If Sergeant Rivers was a natural king among my dusky soldiers, Corporal
Robert Sutton was the natural prime-minister. If not in all respects the
ablest, he was the wisest man in our ranks. As large, as powerful, and
as black as our good-looking Color-Sergeant, but more heavily built and
with less personal beauty, he had a more massive brain and a far more
meditative and systematic intellect. Not yet grounded even in the
spelling-book, his modes of thought were nevertheless strong, lucid, and
accurate; and he yearned and pined for intellectual companionship beyond
all ignorant men whom I have ever met. I believe that he would have
talked all day and all night, for days together, to any officer who
could instruct him, until his companion, at least, fell asleep
exhausted. His comprehension of the whole problem of Slavery was more
thorough and far-reaching than that of any Abolitionist, so far as its
social and military aspects went; in that direction I could teach him
nothing, and he taught me much. But it was his methods of thought which
always impressed me chiefly: superficial brilliancy he left to others,
and grasped at the solid truth. Of course his interest in the war and in
the regiment was unbounded; he did not take to drill with especial
readiness, but he was insatiable of it and grudged every moment of
relaxation. Indeed, he never had any such moments; his mind was at work
all the time, even when he was singing hymns, of which he had endless
store. He was not, however, one of our leading religionists, but his
moral code was solid and reliable, like his mental processes. Ignorant
as he was, the "years that bring the philosophic mind" had yet been his,
and most of my young officers seemed boys beside him. He was a Florida
man, and had been chiefly employed in lumbering and piloting on the St.
Mary's River, which divides Florida from Georgia. Down this stream he
had escaped in a "dug-out," and after thus finding the way, had returned
(as had not a few of my men, in other cases) to bring away wife and
child. "I wouldn't have leff my child, Cunnel," he said, with an
emphasis that sounded the depths of his strong nature. And up this same
river he was always imploring to be allowed to guide an expedition.
Many other men had rival propositions to urge, for they gained
self-confidence from drill and guard-duty, and were growing impatient of
inaction. "Ought to go to work, Sa,--don't believe in we lyin' in camp,
eatin' up the perwisions." Such were the quaint complaints, which I
heard with joy. Looking over my note-books of that period, I find them
filled with topographical memoranda, jotted down by a nickering candle,
from the evening talk of the men,--notes of vulnerable points along the
coast, charts of rivers, locations of pickets. I prized these
conversations not more for what I thus learned of the country than for
what I learned of the men. One could thus measure their various degrees
of accuracy and their average military instinct; and I must say that in
every respect, save the accurate estimate of distances, they stood the
test well. But no project took my fancy so much, after all, as that of
the delegate from the St. Mary's River.
The best peg on which to hang an expedition in the Department of the
South, in those days, was the promise of lumber. Dwelling in the very
land of Southern pine, the Department authorities had to send North for
it, at a vast expense. There was reported to be plenty in the enemy's
country, but somehow the colored soldiers were the only ones who had
been lucky enough to obtain any, thus far, and the supply brought in by
our men, after flooring the tents of the white regiments and our own,
was running low. An expedition of white troops, four companies, with
two steamers and two schooners, had lately returned empty-handed, after
a week's foraging; and now it was our turn. They said the mills were all
burned; but should we go up the St. Mary's, Corporal Sutton was prepared
to offer more lumber than we had transportation to carry. This made the
crowning charm of his suggestion. But there is never any danger of
erring on the side of secrecy, in a military department; and I resolved
to avoid all undue publicity for our plans, by not finally deciding on
any until we should get outside the bar. This was happily approved by my
superior officers, Major-General Hunter and Brigadier-General Saxton;
and I was accordingly permitted to take three steamers, with four
hundred and sixty-two officers and men, and two or three invited guests,
and go down the coast on my own responsibility. We were, in short, to
win our spurs; and if, as among the Araucanians, our spurs were made of
lumber, so much the better. The whole history of the Department of the
South had been defined as "a military picnic," and now we were to take
our share of the entertainment.
It seemed a pleasant share, when, after the usual vexations and delays,
we found ourselves gliding down the full waters of Beaufort River, the
three vessels having sailed at different hours, with orders to
rendezvous at St. Simon's Island, on the coast of Georgia. Until then,
the flag-ship, so to speak, was to be the "Ben De Ford," Captain
Hallett,--this being by far the largest vessel, and carrying most of the
men. Major Strong was in command upon the "John Adams," an army
gunboat, carrying a thirty-pound Parrott gun, two ten-pound Parrotts,
and an eight-inch howitzer Captain Trowbridge (since promoted
Lieutenant-Colonel of the regiment) had charge of the famous "Planter,"
brought away from the Rebels by Robert Small; she carried a ten-pound
Parrott gun, and two howitzers. The John Adams was our main reliance.
She was an old East-Boston ferry-boat, a "double-ender," admirable for
river-work, but unfit for sea-service. She drew seven feet of water; the
Planter drew only four; but the latter was very slow, and being obliged
to go to St. Simon's by an inner passage, would delay us from the
beginning. She delayed us so much, before the end, that we virtually
parted company, and her career was almost entirely separated from our
own.
From boyhood I have had a fancy for boats, and have seldom been without
a share, usually more or less fractional, in a rather indeterminate
number of punts and wherries. But when, for the first time, I found
myself at sea as Commodore of a fleet of armed steamers,--for even the
Ben De Ford boasted a six-pounder or so,--it seemed rather an unexpected
promotion. But it is a characteristic of army life, that one adapts
one's self, as coolly as in a dream, to the most novel responsibilities.
One sits on court-martial, for instance, and decides on the life of a
fellow-creature, without being asked any inconvenient questions as to
previous knowledge of Blackstone; and after such an experience, shall
one shrink from wrecking a steamer or two in the cause of the nation? So
I placidly accepted my naval establishment, as if it were a new form of
boat-club, and looked over the charts, balancing between one river and
another, as if deciding whether to pull up or down Lake Quinsigamond. If
military life ever contemplated the exercise of the virtue of humility
under any circumstances, this would perhaps have been a good opportunity
to begin its practice. But as the "Regulations" clearly contemplated
nothing of the kind, and as I had never met with any precedent which
looked in that direction, I had learned to check promptly all such weak
proclivities.
