Part I
In the summer of 1862 a formidable fleet of war vessels lay at anchor in the Mississippi river just above the city of Vicksburg.
Farragut, flying his broad pennant from Hartford was there with a number of his crack vessels, and Davis with his Mississippi squadron of ironclads and rams.
Naval operations were at a lull just at this time in the West, for the Confederate Navy below New Orleans had been destroyed by Farragut, and that below Memphis had been knocked out in one round by the Mississippi squadron, aided by the rams improvised on the spur of the moment by Colonel Ellet.
Taking advantage of the security offered by this condition of affairs, as well as on account of the fierce July heat, fires had been drawn throughout the fleet and the cleaning of boilers was in progress, as well as the various little repairs that engineers are always wanting to make after a season of arduous service.
Information had reached us that somewhere up the Yazoo River, which empties into the Mississippi about seven miles above the anchorage, there was, in hiding, an ironclad Confederate ram known as Arkansas, one of the vessels which had escaped destruction at Memphis by having previously been sent for completion up the Yazoo.
To ascertain something definite of her whereabouts, the gunboat Tyler, under Lieutenant Commander William Gwin, was directed to make a reconnaissance up the Yazoo accompanied by the ironclad Carondelet, and one of Ellet’s rams, Queen of the West, the two latter to aid in destroying Arkansas should Tyler find her and bring her into action. The plan agreed upon was for the ironclad to take station up the Yazoo, about seven miles from the Mississippi, while Tyler and Queen of the West proceeded on up. The departure of the expedition from the fleet was timed so that it entered the Yazoo at daylight on the morning of 15 July, Tyler in the lead.
About seven o’clock, while the crew was breakfasting, the officer of the deck reported the smoke of a steamer in the distance coming down the river. Captain Gwin came on deck and as soon as the vessel came in sight around a bend, he ordered a shot from a light howitzer fired across her bows as a hint to come to a halt and await his approach, but the stranger paid no attention to this. The morning haze lifting just then revealed that the vessel which we thought to be a river steamboat coming down to give herself up, was an ironclad running out guns. Presently the smoke from her bow, the roar of her guns and the noise of shells passing over Tyler, notified us that we need go no further on our search.
The men sprang to the guns without waiting for the boatswain’s whistle; the breakfast things were hastily brushed aside; and in a few minutes Tyler was cleared for action and responded to the challenge with her heavy battery of 64-pounders, and the fight was soon fairly under way.
Tyler had slowed down her engines when the engagement began, and the current was taking her toward Carondelet and Queen of the West, then some distance behind.
After considerable firing, Carondelet forged by, both vessels using their guns as rapidly as possible.
Arkansas had kept slowly on all this time, her progress arrested only by the concussion of her guns and by swinging from side to side to use her broadside battery, just as Tyler was doing, while the guns in her bow were served as rapidly as possible, directed at Carondelet or Tyler as each offered the best opportunity.
Carondelet had not made much progress ahead of us when, to our surprise and consternation, she suddenly ran into the bank.
Arkansas moved over towards her, and when almost abreast, let go all the guns she could bring to bear.
Our last view of Carondelet was through a cloud of enveloping smoke with steam escaping from her ports, and of her men jumping overboard.
Until it was evident that the ram was intent upon continuing her journey down the river, we considered the capture of Carondelet as certain.
She, however, turned her attention exclusively to Tyler... and moved over to strike us.
Tyler was a wooden vessel, originally a river steamboat, cut down and altered to suit her new character, and carried a broadside of six 8-inch 64-pounders and a 32-pounder Dahlgren in the stern, but her guns and machinery and boilers were unprotected against anything more formidable than musketry.
Her opportune presence at Shiloh was, it will be remembered, of great service during that battle, when the Confederate advance on the left was checked by the fire of her guns and that of her consort, Lexington.
She had covered the landing of Grant’s troops and his retreat from Belmont, where he made his first fight; and did her share of the work at Fort Henry and Fort Donelson.
A few weeks before, Mound City, an armored vessel, had her steam chest perforated while engaged with a battery up the White River, and of her crew of 175 men, 130 were dead and 25 badly injured within a few minutes after she was struck.
