The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1861-03-26

Correspondence Of the London Tines
GAETA AFTER ITS FALL-THE TERRIBL II
EFFECTS OF WAR

EFFECTS OF WAR.
G .As teo. 70 went yesterday,
OF the battered place. had hitherto found plea.
sure rather in viewing batteries, roads, trenches
and parallels, than in contemplating the havoc and
desolaton which were the result of those ingenious
contrlvances. | went over the ground with all
diligence, nevertheless. Gaeta is not Gibraltar
the hill is not steep, the rock not SO firm the
batteries not so cunningly screened from view
above all things the isthmus is not so long t. e
point OF attack not so far removed, vet there is
enough in the insulated ground, in the cramped mn
town, in the sandy isthmus, in the general look
OF one place to remind one of the appearance of the
other.
N o part OF the whole mass of town fortress and
hill has entirely escaped the ravage Of the artillery
which Numbered at it from the land side Where
the cannon ball did not hit point blank, there the
oomo-shel mt with dire effect. The besiegers
reckon they fired, during the whole siege about
5o,ooo shot; $4,000 in one day alone the 22nd of
January. 1t is hardly an exaggel alton to saw that
you may almost tell the effect of each proiectile:
you almost come to the conclusion that moi one If
them mrs been hurled in vain. The siege Of Gaeta
Is, believe the first instance in which rifled can
non has been applied on large scale to the bat
tering of walls and bastions
, Inc Piedmontese, as | told you, had reared so of
these new war engines on their batteries and mo
IN an who has not seen it can believe the havoc thew
have caused. | already described to Won the con-
dtion of that part of the town had already visit
ed, that narrow slip stretching from the town gate
10 the Royal Palace. The houses in this part may
be said to be either altogether blown away or
struck up all OF a heap; the batteries lnino the
sea, before these houses, and even in some instan
ces, the classmates under them, are a mass of
crum63ing ruins. The Royal Palace, and the high
er and lover town before it. are still standing. I'm,
there hardly building, lofty or lowly, whether
utting out or shrinking back, that may be said to
be unscathed. saw CONGRATULATIONS holes tbrouoh
the roof the Catholic Church, and more than one
of its windows smashed out of all shane. As I
assembled the tha
cling walls, the whole mass nearly up to the summit
was, here and there, ploughed up, leveIled down
torn asunder, destroyed, with violence exceeding
all could Imagine as the effect of mere human
contrlyance. The whole hill, up to the foot of
koand's Tower, was strewn with proiectes, The
round tower itself was hit in more than one snot
and, although a small battery of four ri1ed can
non, reared by the Neapotans on the Interest
mad not suffered, yet there was no evidence chat
no inch of ground within the peninsula of G3eta
might be considered as safe from the enemy's fire
walked half way down the hill to the Queens
| battery, and there may say one out of four of
mem were dlsmounted, and the parapets were
everywhere grievously damaged; but | proceeded
to the lower bastions, which had evidently borne
the brunt of the attack, and there is no exappera
ton IN saying that the original design of the works
Is scarcely any longer to be recognized, so misera-
bly, the gabions, sandbags, walls parapets cannon
aifuts and the ground they stood on, have been
blown, and, as it were, winnowed together. have
seen such havoc caused in an Italian VINEYARD or
sdIueh ny some furious hallStorm, where a few
stumps OF trees are all that remain of what was half
an hour before rank mass ofluxurant vegetation,
but could not, repeat, believe that fortress or
part of it could be "crumbed up as an old piece
OF paper" as | saw Gaeta yesterday There is
something bewiIdering, appalling in the sight ESQ
extensive wreck; the buildings, storehouses bar
racks sheds, chapelS, fountains, small suburbs
converts and churches which are scattered here
and there between and behind those
lower bastions have been in many instances not
only crushed and pounded to mere shapeless frag-
ments to atoms, but they have been actually swept
away. Stone or brick, iron or mud, the softest
or the hardest material, equally gave way; the
proJectile seemed to bring destruction with it in
the very wind that encompassed it. Its effect was
not batering merely, but blasting.