Chapter 8

So ended the old year, the first of the war; and the new year came in. It was now January, 1862.

On the 3d, the regiment was for the first time paid off. Frank received pay for two months' service, at twelve dollars a month. He kept only four dollars for his own use, and sent home the remaining twenty dollars in a check, to be drawn by his father in Boston. It was a source of great pride and satisfaction to him that he could send money to his parents; and he wondered at the greedy selfishness of John Winch, who immediately commenced spending his pay for pies and cakes, at the sutler's enormous prices.

On the 6th, the regiment broke camp and marched to Annapolis. There was snow on the ground, which had fallen the night before; and the weather was very cold. The city was a scene of busy activity. The fleet lay in the harbor. Troops and baggage trains crowded to the wharves. Transport after transport took on board its precious freight of lives, and hauling out into the stream to make room for others, dropped anchor off the town.

After waiting five hours--five long and dreary hours--at the Naval Academy, our regiment took its turn. One half went on board an armed steamer, whose decks were soon swarming with soldiers and bristling with guns. The other half took passage in a schooner. And the steamer took the schooner in tow, and anchored with her in the river. And so Frank and his comrades bade farewell to the soil of Maryland.

The excitement of these scenes had served to put Frank's conscience to sleep again. However, it received a sting, when, on the day of leaving Annapolis, he learned that the secessionist whose turkeys had been stolen, had, in revenge for his wrongs, quitted his farm, and gone to join the rebel army.

XIV.

THE VOYAGE AND THE STORM.

On the morning of the 9th of January the fleet sailed.

Frank was on board the schooner towed out by her steam consort.

Although the morning was cold and wet, the decks of the transports were crowded with troops witnessing the magnificent spectacle of their own departure.

Just before they got under way, a jubilant cheering was heard. Frank made his way to the vessel's side, to see what was going on. A small row-boat passed, conveying some officer of distinction to his ship. Frank observed that he was a person of quite unpretending appearance, but of pleasant and noble features.

"Burnside! Burnside! Burnside!" shouted a hundred voices.

And in acknowledgment of the compliment, the modest hero of the expedition stood up in the boat, and uncovered his high, bald forehead and dome-like head.

The rowers pulled at their oars, and the boat dashed on over the dancing waters, greeted with like enthusiasm every where, until the general's flag-ship, the little steamer Picket, took him on board.

And now the anchors were up, the smoke-pipes trailed their cloudy streamers on the breeze, flags and pennants were flying, paddle-wheels began to turn and plash, the bands played gay music, and the fleet drew off, in a long line of countless steamers and sailing vessels, down the Severn, and down the Chesapeake.

All day, through a cold, drizzling rain, the fleet sailed on, the transports still keeping in sight of each other, in a line extending for miles along the bleak, inhospitable bay.

The next morning, Frank went on deck, and found the schooner at anchor in a fog. The steamer lay alongside. No other object was visible--only the restlessly-dashing waters. The wild shrieking of the steamer's whistle, blowing in the fog to warn other vessels of the fleet to avoid running down upon them, the near and far responses of similarly screaming whistles, and of invisible tolling bells, added impressiveness to the situation.

At nine o'clock, anchors were weighed again, and the fleet proceeded slowly, feeling its way, as it were, in the obscurity. There was more or less fog throughout the day; but towards sundown a breeze blew from the shore, the fog rolled back upon the sea, the clouds broke into wild flying masses, the blue sky shone through, and the sunset poured its placid glory upon the scene.

Again the troops crowded the decks. The fleet was entering Hampton Roads. Upon the right, basking in the golden sunset as in the light of an eternal calm, a stupendous fortress lay, like some vast monster of old time, asleep. Frank shivered with strange sensations as he gazed upon that immense and powerful stronghold of force; trying to realize that, dreaming so quietly there in the sunset, those gilded walls, which seemed those of an ancient city of peace, meant horrible, deadly war.

"By hooky!" said Seth Tucket, coming to his side, "that old Fortress Monroe's a stunner--ain't she? I'd no idee the old woman spread her hoop skirts over so much ground."

