Miss Ravenel's conversion from secession to loyalty

by John William De Forest

  CHAPTER XXIV.

  A DESPERATE ATTACK AND A SUCCESSFUL DEFENCE.

  While it was still darkness Lillie was awakened from her sleep by anall-pervading, startling, savage uproar. Through the hot night cametramplings and yellings of a rebel brigade; roaring oftwenty-four-pounders and whirring of grape from the bastions of thefort; roaring of hundred-pounders and flight of shrieking, cracking,flashing shells from the gunboats; incessant spattering and fieryspitting of musketry, with whistling and humming of bullets; and,constant through all, the demoniac yell advancing like the howl of aninfernal tide. Bedlam, pandemonium, all the maniacs of earth and all thefiends of hell, seemed to have combined in riot amidst the crashings ofstorm and volcano. The clamor came with the suddenness and continuedwith more than the rage of a tornado. Lillie had never imagined anythingso unearthly and horrible. She called loudly for her father, and waspositively astonished to hear his voice close at her side, so strangelydid the familiar tones sound in that brutal uproar.

  "What is it?" she asked.

  "It must be the assault," he replied, astonished into telling thealarming truth. "I will step out and take a look."

  "You shall not," she exclaimed, clutching him. "What if you should behit!"

  "My dear, don't be childish," remonstrated the Doctor. "It is my duty toattend to the wounded. I am the only surgeon in the fort. Just considerthe ingratitude of neglecting these brave fellows who are fighting forour safety."

  "Will you promise not to get hurt?"

  "Certainly, my dear."

  "Will you come back every five minutes and let me see you?"

  "Yes, my dear. I'll keep you informed of everything that happens."

  She thought a few moments, and gradually loosened her hold on him. Hercuriosity, her anxiety to know how this terrible drama went on, helpedher to be brave and to spare him. As soon as her fingers had unclosedfrom his sleeve he crept to where his rifle stood and softly, seized it;and in so doing he stepped on the recumbent Gazaway, who groaned,whereupon the Doctor politely apologized. As he stepped out of thebuilding he distinguished Colburne's voice on the river front, shouting,"This way, men!" In that direction ran the Doctor, holding his rifle inboth hands, at something like the position of a charge bayonet, with histhumb on the trigger so as to be ready for immediate conflict. Suddenlybang! went the piece at an angle of forty-five degrees, sending its ballclean across the Mississippi, and causing a veteran sergeant near him toinquire "what the hell he was about."

  "Really, that explosion was quite extraordinary," said the surprisedDoctor. "I had not the least intention of firing. Would you, sir, havethe goodness to load it for me?"

  But the sergeant was in a hurry, and ran on without answering. TheDoctor began to finger his cartridge-box in a wild way, intending to getout a cartridge if he could, when a faint voice near him said, "I'llload your gun for you, sir."

  "_Would_ you be so kind?" replied the Doctor, delighted. "I am sodreadfully inexperienced in these operations! I am quite sorry totrouble you."

  The sick man--one of the invalids whom Gazaway had brought from NewOrleans--loaded the piece, capped it, and added some brief instructionsin the mysteries of half-cock and full-cock.

  "Really you are very good. I am quite obliged," said the Doctor, andhurried on to the river front, guided by the voice of Colburne. At therampart he tried to shoot one of our men who was coming up wounded fromthe palisade, and would probably have succeeded, but that the lock ofhis gun would not work. Colburne stopped him in this well-intentionedbut mistaken labor, saying, "Those are our people." Then, "Your gun isat half-cock.--There.--Now keep your finger off the trigger until yousee a rebel."

  Then shouting, "Forward, men!" he ran down to the palisade followed bytwenty or thirty, of whom one was the Doctor.

