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Lt.-Colonel Arthur J. Fremantle, Three Months in the Southern States, May, 1863. (search)
as the channel between these two forts is a mile wide, they might probably be passed. Within two miles of the city, however, the bay becomes very shallow, and the ship channel is both dangerous and tortuous. It is, moreover, obstructed by double rows of pine piles, and all sorts of ingenious torpedoes, besides being commanded by carefully constructed forts, armed with heavy guns, and built either on islands or on piles. Their names are Fort Pinto, Fort Spanish River, Apalache, and Blakeley. A description of either its sea or land defences is necessarily omitted. The garrisons of these forts complained of their being unhealthy, and I did not doubt the assertion. Before landing, we boarded two iron-clad floatingbatteries. The Confederate fleet at Mobile is considerable, and reflects great credit upon the energy of the Mobilians, as it has been constructed since the commencement of the war. During the trip, I overheard General Maury soliloquizing over a Yankee flag, an
Rebellion Record: a Diary of American Events: Documents and Narratives, Volume 7. (ed. Frank Moore), chapter 22 (search)
from New-Hampshire, Mr. Hawkins, from Media, Pa., and Mr. Shippen, from Pittsburgh, also lent their assistance, and all these gentlemen materially aided us at this and at the second lodge until it was fully organized. With the transfer of our material to town, the irregular organization was changed to a permanent working basis. Dr. W. F. Cheney, who arrived on the tenth, was placed in charge of the camp. He brought with him seven assistants, Messrs. Latz, Cooley, McGuinness, Chesebro, Blakeley, Sherwin, Freshoner, from Canandaigua, N. Y. To these were added Messrs. Reisinger and Hall, from Baltimore, and four detailed soldiers. Cooks had arrived, a large shed for a kitchen had been erected, and full preparations were made for feeding any number. Every facility was granted us by the medical officers of the post and by the commissary. Additional tents were erected, drains made, straw procured, and shelter prepared for one hundred and fifty men. A store-tent was placed near the h
Benson J. Lossing, Pictorial Field Book of the Civil War. Volume 3., Chapter 19: the repossession of Alabama by the Government. (search)
e. Canby perceived the necessity of reducing this work before passing on to Blakely; and, on the following morning, March 27. before ten o'clock, it was completely invested, on the land side. The divisions of Carr and McArthur, of the Sixteenth Corps, were, at first, on the right, the extreme of the former resting on Bayou Minette, and Benton's division of the Thirteenth Corps, was on the left, its extreme touching at Belle Rose. The remainder of the Sixteenth Corps seriously threatened Blakeley. Steele came up a few days afterward and joined that corps, and his troops then formed the extreme right in front of Blakely. Thatcher's squadron had moved up the bay parallel with the army, as far as the shallow water would allow, to assist in reducing the fort and cutting it off from communication with Mobile. Spanish Fort was garrisoned by nearly three thousand men of Hood's late army, under General R. L. Gibson. It was soon found that Spanish Fort proper, with its near neighbors a
Admiral David D. Porter, The Naval History of the Civil War., chapter 48 (search)
r-Admiral) John A. Winslow. appear that the Kearsarge had the advantage in size, weight of ordnance and number of guns and crew ; but this, like many other of his assertions, is disputed by official records, which state as follows: Kearsarge. lbs. 4 short 32-pounders, weight of projectile, 128 2 11-inch pivot-guns, weight of projectile, 272 1 30-pounder rifle, weight of projectile, 30   7 guns, 430 Alabama. lbs. 6 long 32-pounders, 192 1 rifled 100-pounder, (Blakeley） 100 1 8-inch shell-gun, 68   8 guns, 360 In speed the Kearsarge had somewhat the advantage. In tonnage the vessels were almost the same. The Kearsarge had 163 officers and men, the Alabama, 149. It was a matter of little consequence what battery the Alabama carried, as so few of her shots struck the Kearsarge and if, as has been asserted, many of Semmes' crew were old English man-of-war's men, their shooting did little credit to their training. With wise precaution,
Rebellion Record: a Diary of American Events: Documents and Narratives, Volume 9. (ed. Frank Moore), chapter 74 (search)
t in provision of conveniences for wounded men; there is no appropriate place for the performance of operations. Acting upon my recommendation, Lieutenant Commander Thornton, Executive Officer, caused the fore-hold to be arranged for the accommodation of six wounded, after the application of temporary dressings, that they might have immunity from the exposure subjected to while upon the berth-deck. The action continued for eighteen minutes without casualties. Then a sixty-eight pound Blakeley shell passed through the starboard bulwarks below main rigging, exploded upon the quarter-deck, and wounded three of the crew of the pivot gun. One, William Gowin, ordinary seaman, received a compound fracture of left femur at lower and middle third and tibia, and fibula upper third, complicating the kneejoint. No fragments of shell were found in the wounds. The hemorrhage was profuse, chiefly venous. Suitable dressings and stimulants were employed. Another, John W. Dempsey, quarter
