A desperate sally made by the rebels, nearly put to flight a regiment of ours; but, having rallied, they became doubly anxious to reduce the fort. Now ensued one of those terrific events, in the annals of human warfare, at which the mind shudders. Our brave fellows were obliged to sustain nature on the smallest possible allowance of food, and seeing no prospect of replenishing their daily lessening store, came to the determination of making one last desperate effort to open up communications with the fleet. The rebel funs opened a terrible fire, not a piece was fired that did not make dreadful havoc, yet our gallant soldiers were not daunted, on the contrary, their ardent and enthusiastic spirits rose more buoyant than ever.
Sherman had now ordered the fort to be taken by storm. To cross the ditch, filled with spikes, was the work of a moment—the garrison now thoroughly aroused to a sense of their danger, thronged the crests and fought man to man. The rebels fought with the desperation of men resolved to die rather than yield. Our men, borne back by the press, again advanced like the tide of the ocean, gathering strength as it recedes, to sustain a fresh impetus. The rebels, unable to withstand such a determined and bloody resistance, were forced into the fort, where a terrible conflict ensued. The charge of our brave men was truly splendid, its rapid rush up into the enemy's works was as terrific in appearance, as it was destructive in its effect; for, although the confederates met the charge with firmness, they were unable to hold their ground. This brilliant and eminently successful charge gave us Savannah.
Sherman and Howard were spectators of the bloody fight, viewing it from the roof of Dr. Chever's rice mill, a mile from the fort, on the opposite side of the Ogeechee. During the progress of the assault Tecumseh looked agitated; the loss of so many brave men affected him keenly. At this junction, Hazen signaled: "I have invested the fort, and will assault immediately."
Sherman looks toward the fort and exclaims:
"How grandly they advance; not a waver!"
He looks again and exclaims:
"Look, Howard, look, magnificent! See that flag, how steadily it advances! Not a man falters! Grand! Sublimely grand!" He speaks to Howard once more:
"See, they are closing in! There is no faltering, no blundering! Stop! It has halted! They are wavering! No, heavens! It, the flag, is on the parapet! There they go, right over it! See! See! There is a flag, and another, and another, on the works! Hurrah! It is ours! The fort is taken!"
The following congratulatory order was issued immediately after the battle: "General Field Order No. 13.
The General-in-Chief announces, with pleasure, that, today at four and a half o'clock, P. M., the Second Division, of the Fifteenth Army Corps, assaulted Fort McAlister, and carried the place, capturing the entire garrison and armament, giving full communication with the fleet and army of General Foster.
By order of
Maj. Gen. W. T. Sherman.
L. M. Dayton, A. A. G.
GENUINE INTREPIDITY
One of the notable heroic incidents, that occurred in this fiery conflict, was the courage of Captain Grimes, of the 48th Illinois, who, inside of the fort, fought a sabre duel, with a rebel Captain, mortally wounding him. The confederate behaved very gallantly, absolutely refusing to surrender, until overpowered by wounds, when he said: "I shall now submit to my destiny; but as brave men should surrender only to the brave, to you, my noble antagonist, I will resign my sword." The noble boldness, with which he expressed himself charmed the Captain, he returned his sword to him with these words:
"Take, sir, a weapon which no man better deserves to wear! Forget that you are my prisoner, but ever remember that we are friends!"
THE HEROES OF THE FIGHT.
General Hazen is a native of Vermont, and graduated with honors at the West Point Academy; He entered the Regular Army as a Lieutenant, serving in the Mexican and Indian wars with distinction. He is a man of physical proportions, befitting an athlete. He stands nearly six feet high, with a proportionately broad, strong, muscular, well-knit frame. General Hazen is the accomplished type of the Regular Army officer.
Colonel Theodore Jones, commanding a brigade, seems to have earned for himself great credit for his gallant and brave bearing on the field. His Brigade was composed of the following regiments: 6th Missouri, Lieutenant Colonel Van Dusen; 30th Ohio, 116th Illinois, Colonel Maddox.
Great credit is also due to Colonel W. S. Jones, who, 'undaunted, and rushed ahead of his men when the bullets and grape flew fast and thick. This brigade was composed of the 47th Ohio, Colonel Parry; 111th Illinois', Colonel Martin, and 54th, Colonel.
