Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 20.djvu/309

Rh captains, among them Halpin, who afterwards commanded the "Great Eastern" while laying ocean cables, and famous war correspondents, Hon. Francis C. Lawley, M. P., correspondent of the London Times and Frank Vizitelli of the London Illustrated News, afterwards murdered in the Soudan. Nor must the handsome and plucky Tom Taylor be forgotten, purser of the "Banshee" and the  "Night Hawk" who, by his coolness and daring, escaped with a  boat's crew from the hands of the Federals after capture off the fort,  and was endeared to the children as the " Santa Claus " of the war.

At first the little Confederate was satisfied with pork and potatoes, corn-bread and rye coffee, with sorgham sweetening, but after the blockade runners made her acquaintance, the impoverished store- room was soon filled to overflowing, notwithstanding her heavy requisitions on it for the post hospital, the sick and wounded soldiers and sailors always being a subject of her tenderest solicitude and often the hard worked and poorly fed colored hands blessed the little lady of the cottage for a tempting treat.

Full of stirring events were the two years passed in the cottage on Confederate Point. The drowning of Mrs. Rose Greenough, the famous Confederate spy, off Fort Fisher, and the finding of her body, which was tenderly cared for, and the rescue from the waves, half dead, of Professor Holcombe and his restoration, were incidents never to be forgotten. Her fox hunting with horse and hounds, the narrow escapes of friendly vessels, the fights over blockade runners driven ashore, the execution of deserters, and the loss of an infant son, whose little spirit went out with the tide one sad summer night, all contributed to the reality of this romantic life.

When Porter's fleet appeared off Fort Fisher, December, 1864, it was storm bound for several days, and the little family with their household goods were sent across the river to " Orton," before But- ler's powder-ship blew up. After the Christmas victory over Porter and Butler, the little heroine insisted upon coming back to her cot- tage, although her husband had procured a home of refuge in Cum- berland county. General Whiting protested against her running the risk, for on dark nights her husband could not leave the fort, but she said, " if the firing became too hot she would run behind the sand hills as she had done before, and come she would."

The fleet reappeared unexpectedly on the night of the 12th of January, 1865. It was a dark night, and when the lights of the fleet