The Island was taken possession of, and Commodore Lynch’s fleet completely destroyed.
Elizabeth City was attacked on Sunday, and evacuated by the inhabitants. The City was previously burned, but whether by our shells or the inhabitants is not certain.
All the gunboats but one were taken, and that escaped up a creek and was probably also destroyed.
There appears to be no bright side of the story for the Rebels.
Stephen Mallory, Esq.
Department of the Navy
Richmond, Virginia
Sir:
I am a private citizen with great dedication to our noble cause. In my effort to aid in throwing off the yoke of tyranny, I have, at my own expense and endeavor, purchased and fitted out a private ironclad man-of-war. I have been able to make some use of the vessel, participating in the attack on the Union fleet at the Head of the Passes and the subsequent shelling at the bar, an action of which you have no doubt heard. My vessel is the Yazoo River, though, being a private man-of-war and not an official naval vessel, she received less attention than the efforts of my valiant crew warranted.
The Yazoo River currently sails under a letter of marque and reprisal, not because I entertain hopes of reaping some profit from her (I look for no pecuniary gains whatsoever) but rather that she might carry the war to sea with some degree of legitimacy. I would gladly risk myself, my ship, and my men to the last measure for the good of the cause, but I would not give the Yankee barbarians excuse to hang my men as pirates.
I find, to my dismay, that the people available for employment on private men-of-war are not what one might wish, generally foreigners, weaklings, and cowards, as any true Southern man is already in the service, be it the army or navy, or employed at some indispensable trade. For all of the effort and money I have poured into my ship, I find I cannot make decent use of her for want of good men. It has become clear to me that this fine ship must be manned by men of the Confederate States Navy, for only such men as have voluntarily and selflessly joined in the fight can be counted upon to act with zeal, dash, and bravery when the hard and dangerous work is to be done.
This is the reason I appeal to you. For the good of our cause, I would like to offer my ship to the Confederate States Navy, at no cost to the service. She is an ironclad, side-wheeler, three hundred tons, 147 feet length overall. She has two boilers and two noncondensing engines with eighteen-inch cylinders, all in good repair. She currently mounts a ten-inch Dahlgren forward and two six-pound smoothbores aft, which are of limited use. I would be grateful if the navy was able to supply more and better ordnance.
I say I will give the Yazoo River to the navy at no cost, and that is true, but I would make one demand. It is no longer possible for me to sit idly by while others fight the Northern vandals. Since I have some knowledge of the waters here, I would insist that I be retained aboard in the capacity of pilot, so that I might aid in my way in the great fight. I do not require pay for that service, but do insist upon an official appointment to serve in that capacity.
I look forward to your reply, and remain,
Your obedient servant,
Robley Paine
Norfolk, Virginia, February 12, 1862
Dear Mrs. Jefferson,
My name is Hieronymus Taylor and I am the Chief Engineer aboard the ship CSN Cape Fear, aboard which your son Lafayette volunteered. I regret to inform you that Lafayette was killed during the fight at Roanoke Island on February 7.
Lafayette was a good boy and a hard worker, very much liked by his shipmates. He stood his post bravely to the end and he is sore missed.
I know that money can never make up such a grievous loss, but perhaps it might help some to make up for the support a lost son might have provided. I have enclosed one hundred dollars for you in Lafayette ’s memory, and I hope it is pleasing to him as he looks down from heaven on our suffering here on earth, now that he is in the hands of Jesus and his suffering is at an end.
I am very sorry for your loss, and remain, Your obedient, humble servant,
Hieronymus Taylor
Mrs. Ada Jefferson
Wilmington Street
Elizabeth City, North Carolina
From the report of Captain Samuel Bowater, CSN:
Norfolk, Virginia, February 12, 1862
…and upon realizing the Cape Fear was in a sinking condition, the enemy returned to their own vessel, at which time those men remaining aboard the Cape Fear made preparations to abandon ship. Gallantly, Lt. Simms brought his vessel Appomattox alongside, despite the great danger of enemy fire at close range, and took off the surviving crew of the Cape Fear and the wounded, as well as the body of Lt. Harwell.
