Rebellion Record: a Diary of American Events: Documents and Narratives, Volume 4.
Frank Moore, Ed.

sir: I have the honor to report the return of the detachment from this ship, which had the good fortune to take part in the bombardment of Fort Pulaski. It reached Tybee on the morning of the tenth instant, just before the fire was opened, and the batteries being already manned, our men could not participate in the action of the first day.

Gen. Hunter, Gen. Benham, and Gen. Gilmore all manifested the most generous desire to give the navy a share in the good work; and on the eleventh, the most important day, two rifled guns in battery Sigel, one of the nearest and most exposed batteries, and consequently one of the posts of honor, were assigned to the men of the Wabash. We occupied it at daybreak, and kept up a steady and well-directed fire until the Fort hauled down its flag, at two o'clock P. M.

The officers and men behaved well. I beg leave to commend to you Lieut. Irwin, Acting Master Robertson, and Midshipmen M. L. Johnson and F. H. Pearson, Lewis Boun, captain of the forecastle, and George H. Wood, quartermaster. When the enemy hoisted the white flag, Gen. Benham most courteously invited me to detail a naval officer to accompany the officers sent by him to arrange the terms of the surrender, and I sent Lieut. Irwin upon that honorable duty.

I spent the first day of the bombardment in the trenches with Gen. Hunter, and in visiting the different batteries, which I caused to be visited by several of our officers and men, that they might profit by the experience to be acquired.

The bombardment began at eight o'clock A. M on the tenth, and continued during the day.

At first, while procuring the ranges, it was somewhat inaccurate, many of the artillerists being quite untrained. On the second day, in spite of a high wind, the firing from the rifled guns and columbiads was excellent, the former boring into the brick face of the wall like augers, and the latter striking and breaking off great masses of masonry which had been cut loose by the rifles.

The four upper batteries were about sixteen hundred yards distant from Fort Pulaski, and quite beyond the distance at which it has hitherto been held practicable to effect a breach, but it proved an easy breaching range with those wonderful projectiles which we now possess.

When the Fort surrendered, the barbette guns had been silenced, and many of them dismounted. The breach was practicable in two places, and could have been stormed without doubt. Our projectiles were passing through it, and were knocking down the opposite wall, which protected the main magazine, so that the garrison were convinced that in an hour the magazine must have blown up. The heavy thirteen-inch mortars inflicted much less injury than I had expected. The casemates did not seem at all shaken by them. The parade-ground had been farmed into deep furrows, into which the shells rolled and burst, without the power of doing much harm. The guns used by the men of the Wabash were three thirty-pounder Parrotts, and one twenty-four-pounder James.

I am, very respectfully,

sir: I have the honor to transmit herewith the terms of capitulation for the surrender to the United States of Fort Pulaski, Ga., signed by me this eleventh day of April, 1862.

I trust these terms will receive your approval, they being substantially those authorized by you, as commander of the District.

The Fort hoisted the white flag at forty-five minutes past one o'clock this afternoon, after a resistance since eight o'clock yesterday morning to the continuous fire of our batteries.

A practicable breach in the walls was made in eighteen and a half hours firing by daylight.

I have the honor to be, very respectfully, your most obedient servant,

sir: I have the satisfaction of enclosing to you herewith the terms of surrender of Fort Pulaski, as arranged this day by Acting Brig.-Gen. Q. A. Gilmore, whom I despatched to the Fort for that purpose immediately after the appearance of the white flag from that Fort, about two P. M., this day — the anniversary of the opening of the fire upon Fort Sumter by the rebels, last year.

The terms agreed to by Col. C. H. Olmstead, the rebel commander of the Fort, are essentially those dictated by myself; and such as I trust will meet with your approval, from my previous communications with you on this subject.

With much congratulation to you on this first success in your present department, I have the honor to be, most respectfully, your obedient servant,