Army of the Middle Military Division operated at Opepuan and Cedar Creek, September and October, 1864.
During the year 1862, Brady's men followed these legions. Both armies were maneuvering to strike a decisive blow at the National Capital of either foe—one aiming at Washington and the other at Richmond. The scenes enacted in these campaigns are remarkable in military strategy, and Brady's men succeeded in perpetuating nearly every important event.
Cameras were also hurried to the far South and West where great leaders with great soldiers were doing great things. Several of these cameras arrived in time to bear witness to the bravery of the men of the Mississippi, who were waging battle along the greatest waterway in North America—the stronghold of the Confederacy and the control of the inland commerce of the Continent.
THE first naval conflicts of the Civil War took place early in 1862. On the ninth of March, the revolving turret iron-clad "Monitor" met the enormous Confederate ram, "Merrimac," in Hampton Roads. Both powerful vessels forced the attack and stood under the fiercest bombardment only to again invite assault. After four hours of the nerviest fighting that the seas had ever known, the adversaries withdrew, undefeated, to repair their respective damages. Brady secured several photographs of these vessels immediately after the engagement. One of them on this page shows part of the deck and turret of the "Monitor;" near the port-hole can be seen the dents made by the heavy steel-pointed shot from the guns of the "Merrimac." While the news of this conflict was amazing even old Europe, naval operations along the American coast were creating consternation. On the first anniversary of the Fall of Fort Sumter the National navy, in an attempt to sweep the Confederates from the Atlantic coast, bombarded Fort Pulaski in Georgia. All day long the bombardment was terrific and firing did not cease until nightfall, when five of the guns of the fortress were silent. All night long four of Gillmore's guns fired at intervals of fifteen or twenty minutes and at daybreak the onslaught became furious. At two in the afternoon a white flag appeared from its walls. The spoils of victory were the fort, forty-seven heavy guns, a large supply of fixed ammunition, forty thousand pounds of gun powder, a large quantity of commissary stores; three hundred prisoners and the port of Savannah was sealed against blockade runners—all this with the loss of but one killed on each side. Brady seems to have had unusual foresight. He was nearly always in the right place at the right time and these negatives picture the ruins of Fort Pulaski.
ORIGINAL "MONITOR" AFTER HER FIGHT WITH THE "MERRIMAC"
RUINS OF FORT PULASKI, GA., APRIL, 1862