There was nothing reassuring in the present situation, for we were even more vulnerable than Mound City, and it was evident that Tyler was no match for an armored vessel such as was her antagonist.
Her main reliance, Carondelet, was already disabled and evidence was accumulating on Tyler that Arkansas' guns were heavy and well served.
Arkansas was protected by an armor of railroad iron well greased down, set at an angle and backed by several feet of heavy timbers, and the openings for her guns and smoke-stack were the only vulnerable points about her that our guns could search out.
Queen of the West, in the meanwhile, was a few hundred yards astern of Tyler, having kept about that distance since the engagement began, apparently waiting for orders.
Captain Gwin now called out to her commander, to move up and ram Arkansas. His only response to this was, to commence backing vigorously out of range, while Gwin was expressing his opinion of him through the trumpet in that vigorous English a commander in battle sometimes uses when things do not go altogether right.
The ram commander was badly scared and demoralized by the loss of Carondelet, and he let slip a golden opportunity, for he could have struck and sunk the enemy, had not his valor given way at the critical moment. He pointed his vessel for the fleet and the last we saw of him he was making off at the top of his speed, followed until he was entirely out of hearing by a storm of what the darkey called the “wustest kind of language” from Gwin, who was boiling over with rage and mortification at the turn affairs had taken and the imminent danger he was in of losing his vessel. By the time Tyler got headed down stream and her engines moving, Arkansas was close up and throwing grape, while Tyler, as she swung around, replied with each gun as it could be brought to bear, and with musketry from a detachment of sharpshooters we had taken on board the night before.
Things looked squally. Blood was flowing freely on board, and the crash of timbers from time to time as Arkansas riddled us seemed to indicate that some vital part would be soon struck. In fact our steering apparatus was shot away, and we handled the vessel for some time solely with the engine until repairs could be made.
Here is where Gwin showed his high qualities as a commander. He was ablaze with the spirit of battle. All knew that the vessel might go down and all of us be killed, but there would be no surrender. In fact he made that reassuring remark to the first lieutenant in my presence, when that officer suggested such a possibility. We were fighting for existence and we all knew it.
Tyler had been pounding Arkansas all this while, but with little apparent effect; but her smokestack, close to the armor, had been shot through and through, and the smoke pouring out had lessened the draft from her fires and slackened her speed and we began to gain a little on her.
There are few circumstances more trying than to be exposed to a heavy fire and not be able to hit back.
The unpleasant features of battle are not so apparent while the fight is on; then, one is busy, his pride is aroused, and the strain upon his nerve enables him to look upon death and bloodshed with some little indifference; but exposed to danger, seeing your comrades shot down and idle meanwhile, is trying in the extreme. There is but one thing to do under such circumstances and that is to stand up manfully and take what comes. On board a man-of-war there is no other course. This trying ordeal we went through for the next hour, most of us with practically nothing to do but watch the gunners of Arkansas as they handled their battery, render such assistance as was practicable to the wounded encumbering our decks, occasionally sounding the pumps to see if we had been struck below the belt, and the crew of our one stern gun working it for all it was worth.
Tyler at last turned out into the Mississippi with the ram close at her heels, and soon the smokestack and masts of the fleet appeared in sight. The code signals were run up in warning of the character of the company we were keeping, though the firing constantly approaching nearer, had been so continuous that it was supposed they would be in readiness to give her a warm reception. This was not the case. In fact one of the naval officers, ashore at the time, remarked, when we first came in sight: “There comes Tyler with a prize.”
The heavy firing had been heard of course, but it was supposed that the expedition was on its return and shelling the woods, and no preparations were made to meet the emergency.
In the early days of the war we used to let off our surplus loyalty by shelling the woods, where we thought the enemy might be, when there was no enemy actually in sight to practice on.
In fact there was hardly time to have gotten up steam, and the combined fleets were entirely taken by surprise. The first intimation of the situation came when Tyler and Arkansas appeared in sight, exchanging fire and signals flying.
As Tyler steamed along the line, the crews of the different men-of-war were crowding on deck in hurried efforts to cast loose their guns.
