An Englishman's View of the Battle between the Alabama and the Kearsarge: An Account of the Naval Engagement in the British Channel, on Sunday June 19th, 1864 — John Shaqi
An Englishman's View of the Battle between the Alabama and the Kearsarge: An Account of the Naval Engagement in the British Channel, on Sunday June 19th, 1864Edge, Frederick Milnes
History
An Englishman's View of the Battle between the Alabama and the Kearsarge: An Account of the Naval Engagement in the British Channel, on Sunday June 19th, 1864
Edge, Frederick Milnes
Alabama (Screw sloop); Kearsarge (Sloop); United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Naval operations
The Captain of the Kearsarge was never aware of the Alabama having struck
until a boat put off from her to his own vessel. Prisoners subsequently
stated that she had fired a lee-gun, but the fact was not known on board
the Federal ship, nor that the colours were hauled down in token of
surrender. A single fact will prove the humanity with which Captain
Winslow conducted the fight. At the close of the action, his deck was
found to be literally covered with grape and canister, ready for close
quarters; but he had never used a single charge of all this during the
contest, although within capital range for employing it.
THE FEELING AFTER THE BATTLE.
The wounded of the two vessels were transferred shortly after the action
to the Naval Hospital at Cherbourg. I paid a visit to that establishment
on the Sunday following the engagement, and found the sufferers lying in
comfortable beds alongside each other in a long and admirably ventilated
ward on the first floor. Poor Gowen, who died the following Tuesday, was
in great pain, and already had the seal of death upon his face. James
McBeath, a young fellow of apparently twenty years, with a compound
fracture of the leg, chatted with much animation; while Dempsey, the stump
of his right arm laid on the pillow, was comfortably smoking a cigar, and
laughing and talking with one of the Alabama crew, in the bed alongside
him. The wounded men of the sunken privateer were unmistakably English in
physiognomy, and I failed to discover any who were not countrymen of ours.
I conversed with all of them, stating at the outset that I was an
Englishman like themselves, and the information seemed to open their
hearts to me. They represented themselves as very comfortable at the
hospital, that every thing they asked for was given to them, and that
they were surprised at the kindness of the Kearsarge men who came to visit
the establishment, when they were assured by their own officers before the
action that foul treatment would only be shown them in the event of their
capture. Condoling with one poor fellow who had his leg carried away by a
shell, he remarked to me, "Ah, it serves me right! they won't catch me
fighting again without knowing what I'm fighting for." "That's me too,"
said another poor Englishman alongside of him.
The paroled prisoners (four officers) on shore at Cherbourg, evinced no
hostility whatever to their captors, but were always on the friendliest of
terms with them. All alike frequented the same hotel in the town
(curiously enough--"The Eagle,") played billiards at the same _café_, and
bought their pipes, cigars, and tobacco from the same pretty little
_brunette_ on the _Quai du Port_.
The following are the names of the officers and crew of the Alabama, saved
by the Kearsarge:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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