Plymouth memories of an octogenarian

by William T. Davis

On the 4th of March, 1861, the day of the inauguration of President Lincoln, the government was without money and without credit. Howell Cobb of Georgia, secretary of the treasury, under Buchanan, had before resigning looted the treasury, and placing about six millions where it could be used by the projected Confederacy, had left the government chest with not enough money to pay for a single day’s supply of stationery. John B. Floyd of Virginia, secretary of war, had before resigning, disarmed as far as possible the free states, transferring from the arsenals at Springfield, Mass., and Watervliet, New York, to arsenals in the slave states, one hundred and fifteen thousand arms, and a large amount of cannon, mortars, balls, powder and shells. Isaac Toucey of Connecticut, secretary of the navy, a northern man with southern principles, had performed his part of the great conspiracy, by so dispersing the national war vessels as to render them ineffective in the hands of the government. Of a fleet of ninety vessels, carrying 2,415 guns, five were sent to the East Indies; three to Brazil; seven to the Pacific; three to the Mediterranean, and seven to the coast of Africa, leaving, besides dismantled ships, only two, the steamer Brooklyn, 25 guns, and the storeship Relief, two guns, in northern ports. These men should not have been permitted to escape punishment, not because they became secessionists, but because, while holding office under a government which they had sworn to support, they had been guilty of treason.

The well laid plan of the Confederates was to first weaken the hands of the government while strengthening their own, and then as soon as Sumter fell to seize Harper’s Ferry, Washington and Fortress Monroe, the three outposts of the slave states, and to hold them against any forces which the north might be able to raise in time for their recovery. But they calculated without their host. They failed to take into account the rapidity with which Yankees act in an emergency, and they believed that before the militia of the north could be prepared to move, their own initiatory steps would have been successfully taken. They little thought that within five days after the fall of Sumter the state of Massachusetts would occupy Fortress Monroe with two regiments, and Washington with two more.

In the early movements of the government the depleted state of the treasury made it necessary to seek the aid of the states in carrying on the war. The first attempt to raise money by a loan resulted in bids from bankers running from 85 to 40 for six per cent. bonds, all of which were rejected. In this emergency Massachusetts as usual came to the front, and buying two steamboats, the Cambridge and Pembroke, kept them busy for many weeks in transporting from Boston to Annapolis, Fortress Monroe and Washington soldiers, provisions and camp equipage. As the rebel batteries on the Potomac rendered for some time a passage to Washington by the river impracticable, at first the trips of these steamers were chiefly confined to Fortress Monroe. As the Cambridge was to sail on Friday, May 31, for the Fortress, Governor Andrew asked me to go out in her and visit the Massachusetts troops there, and if practicable in the neighborhood of Washington, also, and as already stated, report to him their condition, sanitary and otherwise, with the view of allaying the anxieties of soldiers’ families from whom he had received earnest inquiries. With Hon. John Morissey as a companion, I left Boston at 4 o’clock, Friday afternoon, having also as fellow passengers, General Ebenezer W. Pierce, with the members of his staff, one of whom was Col. Wm. C. Lovering, our present member of Congress. There were on board twenty carpenters and twenty-nine sappers and miners, and our cargo consisted of lumber, provisions and camp equipage of various kinds. During the trip I spent much of my time in the pilot house, and having kept a pretty close run of our courses and distances, by a sort of instinct, I guessed from time to time our position. About eight o’clock on Sunday evening, while smoking my cigar in the pilot house, I said to Capt. Matthews, “You, of course, know your own business better than a landsman, but it seems to me that if you keep on this course much longer you will go ashore.” His smile indicated that he did not think much of a landsman’s reckoning, and not long after I went below and turned in. I was soon awakened by the stoppage of the engine, and directly a steward rapped at my door and said that the steamer was ashore, and the captain wanted all hands on deck. On reaching the deck I found the propeller churning the water with a full back, without any movement of the vessel. The two howitzers, which had been on the forward deck, had been moved aft, and all hands were jumping. It was fortunately a dead calm, with scarcely a ripple on the shore, and after a while we succeeded in backing into deep water. We had crossed a sand bar just rubbing it, as we went, and had gone onto Hog Island twenty-five or thirty miles north of Cape Charles. After sending out a boat to sound a passage for recrossing the bar, we reached about daylight the open sea, and were on our way to the Fortress which we reached about ten o’clock Monday forenoon. Some excuse may be found for the blunder of the captain, in the fact that all the lights from Maryland to Texas, except those at Key West, Tortugas and Rosas Island, had been put out by the rebels, and possibly there may have been a current setting to the north at that time. I believe, however, that in navigation, as in many other matters, there is something in instinct, or what you feel in your bones, as old women say, which should not be disregarded.

