ISLAND No. 10.
When the necessity of an early evacuation of Columbus became apparent to the rebel leaders, they commenced the fortification of Island No. 10, in the Mississippi river, forty-five miles below Columbus and twenty-six from Hickman. It is located 250 miles below St. Louis and 997 from New Orleans; and when chosen by the secessionists it was deemed impregnable. The earthworks were constructed with great skill, and well calculated to resist any assault which could be made from the river above, while they held undisputed control of the navigation below, and had at their command a formidable fleet of gunboats. New Madrid, on the Missouri shore of the river, a few miles below, was fortified and garrisoned by rebel troops, and they had easy communication and abundant facilities for supplies and reinforcements, if needed.
The energy and perseverance of General Pope, which enabled him, despite the most serious obstacles, to invest and capture the town of New Madrid, was the first note of warning received by the rebels at Island No. 10 that their position was no longer tenable.
The topography of the peninsula on the Tennessee shore, immediately back of the island, where most of the rebel forces were located, is very peculiar; and if the disadvantages of position which the course of events gradually unfolded could have been foreseen, the site would never have been selected. Commencing at a point about a mile and a half above the island is a range of high land, which extends back south-eastwardly to Reelfoot Lake, a distance of four miles. This lake, in the rear of the peninsula, is fifteen miles in length, and terminates in a swamp, which extends south of Tiptonville, a town on the river bank, below the peninsula. The swamp at that time varied in width from one and a half to eight miles, its narrowest point being four miles above Tiptonville, where the rebels had prepared a corduroy road and bridge, as a means of escape from their position, should retreat by land become necessary.
On the 15th of March, the gun and mortar-boats comprising the fleet of Commodore Foote commenced the investment and bombardment of Island No. 10, and the rebel batteries and camps at the adjacent peninsula on the Tennessee shore.
The fleet consisted of eleven gunboats, and twelve mortar-boats, each of the latter carrying one immense mortar, throwing a shell of two hundred and twenty pounds weight a distance of from two to three miles. The Commodore engaged the rebel batteries almost daily for three weeks, deeming it imprudent to risk the destruction of his vessels by close action, as any misfortune to them would have placed all the towns on the Upper Mississippi at the mercy of the armed steamers of the enemy.
The rebels had eighty guns of heavy calibre in the batteries on the island and the adjacent peninsula, while the iron-clad ram Manassas, and a fleet of twenty vessels—gunboats, steamers and transports, were moored under their guns, prepared to act as opportunity or emergency might require.
One or more gunboats would advance to attack a shore battery from the right hand of the river—or engage the water battery on the island, approaching from the left bank. The mortars kept continually changing positions, generally hugging the shore on the left bank where the rebel batteries could not reach them, as they were covered by a promontory, or neck of land, made by the bend of the river; and their fire was kept up so unceasingly, that frequently a mortar-shell was thrown every hour during the night.
At two o’clock on the morning of April 1, a most daring enterprise on the part of Colonel Roberts, of the Forty-second Illinois regiment, was crowned with success. Taking advantage of a severe storm while the elements were raging furiously, and a dreadful hurricane, accompanied with thunder and lightning, was sweeping the earth and driving the vessels from their moorings, he started with forty picked men, in six yawl boats, and with muffled oars rowed towards the upper water battery on Island No. 10, keeping close to the edge of the river bank. The boats, favored by the intense darkness, approached within a few rods of the battery, when a blinding sheet of lightning flashed across the water, revealing the adventurous party to the enemy’s sentinels. The dark object looming out from the storm alarmed the sentinels, who fired wildly and at random, fleeing with the first discharge. The Union boats made no reply. A few minutes more brought them to the slope of the earthworks, and the men at once sprung over the parapet. In less than five minutes the huge guns on the battery were securely spiked. They were all of large calibre, consisting of two 64, two 80-pounders and one splendid 9-inch pivot gun. Their desperate work accomplished, the boats returned safely to the fleet, having performed a perilous exploit with wonderful success.