The Sun.
London, England, 1865-02-17 00:00:00

the country, North and South knew where the fleet
was going. You all knew, the rebels all knew that
it was fitting out to be sent to Wilmington. Indeed
to such an extent was the publicity curled, and
although General Weitzel, with General Graham,
of the Naval Brigade, had sent to reconnoitre the
vicinity of Port Fisher, yet General Grant concluded
that the enemy were so informed of the purposes of
the expedition that it was best not to send any men
at that time, and did actually refuse to do so, leav-
ing the fleet lying in Hampton Roads for months
claiming to be ready, and boasting what they would
do to Wilmington. Afterward, for the purpose of
trying an experiment, and of allowing the question
to be tested what would be the effect of the explo-
sion of a large quantity of powder in the neighbour-
hood of a fortification, to see whether it would have
the destructive effect which it.was claimed by some
it would have, or whether it would result in com-
parative harmlessness, General Grant determined I
to send 3,000 men in aid of the navy, and after
learning that the enemy were detaching forces to
meet Sherman, he increased the force to 6,000, one
half of which were negroes, hoping to surprise Fort
Fisher, upon the supposition that General Bragg
had carried off his forces to meet Sherman, and
therefore the fort would be undefended by any con-
siderable force. General Grant also hoped that a
portion of the fleet would run by the fort into Cape
Fear River, and then, by landing the troops and
entrenching across the peninsula, between the river
and the sea, blockade running at least might be
stopped. It was said that there was not sufficient
depth of water to go up the river, but as since the
fort has indeed been silenced, there seems to have
been no considerable difficulty in getting most of
the gunboats up the river. I am inclined to the
opinion that it was another want, rather than the
want of water, that prevented the gunboats from
going up the river by the forts while they
were in possession of the enemy. Farragut
was not there. Although Admiral Porter
telegraphed to me, which telegraph I have, that
he would be ready on the Bth of December—
and the troops were ready on that day—yet we
waited for the fleet at Fortress Monroe until the
14th day of December, when we sailed from Chesa-
peake Bay at 4 o'clock in the afternoon. We arrived
at the place of rendezvous, appointed by Admiral
Porter's printed order on the night of the 15th, and
there we waited three days, while the sun never
shone more brightly in the heavens, while the sea
was never calmer, while the wind was never more
zephyr like, until the 18th ; but still Admiral Porter
did not come, and the fort at that time was sub-
stantially undefended, as its reinforcements did not
arrive till the night of the 24th of December. Judge,
then, of my surprise when I read one despatch, first,
that the army was not ready soon enough ; in an-
other, that we sailed too soon ; and again, in another
despatch—for they seem to be fruitful of despatches
—that the powder-boat was prepared by me, and
that we waited for it. Fellow-citizens, I have lived
with you, man and boy, for 30 years, and .I am
going to live with you, if you will have me, for 30
years longer. (Great applause.) I have stood before
you many times, and I hope to stand before you
many times more, to advise with you upon that
which is for the good of the country ; but, often as
I have met you, no man can say that I ever misre-
presented a fact, and when I tell you that I never
saw that powder-boat; that all I had to do with it
was to order my ordnance officer to turn over to the
navy 150 tons of powder, and that the whole thing
was under the charge of the navy, and was arranged
exactly as the navy desired, when they wished and
how they wished, you can judge of the truth of the
despatch which states that I proposed the powder-
boat. Whoever states it, there is no truth in it. But
the powder-boat, it is said, was a failure. Granted,
as the powder in it never was wholly set on fire. It
was intended that there should be exploded more
powder than ever was exploded before. Powder
enough, in my judgment, to have done very great
damage, so much, in fact, that I have the written
advice of Admiral Porter that I should stand about
25 miles, let off the steam and draw the fire from the
boiler of my boat before it went off, lestthe explosion
ouldblow me up even there.(La,ughter and applause)
This suggestion, I say, I have in writing; yet Porter
would intimate I had too much faith in the efficacy
of the powderboat, and that he had no belief in ito
effect. Certainly, it is admitted that he got his fleet
so far away from the scene of the explosion that for
that or some other reason he could not get back
again under ten hours thereafter to fire the first shot
at the fort after the powder-boat exploded. There
was a very large quantity of potvder, and I am still
confident that if it had gone off it would have done
great damage. It was intended to place it in bags
with fuses running all through it, so that it might be
instantaneously exploded in every part. But how
was it done ? The clock work, the candles, the
fuses, everything prepared to ignite it, failed, and
the only way that it was got off at all was to set fire
to the ship at the bow and let it burn up to one end
of the mass of powder, the explosion of which sent
the other part into the water without being burnt.
