Rebellion Record: a Diary of American Events: Documents and Narratives, Volume 6.
Frank Moore, Ed.

sir: In conformity with your instructions, we proceed to state the facts in relation to the capture of Galveston, Texas, on the first of January, 1863, as elicited by the testimony before the court of inquiry.

The naval force in possession consisted of the Westfield, Clifton, Harriet Lane, Owasco, Sachem, and Corypheus. The two latter had joined only two days previous to the attack, having come up from below, the Sachem (steamer) in a broken-down condition, and the Corypheus as her escort. The positions of the vessels were as shown by the accompanying chart. The United States troops on shore consisted of two hundred and sixty rank and file, commanded by Colonel Burrill, of the Forty-second Massachusetts volunteers, occupying, by advice of the commanding naval officer, a wharf in the town.

It seems that the night previous to the attack, information had been received by the commanding officers of both land and naval forces that such an attempt might be made.

At half-past 1 A. M., on the first of January, it being bright moonlight, some two or three rebel steamers were discovered in the bay above by the Clifton. The Westfield, from the other channel, likewise made the same discovery. The naval forces, therefore, were not taken by surprise.

Very soon after, our troops on shore learned through their pickets, that the artillery of the enemy was in possession of the market-place, about one quarter of a mile distant.

The attack commenced on shore about three A. M., by the enemy upon our troops, which were defended by the Sachem and Corypheus with great energy; our troops only replying with musketry, having no artillery. About dawn the Harriet Lane was attacked, or rather attacked two rebel steamers, one of which, the Bayou City, was armed with a sixty-eight pounder rifled gun, had two hundred troops, and was barricaded with cotton bales some twenty feet from the water-line. The other, the Neptune, was similarly barricaded, and was armed with two small brass field-pieces, and one hundred and sixty men, (both were common river steamers.) The Harriet Lane was under way in time, and went up to the attack firing her bow gun, which was answered by the rebels, but their sixty-eight pounder burst at the third fire.

The Harriet Lane ran into the Bayou City, carrying away her wheel-guard, which did her little or no damage. The other rebel steamer then ran into the Harriet Lane, but was so disabled by the collision that she was soon afterward obliged to back in the flats, where she sank in about eight feet of water, near to the scene of action. The Bayou City turned and ran into the Harriet Lane, and she remained secured to her by catching under her guard, pouring in incessant volleys of musketry, as did also the other steamer, which was returned by the Harriet Lane, with musketry. This drove the Harriet Lane's men from her guns, and probably wounded Commander Wainwright and Lieutenant Commander Lee, the latter mortally. She was then carried by boarding, by the Bayou City, her commander summoned to surrender, which he refused, gallantly defending himself with his revolver until killed.

But five of the Harriet Lane's men were killed and five wounded--one hundred and ten, exclusive of officers and wounded, were landed on shore, prisoners. Her Commander and First Lieutenant were buried on the following day on [338] shore, in the cemetery, with the honors of war, and her other officers paroled. The Owasco, which had been anchored below the town, coaling, the night before, got under way, moved up at the commencement of the attack, and engaged the enemy's artillery on shore. When it was light enough for her to observe that there were two rebel steamers alongside the Harriet Lane, she moved up to her assistance, grounding several times in so doing, owing to the narrowness of the channel. She could only occasionally bring her eleven-inch gun to bear. She was soon driven back by the incessant fire of the enemy's musketry, and when the howitzers of the Harriet Lane opened on her, she concluded she had been captured, and backed down below the Sachem and Corypheus, continuing her engagement with the enemy on shore. She had all her rifle-gun crew wounded when above, and lost in all one man killed and fifteen wounded.

The Clifton before the action commenced, went around into Bolivar Channel, to render assistance to the Westfield, which had got under way when the rebel steamers were first discovered, soon afterward got hard and fast ashore, at high-water, and then made a signal for assistance. While the Clifton was in the act of rendering this assistance, the flashes of the enemy's guns were first seen in the town. Commander Renshaw then directed Lieut. Com. Law to leave him and to return to the town.

