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direction over the yard, and the gates to the entrance knocked off. The parapet walls on the Tybee side were all gone, in many places down to the level of the earth on the casemates.
The protection to the magazine in the northwest angle of the fort had all been shot away; the entire corner of the magazine next to the passageway was shot off, and the powder exposed, while three shots had actually penetrated the chamber.
Such was the condition of affairs when Colonel Olmstead called a council of officers in a casemate; and without a dissenting voice they acquiesced in the necessity of a capitulation, in order to save the garrison from utter destruction by an explosion, which was momentarily threatened.
Accordingly, at 2 o'clock p. m. the men were called from the guns and the flag was lowered.
Early in the day Colonel Olmstead had no doubt of his ability to silence every battery on Tybee island, and to this end he determined that when night came and the enemy's fire slackened, he would change the position of all his heavy guns, so as to bring them to bear on the enemy.
As the day progressed, however, his situation became desperate.
Every man did his duty with aladrity, and there being few guns that bore on the enemy, there was a continued contest as to who should man them.
When volunteers were called for to perform any laborious duty, there was a rush of men from every company in the fort.
Among the last guns fired were those on the parapet, and the men stood there, exposed to a storm of iron hail, to the last.’ When the flag was shot down on the second day, Lieut. Christopher Hussey, of the Montgomery Guards, and Private John Latham, of the Washington Volunteers, leaped upon the exposed parapet and disentangled the flag and remounted it at the northeastern angle on a temporary staff.
The terms of capitulation were arranged by Colonel Olmstead and General Gillmore, and the swords of the officers were received by Maj. Charles G. Halpine, of
Atlanta, Ga. 1899.
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