So that, in my belief, not more than one-tenth of
the powder on board ever did burn, making an ex-
plosion indeed which is described as hardly more
than would have been felt from a 15-inch gun. You
see, therefore, the experiment was not tried. Some
day it may be. At all events the explosion, such as
it was, did not hurt, because I was 65 miles off, in
the harbour of Beaufort, coaling and watering my
transports after the storm, relying upon the promise
of Admiral Porter, made to my officers, 'that he
would give me notice, so that I could be present with
the troops when it should be determined to blow up
the powder-ship, to land and attack the fort under
cover of the injury and demoralisation caused by
the explosion ; yet the admiral blew it up, when he
knew I was 65 miles off, out of tender consideration
for my safety, I suppose, for I know no other reason
why he should have failed to keep his promise, except
perhaps believing that the powder-boat would blow
up a steamboat 25 miles off. The admiral supposed
it would utterly demolish the fort and garrison, and
he would only have to land his marines, and put on
the works David Porter, his " X" mark, and hand
it over to the army when they arrived, with a
claim for prize money. Let me say a word or two
about the explosion. In the first place, the powder
was expected to at least paralyse the men in the for-
tification, and it was intended that the army should
thereupon immediately land, and take possession of
the work. Such being the plan, why explode the
powder when the army was 65 miles off ? Again,
the time for the explosion was to be so chosen that
if it paralysed the men or did any damage to the
works, it might be promptly taken advantage of by
landing the army and an attack by the navy ;_why,
wh
then, blow up the powder at 1 o'clock at night, yet'
yet
fail to fire even the first gun from the navy until
12
o'clock next day, thus giving the enemy II hours to
get over being stunned and to repair any damages
that might have been caused by the explosion? Well,
a bombardment was opened upon Fort Fisher, and
it seemed to be conducted with considerable skill,
the fire being directed with considerable accuracy.
This for one day. Arriving at night, I sent my
staff officer to Admiral Porter to say that I would
consult with him about the attack to be made in
the morning of the next day. The admiral sent me
word that he was tired, and could not see me that
night, but that he would see me or my officers as
early the next morning as we were ready. Intend-
inghdto,
in
day's work before us, we . ,
to attack a fort, and hdiadvinasg,
waes
gweenetrhaolluyg
Malvern at 6
the
board the
Generals Weitzel
aLnodwecllo,msgettoacbok uwteinttatondayblci,
o'clock, but the
admiral was not up. They arranged,
however, that we should attack at 8 o'clock, but it
was 12 o'clock before the navy reported that they
had covered the shore so that we could make a land-
ing. I landed 2,200 men. It was a beautiful
smooth sea when we landed, but a storm was coming
on, and within eight hours after we began landing
the surf rolled so high upon that beach that no man
could get on or off. Not a gun had been landed
s er save
that I boat howitzers. I sent the ablest engineer
by
Grant, who had staff of
General Lieutenant- C ol on el Comstock,
been detailed
engineer of the
by the lieutenant_upon this expedittenneral himself to go with me
those two officers on 'shoarnd who did go. I sent
to me that the face of e and they both reported
the fort was uninjured,

and that in their judgment it was useless to assault. Judge,
then, whether I was derelict in my duty to my superiors
and to the country, and whether I ought to be hounded
down, and a price almost set upon my head, like a wolf
because I did not order an assault which two of the best
engineer officers in the United States advised me not to
make, and in reference to which one of them said to me, I
use his very expression. If you order it, general, it will be
murder.' Suppose I had made :that assault, after these
well-instructed officers had advised me against it, and it
had failed, ought not Ito have been tried for murder ? And
I should have been guilty of that crime in the sight of my
God and in the eyes of every honest man. Every one
would have a right to join in the cry in that case. Ah, he
was a volunteer general; he would not take the goad.ad-
vice offered to him by well-instructed army officers. Rash
fool, see the result. You, sir, who had lost a brother—
you, madam, who had lost a son in such an assault, could
I have looked you in the face if I had ordered it ? Again,
it has been said that I was not to go with the expedition—
that it was to be commanded by General Weitzel. Upon
that question I might shelter myself under the fact that the
department under my command was the department of
Virginia and North Carolina, and that the operations were
within my department, and so I had a right to go. But I
scorn all subterfuge or indirection. I accompanied the ex-
pedition with the full knowledge and consent of General
Grant, verbally given. Nay more, if you will examine his
orders for the expedition to me, you will see that he says,

' The execution of the details of this order is entrusted to
you and subordinate officers under your command, not to
Gen. Weitzel alone.' Still further, as I have said, Lieut.-Col.
