|
©2002,
Your Company Name. All rights reserved.
Address:
Phone:
Fax: |
|
Voices of Morris Island
| Major Peter. F. Stevens was Superintendent
of the Citadel who on January 9th 1861 ordered Cadets from the
Citadel manning a battery of guns on Morris Island to open fire
on the Star of the West as the ship was attempting to re-supply
Fort Sumter's garrison. He was in charge of the Point and Iron
batteries on Morris Island during the siege of Fort Sumter that
began the Civil War and included the following observation in
his April 18, 1863 report of that action:
"There is one somewhat remarkable incident which
I beg to leave here to record. On Thursday evening our camp
was thrown into considerable excitement by the report that
the demand was to be made for the surrender of the fort, and
when it was reported that a white flag had been sent to Sumter
our batteries were all manned, and the men in eager expectations
were watching the fort. I was standing on the traverse closing
the flank of the Iron battery. A number of men were around
me. Suddenly the United States flag on Fort Sumter was seen
to split in two distinct parts, dividing from the front edge
to the back along the lower extremity of the "Union."
I remarked to the men around me, "I wonder if that is
emblematical?" Several remarked that it appeared ominous.
For several minutes it flew in this condition, when it was
hauled down and another flag raised in its stead."
The War of the Rebellion A Compilation of
the Official Records of the Union and
Confederate Armies Series I - Volume I. Government Printing
Office. Washington
D.C. p. 49.
Note; Both of the flags that Major Stevens viewed from his
post on Morris Island are in the possession of the National
Park Service and are on display in Charleston. The torn garrison
flag is located at the Fort Sumter Visitors Center in Liberty
Square. The replacement flag is located at Fort Sumter.
|
Harriet Tubman, according to legend, is said to
have served Major Robert Gould Shaw his last meal before the
July 18, 1863 attack on Battery Wagner. Tubman escaped
from slavery and led many others to freedom, earning the nickname
"Moses." She worked as a spy and scout for Union forces
in the southeast.
"I looked at my hands to see if I was the same person
now I was free. There was such a glory over everything....I
felt like I was in heaven."
Bradford, Sarah H. Harriet Tubman, the Moses
of Her People. Carol Publishing Company. Secaucus, NJ. 1997
reprint of 1886 publication, 149pp, illus.
|
| Sergeant William H. Carney was born into slavery
in Virginia. His father escaped to freedom and later purchased
his family out of slavery. It was on the parapet of Battery
Wagner that Sergeant Carney risked his life in an action for
which he received the Medal of Honor. A member of the 54th Massachusetts
Volunteers, in 1900 Carney became the first African American
to receive this award. His citation reads in part:
"When the color sergeant was shot down, this soldier
grasped the flag, led the way to the parapet, and planted
the colors thereon. When the troops fell back he brought off
the flag, under a fierce fire in which he was twice severely
wounded."
Before collapsing from his wounds, he told his comrades:
"Boys, I only did my duty. The flag never touched
the ground."
Congressional Medal of Honor Society http://www.cmohs.org/recipients/carney_history.htm
|
| Clara Barton is remembered as America's first
battlefield nurse. She witnessed the July 18, 1863 assault on
Battery Wagner and gave first aid to the wounded of the 54th
Massachusetts. She wrote of her experiences that night:
"I can never forget the patient bravery with which
they endured their wounds received in the cruel assault upon
Wagner, as hour after hour they lay in the wet sand, just
back of the growling guns waiting their turn for the knife
or the splint and bandage...and when ever I met one who was
giving his life out with his blood, I could not forbear hastening
to tell him...that he was the soldier of Freedom..."
Oates, Steven B. A Woman of Valor Clara Barton
and the Civil War. The Free Press. New York, N.Y. 1994. p.176.
|
| W. Gordon McCabe, 1st Lieutenant, Artillery, C.S.A.
was serving on General Roswell Ripley's staff during the evacuation
of Morris Island. He wrote of his experiences surrounding that
event:
Sept. 6th, 1863. The Gen'l and I went down last night
and saw the fun...We first went to Battery Bee & Fort
Moultrie, which the enemy were to attack with monitors...It
was a beautiful night overhead but the roar of artillery was
terrific. Two monitors were sweeping the water approaches
to Gregg & the land batteries & mortars were playing
on Wagner. The mortar practice is "beautiful exceedingly"
- at a distance....
...we saw the brilliant flash & heard the deafening
thunder of a 15 in. Dahlgren from a monitor, who had steamed
in close to Sumpter, but was opening on our Sullivan's Island
Batteries. In a moment more, we were flying over the waves
back to Sullivan's Island, our oarsmen straining every nerve.
The whole of the lower end of Morris
Island in the direction of Wagner was lighted up by a brilliant
calcium light, & the mortar hulks & land mortar batteries
were busy at work, the 15 in. literally raining upon Wagner...
...the enemy have come through Vincent's Creek in their
barges, oars muffled, & boat howitzers mounted forward.
Lesesne has seen them, but he just steps down from the parapet
& awakens his cannoneers, who are sleeping at the guns....
Sept 7th. Stopped at Ft. Sumpter but a moment - the poor
old place is knocked all to pieces - Major Elliott was sitting
in his quarters with as severe a face as if he [wished he
were] far away from wars and rumours of wars. I deliver my
dispatches, & pull away for battery Gregg... As I drew
near Battery Wagner the fire was
terrific...It was now quite dark & the stars were shining
down tranquilly from the beautiful summer sky, but Death was
holding high carnival here amid the baleful glare of bursting
shell, & the incessant roar of artillery....
Late at night...I pulled away for the city...The evacuation
was skillfully performed...
