised
to act in concert. There was no other brigade in the armies on either
side that was put through such a complete and thorough course of brigade
drill as General Stevens gave his command at Beaufort. Schools of
instruction for officers and for non-commissioned officers were also
vigorously kept up. The picketing of the widely extended and exposed
points on the islands involved a line twenty-five miles in extent, and
was a severe task on the troops. An entire regiment was required for
this duty, and was changed every ten days. To insure the vigilance of
the pickets, General Stevens organized a system of nightly inspections
by members of his staff and other officers specially sent out from
Beaufort, in addition to the grand rounds and inspections by their own
officers. Besides the staff officers already mentioned, Lieutenant
Benjamin R. Lyons, of the 50th Pennsylvania, and Lieutenant A. Cottrell,
of the 8th Michigan, were detailed as aides, and Captain Charles A.
Fuller took the place of Captain Lilly as quartermaster, the latter
being court-martialed and cashiered.
A fine mansion in the edge of town, in the midst of a luxuriant
semi-tropical garden, with the negro quarters and kitchens in detached
buildings, served as headquarters. On the open space on one side,
brigade guard-mounting was held every morning to the martial and
inspiring music of the Highlanders' band. This was one of the finest
bands in the service, or, indeed, in the country. It had been long
established in New York, and was maintained with indefatigable zeal and
industry by Lieutenant William Robertson, the band-master.
Thus well occupied with drills, dress parades, guard-mountings,
picketing, and study, in that beautiful region and delightful winter
climate, profusely supplied with fresh beef, poultry, and sweet
potatoes, in addition to the ample regular ration, the troops greatly
enjoyed their sojourn at Beaufort, while they rapidly gained soldierly
discipline and efficiency. In April a detachment of two hundred and
fifty of the 8th Michigan escorted Lieutenant James H. Wilson on a
reconnoissance to Wilmington Island, on the Savannah River, and in a
very creditable action defeated and drove an entire rebel regiment, the
13th Georgia, suffering, however, a loss of forty-two killed and
wounded.
The following letters from General Stevens to his wife give interesting
sketches of this period:--
[Illustration: HEADQUARTERS AT BEAUFORT]
BEAUFORT, S.C., February 16, 1861.
MY DEAR WIFE,--I am devoting my energies to perfecting the
discipline of my brigade. All the regiments are now in very
respectable drill,--one in very superior drill. For five weeks I
have had brigade drills, an average of four per week. In this week
they will have been instructed in all the evolutions of the line.
Hazard is very expert both at battalion and brigade drill, and he
can drill a brigade much better than any of my colonels. Then I have
a regiment doing picket duty on the island. I relieve it every ten
days, so each regiment has been thoroughly instructed in picket and
outpost duty. I have here the second battalion of the 1st
Massachusetts cavalry, commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Sargent. It
is finely officered, and is a splendid body of men. I have also a
Connecticut light battery of six guns. It will, however, take months
to make this battery efficient. For the last three weeks I have had
regimental schools for officers and non-commissioned officers. They
are doing well, and both officers and non-commissioned officers take
great interest in them. Hazard's health is excellent. He takes very
great interest in everything, is full of life and energy, very
industrious, studies carefully his tactics, regulations, etc. He is
making a very superior officer indeed; is a very efficient
adjutant-general. My aides, Captain Lusk and Lieutenant Cottrell,
are good men.
April 17.... I have endeavored to do all I could with propriety to
facilitate everything which tended to the improvement of the
condition of the negroes. Many of the people here, both men and
women, understand pretty well the circumstances of the case, and are
getting to take practical views of the subject.
April 21.... Mrs. Johnson and Miss Donelson leave day after
to-morrow on the Atlantic. We shall send for them and see that they
are comfortably taken on the ship. Two officers of my brigade return
at the same time on leave of absence, in whose special charge I will
place them.
The 8th Michigan regiment had a very brilliant affair last
Wednesday. Whilst about two hundred and sixty of the regiment under
their colonel (Fenton) were reconnoitring Wilmington Island, they
were attacked by a full regiment (the Georgia 13th), eight hundred
strong. After a desperate conflict of nearly two hours our men
whipped them, drove them off the ground, pursued them for a mile,
and then carefully and leisurely held the field for five hours. All
our dead and wounded and every particle of baggage were brought off.
