CHAPTER LIII

BATTLE OF JAMES ISLAND

Meantime Benham was chafing at the helpless and ignominious position in which he found himself. At the head of twelve thousand fine troops, within six miles of Charleston, he was confronted by a formidable line of works, and had received positive orders from Hunter not to fight a battle. For several days he contemplated a movement towards the enemy's right, and issued some preliminary orders to that end. General Stevens thought an attempt should have been made in that direction as soon as Wright's division arrived. General Wright agreed that, if any part of the line was to be attempted, it should be the right. Both judged the left impracticable, resting as it did on the water, and covered by the advanced flanking fort at Secessionville.

General Hunter returned to Hilton Head for a short visit. In his absence, in an evil hour General Benham took it into his head that he might take the Secessionville fort. Its guns were shelling our pickets, and even the commanding general himself, when he ventured within range. They could almost reach Wright's camp. He resolved upon this attempt as precipitantly, and as regardless of the difficulties, as was his wont. On the evening of the 15th be summoned his subordinate commanders on board his headquarters steamer. There assembled Generals Stevens, Wright, and Williams. Captain Percival Drayton, commanding the naval force, was also present. To them Benham announced his decision: General Stevens to assault the fort before daylight with his division, Wright and Williams to support, the navy to coöperate. This announcement, coming at nine o'clock at night, for such an attack before daylight the next morning, without any previous notice or chance for preparation, must have taken them aback.

General Wright couched an emphatic protest in the diplomatic form of questions to General Stevens:--

"Have you impaired the strength of the enemy's works at Secessionville by the firing of your battery?"

"Not in the least," replied General Stevens; "I have driven the enemy from his guns by my fire, and I can do it again, but as soon as the fire ceases he returns. I have not dismounted a gun, and we shall find him in the morning as strong as ever."

"Do you know of any instance where volunteer troops have successfully stormed works as strong as those which defend the approach to Secessionville?"

"I know of no such instance."

"Have you any reason to believe that the result in the present case will be different in its character from what it has invariably been heretofore?"

"I have no reason to expect a different result. It is simply a bare possibility to take the work."

"There, general," said General Wright, turning to Benham, "you have my opinion."

In this General Williams concurred.

General Stevens states in a letter to General Hunter, written on July 8, soon after the battle:--

"I then proceeded to state with all possible emphasis my objections to this morning attack. I urged that it should be deferred to a much later period in the day; that we should first shake the _morale_ of the garrison, and endeavor to weaken its defenses by a continuous fire of the battery and of our gunboats; that in the mean time we should carefully survey the ground and prepare our troops, and make the attack when the battery and gunboats had had the desired effect. I closed by saying that under such circumstances I could do more with two thousand men than I could with three thousand men in the way he proposed. General Wright, moreover, warned General Benham that his orders were in fact orders to fight a battle. In this General Williams and myself in express terms concurred. General Benham, however, overruled all our objections, and premptorily ordered the attack to be made.

"I assured him, as did the other gentlemen, that he should rely upon my promptitude and activity in obeying his orders, but I considered myself as obeying orders to which I had expressed the strongest possible objections, and I therefore determined there should not be the least want of energy or promptitude on my part."

With this the conference broke up, and the officers hastened ashore to their respective commands to prepare for the arduous task of the morrow.

General Stevens at once ordered his troops to be in readiness at the advanced camps, two miles from the river, at two A.M., with sixty rounds of ammunition and twenty-four hours' cooked rations. Captain Strahan's company, I, 3d Rhode Island, was detailed from Wright's division to relieve the detachment of Roundheads in the three-gun battery. Over three hundred of that regiment were out on the widely extended picket line. Ordered to assemble and join their regiment, only one hundred and thirty of the number succeeded in reaching it in time to take part in the action, and then only after it had come under fire, so scanty and inadequate was the time allowed for preparation. Two companies of the 28th Massachusetts were on fatigue duty and had to be left behind. The 7th Connecticut, moreover, had been on severe fatigue duty the three previous nights, and were much jaded.

At the hour fixed, the troops were at the appointed place. Before 3.30 A.M. the column was advanced two miles farther to the outer pickets, and was arranged in the following order:--

Lieutenant Benjamin R. Lyons, aide-de-camp, with a negro guide, led the storming party, which consisted of two companies of the 8th Michigan, commanded respectively by Captains Ralph Ely and Richard N. Doyle, followed by Captain Alfred F. Sears's company, E, Serrell's New York engineers.

