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Charges on Fort Wagner.i The following graphic account of the■ infantry chargee upon Fort Wagner, we Snd in the N. Y. Tribune’s Morris Island, correspondence:For eight hours the Monitors and the i Ironsides hare kept up a continuous fire, [ and Fort Wagner has nob yet surrendered. . For eight hours fifty-four guns from the . land batteries hare hurled their shot and ! shell within her wall6, and still she flaunts . the red battle flag in our face.“Something must be done, and that too, i quickly, or in a few days we shall have the whole army in Virginia upon us/' said , an officer high in command. “We must i storm the fort- to-night and carry it at the point of the bayonet 11 In a few moments signals are made from p the top of the lookout, and soon Generals and Colonels commanding divisions and - brigades were seen galloping to the head-. quarters of the commanding General. A• few words in consultation, and Gens. Sey-1 mour, Strong, Stevenson, and Cols. Put-! nam and Montgomery, are seen hasteningback to their respective commands. Oi-. fleers shout, bugles sound, the word of command is given, and soon the soldiers around upon and under the sand hills of . Morris Island spring from their hiding places, fall into line, march tu the beach, are organized into re™ brigades and in 1 solid column standi ready to move to the deadly assault. i Notin widely extended battle line, with■ cavalry and artillery at supporting distances ; but in solid regimental column, on the hardocean beAch, for half a mile before reach-I ing the fort, in plain sight of the enemy• did these three brigades move to their ap* s pointed work.■ Gen. Strong, who has so frequently since■ his arrival iu this department, braved ' death in i8 many forms of attack, was ae-■ signed to the command of the l»i brigade Col Putnam, of the 7th New Hampshire,i who, althftusjh ot the regular army, and■ considered one of the best officers in this s Department, had never led his men intobattle nor been under fire, took command , of the 2d. and Gen. Stevenson the 3d, cori-■ shitufing the reserve. The 54th Massachusetts, (colored regiment.) Col. Shaw,i was the advanced regiment in the 1st brig• ade, and the 2d South Carolina, (colored) Col Montgomery, was the last regiment ofi t^e reserve. The seleetioo of the 54ih : Massachusetts to lead the charge, was undoubtedly m.tde on account ot the good fighting qualifies it had displayed a few day* before on James I-Iand,These brigades, as I have remarked be-1 fore, were formed tor this express duty.— Many of the regiments had never seen their brigade commanders before: some of them had never been uDder fire, sod, with the exception of three Tegituents in the 1st brigade, none i.f them had ever been en-, gaged in this form of attack. All had fresh■ in their meoi'-ries the severe repulse we had met on the .norning of iho 11th inst. Fur two years the Department of the South had been in existence, and until the storming of the batteries on the south end of Morris Island, the army had won rio victory [airlv acknowledged by the enemy.i Just as darkness began to cluster iu up* nn the eeene of the afternoon and the evening, Gen. Strong rode to the front and i ordered- his brigade, consisting of the 54tb■ Mass., Col. Shaw (colored regiment ) the r 6th Conn., Col. Ch.itfield, the 48;h NewYork, Col. Barton, the 3d New Hampshire, Col. Jackson, the 76tH Pennsylvania, and the 9 h Maine, Col. Emery, to advance to the assault. At the instant, the line was seen slowly advancing in the dusk toward the fort, and before a double quick had been ordered, a tremendous fire from the barbette guns on Fort Sumter, from the batteries on Cummings' Point, and from all the guns on Fort Wagner, opened upon it. The guns from Wagner swept the beach and those from Sumter and Cummings' Point enfiladed it on the left. In the midst of this terrible shower of sliot and shell they pu.-hed their way, reached the fort, portions of the 54th Massachusetts, the 6th Connecticut and the 48th New York dashed through the ditches, gained the ; parapet, and engaged in a hand to hand . fiiiht with the enemy, and for nearly hall an hour held their ground, arid did not fall back until nearly every commissioned of Beer was shot down. As on the morning of the assault of the liih instant, these brave men were exposed to a mo3t galling lire of grape and canister, from howitzers, raking the ditches from the bastions of the fort, from hand grenades, and from almost every other modern implement of warfare., The rebels fought with the utmtst des-1 peratiou, and so did iho larger portion of Gen. Strong's brigade, as long as there was an officer to command it.When the brigade made the assault Gen. Strong aaUanily rode at its head. When it fell back, broken, torn ac.d bleeding. Major Plimpton of the 3d New Hampshire was the highest commissioned officer to command it. Gen. Strong, Col. Shaw. Col Ohatfleld, Col. Barton, Co!. Green, Colonel Jackson all had fallen ; and the list I send you will tell how many other brave officers fell with them. Stories are flying about that ibis regiment and that regiment broke and run j but that tor the frightened 54th Massachusetts (negro) we would havecar-' ried the fort; that the 9th Maine did not reflect much credit upon the gallant State she represents, and a thousand other reasons which I care not to enumerate. 