Captain Hallett proved the most frank and manly of sailors, and did
everything for our comfort. He was soon warm in his praises of the
demeanor of our men, which was very pleasant to hear, as this was the
first time that colored soldiers in any number had been conveyed on
board a transport, and I know of no place where a white volunteer
appears to so much disadvantage. His mind craves occupation, his body
is intensely uncomfortable, the daily emergency is not great enough to
call out his heroic qualities, and he is apt to be surly, discontented,
and impatient even of sanitary rules. The Southern black soldier, on the
other hand, is seldom sea-sick, (at least, such is my experience,) and,
if properly managed, is equally contented, whether idle or busy; he is,
moreover, so docile that all needful rules are executed with cheerful
acquiescence, and the quarters can therefore be kept clean and
wholesome. Very forlorn faces were soon visible among the officers in
the cabin, but I rarely saw such among the men.
Pleasant still seemed our enterprise, as we anchored at early morning in
the quiet waters of St. Simon's Sound, and saw the light fall softly on
the beach and the low bluffs, on the picturesque plantation-houses which
nestled there, and the graceful naval vessels that lay at anchor before
us. When we afterwards landed, the air had that peculiar Mediterranean
translucency which Southern islands wear; and the plantation we visited
had the loveliest tropical garden, though tangled and desolate, which I
have ever seen in the South. The deserted house was embowered in great
blossoming shrubs, and filled with hyacinthine odors, among which
predominated that of the little Chickasaw roses which everywhere bloomed
and trailed around. There were fig-trees and date-palms, crape-myrtles
and wax-myrtles, Mexican agaves and English ivies, japonicas, bananas,
oranges, lemons, oleanders, jonquils, great cactuses, and wild Florida
lilies. This was not the plantation which Mrs. Kemble has since made
historic, although that was on the same island; and I could not waste
much sentiment over it, for it had belonged to a Northern renegade,
Thomas Butler King. Yet I felt then, as I have felt a hundred times
since, an emotion of heart-sickness at this desecration of a
homestead,--and especially when, looking from a bare upper window of the
empty house upon a range of broad, flat, sunny roofs, such as children
love to play on, I thought how that place might have been loved by yet
innocent hearts, and I mourned anew the sacrilege of war.
I had visited the flag-ship Wabash ere we left Port-Royal Harbor, and
had obtained a very kind letter of introduction from Admiral Dupont,
that stately and courtly potentate, elegant as one's ideal French
marquis; and under these credentials I received polite attention from the
naval officers at St. Simon's,--Acting Volunteer Lieutenant Budd, U. S. N.,
of the gunboat Potomska, and Acting Master Moses, U. S. N., of
the barque Fernandina. They made valuable suggestions in regard to the
different rivers along the coast, and gave vivid descriptions of the
last previous trip up the St. Mary's, undertaken by Captain Stevens,
U. S. N., in the gunboat Ottawa, when he had to fight his way past
batteries at every bluff in descending the narrow and rapid stream. I
was warned that no resistance would be offered to the ascent, but only
to our return; and was further cautioned against the mistake, then
common, of underrating the courage of the Rebels. "It proved impossible
to dislodge those fellows from the banks," my informant said; "they had
dug rifle-pits, and swarmed like hornets, and when fairly silenced in
one direction, they were sure to open upon us from another." All this
sounded alarming, but it was nine months before that the event had
happened; and although nothing had gone up the river since, I was
satisfied that the resistance now to be encountered was very much
smaller. And something must be risked, anywhere.
We were delayed all that day in waiting for our consort, and improved
our time by verifying certain rumors about a quantity of new
railroad-iron which was said to be concealed in the abandoned Rebel
forts on St. Simon's and Jekyll Islands, and which would have much value
at Port Royal, if we could only unearth it. Some of our men had worked
upon these very batteries, so that they could easily guide us; and by
the additional discovery of a large flatboat we were enabled to go to
work in earnest upon the removal of the treasure. These iron bars,
surmounted by a dozen feet of sand, formed an invulnerable roof for the
magazines and bomb-proofs of the fort, and the men enjoyed demolishing
them far more than they had relished their construction. Though the day
was the 24th of January, 1863, the sun was very oppressive upon the
sands; but all were in the highest spirits, and worked with the greatest
zeal. The men seemed to regard these massive bars as their first
trophies; and if the rails had been wreathed with roses, they could not
have been got out in more holiday style. Nearly a hundred were obtained
that day, besides a quantity of five-inch plank with which to barricade
the very conspicuous pilot-houses of the John Adams.
Still another day we were delayed, and could still keep at this work,
not neglecting some foraging on the island, from which horses, cattle,
and agricultural implements were to be removed, and the few remaining
colored families transferred to Fernandina. I had now become quite
anxious about the missing steamboat, as the inner passage, by which
alone she could arrive, was exposed at certain points to fire from Rebel
batteries, and it would have been unpleasant to begin with a disaster. I
remember, that, as I stood on deck, in the still and misty evening,
listening with strained senses for some sound of approach, I heard a low
continuous noise from the distance, more wild and desolate than anything
in my memory can parallel. It came from within the vast girdle of mist,
and seemed like the cry of a myriad of lost souls upon the horizon's
verge; it was Dante become audible: and yet it was but the accumulated
cries of innumerable sea-fowl at the entrance of the outer bay.
Late that night the Planter arrived. We left St. Simon's on the
following morning, reached Fort Clinch by four o'clock, and there
transferring two hundred men to the very scanty quarters of the John
Adams, allowed the larger transport to go into Fernandina, while the two
other vessels were to ascend the St. Mary's River, unless (as proved
inevitable in the end) the defects in the boiler of the Planter should
oblige her to remain behind. That night I proposed to make a sort of
trial-trip up stream, as far as Township Landing, some fifteen miles,
there to pay our respects to Captain Clark's company of cavalry, whose
camp was reported to lie near by. This was included in Corporal Sutton's
programme, and seemed to me more inviting, and far more useful to the
men, than any amount of mere foraging. The thing really desirable
appeared to be to get them under fire as soon as possible, and to teach
them, by a few small successes, the application of what they had learned
in camp.
I had ascertained that the camp of this company lay five miles from the
landing, and was accessible by two roads, one of which was a
lumber-path, not commonly used, but which Corporal Sutton had helped to
construct, and along which he could easily guide us. The plan was to go
by night, surround the house and negro cabins at the landing, (to
prevent an alarm from being given,) then to take the side path, and if
all went well, to surprise the camp; but if they got notice of our
approach, through their pickets, we should, at worst, have a fight, in
which the best man must win.
