Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1863-04-15
WORCE S Err:
WEDNESDAY, APRIL Is. 1868.


Affairs In Charleston HarbOr.
At the date of the last reports from Charles
ton, CAST Saturday, April I'D our iron fleet
was still at anchor within the bar. Report
says, the attack was to be renewed. Of
course renewal of the attack depends on the
success of admiral Dupont and his officers in
devising means to remove tue Instructions in
the channel. A correspondent of the New
York Times gives the following graphic ac-
count of the attack on the forts, and of the
encounter of the iron-clads with the obstruc-
tons which stopped their progress towards the
city: =
"Slowly the leading vessel, followed by the
other eight iron-clads, moves up the main
ship channel-the shore of Morris Island
against which from our point of view they
seem to rest forming fixed point, by which
we measure the progress of the fleet. The
first battery to whose fire it will be exposed is
fort Wagner, and one fixes his eye on it and
on the Weehawken, approaching nearer and
nearer, for the fleet will there undergo its first
fiery baptism. Now then she comes within
range OF the fort no fire. She passes across
it, still no fire The second ship comes up,
and meets the same silent reception; and 50
on, one by one, till, with the Keokuk, the
whole nine file by without single shot from
this seemingly formidable work.
"Meantime, while the fleet is passing Wag-
ener unmolested, the leading vessel has come
up with the next rebel work-battery Bee.
The same silent reception for her: the same
silent reception for the whole fleet? WHAT'S
the meaning Of this? The enemy is obviously
holding back his fire until he can deliver it
with the greatest possible effect. The line
has now passed across the front of Morris Isl
and and rounds to make the entrance of the
harbor, coming up within the circle of the
IRE OF fort Sumter and the batteries on Suli-
vans Island The suspense becomes painful.
There was silence deep as death,
Ana the Doidest held their breath
For awhile
sin an instant a hollow square of smoke
rises from the top of Sumter-a hollow square
OF hame shoots up-a crash counterfeiting
'JoVes dread clamors' bursts on the ear and
whole brOadslde streams down from the bar
bette guns. 1t Is precisely four minutes past
three in the afternoon. While the Weehaw
ken is receiving this fire, the others are grad
ually coming up to the same position; but the
leading vessel, instead OF passing on above
Sumter so as to place herself in the prescribed
station opposite the northwest face, sheers off
to the right, and hangs cstopped between
Sumter and Moultriel
our point OF view no cause for this unlocked
for development can be perceived, but to
those on the Weehawken it is only too appar-
ent. stretching from a point close to the
northeastern angle OF fort Sumter completely
across the. channel to fort Moultrie, is a stout
hawser floating ON lager beer casks, on which
are hung nets, seines and cables strung with
torpedOeS. The vessel comes afoul of this.
Wmsks up the nasty entanglements with its
propeller, is thus deprived of all motive power
and Is at the mercy OF the current, to be drift
ed ashore into the hands of the rebels. If
this fatality was not actually really realized |
Ii vaPtaIns = ~ ~ 'iis ~
ships, who, when their vessels were Just on
the point OF touling, sheered off, and saved
themselves and the fleet.
''The right hand channel being thus OBJ
structed, it remains to see what can be done
with the left, between Sumter and Cummings
Point. But this, too, is still more etfectuay
blockaded by row of piles, rising ten feet
above the water, and extending across the
whole width OF the passage. Looking up the
harbor, another row of piles discloses itself
stretching across from fort Ripley on the mid
die ground to fort Johnson 1t does not
stretch entirely across, however, for midway
is an opening, inviting the passage of the feet.
Submerged in the water, underneath that
opening, Is torpedo filled with-incredible
though the statement may seem, it is an actu-
al fact-fre thousand pounds of powder!
Furthermore, above this first line of piles is
second, and above the second third while
above all, and just behind the upper line of
distractions, are the three rebel iron clads, |
drawn up in battle array, and vomiting huge |
clouds of smoke.
"Y on can readily conceive that this unlock |
editor eStoppel utterly deranged the original |
intentions. The rebels were quite as well
aware as we that the northwest face of Sum-
ter is its weakest point; that it was, in fact,
never finished, and therefore, that it W ould be
first attacked; and they used every means
which admirable engineering skill could sug-
gest to prevent our reaching it."