Comstock, engineer of General Grant's staff, was by him-
self in person detailed to go with me upon that expedition,
and left General Grant's headquarters to go with me down
the river on the same boat when I started on the expedi-
tion. Again, I lay at Fortress Monroe from the 9th of
December till the 14th, receiving frequent telegrams from
General Grant, which have been published, while my
answers have been suppressed. If you will read these tele-
grams you will see that each and every one of them says,
When will you get off ?"When will your expedition
sail?' and though I have had frequent conversations with
Gen. Grant upon this, for me, unhappy expedition, yet
never by letter, despatch, or by word, has Gen. Grant inti-
mated to me that he did not expect me to accompany the
expedition, or chide me for going with it. And last of all,
on the 20th day of December, while I lay in Beaufort har-
bour, as commander of the expedition, I sent a report of
progress to Gen. Grant, which he forwarded to Washington
without a word of dissent that I was not duly authorised
commander of the expedition. The first intimation from
any quarter that I ever had that I was not properly there
was when I read in the New York Herald an endorsement
upon my official report, which endorsement is in the hand-
writing of a staff officer of Gen. Grant, and was not filed in
the War-office till seven days after Gen. Grant's letters to
the President, asking for my relief upon other grounds than
any action of mine in regard to the Wilmington expedition,
but which reasons I am not permitted to state to you, and
five days after my farewell order to the Army of the James,
the context of which may have been misunderstood, and
possibly given offence. What was done there was exactly
what Gen. Weitzel advised. Why was it worse for me to do
what Gen. Weitzel advised and thought right to be done
than it would have been for him to do the same thing him-
self if he had been there alone? Answer me this and I will
take the blame. Now, let us see what it is to assault a fort.
Let us see what the commanding general and admiral has
to do in sueh a case. At Fort Fisher the admiral was on
board his vessel. I was on mine quite as near the fort as he
was, and that was not at all too near for either of us. Upon
such an occasion the only duty of a commanding officer, stand-
ing at a safe distance with his glass in his hand, is to pass
his eye over the whole field, and when he thinks the time
has come to say to his men, "Forward, make the assault!"
Certainly it does not require much personal courage in a
man to give such an order; but it does require some little
courage to follow the dictate of one's own judgment and
save the lives of his men, when that judgment tells him
that to order an assault would be to sacrifice them. This
is indeed trial—this is temptation ! At Fort Fisher I did
my duty, and as God lives and I live, if it all had to be re-
peated, with all the knowledge I now have, even unto the
stream of obloquy pouring upon my head, as it has poured
ever since, I would do so again, if He would give me
strength in answer to my prayer, Lead me not into
temptation,' to act according to the dictates of my con-
science and judgment, for there was every temptation
to make the assault at Fort Fisher, and thus take
the chance to win honour and glory at the sacrifice of
my men, and none to forbear to make it and come away.
(Great cheering.) But some gentleman may say, why,
having determined not to make the assault, did you not
stay there and entrench ? For three reasons. Let us
examine them in a few minutes. But first bear in mind
that I have not gone into the newspapers in explanation of
this subject, I have not been porter or reporter of it again
and again. (Laughter.) No, I have come home here to
my neighbours, whose hands I have taken in friendship,
with whom I must live, whose children are to grow up with
mine, and here I make the explanations that I have to
make, then caring not a rappee what is thought of the mat-
ter elsewhere. I have encountered worse storms than this
before, and have lived through them, and I shall live
through this also. (Good, good, and cheers.) Now, then,-
why did_ I not be upon the beach ? In the first place,
I 'had made only a partial landing of one-third of my
men, and none of my artillery. The sea arose so high
that no more men or guns could be landed, and you
will see that the rebel General Whiting, in his report,
states that a great storm came up that night, which injured
his garrison very much. The garrison having been under
arms all night to meet our approach; I put on shore 2,200
men, and eight hours afterwards the storm was so severe
that I could not get a gun or even a box of bread on shore
except by heading the latter up tight in-a cask and sending
it ashore on a raft. Again, if you will look in one of
Admiral Porter's last reports, you will see that he having
expended in the bombardment almost the last shot and
