From various points on the coast, the ships and steamers assembled like magic, and on Monday morning, June 14, 1847, the squadron came to anchor off the mouth of the Tabasco river. The detachments from eleven vessels, numbering 1084 seamen and marines in forty boats, were under the Commodore’s immediate direction and command. He had prepared the plan of attack with great care. Every contingency was foreseen and provided against, and the minutest details were subject to his thoughtful elaboration. At that point of the river called the Devil’s Bend, danger was apprehended. Here the dense chapparal feathered down to the river’s edge affording a splendid opportunity for ambush. The alert Commodore was standing on the upper waist deck of the _Scorpion_ under the awnings entirely exposed, on the look-out for the enemy. Suddenly, as the flag-ship reached the elbow, from the left side of the river the guns of at least a hundred men blazed forth in a volley, followed by a dropping fire. In an instant the awnings were riddled and all the upper works of wood and iron scratched, dented, and splintered, by the spatter of lead and copper. Strange to say, not a single man on the _Scorpion_ was touched by the volley though a sailor on the _Vesuvius_ was hit later. As the smoke curled up from the chapparal, Perry pointed with his glass to the guns still flashing, and gave, or rather roared out, the order “Fire.” The guns of the _Scorpion_, _Washington_ and the surf-boats, with a rattling fusillade of small arms, soon mowed great swaths in the jungle. From the masthead of the _Stromboli_, a number of cavalry were seen beyond the jungle. A ten-inch shell, from the eight-ton gun of the _Vesuvius_, exploding among them, seemed to the enemy to be an attack in the rear, cutting off their retreat, and they scattered wildly. Very few of the Mexicans took time to reload or fire a second shot. It was now past six o’clock and it was determined to anchor for the night. The whole squadron assembled in the Devil’s Turn, and anchored in sight of the Seven Palm Trees below which the obstructions had been sunk. Due precautions were taken against a night attack, as the dense chapparal was only twenty yards distant. A barricade of hammocks was therefore thrown up on the bulwarks for protection, and the sailors, as soldiers are, in rhetoric, said to do, “slept on their arms.” But one volley was received from the shore during the night, the air only receiving injury. The enemy had placed obstructions at the bar to prevent the further ascent of our forces. The Commodore, early in the morning, dispatched two boats with survey officers to reconnoitre and sound a channel. These drew the fire of a breastwork, La Comena, on the shore, which severely wounded Lieutenant William May.