As soon as she was raised, she was brought to Charleston, and a few days after her acceptance by General Beauregard, Lieutenant Payne, of the Confederate Navy, volunteered with a crew of six men to man her and attack the Federal fleet off Charleston. While he had her at Fort Johnson, on James Island, and was making preparations for the attack, one night as she was lying at the wharf the swell of a passing steamer filled her, and she went to the bottom, carrying with her and drowning the six men. Lieutenant Payne happened to be near an open manhole at the moment, and thus he alone escaped. Notwithstanding the evidently fatal characteristics of this boat, as soon as she was raised another crew of six men volunteered under Payne and took charge of her. But only a week afterwards an exactly similar accident happened while she was alongside the wharf at Fort Sumter, and only Payne and two of his men escaped.
H. L. Hundley, her builder in Mobile, now believed that the crews did not understand how to manage the "Fish," and came on to Charleston to see if he could not show how it should be done. A Lieutenant Dixon, of Alabama, had made several successful experiments with the boat in Mobile Bay, and he also came on, and was put in charge, with a volunteer crew, and made several successful dives in the harbor. But one day, the day on which I saw the boat, Hundley himself took it into Stono River to practice her crew. She went down all right, but did not come up, and when she was searched for, found and raised to the surface, all of her crew were dead, asphyxiated as others had been.
After the boat was brought up to Charleston, several successful experiments were made with her, until she attempted to dive under the Confederate receiving ship Indian Chief, when she got entangled with an anchor chain and went to the bottom, and remained there until she was raised with every one of her crew dead, as were their predecessors.
No sooner had she been raised than a number of men begged to be allowed to give her another trial, and Lieutenant Dixon was given permission to use her in an attack on the U. S. S. Housatonic, a new gunboat that lay off Beach Inlet on the bar, on the condition that she should not be used as a submarine vessel, but only on the surface with a spar torpedo. On February 17, 1864, Lieutenant Dixon, with a crew of six men, made their way with the boat through the creeks behind Sullivan's Island to the inlet. The night was not very dark, and the Housatonic easily could be perceived lying at anchor, unmindful of danger. The "Fish" went direct for her victim, and her torpedo striking the side tore a tremendous hole in the Housatonic, which sank to the bottom in about four minutes. But as the water was not very deep her masts remained above water, and all of the crew, except four or five saved themselves by climbing and clinging to them. But the "Fish" was not seen again. From some unknown cause she again sank, and all her crew perished. Several years after the war, when the government was clearing the wrecks and obstructions out of Charleston harbor, the divers visited the scene of this attack, and on the sandy bottom of the sea found the hulk of the Housatonic, and alongside of her the shell of the "Fish." Within the latter were the skeletons of her devoted crew.
This submarine torpedo boat must not be confused with the surface ones, called "Davids," that were first built and used at Charleston in the fall of 1863. These "Davids" were cigar-shaped crafts about 30 feet long, and propelled by miniature steam engines; and they each carried a torpedo at the end of a spar in the bow. There were several of them at Charleston and points along the coast.
In March, 1864, I had the only violent illness I had during my service, until at the end, a year later, and being given a thirty-day furlough went up to Sumter, where I had some near relatives. Here I stayed a couple of weeks, and then went over to Aiken, where my parents and sisters resided. Although the distance from Sumter to Aiken was only about 135 miles, the railway trains took seventeen hours to make the distance. It is hard to realize now the delays and discomforts of travel in the South in 1864. With worn-out tracks and roadbeds, dilapidated engines and cars, it is remarkable that the railway trains were able to run at all. On this occasion, which was typical of travel then, I left Sumter at 10 o'clock p. m., and just before reaching Kingsville the engine ran off the track from a worn-out rail. Two hours or more were spent in prying it back. Then shortly after the train stopped in a piece of woodland, and the fireman and train hands took their axes and spent an hour cutting wood and putting it on the tender. So it was full daylight when we reached Kingsville. From there all went well until after passing Branchville the engine broke one of its connecting rods, and we had to wait until another engine could be got from Branchville. Some miles farther up the road the train again stopped, and the hands went into the woods and cut wood for the engine. Finally, at about four o'clock in the afternoon I arrived at Aiken. Here I remained for a fortnight, and then joined my command, which had just been ordered to Florida.
Early in the spring the Federals made an advance into Florida from Jacksonville, and a number of troops were sent from South Carolina to oppose them. Among them was our battery of artillery. We reached the section of the State threatened the day after the battle of Olustee, or Ocean Pond, and were then ordered back to Madison, where we encamped, and during our stay there of a couple of weeks were most hospitably treated by the ladies of the town.
This battle of Olustee was a very severe fight, and a bloody one, in which the Federals under General Seymour were routed by the Confederates under Gen. Pat. Finnigan and Gen. A. H. Colquitt. In this battle the Federal loss was about 1,900 men and the Confederate about 1,000. The obstinacy of the struggle may be appreciated when it is observed that, out of the total of 11,000 men engaged, the casualties amounted to 2,900, nearly 27 per cent. As I have said, our battery reached the scene after the battle, so we made no stay near Olustee, but retired to Madison. The wounded were all cared for at the wayside hospitals, and the dead white men of both sides buried; but the dead negroes were left where they fell. There had been several regiments of negroes in the Federal force, who as usual had been put into the front lines, and thus received the full effect of the Confederate fire. The field was dotted everywhere with dead negroes, who with the dead horses here and there soon created an intolerable stench, perceptible for half a mile or more. The hogs which roamed at large over the country were soon attracted to the spot and tore many of the bodies to pieces, feeding upon them. This field of death, enlivened by numbers of hogs grunting and squealing over their hideous meal, was one of the most repulsive sights I ever saw.
About the beginning of March our battery was ordered to Baldwin, about 9 miles from Jacksonville. Here we remained for nearly a month, and strange to say had a very uncomfortable time as far as food was concerned. The surrounding country was barren, swampy, and very thinly settled, so there was very little private foraging to be done and we had to suffer from the very scant rations served out by the commissary.
This department was in a very disorganized condition, probably because of the sudden massing of troops at an unexpected point; but the fact was that our men seldom got enough of even the coarsest food. Our battery horses were supplied with corn and forage, and on several occasions after going twenty-four hours without any food I made use of some opportunity to steal the horses' corn, and parched that for a meal.