  The assailing brigade, debouching from the woods half a mile away fromthe front, had advanced in a wide front across the flat, losing scarcelyany men by the fire of the artillery, although many, shaken by thehorrible screeching of the hundred-pound shells, threw themselves on theground in the darkness or sought the frail shelter of the scattereddwellings. Thus diminished in numbers and broken up by night andobstacles and the differing speed of running men, the brigade reachedthe fort, not an organization, but a confused swarm, flowing along theedge of the ditch to right and left in search of an entrance. There wasa constant spattering of flashes, as individuals returned the steadyfire of the garrison; and the sharp clean whistle of round bullets andbuckshot mingled in the thick warm air with the hoarse whiz of Minies.Now and then an angry shout or wailing scream indicated that some onehad been hit and mangled. The exhortations and oaths of the rebelofficers could be distinctly heard, as they endeavored to restore order,to drive up stragglers, and to urge the mass forward. A few jumped orfell into the ditch and floundered there, unable to climb up the smoothfacings of brickwork. Two or three hundred collected around the palisadewhich connected the northern front with the river, some lying down andwaiting, and others firing at the woodwork or the neighboring ramparts,while a few determined ones tried to burst open the gate by mainstrength.

  The Doctor put the whole length of his barrel through one of the narrowport holes of the palisade and immediately became aware that some on theoutside had seized it and was pulling downwards. "Let go of my gun!" heshouted instinctively, without considering the unreasonable nature ofthe request. "Let go yourself, you son of a bitch!" returned theoutsider, not a whit more rational. The Doctor pulled trigger with asense of just indignation, and drew in his gun, the barrel bent at aright angle and bursted. Whether he had injured the rebel or onlystartled him into letting go his hold, he never knew and did not thenpause to consider. He felt his ruined weapon all over with his hands,tried in vain to draw the ramrod, and, after bringing all hisphilosophical acumen to bear on the subject, gave up the idea ofreloading. Casting about for a new armament, he observed behind him aman lying in one of the many little gullies which seemed to slopebetween the fort and the river, his eyes wide open and fixed upon thepalisade, and his right hand loosely holding a rifle. The Doctorconcluded that he was sick, or tired, or seeking shelter from thebullets.

  "Would you be good enough to lend me your gun for a few moments?" heinquired.

  The man made no reply; he was perfectly dead. The Doctor beingshort-sighted and without his spectacles, and not accustomed, as yet, toappreciating the effects of musketry, did not suspect this until he bentover him, and saw that his woolen shirt was soaked with blood. He pickedup the rifle, guessed that it was loaded, stumbled back to the palisade,insinuated the mere muzzle into a port-hole, and fired, with splinteringeffect on the woodwork. The explosion was followed by a howl of anguishfrom the exterior, which gave him a mighty throb, partly of horror andpartly of loyal satisfaction. "After all, it is only a species ofsurgical operation," he thought, and proceeded to reload, according tothe best of his speed and knowledge. Suddenly he staggered under aviolent impulse, precisely as if a strong man had jerked him by thecoat-collar, and putting his hand to the spot, he found that a bullet(nearly spent in penetrating the palisades) had punched its way throughthe cloth. This was the nearest approach to a wound that he receivedduring the engagement.

  Meantime things were going badly with the assailants. Disorganized bythe night, cut up by the musketry, demoralized by the incessantscreaming and bursting of the one-hundred-pound shells, unable to forcethe palisade or cross the ditch, they rapidly lost heart, threwthemselves on the earth, took refuge behind the levees, dropped away insquads through the covering gloom, and were, in short, repulsed. In thecourse of thirty minutes, all that yelling swarm had disappeared, exceptthe thickly scattered dead and wounded, and a few well-coveredstragglers, who continued to fire as sharpshooters.

  "We have whipped them!" shouted Colburne. "Hurrah for the old flag!"

  The garrison caught the impulse of enthusiasm, and raised yell on yellof triumph. Even the wounded ceased to feel their anguish for a moment,and uttered a feeble shout or exclamation of gladness.
The Doctorbethought himself of his daughter, and hurried back to the brickbuilding to inform her of the victory. She threw herself into his armswith a shriek of delight, and almost in the same breath reproached himsharply for leaving her so long.

  "My dear, it can't be more than five minutes," said the Doctor, fullybelieving what he said, so rapidly does time pass in the excitement ofsuccessful battle.

  "Is it really over?" she asked.

  "Quite so. They are rushing for the woods like pelted frogs for apuddle. They are going in all directions, as though they were bound forCowes and a market. I don't believe they will ever get together again.We have gained a magnificent victory. It is the grandest moment of mylife."

