“We for some time awaited the return of the _Monitor_ to the Roads. After consultation it was decided that we should proceed to the navy-yard in order that the vessel should be brought down in the water and completed. The pilots said if we did not then leave that we could not pass the bar until noon of the next day. We therefore at 12 M. quit the Roads and stood for Norfolk. Had there been any sign of the _Monitor’s_ willingness to renew the contest we would have remained to fight her.” Lieutenant Greene, of the _Monitor_, says of this matter: “Exactly how much time elapsed from the moment that Worden was wounded until I had reached the pilot-house and completed the examination of the injury at that point, and determined what course to pursue in the damaged condition of the vessel, it is impossible to state; but it could hardly have exceeded twenty minutes at the utmost. During this time the _Merrimac_, which was leaking badly, had started in the direction of the Elizabeth River; and, on taking my station in the pilot-house and turning the vessel’s head in the direction of the _Merrimac_, I saw that she was already in retreat. A few shots were fired at the retiring vessel, and she continued on to Norfolk. I returned with the _Monitor_ to the side of the _Minnesota_, where preparations were being made to abandon the ship, which was still aground. Shortly afterward Worden was transferred to a tug, and that night he was carried to Washington.” Undoubtedly fair is the statement made by Lieut. John Taylor Wood: “Although there is no doubt that the _Monitor_ first retired,--for Captain Van Brunt, commanding the _Minnesota_, so states in his official report,--_the battle was a drawn one_, so far as the two vessels engaged were concerned. But _in its general results the advantage was with the Monitor_.” The italics are not in Lieutenant Wood’s statement, but are inserted here to emphasize the effect of what he says. Greene adds: “It has never been denied that the object of the _Merrimac_ on the 9th of March was to complete the destruction of the Union fleet in Hampton Roads, and that in this she was completely foiled and driven off by the _Monitor_; nor has it been denied that at the close of the engagement the _Merrimac_ retreated to Norfolk, leaving the _Monitor_ in possession of the field.” The reader is likely to think that “retreat” is a strong word to use under the circumstances, especially as the ebb-tide and not the _Monitor_ made the _Merrimac_ leave. Nevertheless, there was also the leak in the _Merrimac’s_ bow to be considered. That leak was “alarming,” according to Jones, and the _Merrimac_ got it in battle by ramming the _Monitor_.