The moon had now gone down, and it became quite dark, yet the Clifton, with some difficulty got around into the other channel, opening the batteries upon Fort Point, which the rebels now had possession of, shelling them out and driving them up the beach as she neared the town. Here she anchored and continued the engagement, but did not proceed up to the rescue of the Harriet Lane, owing to the failure of the Owasco, the intricacy of the channel, and the apprehension of killing the crew of the Harriet Lane, who were then exposed by the rebels on her upper deck.

It was now about half-past 7 A. M. A white flag was hoisted on the Harriet Lane. A boat bearing a flag of truce, with a rebel officer and an Acting Master of the Harriet Lane, came down to the Clifton, informing her Commander of the capture of the Harriet Lane, the death of her Commander and First Lieutenant, and the killing and wounding of two thirds of her crew, all of which was corroborated by the Acting Master.

Major Smith, their Commander, now proposed that our vessels should all surrender, and that one should be allowed, with the crews of all, to leave the harbor; otherwise they would proceed down with the Harriet Lane, and all their steamers, (three more of which had appeared in sight after daylight, but were neither armed or barricaded,) and proceed to capture the gunboats in line.

Lieut. Commander Law replied that he was not the commanding officer, and that he could not imagine that such terms could be accepted; but that he would take the Acting Master of the Harriet Lane, and proceed over to the Westfield, and tender his proposal to Commander Renshaw. This he did, and went in his own boat. Flags of truce were at this time flying on our vessels, and by the parties on shore. During the absence of Lieut. Commander Law, and under these flags of truce, the rebels coolly made prisoners of our troops on shore, got more of their artillery into position, and towed the Harriet Lane alongside the wharf, though it had been understood that every thing should remain in statu quo until an answer should have been received. Commander Renshaw refused to accede to the proposition, directed Lieut. Commander Law to return, and get all the vessels out of port as soon as possible, and as he found he could not get the Westfield afloat, he should blow her up and go on board the army transports Saxon and M. A. Boardman, which were lying near him, with his officers and crew.

Upon Lieut. Commander Law's return to his vessel, he proceeded to carry out these direction. The flags of truce were hauled down, the enemy firing upon the vessels as we then left the harbor.

When the Clifton was half-way toward the bar, her commander was informed, by a boat from the Westfield, that in the explosion of that vessel, which they observed some half-hour before, Commander Renshaw, Lieut. Zimmerman, Engineer Green, and some ten or fifteen of the crew, had perished, the explosion being premature. Lieut. Commander Law, now being commanding officer, proceeded to cross his vessel over the bar, and finally concluded to abandon the blockade altogether, considering the Owasco as his only efficient vessel, and regarding her as not equal to resist an attack from the Harriet Lane, should she come out for that purpose.

By eight P. M. they had all left the blockade, although the commander of the Clifton had been notified by an officer on board the M. A. Board man, that another transport would be down within forty-eight hours, and requested that he would warn her off.

The vessels, which were left in possession of the enemy, were the Harriet Lane, and two coal barks, the Cavallo and Elias Pike. The only injury sustained by the Harriet Lane, appears to have been from an eleven-inch shell under her counter, fired by the Owasco, and the damage to her guard from the collision.

Very respectfully,

Yesterday, at sunset, a startling rumor reached this city. It was said that the rebels at Galveston, Texas, had made an unexpected attack, [339] in overpowering numbers, upon the handful of United States soldiers, who, supported by a few war-vessels, have held the place in nominal subjection. That the former had been killed or taken prisoners, the Harriet Lane captured, and, worst of all, the Westfield, the flag-ship of the flotilla, blown to pieces, involving the destruction of Commodore Renshaw, its commander, and a number of officers and men, just as he was abandoning his vessel. Inquiry traced the rumor to a telegraphic despatch received by General Banks from down the river. For an hour or two its purport was questioned, contested, disbelieved — presently admitted, but indefinitely. This morning brings confirmation, in all its appalling particulars.

