[Illustration]
Here the army is saving the navy by a brilliant piece of engineering that
prevented the loss of a fleet worth $2,000,000. The Red River expedition
was one of the most humiliating ever undertaken by the Federals. Porter's
fleet, which had so boldly advanced above the falls at Alexandria, was
ordered back, only to find that the river was so low as to imprison twelve
vessels. Lieut.-Colonel Joseph Bailey, acting engineer of the Nineteenth
Corps, obtained permission to build a dam in order to make possible the
passage of the fleet. Begun on April 30, 1864, the work was finished on
the 8th of May, almost entirely by the soldiers, working incessantly day
and night, often up to their necks in water and under the broiling sun.
Bailey succeeded in turning the whole current into one channel and the
squadron passed below to safety. Not often have inland lumbermen been the
means of saving a navy.
[Illustration: COLONEL JOSEPH BAILEY IN 1864.