When we landed at the Fortress, some of the Plymouth boys were on the wharf expecting boxes from home, and they were, of course, glad to see us. We loaded them down with packages, of which a box of tea was the most prized, as tea was not included in the regular rations. The Fortress is surrounded by a moat, which is crossed by four bridges. Entering the main gate after crossing the bridge leading to it, I found myself in an area about seventy acres in extent, with casemates on the right, barracks on the left, a parade ground of about seven acres in the centre, and in the distance a two story brick building, the headquarters of General B. F. Butler, who was the commander at the post. Calling at once on the General, with whom I was intimate, having been with him in the senate two years before, he received us with courtesy, and invited us to make his house our home as long as we remained at the Fortress. He introduced us to his nephew, Capt. John Butler, and Major Haggerty, members of his staff, and to his military secretary, Major Theodore Winthrop, the last of whom was our constant companion during our visit. He and I seemed to have found our affinities, and I do not think on so short an acquaintance I ever formed so strong an attachment. When at the end of the week we left for Washington, he came down to the steamboat to bid us good-bye, and I little thought that on the next Monday, the 10th, he would meet his death on the battlefield of Big Bethel. He was born in New Haven, September 22, 1828, and in 1848 graduated at Yale. He began the practice of law in St. Louis, but removed to New York, where he acquired reputation as the author of Cecil Dreeme, John Brent and other popular books. He went to Washington with the New York seventh regiment, and was selected by General Butler as a member of his staff.

There were thirteen Massachusetts companies in the Fortress: The Halifax Company, Captain Harlow; Plymouth Standish Guards, Capt. Charles C. Doten; Plymouth Rock Guards, Capt. Samuel H. Doten; Freetown Company, Capt. Marble; Plympton Company, Capt. Perkins; Carver Company, Capt. McFarlin; New Bedford Company, Capt. Ingraham; Cambridge Company, Capt. Richardson; Sandwich Company, Capt. Chipman; East Bridgewater Company, Capt. Leach; Lynn Company, Capt. Chamberlin; Boston Company, Capt. Tyler; and Lowell Company, Capt. Davis. Of these companies two, the Boston and Lynn, belonged to the 4th Regiment, which was encamped at Newport News, and the Lowell company was attached to the post, the remaining ten forming the 3d regiment. The officers were quartered in the casemates, and the privates in various buildings, the Cambridge and Halifax companies in the carriage shop, the Plympton company in a room overhead, the two Plymouth companies in the forge, which had been floored over, the East Bridgewater, New Bedford, Sandwich and Lowell companies in other buildings, and the remainder of the Massachusetts companies in tents. The health of the men was good, only ten being in the hospital, and twenty off duty all told in the thirteen companies. I made a note of the rations for eleven days allowed to a company of seventy men, which included 352½ pounds of pork; 352½ pounds of salt beef; 45 quarts of beans; 47 quarts of rice, 103½ pounds of coffee; 155 pounds of sugar; 10½ gallons of vinegar; 12¾ pounds of candles; 41 pounds of soap; 20½ quarts of salt; 352 pounds of fresh beef, a fresh supply of bread every day, and an allowance of potatoes and chocolate. The East Bridgewater Company had not received the new uniforms, the Plympton Company was without overcoats, and none of the companies had canteens or rubber blankets, all of which, however, were supplied later. On the Hampton camping ground outside of the Fortress, there were five New York regiments, commanded by Colonels Duryea, Allen, Townsend, Carr and McChesny, and General Pierce had his headquarters in the Hampton female seminary. The troops I have mentioned, with a few regulars made up the force at and about the Fortress during my visit, which extended from the third to the seventh of June.