The moon was bright, and the river swift, but easy of navigation thus
far. Just below Township I landed a small advance force, to surround the
houses silently. With them went Corporal Sutton; and when, after
rounding the point, I went on shore with a larger body of men, he met me
with a silent chuckle of delight, and with the information that there
was a negro in a neighboring cabin who had just come from the Rebel
camp, and could give the latest information. While he hunted up this
valuable auxiliary, I mustered my detachment, winnowing out the men who
had coughs, (not a few,) and sending them ignominiously on board again:
a process I had regularly to perform, during this first season of
catarrh, on all occasions where quiet was needed. The only exception
tolerated at this time was in the case of one man who offered a solemn
pledge, that, if unable to restrain his cough, he would lie down on the
ground, scrape a little hole, and cough into it unheard. The ingenuity
of this proposition was irresistible, and the eager patient was allowed
to pass muster.
It was after midnight when we set off upon our excursion. I had about a
hundred men, marching by the flank, with a small advanced guard, and
also a few flankers, where the ground permitted. I put my Florida
company at the head of the column, and had by my side Captain Metcalf,
an excellent officer, and Sergeant McIntyre, his first sergeant. We
plunged presently into pine woods, whose resinous smell I can still
remember. Corporal Sutton marched near me, with his captured negro
guide, whose first fear and sullenness had yielded to the magic news of
the President's Proclamation, then just issued, of which Governor Andrew
had sent me a large printed supply;--we seldom found men who could read
it, but they all seemed to feel more secure when they held it in their
hands. We marched on through the woods, with no sound but the peeping of
the frogs in a neighboring marsh, and the occasional yelping of a dog,
as we passed the hut of some "cracker." This yelping always made
Corporal Sutton uneasy: dogs are the detective officers of Slavery's
police.
We had halted once or twice, to close up the ranks, and had marched some
two miles, seeing and hearing nothing more. I had got all I could out of
our new guide, and was striding on, rapt in pleasing contemplation. All
had gone so smoothly that I had merely to fancy the rest as being
equally smooth. Already I fancied our little detachment bursting out of
the woods, in swift surprise, upon the Rebel quarters,--already the
opposing commander, after hastily firing a charge or two from his
revolver, (of course above my head,) had yielded at discretion, and was
gracefully tendering, in a stage attitude, his unavailing sword,--when
suddenly----
There was a trampling of feet among the advanced guard as they came
confusedly to a halt, and almost at the same instant a more ominous
sound, as of galloping horses in the path before us. The moonlight
outside the woods gave that dimness of atmosphere within which is more
bewildering than darkness, because the eyes cannot adapt themselves to
it so well. Yet I fancied, and others aver, that they saw the leader of
an approaching party, mounted on a white horse and reining up in the
pathway; others, again, declare that he drew a pistol from the holster
and took aim; others heard the words, "Charge in upon them! Surround
them!" But all this was confused by the opening rifle-shots of our
advanced guard, and, as clear observation was impossible, I made the men
fix their bayonets and kneel in the cover on each side the pathway, and
I saw with delight the brave fellows, with Sergeant McIntyre at their
head, settling down in the grass as coolly and warily as if wild turkeys
were the only game. Perhaps at the first shot, a man fell at my elbow. I
felt it no more than if a tree had fallen,--I was so busy watching my
own men and the enemy, and planning what to do next. Some of our
soldiers, misunderstanding the order, "Fix bayonets," were actually
_charging_ with them, dashing off into the dim woods, with nothing to
charge at but the vanishing tail of an imaginary horse,--for we could
really see nothing. This zeal I noted with pleasure, and also with
anxiety, as our greatest danger was from confusion and scattering; and
for infantry to pursue cavalry would be a novel enterprise. Captain
Metcalf stood by me well in keeping the men steady, as did
Assistant-Surgeon Minor, and Lieutenant, now Captain, Jackson. How the
men in the rear were behaving I could not tell,--not so coolly, I
afterwards found, because they were more entirely bewildered, supposing,
until the shots came, that the column had simply halted for a moment's
rest, as had been done once or twice before. They did not know who or
where their assailants might be, and the fall of the man beside me
created a hasty rumor that I was killed, so that it was on the whole an
alarming experience for them. They kept together very tolerably,
however, while our assailants, dividing, rode along on each side through
the open pine-barren, firing into our ranks, but mostly over the heads
of the men. My soldiers in turn fired rapidly,--too rapidly, being yet
beginners,--and it was evident, that, dim as it was, both sides had
opportunity to do some execution.
I could hardly tell whether the fight had lasted ten minutes or an hour,
when, as the enemy's fire had evidently ceased or slackened, I gave the
order to cease firing. But it was very difficult at first to make them
desist: the taste of gunpowder was too intoxicating. One of them was
heard to mutter, indignantly,--"Why de Cunnel order _Cease firing_, when
de Secesh blazin' away at de rate ob ten dollar a day?" Every incidental
occurrence seemed somehow to engrave itself upon my perceptions, without
interrupting the main course of thought. Thus I know, that, in one of
the pauses of the affair, there came wailing through the woods a cracked
female voice, as if calling back some stray husband who had run out to
join in the affray,--"John, John, are you going to leave me, John? Are
you going to let me and the children be killed, John?" I suppose the
poor thing's fears of gunpowder were very genuine, but it was such a
wailing squeak, and so infinitely ludicrous, and John was probably
ensconced so very safely in some hollow tree, that I could see some of
the men showing all their white teeth in the very midst of the fight.
But soon this sound, with all others, had ceased, and left us in
peaceful possession of the field.
I have made the more of this little affair because it was the first
stand-up fight in which my men had been engaged, though they had been
under fire, in an irregular way, in their small early expeditions. To me
personally the event was of the greatest value: it had given us all an
opportunity to test each other, and our abstract surmises were changed
into positive knowledge. Hereafter it was of small importance what
nonsense might be talked or written about colored troops; so long as
mine did not flinch, it made no difference to me. My brave young
officers, themselves mostly new to danger, viewed the matter much as I
did; and yet we were under bonds of life and death to form a correct
opinion, which was more than could be said of the Northern editors, and
our verdict was proportionately of greater value.