I will not attempt to explain Lt. Simms’s decision to make for the canal, except to say that it is a decision I myself would have made, given the fact that the Confederate fleet was lost and there would have been no purpose served in fighting on, and the only result would have been the loss of the last ship and crew. It is unfortunate that the Appomattox proved to be two inches too wide to fit in the lock and Lt. Simms was forced to burn the vessel there. I cannot speak too highly of the gallantry of this officer, and the debt owed to him by the men of the Cape Fear .
Of the men of the Cape Fear , they all performed well and to my full satisfaction, but I would like to single a few out for special commendation. First Assistant Engineer Hieronymus Taylor stood his post despite the grave danger of enemy shells hitting the boiler, and when called upon joined in the hand-to-hand fighting and displayed calm and leadership in that capacity. Seaman First Class Ruffin Tanner was ubiquitous during the fight, serving as helmsman, repelling boarders, and aiding the wounded off the ship. He was the last man, besides myself, to leave the sinking vessel.
In particular I would like to praise Lt. Thadeous Harwell, who manned the bow gun and was foremost when the fighting became hand-to-hand. He was a brave and gallant officer, displaying the finest qualities of the Southern officer and gentleman, and he was tragically killed in the final moments of the fight. He will be missed.
In all, the Cape Fear suffered one coal passer, four seamen, and one officer, Lt. Harwell, dead, and seven wounded, one of whom it is thought will not survive his wounds.
After the forced abandonment of the Appomattox, my crew showed a laudatory desire to remain together. As a unit we traveled to Norfolk, and now take lodging at the naval shipyard. If it is necessary, for the need of the service, that we should be split up, then we are of course perfectly agreeable to that. But I would suggest that, since we are, as a crew, now well trained and used to working with one another, we might better serve if transferred as a whole to another vessel, if such a one is available. I await your pleasure in this matter, and have the honor to be,
Samuel Bowater
Lieutenant, Confederate States Navy
Hon. S. R. Mallory,
Secretary of the Navy, Richmond
Instructions from the Secretary of the Navy to Flag Officer Farragut, U.S. Navy, regarding the operations of the West Gulf Blockading
Navy Department, January 20, 1862
SIR: When the Hartford is in all respects ready for sea, you will proceed to the Gulf of Mexico with all practicable dispatch and communicate with Flag Officer W. W. McKean, who is directed by the enclosed dispatch to transfer to you the command of the Western Gulf Blockading Squadron.
There will be attached to your squadron a fleet of bomb vessels, and armed steamers enough to manage them, all under command of Commander D. D. Porter, who will be directed to report to you. As fast as these vessels are got ready they will be sent to Key West to await the arrival of all, and the commanding officers, who will be permitted to organize and practice with them at that port.
When these formidable mortars arrive, and you are completely ready, you will collect such vessels as can be spared from the blockade and proceed up the Mississippi River and reduce the defenses which guard the approaches to New Orleans, when you will appear off that city and take posses
sion of it under the guns of your squadron, and hoist the American flag thereon, keeping possession until troops can be sent to you.
As you have expressed yourself satisfied with the force given to you, and as many more powerful vessels will be added before you can commence operations, the Department and the country will require of you success.
Destroy the armed barriers which these deluded people have raised up against the power of the United States Government, and shoot down those who war against the Union, but cultivate with cordiality the first returning reason which is sure to follow your success.
Very respectfully, etc.
Gideon Welles
Flag Officer D. G. Farragut,
Appointed to Command West Gulf Squadron
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We cannot, either with cotton or with all the agricultural staples of the Confederacy put together, adopt any course that will make cotton and trade stand us as a nation in the stead of a Navy.