We lost two officers and ten men killed, and thirty men wounded,--a
very heavy loss, being one fifth of the entire command. On Friday
and Saturday we buried the dead. The services were very affecting.
The regiment returned on Saturday afternoon, and the whole brigade
turned out to receive them. We had invited the ladies from the Pope
plantation to come to Beaufort on Friday to attend a concert given
by the Highlanders on Friday evening. Mrs. Johnson, Miss Donelson,
and Miss Ward came over. They returned on Saturday evening. We had
the burial of the dead, the concert, and the reception while they
were here. We entertained them at the house, and they really enjoyed
their visit. Indeed, Mrs. J. and Miss D. have found it rather lonely
on Ladies' Island, and I thought, in view of old acquaintance' sake
and their kind and excellent natures, that we ought to do something
to give them a little change.
May 24. We have had a sad household the last few days. Mr. Caverly
has been sinking gradually since Wednesday morning, and died this
morning at one o'clock. He was exceedingly patient and resigned, and
very grateful for the attentions he had received here. I am very
thankful I did not hesitate, in his enfeebled condition, insisting
upon his coming to my house. His wife has borne herself with great
fortitude and courage throughout. Lieutenant Pratt, of the
Massachusetts cavalry, is going home on leave of absence, and will
take charge of Mrs. Caverly.
May 18. Above is a view of the steamer Planter, a dispatch boat of
General Ripley in Charleston harbor, which was run off by the pilot
Robert and the black crew last week. It is a very remarkable affair,
and makes quite a hero of Robert. She was tied up at the wharf close
to Ripley's office. Yet he slipped out of the harbor unobserved, and
gave the steamer up to our blockading fleet. The Planter lay at
Beaufort from Thursday morning to this morning. She was run off on
Tuesday, May 13.
The following to Mr. Fuller gives General Stevens's views on the proper
war policy, and the severity of the contest yet to be fought. It was at
this time that the government, rendered over-confident by Western
successes, stopped recruiting. It will be seen how exactly he read the
military situation:--
BEAUFORT, S.C., March 15, 1862.
MY DEAR SIR,-- ... At this moment every effort should be made to
keep our ranks full by enlistments. We are only at the beginning of
the hard fights. Our men will fall in battle, and die in the
hospitals. The best troops rapidly melt away in aggressive
movements. We must take nothing for granted except the determination
on the part of the South to make a stern and protracted resistance.
The great point is to open the Mississippi down to the Gulf, and
this can be done by driving our forces southward in Tennessee, and
farther south into Alabama and Mississippi. This should be combined
with a great movement from the Gulf. The Mississippi River in our
control, everything westward will fall by vigorous, rapid,
comparatively short movements. We must husband our men and
resources. We, if we don't look out, will find our victorious march
stayed in mid-course by the melting away of our attacking columns,
not kept full in consequence of a too great dissemination of our
force.
At this time General Stevens wrote Professor Bache a memoir, to be laid
before the President, giving his views of the military policy and
operations to be undertaken. Dr. Lusk, who, as his aide, copied the
letter from the rough draft, declares that he urged the very movements
that were afterwards adopted, and was greatly impressed with the ability
and prophetic foresight of the memoir. Unfortunately, no copy of it has
been found.
HEADQUARTERS SECOND BRIGADE, E.C.,
BEAUFORT, S.C., February 25, 1862.
W.J.A. FULLER, ESQ.,
_My dear Sir_,--I hope not the least suggestion will be made in any
quarter in relation to placing me in command of the expeditionary
corps of General Sherman. I am induced to write you in relation to
it, because I have learned from a reliable source that it is being
spoken of in some influential quarters in Massachusetts. General
Sherman has treated me with marked kindness and consideration, and I
feel that I would be acting badly towards him if I did not express
decidedly my views and feelings in regard to the matter. It would
be, however, sheer affectation on my part to say that I did not
desire a separate command. I of course most earnestly desire one,
but not at the expense of a friend, or with injustice to any one.
