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321]
Second day's fight.
Relative to the first day's engagement, that of March 8th, there has been no dispute, but on the second day, March 9th, the failure of
Lieutenant Jones to destroy the
Minnesota after the
Monitor retired to shallow water, when
Lieutenant,
Worden was incapacitated by a shot fired by the
Virginia, enabled claims to be made for the
Monitor, which are not sustained by official records.
It is true that those who had become panic—stricken when the reverse of the 8th was flashed to them had good reason to rejoice that the
Virginia had met the
Monitor in conflict and that the
Minnesota had not been destroyed by the former, as was expected would be the case at the close of the engagement of the 8th, but it does not justify claims that cannot be sustained by the records.
The student of these records will find that very extravagant claims were made for the
Monitor, and later on that such claims were not founded upon fact.
Chief Engineer Stimers, of the
Monitor, in a letter to
Commodore Joseph Smith, under date of March 17th, page 27, says: ‘We fired nothing but solid cast-iron shot, and when we were directly abeam of her (
Merrimac) and hit her our shot went right through her.’
Assistant Secretary of the Navy, G. V. Fox, in a telegram to
Major-General George B. McClellan, at Fairfax Courthouse, dated Navy Department, March 13th, page 100, says:
“The Monitor is more than a match for the
Merrimac, but she might be disabled in the next encounter. * * * The Monitor may, and I think will, destroy the
Merrimac in the next fight, but this is hope, not certainty.”
Despite these expressions, which are about the strongest that are to be found in the volume of records, the claim is here made that—
1. The monitor on the 9th of March, 1862, was the first to retire from the engagement with the
Virginia.
2. That the
Monitor and all of the vessels near
Old Point and the Rip-Raps declined the
Virginia's offer to battle on the 11th of April, 1862, when three transports were taken from under the guns of
Fortress Monroe and towed to
Norfolk.
3. That on the 8th of May, 1862, when the
Monitor and five other vessels were bombarding
Sewell's Point, just two