I was convinced from appearances that we had been victorious, so far,
though I could not suppose that this would be the last of it. We knew
neither the numbers of the enemy, nor their plans, nor their present
condition: whether they had surprised us or whether we had surprised
them was all a mystery. Corporal Sutton was urgent to go on and complete
the enterprise. All my impulses said the same thing; but then I had the
most explicit injunctions from General Saxton to risk as little as
possible in this first enterprise, because of the fatal effect on public
sentiment of even an honorable defeat. We had now an honorable victory,
so far as it went; the officers and men around me were in good spirits,
but the rest of the column might be nervous; and it seemed so important
to make the first fight an entire success, that I thought it wiser to
let well alone; nor have I ever changed this opinion. For one's self,
Montrose's verse may be well applied,--"To win or lose it all." But one
has no right to deal thus lightly with the fortunes of a race, and that
was the weight which I always felt as resting on our action. If my raw
infantry force had stood unflinching a night-surprise from "de hoss
cavalry," as they reverentially termed them, I felt that a good
beginning had been made. All hope of surprising the enemy's camp was now
at an end; I was willing and ready to fight the cavalry over again, but
it seemed wiser that we, not they, should select the ground.
Attending to the wounded, therefore, and making as we best could
stretchers for those who were to be carried, including the remains of
the man killed at the first discharge, (Private William Parsons of
Company G,) and others who seemed at the point of death, we marched
through the woods to the landing,--expecting at every moment to be
involved in another fight. This not occurring, I was more than ever
satisfied that we had won a victory; for it was obvious that a mounted
force would not allow a detachment of infantry to march two miles
through open woods by night without renewing the fight, unless they
themselves had suffered a good deal. On arrival at the landing, seeing
that there was to be no immediate affray, I sent most of the men on
board, and called for volunteers to remain on shore with me and hold the
plantation-house till morning. They eagerly offered; and I was glad to
see them, when posted as sentinels by Lieutenants Hyde and Jackson, who
stayed with me, pace their beats as steadily and challenge as coolly as
veterans, though of course there was some powder wasted on imaginary
foes. Greatly to my surprise, however, we had no other enemies to
encounter. We did not yet know that we had killed the first lieutenant
of the cavalry, and that our opponents had retreated to the woods in
dismay, without daring to return to their camp. This at least was the
account we heard from prisoners afterwards, and was evidently the tale
current in the neighborhood, though the statements published in Southern
newspapers did not correspond. Admitting the death of Lieutenant Jones,
the Tallahassee "Floridian" of February 14th stated that "Captain Clark,
finding the enemy in strong force, fell back with his command to camp,
and removed his ordnance and commissary and other stores, with twelve
negroes on their way to the enemy, captured on that day."
In the morning, my invaluable surgeon, Dr. Rogers, sent me his report of
killed and wounded; and I have been since permitted to make the
following extracts from his notes:--"One man killed instantly by ball
through the heart, and seven wounded, one of whom will die. Braver men
never lived. One man with two bullet-holes through the large muscles of
the shoulders and neck brought off from the scene of action, two miles
distant, two muskets; and not a murmur has escaped his lips. Another,
Robert Sutton, with three wounds,--one of which, being on the skull, may
cost him his life,--would not report himself till compelled to do so by
his officers. While dressing his wounds, he quietly talked of what they
had done, and of what they yet could do. To-day I have had the Colonel
_order_ him to obey me. He is perfectly quiet and cool, but takes this
whole affair with the religious bearing of a man who realizes that
freedom is sweeter than life. Yet another soldier did not report himself
at all, but remained all night on guard, and possibly I should not have
known of his having had a buck-shot in his shoulder, if some duty
requiring a sound shoulder had not been required of him to-day." This
last, it may be added, had persuaded a comrade to dig out the buck-shot,
for fear of being ordered on the sick-list. And one of those who were
carried to the vessel--a man wounded through the lungs--asked only if I
were safe, the contrary having been reported. An officer may be pardoned
some enthusiasm for such men as these.
The anxious night having passed away without an attack, another problem
opened with the morning. For the first time, my officers and men found
themselves in possession of an enemy's abode; and though there was but
little temptation to plunder, I knew that I must here begin to draw the
line. I had long since resolved to prohibit absolutely all
indiscriminate pilfering and wanton outrage, and to allow nothing to be
taken or destroyed but by proper authority. The men, to my great
satisfaction, entered into this view at once, and so did (perhaps a
shade less readily, in some cases) the officers. The greatest trouble
was with the steamboat-hands, and I resolved to let them go ashore as
little as possible. Most articles of furniture were already, however,
before our visit, gone from the plantation-house, which was now used
only as a picket-station. The only valuable article was a piano-forte,
for which a regular packing-box lay invitingly ready outside. I had made
up my mind to burn all picket-stations, and all villages from which I
should be covertly attacked, and nothing else; and as this house was
destined to the flames, I should have left the piano in it, but for the
seductions of that box. With such a receptacle all ready, even to the
cover, it would have seemed like flying in the face of Providence not to
put the piano in. I ordered it removed, therefore, and afterwards
presented it to the school for colored children at Fernandina. This I
mention because it was the only article of property I ever took or
knowingly suffered to be taken, in the enemy's country, save for
legitimate military uses, from first to last; nor would I have taken
this, but for the thought of the school, and, as aforesaid, the
temptation of the box. If any other officer has been more rigid, with
equal opportunities, let him cast the first stone.
I think the zest with which the men finally set fire to the house at my
order was enhanced by this previous abstemiousness; but there is a
fearful fascination in the use of fire, which every child knows in the
abstract, and which I found to hold true in the practice. On our way
down river we had opportunity to test this again.
The ruined town of St. Mary's had at that time a bad reputation, among
both naval and military men. Lying but a short distance above
Fernandina, on the Georgia side, it was occasionally visited by our
gunboats. I was informed that the only residents of the town were three
old women, who were apparently kept there as spies,--that, on our
approach, the aged crones would come out and wave white
handkerchiefs,--that they would receive us hospitably, profess to be
profoundly loyal, and exhibit a portrait of Washington,--that they would
solemnly assure us that no Rebel pickets had been there for many
weeks,--but that in the adjoining yard we should find fresh
horse-tracks, and that we should be fired upon by guerrillas the moment
we left the wharf. My officers had been much excited by these tales; and
I had assured them, that, if this programme were literally carried out,
we would straightway return and burn the town, or what was left of it,
for our share. It was essential to show my officers and men, that, while
rigid against irregular outrage, we could still be inexorable against
the enemy.
