Chapter 10 Grape, Canister, Shot, and Shell As in any such tumultuous event, accounts of the battle at
Secessionville on 16 June 1862 differ according to the position and emotional
involvement of the observer. In the ensuing days, each officer submitted to his
immediate superior a report of the actions of the men under his command.
Understandably, these accounts tended to emphasize the hardships faced by each
unit and the courage with which the men met their particular challenge. The
Confederates, for example, reported three distinct assaults; the Union
commanders regarded it as one sustained attack that came in waves only because
the front was too narrow to allow simultaneous troop movements. When one reads
all of the official reports, however, certain points become clear. The Union forces obeyed orders to form their lines in
silence during the night. Each man was to carry sixty rounds of ammunition but
to advance with fixed bayonets and unloaded rifles, since surprise was the key
to a successful attack. The regiments lined up in this order: the Eighth
Michigan, the Seventh Connecticut, the Twenety-Eighth Massachusetts, the
Seventy-ninth New York, the Hundredth Pennsylvania, and the Forty-Sixth New
York. General Wright's division was on the left to protect the leading troops
from a flank attack. They were ordered to remain one-half mile to the rear and
to provide support. The troops assembled at various times between 1:00 A.M. and
3:30 A.M. They were to move at daybreak. A major discrepancy in the accounts concerned the time at
which the attack actually began. General Stevens reported that they moved
before dawn. "It was," he said, "a very dark and cloudy morning.
I moved at 4 o'clock. It was so dark that one man could not follow another except
at very short intervals, it was much darker than on usual starlight
nights." Colonel Joseph R. Hawley, Seventh Connecticut Infantry, whose men
were near the forefront of the advance, maintained that he was able to see
clearly for a distance of over 75 yards when the attack began. Most accounts
place the time of the attack between 4:00 A.M. and 5:00 A.M.; observers
variously described the morning as overcast, cloudy, or foggy. The question of
available light became important in later attempts to understand what went wrong
with the attack, for surprise was only possible if the approach were made under
cover of darkness. On 16 June 1862, at latitude 33 degrees, sunrise occurred at
4:51 A.M. More significant, the beginning of morning nautical twilight, which
permits observation of objects on the ground at 400 yards, came at 3:45 A.M. It
seems evident that the approaching forces would have been easily visible from
the fort. The Union forces faced a march of two miles. The front was
approximately 200 yards wide, narrowing to some thirty yards in front of the
earthworks. The ground was sandy and ridged by old cotton furrows and stubble.
Trisecting the field over which the Union army had to march were two ditches
lined with hedgerows that provided some meager cover. On either side of the
approach to Battery Lamar (Tower Fort), pluff mud and salt marshes lined the
narrow finger of navigable ground. General Isaac Stevens described it this way: "The front
on which the attack occurred was narrow, not over 200 yards in extent,
stretching from the marsh on the one side to the marsh on the other. It was at
the saddle of the peninsula, the ground narrowing very suddenly at this point
from our advance. On either hand were bushes on the edge of the marsh for some
little distance. The whole space at the saddle was occupied by the enemy's
work, impracticable abatis on either hand, with carefully prepared torus
de-loup on our left and in front a ditch 7 feet deep, with a parapet of
hard-packed earth, having a relief of some 9 feet above the general surface of
the ground. On the fort were mounted six guns, covering the field of our
approach. The whole interior of the work was swept by fire from the rifle pits
and defenses in the rear, and the flanks of the work itself and the bushes
lining the marsh on either hand were under the fire of riflemen and
sharpshooters stationed in the woods and defenses lying between the work and
the village of Secessionville." Although technically outnumbered, the Confederate troops
possessed a tactical advantage by virtue of their strongly entrenched position.
