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quietly in their bomb-proofs unharmed by the bombardment, and, the moment our charging columns appeared, rushed out fresh for the fight.

It was midnight when our troops retired, still exposed, as they retreated along the beach, to the pitiless peltings of this battle-storm. The expanse was covered with the wounded, the dying, and the dead. Twinkling lights were seen here and there, as friendly hands sought the wounded and bore them, in stretchers, from the range of fire. Some, their life-blood ebbing away, fell sweetly asleep, as with placid smile they dreamed of those friends and that home which they would never see again. Others, in the frenzy of delirium, shouted and sang, while the music of the tireless billows chanted funeral dirges all along the desolate shore.

Some time elapsed after this unsuccessful attack upon Wagner, during which both parties were strengthening their positions. The patriots, working day and night, in the face of a severe fire, gradually advanced their parallels. The rebels had buried thickly torpedoes, just below the surface of the ground, where the blow of a pick or shovel would explode them. This rendered extreme caution necessary. About fifty yards in advance of our works the enemy had constructed rifle-pits, from which their sharpshooters seriously annoyed our workmen in the parallels. One evening in August, the Twenty-fourth Massachusetts, armed with a gun in one hand and a shovel in the other, dashed into the pits. The rebels rushed in swarms from the rear and made for Fort Wagner A number of howitzers, which were in position for the service, swept the line of their retreat with so terrible a fire, that most of the fugitives were compelled to return and surrender. By this advance our lines were brought within two hundred yards of Fort Wagner.

About this time a masked battery was erected in a marsh, from which shells could easily be thrown into Sumter. This marsh fringed Morris Island on the west, by a border nearly a mile wide. It was covered with a luxurious growth of canes, and, though dry at low tide, was at high tide covered with water about four feet deep. Scows, loaded with sand-bags, were floated, by night, to a selected spot, and thus a solid foundation was made, which rose several feet above the surface of the water. All the work had to be done by night, as the spot was in full view from several batteries. An immense two-hundred-pound Parrott gun was then floated through the canes and mounted. Its ponderous missiles were to be thrown a little more than two and a half miles. When it first opened fire, this monster gun hurled its solid shot entirely through the gorge wall of the fort, tearing holes from four to five feet in diameter. The soldiers christened this battery the "Swamp Angel." Several other batteries were also reared for an assault upon Sumter.

On the morning of the 17th of August, General Gillmore, having sixty guns in position, opened fire upon the doomed fortress, where the flag of treason was defiantly unfurled. At the same time the fleet, consisting of the Ironsides, several monitors, and some wooden gunboats, coöperated. The fleet first opened upon Wagner and Gregg, and speedily silenced their guns. They then proceeded to the bombardment of Sumter.

The terrific cannonade continued with but slight intermission for many

days. The Parrott guns threw bolts eight inches in diameter, two feet long, with flat heads of chilled iron, and which weighed two hundred pounds. Before this pounding the massy walls of the fort were gradually crumbled into a heap of loose stones. From the 17th of August to the 24th, this storm of iron fell with ceaseless fury on the fort. The face of the fort then presented a shapeless mass of ruin, and was reported by General Gillmore as no longer of any avail in the defence of Charleston.

Several shells were also thrown into the city of Charleston, a distance of four or five miles, creating great astonishment and consternation there. Thirteen of these shells, thrown by the "Swamp Angel," entered the city. While this bombardment was going on, our parallels were rapidly approaching Wagner. By the 7th of September the sappers had mined the counterscarp, and all the arrangements were made to carry the works by assault the next morning. That night the rebel Colonel Keitt, of South Carolina, with his garrisons in Forts Wagner and Gregg, of about sixteen hundred men, effected their escape in small boats. In the morning our troops entered the evacuated forts unopposed. They were thus left in undisputed possession of Morris Island.

A very heroic but disastrous attempt was made on the 7th to storm Fort Sumter. There was, perhaps, more of chivalric valor than of sound judgment in this enterprise. Lieutenant-Commandant Williams, and a hundred marines, approached the fort in about thirty boats. They were met with a deadly fire of musketry and hand grenades; and, at a signal from the fort, all the surrounding rebel batteries opened upon them with such well-directed volleys that they were compelled to retire, having lost about fifty of their number in killed or wounded.