We had previously planned to stop at this town, on our way down river,
for some valuable lumber which we had espied on a wharf; and gliding
down the swift current, shelling a few bluffs as we passed, we soon
reached it. Punctual as the figures in a panorama, appeared the old
ladies with their white handkerchiefs. Taking possession of the town,
much of which had previously been destroyed by the gunboats, and
stationing the color-guard, to their infinite delight, in the cupola of
the most conspicuous house, I deployed skirmishers along the exposed
suburb, and set a detail of men at work on the lumber. After a stately
and decorous interview with the queens of society at St. Mary's,--is it
Scott who says that nothing improves the manners like piracy?--I
peacefully withdrew the men when the work was done. There were faces of
disappointment among the officers,--for all felt a spirit of mischief,
after the last night's adventure,--when, just as we had fairly swung out
into the stream and were under way, there came, like the sudden burst of
a tropical tornado, a regular little hailstorm of bullets into the open
end of the boat, driving every gunner in an instant from his post, and
surprising even those who were looking to be surprised. The shock was
but for a second; and though the bullets had pattered precisely like the
sound of hail upon the iron cannon, yet nobody was hurt. With very
respectable promptness, order was restored, our own shells were flying
into the woods from which the attack proceeded, and we were steaming up
to the wharf again, according to promise.
Who shall describe the theatrical attitudes assumed by the old ladies as
they reappeared at the front door--being luckily out of direct
range--and set the handkerchiefs in wilder motion than ever? They
brandished them, they twirled them after the manner of the domestic mop,
they clasped their hands, handkerchiefs included. Meanwhile their
friends in the wood popped away steadily at us, with small effect; and
occasionally an invisible field-piece thundered feebly from another
quarter, with equally invisible results. Reaching the wharf, one
company, under Lieutenant (now Captain) Danilson, was promptly deployed
in search of our assailants, who soon grew silent. Not so the old
ladies, when I announced to them my purpose, and added, with extreme
regret, that, as the wind was high, I should burn only that half of the
town which lay to leeward of their house, which did not, after all,
amount to much. Between gratitude for this degree of mercy and imploring
appeals for greater, the treacherous old ladies manoeuvred with
clasped hands and demonstrative handkerchiefs around me, impairing the
effect of their eloquence by constantly addressing me as "Mr. Captain";
for I have observed, that, while the sternest officer is greatly
propitiated by attributing to him a rank a little higher than his own,
yet no one is ever mollified by an error in the opposite direction. I
tried, however, to disregard such low considerations, and to strike the
correct mean betwixt the sublime patriot and the unsanctified
incendiary, while I could find no refuge from weak contrition save in
greater and greater depths of courtesy; and so melodramatic became our
interview that some of the soldiers still maintain that "dem dar ole
Secesh women been a-gwine for kiss de Cunnel," before we ended. But of
this monstrous accusation I wish to register an explicit denial, once
for all.
Dropping down to Fernandina unmolested after this affair, we were kindly
received by the military and naval commanders,--Colonel Hawley, of the
Seventh Connecticut, (now Brigadier-General Hawley,) and
Lieutenant-Commander Hughes, U. S. N., of the gunboat Mohawk. It turned
out very opportunely that both of these officers had special errands to
suggest still farther up the St. Mary's, and precisely in the region
where I wished to go. Colonel Hawley showed me a letter from the War
Department, requesting him to ascertain the possibility of obtaining a
supply of brick for Fort Clinch from the brickyard which had furnished
the original materials, but which had not been visited since the
perilous river-trip of the Ottawa. Lieutenant Hughes wished to obtain
information for the Admiral respecting a Rebel steamer--the Berosa--said
to be lying somewhere up the river, and awaiting her chance to run the
blockade. I jumped at the opportunity. Berosa and brickyard,--both were
near Woodstock, the former home of Corporal Sutton; he was ready and
eager to pilot us up the river; the moon would be just right that
evening, setting at 3h. 19m. A. M.; and our boat was precisely the one
to undertake the expedition. Its double-headed shape was just what was
needed in that swift and crooked stream; the exposed pilot-houses had
been tolerably barricaded with the thick planks from St. Simon's; and we
further obtained some sand-bags from Fort Clinch, through the aid of
Captain Sears, the officer in charge, who had originally suggested the
expedition after brick. In return for this aid, the Planter was sent
back to the wharf at St. Mary's, to bring away a considerable supply of
the same precious article, which we had observed near the wharf.
Meanwhile the John Adams was coaling from naval supplies, through the
kindness of Lieutenant Hughes; and the Ben De Ford was taking in the
lumber which we had yesterday brought down. It was a great
disappointment to be unable to take the latter vessel up the river; but
I was unwillingly convinced, that, though the depth of water might be
sufficient, yet her length would be unmanageable in the swift current
and sharp turns. The Planter must also be sent on a separate cruise, as
her weak and disabled machinery made her useless for my purpose. Two
hundred men were therefore transferred, as before, to the narrow hold of
the John Adams, in addition to the company permanently stationed on
board to work the guns. At seven o'clock on the evening of January 29th,
beneath a lovely moon, we steamed up the river.
Never shall I forget the mystery and excitement of that night. I know
nothing in life more fascinating than the nocturnal ascent of an unknown
river, leading far into an enemy's country, where one glides in the dim
moonlight between dark hills and meadows, each turn of the channel
making it seem like an inland lake, and cutting you off as by a barrier
from all behind,--with no sign of human life, but an occasional
picket-fire left glimmering beneath the bank, or the yelp of a dog from
some low-lying plantation. On such occasions, every nerve is strained to
its utmost tension; all dreams of romance appear to promise immediate
fulfilment; all lights on board the vessel are obscured, loud voices are
hushed; you fancy a thousand men on shore, and yet see nothing; the
lonely river, unaccustomed to furrowing keels, lapses by the vessel with
a treacherous sound; and all the senses are merged in a sort of anxious
trance. Three times I have had in full perfection this fascinating
experience; but that night was the first, and its zest was the keenest.
It will come back to me in dreams, if I live a thousand years.