The advanced position of General Stevens's command was a constant threat
to the Charleston and Savannah Railroad, justly regarded by the enemy as
the vital line of communication between the two cities. The railroad
crossed the many rivers which empty along this part of the coast by long
pile or trestle bridges of hard Southern pine, full of pitch, and
exceedingly combustible. In thirty miles it thus crossed, going north
from Savannah, the Coosawhatchie, Tulifiny, Broad, Pocotaligo, Combahee,
and Ashepoo rivers, with six miles of bridges in the aggregate, and at
Pocotaligo, the centre of this stretch, was only eight miles distant
from Port Royal Ferry and the Union lines. So important was the
preservation of this railroad regarded by General Robert E. Lee, the
Confederate commander, and so probable did he deem our advance in this
direction, that he made his headquarters at Coosawhatchie, posted strong
detachments with guns and intrenchments at the bridges, and supported
them with considerable bodies of troops at central points, all under
General J.C. Pemberton, with headquarters at Pocotaligo. And that
officer, on succeeding Lee in command of South Carolina and Georgia in
March, remained at the same place, and continued the same attitude of
watchful defense.
General Stevens early fixed his eye upon these bridges as affording the
most feasible way of breaking up the railroad. He was eager to cross
swords with Lee and confident, more than once remarking that he could
beat "Bob Lee,"--that he felt himself more than a match for him. From
negro refugees he learned that the enemy held them in force, but nothing
sufficiently definite and reliable to be of much value. Anxious to gain
exact and full information of the bridges, the enemy, and his
dispositions, and of the roads and nature of the country, he offered the
task to Captain Elliott, of the Highlanders, who undertook it with
alacrity. During January, February, and March, this intrepid officer
made trip after trip within the enemy's lines, explored the whole
region, and examined every bridge between the Coosawhatchie and the
Ashepoo, located the enemy's posts, ascertained their forces,
intrenchments, guns, etc., and gleaned much information in regard to the
roads, approaches, and country. On these scouts Captain Elliott went in
uniform. He would start at night in a small canoe with a trusty negro
guide, paddle noiselessly up one of the rivers until within the enemy's
lines, then land and pursue his explorations on foot. By day he usually
lay hid in the swamps or pine woods. The service was not only fraught
with danger, but extremely arduous, involving every hardship of cold,
hunger, and exposure. It was so well performed that it is doubtful if
the Confederate commander himself was much better informed as to the
state of things within his lines than was his opponent. No whisper of
suspicion of Captain Elliott's scouts was suffered to get out; and
although his long and frequent absences on special duty excited comment,
all knowledge of them was confined to himself, General Stevens, and the
assistant adjutant-general of the brigade.
In the latter part of February General Stevens sent Captain Ralph Ely,
of the 8th Michigan, with four officers and twenty-two men, in boats on
a reconnoissance up the Combahee River. Captain Ely performed this duty
with skill and success, was gone three days, and went entirely around
some of the enemy's posts without revealing his presence to them.
With the thorough knowledge of the enemy's defenses he had so carefully
gained, General Stevens conceived the plan of moving suddenly by land
and water upon the railroad, breaking it up irremediably by destroying
every bridge for thirty miles, thus cutting the communication between
the cities and threatening both, and then rapidly to countermarch the
whole force to the ferry, Beaufort, or Broad River, embark on
transports, and, reinforced by every available man of Sherman's command,
to strike for Charleston by the inner waterways of the North Edisto,
Wadmalaw, and Stono, thus completely turning the heavy harbor and sea
defenses which protected the city against a front attack.
He worked out the details of this movement against the railroad with
great pains, knowing that he would have it to execute. He counted
largely upon the flotilla of launches and flatboats, by means of which
he would be enabled to throw strong forces up the rivers, and cut off
and isolate every position and bridge in turn. Port Royal Ferry had
demonstrated the practicability of thus moving troops by water, and had
given them the idea. He had plenty of flats, great numbers of negroes
trained to the oar, and there was no lack of good boatmen among the
soldiers.