shell which I had with me, I found it necessary to go back
to Beaufort to get a new supply. I should have looked very
well, would I not, planting myself upon that beach with a
handful of men, with a body of the enemy behind me
(Hoke's division from Richmond), larger than my whole
army, my only support being a navy without ammunition,
which was as useless and idle as a 'painted ship upon a
painted ocean.' It took Admiral Porter until the 14th of
January (18 days) to get back from Beaufort with his new
supply of ammunition, and if my troops had stayed there
and waited for him, what do you suppose would have hap-
pened to us during the time that he was away ? But again,
if nothing was to be gained by it, what was the use of
staying there at all, and hazarding my men ? I had no
siege train, yet Lieut.-General Grant agrees that my pre-
parations and instructions were all correct. I could not
besiege the fort. I had only 12 light guns, and I had 17
heavy guns bearing upon me from the fort ; therefore, I
could not besiege. What, then, could Ido ? Perhaps you
will say that I might have stayed there and tried to stop
up the river, by opening my guns upon blockade-runners
as they passed up and down the river ; and I know it
seems so from the map; but there was a mile and a half of
'harsh between me and the river, and notwithstanding all
that I could have done the enemy could have reinforced
and provisioned Fort Fisher at pleasure, and landed men
on all sides of me, and the blockade-runners could have
passed backward and forward almost as freely as the rebel
rams passed up and down the James River the other day in
spite of the navy. (Laughter.) What else could I have
done ? Ought Ito have stayed there and maintained a
landing, so that troops could be landed again ? The fact
is, I saw that at any time when there was a smooth
sea a landing could be easily effected under cover of
the guns of the navy ; and you remember that General
Terry landed his troops without the loss of a man. What,
then, was the use of my staying there ? There was
none. But, besides, Hoke's division was there ; I captured
65 of them, and if I had stayed there I would have been
exposed to an overwhelming attack, and lost my men with-
out benefit to the service. Besides, by staying there I only
kept the enemy there; by going away the enemy went
away, supposing the attack to be abandoned,.and-thus we
found no sufficient force to oppose General Terry. And
now, fellow-citizens, let me state, speaking with the full
knowledge that what I say is to be heard abroad over the
country, that I am here to-day on the written letter of the
lieutenant-general to the President for my relief, in which
letter no word is said of Fort Fisher, nor is there anything
alleged against me in relation to the Wilmington expedi-
tion as the reason for my being here now, instead of under
the log roof of my log cabin, about seven miles from Rich-
mond, where I have spent most of the winter up to this
time. I repeat it, no word is said of Fort Fisher, no word
is said of Wilmington, no blame on account of Wilmington
is laid upon me in that letter asking for my relief. Why I
ra g notet
soundam here I cannot tell you now, because I am not permitted
to give the reasons until it shall please the War Depart-
ment to let them be published. I have applied to have
their
uh reasonsrand a
nublished, but the application has not yet
been as granted, and in the meantime, lam not Porter, I
e
(Laughter
elaini
understandthe pmpylaouwsen.) I
I trumpet—at
thatenle, alstelaaigmainthsteocrrdeedirst:
that lorythoferneotarhe taviiinogseaswshaoulwteedreFaomrtoFng my
Fisher.
old
friends in politics, but who, unfortunately have lately gone
upon the other side, who sneer at me as the hero of Big
Q
Bethel and Fort Fisher. I accept the title ; they d me
honour overmuch. What was Big Bethel ? It was askir-
, mish, in which twenty-five men were killed and wounded.
; But Big Bethel was not Bull Run ; Big Bethel was not
, Fair Oaks; Big Bethel was not Seven Pines; Big Bethel
was not the Chickahominy. Big Bethel was a failure,
but it was no disaster. No West Point general com-
manded there. I claim credit for this, that when we of the
volunteer army of the United States make failures we
do not make disasters. Stop a moment and compare the
battles I have named with Big Bethel. Why, at these there
were more men slaughtered and homes made desolate than
there were leaves on the trees and the forest around Big
Bethel, not to be numbered. But lam the hero of Fort
Fisher, too. Well, Fort Fisher is not Fredericksburg ;
Fort Fisher was not Chaneellorsville ; Fort Fisher was not
the Wilderness ; Fort Fisher was not Cold Harbour. A
volunteer general commanded at Fort Fisher at each attack.
One was without result, but no disaster. The last was a
tsueecr ocesssidieArs. All honourAgain
it is
to gencheralargTederlrlypoann
udshtihsabtrawvee
divodlunna-t
make so big a hole in the Dutch Gap Canal as we ought to