22d. If that redoubt, which gave support to our left flank (that otherwise would have been "in air"), was worth a great sacrifice of life to recapture it, as ordered by Longstreet, then certainly it was in accord with the science of war to place two guns on the works to strengthen and protect the left flank of his army.[24]
I am tired of volunteering against gunboats any more, and declined having anything to do with the line defended by Gen. Hood because of a communication received from the general commanding saying I was "in charge of the river defenses." To have charge of the river defenses involves more or less the command of all the army. I really had officially nothing to do with the river defenses, only I voluntarily placed two large siege guns in position to be used in attacking any boats passing up or down the river. Connally's Regiment was a support for these two guns.
23d. Confined myself to the immediate command of my division, and took no more interest in Hood's line, and ordered Connally's Regiment to join his brigade.
24th and 25th. There was some skirmishing.
26th. Rode down with Gen. Longstreet to the Whitemarsh road. Gone all day. The line there is commanded by Gen. Armstead.
And now come the Richmond papers proclaiming: "From Suffolk—Gen. French lost Stribbling's battery." Mark you, no mention of the capture of the fort; no mention of the capture of the two companies that garrisoned it. It would not do to have it reported that the Yankees crossed the Nansemond yesterday and captured a fort on our side of the river by assault. The garrison, composed of two companies of the Forty-Fourth Alabama Regiment of Law's Brigade, Hood's Division, were taken prisoners and the two guns were lost. But it will not do to let this be known. No, no; write it down thus: "Yesterday Gen. French lost Stribbling's battery." The world is too busy to inquire, and the world will believe it. The truth is, I was never in the fort, never saw it. I had no authority over the garrison, and I was in no way responsible for the loss of the redoubt, the garrison, or guns.
The most remarkable feature of this little affair is the persistency with which headquarters proclaimed that "French lost Stribling's battery," and were silent about the infantry garrison captured, etc. I will give two letters here from the War Records:
Headquarters Near Suffolk, April 21, 1863.
Maj. Gen. D. H. Hill, Goldsboro.
Gen. Longstreet is closely engaged to-night, and he has asked me to write you briefly the particulars of the affair of Sunday night which resulted in the capture by the enemy of Stribbling's battery. Several batteries had been planted on the Nansemond to hold the river against the passage of gunboats and transports. Stribbling's occupied an old uninclosed work on Hill's Point, a tongue of land a little above the confluence of Western Branch and Nansemond. About dark on the evening of the 19th the enemy opened a severe fire from his field batteries planted opposite, and his gunboats above and below the fort, entirely sweeping with a cross fire the plain in the rear of the work. Under cover of this fire and darkness they landed a force, not more than one hundred and fifty strong, a very little distance from the fort, rushed upon its rear, and surprised and captured its garrison.