I derive the following narrative (which I shall endeavor to render as clear and coherent as is possible) from Major W. L. Burt, of Gen. Hamilton's staff, who has this morning returned from the scene of the recent tragedy. He was despatched thither as the General's representative in his future capacity of Military Governor of Texas; his duties comprising the assisting of Union men, and the raising of recruits for the wresting of the State from the bloody misrule of treason now rampant there. With him went also Capt. S. W. Cozzens, of Texas, to be assigned to a command. Both gentlemen left this port in the Mary A. Boardman, on the night of Monday, December twenty-ninth, just six days ago. Before I relate Major Burt's experience, it is advisable to mention a few preliminary details necessary to the understanding of his story.

At Galveston the position of affairs was as follows: The town, attacked and taken by Commodore Renshaw on October tenth, 1862, the rebels flying upon the appearance of the gunboats, had remained, in a comparatively deserted condition, under their control. It was held merely as a landing-place for future operations, and occupied principally by Union refugees, fugitives from the terrorism of the interior. We had barely the city and island upon which it stands, a mere sand-bank, thirty miles long, not over two in width, and connecting with the interior by a bridge of two miles in extent, built upon cedar piles. Over this bridge the Galveston and Houston Railroad crosses West Bay and enters the former city. Unfortunately no attempt had been made to destroy this structure, in consideration of its past and possibly future usefulness, a mark of consideration which the rebels have improved to bloody advantage. They had exclusive possession of it, coming and going at pleasure, controlling it by means of three batteries at Virginia Point — the north, or mainland end — and by another, on the island end, at a spot called Eagle Grove. A sort of tacit compromise seems to have existed, by which the enemy agreed neither to use the bridge for belligerent purposes, nor to molest the Harriet Lane, on duty guarding it, while she refrained from shell practice on the batteries, until an active necessity arose for doing so, contenting herself with mutely menacing them, and commanding both the bridge and the four miles space intervening between it and the city. In what sanguinary shape the contingency appeared, will presently be narrated.

There were in Galveston, up to within a week of the attack, absolutely no troops, the place being held merely by the naval arm. Two regiments had been ordered thither, the Forty-second Massachusetts, Col. Burrill, the Twenty-third Connecticut, Colonel----, with one battery, the Second Vermont, under command of Capt. Holcomb; also a fraction of the First Texas cavalry, the expected nucleus of a regiment. Of these troops, only the Forty-second Massachusetts embarked for Texas, on or before the twenty-fifth of December, the Twenty-third Connecticut remaining at Ship Island, where it still is. The first-mentioned regiment went in three transports, under the respective charges of its Colonel, Lieutenant-Colonel, and Major. The vessels being slow, only three companies of this regiment, under Col. Burrill, had arrived, landing on a wharf near the upper part of Galveston. There they took possession of one of the churches as a look-out, and waited the arrival of their comrades. They were, in all, about three hundred men; not enough to establish pickets. They relied entirely on the vicinity of the gunboats for their safety and protection. The Saxon, which had brought them, still lay in the harbor, outside the bar, in shoal-water, with Commodore Rensaw's flag-ship West-field, the gunboats Clifton and Owasco, in addition to the Harriet Lane, keeping watch and ward over the silent city. Such was the condition of Galveston up to the thirtieth of December. I append a brief list of the armament of the vessels, in order to complete this part of the subject.

Flag-ship Westfield, Commodore Renshaw--two nine-inch guns, four sixty-eight pounders, two rifled guns.

The Harriet Lane, Captain Wainwright--three nine-inch guns, one thirty-pound rifled gun, four twenty-pounders.

The Clifton, Captain Law--two nine-inch guns, four thirty-two pounders, one pivot rifled gun.

The Owasco, Captain Wilson--one eleven-inch gun, one thirty-pound rifled gun, four twenty-four-pound howitzers.

