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men, it operated also, in some degree, to save the
Confederates.
Our most powerful batteries and all our shell guns were on the barbette tier, and, being forbidden their use, we were compelled to oppose a destructive shell fire with solid shot alone.
This, especially as we had no mortars, was a great disadvantage.
Had we been permitted to use our shell guns we could have set fire to the barracks and quarters in
Moultrie; for, as it was, we wrecked them badly with solid shot, although we could not see them.
Then the cotton-bale shutters would have been destroyed, and we could have made it much livelier generally for our adversaries.
This was so apparent to the men, that one of them — a man named
Carmody — stole up on the ramparts and deliberately fired every barbette gun in position on the Moultrie side of the work.
The guns were already loaded and roughly aimed, and
Carmody simply discharged them in succession; hence, the effect was less than it would have been if the aim had been carefully rectified.
But
Carmody's effort aroused the enemy to a sense of his danger.
He supposed, no doubt, that
Major Anderson had determined to open his barbette batteries, so he directed every gun to bear on the barbette tier of
Fort Sumter, and probably believed that the vigor of his fire induced
Major Anderson to change his mind.
But the contest was merely
Carmody against the
Confederate States; and
Carmody had to back down, not because he was beaten, but because he was unable, single-handed, to reload his guns.
Another amusing incident in this line occurred on the
Morris Island side of the fort.
There, in the gorge angle, a ten-inch columbiad was mounted, en barbette, and as the 42-pounders of the casemate battery were making no
