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nations. The Confederates with all speed utilized the interim between the announcement of the blockade in April and its practical enforcement by mid-July, 1861, to dispose of its cotton and other marketable products, abroad, and also to equip privateers and blockade runners. They transformed a screw steamer, of 500 tons, in the passenger service between New Orleans and Havana, into the Sumter, armed her with five guns, got her through the blockade, late in June, and began capturing and burning American merchantmen, at which she was highly successful for six months, till taking refuge off Gibraltar and there watched by United States warships, the Confederate authorities, concluding that her course was run, disposed of her by sale. The Savannah, another extemporized privateer, of fifty-three tons burden, getting out to sea early in June began giving chase to merchantmen, but mistaking the brig-of-war Perry for one, was by her overhauled, captured and the crew put in confinement and soon after indicted for piracy, but after the disagreement of the jury, remanded to prison, but later exchanged. The effective Confederate navy comprised the scattered warships built in England, as the Alabama, Florida, and others, which speedily won the notoriety of commerce destroyers, and whose depredations were the sufficient cause for the subsequent award, by the Geneva Court of Arbitration, of $15,500,000 to the United States for damages done to American commerce by English-built Confederate cruisers. The South had poor facilities for building warships. The Merrimac must take rank as a most powerful naval weapon, but she was early put out of service. Keels of warships were laid at New Orleans, at Charleston, at Norfolk, and at Richmond, the Tredegar Iron Works near the latter being the chief manufactory of plate iron-but the supply of iron was scarce, the machinery slight and antiquated and the finished plate inferior in quality. Excepting the Merrimac, the projected members of a Confederate fleet were unfinished, due, principally, to the blockade, the early capture of the Confederate ports and the scarcity of material and skilled labor.

At the North both skilled labor and material were abundant and the United States, which at the outbreak of the Rebellion had a feeble navy, created, during the first three years of the war, one of the most powerful navies in the world. Lincoln's remark that "the events of the war give an increased interest and importance to the navy which will probably extend beyond the war itself," and that "armored vessels of greater strength and capacity will be necessary for cruising purposes, and to maintain our rightful position on the ocean" discloses his statesmanship in the light of the naval history of the United States in later years.

In the spring of 1861, the number of seamen in the public service was 7,500; at the close of 1863, it was 34,000. The navy bore no conspicuous part in the attempted relief or the brief defense of Fort Sumter; its services on the Atlantic coast may be said to begin with the reinforcement of Fort Pickens, under the immediate direction of President Lincoln, and effected through the services of Commandant, afterward Rear Admiral, Andrew H. Foote, of fame in the campaign culminating in the surrender of Fort Donelson, Lieutenant, afterward Admiral, D. D. Porter, Captain, afterward General, M. C. Meigs, and others, who, with the warship Powhatan, the transport Atlantic, the merchant steamer Illinois, and the Wyandotte succeeded, during the first two weeks of April, 1861, in reaching Fort Pickens from New York, bringing reinforcements, and saving that most important station and strategic point to the United States. During the summer of the same year Flag-Officer, afterward Rear Admiral, Silas H. Stringham, sailing from Fort Monroe in command of five war steamers and two transports, August 26th, with eight hundred troops, under Major-General B. F. Butler, proceeded down the coast, captured Forts Clark and Hatteras and made the blockade of the North Carolina coast effective. Captain, afterward Admiral, Du Pont, with fourteen war steamers, left Fort Monroe, October 29th, entered Port Royal Sound and on the 7th of November captured Forts Beauregard and

