January 7, 1861. |
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The insurgents at Charleston were thus enabled to prepare for her reception.
They did so; and when she had arrived within two miles of Forts, Moultrie and Sumter, unsuspicious of danger, a shot came ricocheting across her bow from a masked battery on Morris Island, three-fourths of a mile distant, the only indication of its presence being a red Palmetto flag.
The battery was under the command of Major Stevens, Principal of the State Military School, kept in the Citadel Academy, and his gunners, called the Citadel Cadets, were his pupils.
He was supported by about two hundred and sixty-five soldiers under Lieutenant-Colonel J. L. Branch.
The National flag was flying over the Star of the West at the time, and, as soon as possible, Captain McGowan displayed a large American ensign at the fore.
Of course the assailants had no respect for these emblems of the Union, and for ten minutes, while the vessel went forward, a continuous, fire was kept up from the battery, and one or two shots were hurled at her from Fort Moultrie, without producing serious damage.
The heavy balls flew over her deck and through her rigging, “and one,” said the Captain, “came within an ace of carrying away our rudder.”
Fort Moultrie, well armed and garrisoned, was then just ahead, and from it two steam-tugs were seen to put out, with an armed schooner, to intercept the Star of the West. Hemmed in, and exposed to a cannonade without power to offer resistance (for his vessel was unarmed), Captain McGowan perceived that his ship and all on board of her were in imminent peril of capture or destruction; so he turned her bow ocean-ward, after seventeen shots had been fired at her, put to sea, and returned to New York on the 12th.1 Major Stevens, a tall, black-eyed, black-bearded young man of thirty-five years, was exceedingly boastful of his feat of humbling the flag of his country.
The friends of Colonel Branch claimed the infamy for him.
The garrison in Sumter had been in a state of intense excitement during the brief time when the Star of the West was exposed to danger.
Major Anderson was ignorant of her character and object, and of the salutary official changes at Washington, or he would have instantly resented the insult to the old flag.
Had he known that the Executive and the new members of his Cabinet approved his course, and were trying to aid him — had he known that, only two days before,
a resolution of such approval had passed the National House of Representatives by a large majority2--the Star of the West and her precious freight of men and stores would not have been driven to sea by a band of less than three hundred insurgents.
He was ignorant of all this.
She appeared as only a merchant vessel on a commercial errand to Charleston.
When the first shot was fired upon her, he suspected her of being a relief-ship.
When she ran up the old ensign at the fore, he could no longer doubt.
His guns bearing on Moultrie, Morris Island, and the channel, were shotted and
1 Report of Captain McGowan, January 12, 1861.
2 The resolution, offered by Mr. Adrain of New Jersey, was as follows:--“Resolved, That we fully approve of the bold and patriotic act of Major Anderson in withdrawing from Fort Moultrie to Fort Sumter, and of the determination of the President to maintain that fearless officer in his present position; and that we will support the President in all constitutional measures to enforce the laws and preserve the Union.” This resolution was adopted by a vote of one hundred and twenty-four against fifty-six. For the yeas and nays, see Congressional Globe's report of the proceedings of the Thirty-sixth Congress, page 281.
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