Original Photographs Taken on the Battlefields during the Civil War of the United States — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
Original Photographs Taken on the Battlefields during the Civil War of the United States
John Stuart Mill · en
THE first naval conflicts of the Civil War took place early in 1862. On
the ninth of March, the revolving turret iron-clad "Monitor" met the
enormous Confederate ram, "Merrimac," in Hampton Roads. Both powerful
vessels forced the attack and stood under the fiercest bombardment only
to again invite assault. After four hours of the nerviest fighting that
the seas had ever known, the adversaries withdrew, undefeated, to repair
their respective damages. Brady secured several photographs of these
vessels immediately after the engagement. One of them on this page shows
part of the deck and turret of the "Monitor;" near the port-hole can be
seen the dents made by the heavy steel-pointed shot from the guns of the
"Merrimac." While the news of this conflict was amazing even old Europe,
naval operations along the American coast were creating consternation.
On the first anniversary of the Fall of Fort Sumter the National navy,
in an attempt to sweep the Confederates from the Atlantic coast,
bombarded Fort Pulaski in Georgia. All day long the bombardment was
terrific and firing did not cease until nightfall, when five of the guns
of the fortress were silent. All night long four of Gillmore's guns
fired at intervals of fifteen or twenty minutes and at daybreak the
onslaught became furious. At two in the afternoon a white flag appeared
from its walls. The spoils of victory were the fort, forty-seven heavy
guns, a large supply of fixed ammunition, forty thousand pounds of gun
powder, a large quantity of commissary stores; three hundred prisoners
and the port of Savannah was sealed against blockade runners--all this
with the loss of but one killed on each side. Brady seems to have had
unusual foresight. He was nearly always in the right place at the right
time and these negatives picture the ruins of Fort Pulaski.
[Illustration: ORIGINAL "MONITOR" AFTER HER FIGHT WITH THE "MERRIMAC"]
[Illustration: RUINS OF FORT PULASKI, GA., APRIL, 1862]
[Illustration: OFFICERS ON BOARD "MONITOR," JULY 9, 1862, AT HAMPTON
ROADS]
[Illustration: THE BREACHFORT AT PULASKI AFTER BATTLE]
[Illustration]