"You can see the big Union gun there on the beach," said Atwater. "To look at that, then just turn your eye over to Sewell's Point there, where the rebel batteries are, makes it seem like war." And the tall, grave soldier smiled, with a light in his eye Frank had seldom seen before.

The evening was fine, the sky clear, the moon shining, the air balmy and spring-like. The fleet had come to anchor in the Roads. The bands were playing, and the troops cheering from deck to deck. The moonlight glittered on the water, and whitened the dim ships riding at anchor, and lay mistily upon the bastions of the great slumbering fortress. At a late hour, Frank, with his eyes full of beauty and his ears full of music, went below, crept into his berth, and thought of home, and of the great world he was beginning to see, until he fell asleep.

The next day the fleet still lay in Hampton Roads. There were belonging to the expedition over one hundred and twenty-five vessels of all classes, freighted with troops, horses, forage, and all the paraphernalia of war. And this was the last morning which was to behold that magnificent and powerful armada entire and unscattered.

At night the fleet sailed. Once at sea, the sealed orders, by which each vessel was to shape its course, were opened, and Hatteras Inlet was found to be its first destination.

The next day was Sunday, January 12. The morning was densely foggy. Frank, who had been seasick all night, went on deck to breathe the fresh sea air. The steamer, still towing the Schooner, was just visible in the fog, at the other end of the great sagging hawser. And the sea was rolling, rolling, rolling. And the ship was tossing, tossing, tossing. And Frank's poor stomach, not satisfied with its convulsive efforts to turn him wrong side out the night before, recommenced heaving, heaving, heaving. He clung to the rail of the schooner, and every time it went down, and every time it came up, he seemed to grow dizzier and sicker than ever. He consoled himself by reflecting that he was only one of hundreds on hoard, who were, or had been, in the same condition; and when he was sickest he could not help laughing at Seth Tucket's inexhaustible drollery.

"Well, try again, ef ye want to," said that poetical private, addressing his stomach. "Be mean, and stick to it. Keep heaving, and be darned!"

Stomach took him at his word, and for a few minutes he leaned heavily by Frank's side.

"There!" he said to it, triumphantly, "ye couldn't do any thing, and I told ye so. Now I hope ye'll keep quiet a minute. Ye won't? Going at it again? Very well; do as you please; it's none o' my business--by gosh!"--lifting up his head with a bitter grin; "that inside of me is like Milton's chaos, in Paradise Lost. 'Up from the bottom turned by raging wind and furious assault!'--Here it goes again!"

Frank had been scarcely less amused by the misery of Jack Winch, who declared repeatedly that he should die, that he wished he was dead, and so forth, with groanings unutterable.

But Frank kept up his courage, and after eating a piece of hard bread for breakfast, began to feel better.

Towards noon the fog blew off, and the beach was visible on the right,--long, low, desolate, a shore of interminable sand, over which the breakers leaped and ran like hordes of wild horses with streaming tails and manes. Not a sign of vegetation was to be seen on that barren coast, nor any trace of human existence, save here a lonely house on the ridge, and yonder a dismantled wreck careened high upon the beach, or the ribs of some half-buried hulk protruding from the sand.

On the other side was an unbroken horizon of water. Numerous vessels of the fleet were still in sight And now a little steamer came dashing gayly along, hailed with cheers. It was the Picket, General Burnside's flag-ship.

In the afternoon, more fog. But at sunset it was clear. The wind was light, blowing from the south. But now the ocean rolled in long, enormous swells, showing that the vessels were approaching Cape Hatteras; for, whatever may be the aspect of the sea elsewhere, here its billows are never at rest.

So the sun went down, and the night came on, with its cold moon and stars, and Hatteras lighthouse shot its arrowy ray far out across the dark water.

