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deadly conflict.
Blinding smoke hovered about the scene of all this confusion and horror; and, as the battle progressed and the Confederate fleet was destroyed, all the cheering voices on shore were silenced.
When the last hope of the
Confederates gave way, the lamentations which went up from the spectators were like cries of anguish.
Boats were put off from our vessels to save as many lives as possible.
No serious injury was received by any one on board the United States fleet.
Colonel Ellet received a pistol-shot in the leg; a shot struck the
Carondelet in the bow, broke up her anchor and anchor-stock, and fragments were scattered over her deck among her officers and crew, wounding slightly
Acting-Master Gibson and two or three others who were standing at the time on the forward deck with me. The heavy timber which was suspended at the water-line, to protect the boats from
the Confederate rams, greatly impeded our progress, and it was therefore cut adrift from the
Carondelet when that vessel was in chase of the
Bragg and
Sumter.
The latter had just landed a number of her officers and crew, some of whom were emerging from the bushes along the bank of the river, unaware of the
Carondelet's proximity, when I hailed them through a trumpet, and ordered them to stop or be shot.
They obeyed immediately, and by my orders were taken on board a tug and delivered on the
Benton.
General Jeff. Thompson, noted in partisan or border warfare, having signally failed with those rams at
Fort Pillow, now resigned them to their fate.
It was said that he stood by his horse watching the struggle, and seeing at last his rams all gone, captured, sunk, or burned, he exclaimed, philosophically, “They are gone, and I am going,” mounted his horse, and disappeared.
An enormous amount of property was captured by our squadron; and, in addition to the Confederate fleet, we captured at
Memphis six large
Mississippi steamers, each marked “C. S. A.”
We also seized a large quantity of cotton in steamers and on shore, and the property at the Confederate Navy Yard, and caused the destruction of the
Tennessee, a large steam-ram, on the stocks, which was to have been a sister ship to the renowned
Arkansas.
About one hundred Confederates were killed and wounded and one hundred and fifty captured.
Chief of all results of the work of the flotilla was the opening of the
Mississippi River once for all from
Cairo to
Memphis, and the complete possession of
Western Tennessee by the
Union forces.