The Confederates themselves, however, were not at all sure that their defenses
would prove adequate. Although they were aware that attack was imminent from
their observations of Union troop movements, they were not yet fully prepared
for battle. On the night of 15 June, they had stationed pickets 800 yards in
front of the earthworks to alert them to any advance. Most of the rebel
soldiers had worked through the night on the entrenchments. They had not fallen
asleep until 3:00 A.M. Then, at 4:00 A.M., the pickets were captured, and the
defenders found themselves rudely awakened and plummeted into battle. The Union
army had begun their attack in what should have been an opportune moment when
the Confederates were still sleep-logged. The Eighth Michigan under William
Fenton was first out, designated, according to Patrick Brennan's study of the
battle, to serve as "bait" in the "forlorn hope" that they
might attempt such a daring assault and live to tell about it. The original 500 men stationed on the earthworks were armed
with an eight-inch Columbiad loaded with grape and canister, two rifled
24-pounders, two 18-pounders, and a mortar. Defensive forces were not complete
until the arrival of General Evans, leading the Pee Dee Battalion, the
Charleston Battalion, and the Louisiana Battalion. These troops had not moved
until alerted by the first sounds of gunfire; encounters with their own troops
further delayed the Eutaw Battalion along the way. The New York Herald published a
lengthy eyewitness version of the battle, which the New
Castle Courant later reprinted. Their correspondent wrote: "The
forces of General Stevens were formed in perfect quiet at his outer pickets at
2 1⁄2 yesterday morning. The men fell promptly into line, having been at that
hour first apprised of the movement they were to undertake. The morning was
cold, and the entire sky was overcast with black, heavy clouds, so that in the
darkness the task of maintaining silence and avoiding confusion was one of no
little difficulty. We moved at half past four, no accident occurring to
interrupt our progress. Colonel Fenton's brigade consisting of the Eighth
Michigan Volunteers, under Lieutenant Colonel Graves; the Seventh Connecticut,
under Colonel Hawley, and the Twenty-eighth Massachusetts, under Lieutenant
Colonel Moore—was in the advance.—Colonel Leasure's brigade comprising the
Seventy-ninth Highlanders, under Lieutenant Colonel Morrison, the Hundredth
Pennsylvania, under Major Leckey, and the 46th New York, Colonel Rosa—was in
support, together with Rockwell's Connecticut Battery, Captain Sears' company
of Volunteer Engineers, and Captain Sargeant's company of Massachusetts
cavalry. A storming party consisting of two companies of the Eighth Michigan,
led by Lieutenant Lyons, Aid-de-Camp to General Stevens, with a negro guide was
in the extreme advance." General Stevens led his forces very quietly as far as Rivers
Causeway, where he stopped to let stragglers catch up. Shortly thereafter, they
ran into Confederate pickets from the Charleston Light Infantry. The Charleston
paper the next morning reported, "The enemy, about daylight Monday
morning, made a sudden move upon them, capturing some three or four and driving
in the remainder. The alarm was immediately given, but the enemy had also
pushed rapidly forward and had got within three hundred yards of the battery .
. ." The New York Herald
correspondent made the encounter sound more dramatic: "Our route lay over
an extensive cotton field, or rather a succession of cotton fields separated
from each other by hedges and ditches. The ground was broken by these ridges
peculiar to the plantations in this vicinity, and the passage over the uneven,
billowy surface, marching as we were upon the 'double quick' was excessively
fatiguing; yet we moved forward very rapidly. Although our line was formed
within rifle shot of the enemy's pickets so quietly were the troops maneuvered
that they were ignorant of it, and a rebel lieutenant and four privates were
surprised and captured.—Orders had been given to move forward by the flank,
regiment following regiment. In no event were we to fire, but to press on and
forward into line by regiments. When the enemy should open upon us, we were to
use the bayonet on him and endeavor if possible to gain possession of the
works. "These orders were faithfully executed. Reaching the
open fields about a mile from the rebel fortifications, Fenton's brigade
directed its attack against the right, and Leasure's against the left of the
work. These two brigades now pushed forward with great rapidity, the regiments
keeping within supporting distance of each other and the Michigan regiment
keeping close to the storming party. "Inside the fort, confusion reigned for a few minutes
as sleeping Confederate soldiers came awake to the reality of a battle already
in progress. Captain R. L. Crawford, of the First South Carolina Volunteer
Infantry, described the scene: "I suppose by the time you get this, you
will have seen an account of the battle day before yesterday. We had a hot time
of it for about 3 or 4 hours. The battle commenced about 5 oclock in the
morning and lasted until 9. The enemy had for nearly two days and a night been
fighting our batteries at Secession Ville. Finding that they could not silence
them, they finally concluded to take them by storm. They ceased firing about 8
oclock at night. When the firing stopped, Col Lamar ordered his men, who wer
nearly exhausted from the long continued fight, to go into the rat holes and
rest. Pickets wer then thrown out, and every thing thought to be secure. "Next morning however they were completely surprised.
The enemy passed our pickets and advanced under cover of a thick skirt of
woods, and when the sentinel at the Fort discovered them they wer not more than
a hundred yards off, he fired his gun and gave the alarm. Capt Reid [sic] who
was in command of one of the companies ran out, and to his utter surprise found
the enemy in strong force about forty yds from the fort, he immediately leveled
our piece and fired into them. By this time one of the sergeants had got to
another gun, but was unable to sight it, he called to Capt Reid to send some
one to sight his gun, he jumped to the gun saying he would do it himself, just
as he was getting the piece into position, he was shot through the head, the
sergeant was also severely wounded. By this time Col Lamar had got to another
gun and fired it with his own hands, he too was wounded in the face and back of
the neck. The whole command was now in the fort but as they had no small arms
and the Yankees had begun to come up the breast works their condition was truly
critical. Determined however not to give up their works they gathered the large
sticks they use to put their pieces in position, and succeeded in clubbing them
back as they would come up. they must have done good work from the quantity of
brains which I saw on the breast works." Confederate guns on either side of the breastworks fired
down the center of the field, causing the Yankees to veer both left and right.
The New York Herald described the design of
Confederate defenses: "When within about four hundred yards of the fort a
terrific fire of grape and canister was opened on our columns from the work,
and from the woods, abattis and rifle pits on our right. Four heavy guns on the
enemy's parapet sent their murderous charges through the files of our brave
men; masked batteries, of whose existence we had no knowledge, poured their
terrible missles against us; sharp-shooters stationed all along the rebel line
selected our officers for targets, and many a gallant leader fell at their
first volley, while the men in the ranks dropped by scores." |
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