The breeze freshened and increased to a gale; and the violence of the waves increased with it, until the schooner creaked and groaned in every part, and it seemed as if she must break in pieces. Sometimes the billows burst upon the deck with a thunder-crash, and, sweeping over it, poured in cataracts from her sides. Now a heavy cross-sea struck her beams with the jarring force of an avalanche of rocks, flinging more than one unlucky fellow clear from his berth. And now her bows went under, sunk by a weight of rolling water, from which it seemed for an instant impossible that she could ever emerge. But rise she did, each time, slowly, laboring, quivering, and groaning, like a living thing in mortal agony. Once, as she plunged, the great cable that united her fortunes with those of the steamer, unable to bear the tremendous strain, snapped like a wet string; and immediately she fell off helplessly before the gale.

The troops had a terrible night of it. Many were deathly sick. Two or three broke their watches, besides getting badly bruised, by pitching from their bunks. Frank would not have dared to go to sleep, even if he could. Once, when the ship gave a lurch, and stopped suddenly, striking the shoulder of a wave, he heard somebody tumble.

"Who's that?" he asked.

And the nasal sing-song of the poetical Tucket answered, "'Awaking with a start, the waters heave around me, and on high the winds lift up their voices; I depart, whither I know not; but the hour's gone by when Boston's lessening shores can grieve or glad mine eye.'"

And Tucket crept back into his bunk.

"We're all going to the bottom, I'm sure," whined John Winch, from the top berth, over Frank. "I believe we're sinking now."

"Well," said Frank, "the water will reach me first, and you'll be one of the last to go under; you've that for a satisfaction."

"I believe that's what he chose the top berth for," said Harris.

"How can you be joking, such a time as this?" said John. "Here's Atwater, fast asleep! Are you, Atwater?"

"No," said the soldier, who lay sick, with his thoughts far away.

"Ellis is; ain't you, Ellis?" And Jack reached to shake his comrade. "How can you be asleep, Ned, when we're all going to the bottom?"

"Let me alone!" growled Ned.

"We are going to the bottom," said Jack,--the ship just then rolling in the trough of the sea.

"I can't help it if we are," replied Ellis, sick and stupefied; "and I don't care much. Let me go to the bottom in peace."

"O Lord! O Lord! O Lord!" moaned Jack, in despair, feeling more like praying than ever before in his life.

Tucket had a line of poetry to suit his case:--

"'And then some prayed--the first time in some years;'" he said, quoting Byron. And he proceeded with a description of a shipwreck, which was not very edifying to the unhappy Winch: "'Then rose from sea to sky the wild farewell,'" etc.

"I never would have enlisted if I was such a coward as Jack," said Harris, contemptuously.

"I ain't a coward," retorted Jack. "I enlisted to fight, not to go to sea and be drowned."

"Drownded--ded--ded--dead!" said Tucket.

"O, yes," said Harris, "you are mighty fierce for getting ashore and fighting. But when you were on land you were just as glad to get to sea. Now I hope you'll get enough of it. I wouldn't mind a shipwreck myself, just to hear you scream."

Then Tucket: "'At first one universal shriek there rushed, louder than the loud ocean,--like a crash of echoing thunder; and then all was hushed, save the wild wind, and the remorseless dash of billows; but at intervals there gushed, accompanied with a convulsive splash, a solitary shriek--the babbling cry of private Winch, in his last agony!'"

After this, conversation ceased for a time, and there was no noise but of the storm, and the groanings of the ship and of the sick.

Frank could not sleep, but, clinging to his berth, and listening to the shock of billows, thought of the other vessels of that brave fleet, scattered and tossed, and wondered at the awful power of the sea.

Then he remembered the story Corporal Gray had that day told them of the great Spanish Armada, which sailed in the days of Queen Elizabeth to invade England, and was blown to its destruction by the storms of the Almighty; and he questioned within himself whether this proud expedition was destined for a similar fate. Already he seemed to hear the lamentations of those at home, and the frantic rejoicings of the rebels.

