Lincoln's Admiral Page 9

  On that first day, more than 1,400 mortar shells and an unknown quantity of shells from the gunboats were fired at Fort Jackson. But it was obvious to the captains of the Union squadron that little real damage had been done, for the fort’s gunners kept up an almost steady reply from their own guns. Although he never acknowledged it, Farragut was probably not the least surprised by the result of this first day’s bombardment. He had not really believed in Porter’s theory that mortars could reduce these well-built forts. Had his opinion been requested before the decisions were made, he would have told Welles and Fox to leave the mortar boats out of the squadron. His own study of naval history told him that the best plan for success was to rush past the forts instead of trying to conquer them with such a head-on assault as mortar boats. He knew from army reports that both forts relied on New Orleans, the object of their protection, for their supplies and communications. Capture New Orleans, he had said often during the past few weeks, and the forts would collapse from their own need. But Welles and Fox had already decided on the plan of action before his appointment, so he had no option but to accept Porter’s mortar boats and allow them to do their best against the forts.

  The second day began much as the first had, with mortar boats opening up against Fort Jackson shortly after dawn. By late afternoon, Porter realized that his pledge to reduce the forts within forty-eight hours was not to be fulfilled. He instructed his captains to keep firing during the night at the rate of one shell every half hour per boat. Still, it was obvious that little real physical damage was being done by the constant bombardment. But, while it was true that Fort Jackson was not suffering any real or lasting physical damage, the constant bombardment was having an effect on the garrison. The men were getting little if any sleep. That, plus the fact that most of them were not ardent supporters of the Confederate cause, made for a restive feeling among the garrison that held the potential for open rebellion against the officers. Apparently the discontent was not strong enough, nor were the men organized enough, to carry out any plan they might have developed. The fort remained in rebel hands, and the men inside did the best they could to protect themselves from the mortars.

  On Easter morning, April 20, Farragut summoned the captains of his ships and boats to a meeting on the Hartford. At the meeting, Commander James Alden of the Richmond read a memorandum from Porter, who was unable to attend. In it, Porter urged the continuation of the bombardment, and stated his belief that the fleet could not possibly pass the forts while they remained in Confederate hands.

  Farragut was unmoved by Porter’s arguments, or by those of the other captains, most of whom apparently also thought it impossible to get their ships beyond the forts while they both remained standing. He explained to the captains that the ships, especially the mortar boats, were using ammunition at an incredible rate and would run out of shells long before the forts were destroyed or forced to surrender. The forts could be passed, he believed, and once that was done, army troops could be landed above them. This would isolate the forts, and they could eventually be starved into submission.

  Farragut knew his own inclination to force his way beyond the forts and continue on to New Orleans was not popular in most quarters. Many of his own squadron officers thought it couldn’t be done, and Washington considered it an almost impossible task, one that ran too many risks, even if it were somehow successful. Farragut stood virtually alone in his opinion that his ships could ignore the forts and attack New Orleans successfully.

  Two months earlier, Secretary Welles had sent Farragut a memorandum concerning the forts, prepared by Brigadier General John Gross Barnard, chief engineer of the Army of the Potomac. The former superintendent of West Point, from which he graduated in 1833 as second in a class of forty-three, was a highly respected expert who had spent several years teaching military engineering at the academy. He had also served, years earlier, as engineer during the strengthening of both forts. General Barnard was therefore considered not only an engineering expert, but also extremely knowledgeable about both forts. Consequently, Welles expected Farragut to heed Bernard’s advice.

  General Barnard regarded an attempt to pass the forts without first reducing them to be “not a trifling undertaking.” In the memorandum, he had detailed why he thought it would be so difficult to pass the forts, even if the enemy were not able to maintain an obstruction across the river: “From a point in the river 1 and 1/2 miles from the lowest battery of Fort Jackson to another 1 and 1/2 miles above the nearest upward-bearing batteries (of Fort St. Philip) we shall find a distance of 3 miles to be traversed, 2 miles of which under the fire of 100 to 125 guns and the other mile under 50 to 100.” He then estimated that taking into consideration the strength of the Mississippi River’s current, and the power of the naval steam engines, the majority of Farragut’s squadron would take twenty-five to thirty minutes to make this journey “with hot-shot” pouring down on them.

  General Barnard then suggested that if there were no alternative but to attempt to pass the forts, it should be attempted at night, because daylight passage, when the rebel gunners would have a clear view of the Union ships, was “too hazardous to be undertaken.” But, he cautioned, if the Confederates were able to maintain an obstruction across the river that would stop or at the least slow down the ships, “the forcing of a passage would become almost impractical.”

  Finally, he addressed the issue of what the result might be if the squadron was successful in passing the forts relatively intact. “Would it be prudent, however, supposing these works [the forts] to be all formidably armed, to force a passage, leaving them behind intact, while the fleet advanced on New Orleans? I think not.” Unless a large land force was used to support the fleet, something the general described as too difficult to accomplish, “a fleet can not maintain itself long above those works unless the city of New Orleans is captured and held by us.” Stranded between the forts and the city, and unable to be resupplied, the squadron “would have to pass the gauntlet again in retiring and our loss become very great.”