1 i absurd to say that these men did not flu hi and were nut exposed to perhaps the most deadly fire of the war, when so many of the rank and file were killed It must be remembered, too, that this assault was made in the night—a very dark night-even ihe liaht cif the stars was rb-cured by the blackness of a heavy thunder sti.rm and the enemy could be distinguished fr m our own men only by the light of the bursting shell and the flash of «he Imwuzer and the musket. The 64th M fRsachuseits (negro) whom copperhead office.a would have called cowardly if they Imd stormed and earned the gate* of hell, went bold I j into battle, for the second time,'command ed by their brave Colonel, but came out of it led by no higher officer than the boy, Lieut Higainson.The 1st Brigade, under the lead of Gen. Strong, failed to take the fort. It was now the turn of Col. Putnam, commanding the 2d Brigale, composed of the 7th New Hampshire, the 62d Ohio, Col. Steele, the 67th Ohio, Col. Vnrhees. and the 100th N. Y., Col. Donely, to make the attempt.— But alas 1 the tusk was loo much for hiT*. Through the same terrible fire, he led his men to, over and into the fort, and for an hour held one half of it, fighting every moment of the time, and as with the 1st Brigade, it was not until he himself fell killed and nearly all of bis officers wounded, and no reintorcements arriving, that his men fell back, and the lebel shout and cheer of victory was heard above the roar of Sumter a i'd the guns from Cutnmiog’s Point.In this second assault by Cat. Putnam’s brigade, Col. Turner, of Gen Gilmore’S staff, stood afe the side of Col. Putnam when he fell, and with his voice and sword urged on the thinned ranks to the final charge. But it was too late. The Third Brigade, Gen. Stevenson's, was not on • hand. It ^-ag madness for the 2d to remain longer under so deadly a fire, and the thought of surrendering in a body to the enemy could not for a moment be entertained. To fight their way back to the intrenc-hments was all that could be done,from our own fire. The darkness was so in tense,; the roar of artillery so loud, the flight of grape and canister shot so rapid and destructive, that it was absolutely impossible to preserve order in the ranks of individual companies, to say nothing of the regiments.More than half the time we were in the fort, the fight was simply a hand to hand one, ae the wounds received by wany clearly indicate. Some have sword-thrusts some are hacked on the head, some are stabbed with bayonets, and a few were knocked down with the butt end of their muskets, but recovered in time to go away with swollen heads. There was terrible fighting to get into the fort, and terrible fighting to get out of it. The cowardly stood no better chance for their lives than the fearless. Even if they surrendered, the shell of-Sumter were thickly falling around them in the darkness, and ae prisoners, they could not be safe, until victory, decisive and questioned, rested with one or the other belligerent.The battle is over ; it is midnight; the ocean beach is crowded with the dead, the dying and the wounded. It is with difficulty you can urge your horse through Lighthouse Inlet. Faint lights are glimmering in the sand holes and rifle pits to the right, as you pass down the beach.— In these holes many a poor wounded and bleeding soldier has laid down to his last sleep. Friends are bending over them to staunch their wounds, or bind up their shattered limbs, but the deathly glare from ; sunken eyeS'tells that their kind services are all in vain.In this night assault, and from its com- lt;mencemem to its close, Gen. Gilmore, his j staff, and bis volunteer aids, consisting ol . Col. Littlefield, of the 4th S. C., and Majors Banister and Stryker, of the Paymaster’s Department, were constantly under fire and doing all in their power to sustain the courage of the troops and urge on rp- , inforcemects. All that human power could do to carry this formidable earthwork, seems to have been done. No one would have imagined in the morning that so fierce a cannonade from both the navy and the batteries on shore, could fail . to destroy every bomb proof the rebels had erected. But the moment our men touched the parapets of the fort, I 300 rebel streamed from their safe hiding place, where they had been concealed during the day, and fresh and strong were prepared to drive us back. We then found to our sorrow that the 15 inch shot from the Monitors, even when fired at a distance of bat 1,080 yards, had not injured them in the least. Only the parapets of the fort had been knocked into sand hlt; apa.
Newspaper Details
Beaver Dam Argus
Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, US
Wed, Aug 05, 1863
Page 2
Full Page
Clipped by
Gettysburg C.
PA, USA 12 Mar 2025
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