Alfred Roman, The military operations of General Beauregard in the war between the states, 1861 to 1865

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Headquarters, Department S. C., Ga., and Fla., Charleston, S. C., April 8th, 1863.
Captain W. F. Nance, A. A.-Genl.:

Captain,—Hold two hundred men of Colquitt's regiment in readiness to be sent to Fort Sumter, to relieve the garrison until another attack shall appear as imminent.

Respectfully, your obedient servant,

Thomas Jordan, Chief of Staff.

Confederate States Engineers' Office, Charleston, S. C., April 9th, 1863.
Major D. B. Harris, Chief-Engineer Department:

Major,—I have the honor to make the following report of the engagement between Fort Sumter and the enemy's ironclad fleet, on the 7th of April, 1863, at 3 o'clock P. M., lasting two hours and twenty-five minutes.

The incidents which transpired during the engagement are based upon information received from the officers in charge of the works, but more particularly from the observations of Colonel Rhett, commanding Fort Sumter, and Lieutenant S. C. Boyleston, Adjutant, First Regiment South Carolina Artillery, who made special observations during the whole action; the remainder from personal inspection afterwards.

Forts Sumter, Moultrie, batteries Bee, Beauregard, Cummings's Point, and Wagner, were engaged. The fleet consisted of the Ironsides, supposed armament sixteen guns; the Keokuk, two stationary turrets, carrying one gun each; and seven single revolving turreted vessels, carrying (supposed) two guns in each, presumed to be the Montauk, Passaic, Weehauwken, Patalpsco, Nahant, Catskill, and Nantucket, which took position from nine hundred to fifteen hundred yards from Fort Sumter.

They steamed up main ship-channel towards Fort Moultrie, in line of battle, as follows: four single turrets, Ironsides, three single turrets, and Keokuk, following one after the other at intervals of about three hundred yards; the foremost one moving slowly, and carrying on her prow the ‘devil,’ or torpedosearcher, a description of which will be sent you. When within twenty-two hundred yards, Fort Moultrie fired the first gun upon her, near buoy No. 3, then distant about fifteen hundred yards from Sumter, which had previously trained her battery of barbette guns upon the buoy, and opened fire by battery, when she reached that position, at three minutes past three o'clock.

The first turret opened fire at five minutes past three, and moved backward, thus developing their manoeuvre of attack. At this moment the engagement became general. The second turret passed the first, fired, moved backward; the first moved forward, passed the second, fired, and backed, then retired from action; the other turrets manoeuvring in the same relative manner, each time nearing or receding a little from the fort, in order not to present a permanent target.

The Ironsides, when at seventeen hundred yards from Moultrie and two thousand from Sumter, stopped, discharged a battery at the former, when Sumter concentrated a heavy fire upon her; numbers of shot were seen to strike her,