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[513]

Torpedo service in Charleston harbor.

General G. T. Beauregard.
On my return to Charleston, in September, 1862, to assume command of the Department of South Carolina and Georgia, I found the defenses of those two States in a bad and incomplete condition, including defective location and arrangement of works, even at Charleston and Savannah. Several points — such as the mouths of the Stono and Edisto rivers, and the headwaters of Broad river at Port Royal — I found unprotected; though, soon after the fall of Fort Sumter, in 1861, as I was about to be detached, I had designated them to be properly fortified. A recommendation had even been made by my immediate predecessor that the outer defenses of Charleston harbor should be given up, as untenable against the iron-clads and monitors then known to be under construction at the North, and that the water line of the immediate city of Charleston should be made the sole line of defense. This course, however, not having been authorized by the Richmond authorities, it was not attempted, except that the fortifications of Cole's Island — the key to the defense of the Stono river — was abandoned, and the harbor in the mouth of the Stono left open to the enemy, who made it their base of operations. Immediately on my arrival I inspected the defenses of Charleston and Savannah, and made a requisition on the War Department for additional troops and heavy guns deemed necessary; but neither could be furnished, owing, it was stated, to the pressing wants of the Confederacy at other points. Shortly afterward, Florida was added to my command, but without any increase of troops or guns, except the few already in that State; and,

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