The Maine bugle ... campaign; 1-5 Jan. 1894-Oct. 1898 - Maine.gov

A MAN FROM MAINE. 37
by the ablest engineers in the rebel army, and as the sequel
shows it could not have been placed in worthier hands.
All da\- antl night of the 13th and 14th the navy continued
such a ceaseless fire against the fort that it was impossible for
its garrison to repair damages. The monitors and the " Iron-
sides " bowled their eleven- and fifteen-inch shells along the
parapet, scattering a destructive storm of shrapnel in the dark-
ness. The defenders of the fort lost heavily in killed and
wounded, and this fact shows that the fire of the navy was much
more effective than on the first expedition.
On the afternoon of the 13th Ames directed the Forty-seventh
New York Volunteers, Second Brigade, under command
of Colonel Joseph M. McDonald, to cross the peninsula to the
river, and under the protection of its bank to push up skirmish-
ers as near to the fort as possible. This movement was executed
with difficulty, as it had to pass over a strip of marshy
ground. The skirmishers were quite successful in silencing the
gunners who were trying to serve the barbette guns on the
parapet.
Curtis with the First Brigade, however, had been selected by
Ames for the advanced line, and on the morning of the 14th
the Third New York of this brigade was ordered to relieve
Colonel McDonald. As this regiment marched across the open
plateau it was fired upon by the rebel steamer " Chickamauga,"
and a number of its men were killed and wounded. Colonel
Weeks, commanding, lost a leg. This attack did not materi-
ally check the advance of Curtis, who pushed on to the river
and captured a rebel flat-bottomed steam-transport laden with
stores, that had unwittingly come up to the dock at Craig's
Landing. This brigade had been over this same ground on the
first expedition and was familiar with it. It worked its way
along the river-shore, taking advantage of its bank, that gave
some protection, until the advance redoubt near the river and
about half a mile from the main fort had been reached and
captured. This brigade met a determined resistance, the fort
having thrown out a company of skirmishers and brought the
guns to bear on our position, while we on our part picked off