Tyler passed under the stern of Hartford receiving a parting shot from Arkansas, freighted with death for one unfortunate who had rested his head against the bulwark, only to have it taken off. Arkansas kept on down the entire line within pistol shot, receiving the broadsides of such of the men-of-war as were ready as she came within range and blazing herself with fire and smoke with her return compliments, and soon was safely under the guns of Vicksburg.
Tyler in the meantime had come to anchor, and boats began pulling over with surgeons offering assistance, and officers, out of curiosity, to note the results of the encounter.
Tyler's decks presented a shocking spectacle. During the fight she had been hulled 11 times, besides being cut up by grape, thrown at very close range, and by exploding shells. Her decks were literally running with blood, and the killed and wounded lay around in every direction.
At the very commencement of the fight in the Yazoo, Arkansas had exploded a shell from one of her forward guns directly on our crowded deck. It had horribly mutilated and instantly killed a commissioned officer and five men, piling them up in one sickening heap. Four of them were headless, and for many feet on both sides of the deck, the woodwork was spattered with blood and shreds of flesh and hair, while few of us escaped without bloody evidences on our clothing and in our faces of the destruction of our comrades.
Tyler had lost in the engagement four officers and 21 men, killed and wounded, while the injuries to the vessel were of such a character as to require extensive repairs before she was again able to enter into active service.
Carondelet, which had been left disabled in the Yazoo, repaired damages and reached the fleet later in the day. She, too, had a large casualty list. The mortification of the two admirals was excessive, but both owned up manfully that they had been caught napping.
I have read several reports of this fight and it is unnecessary to say that none of them agree! From the Carondelet point of view that vessel did all the fighting. Tyler is mentioned incidentally, I think, as having some trifling connection with the affair.
The report of Brown, the commander of Arkansas, would lead one to suppose that he did most of the fighting, while from this sketch of mine it may seem as though Tyler was not entirely a looker on.
The commander of Queen of the West has not yet shown up in war literature with his claim for the laurels. Perhaps he is still running.
There was no pluckier exploit in the war than this of Arkansas, in running the gauntlet of these two formidable fleets. Fortune favored the brave in this instance, in her finding them unprepared to receive her, and her audacity and pluck did the rest. She had, on her way down, disabled an ironclad of her own size, which she could have compelled to strike her flag, had she the time to wait. She had badly injured and all but sunk Tyler, and as she was passing through the fleet had blown up another ram, which, having steam up, had gotten under way to strike her. Arkansas had herself escaped without material injury.
In her encounter with us, however, and in passing the fleet, she had lost in all, killed and wounded, a large number of her crew, amongst the latter her gallant commander, Isaac N. Brown of the old navy, who was barked by one of our sharpshooters in the Yazoo while standing on deck by the pilot house directing the movements of his vessel, and for some little while was insensible.
Captain Gwin received many congratulations on the gallant manner in which he had stuck by Carondelet and fought his vessel, while those who were fortunate enough to escape alive received substantial recognition in promotion.
Not long after this we lost Gwin, then in command of Benton, while fighting a battery in the Yazoo, not far from the place where we encountered Arkansas, struck by a shell just as the rebel guns were silenced.
Gwin was a man of fine personal appearance, of elegant and winning manners, and courageous to the last degree. He was one of that class of officers who loved a fight, and never knowingly lost an opportunity to engage his vessel.
During the operations up the Tennessee river previous to the movement of Grant’s army to Pittsburg Landing, he found congenial occupation in keeping the Confederates from making a lodgement on the river with their batteries.
At Pittsburg Landing, he fought a six-gun battery with Tyler and Lexington and silenced it, though not without a loss, for which he feared a reprimand on the score of rashness.
He had the old-fashioned idea, that the place for the commander of an ironclad in action, was outside the armor, and was killed while carrying it out. It is hard to estimate the value of an utterly fearless officer in action, in holding subordinates up to their work.
No one ever thought of anything but strict devotion to duty when under fire with him. None of us dared to duck our heads, no matter how close and fast the balls came, or act otherwise than as though we thoroughly enjoyed it.