The Mary A. Boardman, the Honduras, and the Cumbria were excepted. The first (a propeller, built for Chinese waters) was laden with stores and forage; the second carried the Vermont battery before spoken of; and the Cumbria (captured off Charleston) contained a number of Texas refugees, embryo United States cavalrymen, with one thousand stand of arms for the use of their loyal countrymen. These vessels were to have left New-Orleans on or about December twenty-seventh. None of them, however, got off until two days later, when, as already related, the Mary A. Boardman steamed southward for Galveston, and with her the Honduras, leaving the slower Cumbria to bring up the rear, full forty-eight hours subsequent. The Mary A. Boardman parted with her companion at the Delta of the Mississippi, on the bar of the South-West Pass, and henceforward held on her way alone. At four o'clock on the afternoon of December thirty-first she arrived [340] off Galveston. Here an ominous sight awaited her in the ruined lighthouse on Bolivar Point — a long sandy reach stretching toward the town from the east. The upper portion of the tower, of whitewashed brick, had been destroyed, the light extinguished, the house below burned, as afterward appeared, on the night of Sunday, the twenty-eighth, by the rebels, in anticipation of the arrival of Union troops. The signal of the Mary A. Boardman being answered by the flagship Westfield, that vessel came out to meet her, and Com. Renshaw sent an officer and pilot on board, when the Mary's crew learned for the first time that Magruder was in command at Virginia Point, with heavy reenforcements, threatening active hostilities.

The Mary A. Boardman crossed the first bar of the harbor in company with the Westfield, just at sunset, the day dying magnificently, the declining sun lighting up the windows of the city with dazzling lustre. Passing the inner bar, she came to anchor up Bolivar's Channel, on the eastern side of Pelican Island, in the still water below the town, the flag-ship doing the like, within hailing distance, only a little nearer to Bolivar's Point. Seaward, further down, lay the Saxon. A fine, calm, moonlight night succeeded the day; it was a little hazy, but without fog, and very quiet; one could see objects distinctly, hear the dash of the waves on the beach, and their ripple on the bay. And so the last night of the year settled down on Galveston.

Up to half-past 2 o'clock A. M., every thing remained tranquil, but just then, when the moon was disappearing in the western haze, and the specks of light on the vessels burned all the brighter for the gathering darkness, the Harriet Lane signalled suddenly, announcing danger. From her post at the inner extremity of the town she had discerned an uprising within it — an attack upon our three hundred Massachusetts soldiers. Almost simultaneously, four rebel gunboats were discovered, either by the Clifton or Westfield, coming down the bay. Immediately the signalled vessels answered, and the Westfield, hauling up her anchor, got under way, intending to cross the Pelican Spit and run up to the wharves, abreast the town.

The flag-ship aground! A fatal mischance! Drifted by the current directly on to the island, in shoal-water, at full tide, there she struck on her bows and there remained. A thousand-ton boat, one of the best of our blockading fleet, with a rudder at each end, double boilers, and seventy feet breadth of beam, she lay in the sand immovable.

And first she signalled to the Clifton (another vessel of the same sort, and, like the Westfield, well known to Staten Islanders and holiday New-Yorkers) to come alongside and tug her off, and the Clifton tugged and tugged, and could not effect it. At this juncture Commodore Renshaw sent a warning to the Mary A. Boardman concerning the rebel gunboats, and resumed his pilot, Mr. Davis, who had remained on board the former. Leaving the Westfield for a while, until the tragic interest of the scene shall culminate in her, let us turn our eyes (still from the deck of the Mary A. Boardman) to what is transpiring elsewhere.