  "Is Captain Colburne unhurt?" was Lillie's next question.

  "Perfectly. We haven't lost a man--except one," he added, bethinkinghimself of the poor fellow whose gun he had borrowed.

  "Oh!" she sighed, with a long inspiration of relief, for the life of herbrave defender had become precious in her eyes.

  The Doctor had absent-mindedly brought his rifle into the room, and wasmuch troubled with it, not caring to shock Lillie with the fact that hehad been personally engaged. He held it behind his back with one hand,after the manner of a naughty boy who has been nearly detected inbreaking windows, and who still has a brickbat in his fist which hedares not show, and cannot find a chance to hide. He was slyly settingit against the wall when she discovered it.

  "What!" she exclaimed. "Have you been fighting, too? You dear, darling,wicked papa!"

  She kissed him violently, and then laughed hysterically.

  "I thought you were up to some mischief all the while," she added. "Youwere gone a dreadful time, and I screaming and looking out for you.Papa, you ought to be ashamed of yourself."

  "I have reason to be. I am the most disgraceful ignoramus. I don't knowhow to load my gun. I think I must have put the bullet in wrong endfirst. The ramrod won't go down."

  "Well, put it away now. You don't want it any more. You must take careof the wounded."

  "Wounded!" exclaimed the Doctor. "Are there any wounded?"

  "Oh dear! several of them. I forgot to tell you. They are to bring themin here. I am going to our trunks to get some linen."

  The Doctor was quite astonished to find that there were a number ofwounded; for having escaped unhurt himself, he concluded that every oneelse had been equally lucky, excepting, of course, the man who lay deadin the gulley. As he laid down his gun he heard a groaning in onecorner, and went softly towards it, expecting to find one of the victimsof the conflict. Lifting up one end of a blanket, and lighting a matchto dispel the dimness, he beheld the prostrate Gazaway, his face beadedwith the perspiration of heat and terror.

  "Oh!" said the Doctor, with perhaps the merest twang of contempt in theexclamation.

  "My God, Doctor!" groaned the Major. "I tell you I'm a sick man. I'vegot the most awful bilious colic that ever a feller had. If you can giveme something, do, for God's sake!"

  "Presently," answered Ravenel, and paid no more attention to him.

  "If I could have discharged my gun," he afterwards said, in relating thecircumstance, "I should have been tempted to rid him of his biliouscolic by a surgical operation."

  The floor of the little building was soon cumbered with half a dozeninjured men, and dampened with their blood. The Doctor had noinstruments, but he could probe with his finger and dress with wetbandages. Lillie aided him, pale at the sight of blood and suffering,but resolute to do what she could. When Colburne looked in for a moment,she nodded to him with a sweet smile, which was meant to thank him forhaving defended her.

  "I am glad to see you at this work," he said. "There will be more ofit."

  "What! More fighting!" exclaimed the Doctor, looking up from a shatteredfinger.

  "Oh yes. We mustn't hope that they will be satisfied with one assault.There is a supporting column, of course; and it will come on soon. Butdo you stay here, whatever happens. You will be of most use here."

  He had scarcely disappeared when the whole air became horribly vocal,as, with a long-drawn, screaming battle-yell, the second brigade ofTexans moved to the assault, and the "thunders of fort and fleet"replied. Taking the same direction as before, but pushing forward withsuperior solidity and energy, the living wave swept up to thefortifications, howled along the course of the ditch, and surgedclamorously against the palisade. Colburne was there with half the otherofficers and half the strength of the garrison, silent for the mostpart, but fighting desperately. Suddenly there was a shout of, "Back!back! They are coming round the palisade."