Walker, the eastern portion of South Carolina thus coming again under the National flag. The acquisition of Port Royal, the finest harbor at the South, gave into National control the sea-island cotton region. At the coming of Du Pont's fleet the Confederate population fled, leaving only the negroes in possession of the region. During the first half of 1863, Charleston, South Carolina, was the objective of the Union fleet under Du Pont but the city was not taken. The Confederate warships and iron-clads rendered effective service during the siege and frequent bombardments. Admiral Du Pont and General Hunter were to co-operate against Charleston; the failure of the attempt led to their being relieved of their commands. "The campaign of the Bayous", during January-May, was preliminary to the fall of Vicksburg and was shared almost equally by the army and navy, "Uncle Sam's web-feet," as Lincoln called the supporting fleet, being under the command of Admiral Porter. The naval operations in the Yazoo Pass, and here and there through the innumerable bayous of western Mississippi, were novel in character, and notable examples of the practical ingenuity of the officers and seamen, perhaps unsurpassed in the history of the navy. Admiral Porter co-operated with Grant effectively throughout the entire Mississippi campaign-the running of the Vicksburg batteries being among the boldest deeds of the war. The North had not forgotten Fort Sumter and its recapture became from its fall one of the steady purposes of the government. Admiral John A. Dahlgren acceded to the command of the fleet early in July, 1863, and a plan for the reduction of Fort Sumter was formulated in co-operation with General Q. A. Gillmore. In the assault on Fort Wagner, July 18th, Robert George Shaw, Colonel of the Fifty-fourth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers (colored) was killed at the head of his troops. To the request of his friends for his remains, the Confederates replied that they "had buried him under a layer of his niggers." The fort was at last taken by assault on September 6th, by Gillmore's

troops. The fleet reduced Fort Sumter to a heap of ruins but was unable to silence the forts in the harbor, and in consequence, unable to capture Charleston.

During the summer of 1863 the known character of the schemes of Napoleon III to establish a French protectorate in Mexico caused President Lincoln to attempt the restoration of National authority on the coast of Texas in order that Maximilian, on his arrival in his new empire, might not mistake the authority north of the Rio Grande. This desire of the president led to a joint expedition, under General Banks and Admiral Porter, known as the Red River expedition. In March bad news began to reach Lincoln and he apprehended disaster. At Sabine Cross, April 7th, the Union army was thoroughly defeated. The fleet, with great effort, succeeded in getting up the Red River as far as Springfield Landing, but receiving news of the disaster at Sabine Cross Roads, immediately started down the river, fighting continuously, as the banks were well lined with Confederate batteries. Admiral Porter succeeded in bringing most of his fleet to Alexandria, losing the Eastport, and finding that the water in the river was rapidly falling, the channel in the shallowest parts not exceeding four feet in depth. For the fleet to await, indefinitely, the rise of the river meant its probable destruction, and yet there seemed no escape. At this critical moment the man equal to the emergency came forwardLieutenant-Colonel Joseph Bailey of the Fourth Wisconsin, who was chief engineer on General Franklin's staff. He proposed to build a dam to raise the water, and when sufficient water had been stored, to break the dam and thus enable the fleet to escape. Admiral Porter derided the project; General Franklin approved it. Colonel Bailey began on April 30th, the building of a dam 758 feet wide, at a point where the river had a fall of six feet, and it was necessary to raise the level of the river seven feet to save the fleet. The whole army turned in to help and the dam was completed in nine days. All the vessels were saved. No like piece of

engineering skill is recorded in military annals. Congress on June 11, 1864, thanked Colonel Bailey "for distinguished services, by which the gunboat flotilla was rescued from imminent peril." The Red River expedition resulted in lamentable failure: its one brilliant episode was the engineering feat by which the fleet was rescued.

On February 29, 1864, Congress revived the grade of lieutenant-general and authorized the president to appoint that officer, by and with the consent of the Senate, to be under the direction of the president, to serve during his pleasure and "to command the armies of the United States." Grant's victories in the Mississippi Valley and the recognized necessities of the hour wrote this law. It was enacted with common understanding who would be appointed. Lincoln nominated Grant general-in-chief, immediately upon signing the bill. This, the highest rank in the military service of the United States, lieutenant-general, was held by Washington, shortly before his death, during the imminence of war with France, and by General Scott, by brevet. As has been said by many writers, Grant may not have been the ablest but he was the most fortunate general of the war. The nomination was confirmed March 3d, and next day Grant started for Washington, writing, the night before, a characteristic letter to General Sherman:

"I start in the morning to comply with the order. While I have been eminently successful in this war, in at least gaining the confidence of the public, no one feels more than I how much of this success is due to the energy, skill, and the harmonious putting forth of that energy and skill, of those whom it has been my good fortune to have occupying subordinate positions under me. There are many officers to whom these remarks are applicable to a greater or less degree, proportionate to their ability as soldiers, but what I want is to express my thanks to you and McPherson as the men to whom, above all others, I feel indebted for whatever I have had of success. How far your advice and suggestions have been of assistance you know. How far

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