The fighting began in the town at from three to half-past 3 A. M., and raged furiously. It appeared in the upper portion, where Colonel Burrill's men were encamped, above the gas works, at three wharves distance below where the Harriet Lane lay. From warehouses, wharves, windows, and house-tops, a hellish fire of musketry had opened upon the devoted three hundred of the Forty-second Massachusetts, while light artillery raked the streets leading to the water-side. To this the Harriet Lane responded, first by throwing solid shot from her two nine-inch guns, and then by shell from her rifled cannon and twenty-pounders, throwing them in the direction of the railroad bridge, by which it was only too evident that the rebels were swarming to the attack. Their batteries — the four before mentioned — were all active. They had crossed with upward of three thousand infantry, commanded by Magruder in person, bringing artillery on the cars. At this time it was as dark as Erebus; a blackness illumined only by the flash of cannon, the bursting of shell, and the quick, intermittent sparkle of musketry. The sounds, at once horrible and indescribable, welcoming this ghastly New-Year's morning, need not be dwelt upon.

As soon as the firing began, two of the rebel gunboats had borne down upon the Harriet Lane and engaged her. One was a huge, long, high-pressure Mississippi steamer, of the usual two-story build, with her tall chimneys cut down, piled four bales high with cotton, her paddle-boxes hidden by them, faced with planking and cross-pieces, and manned — the upper and lower decks — with sharp-shooters. The other, a stern-wheel boat, slow and small, partook of the character of a ram, being armed with one pivot-gun, and faced, even to the top of her solitary chimney, with railroad iron, so that the black smoke exuded as from the conical roof. Both of these anomalous monsters assailed the Harriet Lane, evidently intending to board her, she in her turn throwing shell at them, some of which ricocheted for half a mile upon the surface of the water, her object being to strike them below the guards and sink them. This, however, she did not effect, and steadily they approached, the ram careening over to one side, as if ill balanced, and the sharp-shooters on the steamer keeping up an incessant fusilade from her decks and the tops of the cotton-bales, where they clustered like bees.

To the assistance of the Harriet Lane came the Owasco and the little Sachem, a combatant worthy of mention. A light-draft steamer, she had put into Galveston in an almost unseaworthy condition, and had been ordered to lie by the wharf to protect Col. Burrill's men; with her one large rifle-gun and two small ones she joined battle with all the courage of a first-class man-of-war.

So, presently, did the Clifton, temporarily relinquishing the hope of rescuing the Westfield, and making to the scene of action, but her progress was not unchallenged. As she turned to [341] pass over the bar, suddenly the enemy opened fire upon her with two heavy pieces, from Fort Point, an old battery, hitherto abandoned, but which the rebels had succeeded in remounting during the night. This compliment the Clifton answered, first with her bow-gun, then the rest of her armament, moving rapidly, and throwing shell continuously. Soon she had cleared the Point, and, losing one man by the Minie bullet of a sharp-shooter, held on her course toward the Harriet Lane and the thickest of the fight, which then became general both on land and water.

The doomed vessel, her steam not up, unable to escape, was the centre of a perfectly infernal fire-dance. Seen from the Mary A. Boardman, the spectacle assumed an aspect at once grand and terrific. Overhead and around night. was slowly retiring before day; the dim light prevalent being rent by the frequent flashes of cannon, the soaring aloft of shell, and the omnipresent short-lived blaze of musketry, while the hellish discord beggars all description. Prominent amid it, one heard the sonorous boom of the eleven-inch gun of the Owasco, the bellowing of the batteries, and the volleys, shrieks, and detonations pervading the town. But our struggle is nearing its end. The rebel steamer and ram have closed at length, on either side of the Harriet Lane, boarded her, and a bloody struggle is raging on her deck. Her leaders, maddened it is said with whisky, fight like infuriate devils, precipitating themselves headlong on the guards, swarming fore and aft, and pouring an incessant hail of small arms from above and below upon the devoted crew. They contend with an enemy apparently unwilling either to give or take quarter. Sternly they are met, sternly resisted. Gallant Captain Wainwright is killed, and of his one hundred and thirty men, all but ten or twenty share his fate, and the Harriet Lane is captured by the enemy!