I feared no attack during our ascent,--that danger was for our return;
but I feared the intricate navigation of the river, though I did not
fully know, till the actual experience, how dangerous it was. We passed
without trouble far above the scene of our first fight,--the Battle of
the Hundred Pines, as my officers had baptized it; and ever, as we
ascended, the banks grew steeper, the current swifter, the channel more
tortuous and more incumbered with projecting branches and drifting wood.
No piloting less skilful than that of Corporal Sutton and his mate,
James Bezzard, could have carried us through, I thought; and no
side-wheel steamer less strong than a ferry-boat could have borne the
crash and force with which we struck the wooded banks of the river. But
the powerful paddles, built to break the Northern ice, could crush the
Southern pine as well; and we came safely out of entanglements that at
first seemed formidable. We had the tide with us, which makes steering
far more difficult; and, in the sharp angles of the river, there was
often no resource but to run the bow boldly on shore, let the stern
swing round, and then reverse the motion. As the reversing machinery was
generally out of order, the engineer stupid or frightened, and the
captain excited, this involved moments of tolerably concentrated
anxiety. Eight times we grounded in the upper waters, and once lay
aground for half an hour; but at last we dropped anchor before the
little town of Woodstock, after moonset and an hour before daybreak,
just as I had planned, and so quietly that scarcely a dog barked, and
not a soul in the town, as we afterwards found, knew of our arrival.
As silently as possible, the great flatboat which we had brought from
St. Simon's was filled with men. Major Strong was sent on shore with two
companies,--those of Captain James and Captain Metcalf,--with
instructions to surround the town quietly, allow no one to leave it,
molest no one, and hold as temporary prisoners every man whom he found.
I watched them push off into the darkness, got the remaining force ready
to land, and then paced the deck for an hour in silent watchfulness,
waiting for rifle-shots. Not a sound came from the shore, save the
barking of dogs and the morning crow of cocks; the time seemed
interminable; but when daylight came, I landed, and found a pair of
scarlet trousers pacing on their beat before every house in the village,
and a small squad of prisoners, stunted and forlorn as Falstaff's ragged
regiment, already in hand. I observed with delight the good demeanor of
my men towards these forlorn Anglo-Saxons, and towards the more
tumultuous women. Even one soldier, who threatened to throw an old
termagant into the river, took care to append the courteous epithet
"Madam."
I took a survey of the premises. The chief house, a pretty one with
picturesque outbuildings, was that of Mrs. A., who owned the mills and
lumber-wharves adjoining. The wealth of these wharves had not been
exaggerated. There was lumber enough to freight half a dozen steamers,
and I half regretted that I had agreed to take down a freight of bricks
instead. Further researches made me grateful that I had already
explained to my men the difference between public foraging and private
plunder. Along the river-bank I found building after building crowded
with costly furniture, all neatly packed, just as it was sent up from
St. Mary's when that town was abandoned. Pianos were a drug; china,
glass-ware, mahogany, pictures, all were here. And here were my men, who
knew that their own labor had earned for their masters these luxuries,
or such as these; their own wives and children were still sleeping on
the floor, perhaps, at Beaufort or Fernandina; and yet they submitted,
almost without a murmur, to the enforced abstinence. Bed and bedding for
our hospitals they might take from those store-rooms,--such as the
surgeon selected,--also an old flag which we found in a corner, and an
old field piece, (which the regiment still possesses,)--but after this
the doors were closed and left unmolested. It cost a struggle to some of
the men, whose wives were destitute, I know; but their pride was very
easily touched, and when this abstinence was once recognized as a rule,
they claimed it as an honor, in this and all succeeding expeditions. I
flatter myself, that, if they had once been set upon wholesale
plundering, they would have done it as thoroughly as their betters; but
I have always been infinitely grateful, both for the credit and for the
discipline of the regiment,--as well as for the men's subsequent
lives,--that the opposite method was adopted.
When the morning was a little advanced, I called on Mrs. A., who
received me in quite a stately way at her own door with "To what am I
indebted for the honor of this visit, Sir?" The foreign name of the
family, and the tropical look of the buildings, made it seem (as,
indeed, did all the rest of the adventure) like a chapter out of "Amyas
Leigh"; but as I had happened to hear that the lady herself was a
Philadelphian and her deceased husband a New-Yorker, I could not feel
even that modicum of reverence due to sincere Southerners. However, I
wished to present my credentials; so, calling up my companion, I said
that I believed she had been previously acquainted with Corporal Robert
Sutton? I never saw a finer bit of unutterable indignation than came
over the face of my hostess, as she slowly recognized him. She drew
herself up, and dropped out the monosyllables of her answer as if they
were so many drops of nitric acid. "Ah," quoth my lady, "_we_ called him
Bob!"
It was a group for a painter. The whole drama of the war seemed to
reverse itself in an instant, and my tall, well-dressed, imposing,
philosophic Corporal dropped down the immeasurable depth into a mere
plantation "Bob" again. So at least in my imagination; not to that
personage himself. Too essentially dignified in his nature to be moved
by words where substantial realities were in question, he simply turned
from the lady, touched his hat to me, and asked if I would wish to see
the slave-jail, as he had the keys in his possession.
If he fancied that I was in danger of being overcome by blandishments
and needed to be recalled to realities, it was a master-stroke.
I must say, that, when the door of that villainous edifice was thrown
open before me, I felt glad that my main interview with its lady
proprietor had passed before I saw it. It was a small building, like a
Northern corn-barn, and seemed to have as prominent and as legitimate a
place among the outbuildings of the establishment. In the middle of the
floor was a large staple with a rusty chain, like an ox-chain, for
fastening a victim down. When the door had been opened after the death
of the late proprietor, my informant said a man was found padlocked in
that chain. We found also three pairs of stocks of various construction,
two of which had smaller as well as larger holes, evidently for the feet
of women or children. In a building near by we found something far more
complicated, which was perfectly unintelligible till the men explained
all its parts: a machine so contrived that a person once imprisoned in
it could neither sit, stand, nor lie, but must support the body half
raised, in a position scarcely endurable. I have since bitterly
reproached myself for leaving this piece of ingenuity behind; but it
would have cost much labor to remove it, and to bring away the other
trophies seemed then enough. I remember the unutterable loathing with
which I leaned against the door of that prison-house; I had thought
myself seasoned to any conceivable horrors of Slavery, but it seemed as
if the visible presence of that den of sin would choke me. Of course it
would have been burned to the ground by us, but that this would have
involved the sacrifice of every other building and all the piles of
lumber, and for the moment it seemed as if the sacrifice would be
righteous. But I forbore, and only took as trophies the instruments of
torture and the keys of the jail.