  Despite all opposition, Farragut held fast to his belief that success would only be achieved if the fleet ran the forts and did so soon. Time was not on his side. He had already written to Secretary Welles complaining that he was “not half supplied with anything.” Perhaps preparing Welles for what he now believed was the inevitable change in plans - passing the forts without first reducing them - Farragut told the secretary, “My shells, fuzes, cylinder cloth and yarn to make cylinders are all out. I asked for the shells I wanted and other ordnance stores and am told my demand is out of the question. I have not a solid shot on my ship and none in the squadron except a few on board the Richmond. We have only a few grape canister; the fuzes of sufficient length were fired away the first day.”

  Even Porter’s mortar fleet was not faring well. Hidden from enemy gunners, only one had actually been sunk by fire from the forts, but the ceaseless concussions of the firing of their own mortar guns were taking a severe toll on them. Several of the schooners had water from leaks caused by the strain and shaking. The crews, unable to sleep because of the noise, and suffering from short rations, were tiring.

  Time was on the side of the enemy. As long as the supply line to New Orleans remained open, the forts would continue to receive supplies for the men and the guns. Sooner or later the Confederate government would awaken to the danger posed by the Union fleet, and come to the rescue of the forts. Farragut, in the meantime, would remain without replenishment of existing supplies. He decided the time had come to set aside the orders from Washington, and take matters into his own hands.

  Following the Easter Sunday meeting, Farragut issued a general order to all vessels in his squadron. He opened with the following words: “The Flag-Officer, having heard all the opinions expressed by the different commanders, is of the opinion that whatever is to be done will have to be done quickly, or we shall be again reduced to a blockading squadron, without the means of carrying on the bombardment, as we have nearly
expended all the shells and fuses and material for making cartridges.” He had made his decision: The squadron would run past the forts as soon as the barrier across the river had been opened and the winds, which had been blowing from the north, had changed. He knew his ships would have a difficult time with the flow of the river and was willing to wait until the wind changed so as to reduce that hindrance to their movement. Once north of the forts, army troops could be landed by way of the various bayous, and the campaign against New Orleans could be conducted as a joint army-and-navy operation. He would, Farragut told the ships’ crews, “abide the result - conquer, or be conquered.”

  The first matter to be dealt with was the barrier. It was made up of mostly old schooners with their masts removed. They were chained together, with their bows anchored facing upriver to reduce the drag caused by the flow of the river. While the entire obstacle could not be removed, it had to be breached enough for the largest Union ships to get through. For this task, Farragut selected his fleet captain, Henry Bell. It was just 10:00 p.m. on the night of the twentieth, when Bell took two gunboats, the Pinola and the Itasca, and quietly steamed up to the obstruction. A good omen for their mission was the fact that both gunboats were almost invisible to the enemy. The night was wrapped in almost total darkness, and the noise of their engines was silenced by a driving rain and an almost gale-force wind blowing down the river.

  The plan called for the two gunboats to plant explosives aboard one of the schooners, which they did. At about that time, they were spotted by lookouts from Fort Jackson, and they came under heavy but ineffectual fire from the water batteries below the fort. Porter then ordered his mortar boats to step up their pace of bombardment in an effort to force the enemy gunners to desert their guns and seek safety.

  As the firing continued around them, the crew secured the Pinola to one of the schooners and, under the direction of explosives expert Julius Kroehl, unloaded and placed five 180-pound charges of powder aboard the schooner. Kroehl then connected a device of his own invention to the charges and ran insulated wire from the charges to the Pinola. Unfortunately, the strength of the current and the wind combined to push the gunboat away from the schooner, causing Kroehl’s wires to break before he could ignite the charge.

  In the meantime, the Itasca had pulled alongside another schooner. Using hammers and chisels, crew members freed the schooner from her restraints, and she began to drift downriver. Unfortunately, the Itasca became entangled with the schooner’s lines and was pushed onto the river’s east bank, where she became stuck. Only after great effort, and with the assistance of the Pinola, was she finally freed. Once free, she steamed upriver through the opening she had made in the obstacle. When she had gotten almost to the position of Fort St. Philip, the Itasca turned her back to the wind and faced downriver. The gunboat was swept along by wind, current, and her own engine. With a great crash, she hit the chain that held several schooners together. Her bow rose up out of the water as the chain rubbed along her keel. Almost the entire forward half of the boat was out of the water when the chain finally gave way, and the gunboat crashed back to the surface. The chain-and-schooner obstruction was opened wide enough for the Union fleet to make its way through.

  While this dramatic event was taking place, few aboard the Union ships could sleep, including the flag officer. Everyone understood the importance of the mission Bell had been sent on, and also the danger the two gunboats faced as they struggled with the chain and the schooners almost directly under the guns of Fort Jackson. In a letter written the following day, Farragut told his wife, “I never felt such anxiety in my life as I did until his return. I was as glad to see Bell on his return as if he had been my boy. I was up all night, and could not sleep until he got back to the ship.”

