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After the
battle at Big Bethel, nothing of great importance occurred at
Fortress Monroe and its vicinity during the remainder of
General Butler's administration of the affairs of that department, which ended on the 18th of August,
excepting the burning of
Hampton on the 7th of that month.
It was now plainly perceived that the insurgents were terribly in earnest, and that a fierce struggle was at hand.
It was evident that their strength and resources had been underrated.
Before any advance toward
Richmond, or, indeed, in any other direction from
Fortress Monroe might be undertaken, a great increase in the number of the troops and in the quantity of munitions of war would be necessary; and all that
General Butler was enabled to do, in the absence of these, was to hold his position at
Newport-
Newce and the village of
Hampton.
On the 1st of July that village was formally taken possession of, and
General Peirce was placed in command of the camp established there.
Under his direction a line of intrenchments was thrown up, extending from
Hampton Creek across to the marshes of
Back River, a part of which, as we have observed, included the old church-yard walls.
On these intrenchments the large number of fugitive slaves who had fled to the
Union lines were employed.
Troops from the
North continued to arrive in small numbers, and the spacious building of the “
Chesapeake Female Seminary,” standing on the edge of the water, and overlooking
Hampton Roads, was taken possession of and used as a hospital.
Butler began to have hopes of sufficient strength to make some aggressive movements, when the disastrous
battle at Bull's Run occurred, and blasted them.
The
General-in-chief drew upon him for so many troops for the defense of
Washington that he was compelled to reduce the garrison at
Newport-
Newce, and to abandon
Hampton.
The latter movement greatly alarmed the “contrabands” there, under the protection of the Union flag; and when the regiments moved over Hampton Bridge, during a bright moonlit evening,
these fugitives followed — men women, and children — carrying with them all of their earthly effects.
“It was a most interesting sight,”
General Butler wrote to the
Secretary of War, “to see these poor creatures, who trusted to the protection of the arms of the
United States, and who aided the troops of the
United States in their enterprise, thus obliged to flee from their homes, and the homes of their masters who had deserted them, and become fugitives from fear of the return of the rebel soldiery, who had threatened to shoot the men who had wrought for us, and to carry off the women who had served us to a worse than
Egyptian bondage.”
It was in this letter
that
General Butler asked the important questions, “
First, What shall be done with these fugitives?
and,
second, What is their state ”