The largest part of the attacking force was to be thrown directly on the
railroad, moving simultaneously in two columns, one overland from Port
Royal Ferry via Garden's Corners, the other ascending Broad and
Pocotaligo rivers in flatboats, supported by naval launches and
light-draught gunboats. Strong detachments were boldly to press the
enemy's posts on the Coosawhatchie and Tulifiny, and be ready to join in
the attack upon them later by the main force. A picked detachment was to
ascend the Combahee in boats, carry the enemy's posts on that river and
on the Ashepoo, and destroy the railroad bridges, and then, proceeding
along the railroad, join and coöperate with the main column in
destroying the bridge over the Pocotaligo, when the united force were to
press southward down the railroad towards Savannah, sweeping everything
clear beyond the Coosawhatchie, and leaving the railroad in smoking
ruins for thirty miles.
In connection with the siege of Pulaski, General Sherman desired to
operate against Savannah. He complained that a combined movement in
force upon that city planned by him in January was balked by the refusal
of the navy to coöperate. Later, he was ordered by McClellan to abandon
the design. Naturally impatient of delay, and anxious to achieve some
success, he was ripe for new undertakings. As the fall of Pulaski was
evidently impending, General Stevens unfolded his plan to General
Sherman, and the two officers, in several long and confidential
conferences, discussed it fully. General Sherman decided to adopt and
carry it out as soon as the fall of Pulaski should free his whole force
for the operation. Commodore Dupont also heartily entered into the plan,
and was ready to give it all requisite naval support. Moreover, he
proposed making a strong naval demonstration on Bull Bay, north of
Charleston, in order still further to distract the enemy at the critical
time.
The objective point to be seized as the key to Charleston--the
turning-point of the campaign--was known as Church Flats, situated on
the stream extending from the Wadmalaw to the Stono River. From this
point a good road led to Charleston, fourteen miles distant. The
gunboats could approach within two miles of it. The movement of
Sherman's entire force was to be so combined and timed that every
effective man--Wright from Florida, Viele from Pulaski, Williams from
Hilton Head, and Stevens's flying column fresh from their attack on the
railroad, leaving ruined bridges and a beaten, disconcerted enemy behind
it--was to be transported by water and thrown upon Church Flats. True,
the point was fortified and garrisoned, but the navy would cover the
landing, and afford support in case of repulse. A successful dash might
take Charleston at a blow. Or, if a foothold only were gained, the army
could force its way by the Stono, turn all the defenses on James Island
and the harbor, and reduce or destroy the city from the banks of the
Ashley. This movement was taking the enemy by the throat. The subsequent
attacks on the sea front were taking the bull by the horns, and met the
usual fate of that performance.
Fort Pulaski fell April 11. With due allowance for preparation and
delays, the railroad should have been destroyed and our army in
possession of Church Flats by May 1. What means of defense had the enemy
at this juncture? Lee had been sent to Virginia, and during the six
weeks succeeding his departure Pemberton was stripped of regiment after
regiment, dispatched to Richmond or to Corinth. About April 20 he
withdrew all troops except the cavalry between the Ashepoo and Oketie
for the defense of the two cities. "This," he reports, "will leave the
line of the Charleston and Savannah Railroad with no other protection
than what the cavalry companies can afford, which is altogether
insufficient." At this time also he moved his headquarters from
Pocotaligo to Charleston, and abandoned the defenses of Georgetown north
of Charleston, removing the guns therefrom for the protection of the
latter.
Only four thousand men, under Colonel P.H. Colquitt, 46th Georgia,
guarded the long and exposed line south of the Ashepoo clear to
Savannah. Colquitt's headquarters, with his own regiment and two field
batteries, were at Pocotaligo; the remainder of his force was scattered
along the road.
There were no obstructions yet planted in the Stono, except possibly at
Church Flats, where, as late as April 29, Pemberton orders Evans, "Sink
the obstructions at Church Flats immediately." The line of defenses
across James Island was not commenced. The guns with which it was
afterwards armed were in the exposed, advanced batteries on Cole and
Battery islands, and must have been abandoned there.