Colonel Oliver, commanding the Third Brigade, was stationed in a most exposed position, and acted with gallantry through all the action. The 48th Illinois, Major Adams; 90th Illinois, (Irish Regiment,) Lieutenant Colonel Stewart, and 70th Ohio, Lieutenant Colonel Phillips. These regiments formed the Third Brigade.
After the fall of Fort McAlister, Sherman closed his lines around Savannah, the Twentieth Corps holding the extreme left, a Brigade of Geary's being on Hutchison's Island Sherman proceeded energetically with the siege. By the 19th, his base at King's Bridge, twenty-eight miles from Ossabaw Sound, was well established. The approaches to Savannah were well guarded and defended by entrenchments and redoubts, mounting several large guns. Sherman had transported the heavy siege guns, taken at Fort McAlister, and fixed them on the lines and the whole city was in danger. The line was thirty miles long. Slocum's wing, the Twentieth and Fourteenth Corps, held the left, on the Savannah; Howard’s column, the Seventeenth and Fifteenth Corps, the right, on the Ogeechee. On the 20th, Hardee's iron clads moved up the river, opening a furious bombardment on our lines. Hardee, at this time, was evacuating the city, transporting his men to Union Causeway, on rafts and steamboats. The Navy Yard and the two formidable rams, Georgia and Savannah, had been previously blown up. General John W. Geary, commanding the Second Division, Twentieth Corps, ever vigilant, hearing the explosion, ordered his men to get ready, and in a short time they entered the deserted city. Mayor Arnold met them, surrendering the place, requesting protection for property. A thousand prisoners were taken from the enemy, and, also a hundred and fifty guns, thirteen locomotives, three steamers and thirty-three thousand bales of cotton.
Our loss was trifling, not reaching over six hundred. General Sherman sent the following dispatch to the President:
"I beg to present you, as a Christmas gift, Savannah, with one hundred and fifty heavy guns, and, also twenty-five thousand bales of cotton.
(Signed) W. T. Sherman, Maj. Gen."
THE FIRST TO BRING NEWS FROM SHERMAN.
Captain William Duncan, Sergeant Myron J. Emenick, of the 15th Illinois Cavalry and George W. Quimby, of a Wisconsin regiment, were the first persons who brought intelligence to the coast, of success, both in the case of the march upon Savannah and the movements upon Fayetteville and Goldsboro. They are members of an organization of great celebrity in the West, made up of the best men of Western regiments. These daring fellows are known as the scouts of the Army of the Tennessee. On December 8th, General Sherman desiring to communicate with the coast, held a personal interview with the men destined for the perilous undertaking, and explained his desire to inform the Government of his safety. Copies of the dispatches, in writing, were handed to each, and the substance also mentioned to them verbally. On the afternoon of the 9th, all being ready, the three men proceeded to King's Bridge, on the Gulf Railroad, where rested the right of General Howard's Corps.
Embarking in a frail dug-out, which they found, they launched out on the rapid waters of the Ogeechee river and with the assistance of paddles made their way down stream as rapidly as possible. The same night they slept on shore. The next morning they continued on their voyage making: good time. On several occasions they were observed, on the shore by Negroes, who, supposing them to be escaped prisoners, did not detain them. On the same afternoon they landed and proceeded to a house near the stream, in quest of food. They had scarcely entered before a party of rebels
rode up in search of them. The Negroes, ever faithful friends of the Union soldiers, hid the scouts under the floor. The rebels surrounded the house, declaring if the three men were found they would hang them. The scouts kept their cover, and the rebels disappointed in not finding them, soon left. The Negroes now released the scouts from their hiding place, gave them food to eat and an ample supply for future use, escorted them to the river and saw them safely in the current, paddling away to their destination. During the night of the 10th, the little canoe glided noiselessly by a rebel gunboat, so close that its occupants could see the rebel sentinels on watch, and, as they passed, they heard the cry of "all's well."
