At daybreak of June 22, 1813, a determined attack was made by the British under Cockburn from land and sea, which was repulsed. Three days later quiet Hampton was captured after a gallant defence by an inadequate garrison and the town pillaged in barbaric fashion. Soon after, Cockburn withdrew to the coasts of South Carolina and Georgia, but resumed his operations in the lower Chesapeake March 1, 1814. In July, 1814, he was largely reinforced and with a combined land and naval expedition commenced that march up the Chesapeake which culminated in the sacking of Washington and the final repulse of the expedition at Fort McHenry. This was the last important engagement of the War of 1812. During the Civil War Fortress Monroe saw stirring scenes, though it had no very active part in any of them. In October, 1861, Hampton Roads off the fort was the rendezvous for great land and naval forces under Admiral Dupont and General Sherman designed to capture Hilton Head. In the January following another great force was brought together here for operations on the Carolina coast. In the spring of 1862 McClellan’s army arrived at Old Point and went to Yorktown. In March of 1862 occurred in Hampton Roads the episodes of the _Merrimac_. A watcher on the walls of Fort Monroe would have seen this queer, square vessel, covered with railroad iron, sailing down the blue waters. He might have seen the sinking of the _Cumberland_ with the greater part of her crew despite her desperate, impotent efforts against this new kind of adversary. He might have witnessed the destruction of the _Congress_ by fire and the partial disabling of the _Minnesota_. He might have heard in the old fort that night the barrack-room gossip of the new giant and whispers of the expected arrival of a United States champion which was to take up the gage of combat. The next day he might have seen from the ramparts the struggle between the _Merrimac_ and the _Monitor_, which ushered in a new chapter in naval warfare and began the era of the steel-clad knight of the seas. Later Old Point Comfort became the base of operation of the Army of the James. In 1893, during the celebration of the Columbian Exposition, Hampton Roads was the rendezvous under the guns of old Monroe for the vessels of all of the nations of the world. The old fort sees the most important manœuvres of the United States navy of to-day. FORTS SUMTER AND MOULTRIE NEAR CHARLESTON--SOUTH CAROLINA The bombardment of Fort Sumter from Fort Moultrie began at dawn of April 12, 1861, and continued without remission for about 36 hours, or until noon of the second day. During that time, though shot and shell played havoc with the walls of both the besiegers and the besieged, no human being was hurt,--a strange preliminary, indeed, to the most murderous civil war since the invention of gunpowder in the history of the world.