On the evening of December 13, 1862, Capt. Boone’s company of Light Artillery, supported by Co’s D and F of the First Alabama, crossed the river and after dark moved down opposite the anchorage of the iron clad Essex and a wooden vessel. The guns, consisting of two smooth-bore 6-pounders and one 12-pound howitzer were planted behind the levee, and at daylight the next morning fire was opened on the wooden vessel. The fire was so effective that the Essex had to steam up and interpose her iron sides for the protection of her consort. Both vessels then retired down the river. Although the Federal vessels kept up a heavy fire our loss was but one man wounded.
During the early part of December the regiment was busy constructing barracks of willow logs, the roofs covered with cypress boards. Co. K built two cabins, which were completed about the last of the month. They were 18 by 22 feet, with a large fireplace at each end. The chimneys were built of sticks daubed with clay. An open door way furnished entrance and light, while ventilation was secured by leaving the upper cracks between the logs unchinked; bunks were built in tiers along the walls, and the men were very comfortably quartered for the winter.
On December 31st Capt. Whitfield received the promise of a one gun battery—a 30-pound Parrott gun—on the condition that his company build the battery and magazine. The battery was laid off above the redan, then known as Battery No. 1, but separated from it by a deep ravine. Co. K worked alone on their battery till January 8th, when details were made from the infantry companies of the regiment to assist them. By the 18th of January the work was so nearly completed that the gun was brought up from Battery No. 11 and put into position. The magazine was not completed till the last of February, the powder being stored in it on March 2, 1863. The gun was christened the “Lady Whitfield.”
On December 26th, Lieut. Tuttle and Corp. John Hearn left for Alabama to secure recruits for Co. K. They returned in February having secured 45, as follows:—
In addition to these Henry Fralick, of Autauga Co., joined the company in September, 1862.
Second Lieut. Dixon S. Hall having resigned from ill health, Junior Second Lieut. Tuttle was promoted, and an election was held March 4, 1863, for Junior Second Lieutenant, resulting as follows: John Frank, Jr., 35; Norman Cameron, 20; N. K. Adams, 8; John Frank, Jr., was thereupon duly commissioned.
On March 12, 1863, Moses Tarleton, of Lowndes Co., one of the recruits, died, and was buried with military honors. This was the only one of the company, owing in other cases of death to lack of opportunity, to whom these honors were paid.
Company K, having a full complement of men, and having but one gun in its battery, was divided as to duty. One portion was drilled as heavy artillery, another portion as infantry, while Lieut. Tuttle with the remainder was detailed to act with a detachment of the regiment under command of Major Knox as river police. The company was jocularly known, in consequence of this division, as “Whitfield’s Legion.”
On the afternoon of March 13, 1863, several of Admiral Farragut’s vessels appeared in sight below Port Hudson, anchoring near the head of Prophets Island, and when the fog lifted on the morning of the 14th, his whole fleet lay at anchor just out of range of our guns. There were eight magnificent war steamers, one iron clad and six mortar boats. The flag ship was the steam-frigate “Hartford,” with an armament of 26 eight and nine-inch Paixhan guns. The “Richmond,” a ship of the same class, was armed with 26 eight and nine-inch Columbiads; the side-wheel steam-frigate “Mississippi” had 19 eight-inch guns, 1 ten-inch, 1 twenty-pound Parrott and 2 howitzers in her tops; the “Monongahela,” steam-sloop of war, carried 16 heavy guns; the gunboats “Kineo,” “Albatross,” “Sachem,” and “Genesee” each carried 3 heavy Columbiads and 2 six-inch rifles. All of these but the “Mississippi” were screw propellers. In addition to the above vessels all of which, except the “Sachem,” were to attempt to run the batteries, there was the iron clad “Essex” carrying 10 heavy guns and also six mortar-boats, each carrying 1 thirteen-inch mortar. These last were to cover the advance of the fleet by fiercely shelling the Confederate batteries. The mortar-boats were moored close under the river bank at the head of Prophets Island, and were protected from the Confederate batteries by the bluff which at that point curved almost at a right angle. The “Essex” was anchored in the stream opposite the mortar-boats, and the other vessels some distance lower down but in sight.