Perhaps a word in this connection would not be out of place, as regards the service of which he was such a fine representative. From the commencement of active operations at Belmont, the Mississippi squadron never failed in a loyal support of the army, clearing the way for its operations, convoying its troops and supporting it under fire, and its fights were frequently bloody ones.
It was one of the sights, after a prolonged engagement, like that at Donelson, Grand Gulf or Vicksburg, to go on board any of our fleet, but more particularly the flagship. The sanguinary character of the service, evidenced by broken and blood-stained woodwork and dead and mutilated men, was generally more apparent there, for carrying the admiral’s flag she was always a more or less conspicuous mark for the Confederate gunners. From the character of the service there could necessarily be no flinching, every man had to stand to his gun, no matter how ghastly the sights presented by his mutilated comrades.
There never was a more determined or pluckier fight than the fleet made at Grand Gulf, where for five and one-half hours it was under fire of Confederate guns, nor at Vicksburg, when supporting Grant’s assault, by engaging the water batteries of that place at close range.
It operated in a climate where a formidable sick list had always to be contended with and where men were constantly breaking down from exposure, and where, too, quinine and whisky were indispensable parts of our rations; but, in spite of fever-racked bodies and weakened gun crews, the squadron always came up smiling to a fight, and history now associates its name with our successes at Belmont, Fort Henry and Donelson, Island Number 10, Vicksburg, and the numerous encounters that eventuated in the opening of the Mississippi.
The action of the play was always rapid, and when the curtain was finally rung down, we were all ready and willing to bid a final adieu to the swamps and bayous, where for four years we had been slowly getting poisoned.
It was pleasant to take up again the duties of civil life in a climate where quinine was known only as a drug—not as an article of diet; where people drank whisky because they liked it, and not to sustain life; and where one could take his “constitutional” without the crack of a sharpshooter rifle to shake up his nerves and impress upon him the uncertainty of life.—S. B. Coleman, Acting Master, U. S. Navy, 6 March 1889
Part II
In Memphis, Tennessee, the Confederacy was constructing two ironclad rams, or armored gunboats, Arkansas and Tennessee. Guns and other vital equipment were furnished from the captured U. S. Navy Yard at Norfolk. The Union determined to split the Confederacy by controlling the Mississippi River. In anticipation, the Confederacy erected forts and batteries on its banks. With Farragut’s fleet of regular ships of the line approaching up river and Porter and Davis’s newly constructed gunboats and mortar ships coming down river, the city of Memphis, after the capture of Island Number Ten, was threatened. Tennessee, the further of the two from completion, was destroyed. Arkansas, was towed 300 miles down river to the mouth of the Yazoo River, and then 200 miles up the Yazoo River well beyond Yazoo City, Mississippi. There she was safe and it was hoped she could be completed. Lieutenant Isaac Brown of Kentucky—he of the USS Niagara of Commodore Perry’s squadron that Stevens had met in Hong Kong—was put in command of the unfinished Arkansas and ordered to bring her to completion and ready for combat. Lieutenant Henry K. Stevens was appointed first lieutenant or Executive Officer. Lieutenant Brown had had 27 years service in the U. S. Navy. Stevens had had 22 years.
When Brown and Stevens arrived at Arkansas, the Yazoo River was in flood and had broken through its levies. The pier to which Arkansas was secured was under water. The ship was actually four miles from land. The ship itself was a wreck—a mere hulk. The barge, which had been alongside and contained the priceless railroad rails with which to arm the ship’s sloping sides (35 degrees inboard sheer), had sunk. Brown closed his eyes and groaned. Stevens whistled in amazement. How were they, with no engineers or skilled mechanics, with no tools or materials, to complete the construction of a warship in a wilderness? By now the heat on this blazing river was 110 degrees. Brown gave Stevens a fist of Confederate naval officers whom he wanted and sent him back to Vicksburg, a few miles south of the mouth of the Yazoo River, where it emptied into the Mississippi.