The returns of Pemberton's forces for May 11, 1862, give the effective
force in his department:--
Georgia 9,172
South Carolina 18,514
------
Total 27,686
The South Carolina troops were disposed as follows:--
Charleston defenses, Brigadier-General Ripley 9750
James Island to the Ashepoo, Brigadier-General Evans 4883
Ashepoo to Savannah, Colonel Colquitt 3881
General Stevens's movement on the railroad, if successful, would
effectually break up Colquitt's command, and prevent succor reaching the
threatened point at Charleston from the troops at and about Savannah for
at least a week, most probably two weeks; for they would have to be sent
around by way of Augusta, Ga., and by this route the rail was not
continuous, there being a gap of over forty miles.
Consequently Pemberton's available force to resist the proposed movement
would be reduced to Ripley's and Evans's commands, which mustered,--
Infantry 10,477
Artillery 3,032
Cavalry 1,133
------
Total 14,642
Counting out the garrisons of the forts and batteries about the city and
harbor, and on James, Cole, and Battery islands, it is clear that
Pemberton could not possibly have concentrated over six or seven
thousand troops to meet Sherman's advance on the Stono. In all
probability he would not have had half that number at the critical point
in time; for the vigor of the attack on the railroad, sweeping
southward, would surely have impressed him that Savannah was in danger,
causing him perhaps to hurry part of his troops to the relief of that
city via Augusta, while Dupont's demonstration on Bull Bay would have
still further distracted his attention from the real point of attack
until too late.
Returns of the Union forces for April 30 show present for duty some
17,000, as follows:--
Brigadier-General Viele, Daufuskie, Bird and
Jones islands 3077
Brigadier-General Stevens, Beaufort 3881
Brigadier-General Wright, Edisto and Otter islands 3623
Brigadier-General Q.A. Gilmore, Fort Pulaski,
Tybee, and Cockspur 2139
Colonel Robert Williams, Hilton Head 2987
Fernandina and St. Augustine, Florida 1194
Fort Seward, South Carolina, 92, and department
commander and staff, 16 108
------
Total 16,988
An effective force of 10,000 could have been formed from these troops
and thrown upon the Stono. Sherman was a good and resolute soldier; his
troops were in fine condition, and full of pluck and confidence. With
Stevens and Wright to lead them, and the navy at his back, he would
almost certainly have achieved success.[16]
But this promising movement was nipped in the bud by the untimely and
unexpected arrival of Major-General David Hunter to supersede Sherman.
Brigadier-General H.W. Benham accompanied Hunter as a kind of second in
command. In fact, both officers were _enfants terribles_, whom the
administration exiled to South Carolina to get rid of. Hunter had just
been relieved from commanding in Missouri for an act of insubordination
in issuing an emancipation proclamation in defiance of orders; and
Benham, fresh from skirmishes in West Virginia, was in Washington,
claiming everything in the way of credit, and loudly importuning the
government for high command, when they were ordered to South Carolina.
Sherman turned over the command of the department, and sailed north on
the 8th of April. Three days later Pulaski fell after a day and a half's
bombardment, and Benham made haste to claim the credit of the
achievement due to Sherman and Gilmore.
General Hunter divided his department into the Northern and Southern
Districts, and gave Benham the command of the former, comprising South
Carolina, Georgia, and part of Florida, and nearly all the troops. About
the middle of April General Wright returned from Florida with the
greater part of his brigade, and took post on Edisto Island.
Hunter, a sincere, earnest, and patriotic man, was absorbed in the
political and humanitarian aspects of the great struggle. He lost no
time in issuing another emancipation proclamation. "Martial law and
slavery," so ran this unique document, "in a free country are altogether
incompatible; the persons heretofore held as slaves are therefore
declared forever free." The same day he issued the following order to
the commanding officers of the several posts and islands: "Sir, you will
send immediately to these headquarters, under guard, all able-bodied
negroes capable of bearing arms within your lines." The six hundred
forlorn and frightened darkeys, who next day were loaded on a steamer at
Beaufort and shipped to Hilton Head, must have been sadly puzzled over
their new-found forever freedom. But Hunter soon solved all doubts by
throwing them into camp with uniforms on their backs, arms in their
hands, white officers to drill them, black preachers to exhort them, and
a cordon of white soldiers sentineling their camp to make sure they did
not run away. Thus was raised the first negro regiment. Hunter, having
proclaimed them free, felt no scruples in making them fight for freedom.