The next morning the wind lulled; but the sea still ran high. The sun rose upon a scene of awful grandeur. The schooner was sailing under the few rags of canvas which had withstood the gale. The steamer was nowhere in sight; but other vessels of the shattered fleet could be seen, some near, and some half below the horizon, far out at sea. The waves, white-capped, green-streaked, ceaselessly shifting, with dark blue hollows and high-curved crests all bursting into foam, came chasing each other, and passed on like sliding liquid hills, spurning the schooner from their slippery backs.

"'Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean! roll! ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain!'" observed Tucket, coming on deck with Frank, and gazing around at the few tossed remnants of the storm-scattered expedition.

Wild and terribly beautiful the scene was; and Frank, who had often wished to behold the ocean in its fury, was now sufficiently recovered from his sickness to enjoy the opportunity. Nor was the wondering delight with which he saw the sun rise out of the deep, and shine across the tumbling yeasty waves, at all diminished by the drolleries of his friend Seth, who kept at his side, saying the queerest things, and ever and anon shouting poetry to the running seas.

"'Though the strained mast should quiver as a reed, and the rent canvas fluttering strew the gale, still must I on; for I am as a weed flung from the rocks on Ocean's foam to sail, where'er secession breeds, or treason's works prevail,'"--added Seth, altering the verse to suit the occasion.

The fleet had indeed been rudely handled in that rough night off the cape. But now sail after sail hove in sight, all making their way as best they could towards the inlet. This some reached, and got safely in before night. Others, attempting to enter, got aground, and were with difficulty got off again. Some anchored outside, and some lay off and on, waiting for morning, to be piloted past the shoals, and through the narrow channel, to a safe anchorage inside.

XV.

HATTERAS INLET.

But what a morning dawned! Another storm, more terrible than the first, had been raging all night, and its violence was still increasing. And now it came on to rain; and rain and wind and sea appeared to vie with each other in wreaking their fury on the ill-starred expedition.

Tuesday night the storm abated, and Wednesday brought fair weather. The fleet in the mean time had suffered perils and hardships which can never be told. Many of the transports were still missing. Many were at anchor outside the inlet, waiting for pilots to bring them in. Some had been lost. The "City of New York," a large steam propeller, freighted with stores and munitions of war, had struck on the bar, and foundered in the breakers. The crew, after clinging for twenty-four hours in the rigging to avoid being washed off by the sea, which made a clean breach over her, had been saved, but vessel and cargo were a total loss. Frank had watched the wreck, which seemed at one moment to emerge from the waves, and the next was half hidden by the incoming billows, and enveloped in a white shroud of foam.

The schooner had escaped the dangers of the sea, and was safe at last inside the inlet; as safe, at least, as any of the fleet, in so precarious an anchorage.

There was still another formidable bar to pass before the open waters of Pamlico Sound could be entered. The transports that had got in were lying in a basin, full of shoals, with but little room to swing with the tide, and they were continually running into each other, or getting aground. Nor was it encouraging to see bales of hay from one of the wrecks lodge at low water upon the very sand-bar which the fleet had still to cross.

Frank and his comrades took advantage of the fair weather to make observation of the two forts, Hatteras and Clark, which command the situation. These were constructed by the rebels, but had been captured from them by General Butler and Commodore Stringham, in August, 1861, and were now garrisoned by national troops. They stand on the south-western limb of one of the low, barren islands which separate this part of Pamlico Sound from the Atlantic. Between two narrow sand-spits the tides rush in and out with great force and rapidity; and this is the inlet--a mere passage cut through into the sound by the action of the sea.

As the schooner was being towed farther in, some men in a boat, who had been ashore at Fort Hatteras, and were returning to their ship, came alongside. The party consisted of some officers belonging to a New Jersey regiment, together with a boat's crew of six men.

"Throw us a line," they said; "and tow us along."

A line was flung to them from the schooner; but they had some difficulty in getting it, for the waves were running high in the channel. Pending the effort, the tiller slipped from the hands of the officer who was steering; a heavy sea struck the boat on the quarter, and she capsized. Boats were lowered from the schooner, and sent to the rescue. It was a scene of intense and anxious interest to Frank, who was on deck and saw it all. The men in the water righted the boat several times, but she filled and capsized as often. One officer was seen to get his feet entangled, sink with his head downward, and drown in that position before he could be extricated. He was the colonel of the regiment. The surgeon of the regiment also perished. All the rest were saved.

