MILITARY OCCUPATION OF ANNAPOLIS, Md.
April 21, 1861.
On the 18th of April, the Eighth Massachusetts regiment, under the command of General Butler, left Boston for Washington. On arriving at Philadelphia, he ascertained that all communication with Washington by the ordinary line of travel through Baltimore had been cut off, and telegraphic operations suspended. He proceeded to the Susquehanna river, and at Perryville seized the immense ferry-boat “Maryland,” belonging to the railroad company, and steamed with his regiment for Annapolis. Through the supposed treachery of the pilot, the boat was grounded on the bar before that place, and they were detained over night. The arrival of troops at this point proved of vital importance. A conspiracy had been formed by a band of secessionists to seize the old frigate Constitution, which lay moored at the wharf of the Naval Academy at that place, being in service as a school for the cadets. Captain Devereux, with his company, was ordered to take possession of the noble old craft, which was promptly done, and the vessel towed to a safe distance from the landing. Governor Hicks, of Maryland, hearing of their arrival, sent a protest against troops being landed at that place.
On Monday, the 22d, the troops landed at the Naval Academy, followed by the New York Seventh regiment, which had just arrived on board the steamer Boston, from Philadelphia, by the help of which vessel the Maryland was enabled to get off the bar.
In order to insure the ready transportation of troops and provisions which were to follow him by the same route, General Butler seized several vessels in the neighborhood, and promptly entered them into the United States service. Meantime a Pennsylvania regiment had arrived at Havre de Grace, and, anticipating the speedy accession of reinforcements from New York by water, three companies of the Eighth Massachusetts were detached as an engineer corps to repair the road to the Annapolis and Elk Ridge Railroad, of which General Butler had taken military possession.
The Seventy-first New York and other regiments having arrived during the night of April 23d, early on the following morning the Seventh regiment, from New York, took up its line of march on the track to Washington Junction. A member of this regiment, young O’Brien the poet, pays a merited tribute to the brave men who preceded them:
On the morning of the 22d we were in sight of Annapolis, off which the Constitution was lying, and there found the Eighth regiment of Massachusetts volunteers on board the Maryland. They were aground, owing, it is supposed, to the treachery of the captain, whom they put in irons and wanted to hang. I regret to say that they did not do it. During the greater portion of that forenoon we were occupied in trying to get the Maryland off the sand-bar on which she was grounded. From our decks we could see the men in file trying to rock her, so as to facilitate our tugging. These men were without water and without food, were well-conducted and uncomplaining, and behaved in all respects like heroes. They were under the command of Colonel Butler, and I regret that that gentleman did not care more for the comforts of men whose subsequent pluck proved that nothing was too good for them.
On the afternoon of the 22d we landed at the Annapolis dock, after having spent hours in trying to relieve the Maryland. For the first time in his life your correspondent was put to work to roll flour-barrels. He was entrusted with the honorable and onerous duty of transporting stores from the steamer to the dock. Later still he descended to the position of mess servant, when, in company with gentlemen well known in Broadway for immaculate kids, he had the honor of attending on his company with buckets of cooked meat and crackers—the only difference between him and Co. and the ordinary waiter being, that the former were civil.
We were quartered in the buildings belonging to the Naval School at Annapolis. I had a bunking-place in what is there called a fort, which is a rickety structure that a lucifer match would set on fire, but furnished with imposing guns. I suppose it was merely built to practice the cadets, because as a defence it is worthless. The same evening boats were sent off from the yard, and towards nightfall the Massachusetts men landed, fagged, hungry, thirsty, but indomitable.
The two days that we remained at Annapolis were welcome. We had been without a fair night’s sleep since we left New York, and even the hard quarters we had there were a luxury compared to the dirty decks of the Boston. Besides, there were natural attractions. The grounds are very prettily laid out, and in the course of my experience I never saw a handsomer or better bred set of young men than the cadets. Twenty had left the school owing to political convictions. The remainder are sound Union fellows, eager to prove their devotion to the flag. After spending a delightful time in the Navy School, resting and amusing ourselves, our repose was disturbed at 9 P. M., April 23, by rockets being thrown up in the bay. The men were scattered all over the grounds; some in bed, others walking or smoking, all more or less undressed. The rockets being of a suspicious character, it was conjectured that a Southern fleet was outside, and our drummer beat the rollcall to arms. From the stroke of the drum until the time that every man, fully equipped and in fighting order, was in the ranks, was exactly, by watch, seven minutes. The alarm, however, proved to be false, the vessels in the offing proving to be laden with the Seventy-first and other New York regiments; so that, after an unpremeditated trial of our readiness for action, we were permitted to retire to our couches, which means, permit me to say, a blanket on the floor, with a military overcoat over you, and a nasal concert all around you, that, in noise and number, outvies Musard’s concerts monstres.