General Hunter courteously assigned the steamer Nantucket to the gentlemen connected with the press, giving them complete control of the steamer, to go where they pleased, knowing that there was an intense desire not only in the North, but throughout the world, to know the result of the first contest between ironclads and fortifications. The Nantucket was a small side-wheel steamer of light draft, and we were able to run in and out over the bar at will. Just before the signal was given for the advance we ran alongside the flag-ship. The crew were hard at work hoisting shot and shells from the hold to the deck. The upper deck was bedded with sand-bags, the pilot-house wrapped with cable. All the light hamper was taken down and stowed away. The iron plating was slushed with grease. Rebel soldiers were marching across Morris Island, within easy range. A shell would have sent them in haste behind the sand-hills; but heavier work was at hand, and they were harmless just then.
It was past one o'clock when the signal for sailing was displayed from the flag-ship, and the Weehawken, with a raft at her prow, intended to remove torpedoes, answered the signal, raised her anchor, and went steadily in with the tide, followed by the others, which maintained their respective positions, distant from each other about one third or a half-mile. In this battle of ironclads there are no clouds of canvas, no beautiful models of marine architecture, none of the stateliness and majesty which have marked hundreds of great naval engagements. There are no human beings in sight,—no propelling power is visible. There are simply eight black specks and one oblong block gliding along the water, like so many bugs.
But Sumter has discovered them, and discharges in quick succession nine signal guns, to announce to all Rebeldom that the attack is to be made. Morris Island is mysteriously silent as the Weehawken advances, although she is within range. Past Fort Wagner, straight on toward Moultrie the Weehawken moves. The silence is prolonged. It is almost painful,—the calm before the storm, the hushed stillness before the burst of the tornado!
There comes a single puff of smoke from Moultrie,—one deep reverberation. The silence is broken,—the long months of waiting are over. The shot flies across the water, skipping from wave to wave, tossing up fountains, hopping over the deck of the Weehawken, and rolling along the surface with a diminishing ricochet, sinking at last close upon the Morris Island beach. Fort Wagner continues the story, sending a shot at the Weehawken, which also trips lightly over the deck, and tosses up a water-spout far toward Moultrie. The Weehawken, unmindful of this play, opens its ports, and sends a fifteen-inch solid shot toward Sumter, which, like those that have been hurled toward her, takes a half-dozen steps, making for a moment its footprints on the water, and crashes against the southwest face of the fort, followed a moment later by its eleven-inch companion. The vessel is for a moment enveloped in the smoke of its guns. Bravely done! There comes an answer. Moultrie, with the tremendous batteries on either side by the hotel and east of it, and toward the inner harbor, bursts in an instant into sheets of flame and clouds of sulphurous smoke. There is one long roll of thunder, peal on peal; deep, heavy reverberations and sharp concussions, rattling the windows of our steamers, and striking us at the heart like hammer strokes.
The ocean boils! Columns of spray are tossed high in air, as if a hundred submarine fountains were let instantly on, or a school of whales were trying which could spout highest. There is a screaming in the air, a buzzing and humming never before so loud.
At five minutes before three Moultrie began the fire. Ten minutes have passed. The thunder has rolled incessantly from Sullivan's Island. Thus far Sumter has been silent, but now it is enveloped with a cloud. A moment it is hid from view—first a line of light along its parapet, and thick folds of smoke unrolling like fleeces of wool. Other flashes burst from the casemates, and the clouds creep down the wall to the water, then slowly float away to mingle with that rising from the furnaces in the sand along the shore of Sullivan's Island. Then comes a calm,—a momentary cessation. The Rebel gunners wait for the breeze to clear away the cloud, that they may obtain a view of the monitor, to see if it have not been punched into a sieve, and if it be not already disappearing beneath the waves. But the Weehawken is there, moving straight on up the channel, turning now toward Moultrie. To her it has been only a handful of peas or pebbles. Some have rattled against her turret, some upon her deck, some against her sides. Instead of going to the bottom, she revolves her turret, and fire two shots at Moultrie, moving on the while to gain the south eastern wall of Sumter.
Again the forts and batteries begin, joined now by Cummings Point and long ranges from Fort Johnson. All around the Weehawken the shot flash, plunge, hop, skip, falling like the rain-drops of a summer shower. Unharmed, undaunted, she moves straight on, feeling her way, moving slowly, with grappling-irons dragging from the raft in front to catch up torpedoes. It is for the Weehawken to clear the channel, and make smooth sailing for the remainder of the fleet.
To get the position of the Weehawken at this moment, draw a line from Cummings Point to Moultrie, and stick a pin on the line a little nearer to Moultrie than to Morris Island. It is about one half a mile from Moultrie, about one third of a mile from Sumter.
There she is,—the target of probably two hundred and fifty or three hundred guns, of the heaviest calibre, at close range, rifled cannon throwing forged bolts and steel-pointed shot, turned and polished to a hair in the lathes of English workshops,—advancing still, undergoing her first ordeal, a trial unparalleled in history!
For fifteen minutes she meets the ordeal alone, but the channel found to be clear, the Passaic, the Montauk, and Patapsco follow, closing up the line, each coming in range and delivering their fire upon Sumter. At twenty minutes past three the four monitors composing the right wing of the fleet are all engaged, each pressing on to reach the northeastern face of the fort, where the wall is weakest, each receiving as they arrive at particular points a terrible fire, seemingly from all points of the compass,—points selected by trial and practice indicated by buoys. They pass the destructive latitudes unharmed. Seventy guns a minute are counted, followed by moments of calm and scattering shots, but only to break out again in a prolonged roar of thunder. They press on, making nearer and nearer to Sumter, narrowing the distance to one thousand yards, eight hundred, six, five, four hundred yards, and send their fifteen-inch shot crashing against the fort, with deliberate, effective fire.