Comte de Paris, History of the Civil War in America. Vol. 4.
Henry Coppee , LL.D., Ed.

---

[358] and presented a front three hundred and twenty-five yards in extent, protected by a morass impassable throughout, save for about forty-three yards, the breadth of the tongue of firm land that connected it with the rest of Morris Island. The ditch, a very important thing, was provided with a sluice-gate, by means of which high-tide water could be retained. Constructed, of course, without masonry, its batteries were open at the top; but an immense shelter with blinds formed with trunks of trees and plates of sheet iron covered over with a thick layer of sand, could receive all the garrison. This sea-sand, of a very fine grain, that constituted all the soil of Morris Island, was at once very embarrassing to the assailants, because it could not be worked in the trenches, which would fill up with it at the least wind, and very advantageous to the defence, because, on account of its very mobility, it neutralized the effects of the projectiles: these, penetrating the slope, thanks to the elasticity of the sand, caused it to scatter in the air, but it would come down and cover the furrows, thus constantly effacing the tracks of the shells and bullets. Not to revert to this subject, we shall say that, according to the calculations made by General Gillmore on the weight of the projectiles thrown against the fort and the damage resulting therefrom, it required nearly sixty-six pounds of iron to displace two hundred and nineteen pounds of sand.¹ Under these circumstances a bombardment could produce no decisive effect unless it were the destruction of the uncovered cannon behind the parapet.

While the artillery of Fort Wagner, supported by Sumter's heavy ordnance, sought to delay the construction of the Federal batteries, Beauregard, very uneasy on account of the presence of Terry's division on James Island, made a demonstration on the 16th of July against the positions that the latter had taken near Grimball's plantation. The Confederates, although superior in number, did not seriously attack, but their artillery compelled a prompt retreat on the part of the Federal gunboats, which could