Sept 8th. The Yankees seem greatly elated & are rushing
all over Wagner & Gregg, peering into every hole and corner.
I have been watching them a long time through the large telescope
we have at Head Quarters. Well, they ought to be glad, the
stout little earthwork has held out fifty seven days against
the most terrible artillery fire to which any fort in the
annals of war has ever been subjected. An English officer,
who was in the fort, & who had been all throu' the Crimean
campaign told me that Sevastapol was child's play to it. It
has demonstrated that sand forts are the most invulnerable
to such enormous ordnance as is now in use.
From an unpublished diary dated 17 August-23
October 1863, kept by William.
Gordon McCabe (1841-1920) in the possession of the Virginia
Historical Society, Richmond Virginia while serving on the
staff of Roswell Sabine Ripley at Charleston, S.C., concerning
military operations at batteries Gregg and Wagner, Fort Sumter,
and Morris Island (section 1).
|
Brig. General Quincy A. Gillmore was in charge
of the operations against Morris
Island in 1863. On the occasion of the evacuation of the island
he wrote the following to the troops under his command:
Hdqrs. Dept. of the South
In the Field, Morris Island, S. C. Sept. 15, 1863
It is with no ordinary feelings of gratification and pride
that the brigadier-general commanding is enabled to congratulate
this army upon the signal success which has crowned the enterprise
in which it has been engaged. Fort Sumter is destroyed.
The scene where our country's flag suffered its first dishonor
you made the theater of one of its proudest triumphs. ....
Forts Wagner and Gregg, works rendered memorable by their
protracted resistance and the sacrifice of life they have
cost, have also been wrested from the enemy
by your persevering courage and skill, and the graves of your
comrades rescued from desecration and contumely.
You now hold in undisputed possession the whole of Morris
Island, and the city
and harbor of Charleston lie at the mercy of your artillery
from the very spot where the first shot was fired at your
country's flag and the rebellion itself inaugurated.
To you, the officers and soldiers of this command and to the
gallant navy which has co-operated with you, are due the thanks
of your commander and your country. You were called upon to
encounter untold privations and dangers, to undergo unremitting
and exhausting labors, to sustain severe and disheartening
reverses. How nobly your patriotism and zeal have responded
to the call, the result of the campaign will show and your
commanding general gratefully bears witness.
Q. A. Gillmore Brigadier-General, Commanding
The War of the Rebellion A Compilation of
the Official Records of the Union and
Confederate Armies Series I - Volume XXVII. Government Printing
Office. Washington D.C. p.94
|
| Esther Hill Hawks was one of the first women to
earn a degree in medicine. She was in Beaufort teaching newly
freed slaves when the wounded of the 54th Mass were brought
to a makeshift hospital. She gave medical aid and comfort to
the soldiers. She wrote of her visit to Battery Wagner on Morris
Island in July 1864 during the bombardment of Charleston:
"My mind went back through the short year that has
passed, to the eventful
18th of July/63, when the whole country was thrilled with
the daring charge on this most formidable Fort: and I remembered
how the torn-and mangled bodies were brought into hospital
to us; - how brave and patient the men who had dared and lost
so much
- and it was hard to realize that my feet stood on the soil
soaked through and through with our Countries' richest blood!
I should have taken off the shoes from my feet and with head
uncover'd, trod with silent reverence over such hallowed earth!
- but all the excitement of actual war is about us."
Schwartz ,Gerald, ed. A Woman Doctor's Civil
War- Esther Hill Hawks Diary. University of South Carolina
Press. 1984. p.88.
|
Colonel Charles W. Trowbridge delivered a speech
during the mustering out ceremony of the 33rd US Colored Troops
(formerly the First South Carolina Volunteers) on
Morris Island, February 9, 1866:
"It seems fitting to me, that the last hours of our
existence as a regiment should pass amidst the unmarked graves
of your comrades, at Fort Wagner. Near you rest the bones
of Colonel Shaw, buried by an enemy's hand, in the same grave
with his black soldiers, who fell at his side: where in the
future your children's children will come on pilgrimages to
do homage to the ashes of those who fell in this glorious
struggle."
Higginson, T. W. Army life in a Black Regiment.
W. W. Norton. New York, New York. 1984. Appendix E.
|
| Private Abraham J. Palmer of the 48th New York
Volunteers wrote in the regiment's history of his return to
the site of Battery Wagner on Morris Island in 1874 that:
" ...the day may come when opposing sections of a
restored Union will unite to erect upon that mound (Wagner)
a monument to the heroes who fell there on either side. Let
this be a noble shaft, typical of the brave spirits who loved
their lives less than they loved their honor, and who died
upon those sands, lifting them forever into undying renown."
Bradshaw, Timothy, Jr. Battery Wagner. Palmetto
Historical Works. Columbia 1993. p. 116.
|
| Susie King Taylor was born enslaved in Savannah,
Georgia in 1848 and was secretly educated. She escaped to Union
lines and taught school to newly freed slaves on St. Simon's
Island, Georgia. She worked as a laundress, clerk and nurse
with the 1st South Carolina Volunteers, the 33rd Regiment. In
1902 she published her memoirs:
"I look around now and see the comforts that our
younger generation enjoy,
and think of the blood that was shed to make these comforts
possible for them, and to see how little some of them appreciate
the old soldiers.... There are only a
few of them left now, so let us all, as the ranks close...remember
that it was through the efforts of these veterans that they
and we older ones enjoy our liberty today."
Romero Patricia W. and Willie Lee Rose editors.
Susie King Taylor Reminiscences
of My Life A Black Woman's Civil War Memoirs . Markus Wiener
Publishing. New York. 1988. p. 120.
|
|
