March 8, 1862. |
 |
| John Ericsson. |
March 9. |
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she was attacked by the Merrimack and two of the Confederate gun-boats, the Jamestown and Patrick Henry.1 Fortunately, the water was so shallow that the Merrimack could not approach within a mile of her. She fought gallantly, and at dusk her assailants, considerably crippled, withdrew, and went up toward Norfolk.2 Marston did not get up in time with the Roanoke to join in the fight.
His vessel was grounded, and so was the frigate St. Lawrence, towed by the gun-boat Cambridge, that was trying to join in the conflict.3
The night after the battle
was one of greatest anxiety to the loyal men on the northern borders of Hampton Roads.
It was expected the savage Merrimack would bear down upon the fast-grounded Minnesota in the morning, destroy her and perhaps others of the squadron, escape to sea, and appear like a besom of destruction in the harbors of the seaboard cities of the North.
There seemed to be no competent human agency near to avert these threatened disasters, when,, at a little past midnight, a mysterious thing came in from the sea between the capes of Virginia, lighted on its way by the burning Congress, and appearing to the wondering eyes of sentinels, who had. no warning of its existence nor its expected advent, like a supernatural apparition.
It was, indeed, a strange but substantial reality, for it was Ericsson's Monitor, on its trial trip to fulfil the stipulation of the contract with the Government that she was not to be accepted until after a successful trial of her powers before the heaviest guns of the enemy, and at the shortest range.
She was in command of, Lieutenant John L. Worden, of the Navy,4 and had been towed to the Roads by the steamer Seth Low, with two others as a convoy.
Her sea-worthiness had been tested by a heavy gale and rolling
sea, that had been encountered on her way from New York.
Worden reported to the flag-officer in the Roads for orders on his arrival, and was immediately sent to aid the Minnesota. He was in conference with her commander (Captain Van Brunt) at two o'clock on Sunday morning.
The Monitor lay alongside of the grounded vessel, “when,” said Van Brunt afterward, “all on ”
1 The armed vessels that assisted the Merrimack in her raid, were the Patrick Henry, Commander Tucker, 6 guns; Jamestown, Lieutenant-Commanding Barney, 2 guns; and Raleigh, Lieutenant-Commanding Alexander; Beaufort, Lieutenant-Commanding Parker, and Teazer, Lieutenant-Commanding Webb, each one gun.
2 Commodore Buchanan and several others on board the Merrimack were wounded. The Commander was so badly hurt that Captain Jones, his second in command, took charge of the vessels. Two of her guns were broken; her prow was twisted; some of her armor was damaged; her anchor and all the flag-staffs were shot away, and the smoke-stack and steam-pipe were riddled.-Report of Catesby Ap R. Jones to Flag Officer F. Forest, March 8, 1862.
3 Report of Flag-Officer John Marston to the Secretary of the Navy, March 9, 1862; also, of Lieutenants Morris and Pendergrast.
4 See page 365, volume I.
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