Flag Officer Samuel Barron, of the Confederate navy, who had charge of a small fleet of armed boats on the sound; Major W. S. G. Andrews, commanding the forts, and 615 men and officers were captured. The two forts contained together twenty-five guns, every one of which came from the Norfolk Navy Yard, as did also 1,000 muskets and a quantity of ordnance stores found in the fort. [Illustration: Eight-inch Mortar Captured at Hatteras.] This point was thereafter held by the Union forces throughout the war. To show the value of this victory, we may quote the report of General Butler. He said: “From there the whole coast of Virginia and North Carolina, from Norfolk to Cape Lookout, is within our reach by light draught vessels, which cannot possibly live at sea during the winter months. From it offensive operations may be made upon the whole coast of North Carolina to Bogue Inlet, extending many miles inland to Washington, Newbern, and Beaufort. In the language of the chief-engineer of the rebels, Colonel Thompson, in an official report, ‘it is the key of Albemarle.’ In my judgment, it is a station second in importance only to Fortress Monroe on this coast. As a depot for coaling and supplies for the blockading squadron it is invaluable. As a harbor for our coasting trade, or inlet from the winter storms or from pirates, it is of the first importance.” A fort at Ocracoke Inlet was abandoned by the Confederates when those at Hatteras fell. [Illustration: L. M. Goldsborough _From an engraving by Buttre._] Meantime the Twentieth Regiment of Indiana Volunteers, under Colonel Brown, of the Hatteras Island garrison, got into serious trouble. The regiment had gone to a small settlement at the north end of the island--Chicamicomico by name--twenty-five miles north of Cape Hatteras lighthouse. Just what purpose they were to serve there is not now apparent; but the Confederates, who had fortified Roanoke Island, came with a superior force to cut them off from communication with the forces at the inlet, and there was a most fatiguing race down the beach. The Union force won, the Confederates being driven off by the Union steamer _Monticello_, Capt. D. L. Braine. Following this, in 1862, came the expedition under Flag Officer L. M. Goldsborough and Gen. A. E. Burnside against Roanoke Island. The force left Hampton Roads on January 11th. There was a long delay at Hatteras Inlet bar, but on Friday morning, February 7th, they were facing the Confederate forts on the north end of Roanoke Island, and a squadron of Confederate ships, which their commander, Commodore W. F. Lynch, described as “two old side-wheel steamers, and six propellers--the former possessing some speed; the latter slow in their movements, and one of them frequently disabling its shaft.” [Illustration: Stephen C. Rowan. _From a photograph._]