Then followed Fenton's first brigade, comprising the 8th Michigan, Lieutenant-Colonel Frank Graves; the 7th Connecticut, Lieutenant-Colonel Joseph R. Hawley; and the 28th Massachusetts, Lieutenant-Colonel McClellan Moore.

Then Rockwell's battery of four guns.

Then Colonel Leasure's second brigade, consisting of the Highlanders, Lieutenant-Colonel David Morrison; the Roundheads, Major David A. Lecky; and the 46th New York, Colonel Rudolph Rosa.

Captain L.M. Sargent, with his Company H, 1st Massachusetts cavalry, twenty-eight men, brought up the rear.

The attacking column numbered not exceeding 2900 officers and men, as shown by the following return:--

Officers. Men. Total. General and staff 9 6 15 First brigade:-- 8th Michigan 25 509 534 7th Connecticut 25 573 598 28th Massachusetts 20 416 436 Second brigade:-- 79th Highlanders 24 460 484 100th Pennsylvania 21 230 251 46th New York 22 452 474 Rockwell's battery, four guns 4 73 77 Sears's company, E, 1st New York engineers 2 59 61 Sargent's company, H, 1st Mass. cavalry 2 28 30 --- ---- ---- Aggregate 154 2806 2960

General Stevens gave the most explicit orders, reiterated in person to the several commanders, that the troops were to preserve strict silence, no stop to be made after passing the enemy's pickets; to form forward into line on reaching the fields in front of the fort; regiment to follow regiment and storm the work; not to fire a shot but rely exclusively on the bayonet, the muskets to be loaded but not capped. The idea impressed upon all was simply to assault the work in column of regiments, without an instant's pause after alarming the enemy's pickets, and take it with the bayonet.

Just before four A.M. the column moved forward on the road already described, and crossed the marsh by the causeway. Here a section of Rockwell's guns dropped out, and fell in again behind the second brigade. No opposition was encountered until the first house beyond our lines was reached, when the enemy's pickets fired, wounding five men of the storming party, and fled; but an officer and three men of their number were captured. The road was found blocked with felled timber, but the column without any delay advanced through the fields alongside the road until past the obstruction, and reached the open fields in front of the fort at 4.15 A.M., just as day was breaking. The storming party and the 8th Michigan filed into the field through an opening in the hedge and ditch which bordered the road, formed forward into line without a pause, and advanced steadily in excellent order over the uneven, deeply furrowed ground, soon surmounted the second ditch and hedge, and swept onward across the field next the work. The enemy were seen hastily forming on the parapet; their commander, Colonel Lamar, rushing to the gun half dressed, fired the great columbiad, heavily charged with grape, which tore a great gap through the advancing line, and they immediately opened with a storm of grape and canister from the guns, and a rapid and deadly fire of musketry along the whole front. Closing their ranks without break or pause, the gallant Michiganders pushed on, the storming party forty yards in advance, strewing the ground at every step with their dead and wounded. As they reached the ditch, Lieutenant Lyons dashed forward crying, "Come on, boys!" was the first man across the ditch, and fell half way up the parapet with a shattered arm. Many of the brave fellows who survived the murderous fire resolutely pressed on, gained the parapet, and poured their fire into the defenders behind it, who visibly gave back. Captain Reed, of the 1st South Carolina artillery, was killed at the gun he was serving by a Union captain, who was in turn immediately shot down. But the enemy rallied, the supports in the grove of pines in rear of the work poured in a deadly fire, and the brave stormers on the parapet, too few in number, soon melted away. The few survivors were forced to give back, and, throwing themselves on the ground, sheltered themselves as best they could behind the cotton ridges, from which they opened a fire on the fort with their muskets.

Meantime the 7th Connecticut and 28th Massachusetts, following close upon the 8th Michigan, turned into the field, deployed in like manner, and moved forward. Unfortunately they inclined a little to the left, and after crossing the second hedge the heavy grape and canister and musketry of the fort cut them up severely, and drove them still farther to the left, where they became disordered, and entangled in the bushes and broken ground bordering the marsh on that side. Lieutenant-Colonel Hawley tried to straighten out his regiment, setting up his colors in the field, and moved it to the rear and to the right, when he was ordered by Colonel Fenton to move still farther to the right, and advance again on the fort. The 28th Massachusetts, although considerably scattered, moved forward under cover of the bushes until they encountered an inlet of the marsh and the abattis of slashed trees, when they fell back under cover.

