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up of the
Merrimac and two tugs, manned by thirty volunteers on each tug-boat.
They were all armed and provided with iron wedges and top mauls and tar balls.
The plan was to board her, a tug on each side landing the men, and throwing lighted tar balls down through the ventilators and wedge up the turret so it would not revolve.
They took my steamer as one of the boats, but I refused to command her or go with her. The Monitor, luckily for them, did not come out over the bar to give them a chance to try the experiment.
The pounding which the
Monitor gave the
Merrimac the latter never recovered from.
They lost faith in her.
I ran the blockade on the 8th day of May, 1862, escaping with my steamer, the
J. B. White, to
Fortress Monroe, where I met
President Lincoln, with some of his Cabinet, giving him the first information he had of the true state of affairs at
Norfolk, and the preparations made by the rebels to evacuate it.
Admiral Tatnall blew up the
Merrimac off
Craney Island shortly afterwards—a fitting end to a gallant but unfortunate ship in the service she was last engaged in.
Subscribed and sworn to before me this 21st day of November, 1874, at
Buffalo, N. Y.
[L. S.]