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Weary months now passed away, during which no progress was made towards the capture of Charleston. The hostile forces, strongly intrenched, looked each other sternly in the face, while a slow but steady bombardment was kept up on both sides. Charleston did not fall until Sherman, in his majestic campaign from Savannah to Columbia, was found in its rear, when the rebels were compelled to a precipitate evacuation. These incidents must be recorded in the chapter which narrates Sherman's campaign.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

EAST TENNESSEE.

(From January, 1861, to November, 1863.)

DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTRY.-BARBARITY OF THE REBELS.-SUFFERINGS OF THE PATRIOTS.---FRAUDULENT MEASURES OF SECESSION.-BATTLE OF MIDDLE CREEK.—ANECDOTES.-PATRIOTISM OF JOHN J. CRITTENDEN.-BATTLE OF MILL SPRINGS.-DEATH OF THE REBEL ZOLLICOFFER, SIGNAL VICTORY.-CUMBERLAND GAP.--MORGAN'S RAID.-ARMY MOVEMENTS IN EAST TENNESSEE.--THE CARTER FAMILY.-GENERAL BURNSIDE.-BATTLE OF KNOXVILLE.-EAST TEN

NESSEE REDEEMED.

A RANGE of mountains, commencing at the extreme northeastern boundary of Maine, runs in a southwesterly direction parallel to, and not far from the Atlantic coast, terminating in the States of Alabama and Georgia. The White Mountains of New Hampshire, the Green Mountains of Vermont, the Berkshire Hills of Massachusetts, and the Catskill Mountains of New York, constitute a part of this range. Entering the State of Pennsylvania, it assumes a more distinctly continuous character, and eventually diverges into three great parallel ridges, the Blue, the Alleghany, and the Cumberland.

These ridges divide the Old Dominion into East and West Virginia, and give a peculiarly broken and mountainous character to East Tennessee and Northern Alabama and Georgia. Mountains have always been favorable to liberty. In the midst of these hills there have ever dwelt a hardy and industrious population, in the Southern States, quite different from their brethren of the lowlands. In the American Revolution, when the inhabitants of the plains were almost equally divided into tories and loyalists, these hardy mountaineers, almost to a man, rallied as patriots. Loyal then, again they have attested their devotion to their country by their blood. While the treasonable spirit of secession swept almost unresisted over other portions of the South, the dwellers among these hills of Tennessee, Alabama, and Georgia, were "faithful found among the faithless." The reason for this is mainly to be ascribed to the fact, that slavery had but a feeble existence in that region of the Southern States.

That portion of this section where the loyalty of the inhabitants has been most illustrious, and their sufferings most dreadful, is East Tennessee. To the history of that loyalty and those sufferings we now direct the attention of our readers.

1

East Tennessee consists of thirty counties, occupying a region about three hundred miles long and nearly a hundred wide. The Cumberland Mountains separate it from Kentucky. The population is of the same parentage with that of Kentucky, the original settlers having mostly emigrated from North Carolina and Virginia. There is here but little of

wealth or of poverty, the inhabitants being very much on an equality, and characterized by manly frankness, bravery, and devotion to the National Government. The region which is their favored home enjoys a delicious climate, and is beautifully diversified with all that is sublime in towering mountains, and all that is lovely in sunny and blooming vales. It is not a cotton-growing region, and hence, though in the midst of slave-holding States, it has essentially escaped the curse of slavery. Innumerable herds of cattle graze upon its green hills. Indian corn and wheat are its great staples. Apples, peaches, pears, and plums, attain great perfection. Coal of the finest quality, and rich ores, are stored abundantly in the mountains. It may be doubted whether there be any other spot upon our globe which presents greater attractions for a home.