By this time Leasure's brigade was up, and, directed by General Stevens in person, advanced straight on the fort, regiment after regiment, deploying as they advanced. The Highlanders moved forward in fine order, followed by the Roundheads, taking ground a little more to the left. Crossing the second hedge, they came under the terrible fire of canister which struck the left of the Highlanders and the centre of the Roundheads, literally cutting the latter in two. The Highlanders pushed steadily forward, supported by the right wing of the Roundheads, passing the 7th Connecticut as Hawley was endeavoring to lead it to the right as directed by Fenton, struck the work at the angle on its left (our right), and, led by the gallant Morrison, plunged across the ditch, and clambered up the steep parapet; many of the defenders ran back, and again the fort seemed won. But again the musketry from the sharpshooters on the flanks and rear cut down the brave Scotsmen; a bullet grazed Morrison's temple, inflicting a serious wound, and he and the half score survivors of the brave band that so gallantly gained the parapet were forced to leap down again. But they did not return empty handed. Morrison brought out a prisoner at the muzzle of his revolver. The capture of another was even more daring. A rebel soldier sprang upon the parapet in his eagerness, and aimed his musket at one of the assailants, scrambling up the steep and lofty bank, but the Highlander, making a tremendous leap, dashed aside the weapon, seized his antagonist in his arms, and rolled with him to the bottom of the ditch, where he was forced to surrender.

While the Highlanders were thus storming the work, the left wing of the Roundheads, with some of the Highlanders, cut off and driven to the left by the terrible hail which smote them, yet pushed determinedly on. They ran over or through the 7th Connecticut as that regiment was moving out into the field, as already narrated, throwing it into some confusion, and dashed themselves against the fort. But here the front was well protected by abattis, and afforded no opening. The Reed battery raked them terribly. The men fell by scores, the line lost its impetus, and the survivors threw themselves on the ground behind the cotton-ridges for shelter.

The 46th New York was double-quicked the last half mile of the road, conducted across the first field and through the farther hedge, and ordered forward. Its course, like that of the 7th Connecticut and 28th Massachusetts, bore too much to the left, and like them it became entangled in the bushes on that side. Here portions of the 7th Connecticut and 28th Massachusetts, retreating, broke through the 46th, carrying back fifty men of that regiment. There they stayed, suffering considerably from grape, until the advanced regiments moved back, when they also withdrew to the hedge.

While the attack was making, Rockwell planted three guns of his battery well forward and to the left in the first field, and maintained as constant a fire of shells upon the fort as the movement of our troops admitted. His fourth gun was posted on the road to guard the left rear. Captain Sears aided Rockwell's guns across the hedge and ditch and high ridges, and later cleared out the felled trees from the road in rear.

General Stevens, from his position in the first field, had a clear view of every movement. Lieutenant Lyons and other wounded officers brought discouraging reports. Seeing plainly that the assailants were all driven from the parapet, and that the attacking force was completely scattered and had in a manner disappeared, he was satisfied the attack had failed. With instant decision he ordered the troops to fall back, and reform behind the hedges. Captain Stevens was sent with the order. On reaching the front of the fort not a line, or semblance of one, could be seen, except about forty men standing in the field within a hundred yards of the work. Besides the dead and wounded, the ground was covered with blue-clad men, crouching down between the ridges, many of whom were firing on the work. A heavy hail of musketry came from it, or from the pine grove and cover behind it. The guns fired only at intervals. Captain Stevens did not see a mounted officer, nor a single color, except perhaps one with the scanty line referred to, nor a single man running away. Riding to this line, he found Lieutenant-Colonel Hawley and two officers on the right of it, endeavoring to cheer on the men. The line had stopped. The men were dropping fast, some stricken down, others voluntarily for shelter in the deep furrows; two were knocked over within arm's length as he delivered the order.