We found but few colored people in this vicinity; some we brought away
with us, and an old man and woman preferred to remain. All the white
males whom we found I took as hostages, in order to shield us, if
possible, from attack on our way down river, explaining to them that
they would be put on shore when the dangerous points were passed. I knew
that their wives could easily send notice of this fact to the Rebel
forces along the river. My hostages were a forlorn-looking set of
"crackers," far inferior to our soldiers in _physique_, and yet quite
equal, the latter declared, to the average material of the Southern
armies. None were in uniform, but this proved nothing as to their being
soldiers. One of them, a mere boy, was captured at his own door, with
gun in hand. It was a fowling-piece, which he used only, as his mother
plaintively assured me, "to shoot little birds with." As the guileless
youth had for this purpose loaded the gun with eighteen buck-shot, we
thought it justifiable to confiscate both the weapon and the owner, in
mercy to the birds.
We took from this place, for the use of the army, a flock of some thirty
sheep, forty bushels of rice; some other provisions, tools, oars, and a
little lumber, leaving all possible space for the bricks which we
expected to obtain just below. I should have gone farther up the river,
but for a dangerous boom which kept back a great number of logs in a
large brook that here fell into the St. Mary's; the stream ran with
force, and if the Rebels had wit enough to do it, they might in ten
minutes so choke the river with drift-wood as infinitely to enhance our
troubles. So we dropped down stream a mile or two, found the very
brickyard from which Fort Clinch had been constructed,--still stored
with bricks, and seemingly unprotected. Here Sergeant Rivers again
planted his standard, and the men toiled eagerly, for several hours, in
loading our boat to the utmost with the bricks. Meanwhile we questioned
black and white witnesses, and learned for the first time that the
Rebels admitted a repulse at Township Landing, and that Lieutenant Jones
and ten of their number were killed,--though this I fancy to have been
an exaggeration. They also declared that the mysterious steamer Berosa
was lying at the head of the river, but was a broken-down and worthless
affair, and would never get to sea. The result has since proved this;
for the vessel subsequently ran the blockade and foundered near shore,
the crew barely escaping with their lives. I had the pleasure, as it
happened, of being the first person to forward this information to
Admiral Dupont, when it came through the pickets, many months
after,--thus concluding my report on the Berosa.
Before the work at the yard was over, the pickets reported mounted men
in the woods near by, as had previously been the report at Woodstock.
This admonished us to lose no time; and as we left the wharf, immediate
arrangements were made to have the gun-crews all in readiness, and to
keep the rest of the men below, since their musketry would be of little
use now, and I did not propose to risk a life unnecessarily. The chief
obstacle to this was their own eagerness; penned down on one side, they
popped up on the other; their officers, too, were eager to see what was
going on, and were almost as hard to cork down as the men. Add to this,
that the vessel was now very crowded, and that I had to be chiefly on
the hurricane-deck with the pilots. Captain Clifton, master of the
vessel, was brave to excess, and as much excited as the men; he could no
more be kept in the little pilot-house than they below; and when we had
passed one or two bluffs, with no sign of an enemy, he grew more and
more irrepressible, and exposed himself conspicuously on the upper deck.
Perhaps we all were a little lulled by apparent safety; for myself, I
lay down for a moment on a settee in a state-room, having been on my
feet, almost without cessation, for twenty-four hours.
Suddenly there swept down from a bluff above us, on the Georgia side, a
mingling of shout and roar and rattle as of a tornado let loose; and as
a storm of bullets came pelting against the sides of the vessel and
through a window, there went up a shrill answering shout from our own
men. It took but an instant for me to reach the gun-deck. After all my
efforts, the men had swarmed once more from below, and already, crowding
at both ends of the boat, were loading and firing with inconceivable
rapidity, shouting to each other, "Neber gib it up!" and of course
having no steady aim, as the vessel glided and whirled in the swift
current. Meanwhile the officers in charge of the large guns had their
crews in order, and our shells began to fly over the bluffs, which, as
we now saw, should have been shelled in advance, only that we had to
economize ammunition. The other soldiers I drove below, almost by main
force, with the aid of their officers, who behaved exceedingly well,
giving the men leave to fire from the open port-holes which lined the
lower deck, almost at the water's level. In the very midst of the
_melee_, Major Strong came from the upper deck, with a face of horror,
and whispered to me,--"Captain Clifton was killed at the first shot by
my side."
If he had said that the vessel was on fire, the shock would hardly have
been greater. Of course, the military commander on board a steamer is
almost as helpless as an unarmed man, so far as the risks of water go. A
seaman must command there. In the hazardous voyage of last night, I had
learned, though unjustly, to distrust every official on board the
steamboat except this excitable, brave, warm-hearted sailor; and now,
among these added dangers, to lose him! The responsibility for his life
also thrilled me; he was not among my soldiers, and yet he was killed. I
thought of his wife and children, of whom he had spoken; but one learns
to think rapidly in war, and, cautioning the Major to silence, I went up
to the hurricane-deck and drew in the helpless body, that it should be
safe from further desecration, and then looked to see where we were.
We were now gliding past a safe reach of marsh, while our assailants
were riding by cross-paths to attack us at the next bluff. It was Reed's
Bluff where we were first attacked, and Scrubby Bluff, I think, was
next. They were shelled in advance, but swarmed manfully to the banks
again as we swept round one of the sharp angles of the stream beneath
their fire. My men were now pretty well imprisoned below in the hot and
crowded hold, and actually fought each other, the officers afterwards
said, for places at the open port-holes, from which to aim. Others
implored to be landed, exclaiming that they "supposed de Cunnel knew
best," but it was "mighty mean" to be shut up down below, when they
might be "fightin' de Secesh _in de clar field_." This clear field, and
no favor, was what they thenceforward sighed for. But in such difficult
navigation it would have been madness to think of landing, although one
daring Rebel actually sprang upon the large boat which we towed astern,
where he was shot down by one of our sergeants. This boat was soon after
swamped and abandoned, then taken and repaired by the Rebels at a later
date, and finally, by a piece of dramatic completeness, was seized by a
party of fugitive slaves, who escaped in it to our lines, and some of
whom enlisted in my own regiment.
