Waterbury evening Democrat., 1903-03-16
[copyrlght,a 1908, by a L. Kilmer.l

A InAA SS 1x3OOt dltlOSL TWO yEAES
 N after tho dramatic surrender of
 "A Fort Sumter to the Confeder- ates. Federal fleet an Charles ton harbor made the first attempt to recover tho renowned citadel. Mere sentiment played no part in spurrlng Admiral Dupont to make the attack. While the officers and sailors of the fleet were stimulated by a latent de- sire to see the old flag floating once more from the staff where it had been humiliated April IA, 1861, that was not the end in view.
 Sumter was the key to Charleston harbor, and Charleston, in spite of the Federal blockade, was the chief entre- pot for the importation of foreign arms, munitions of war and many tie- cessities of life In the south. To reduce Sumter would be to reduce Charleston, and to wipe that from the list Of block ade running ports would come as a knife thrust into the vitals of the Confederacy.
 Briefly the delay in attacking Sumter was the invention of the ironclad. The victory of the little Monitor over the Merrimac in March, 1862, made every sailor envious of the armored ship. Big guns will batter down concrete para pets if they get near enough, but wood- en floating batteries were useless ma chimes to venture into the circle of fire which the Confederates could pour upon an attacking fleet from Sumter and the chain of land batteries around the harbor. The attacking guns must be protected by iron walls, and Du- pont waited for an ironc1ad fleet to make the first dash at Sumter.
 Nine new ironclads were on the scene some time before the attack. In order to test the new ships Dupont sent the Montauk, duplicate of the original monitor and commanded by her cap tain, John l.. Worden, to batter the mud walls of Fort McAllister, on the Georgia coast. The fort was not harmed in the encounter, but the Mon- tauk lived for hours under a rain of shots which barely dented her armor.
 Seven of the new ironclads were mon itors, each carrying one eleven inch and one fifteen inch gun in a single turret These were besides the Montauk the Weehawken, Captain John Rodgers, who had fought the wooden ship Gale na so gallantly under the guns of Dru- rys bluff, in James river, the year be- fore; the Passaic, Captain Percival Drayton, one of the heroes of the fight against forts at Hilton Head; the Cats kill, Commander c. w. Rodgers; the Nantucket, Commander D. McNeil Fairfax, and the Nahant, Commander J. A. Downes. In the fleet also were two experiments in ironclads, the most important being the New Ironsides, christened with the synonym of the celebrated frigite Constitution. The New Ironsides was an armored battle ship, something after the pattern of the Merrimac, except that she was not armed with ram, and her roof was fiat instead of sloping. She carried two 15O pounder pivot rifles and fourteen eleven inch guns in broadside. The oth- CT experiment, the Keokuk, Commander A. c. Rhhnd, was a double turret moni- tor of extra length and width.
 In the harbor the fleet was to run amuck in channel planted with rope
 
 does and face the fire of sixty nine guns which from batteries in front, to the right and to the left swept the sea. Dupont's orders to the ship command CTS were to pay no attention to any battery except Fort Sumter and to con- centrate the fire upon the center em- brasure of that work. The walls of the fort rose forty-fve feet above high water. They were built of the best Carolina gray brick laid with mortar, concrete of pounded oyster shells and cement and a still frmer concrete used for the embrasures, which would get the hardest blows in fight.
 Dupont proposed to head the line with Ironsides as his flagship, but his captains persuaded him to take the center, and the Weehawken led off. The batteries at the entrance to the channel paid no attention to the fleet as it passed silently on, steering for Sumter, but when the Weehawken came within range of Fort Mou1trie the Confederate and Palmetto flags of thirteen guns announced the open ing of the drama of Sumters new ca reer, her war upon the old flag. Fort Moultrie fired the first Shot, which the Weehawken answered. Then Sumter, Batteries Bee and Beauregard, Cum ming's Point and Battery Wagner opened fire. For wonder the Confed- crate commander in Charleston at the time was Beauregard, the original con- queror of Sumter, and so the same brain that had directed the fire of Moultrie and the batteries upon Major Anderson's garrison in April, 1861, now directed the bombardment poured upon the Federal fleet having Sumter for target.
 The first adventures came to the monitor Weehawken. Rodgers ran his ship close up to the rope Instructions between Sumter and Moultrie and got in the first Federal shot. Finding his ship in danger of being shared by the Instructions, the captain turned her about, fighting from the stern. As the vessel turned torpedo exploded under her bow, but did no damage beyond straining the iron.
 Dupont's flagship Ironsides was of |. GzL |.