The perfect discipline which prevailed on board the Harrisburg inspired every man with zeal and courage for he knew that he was one wheel in the vast machine whose action was essential to the operation of the whole. Every one supported every other one, and was in turn supported by them; and entire confidence reigned throughout the ship. The Harrisburg passed Fort Jackson, and poured her broadside into St. Philip. It was the same scene over again, but intensified by the hopes of success, and by the continued tension upon the nervous systems of its actors. But hardly had the ship passed the second fort before she got aground; and, at the same instant, the vessel seemed to be wrapped in flames. It was an awful moment to the devoted tars, who could not yet comprehend the nature or the extent of the calamity which had overtaken the ship; but, to their honor and glory, not one of them deserted his station. The port-battery still roared, as it poured its destructive missiles into the enemy. An immense fire-raft had been pushed forward by one of the rebel rams; and the Harrisburg, in attempting to avoid it, had been run into shoal water, and grounded. The ship was on fire, the flames leaping up to her tops; and her destruction seemed to be inevitable. The firemen were called away; and, after exertions almost superhuman, the fire was extinguished, and the noble ship was then backed off from the shoal. The severest part of the day’s work was yet to come. What the officer saw was soon patent to all the crew,--that the river was swarming with rebel gunboats and ironclads. The roar of battle increased; and the shot and shell crushed through the sides of the Harrisburg, scattering splinters and other missiles in every direction. Wounded men were borne down to the cockpit, where Dr. Sawsett was busily discharging the duties of his profession; and the dead lay silent and calm amid the awful din. Still our noble ship continued to pour a terrible fire into the rebel vessels; and still her men, nerved to desperation by the thunder and crash of battle, worked like heroes. Now she butted against a rebel ram, and now she poured her death-dealing broadsides into the iron-mailed vessels that assailed her. Jack Somers was only a hero among heroes. Stunned by the roar, blinded by the smoke, he maintained his position at gun No. 9, without knowing what was transpiring even a few feet from him. As the ship changed her place, he obtained an occasional glance at a rebel gunboat; and he saw one of them crushed like a paper-box by the great guns of the Pensacola. Still he exerted himself to the utmost. When he saw a solid shot crush the head of poor Lawrence,--one of his top-mates,--he felt dizzy for an instant; but, even from this shock, he recovered under the stimulus of the awful excitement.