– Commander Matthew F. Maury, CSN
A cold front rolled through Yazoo City, foul weather out of the north. Robley Paine pulled the collar of his heavy coat up around his face, felt the scraggly growth of ill-tended beard scrape on the cloth. He squinted into the wind, looked out across the water.
Yazoo City. The Yazoo River was tied up at one of the docks that jutted out from the trampled riverfront, a few miles west of the town. At the base of a series of low hills covered with a tangle of scrubby trees, coarse grass, the place where businesses that catered to the river traffic clustered. A few dilapidated machine shops, some carpenters, blacksmiths, boiler shops, they gave service to the great fleet of vessels which, in the days before the birth of the Anaconda, would come upriver to load cotton from Yazoo City’s wharfs.
Paine looked upriver. He could see part of the town itself from where he stood on the Yazoo River’s hurricane deck, the brick buildings and perfectly parallel roads, the bare trees like skeletal hands. The river looked as if it came to an abrupt stop right at the town’s waterfront. In fact it made a hard turn left at Yazoo City, a bend of nearly 170 degrees, as if the river had been rushing right for the town and had deflected off the waterfront, bounced back in the direction from which it came.
It was a dead time. February in Yazoo County had never been a bustle. Too cold for Southern blood to do much, nothing to be done in the cotton fields, no bales piling up on the wharf for transport to the cotton mills of the North, and England.
It was even more dead now. Most of Yazoo County’s young men were off to war, commerce quashed by the blockade.
The Anaconda was circling, Robley could feel it, as if it was breathing down his neck. New Orleans would be next. Farragut was in command of the Western Gulf Blockading Squadron. He had big steam frigates. He had mortar scows.
The forts to the north, Fort Henry, now Fort Donelson, on the Tennessee River, fallen to Grant. The Union gunboats would push down the Mississippi River, and Farragut would hit New Orleans, and the head and the tail of the serpent would move toward one another, down the Father of Waters.
Robley Paine shook his head. Can’t think on that, can’t think on that… He let his mind wander down that route and it would dead-end in a brilliant red rage. The Anaconda closing in, and he was sitting on a river gunboat-just the thing that the Confederates needed to hold the snake off-and he could get no help in running the thing. Letter after letter with no response, gold sent out with an utter lack of discretion, but neither patriotism nor greed seemed to move anyone to help him in his quest.
He climbed down from the hurricane deck, down to the side deck and down the brow to the dock. It was a Tuesday morning, but there seemed to be no one around. He unhitched his horse and led it over to a step from which he could mount. His old wound ached too much now to allow him to put a foot in the stirrup and swing himself up.
He rode slowly into town, and as he approached he began to see people, who waved to him, bid him good day. Yazoo City was not the paradise he had dreamed of; there were no mechanics and carpenters and engineers and sailors who swarmed to help him, to fight the Yankee. But neither was it New Orleans, den of iniquity. He was known here. Respected. The people of Yazoo City thought he was mad-he could see that, he was not delusional-but still they treated him with the deference and respect that the name Paine warranted in that county.
He rode down the main street, stopped at the post office, and slid off his horse. With teeth clenched against the pain he climbed the granite steps, pushed the door open.
“Mr. Paine, good day,” the postmaster called out.
The first time Robley had shown up there, six weeks before, he had seen the fear in the man’s eyes. Robley seemed to inspire fear these days, but he did not care.
The postmaster told him then, coughing, hemming, stammering, that they had run out of room in the box, that he had sent all of the Paines’ mail down to Paine Plantation.
Robley did not care about that. That was before he began writing to Secretary Mallory, before he had begun shipping gold for railroad iron and guns and shells, before his real work had commenced. That mail was the detritus of the dead, something that had relevance once, when he was alive, but it meant nothing now, like Katherine’s dresses, which, he imagined, still hung in her wardrobe.
He had not returned to Paine Plantation to retrieve the mail, had not gone back to that place at all. He did not think he could bear it. He had steamed past, on his way to Yazoo City, looked at the hideous gargoyle he had made of the old oak, wondered what he had been thinking. Had he thought that was enough? Painting a tree? He did not understand then, as he did now, the sacrifice that needed to be made.