Hawley at once about-faced his line and moved back. Then a most remarkable sight was observed. The men of his regiment, lying between the ridges, rose to their feet, and hastened to form on either flank of the line, which rapidly grew and lengthened out as it withdrew. Then another and another and another line rose out of the ground in like manner, and in a few minutes the four regiments, which had so gallantly dashed themselves against the fort, were moving back in four well-formed lines with colors flying, and men rising from all parts of the field and running to form on their respective regiments; but, alas, how reduced and scanty were they as compared with the strong, brave regiments which so proudly entered that fatal field barely a half hour before, where six hundred brave men now lay weltering in their blood!

The withdrawn regiments were halted behind the second hedge and straightened out. As soon as the troops could be seen moving back, Captain Strahan opened on the fort. Two of his guns were soon disabled, and he lost a sergeant killed, but with the remaining gun he kept up a well-directed and regular fire until the close of the battle. The gunboats Ellen and Hale, moving up Big Folly Creek, now began throwing shells at the long range of over two miles, some of which fell in the fields, greatly endangering our own men; but, guided by the signal officers, Lieutenant Henry S. Tafft on shore and Lieutenant O.H. Howard on the Ellen, the subsequent fire was more accurately directed upon the fort. The distance, however, was too great, and the shells too few, to produce much effect.

According to the plan, while General Stevens's division was assaulting the fort, Wright and Williams, moving together from Grimball's, were to act as a support to the former, protecting his left and rear from an attack by the enemy from his main line. Williams's brigade comprised five companies of the 3d Rhode Island, the 3d New Hampshire, six companies of the 97th Pennsylvania, and a section of Battery E, 3d United States artillery.

Wright had of his own division, of Chatfield's brigade, two companies of the 6th Connecticut and eight companies of the 47th New York; and of Walsh's brigade, six companies of the 45th Pennsylvania, three companies of Serrell's New York engineers, and besides these the other two sections of Hamilton's battery, E, and two squadrons of the 1st Massachusetts cavalry. These organizations were mere skeletons, and numbered about two thousand seven hundred effective. The remaining troops were left on picket, and to guard the camps.

Wright moved soon after three A.M. to, and formed under cover of, the woods one mile in front of his camp. Hearing a few shots on his right front, he rightly judged that Stevens's column was advancing, and at once moved forward. By this time daylight was upon him. Now he was joined by General Benham, who assumed command, leaving Wright responsible for only his own skeleton division. Moving rapidly to the front, Wright soon placed his troops in position fronting the enemy's main line, and maintained substantially this position until ordered to withdraw, throwing the 47th New York to the left, and advancing a section of Hamilton's battery, which opened a sharp fire.

Before reaching this position General Benham received a message from General Stevens asking immediate support, and ordered Williams to move forward and report to him. Reaching the field just as the assaulting column was falling back and reforming behind the hedges, and ordered by General Stevens to push in on his left, and do the best in concert with him that the ground would admit of, Williams threw the 3d New Hampshire forward beyond, or on our left of the marsh and inlet which covered the flank of the fort on that side, with the view of taking it in flank, and supported it with the battalion of the 3d Rhode Island. The 97th Pennsylvania he posted on the left of General Stevens's reforming regiments. The two former advanced with great bravery and steadiness, so far that they actually poured a telling fire into the flank of the fort, and the garrison was manifestly shaken. For half an hour they maintained the contest, sustaining unflinchingly a severe fire from the fort and the 4th Louisiana battalion, which hastened to reinforce it, raked by the Reed battery on the left and smitten in the rear by Boyce's field battery. The 3d Rhode Island was thrown to the left against the latter. It encountered three companies of the 24th South Carolina, drove them back, and struck the 25th and 1st South Carolina, which supported Boyce's guns, and were protected by a patch of felled timber, and maintained an unequal contest with them until ordered to withdraw.

Meantime General Stevens, with the greatest possible rapidity, was advancing his regiments as fast as reorganized to the farther hedge, the one nearest the fort, where they found cover in the ditch. The sun had cleared away the morning clouds, and now shone bright and clear. It was a beautiful and inspiriting sight to see each regiment move forward across the wide field in well-dressed line with colors flying, unheeding the shell and grape which hurtled past or overhead. Rockwell dashed his guns up to the same line nearly, and in the open field maintained a rapid and steady fire on the fort, only five hundred yards distant. Strahan plied his single gun, and the occasional heavy shells from the gunboats burst over the work with a deeper roar. Sharpshooters, as well as the advanced men who still clung close up to the fort, kept the parapet tolerably clear, but the fort was no whit silenced. The grape fell in frequent showers. Notwithstanding the severe losses the men were not discouraged, but were as determined and confident as before. Stimulated by the volleys and cheers of Williams's troops, they were ready, nay eager, to be led to the assault the second time. General Stevens sent word to Benham that his whole division was in the advanced position, reformed and ready, and that he would attack again as soon as Williams's movement produced its effect.

