Page:Confederate Military History - 1899 - Volume 12.djvu/55

Rh 60. On the Merrimac, Commodore Buchanan and Lieut. R. D. Minor were wounded. Captains Webb, of the Teaser, and Alexander, of the Raleigh, were slightly wounded. Lieut. Catesby Jones succeeded to the command of the Merrimac."

In all descriptions of this battle, the Merrimac has so completely overshadowed her consorts that but little of the honor of the day has fallen to them, but that they greatly assisted in the successful result cannot be denied. When the Merrimac went up James river to turn a "tedious operation," according to Lieut. Catesby Jones the gunboats Beaufort and Raleigh were left alone to contend with the frigate Congress and the shore batteries under the signal, "Close action." Secretary Gideon Welles in his report for 1862 says:

Having thus destroyed the Cumberland, the Merrimac turned again upon the Congress, which had in the meantime been engaged with the smaller rebel steamers [the Beaufort and Raleigh], and after a heavy loss, in order to guard against such a fate as had befallen the Cumberland, had been run aground. The Merrimac now selected a raking position astern of the Congress, while one of the smaller steamers [the Beaufort] poured in a constant fire on her starboard quarter. Two other steamers of the enemy also approached from James river, firing upon the unfortunate frigate with precision and severe effect.

Lieutenant Pendergrast, of the Congress, says: "The smaller vessels [the Beaufort and Raleigh] then attacked us, killing and wounding many of our crew." The captain of the Minnesota, Van Brunt, also speaks of the damage done his vessel by the wooden Confederate steamers Patrick Henry and Jamestown. It is useless to deny the important services of our wooden gunboats on this occasion; and although it is possible that the Merrimac alone could have accomplished all that was done, certain it is that if these gunboats had been sent in on the next