Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 39.djvu/133

 Defence of Spanish Fort. 121

adding strength to the place.

Several days elapsed before the enemy made his appearance. The time was spent in "planting" torpedoes all through the woody marsh in front of us, in strengthening our works and in making great "bomb-proofs" right behind our works for our wounded, our ammunition and so on. These bomb-proofs were made, some of them, on a vast scale. One I worked upon was about 16x20 feet in dimensions and 10 to 12 feet deep. We cut down great trees, rolled the trunks over the mouth, then put a layer of brush and dirt ; then came another layer of heavy logs crosswise, then a layer of brush and dirt, until the roof was six to eight feet thick.

At last the enemy were in sight. Farragut's fleet appeared first. How gallantly ship after ship came up the bay and how we watched them ! But suddenly the foremost was hid in a dense cloud of smoke and water. When she came to view again her bow was up in the air and she was evidently sinking. From where we were we could hear no report, but we knew that she had struck one of our torpedoes. The channel was full of them. This was why our leaders left us so exposed, apparently, in our rear. This stopped the advance for the time on the water side. But soon the pop, pop of our pickets' guns drew out attention to our immediate front ; the firing grew into volleys, our men came into view through the woods, slowly falling back and finally retiring to the line alreadv marked for them as their permanent fighting posts, the blue waves of the Federal forces circled around us and by nightfall we were invested.

I think it was about the 22d or 23d of March, '65. I know we were invested seventeen days and made our escape about the Qth of April. Those seventeen days were sufficiently thrilling and eventful. Imagine our position and you can readily be- lieve me. A force reported to be 30,000 strong, under General Steele in front, massed and crowded around our little semi-circle line, their artillery packed thick along the works they were al-