Page:Encyclopedia of Virginia Biography volume 3.djvu/85

 UNDER THE CONFEDERACY

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siege of Vera Cruz. He also served in the United States Coast Survey with Alaury, and at the naval observatory. He assisted Dahlgren in conducting his experiments with the Dahlgren gun, and at his request Lieut. Jones was ordered to the Merriinac as ordnance officer, and at her return from her cruise he was selected by Dahlgren as executive officer of the ordnance ship Ply- mouth, which was the first to mount an eleven inch gun upon a naval carriage. He later served as ordnance officer of the Para- guay expedition. Jones, coming of a Vir- ginia family distinguished in public service for many generations, was proud of his state and believed in the right of secession, and on the day of the passage of the seces- sion ordinance at once resigned his com- mission. Gov. Letcher appointed him a cap- tain in the Virginia navy. With Capt. Pe- gram he organized an expedition, and seized the naval powder magazine from under the guns of the Cumberland, and other men-of- war. The battle of Bull Run was fought with this powder. He then performed a useful service in improving the harbor de- fences of Norfolk and James river. He erected batteries at Jamestown island, which lend so much to the present pictur- esqueness of the site of the first settlement. Here he experimented with targets to test the efficiency of different kinds of arms for ships and in November, 1861, was ordered as executive and ordnance ofificer to the Mcrriiunc, which had been scuttled In' the Federals, when they abandoned the navy yard at Norfolk. He aided in converting the Mcrrimac into the Virginia, plated Avith iron two inches thick. He served as third in command, in the battle of March 8, 1862, with the Federal wooden fleet, which was

defeated. In this conflict Flag Officer Lieut. Franklin Buchanan and F^lag Lieut. Minor were both wounded and disabled and Jones commanded the Virginia in the battle next day with the Monitor. The engagement lasted four hours, at the end of which time the captain of the Monitor was blinded by a shell, and his ship retired from action. The I irginia was unable to get close enough to the Minnesota to destroy her, and steamed back to Norfolk. As Lieut. Buchanan was unable to resvmie command, the government at Richmond placed the Virginia under Com- modore Josiah Tatnall and made Lieut Jones his sei:ond ; Commodore Tatnall as- sumed command March 29, 1862, and on April II the reconstructed J'irginia steamed down the Roads expecting again to meet the Monitor, but the fleet of United States vessel was behind Fort Monroe and did not come out for a second trial ; on May 8 the Virginia again went down to the Roads, to find the Monitor, Nangatuck, Galena and a number of heavy ships shelling the Con- federate batteries on Sewell's Point, and on the approach of the Virginia the fleet retired under the protecting guns of Fort Mon- roe, and Tatnall, despairing of obtaining an open fight, fired a gun to the windward and took the Virginia back to her Jjuoy. After the evacuation of Norfolk by the Confederate forces, the Virginia steamed down the Eliza- beth river to co-operate with the army, but or. reaching Hampton Roads the pilots de- clined to venture farther up, and Commo- dore Tatnall gave orders to destroy her, and she was burned on the shore near Craney Island, the crew escaping by marching to Suffolk and taking the cars to Richmond, Lieuts. Jones and John Taylor Wood being the last to leave the famous vessel, which