Just as he was about to give the order to advance, the firing on the left slackened and ceased, and Williams's troops were seen moving back. Benham, as hasty and ill judged in abandoning the field as he was precipitate and obstinate in ordering the assault, had ordered them to retreat. On the left were heard the rebel cheers. In front the fort redoubled its fire.

Soon afterwards General Benham ordered General Stevens to withdraw his column to camp. Wright and Williams had already fallen back. The former is particular to state in his report that "the withdrawal from the field of both columns was ordered by General Benham." General Stevens withdrew his forces without loss and unopposed. Even the advanced men were all brought off. Lieutenant H.G. Belcher, of the 8th Michigan, took them the order, and, working over singly to the left, they got under cover of the bushes on that side and thus withdrew. The enemy attempted no pursuit, and by ten A.M. the entire force was back in camp.

Thus ended the battle of James Island or Secessionville, the culmination of crass obstinacy and folly. Benham, who, deaf to the orders of his commander, deaf to the warnings of Wright, deaf to Stevens's earnest entreaties to be allowed to attack later in the day and after due preparation, had so rashly and obstinately forced the fight,--this very Benham shrank from the shock of battle, and ordered the retreat when victory was within his grasp.

The enemy's forces upon James Island were commanded by General N.G. Evans, and numbered certainly not less than 9000 effective. Colonel T.G. Lamar commanded the fort and was severely wounded. He had two companies, B and I, of his own regiment, the 1st South Carolina artillery, the 1st South Carolina or Charleston and 9th South Carolina or Pee Dee battalions, four officers and one hundred picked men of the 22d South Carolina, and three officers and presumably the crew of the floating battery, which had been withdrawn from the fire of the three-gun battery a few days before. All these commands must have numbered at least 800, although Colonel Lamar reports that his force did not exceed 500 until reinforced. He was soon reinforced by the 4th Louisiana battalion, numbering 250, and later by the balance of the 22d South Carolina, so that he must have had at least 1500 men before the action closed. The losses in these commands amounted to 172, of which the original garrison suffered 144, an unusually heavy loss behind strong works, viz.: Charleston battalion, 42; 1st South Carolina artillery, 55; Pee Dee battalion, 29; detachment 22d South Carolina, 18; total, 144. The loss of the 1st South Carolina artillery, 55, would indicate that more than two companies were in the fort.

Colonel Lamar reports that he was expecting an attack, having a detachment at each gun, and the alarm was given when the pickets were driven in; yet the assaulting column advanced so rapidly that it was within seven hundred yards when he reached the battery, and much nearer when in person he fired the 8-inch columbiad heavily charged with grape, which he says broke the leading regiment, cutting it completely in two.

The other Confederate troops engaged were the 1st, 24th, and 25th South Carolina, Boyce's field battery, and Company H, 1st South Carolina artillery, which manned the Reed battery. General Evans ordered up the 47th and 51st Georgia to support his right. His force, engaged and on the field, numbered 4500 effective, besides which were plenty of other troops available on the main works.

The Confederate loss all told was 204.

The Union loss aggregated 685, of which Stevens's column suffered 529; Williams's brigade, 152; Wright's division, four.

The 8th Michigan lost 185 out of 534, or thirty per cent.; 13 out of 22 officers who went into the fight, including every officer of the storming party, were killed or wounded. The Highlanders lost 110 out of 484, notwithstanding which they withdrew in good order, and brought off 60 of their wounded, some of their dead, and their two prisoners. These losses would have been much greater had it not been for the partial shelter afforded by the cotton-ridges, and the fire of the men behind them, which kept down that of the fort. But the loss of the garrison is unparalleled behind such works, and shows the desperate nature of the fighting.