The loss has occurred, but it is not, as yet, evident, indeed perceptible. Though her guns are silenced, the Owasco, the Clifton, the brave little Sachem still prolong the contest. Presently the former, seen in the gray light of the morning at about six o'clock stops firing, the others emulate her example. Everywhere the fire ceases or slackens, and on the opposite side of the island two rebel gunboats are descried, tranquilly looking on, and, in the remote distance, yet two others, only to be distinguished by the long line of black smoke proceeding from their chimneys.

Turn we to the flag-ship Westfield, stranded at three miles' distance. The Mary A. Boardman has abandoned the task of endeavoring to deliver her, rendered the more hopeless by the rapidly-falling tide. A hawser has been discouragingly snapped asunder. Nobody on board of either vessel knows the result of the contest centring about the Harriet Lane, but the silence succeeding it seems ominous. Suddenly, at a little after six, the Owasco, the Clifton, and the Sachem, display their colors.

Up to that moment, no flag, except one, fluttering idly at the bow of the Westfield, and another, a rebel one, the “stars and bars,” on the huge Mississippi steamer, have been visible. The Mary A. Boardman, with her anchor up, follows the example. It is a moment of doubt, of intense excitement. But the Harriet Lane does not respond. In five more, a boat puts off from her toward the Owasco, manned by a handful of rebels, conveying a paroled officer (it is asserted the only surviving one) bearing his white handkerchief tied to his sword as a flag of truce. He goes to request a suspension of hostilities, and, directly afterward, white flags are flying on the Owasco and the Clifton-but not upon the little Sachem!

The best part of an hour passes in inaction. Then Commodore Renshaw sends a message and his pilot to the Mary A. Boardman, bidding her run up to the town to ascertain what has occurred, instructing Capt. Weir, if fired upon, to raise the white flag. Accordingly, taking the precaution to load her ten-pounder, she steams off from the Westfield, past Fort Point, but presently returns, finding her task anticipated. Capt. Law of the Clifton puts off in a gig from that vessel to Commodore Renshaw, with a message received from Gen. Magruder on shore. It gives the Union fleet until ten o'clock to leave Galveston on peril of destruction.

Almost directly after the return of Capt. Law to his steamer, the second cutter of the Westfield reaches the Mary A. Boardman with orders for her to come as near as possible and lie to, as the Commodore has determined to transfer his men and then to blow up his own vessel. It is asserted — whether with truth I cannot pretend to decide — that he was advised to this course by Captain Law.

The scene that ensued, consequent on the knowledge of Com. Renshaw's resolution, on board both vessels, was one scarcely to be paralleled in the experience of a lifetime. It might have been a quarter-past nine o'clock, hence very little time remained for the transfer of men and baggage — the Commodore, indeed, proposed to allow but fifteen minutes. Instantly, then, all was animation. The Westfield lay at about five hundred feet from the Mary A. Boardman, with all her portholes open and her guns run out, every body on board being promiscuously engaged in endeavoring to secure whatever came uppermost. Hammocks, officers' trunks, seamen's chests, cutlasses, swords, rifles, fowling-pieces, blankets, articles of clothing, even looking-glasses, were thrown pell-mell into the boats, hurriedly stowed away and rowed, each with its due proportion of men, to the Boardman, where all hands labored unceasingly to receive them.

The three boats of the Westfield, the first and second cutter and gig, plied to and fro incessantly. In from fifteen to twenty minutes, one hundred and thirty men were transferred from one vessel to the other, Captain Weir superintending matters forward on the Mary A. Boardman, and Major Burt doing the same aft. To the admirable coolness and presence of mind exhibited by [342] the former gentleman, the latter attributes the successful rescue of the crew, nor has the writer any doubt whatever that the praise might be honestly shared.