Now began one of the most prodigious jobs that former U. S. naval officers were ever called upon to do. Captain Brown had a hull. He had twin engines, shafts and propellers, all hand-made in Memphis. He had boilers. He had unmounted guns. He had some plate iron. His hull was 165 feet long, with close to 80 feet in beam amidships, tapering forward and aft. She drew 14 feet, and weighed 1,200 tons. The hull was pierced for ten gun ports. It had an underwater iron beak or ram 16-feet long and extending 10 feet forward of the stem. He had a steam hose with which to repel boarders. He had solid shot and empty shells, but no powder. That was all.
Brown’s first job was to drag the river for his railroad iron, all of which he eventually recovered. Then he had Arkansas towed down to Yazoo City where he had some contact with civilization. To protect his ship, he constructed a raft or boom across the river below her.
With the Yazoo still in flood, supplies reached him from the interior via SS Star of the West, as there was still sufficient water for this oceangoing vessel. This was the same Star of the West, a Union steamer, when coming to the aid of Major Anderson at Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, which had been driven off by the battery of the cadets of the Citadel and led by their Commandant, Major P. F. Stevens, brother to Lieutenant Henry K. Stevens. This, on 9 January 1861, was the opening shot of the Civil War. (Not to be confused with the later attack on Fort Sumter on 12 April of that year, when it fell to the Confederacy.) SS Star of the West, since captured, was now serving the Confederacy.
Two hundred men were detached from the nearest Army command to work on Arkansas. Portable forges from every plantation for miles around were brought to the ship. The work proceeded day and night, never stopping. At night lanterns and pine flares fit up the ship. A Sunday School class in Montgomery, Alabama, collected scrap iron for Arkansas. Children stole coal from Federal barges on the river. Every steel rail had to have six hand- drilled holes. Makeshift drilling machines were set up. Every bolt for the steel rails had to be hand-forged. The sun, beating down on the glassy steaming river, raised the temperature to unheard-of heights. When workmen fell out from the heat or malaria, others took their place. The work never stopped.
Stevens drew from memory the plans and specifications for the gun mounts, to be made out of green lumber in Canton, 30 miles away, by men who had never seen a gun mount. The gun mounts arrived in oxcarts, hauled by many yoke of oxen. Virgin pine and oak was cut, sawed, and hauled in from various places. Slowly but surely Arkansas was progressing into a formidable fighting ship.
Brown and Stevens prepared and supervised the making of their gunpowder out of sulphur, salt-petre and charcoal. As to the ship’s fire power, the battery consisted of ten guns. In her bow gun ports were two 8-inch Columbiads. Her port and starboard batteries were matched, each with a 9-inch Dahlgren, a 6-inch rifled gun, and a 32- pound smooth bore. In her stern she carried two 6-inch rifled guns. Her cypress gun carriages carried iron wheels run on an iron rail quadrant for horizontal sighting, while a screw provided for elevation or vertical sighting. For these guns the magazines contained ample supplies of solid shot, fused shells, grape, shrapnel, and Minie balls.
Captain Brown quickly realized that the unreliability of his handmade engines was his ship’s greatest weakness. Furthermore, with one engine stopped, the ship went out of control while running on the other, as the helm would not hold the ship to its course, and she would circle.
One hundred seamen were found, assembled, and sent to Arkansas. Sixty soldiers were added to these to constitute the crew.
And now a circumstance forced Captain Brown’s hand. He was allowed neither time to complete the construction of his ship nor to train and exercise its crew. The Yazoo River was falling and falling rapidly. After five weeks of exhaustive work in intense summer heat, he was forced to move downstream. The ship was only partially covered with steel rails. Hastily her port and starboard quarter and her stern were covered with boiler plate and sheet iron. Captain W. F. Lynch, senior naval officer on the Mississippi, inspected Arkansas. He found her inferior to Merrimac in every way and likened her to a slaughter pen. With no insulation on the boilers, they became red hot when fired, running the engine room temperature into astronomical heights. The ship drew 14 feet when loaded with coal. There was only 15 feet of water on the bar at the mouth of the Yazoo.