  The following day, the twenty-first, the breach in the obstruction was ignored by both sides as weather conditions made it impractical for the Union fleet to pass through it, or for the rebels to attempt to repair it. The mortar boats continued their bombardment. As the weather continued cold and windy, the Union boats again kept up their routine on the twenty-second. Despite the heavy bombardment, little real damage had been done to the fort. Inside Fort Jackson, General Duncan kept his men busy remounting guns that had been driven off their mounts, making other repairs, and occasionally firing back at the enemy’s ships in the river.

  On the morning of April 23, a clear, cloudless, and warm day, General Lovell visited Fort Jackson to inspect the damage and confer with General Duncan. Lovell was surprised to find that the fort had suffered only four casualties and only slight structural damage. Then, suddenly, at noon, the mortars ceased their incessant firing, and all was calm. Inside the fort, those soldiers not engaged in repairs watched the river anxiously, expecting at any moment to see the Union fleet steaming before them.

  Downriver, Flag Officer Farragut spent the afternoon visiting the ships and boats of his squadron, inspecting them and giving encouragement to their crews. His order of the day was to watch the Hartford during the night: The signal to begin the passing of the forts would be two red lights hoisted to the top of her mainmast. The men of the squadron were as anxious as the men waiting for them inside the two forts and in their surrounding batteries.

  At about eight o’clock that evening, Lieutenant Charles H. Caldwell, commander of the Itasca, took a ten-oar boat upriver of the obstruction to test the actual size of the breach. Trailing a long lead, the boat drifted back downriver. He returned and did the same thing again. Each time the lead remained free, failing to catch on anything that might damage a large ship. At eleven o’clock he signaled the Hartford that the opening offered no impediment to the passage of the ships.

  Meanwhile, the vessels of the squadron were being maneuvered into the positions they had been assigned by Farragut for the run upriver. It was the flag officer’s intention to lead the fleet himself, but he was dissuaded from doing so by his captains. They argued that his own passage ahead of the fleet might result in his losing control of the rest of the squadron, especially should any of them get caught in the obstruction.

  The Union fleet spent the evening preparing for the coming battle. Hammocks were stowed, and the chain cables that had been hung along the sides of the larger ships were checked. In an effort to reduce their visibility, hulls were smeared with the yellow mud of the Mississippi. Decks were whitewashed to help crews see the darker pieces of equipment during what promised to be a completely dark night.

  Inside the forts and the water batteries, men made what preparations they could, but, for the most part, all they could do was wait and watch the darkness. Upriver from the forts, the Confederate naval force also sat waiting. The quiet night, unusual since the arrival of the Porter’s mortar boats, foretold that the time of battle was quickly drawing near. The River Defense Fleet looked impressive but would prove of little or no value when the battle began. The only real threat afloat to the Union squadron was the Louisiana. Although her engines, defective since she was built, remained silent, there were a large number of mechanics aboard trying to make them work. The huge ironclad remained anchored a half mile north of Fort St. Philip, where she served as a floating battery.

  Many people in New Orleans looked on the Louisiana as the city’s strongest defense, after the forts. Along with her sister ship, the Mississippi, the 1,400-ton Louisiana represented the Confederacy’s greatest naval shipbuilding venture. The keels for both vessels had been laid in December 1861 in shipyards at Jefferson City, Louisiana, a short distance upriver from New Orleans - the Louisiana at the yard of E. C. Murray, and the Mississippi at the yard of the Tift Brothers. Supply shortages had slowed construction to a crawl, and both remained incomplete when Flag Officer Farragut’s squadron entered the Mississippi River. E. C. Murray had been building boats for over twenty years, and had established an enviable record of constructing nearly 120 steamboats, but the Louisiana was to be the most unusual craft he had ever undertaken to build. Her superstructure was topped by a flat deck through
which protruded her single large smokestack. Belowdecks were four powerful steam engines that had been removed from the former river steamer Ingomar. Two were to drive the covered paddle wheels located slightly aft of midships, and two were to power more traditional screw propellers. Despite the best efforts of a large number of mechanics and engineers, the transplanted engines never ran. When finally launched on February 6, 1862, the Louisiana carried a crew of 250 men and boasted sixteen six-and seven-inch rifled guns, but she could not move under her own power.

  When the Louisiana was finally dropped into the river, Confederate Navy Secretary Mallory ordered that she be sent north, where, he believed, lay the strongest threat to New Orleans. Military and civilian officials in New Orleans tried to persuade him to allow the powerful ironclad to remain near the Crescent City, but he refused. The issue was moot, of course, since the ship was unable to steam anywhere, so it was by default that she remained at New Orleans. As the Union fleet prepared to run past the forts, the Louisiana remained tied to the riverbank north of Fort St. Philip. Had she been able to gather a head of steam, it is unlikely that she would have played a larger role in the coming battle than she did as a floating battery. The ironclad’s own design made her, in the words of her chief engineer, Wilson Youngblood, “unmanageable in the Mississippi River.”