On Tuesday, June 4th, we went seven miles or more up the bay to Newport News at the mouth of James River, where the 4th Massachusetts Regiment was in camp. We went up in the Steamer “Cataline,” a spelling of the name of the old Roman, for which the author may have had the excuse of Major Ben Russell, the editor of the Columbian Centinel who, when printing his first number, having no capital S, substituted C, and having begun with that letter, always continued its use. At Newport News there were encamped all of the Fourth Massachusetts Regiment except the two companies, which were at the Fortress, the Steuben Rifles of New York under Col. Bendix, and a Vermont regiment under Col. Washburn, the whole under the command of Colonel Phelps of Vermont. Newport News is a peninsula, bounded on one side by the bay and on the other by James River, and an earthwork had been constructed a half mile long, extending across it. Three hundred and thirty of the Fourth were without tents, and occupying huts made of rails covered with branches. For several days tents had been lying piled up on the wharf at the Fortress, but owing to inefficiency, or red tape, they were not delivered until the sixth of June. The hospital was in charge of F. A. Saville of Quincy, and from the three regiments it had only three inmates. Henry Walker, now a lawyer in Boston and the Commander of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company on its late visit to England, was Adjutant of the Fourth, and a friend whom I was glad to see.

On Monday, the tenth of June, the next week after our visit, General Pierce was ordered by General Butler to take five companies of the Fourth, the Steuben Rifles, and Col. Washburn’s New York Regiment, and go up the peninsula from twelve to twenty miles and dislodge a force of rebels at Little and Big Bethel. By a sad blunder Col. Washburn’s Regiment was fired upon by the Steuben Rifles and eleven men were killed, thus breaking up the expedition in which before its retreat Major Winthrop and three of the Fourth Massachusetts were killed.

The Sloop of War Roanoke under the command of Commodore John Marston, the Steamer Vanderbilt, which had been given to the government by Cornelius Vanderbilt, and the Revenue Cutter Harriet Lane temporarily attached to the navy, were anchored between the Fortress and Newport News. Commodore Marston was well known in Plymouth by the Watson family, to whom he was related, and during a winter spent in Philadelphia, where he lived, I was intimate with him and his family. Both as an old friend and as a Plymouth man, he extended to me every courtesy. The Harriet Lane was commanded by Capt. John Faunce, a Plymouth man, first cousin of our townsman, Richard W. Bagnell, their mothers having been sisters, and daughters of Ebenezer Sampson. John was one of the boys, as fearless as Paul Jones or Farragut, and would have enjoyed nothing better than to have a good ripping sea fight for our entertainment. While we were at Newport News he ran across the mouth of the James and banged away at a battery on Pig Point until he was called off by the Commodore. He was glad enough to see a Plymouth boy and while I was on his vessel I was given the “freedom of the ship.”

General Ebenezer W. Pierce who went to the Fortress with me in the Cambridge and who had command at Big Bethel, had been detailed to command the three months’ men in Southern Virginia. He was born in Freetown, Mass., April 5, 1822, and in the Massachusetts militia, before the war, had occupied various positions from Captain to Brigadier General. After he was mustered out July 22, 1861, at the expiration of three months’ service, he again entered the army and December 31, 1861, he was mustered in as Colonel of the Massachusetts 29th Regiment, serving until his resignation November 8, 1864. He was an eccentric man but patriotic and brave. At the battle of White Oak Swamp June 30, 1862, I have been told that when he was ordered to take his regiment into the fight his order was—“by the right flank up the hill; God damn you, forward march.” Within five minutes a ball from a rebel battery took off his right arm at the shoulder. After the wound had been partially dressed under fire he was left on the field within the rebel lines until night, when he crept to cover and found his way to a union camp. Within thirty days he reported for service again and continued in commission until his resignation November 8, 1864. He died in Freetown, August 14, 1902.

On Friday, the 7th of June, the despatch boat Mt. Vernon arrived from Washington, and General Butler gave us passes for her return trip that night. The boat, besides her captain, had two river pilots, and as the lights on the Potomac had been extinguished by the rebels we were guided through its tortuous channels entirely by the lead. Besides the bearer of despatches there was on board a guard of ten men of the 71st New York Regiment, and under deck there was a half a ton of powder. All but one of the rebel batteries on the river were passed in the night, and as we approached them we slowed down so as to make little noise and put out all the lights on board. One battery remained to be passed after daylight, but as we rounded a point and brought it in sight we saw the gunboat Powhattan anchored in the stream, having silenced it since the down trip of the despatch boat. The bearer of despatches was one of those fellows which war would be likely to bring to the surface, apparently a German Jew, about twenty-five years of age, bragging of his exploits as secret messenger from Gen. Butler at Annapolis to Gen. Scott in Washington, and distrusted by the guard, who called him the mysterious cuss. Every step he took and every movement he made was carefully watched, lest he might by a match or some other signal inform the batteries of our passage. I learned on a later visit to Washington that he came to grief as a suspected rebel spy.