The fort which had enabled 397 vessels to pass the blockade was taken by a great New England Captain, and largely by New England troops. Butler made one contribution, and only one, to that victory. That contribution was his absence. It was a curious coincidence which would have brought a blush of shame upon any forehead but his, that when he was testifying before an investigating committee of Congress, who were inquiring into the cause of his great and shameful failure to take the fort, and just after he had testified that Fort Fisher was impregnable and that it was impossible for any Union force to take it, a dispatch was received in the Committee Room announcing its fall. General Grant says in his "Memoirs": "I had no idea of General Butler accompanying the expedition until the evening before it got off from Bermuda Hundred, and then did not dream but that General Weitzel had received all the instructions, and would be in command. I rather formed the idea that General Butler was actuated by a desire to witness the effect of the explosion of the powder-boat. The expedition was detained several days at Hampton Roads, waiting the loading of the powder-boat. The importance of getting the Wilmington expedition off without any delay, with or without the powder- boat, had been urged upon General Butler. The powder-boat was exploded on the morning of the 24th, before the return of General Butler from Beaufort; but it would seem, from the notice taken of it in the Southern newspapers, that he enemy were never enlightened as to the object of the explosion until they were informed by the Northern press."* [Footnote] * "Personal Memoirs, U. S. Grant," p. 604 appendix. [End of Footnote] "General Butler, in direct violation of the instructions given, ordered the reembarkation of the troops and the return of the expedition."* [Footnote] * Ibid., p. 605. [End of Footnote] "I advised Admiral Porter to hold on, and that I would send a force and make another attempt to take the place. This time I selected Major-General A. H. Terry to command the expedition." "At my request Major-General B. F. Butler was relieved."* [Footnote] * Ibid., p. 607. [End of Footnote] I will not undertake to give a detailed account of the blundering strategy of what General Grant aptly called the "Bottling up at Bermuda Hundred" which enabled a powerful Union army to be held in check by a small Confederate force, leaving free the bulk of their army for hostile operations against the Union forces. So the contribution of General Butler's military genius to the success of the United States in the war consisted of a scheme to blow up a powder-boat in the capture of Fort Fisher, somewhat after the Chinese fashion of warfare, which General Grant said hardly had the effect to excite the curiosity of the occupants of the fort which it had been intended to demolish; and of his scheme of engineering at Dutch Gap and Bermuda Hundred.