The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1892-05-19

Here's a case in point an affair quite un-
known, although it was in its way one or
the most desperate and sanguine III our
annals. Out of a gunboat's crew of lf3
souls, that drove wedgelike into one corner
of the fight, 125 persisted and % were
wounded. 1t was in the contest for Arkan-
sas, the second year of the civil war.
When the Union rams and gunboats of
Ellet and Davis had cleared out the Con-
federate feet on the Mississippi above
Vicksburg the rivers flowing in from
Arkansas offered refuge to every floating
thing that escaped humiliation at their
hands. Gen. T. c. Hindman command
ed what there was of the Confed-
eracy in Arkansas, and surmising that
the Union gunboats might take a no
ton to inspect the interior Of his
bailiwick, he ordered that a stand
be made at the bluffs on the White river
below ST. Charles, point 100 miles from
the mouth of the Mississippi. He sent to
the spot two gunboatS, the Pontchartrain
and Maurepas, and 100 men-thirty-five of
them armed. The thirty-fve rifles were
all that could be scraped together for
the purpose. At the same time he ordered
Texas regiment led by Col. Allison Mel
son, then on its way from the Lone Star
State to re-enforce him, to proceed to the
same point. Capt. A. S. Williams, an en-
gineer officer, was put in command of the
100 men, the unarmed ones to aid in OBJ
structing the channel.
On the 10th of June the Union ironclads
Mound City and ST Louis and the wooden
gunboats Conestoga and Tyler, under Com
mander A H. Kitty, of the Mound City,
onH ha mr. VT Indiana la1
by Col G. n Fitch, were slowly ascending
the river just below St. Charles. The in
spiring genius on the Confederate side was
Capt. Joseph Fry, an old United States
naval officer, who resigned in 1861 to fol
low the fortunes of his state, Louisiana, in
the rebellion. He was a gallant fellow,
tall, well proportional handsome, intelli
gent, modest and brave, man with past
history and fated future.
The approach of Kilty's fleet took the
party at St. Charles by surprise. Nelson
was not on hand with his Texans; in fact
he had been detained up the river waiting
for ammunition, which had yet to be man
ufactured out of lead gathered in bits from
the country at large. He was known to
be en- route, however, making all haste to
the rendezvous, and Fry decided to fight if
dDUdCK6u. "A lew uOurS DELAY
change the odds that were for the moment
dead against him. His total force, includ-
ing Capt. Williams thirty-fve riflemen,
was ia men, seventynine of them seamen
on the gunboats Pontchartrain and Maui
repas. The sailors were armed with re-
volvers only. The Pontchartrain carried
two 32-pounder rifles and these were put
into battery on the bluffs. Lieut.. D. W.
Huntington, of the Pontchartrain, com
manded the battery and worked it with
the crew of his vessel. About 400 yards
below Dunnington's battery, Capt. Fry,
placed four guns from his own vessel, the
Maurepas, in battery, and short distance
below that Capt. Williams stationed his
thirty-five riflemen to act as sharpshooters.
This presented three obstacles to the ap-
proach of kilty's feet in ascending the
narrow channel between the bluffs. Still
another was added above the batteries
Capt. Williams had driven some piles in
the channel, intending if time allowed to
extend the barrier from shore to shore.
The sudden appearance of the enemy put
a stop to that work, and Capt. Fry sunk