Admiral Farragut had paid no attention to Arkansas and, saying that it was impossible to complete a ship in the wilderness, he had dismissed her from his mind. He was about to withdraw his ships downstream when two deserters from Arkansas announced to him that the Confederate ram was preparing to come down river to attack. Still skeptical, he sent the iron clad Carondelet, the ram Queen of the West, and the armed wooden steamer Tyler up the Yazoo to investigate and to determine just where Arkansas lay and the condition she was in.
Stevens wore out horses on his way back to Yazoo City to alert Captain Brown of the approaching Federal ships, which news he gained while downstream and cleared for action. She was, however, badly undermanned. Half her crew were ashore, down with malaria, while Captain Brown himself was running a malarial fever.
First Engagement, 15 July
The Union ships steaming up river were hardly prepared for the appearance of Arkansas coming down. Tyler, in the lead, took an Arkansas broadside. She turned and fled downstream while she still could. Then Queen received a broadside, and she also turned away. A broadside from Carondelet, which had 13 guns, killed Arkansas’ pilot and knocked down Captain Brown. Although wounded about the head, Captain Brown continued in command, relaying his orders to Stevens, his visible, on deck, commander. A soldier on Arkansas stuck his head out of a gun port only to have it blown off by a shell splinter and splattered against the ship’s iron side. Stevens rolled his body over the side. Arkansas was swinging from port to starboard in order to give Carondelet both broadsides. Carondelet, now badly hurt, turned into shallow water. Arkansas, her smokestack riddled, was losing steam pressure, and did not have the speed and power to ram. Also, as she drew more water, she could not follow Carondelet and board her. She had to be satisfied with raking Carondelet with shrapnel, cannister, and Minie balls. Carondelet, with 13 heavy shots through her and heavy personnel losses, lowered her flag.
Arkansas held her course downstream. She had no time for the surrendered ship. Besides, Carondelet's last shell had entered a gun port, killing 10 and wounding 20. But Arkansas, in her first engagement, had defeated one of her enemies and had put two more to flight. Tyler and Queeen, with a 30-minute start, returned to the fleet and spread the alarm. None of Farragut’s ships had steam up. Tyler was badly damaged, reporting 17 killed and 14 wounded. Farragut’s fleet had earlier run by the Confederate batteries at Vicksburg and was joined by Captain Porter’s ships from the north. The united fleet, therefore, lay two to three miles below the mouth of the Yazoo— directly above Vicksburg. Arkansas' orders were to run through these two Union fleets, and then to sweep the river clear to the Gulf. From there she was to break out into the Gulf and make her way into Mobile.
Second Engagement, 15 July
Arkansas cleared the bar at the mouth of the Yazoo, and, entering the Mississippi, headed downstream. As she felt the river current, she picked up speed. Before her on one side lay Farragut’s ships of the line at anchor. On the other side was a long line of armored gun boats. All were firing their boilers furiously to get up steam. Down the middle came Arkansas, her guns silent, her gun ports up. Under the intense heat of her engine room, men worked short shifts to fire her boilers. After a few minutes in that cauldron they fell out. Captain Brown held his fire.
USS Hartford, Farragut’s flagship, fired a single shot for range and then gave Arkansas a broadside. This was the signal for general firing from the fleet, and from the artillery on the river banks. Arkansas rocked under the pounding and her flag was shot away. Stevens walked among his men, displaying all that calm and assurance so necessary in a naval officer under fire, and particularly so in this instance when his crew were untrained and partly composed of soldiers or landsmen. The Union men-of-war, with springs on their cables, were able to fire both their broadsides at Arkansas. Only the gunboat Kineo got under way. She threw everything she had at Arkansas. Down went Arkansas’ gun ports, and out came her guns. The bow guns gave Kineo a load of grape. Then a port side salvo smashed through her. With her main steam lines broken, the crew of Kineo were leaping over the side to escape the scalding steam, as Kineo drifted downstream, dead in the water. Down at the end of the double line of ships in midstream, the ironclad Benton blocked the way to Vicksburg.