The nearest parallel to this assault afforded by the war was that on Fort Saunders at Knoxville, where the Highlanders had their revenge. They manned the exposed salient of the fort when Longstreet tried to carry it by storm, November 29, 1863. This work was not so strong either in profile or position as Fort Lamar. It was subjected to a severe shelling and fire of sharpshooters, and then three veteran brigades, fifteen regiments, rushed upon both faces of the salient angle. The Highlanders and Benjamin's Battery E, of the 2d artillery, repulsed every attack. No enemy raised his head above the parapet and lived. And in the midst of the fight, amid the noise and fury of battle, as the Highlanders plied their muskets and rolled by hand 20-pounder shells with fuses cut short and lighted into the ditch, filled with the struggling mass of men, the Highlanders grimly passed the word along the line, "Remember James Island! Remember James Island!"

The Highlanders here lost four killed and five wounded. The entire loss in the fort was inconsiderable. The enemy lost 813 men, three flags, and 600 small-arms. This would seem almost incredible, were it not attested by the official reports, both Union and Confederate.

Why the assault failed, it is not far to seek. The principal cause was the strength of the work, manned as it was by a resolute garrison, and the destructive fire of its heavy guns. Although the alarm was given by the outposts nearly a mile from the work, the column reached it upon the heels of the fleeing picket, and was actually within five hundred yards before the first gun could be fired. But this gun, an 8-inch columbiad charged with grape, shattered the centre of the leading regiment, cutting it completely in two. Then the canister from the big howitzer and other guns doubly decimated them, yet the brave fellows gained the parapet. Had the next two regiments, the 7th Connecticut and 28th Massachusetts, following close upon the Michiganders as ordered, joined them at this instant, the work would undoubtedly have been taken. But they were green troops, never having been under fire; the 28th, indeed, was fresh from home, and under the terrible storm of grape and canister they were beaten to the left, and entangled in the bushes and broken bank there. Although Lieutenant-Colonel Hawley lost no time in disentangling his regiment and moving it out into the field and again forward, it is significant, and well shows the difficulty of handling green troops under fire, that the Highlanders rushed past the right of the 7th Connecticut, and the Roundheads broke through or ran over its centre, and both assaulted the fort and were repulsed--nearly all who reached the parapet being killed, and the remainder forced to give back--by the time the Connecticut regiment had advanced to within a hundred yards of the work, where Hawley received the order to withdraw.

Certainly the rapid advance and onset of the Michiganders, Highlanders, and Roundheads were all that men could do. Their loss was so great and the parapet so difficult that not enough men could surmount it to be able to hold it; but the chief reason for the failure was the deadly fire from the woods and cover behind the fort. The work was fairly stormed, but the stormers, too few to hold it, were destroyed by the deadly fire from its rear.

These three regiments had already smelt powder, and had been well drilled and disciplined by General Stevens. The others, new and inexperienced, could not be expected to equal them, yet they evinced no lack of bravery.

General Stevens says in his report:--

"I must confess that the coolness and mobility of all the troops engaged on the 16th surprised me, and I cannot but believe, had proper use been made of the artillery, guns from the navy, and our own batteries, fixed and field; had the position been gradually approached and carefully examined, and the attack made much later in the day, when our batteries had had their full effect, all of which, you will recollect, was strongly urged by me upon General Benham the evening of the conference,--the result might have been very different."[18]

General Stevens commends the gallantry of his troops in strong terms, and the brave and efficient service of his staff, already mentioned, of Lieutenant Orrin M. Dearborn, of the 3d New Hampshire, aide in place of Lieutenant Cottrell, who, having been promoted captain, had command of his company, and of Lieutenant Jefferson Justice, of the Roundheads, acting division quartermaster, who served upon the field as his aide. Lieutenant Lyons, who so bravely led the stormers, died of his wound in hospital at Hilton Head soon afterwards.

For his wrong-headed and disobedient conduct Benham was placed under arrest by General Hunter and sent North. His appointment as brigadier-general was revoked by the President. Later, by unwearied importunity and the pressure of influence, he managed to get himself reinstated, but never again was he trusted with the lives of brave men.

FOOTNOTES:

[18] See _Rebellion Records_, vol. xiv.; _History of the 79th Highlanders_, by William Todd; Major Pressley, in _Southern Historical Society Papers_, vol. xvi., Major John Johnson's _Defense of Charleston Harbor_.