“These battles were all won by the navy,” said Jack proudly, “and everything on and along the river was destroyed by or surrendered to the navy, for the soldiers didn’t come up till the trouble was all over. We went up with our little fleet and anchored abreast of Fort Jackson. A boat was sent ashore, and when it came back it brought General Duncan and two or three other high-up rebel officers, who did not act at all like badly beaten men, and they were received aboard the Lane and taken into the cabin, where the terms of capitulation were to be drawn up and signed. They hadn’t been gone more than five minutes when some of the crew happened to look up the river, and there was that big iron-clad, the Louisiana, bearing down on us, a mass of flames. Then I was frightened again, I tell you. Mounting, as she did, sixteen heavy guns, she must have had all of twenty thousand pounds of powder in her magazine, and what would become of us if she blew up in the midst of our fleet? There wouldn’t be many of us left to tell the story. It was an act of treachery on the part of the rebel naval officers which Farragut was prompt to punish by sending them North as close prisoners, while the army officers were given their freedom under parole.”
“Did she do any damage when she blew up?” asked Rodney, who was deeply interested in the story.
“Not any to speak of,” replied Jack, “because the explosion took place before she got among us. Of course word was sent below as soon as we caught sight of her, and the order was promptly signalled to every vessel in sight to play out her cable to the bitter end, and stand by to sheer as wide as possible from the blazing iron-clad as she drifted down; but we had hardly set to work to obey the order when there was a wave in the air, which I felt as plainly as I ever felt a wave of water pass over my head; the Lane heeled over two streaks, everything loose on deck was jostled about, and then there was a rumbling sound, not half as loud as you would think it ought to be, and the danger was over. The Louisiana blew up before she got to us, and that was a lucky thing for the Harriet Lane.”
And Jack might have added that it was a lucky thing for the whole country, for the commander, Porter, who was in the Lane’s cabin with the rebel officers, was afterward the fighting Admiral Porter, who commanded the Mississippi squadron. His death at that crisis would have been[been] a national loss.
CHAPTER VII.
SAILOR JACK IN ACTION.
The city of New Orleans surrendered to Flag-officer Farragut, who held it under his guns until General Butler came up with his soldiers to take it off his hands; and then he kept on up the river with a portion of his victorious fleet to effect a junction with the Mississippi squadron at Vicksburg, while the remainder of his vessels, one of which was the Harriet Lane, sailed away to hoist the flag of the Union over the port of Galveston, and break up the blockade running that was going on there. This force appeared before Galveston in May, but no earnest efforts were made to compel a surrender until October; and even then no serious attempt was made to take and hold the city. The commanding naval officer was content to establish a close blockade of the port, and nothing could have suited Jack Gray better. Galveston was a noted place for blockade runners, and it was seldom indeed that one escaped when the Lane sighted and started in pursuit of her. Every capture meant prize money.
“We made the most of the money that was made off that port last summer, but of course we didn’t get it all ourselves,” explained Jack. "If you are cruising by yourself and make a capture while another ship is within signalling distance of you, the law says you must divide with that ship, although she may not have done a thing to help you take the prize; but if you belong to a squadron, every vessel in it has a share in every prize you make. Fortunately for us there were but four ships in our squadron off Galveston, and every time we took a prize somebody would sing:
“‘Here’s enough for four of us;
Thank Heaven there’s no more of us—
God save the king.’”