The general firing and smoke was now intense. Arkansas was badly pounded. The ram Lancaster moved out. Arkansas pierced her with a five-second shell. As it exploded, once more men were leaping into the water to escape the live steam from broken steam lines. Arkansas passed through Lancaster's crew in the water. Another ram moved out to attack, but the stern guns of Arkansas punished her badly. By now Arkansas was firing at Sumter, Louisville, and Cincinnati. A shell entered one of Arkansas’ gun ports, knocking out two of her guns and destroying their gun crews. The ship was now a shambles within and a wreck without. Benton, seeing Arkansas coming down on her, accommodatingly moved out of her way, and received solid shot from Arkansas’ stern guns for her courtesy. At last the protection of the batteries at Vicksburg was reached. This Confederate stronghold, with accurate gunfire, quickly drove off Arkansas’ pursuers, as she ran in for shelter. She had “made it”— one ship against 35. Captain Isaac Brown knelt on his deck and prayed.
Arkansas had “made it.” But three of her ten guns were disabled, her stack was riddled, her coal bunkers were empty, and half of her crew were either dead or wounded.
There were three factors that had made this passage of a Confederate ship through this fleet possible. First and paramount was the fact that the Union fleets were at anchor and without steam. Farragut simply could not conceive of Arkansas ever becoming a fighting ship. Without this element of surprise, in spite of Tyler’s 30-minute warning, Arkansas would have been destroyed. The second element was the fact that each of Arkansas’ guns had a commissioned officer as gun captain or pointer and that these were all former U. S. naval officers. Thirdly, this action was not on the high seas but in narrow and confined inland waters. At times the range was almost point- blank and each shot told against those enemy ships with insufficient armor to withstand them. Of the 97 shots, which Arkansas fired, 73 of them hit their mark. The damage to enemy ships and loss of life was, accordingly, heavy.
Captain Brown left his ship with a high fever. Stevens put the dead and wounded ashore and proceeded to clean and rehabilitate his ship as best he was able. With a volunteer crew from shore, he dropped downstream to coal and, with full bunkers, returned under the guns of Vicksburg. Lieutenant Brown was promoted to commander. Stevens was cited for promotion and commendation.
Porter, with his flotilla and transports, dropped down river, as otherwise everything below Vicksburg to New Orleans would be at Arkansas’ mercy. Farragut’s hand was also forced. It became necessary for him to join Porter, even though by so doing he opened the way for Arkansas to steam up river and free Memphis.
Engagement Number Three, 15 July
At dusk, Farragut moved his ships downstream, risking the fire from the Confederate batteries at Vicksburg in his determination to destroy Arkansas at all costs. But Arkansas, in the fading light, lying against the red bluffs of Vicksburg, was hard to see. When she had left Yazoo City to come down to fight, she was unfinished. The falling of the Yazoo River had forced her out. The steel rails along her sides, recovered from the bottom of the river, were rusty, and there had been no time to paint them. Now the rusty Arkansas blended into the red clay bluff. Only the fire from her guns that were still usable disclosed her position at the water’s edge. She was, however, struck by a 160-pound solid shot, which penetrated her hull at the waterline. Six more of Arkansas’ crew were thus killed and four wounded. Not only was Farragut frustrated in this new attempt, but the guns of Arkansas and the fort’s batteries had disabled two Federal ships, Winona and Sumter.
Engagement Number Four, 16 July
The following morning mortar ships were moved back upstream lobbing 13-inch shells at Arkansas, any one of which, if it had descended upon her unarmored top deck, would have destroyed her. The mortar fire was close, sinking barges directly behind her, but she received no direct hit, shifting her moorings frequently to circumvent it.
Engagement Number Five, 22 July
After a council of war, Farragut moved his capital ships back upstream. His strategy was to engage the shore batteries with his heavy guns as a cover to Essex, which was to run in and ram Arkansas and destroy her. The attack could not have been at a worse time for Arkansas. Most of her crew that had survived were ashore in hospitals, either wounded or down with malarial fever. Only 28 officers and men were aboard at the time of the attack. This handful fought just as valiantly as before with whatever guns would bear. Essex dashed in for the kill, followed by the ram Queen of the West. Arkansas slacked off her bow lines, letting the river current bring out her bow, with her ram ready to meet the oncoming Essex, which ship sheered away just in time. Her range, however, was point-blank, and she fired three 9-inch solid shots, one of which penetrated Arkansas' armor, killing eight and wounding six of the small crew. Essex, in turn, was heavily hit, running aground. She swung with the current and cleared, drifting down stream dead in the water. Then Queen of the West, at high speed, struck with her ram, tearing a hole into Arkansas. It was not a fatal blow, although the ship rocked with the impact. Queen of the West had been struck with many heavy shots, but managed to withdraw and maintain steam. Arkansas, with one engine torn down, and only a bare handful of men alive, was unable to move out and take Essex.