Our gallant party being landsmen, were more accustomed to land navigation; and, consequently, experienced, upon their approaching the sea, much difficulty with the tides. However, a little care saved them from catastrophe. They had no trouble in passing Fort McAlister, and the tide now being in their favor, they were borne down Ossabaw Sound and out to sea. Their craft might be considered a staunch one for inland service, but for the rude and boisterous waves of the ocean, it was no match. As they were beating about at the mercy of the waves, expecting momentarily to founder, they caught sight of a vessel bearing the ensign of the United States. If they could reach this they were all safe; if not, and night should close in upon them, they were certainly lost, for every moment they were drifted farther and farther from the land. To reach the gunboat before dark, was therefore the impulse which nerved their energies to the greatest exertion. But all seemed useless; the wind and waves rose higher, and the little dug-out was cast about like a fleck of foam. Hope sank with the setting sun, and our heroes began to think of certain death, when suddenly they saw a boat push off from the ship. Steadily it came toward them, and so elated them that they waved their hats and shouted for joy. Scarcely had they done so, however, when they were capsized by a huge wave. There were strong arms in the coming boat; and in that boat there were noble hearts that caused the strong arms to pull more quickly now on the quivering oars.
Presently the scouts could hear the encouraging shouts of their rescuers, bidding them to hope, to be strong of heart, to hold out to the last. And presently, as their eyes looked along the water, they saw in the fading evening light the ship's boat poised high above them on the crest of a billow. "Here we are!" they shouted in one voice, "to the right!" "Ship starboard oars! Steady, stand by, steady, so!" shouted another voice, and the next moment the rescuers had swooped down the watery hill side with such precision as to almost strike the stern of the capsized boat. A rush of water, a quick order or two, a rounding to of the boat and a strong hand was on each scout — all was well. The boat belonged to the United States Gunboat, Flag. When the nature of our heroes errand was made known to the commander of the Flag, anchor was immediately weighed and the vessel steamed for Hilton Head. Here the three scouts took the steamer Dandelion, and proceeded to Washington. Having delivered their dispatches and passed a few weeks at the North, they rejoined General Sherman, who, by this time, was in possession of Savannah. The organization to which these dauntless heroes belong is uniformed in confederate clothing, and the men adopt the dialect of the poor people of the South. Being accepted by the inhabitants as straggling rebels, they are intrusted, without question, with the entire stock of information of military movements which they possess. Many of the scouts have even had the audacity to visit the headquarters of the rebel Generals, and in one instance, we remember one of them carried off the officer's monthly return of the strength and equipment of his command.
THE REVIEW OF THE MARCH.
Considered as a spectacle, the march of General Sherman's Army surpassed in some respects, all marches in history. The flames of a city lighted its beginning; desolation, which in one sense is sublime, marked its progress to the sea. Its end was a beautiful possession— a city spared from doom. Underneath smiling skies , cooled by airs balmy as the breath of a Northern summer, the Army of the West, slowly transforming into an Army of the East, moved from sunset to sunrise, through a territory rich in all things wherein the themes of Statesmen have declared it poor. Food in gardens, food in cellars, stock in fields, stock in barns, poultry everywhere, appeared in the distance, disappeared in the presence, and was borne away upon the knapsacks and bayonets of thousands of soldiers.
A New El Dorado, too, was this heart of the South, Money — bright gold, shining silver, plucked from closets and stockings, and burial places by the roadside, enriched the invaders. The soldier has his whims — the tail feathers of peacocks drooped and scintillated along the moving columns from the crests of infantrymen and troopers. Jokes, laughter and songs, and the tasting of the sweets of honey and sorghum, relieved the weary tramp, tramping over fields, woods and bridges. The cavalry swept the pathway of guerrillas; the clang of their hoofs and sabres resounded through the glens to the right, to the left, and in the front. Swift and terrible, and not always just, were the strokes of their arms, and the works of their hands. Pioneers along a march of desolation forty miles in width and three hundred in length, their labor was too swift to be discriminating.
The great army— over the lands and into the dwell of the poor and rich alike, through towns and cities like a roaring wave, swept and paused, reveled and surged on. In the daytime the splendor, the toil, the desolation, the gloom, the music, the joy and slumber of the camp. Memorable the music that marked the move of November on the soil of Georgia; sometimes a triumphant march, sometimes a waltz, again an old air, stirring the heart alike to recollection and hope. Floating out of throats of brass to the ears of soldiers in their blankets and Generals in their tents, these tunes bellowed the ears of all who listened.