  There was a stumbling rush for the cover of the fortification proper;and there the last possible line of defence was establishedinstinctively and in a moment. Officers and men dropped on their kneesbehind the low bank of earth, and continued an irregular, deliberatefire, each discharging his piece as fast as he could load and aim. Thegarrison was not sufficient to form a continuous rank along even thissingle front, and on such portions of the works as were protected by theditch, the soldiers were scattered almost as sparsely as sentinels.Nothing saved the place from being carried by assault except the factthat the assailants were unprovided with scaling ladders. Theadventurous fellows who had flanked the palisade, rushed to the gate,and gave entrance to a torrent of tall, lank men in butternut or dirtygrey clothing, their bronzed faces flushed with the excitement ofsupposed victory, and their yells of exultation drowning for a minutethe sharp outcries of the wounded, and the rattle of the musketry. Butthe human billow was met by such a fatal discharge that it could notcome over the rampart. The foremost dead fell across it, and the massreeled backward. Unfortunately for the attack, the exterior slope wasfull of small knolls and gullies, beside being cumbered with rudeshanties, of four or five feet in height made of bits of board, andshelter tents, which had served as the quarters of the garrison. Behindthese covers scores if not hundreds sought refuge, and could not beinduced to leave them for a second charge. They commenced with musketry,and from that moment the great peril was over. The men behind therampart had only to lie quiet, to shoot every one who approached or roseat full length, and to wait till daylight should enable the gunboats toopen with grape. In vain the rebel officers, foreseeing this danger,strove with voice and example to raise a yell and a rush. Theimpetuosity of the attack had died out, and could not be brought tolife.

  "They don't like the way it works," laughed the Louisiana lieutenant inhigh glee. "They ain't on it so much as they was."

  For an hour the exchange of close musketry continued, the strength ofthe assailants steadily decreasing, as some fell wounded or dead, andothers stole out of the fatal enclosure. Daylight showed more than ahundred fallen and nearly two hundred unharmed men; all lying orcrouching among the irregularities of that bloody and bullet-tornglacis. Several voices cried out, "Stop firing. We surrender."

  An officer in a lieutenant-colonel's uniform repeated these words,waving a white handkerchief. Then rising from his refuge he walked up tothe rampart, leaped upon it, and stared in amazement at the thin line ofdefenders, soldiers and negroes intermingled.

  "By ----! I won't surrender to such a handful," he exclaimed. "Come on,boys!"

  A sergeant immediately shot him through the breast, and his body fellinside of the works. Not a man of those whom he had appealed to followedhim; and only a few rose from their covers, to crouch again as soon asthey witnessed his fate. The fire of the garrison reopened withviolence, and soon there were new cries of, "We surrender," with awaving of hats and handkerchiefs.

  "What shall we do?" asked the Louisiana lieutenant. "They are three toour one. If we let the d--n scoundrels in, they will knock us down andtake our guns away from us."

  Colburne rose and called out, "Do you surrender?"

  "Yes, yes," from many voices, and a frantic agitation of broadbrims.

  "Then throw your arms into the river."

  First one, then another, then several together obeyed this order, untilthere was a general rush to th
e bank, and a prodigious splashing ofdouble-barreled guns and bowie-knives in the yellow water.

  "Now sit down and keep quiet," was Colburne's next command.

  They obeyed with the utmost composure. Some filled their pipes and fellto smoking; others produced corn-cake from their havresacks andbreakfasted; others busied themselves with propping the wounded andbringing them water. Quite a number crawled into the deserted shantiesand went to sleep, apparently worn out with the night's work andwatching. A low murmur of conversation, chiefly concerning the events ofthe assault, and not specially gloomy in its tenor, gradually mingledwith the groans of the wounded. When the gate of the palisade was closedupon them and refastened, they laughed a little at the idea of beingshut up in a pen like so many chickens.

  "Trapped, by Jiminy!" said one. "You must excuse me if I don't know howto behave myself. I never was cotched before. I'm a wild man of theprairies, I am."

  On all sides the attack had failed, with heavy loss to the assailants.The heroic little garrison, scarcely one hundred and fifty strong,including officers, camp-followers and negroes (all of whom had fought),had captured more than its own numbers, and killed and wounded twice itsown numbers. The fragments of the repulsed brigades had fallen backbeyond the range of fire, and even the semicircle of pickets had almostdisappeared in the woods. The prisoners and wounded were taken on boardthe gunboats, and forwarded to New Orleans by the first transport downthe river. As the last of the unfortunates left the shore Colburneremarked, "I wonder if those poor fellows will ever get tired offighting for an institution which only prolongs their own inferiority."

