Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 39.djvu/195

 Stranger Than Fiction. 183

United States transport j\Iaple Leaf, passing out June lo, 1863, at 1 130 P. M., with rebel prisoners on board, had returned, the captain stating that the rebels had overthrown the guard, cap- tured the steamer and landed somewhere south of Cape Henry. General Dix says that some thirty prisoners refused to join in the plot and had returned on the steamer. I much fear my readers will have to accept the statement of the general with a few grains of salt. The truth is that every soul able to travel landed on the beach. That doughty sailor warrior. Captain Fuller, prize master, ringleader, who had so recently seen carried to a most success- ful issue the plans that his brain had conceived, was compelled by reason of severe wounds to remain on the steamer, and was promptly placed in irons upon arrival at Fort Monroe.

Small courtesy that, to a man who prefers remaining a prisoner of war to joining his comrades on the beach and making a bold dash for liberty. One can easily read between the. lines and see that General Dix was in no calm and peaceful frame of mind when his report was penned, and doubtless the officer in charge of the overthrown guard enjoyed a most uncomfortable quarter of an hour, when called into the presence of the old general who requests in his report that he be summarily dismissed from the service. (See War Record, Vol. XXVII. Series I. pt. 2. p. 786.)

The first business on landing on the beach, says Colonel Green, was election of a leader, and Captain Semmes, son of Admiral Raphael Semmes, of Alabama fame, was chosen by acclamation, with Captain Holmes, of a Louisiana regiment, as second in command. The next thing was to find their bearings. Seeing a light in the distance as showing from a house, a scout was sent out, who quickly returned, reporting the house occupied by a lady and children, and that her husband was in the Confed- erate army ; that they were in Princess Anne County. Virginia and would be comparatively safe if they could get to the swamps of North Carolina, but to do so would be compelled to cross Currituck Sound, and the only boats available were nearly thirty miles south on the beach, where seme persons had come over