THE COMBAT DEEPENS.
A. D. 1662.
1862.
By the fortune of war in the Revolution, as again in 1812, the
State was nearly always left with a small proportion of her own
troops to defend the home of their birth. So, also, when the
spring opened in 1862, though fully forty thousand men of the
State were under arms, they were to be found in Virginia and
South Carolina, except a small force left at Wilmington and
Roanoke Island.
2. This condition of affairs did not result, however, from any
indifference on the part of the general government to us, but
from the fact that the main strategic points were in other
States, and fortunate it was for North Carolina that this was so;
for whatever may have been the necessities of local defence, or
the evils incident to an unprotected coastline, or those
inseparable from its occupation by the enemy at various points,
they cannot be compared to the evils resulting from the prolonged
occupation of a State by large contending armies.
3. Roanoke Island was the only hope of defence for Albemarle
Sound and the many rivers flowing therein. To defend it, General
Henry A. Wise was sent with a small force to be added to the
Eighth and Thirty-first Regiments of North Carolina Volunteers.
He was sick on February 7th, 1862, when General Burnside, with a
great fleet and fifteen thousand Federal troops, sailed up
Croatan Sound and began the attack.
4. Colonel Henry M. Shaw, of the Eighth North Carolina Regiment,
was in command, and made a gallant but unavailing defence. The
Federals landed and moved up the island in the rear of the forts
which had been constructed to prevent the passage of vessels to
the west of the defences. The only recourse left was to abandon
the lower batteries and concentrate the Southern troops at a
point near the centre of Roanoke Island.
5. It was hoped that the morasses, indenting both shores and
leaving a narrow isthmus, would enable the small Confederate
force to defend that position; but the bravery and enterprise of
the enemy enabled him to turn both flanks, and nothing was left
Colonel Shaw and his command but to fall back to the northern end
of the island and there lay down their arms.
6. The battle had been bravely fought for two days, and the two
thousand Confederate prisoners and their gallant leader became
captives, but only after inflicting heavy loss upon the
assailants. The place was untenable against superior naval
appliances, and quite men enough had been sacrificed in view of
the impossibility of preventing its isolation by Federal fleets.
7. Very different were the defensive capacities of the city of
New Bern. It was immediately foreseen that this important place
would be next assailed, and with enough troops it would have been
an easy feat to have held it indefinitely, but whether its value
as a strategic point would have justified such a defence may be
doubted. The Confederate authorities entrusted its defence to
General L. O'B. Branch, who had no experience in military
affairs, and in whose command, like General Wise's, was not a
single regiment that had been under fire, though there were
skillful officers of lower rank who had seen much service in the
old army. On March 14th, General Burnside, with the army and
fleet so lately the victors at Roanoke, moved to attack the forts
which had been constructed just below the junction of Neuse and
Trent Rivers.
8. General Branch had in his command the Seventh, Twenty-sixth,
Twenty-seventh, Thirty-third and Thirty-fifth North Carolina
Regiments, a portion of the Nineteenth (cavalry), with Brem's and
Latham's light batteries and a small force of militia. These
were disposed along a line stretching from Fort Thompson, on
Neuse River, across the railroad to an impassable swamp, which
afforded abundant protection to his right flank.
9. The battle began at seven o'clock in the morning and raged
until noon. The Federal attacks were repeatedly repelled until,
by the fatal flight of the militia in the centre, the Confederate
lines were broken and a precipitate retreat ensued. General
Branch lost two hundred prisoners and seventy men killed and
wounded; and, besides these, all his guns and stores. He was
beaten in his first battle, when perhaps naught but defeat was
expected, but he soon won high reputation as a brave soldier and
skillful officer. Victory is not always possible to the best
generalship. He met, in a few days at Kinston, reinforcements
that would have enabled him to hold his ground at New Bern; but
like many other earthly succors, they came too late for real
benefit.
10. The fall of New Bern sealed the fate of the Confederate
forces at Fort Macon. Colonel M. I. White, with five companies
of the Tenth Regiment (artillery), endured the Federal
bombardment until the work was in danger of being blown up. He
surrendered the fort on April 26th, 1862. These disasters at
home were indeed calculated to dishearten, but the only visible
effect upon the people at large was to increase the numbers of
those who were still volunteering by thousands to defend North
Carolina and the Confederate States.
11. In the spring of 1862, General McClellan, the Federal
commander, having determined to make his advance on Richmond by
way of James River, and having made his preparations to that
effect, General Johnston transferred the Confederate troops from
Manassas to the peninsula between the James and York Rivers, thus
placing his army between McClellan and Richmond.
12. At Williamsburg occurred the first memorable conflict of the
year between the two great armies struggling on the soil of the
Old Dominion. In this conflict the charge of the Fifth North
Carolina Regiment, under Colonel D. K. MacRae, excited the
admiration and its terrible losses the sympathy of both friend
and foe.
13. In the bloody and glorious campaign in the Shenandoah Valley,
General T. J. Jackson grew immortal before the coming of
midsummer. The gallantry of the Twenty-first North Carolina
Regiment at Winchester, like that of the Fourth at Seven Pines,
was as conspicuous as bloody. In this latter battle, where so
many other men of the State were slain, the Fourth Regiment,
under Colonel George B. Anderson, lost four hundred and sixty-two
men, out of five hundred and twenty.
14. In the last days of June nearly all of the North Carolina
regiments and many Southern troops were concentrated around
Richmond, under the command of General Robert E. Lee, in place of
General Johnston, who had been wounded at Seven Pines. In the
week of battle which ended in the overthrow of the great
investing army of General McClellan, they lost thousands of their
bravest and best. Ninety-two regiments constituted the divisions
of Jackson, Longstreet, D. H. Hill and A. P. Hill. These were
the forces that drove the Federals to their ships; and forty-six
of these regiments belong to North Carolina. It may be safely
asserted that more than half the men actively engaged and
disabled during that terrible week were citizens of North
Carolina.
QUESTIONS.
1. What is said or North Carolina's forces in the wars?
2. What is said of this condition of affairs?
3. What force was sent to defend Albermarle Sound?
4. Can you tell of Burnside's attack?
5. What was the conclusion of the engagement?
6. What is said of this battle?
7. To what point was attention next directed? What officer was
in command? When was the Federal attack made?
8. What composed General Branch's command?
9. Describe the battle.
10. What is said of the fall of New Bern? What fort was next
surrendered? Where is Fort Mason?
11. What military movements were made in Virginia?
12. What is said of the gallant charge of the Fifth Regiment at
Williamsburg?
13. What regiments are specially mentioned as participants at
Winchester and Seven Pines?
14. What is said of the events at this period?