“I’ve got a letter for you, Mr. Paine,” the postmaster said. It took a moment for the words to register. A letter? Paine had been coming in every other day for a month and a half, and nothing had arrived for him. He had come to expect that, and the postmaster’s words caught him by surprise.
The postmaster held the letter out and Robley took it, stepped away, staring at the envelope. It was addressed to Captain Robley Paine, Yazoo City. In the upper left hand corner, preprinted, it read “Department of the Navy, Richmond, Virginia, Confederate States of America.”
For a long moment Robley just stared until his hands were trembling too much for him to read the return address any longer. He tore at the envelope, dropped it, retrieved it, tore it open. He pulled the letter out and unfolded it.
Dear Captain Paine:
I beg you to forgive my long delay in replying to yours of January 16th, but I am certain you can appreciate that matters of the service have me much diverted and in many different directions.
Your offer of the ironclad gunboat Yazoo River is a generous and patriotic one, and much in keeping with the grand spirit of the South and the magnanimous spirit of her people. It is a particularly timely offer, as it has become clear to me, by recent events, particularly those on the Tennessee River, that ironclad gunboats will be the deciding factor to winning the war on the Western Rivers, which, in turn, will be integral to winning the war overall.
On behalf of the Confederate States Navy I enthusiastically accept your offer to make the Yazoo River a commissioned vessel of the Confederate States Navy, and your offer to act as her pilot, as our experience has shown that skilled pilots are very difficult to come by.
As to the manning of the Yazoo River, I am currently reviewing the names and qualifications of those men currently available, but I am in no doubt that the kind of men you seek will be found and transferred to the Yazoo River as expediently as possible.
Once again, allow me to commend you on your patriotism and selflessness as displayed by this act. I remain,
Your humble and obedient servant,
S. R. Mallory
Secretary of the Navy, Richmond
Robley read the letter, fast. He was breathing shallowly. He forced himself to breathe normally, read it again, then read it again. Thoughts crowded his head, fought for attention, the emotions swirled like smoke.
>
Confederate States Naval Vessel Yazoo River…The words sounded like music in his head. At last, at last…
Then the darker thoughts clawed their way up. He had exaggerated some in his description of the vessel. He had called her an ironclad. And if he had his way, so she would be. He had written, sent orders, money, to iron foundries throughout the South, had written follow-up letters, had his attorneys write follow-up letters. So far, nothing. Not a scrap of iron had arrived. The Yazoo River was still a cotton-clad.
He had overstated his own qualifications as well. Mallory called him “Captain.” Naturally, the Secretary would assume an experienced river pilot would merit that title. Not a big problem-he could get around that one. Take a real pilot at gunpoint if he had to, so long as he was aboard when the CSS Yazoo River got underway.
He read the letter again. He had to get back to his office in the Yazoo River’s wheelhouse. He had to write follow-up letters, find out where his gunboat iron was.
Jonathan Paine pushed open the back door of Miss Sally Tompkins’s house, clomped down the back steps. He held a big basket crammed full of filthy sheets and bloody bandages. The wind plucked at the red-and-white strips, pulled them out, set them flapping like banners. Jonathan turned a shoulder into the wind, hurried across the yard, along the path worn down to dirt and fringed with brown grass.
Bobby stood at a cauldron hanging from a tripod over a blazing fire. He agitated the contents with a big stick, like one of Shakespeare’s witches.
Othello plays in Macbeth, Paine thought, and the thought made him smile. He stepped quickly across the yard. He was moving well with his prosthetic leg now, walking more like a man with a hurt leg than a man with no leg at all. The limp reminded him of his father. Of the three boys, he had always favored his father’s looks the most. Now the effect was even greater.
He moved within the radius of the fire, caught what warmth he could. He and Bobby dumped the bloody bandages into the water and Bobby began stirring again.
Glory In The Name Page 39