It has always been rather a mystery to me why the Rebels did not fell a
few trees across the stream at some of the many sharp angles where we
might so easily have been thus imprisoned. This, however, they
did not attempt, and with the skilful pilotage of our trusty
Corporal--philosophic as Socrates through all the din, and occasionally
relieving his mind by taking a shot with his rifle through the high
port-holes of the pilot-house--we glided safely on. The steamer did not
ground once on the descent, and the mate in command, Mr. Smith, did his
duty very well. The plank sheathing of the pilot-house was penetrated by
few bullets, though struck by so many outside that it was visited as a
curiosity after our return; and even among the gun-crews, though they
had no protection, not a man was hurt. As we approached some wooded
bluff, usually on the Georgia side, we could see galloping along the
hillside what seemed a regiment of mounted riflemen, and could see our
shell scatter them ere we approached. Shelling did not, however, prevent
a rather fierce fusilade from our old friends of Captain Clark's company
at Waterman's Bluff, near Township Landing; but even this did no serious
damage, and this was the last.
It was of course impossible, while thus running the gauntlet, to put our
hostages ashore, and I could only explain to them that they must thank
their own friends for their inevitable detention. I was by no means
proud of their forlorn appearance, and besought Colonel Hawley to take
them off my hands; but he was sending no flags of truce at that time,
and liked their looks no better than I did. So I took them to Port
Royal, where they were afterwards sent safely across the lines. Our men
were pleased at taking them back with us, as they had already said,
regretfully, "S'pose we leave dem Secesh at Fernandina, General Saxby
won't see 'em,"--as if they were some new natural curiosity, which
indeed they were. One soldier further suggested the expediency of
keeping them permanently in camp, to be used as marks for the guns of
the relieved guard every morning. But this was rather an ebullition of
fancy than a sober proposition.
Against these levities I must put a piece of more tragic eloquence,
which I took down by night on the steamer's deck from the thrilling
harangue of Corporal Adam Ashton, one of our most gifted prophets, whose
influence over the men was unbounded. "When I heard," he said "de
bombshell a-screamin' troo de woods like de Judgment Day, I said to
myself, 'If my head was took off to-night, dey couldn't put my soul in
de torments, perceps [except] God was my enemy!' And when de
rifle-bullets came whizzin' across de deck, I cried aloud, 'God help my
congregation! Boys, load and fire!'"
I must pass briefly over the few remaining days of our cruise. At
Fernandina we met the Planter, which had been successful on her separate
expedition, and had destroyed extensive salt-works at Crooked River,
under charge of the energetic Captain Trowbridge, efficiently aided by
Captain Rogers. Our commodities being in part delivered at Fernandina,
our decks being full, coal nearly out, and time up, we called once more
at St. Simon's Sound, bringing away the remainder of our railroad-iron,
with some which the naval officers had previously disinterred, and then
steamed back to Beaufort. Arriving there at sunrise, (February 2, 1863,)
I made my way with Dr. Rogers to General Saxton's bed-room, and laid
before him the keys and shackles of the slave-prison, with my report of
the good conduct of the men,--as Dr. Rogers remarked, a message from
heaven and another from hell.
Slight as this expedition now seems among the vast events of the war,
the future student of the newspapers of that day will find that it
occupied no little space in their columns, so intense was the interest
which then attached to the novel experiment of employing black troops.
So obvious, too, was the value, during this raid, of their local
knowledge and their enthusiasm, that it was impossible not to find in
its successes new suggestions for the war. Certainly I would not have
consented to repeat the enterprise with the bravest white troops,
leaving Corporal Sutton and his mates behind, for I should have expected
to fail. For a year after our raid the Upper St. Mary's remained
unvisited, till in 1864 the large force with which we held Florida
secured peace upon its banks; then Mrs. A. took the oath of allegiance,
the Government bought her remaining lumber, and the John Adams again
ascended with a detachment of my men under Lieutenant Parker, and
brought a portion of it to Fernandina. By a strange turn of fortune,
Corporal Sutton (now Sergeant) was at this time in jail at Hilton Head,
under sentence of court-martial for an alleged act of mutiny,--an affair
in which the general voice of our officers sustained him and condemned
his accusers, so that he soon received a full pardon, and was restored
in honor to his place in the regiment, which he has ever since held.
Nothing can ever exaggerate the fascinations of war, whether on the
largest or smallest scale. When we settled down into camp-life again, it
seemed like a butterfly's folding its wings to re-enter the chrysalis.
None of us could listen to the crack of a gun without recalling
instantly the sharp shots that spilled down from the bluffs of the St.
Mary's, or hear a sudden trampling of horsemen by night without
recalling the sounds which startled us on the Field of the Hundred
Pines. The memory of our raid was preserved in the camp by many legends
of adventure, growing vaster and more incredible as time wore on,--and
by the morning appeals to the surgeon of some veteran invalids, who
could now cut off all reproofs and suspicions with "Doctor, I's been a
sickly pusson eber since de _expeditions_." But to me the most vivid
remembrancer was the flock of sheep which we had "lifted." The Post
Quartermaster discreetly gave us the charge of them, and they filled a
gap in the landscape and in the larder,--which last had before presented
one unvaried round of impenetrable beef. Mr. Obadiah Oldbuck, when he
decided to adopt a pastoral life, and assumed the provisional name of
Thyrsis, never looked upon his flocks and herds with more unalloyed
contentment than I upon that fleecy family. I had been familiar, in
Kansas, with the metaphor by which the sentiments of an owner were
credited to his property, and had heard of a pro-slavery colt and an
anti-slavery cow. The fact that these sheep were but recently converted
from "Secesh" sentiments was their crowning charm. Methought they
frisked and fattened in the joy of their deliverance from the shadow of
Mrs. A.'s slave-jail, and gladly contemplated translation into
mutton-broth for sick or wounded soldiers. The very slaves who once,
perchance, were sold at auction with yon aged patriarch of the flock,
had now asserted their humanity and would devour him as hospital
rations. Meanwhile our shepherd bore a sharp bayonet without a crook,
and I felt myself a peer of Ulysses and Rob Roy,--those sheep-stealers
of less elevated aims,--when I met in my daily rides these wandering
trophies of our wider wanderings.