In the Presidential election of 1860, the slave-holders would not allow the Republican ticket to be presented to the people of the slave-holding States. But Douglas, a Union candidate, received in this State a majority of above fifteen thousand votes over his competitor Breckinridge, the candidate for secession. Indeed, Breckinridge could not have received as large a vote as he did, had not the people been deceived by assurances that he was in favor of the Union. Isham G. Harris, the Governor of the State, a strong pro-slavery partisan and an unscrupulous secessionist, immediately upon the election of President Lincoln, opened a correspondence with the leaders of the incipient rebellion, and, in conspiracy with them, on the 1st of January, 1861, two months before the inauguration of the President, called a special session of the Legislature, to contrive measures to carry the State into the rebellion, although the people had given a majority of over fifteen thousand votes in favor of the Union. The Legislature called for a convention of the people, to consider the state of National affairs. The people, when called upon to vote, gave a majority of sixtyfour thousand one hundred and fourteen in favor of the Union, with a large majority against the convention. East Tennessee gave a majority of over twenty-five thousand against holding any such convention. The secessionists, thus effectually routed, were for a time quiet.

The traitorous bombardment of the United States Fort Sumter, whose echoes roused such indignation throughout the North, also roused a corresponding spirit of treasonable pride and desperation throughout the South. The President called for seventy-five thousand volunteers. War could no longer be avoided. Sectional pride was stronger than National loyalty. Thousands of Unionmen declared that since war had come, they must cast in their lot, not with their assailed country, but with their native States in rebellion. In answer to President Lincoln's call for troops, Harris insolently replied:

"Tennessee will not furnish a man for purposes of coercion, but fifty thousand men, if necessary, for the defence of our rights and those of our Southren brethren."

The Legislature was reassembled on the 25th of April. Its members had been elected months before, without reference to the issues then before the people. Composed mainly of slave-holders, in the interest of the rebellion, it went immediately into secret session. A joint resolution was

passed directing the Governor to enter into a military league with the Confederate States, and surrendering the whole military force of Tennessee to the control of the rebel leaders. The Governor was also authorized to raise immediately an army of fifty-five thousand men, twenty-five thousand of whom were to be at once equipped for the field. By the 1st of June these men were in camps, armed and mainly fitted out with munitions stolen from the arsenals of the United States. These troops exerted a controlling influence over the elections which followed.

The Legislature also passed a vote declaring Tennessee independent of the National Government. The declaration was submitted to the "No people, who were to ratify or reject it by a vote of "Separation" or Separation." In these extraordinary proceedings the Legislature showed an utter disregard both of constitutional forms and popular rights. The Constitution required that any proposed amendment should be passed by two successive Assemblies before it could be submitted to the people. Without any consultation with the people, the Legislature, composed mostly of slaveholders, had effectually divorced the State from the Union; had by a military league joined the rebel Confederacy; and had placed an army of twenty-five thousand men, which could at any time be doubled, under the control of the rebel leaders. If the people, after all this were done, should refuse to ratify separation, they would be placed in an anomalous position, deprived by military force of their old political rights, and not possessed of the new.

Thus swayed by the most passionate appeals to sectional pride, betrayed by the State Government, and overawed by the soldiers, a majority of fiftyseven thousand six hundred and sixty-seven was given for separation. Such was the intrigue by which Tennessee was taken out of the Union. Successful, however, as these measures had been in other parts of the State, they failed to overcome the determined loyalty of the East Tennesseans. Notwithstanding there were over six thousand soldiers stationed, in their counties, these brave patriots, out of a vote of forty-seven thousand nine hundred and three, gave a majority of twenty-three thousand two hundred and forty-three against separation. They immediately commenced holding Union meetings and forming Union organizations. They applied to the National Government for arms, and made vigorous preparations to repel the menaced assaults of their rebel foes.

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The position of the East Tennesseans was one of which the Confederate authorities could not consistently complain. If Tennessee had a right to secede from the Union, East Tennessee had the same right to se--cede from the State. The people of East Tennessee were, beyond all dispute, the rebels themselves being witnesses, in favor of the Union. Still, the rebels were enraged beyond measure at the application, by others, of those very principles upon which they professed to act themselves. They called these patriots, rebels; they quartered an army among them to hold them in subjection, and scoured the country with guerrillas, who robbed and maltreated the Union people in every way, dragging all capable of bearing arms into the rebel ranks, or compelling them to abandon their homes and seek refuge among the mountains. They hunted these patriot refugees with bloodhounds, and shot down defenceless citizens in cold

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