Farragut broke off the action, descending the river to the Gulf for Pensacola and refit for his mauled and battered ships. Thus a determined band, with an inadequate ship, had fought almost continuously until they were all but decimated, and they had won. They won under the hard school by which they had been trained—the U. S. Navy—in every sea and under every circumstance. They exhibited every determination and every sterling quality that could possibly have been expected of them. It was the old cry of the English—“England expects every man to do his duty.” Only that paramount urge could have sustained that heroic band. Farragut, in his heart, must have been proud of them. For they had lifted the siege of Vicksburg. A campaign had been lost for the North. Captain Davis, with his ships, and General Williams’ brigade returned upstream to Memphis. Farragut even abandoned Natchez. Now for the first time, supplies started out of the Red River and up the Mississippi to Vicksburg. Arkansas, riddled and smashed, was still alive. Workmen were once more repairing her under the direction of her officers in an effort to get her back into fighting condition. Arkansas had truly saved the day.
With Farragut’s fleet withdrawn, Confederate Major General Van Dorn determined to retake Baton Rouge. General Breckenridge was ordered to make a surprise attack, and Arkansas, now under the army command, was ordered to co-operate in the attack and to drive off or destroy what Union warships remained stationed in the river before the city. Captain Brown, in the meantime, was on sick furlough, seriously ill, and being nursed by his family at Grenada, Mississippi. Upon receipt of General Van Dorn’s order, Stevens protested that Arkansas was in no condition to proceed, having only one reliable engine. He accordingly wired Captain Brown for instructions. Brown ordered Stevens not to execute General Van Dorn’s order until he could rejoin his ship. Van Dorn would not wait, insisting that his orders be carried out forthwith. Stevens appealed to the senior naval officer on the Mississippi, Captain Lynch, at Jackson. Lynch had no knowledge of Arkansas' condition, but he ordered Stevens to obey Van Dorn’s orders. Arkansas got under way, proceeding downstream toward Baton Rouge. Captain Brown had arisen from a sick bed and, traveling on a cot in the baggage car of a special train, he sped for Vicksburg. He arrived too late. Arkansas had departed. Commandeering a locomotive and tender, the sick man pushed on for Baton Rouge.
Arkansas' chief engineer, who had been nursing the ship’s engines since the beginning, now fell desperately ill. The ship was stopped and he was put ashore. Arkansas passed Natchez and arrived at Port Hudson. Before Baton Rouge stood the ironclad Essex, and two gunboats, Kineo and Katahdin. Now the services of the chief engineer were sorely missed on Arkansas. There had been stops on the way to repair the faulty engine, to make new wrist pins, etc.
Stevens sighted Essex, standing up river to do battle. General quarters were sounded on Arkansas. Essex was all that stood between Arkansas and victory, as the two gunboats could be readily disposed of. With that, the propeller shaft of the faulty engine parted. The ship swung wide for the river bank and grounded. Essex was coming up fast under full speed.
Getting his men and officers ashore in shallow water, Stevens spread the powder train himself and set his ship on fire. With tears of anguish, and his clothes on fire, Stevens leapt into the water. Arkansas swung on the sand bar. Finally, freeing herself, she drifted out to meet Essex. Under the heat of the conflagration, her loaded guns began to fire. Then she blew up in one great roar. Arkansas was no more. When General Breckenridge saw the flames of the explosion and knew that Arkansas was gone, he sounded retreat. The victory within his grasp had slipped through his fingers. Baton Rouge was not to be retaken.—Paul Stevens