"A line of piles and a double one of torpedoes stretched nearly across from Fort Gaines to Fort Morgan, leaving only a narrow channel between that fort and the point of termination. It was through that channel, indicated by a red buoy, that blockade runners passed in and out, and inside of these defences lay the Confederate ironclad Tennessee, and three wooden gun-boats. It was early in the morning of that August day that Farragut's signal was given, for the advance of his seven sloops of war. The firing was heavy and destructive on both sides. But I will not go into particulars at this time, only saying that the result was in favor of the Federals; but the victory cost many lives—of Federals 335 men, of whom 113 were drowned in the Tecumseh—the leading monitor, which had struck a torpedo and gone down—and 52 killed by shot, while the Confederate loss was 10 killed, 16 wounded, and 280 prisoners, besides the loss in the forts, which is unknown."
Just at this point a passing vessel attracted the attention of the captain and his listeners, and the conversation was not renewed until after dinner.
CHAPTER XV.
It was Mrs. Travilla, or Grandma Elsie, as Lulu and Grace called her, who that afternoon started the captain upon the historical sketches so greatly enjoyed by the younger part of the company, to say nothing of the older ones.
"We will pass near enough to Forts Gaines and Morgan to get a view of them—the outside at least—will we not, Captain?" she asked, with a smile.
"Yes, mother," he replied. "Pensacola also, whither, as I have said, the British went after their fruitless attack upon Fort Bowyer—now Fort Morgan—then occupied by the Spaniards under Manrequez, and where they were publicly received as friends and allies.
"All that, and the revelations of Jean Lafitte concerning their attempt to engage him and his outlaws to help them in their contemplated attack upon New Orleans, kindled the hottest indignation in the minds of Jackson and the people of the Southwest. The general issued a proclamation in retort for one sent out by the British officer Nichols shortly before, in which he had made inflammatory appeals to the French, who were prejudiced against the Americans, and the Kentuckians, who were discontented because of a seeming neglect by their government—a state of things largely owing to the arts of ambitious politicians.
"Nichols had also sent out Indian runners to excite their fellows against the Americans, and in that way he gathered nearly a thousand Creeks and Seminoles at Pensacola, where they were supplied with abundance of arms and ammunition.