Benjamnin F. Butler, Butler's Book: Autobiography and Personal Reminiscences of Major-General Benjamin Butler

[806] let him get away far enough to be safe, Porter having told him that the fleet would not be safe short of twenty-five miles at sea, where he had taken the rest of the fleet. So the powder-boat waited until the fire lighted in the stern had burned over the fire-proof enclosure of the engine-room, and struck the powder between decks. This, as soon as it was ignited, exploded and blew all the rest of the powder directly into the sea as if blown from a cannon, because the powder vessel was an iron one, and the berth deck had been entirely cleared out in order to hold powder. It is as safe to say that not nearly one tenth of the powder on board the boat ever exploded, because the moment the explosion took place all the powder in the hold was driven down into the water, and the little powder above the berth-deck was immediately blown into the air. This powder was in bags, and some of the witnesses say they saw a succession of explosions taking place in the air as if of bags of powder which had been thrown up by the explosion.¹

Rhind admits in his letter to the Ordnance Department--just as Jeffers, who had the matter in charge, testified,--that he was told that the last resort was to explode the powder by building a fire on, the forecastle. The fact that the vessel did not explode with all that powder on board until the fire “lighted under her cabin” had been burning nearly two hours, so that the after part of the vessel was enveloped in flames,² so as to be seen by Rhind when twelve miles off out at sea, shows that none of the arrangements for exploding the vessel had been either put in order or availed of. Therefore, it is plain that the experiment of the powder-boat never has been tried. The whole performance of the navy as carried out was simply an abortion of the weakest kind. Rhind admits that he purposely steered away from the fort lest he might be discovered and the scheme frustrated. How could the enemy have frustrated it if they had seen the boat?

But the fatal defect, setting aside all others, was that the vessel was not run on shore so as to put the powder where it could burn.

The testimony of Colonel Lamb, who was in command of the fort, upon this subject, shows clearly that the vessel was not observed, and if it had been would probably have been taken for a blockade runner. His testimony shows that the explosion was of no consequence.