Sitting before his tent in the glow of a camp fire one evening, General Sherman let his cigar go out, to listen to an air that a distant band was playing,
The General turned to one of his officers: "Send an orderly to ask that band to play that tune again."
A little while and the band received the word. The tune was "The Blue Juniata" with exquisite variations. The band played it again, even more beautiful than before. Again it ceased, and then off to the right, nearly a quarter of a mile away, the voices of some soldiers took up the words. The band, and still another played a low accompaniment; camp after camp began singing; the music of "The Blue Juniata" became for a few minutes the oratorio of half and army.
Back along the wide pathway of this grand march, from border to coast, the eye catches glimpses of scenes whose poetic images an American, five years ago, would have thought never could have been revived from the romantic past. Pictures swarm in fields and glens, and by the banks of rivers. A halt at high noon beside a village, a besieging of houses by the troops, soldiers emerging from the doorways and backyards, bearing quilts, plates, poultry, and pigs, beehives attacked, honey in the hands and besmearing the faces of the boys, hundreds of soldiers poking hundreds of bayonets in the corners of yards and gardens, after concealed treasures; here and there a shining prize, and shouting and scrambling, and a merry division of the spoils. In the back ground women with praying hands and beseeching lips unheeded.
Night near a railroad depot. — A roar of fires, a shout of voices, thousands of men ripping up ties and rails, heating them, twisting them, casting them down; axes at work, the depot buildings and wood piles ablaze, a truly picturesque and tumultuous scene.
The march by day.— Winding columns, glittering, muskets, glowing flags, General’s cavalcades, wagon trains, stragglers, and thousands of negroes in the rear, stretching over miles, a country of level fields, crossed by streams, broken occasionally by swamps and patches of forest, the distant smoke of fires, rawed villages and ragged hovels by the way; at intervals a woman's head peeping out from a door or a window, quickly closed; at times, a colored family, voluble with questions, thanking God for the advent, and joining in the march with their kind in the rear.
The Camp by night. — A bright glow of camp fires through miles of darkness, the cooking of supper
s everywhere, laughter and talk, card playing, smoking, music and the sounds of horses hoofs near and far; mess tents, a murmur with a good cheer, growing silence, a fainter glow of fires, a tumbling into blankets, slumber in all the field. Clank, clank, through the dark, through the forest, go the cavalrymen's sabres. Their marches cease not night or day! They go forth to discover, repair, or surprise. Before the day they have sent a guerrilla party headlong, or have anticipated the dawn with an illumination.
The streams are cool and clear by many a cliff and wood. Here, “naked and not ashamed,” a hundred soldiers bathe within the waters. Their clothes and guns flung upon the banks, their bodies gleam and splash among the ripples; their laughter rings harsh and loud, low and musical, while moving ranks upon the bridge above go by. Down, by towns, and cities, and plantations, to the sea, the pageant and the wraith I move to the new conquest, which at last is ours, and the curtain fells upon another act of a drama which finds us in the rich and beautiful city of Savannah.
The services rendered by General Sherman's command, in penetrating the interior of the Southern Confederacy, and destroying all chance for further resistance on the part of the rebels is thus described by the London Times:
"Until May last, the interior of the Confederacy was an unknown or inaccessible country. No Federal force had burst through the frontier armies of the South, or penetrated into the territory beyond. True, there were men in the councils of the North who had recommended such tactics, and who had described the Confederacy as an egg, hard only on its shell or circumference, and utterly unsubstantial within. But until Sherman proved the truth of these views, they passed only for speculations, and nobody knew how an invading army might fare. The great States of Georgia and South Carolina had never felt the war; Alabama had been scarcely touched by it, and the immense territory offered a secure retreat if they should determine to abandon Virginia, and retire upon the resources of the interior. Now all this is changed. Before Grant took Richmond, Sherman had accounted for all the country behind it, and had dissipated the illusions prevailing on the subject. He had marched through these remote regions from end to end without encountering resistance or falling short of supplies, and had led his victorious army, by a prodigious circuit from the borders of Tennessee, through the heart of Georgia, up to the southern frontier of Virginia itself."
Personal Recollections of Sherman's Campaigns in Georgia and the Carolinas Page 25