General Stevens, after obeying the order with a promptness altogether
unexpected by General Hunter, and for which he was totally unprepared,
remonstrated against it in a letter to General Benham, his immediate
commander:--
"1. There is very little material for soldiers in the able-bodied
men of color in this department. I have not yet been able to find a
single man who would venture alone inside the enemy's lines,
although I have diligently sought to find such a man. Occasionally a
negro has been used to accompany white men. They have great fear of
the prowess of their masters, and of white men generally. They have
the strongest local and domestic attachments, which make them very
reluctant to leave their homes.
"2: They can be used to very great advantage in connection with and
for the menial duties of the military service, and also as adjuncts
of existing organizations; thus, as quartermasters' employees, doing
all kinds of labor, from mechanical to the merest drudgery work. As
boatmen, also, and as laborers on the defensive works, as guides and
scouts, they can render most effective service, and should be
employed _as adjuncts of existing organizations_. In fixed batteries
they could do the heavy work, moving the guns, and carrying the shot
and shell. In engineering operations they could do the heavy labor,
even some of the hard lifting and carrying in managing the pontoon
equipage. Thus I conceive a great use can be made of the blacks in
our military operations in devolving upon them the menial duties,
and as strictly subordinate to existing organizations."
These were precisely the views as to raising negro troops expressed not
long afterwards by the distinguished general, W.T. Sherman.
The remonstrance seems to have had some effect, for General Hunter
telegraphed, and afterwards wrote, General Stevens to say to the negroes
that they were sent for to receive their free papers, and would have a
chance to volunteer, if they wished, and that those who did not wish to
remain would be sent back to their homes. In fact, the regiment was
disbanded not long afterwards.
Another cause of anxiety to General Stevens was the delay of the Senate
in confirming his appointment as brigadier-general. The confirmation was
held up by Senator Wilson, of Massachusetts, chairman of the Military
Committee, in consequence of numerous anonymous letters to him and other
senators, written from the Department of the South, charging that
General Stevens was unsound on the slavery question. But when General
Sherman reached Washington and indignantly refuted these slanders,
described the able handling of his troops at Port Royal Ferry, and the
fine condition to which he had brought his brigade; and Messrs. Pierce,
French, and Suydam, the treasury agents, abolitionists themselves, bore
willing witness to his patriotic spirit and the ungrudging assistance
he had given them,--Wilson assented to the confirmation. Senators
Fessenden, John P. Hale, Rice, Nesmith, and others strongly stood up for
him, and on April 12 it was made without further delay.
NOTE.--Admiral Dupont's fleet-captain, Charles Henry Davis, in a
letter written soon after the naval victory at Port Royal, declares
that the true way of attacking Charleston is "by lines of water
communication from St. Helena Sound; and, if you will observe, South
Edisto, North Edisto, and Stono rivers and inlets afford the means
of lateral support to an army moving towards Charleston by vessels
of the navy," etc. _Life of Charles Henry Davis, Rear Admiral_, p.
174.
On the arrival of the new commanders, the admiral, waiving rank in
order to expedite matters, consented to put himself in official
communication with General Benham; but he soon had occasion to call
General Hunter's attention to the tone and character of one of
Benham's letters, and to withdraw the concession.
In a subsequent letter to Hunter the admiral remarks: "I have,
however, to take exception to the attempt of General Benham to
attribute his inability to meet his own arrangements to any
shortcomings on my part." _Official Dispatches of Admiral Dupont_,
pp. 172-183.
[Illustration: LIEUT. WM. T. LUSK, LIEUT. ABRAHAM COTTRELL,
---- ----, MAJOR GEORGE S. KEMBLE, CAPT. B.F.
PORTER, CAPT. HAZARD STEVENS, GENERAL
STEVENS, LIEUT. BENJ. R. LYONS
GENERAL STEVENS AND STAFF]
FOOTNOTES:
[16] The author was General Stevens's chief of staff, and was
confidentially informed and employed by him in all the details
of this plan of campaign against Charleston, and of the scouts
by Captain Elliott and others. Since the war he has gone over
the whole matter with General Thomas W. Sherman, who expressed
the utmost confidence in the proposed movement, and his lasting
regret that he was deprived of the opportunity of carrying it
out.