  "I am afraid not--I am afraid not," said the Doctor. "Not, at least,until they are whipped into reason. They have been educated under anawful tyranny of prejudice, conceit, and ignorance. They are moreincapable of perceiving their own true interests than so many brutes. Ihave had the honor to be acquainted with dogs who were their superiorsin that respect. In Tennessee, on one of my excursions, I stopped overnight in the log-cabin of a farmer. It was rather chilly, and I wantedto poke the fire. There was no poker. 'Ah,' said the farmer, 'Bose hasrun off with the poker again.' He went out for a moment, and came inwith the article. I asked him if his dog had a fancy for pokers. 'No,'said he; 'but one of my boys once burnt the critter's nose with a hotpoker; and ever since then he hides it every time that he comes acrossit. We know whar to find it. He allays puts it under the house andkivers it up with leaves. It's curious,' said he, 'to watch him go atit, snuffing to see if it is hot, and picking it up and sidling off assly as a horse-thief. He has an awful bad conscience about it. Perhapsyou noticed that when you asked for the poker, Bose he got up andtravelled.'--Now, you see, the dog knew what had burned him. But thesepoor besotted creatures don't know that it is slavery which has scorchedtheir stupid noses. They have no idea of getting rid of their hot poker.They are fighting to keep it."

  When it had become certain that the fighting was quite over, MajorGazaway reappeared in public, complaining much of internal pains, butable to dictate and sign a pompous official report of his victory, inwhich he forgot to mention the colic or the name of Captain Colburne.During the following night the flare of widespread fires against the skyshowed that the enemy were still in the neighborhood; and negroes whostole in from the swamps reported that the country was "cram full o'rebs, way up beyon' Mars Ravenel's plantashum."

  "You won't be able to reoccupy your house for a long time, I fear," saidColburne.

  "No," sighed the Doctor. "My experiment is over. I must get back to NewOrleans."

  "And I must go to Port Hudson. I shall be forgiven, I presume, for notreporting back to the hospital."

  Such was the defence of Fort Winthrop, one of the most gallant feats ofthe war. Those days are gone by, and there will be no more like themforever, at least, not in our forever. Not very long ago, not more thantwo hours before this ink dried upon the paper, the author of thepresent history was sitting on the edge of a basaltic cliff which,overlooked a wide expanse of fertile earth, flourishing villages, thespires of a city, and, beyond, a shining sea flecked with the full-blownsails of peace and prosperity. From the face of another basaltic clifftwo miles distant, he saw a white globule of smoke dart a little wayupward, and a minute afterwards heard a dull, deep _pum!_ of explodinggunpowder. Quarrymen there were blasting out rocks from which to buildhives of industry and happy family homes. But the sound reminded him ofthe roar of artillery; of the thunder of those signal guns which used topresage battle; of the alarums which only a few months previous were acommand to him to mount and ride into the combat. Then he thought,almost with a feeling of sadness, so strange is the human heart, that hehad probably heard those clamors, uttered in mortal earnest, for thelast time. Never again, perhaps, even should he live to the age ofthreescore and ten, would the shriek of grapeshot, and the crash ofshell, and the multitudinous whiz of musketry be a part of his life.Nevermore would he hearken to that charging yell which once had stirredhis blood more fiercely than the sound of trumpets: the Southernbattle-yell, full of howls and yelpings as of brute beasts rushinghilariously to the fray: the long-sustained Northern yell, all human,but none the less relentless and stern; nevermore the one nor the other.No more charges of cavalry, rushing through the dust of the distance; nomore answering smoke of musketry, veiling unshaken lines and squares; nomore columns of smoke, piling high above deafening batteries. No moregroans of wounded, nor shouts of victors over positions carried andbanners captured, nor reports of triumphs which saved a nation fromdisappearing off the face of the earth. After thinking of these thingsfor an hour together, almost sadly, as I have said, he walked back tohis home; and read with interest a paper which prattled of townelections, and advertised corner-lots for sale; and decided to make akid-gloved call in the evening, and to go to church on the morrow.