| LOSS OF THE "MONITOR" IN A STORM OFF CAPE HATTERAS, DECEMBER 30, 1862.—GALLANT EFFORTS TO RESCUE THE CREW. |
CHAPTER X.
THE CAPTURE OF NEW ORLEANS.
NEW ORLEANS THE LARGEST SOUTHERN CITY—FORTS ON THE MISSISSIPPI—CAPT. DAVID G. FARRAGUT CHOSEN COMMANDER—GEN. BENJAMIN F. BUTLER IN COMMAND OF LAND FORCES—TERRIFIC BOMBARDMENT OF THE FORTS—CUTTING THE CHAIN ACROSS THE MISSISSIPPI—THE GREAT NAVAL BATTLE IN THE NIGHT—ALL THE FORTS AND THE CONFEDERATE FLEET CAPTURED BY FARRAGUT—SURRENDER OF NEW ORLEANS—GENERAL BUTLER'S CELEBRATED "WOMAN ORDER."
The Crescent City was by far the largest and richest in the Confederacy. In 1860 it had a population of nearly one hundred and seventy thousand, while Richmond, Mobile, and Charleston together had fewer than two-thirds as many. In 1860-61 it shipped twenty-five million dollars' worth of sugar and ninety-two million dollars' worth of cotton, its export trade in these articles being larger than that of any other city in the world. Moreover, its strategic value in that war was greater than that of any other point in the Southern States. The many mouths of the Mississippi, and the frequency of violent gales in the Gulf, rendered it difficult to blockade commerce between that great river and the ocean; but the possession of this lowest commercial point on the stream would shut it off effectively, and would go far toward securing possession all the way to Cairo. This would cut the Confederacy in two, and make it difficult to bring supplies from Texas and Arkansas to feed the armies in Tennessee and Virginia. Moreover, a great city is in itself a serious loss to one belligerent and a capital prize to the other.
As soon as it became evident that war was being waged against the United States in dead earnest, and that it was likely to be prolonged, these considerations presented themselves to the Government, and a plan was matured for capture of the largest city in the territory of the insurgents.
| PANORAMIC VIEW OF NEW ORLEANS—FEDERAL FLEET AT ANCHOR IN THE RIVER. |