At length, only one cutter remained alongside the Westfield, the gig; another, loaded almost to the water's edge, was at a little distance, and about to put off to the Mary A. Boardman. The cutter awaited but its living freight, in the shape of the Commodore and two others; that obtained, a slow match was to be ignited and the steamer blown to air. She had two magazines on board, and was almost literally full of powder, shells, and ammunition. In another ten--in five--minutes all might have been secure, and Commodore Renshaw and those accidentally hurried into eternity with him living men at this hour. That was not to be. Those who saw them last in this world report as follows:

Commodore Renshaw stood quietly on the fore part of the vessel above one of the open powder-magazines. Near him, a barrel of turpentine, with its head stove in, had been lowered down the hatchway into the forecastle. But two oarsmen were in the cutter, with some eight or ten passengers. To them descended the Chief Engineer, Mr. W. K. Green, followed by the First Lieutenant, Charles W. Zimmerman. Both gentlemen seated themselves in the boat. All now had quitted the doomed vessel except the Commodore.

He was seen to step down the stairway, to enter the cutter, when the match, prematurely fired (it is said by a drunkard) must have communicated with the turpentine. Instantly a heavy roll of black smoke surged upward, followed by a bright, explosive flame, full ten feet high. No alarm followed this, not a word was spoken; the Commodore turned round and looked back, the heavy boat was alongside with her crowd of passengers, the crew of the Mary A. Boardman and her recent acquisitions were gazing curiously at the bright flame, and the tall thin form of their first officer, when--

A white puff of smoke broke through the hatchway as from the muzzle of a cannon. It was followed by an explosion so tremendous as to move air, water, every thing within its scope, jarring the Mary A. Boardman as though she were shaken by an earthquake; and shooting up in the shape of a monstrous fan, like the eruption of a volcano, soared a reversed cone of fire, while spreading equally in every direction — for there was not wind enough in the calm January morning to disturb them — rolled and billowed the heavy volumes of smoke. High up, too, overhead, adding infinitely to the horror and beauty of the occasion, exploded innumerable shells, a hundred of which had been piled up on the deck, perhaps in anticipation of their destiny. One of the powder-magazines had exploded, utterly destroying the forward half of the Westfield, and leaving the remaining portion a shattered and blasted ruin. The two boats and all within them had disappeared!

Before the shocked and startled spectators on the Mary A. Boardman had recovered from the concussion of air, (as great as might have been occasioned by the near discharge of a whole park of artillery,) the heavier fragments of the exploded steamer fell with sullen plunges into the water, followed by the lighter, producing a rain-like patter over the surface, in a circle of at least five hundred feet about the centre of ruin. To this extent the troubled water was literally blackened, as though tar had been poured over it. But not more so than the shattered half of the unfortunate Westfield yet afloat, whose smoke-stack and walking-beam were still standing, and over whose bows still waved the American flag. Although her safety-valve had been chained down, her steam got up to the highest point, her boilers had not exploded. The sharp singing of her vapor was distinctly audible on the Mary A. Boardman in the ghastly silence that now prevailed; and — noticeable in it — the captain's gig came slowly drifting down from beneath the bows of the wreck, her gunwale just above the water.

The Westfield remained thus for from five to eight minutes, when she burst into sudden blaze near her smoke-stack. Soon the conflagration had spread throughout the entire ruin; the flagship was one entire sheet of flame. With more shells exploding and cannon going off one by one, as they were accidentally ignited, she was but a dangerous neighbor. The Mary A. Boardman did not wait to witness another explosion by the aft magazine.

The rebel ram and gunboats were now coming down the bay, and the batteries had reopened upon the Owasco, Clifton, and Sachem; in addition to which the artillery used in slaughtering the Twenty-second Massachusetts had been conveyed by mules to below the town, where they began firing upon our steamers. There seemed nothing for it but flight, and flee they did accordingly, leaving the Harriet Lane in possession of the enemy, and the Westfield a mere chimera of fire and smoke, to burn herself to the water's edge in Galveston Harbor. Their last experience was comprised in the Clifton's throwing a shell into the huge Mississippi steamer, which followed them over the bar, and compelling her to retire.

There is now no Union vessel, save the captured Harriet Lane, in Galveston, Texas.