The drowned bodies were brought upon deck, and every effort was made to bring back life into them; but in vain. And there they lay; so full of hope, and courage, and throbbing human life an hour ago--now two pale, livid corpses. The incident made a strong impression on Frank, not yet accustomed to the aspect of death, which was destined to become so familiar to his eyes a few days later.

Still the dangers and delays that threatened to prove fatal to the expedition were far from ended. It seemed that the rebels were the enemies it had least to fear. Avarice, incapacity, and treachery at home had conspired with the elements against it. Many of the larger vessels drew too much water for the passage into the sound, and were wholly unfit for the voyage.

"The contractors," said Burnside, "have ruined me; but God holds me in his palm, and all will yet be well."

With nothing to distinguish him but his yellow belt, in blue shirt, slouched hat, and high boots, he stood like a sea-god (says an eye-witness) in the bows of his light boat, speaking every vessel, and inquiring affectionately about the welfare of the men.

Storm succeeded storm, while the fleet was yet at the inlet; many days elapsing before the principal vessels could be got over the "bulkhead," as the bar is called, which still intervened between them and the sound. To add to the sufferings of the troops, the supply of fresh water gave out. Much of that with which the transports had been provided by dishonest or imbecile contractors, had been put up in old oil casks, which imparted to it a taste and odor far from agreeable. But even of such wretched stuff as this, there was at length none to be had.

"We had ham for dinner yesterday," wrote Frank; "but as we had nothing to drink after it, we thought we should die of thirst. I never suffered so in my life; and O, what would I have given for a good drink out of our well at home! We were as glad as so many ducks, this morning, to see it rain. O, it did pour beautifully! I never knew what a blessing rain was before. I went on deck, and got wet through, catching water where it dripped from the rigging. But I didn't care for the soaking--I had filled my canteen; and I tell you, that nasty rain-water was a luxury."

The noble-hearted general was grieved to the soul by the sufferings of his men. Neither day nor night did he seem to desist for a moment from his efforts to atone, by his own vigilance and activity, for the culpable inefficiency and negligence of others. He hastened to Fort Clark, where there was a condenser for converting salt water into fresh, and attended personally to putting it into operation. By this means a miserably meager supply was obtained,--enough, however, together with the rain that was caught, to keep the demon of thirst at bay until the water vessels could arrive.

Ten days elapsed after the schooner entered the inlet before she was got over the bulkhead into the open sound. And still ten days more were destined to slip by before any general movement against the enemy was attempted by the fleet. In the mean while the troops confined on shipboard resorted to a thousand devices for passing away the time. There was dancing, there was card-playing, there was singing; and many new games were invented for the occasion. Frank learned the manual of arms.

Something else he learned, not so much to his credit. Before saying what that was, I wish to remind the reader of the peculiar circumstances in which he was placed--the tedious hours; the hardships, which he was glad to forget at any cost; the example of companions, all older, and many so much older than himself; and, not least by any means, his own ardent and susceptible nature.

One day he joined his comrades in a game of bluff. Now, bluff is a game there is no fun in unless some stake is played for. The boys had been ashore, and gathered some pebbles and shells from the beach, and these were used for the purpose. Frank had great success. He won more shells than any body. In the excitement, he forgot his thirst, and all the accompanying troubles. He forgot, too, that this was a kind of gambling. And he was so elated, that when somebody proposed to play for pennies, he did not think that it would be much worse to do that than to play for shells and pebbles.

Unfortunately, he was still successful. He won twenty cents in about an hour. He did not intend to keep them, for he did not think that would be right. "I'll play," said he, "and let the boys win them back again." But, at the next sitting, he won still more pennies; so that he thought he could well afford to play a bolder game. His success was all the more gratifying when he considered that he was the youngest of the party, and that by skill and good fortune he was beating his elders.