Rebellion Record: a Diary of American Events: Documents and Narratives, Volume 9. (ed. Frank Moore), Foreign accounts of the fight. (search)
hound that the Alabama fired in all about one hundred and fifty rounds, some single guns, and some in broadsides of three or four, and the Kearsarge about one hundred, the majority of which were eleven-inch shells; the Alabama's were principally Blakeley's pivot-guns. In the early part of the action, the relative firing was about three from the Alabama to one from the Kearsarge, but as it progressed, the latter gained the advantage, having apparently a much greater power of steam. She appeareded at one hundred and fifty men; she had, in fact, but one hundred and twenty, all told. Again, as to her armament; that of the Kearsarge may be correctly given by your correspondent. I do not know what it was. The Alabama had one seven-inch Blakeley rifled gun, one eight-inch smooth-bore pivot-gun, and six thirty-two-pounders, smooth-bore, in broadside. I am, sir, very respectfully, your obedient servant, J. M. Mason. 24 Upper Seymour Street, June 22. Southampton, June 21, 1864. si
Raphael Semmes, Memoirs of Service Afloat During the War Between the States, Chapter 31: (search)
ays greatly over-rated by the enemy. She was ordinarily about a ten-knot ship. She was said to have made eleven knots and a half, on her trial trip, but we never afterward got it out of her. Under steam and sail both, we logged on one occasion, thirteen knots and a quarter, which was her utmost speed. Her armament consisted of eight guns; six 32-pounders, in broadside, and two pivot-guns amidships; one on the forecastle, and the other abaft the main-mast—the former a 100-pounder rifled Blakeley, and the latter, a smooth-bore eightinch. The Blakeley gun was so deficient in metal, compared with the weight of shot it threw, that, after the first few discharges, when it became a little heated, it was of comparatively small use to us, to such an extent were we obliged to reduce the charge of powder, on account of the recoil. The average crew of the Alabama, before the mast, was about 120 men; and she carried twenty-four officers, as follows: A Captain, four lieutenants, surgeon, paym
Raphael Semmes, Memoirs of Service Afloat During the War Between the States, Chapter 39: (search)
, on the other hand, to be a tug, or river steamer, or some such craft, with two or three small guns at the most. The facts are as follows: The Hatteras was a larger ship than the Alabama, by one hundred tons. Her armament, as reported to us by her own people, was as follows: Four 32-pounders; two Parrot 30-pounder rifles; one 20-pounder rifle; and one 12-pounder howitzer —making a total of eight guns. The armament of the Alabama was as follows: Six 32-pounders; one 8-inch shell gun; one Blakeley rifle of 100 pounds—total, eight guns. There was, besides, a little toy-rifle—a 9-pounder—on the quarter-deck of the Alabama, which had been captured from a merchant-ship, and which, I believe, was fired once during the action. The crew of the Hatteras was 108 strong; that of the Alabama 110. There was thus, as the reader sees, a considerable disparity between the two ships, in the weight of their pivot-guns, and the Alabama ought to have won the fight; and she did win it, in thirteen m
Knight's Mechanical Encyclopedia (ed. Knight), C. (search)
tent obtained in 1857. It has been extensively adopted in the British service. It is built up of layers of wrought-iron bars twisted spirally in reverse directions over a steel core, and bound together by one or more wrought-iron rings shrunk on at a white heat. A peculiar breech-loading mechanism is also used with this gun. See Armstrong gun. In the Ames cannon, a series of compound longitudinal rings are consecutively welded to a concave breech-piece, upon a removable mandrel. Blakeley's cannon is composed of an inner tube, which may be of mild steel, upon which an outer tube of less extensible material, as hard steel, is shrunk. His first English patent was in 1855. The American patent, in which the process here mentioned is described, bears date 1864. Whitworth commenced experimenting about 1855, and his guns underwent a satisfactory test in 1860. The leading peculiarities are a bore which is hexagonal in cross section without grooves, and having a rapid twist; th
Knight's Mechanical Encyclopedia (ed. Knight), R. (search)
was the best on record. The possible individual score was180 The possible six-team score was (6 × 180）1,080 The best individual score (Fulton, American) was168 The American team score was934 The Irish team score was931 The best previous shooting at Wimbledon was 1,204 out of a possible 1,440. Rifled cannon were first successfully employed expansible cups or envelopes of soft metal, which are forced into the grooves in the act of firing, so as to prevent windage; as Parrott's, Blakeley's, etc. 4. Breech-loading guns. In these the projectile has a soft metal coating, which is forced into the grooves in the same way as the leaden bullets of small-arms; e. g. the Prussian and Armstrong's. The grooves of the Armstrong muzzle-loader are made deeper on one side than on the other, as shown in Fig. 4328, a; the deeper part is of uniform depth and connected with the shallower during the Franco-Austrian war in Italy, 1859. The Lancaster gun had, however, been tried to some
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