The CARONDELET Runs the Gantlet

On the morning of March 15, 1862, the ironclad gunboat Carondelet—Commander Henry Walke, U.S.N.—lay moored to the left bank of the Mississippi close to the Kentucky-Tennessee line. The river was up, swollen by spring rains and melted western snows, and the gunboat lugged uneasily at the web of lines that tethered her to the sparse cottonwoods as the yellow flood, dotted with debris and wreckage, slid relentlessly by.

Despite her musical name, the Carondclet could lay small claim to beauty except in a functional sense. To the eye of a deep-water navy man, accustomed to graceful sheer and lofty rigging, she must have resembled a prehistoric river monster more than a warship. Nor would he have been entirely mistaken. The ironclads were, in fact, creatures of the river, born on its banks, six of them on the outskirts of St. Louis, the remaining three at Mound City, Illinois.

In August of 1861, the quartermaster general had awarded the contract for their construction to James B. Eads, a prominent St. Louis engineer, who with phenomenal organizing skill and energy had driven 4,000 men night and day, seven days a week, to produce them in just one hundred days. He had contracted to do it in sixty-five days, but the government failed to live up to its agreement to make regular payments for the men’s wages. There were unavoidable delays, and Eads was compelled to use his own funds, plus what he could borrow from patriotic friends, to get the job done. By the spring of ’62 Eads had not yet been paid, and the ironclads fought their early battles more or less as private warships on loan to the government. Because they had been procured by the War Department they “belonged” to the Army, but they were manned and operated by the Navy, under Army directions. The arrangement did not work well, and would have been impossible had the Hag-officer in command and the generals with whom he had to deal been men of small character.

Contemporary photographs reveal the appearance of the ironclads, but their construction and characteristics require some description. On a shallow-draft rectangular hull 175 feet long by about 50 feet wide were mounted five cylindrical boilers which drove two high-pressure engines, each connected to one end of a massive paddle wheel 22 feet in diameter. A boxlike structure enclosed everything, including the paddle wheel. All four sides of this superstructure, or “casemate,” sloped inward and upward from the water line at 35 degrees to deflect shot fired at close range. The casemate’s forward face was armored with 2½ inches of iron plate backed by 20 inches of solid oak. Opposite the boilers and engines the sides were similarly protected, but elsewhere were covered merely by heavy planking, as was the stern.∗ Considerations of weight and a specified maximum draft of 6 feet precluded additional armor except lor some light shielding around the conical pilothouse. Forward, the casemate was pierced for three guns, on each side for four, and at the stern for two. The intended armament had been three 8-inch 04-pounder Dahlgrens; six 32pounder smoothbores; and four ]2-pounder army rides; but variations existed among the ironclads due to the limited availability of guns. The designed speed of the boats was nine miles an hour, though actually they were seldom able to make more than six or seven. But despite their lack of speed and incomplete armor, they were far more formidable than any of the river gunboats possessed by the Confederates, and reflected great credit on their designer, Samuel M. Pook (better known as a creator of recordbreaking clipper ships), in whose honor they were sometimes referred to as “Pook’s turtles.”

∗ Popular belief to the contrary, neither the Merrimac nor her nemesis, the Monitor, was the first ironclad; indeed the European powers had tried out armored floating balleries a decade earlier. But the captured U.S. frigate Merrimac, which the Rebels converted into the Virginia, was the first American ship to be protected all around with iron. Her plating was four inches thick. [Ed.]

The Carondelet had six identical sister ships—St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Louisville, Cairo, and Mound City. Because the seven were as alike as peas ihey were identified by individually colored bands about their twin stacks. The two remaining ironclads of the western flotilla—Essex and Benton— were larger. The Benton was a giant—187 feet long by 75 feet wide—mounting sixteen guns; she was selected as Hagship for the flotilla by its commander, Flag-Officer Andrew H. Foote, U.S.N.

The Carondelet had already seen some hot action at the capture of Forts Henry and Donelson in February. At Donelson, on the Cumberland, Foote had led liis gunboats up the river to within point-blank range of the Confederate guns. As a result they had taken a severe pounding that shortly sent two of them back down again, out of control, and a third limping out of the fight. The action taught Flag-Officer Foote and his gunboat skippers greater respect for Confederate guns and gunners and caused them to change their tactics when it came to attacking heavily defended positions.

The two closely related victories brought important strategic advantages. Besides opening the way for an advance into the heart of Tennessee, they compelled the evacuation of the Confederate stronghold at Columbus, Kentucky, with i/jo guns and a garrison of 12,000, which had effectively closed the Mississippi against a southward advance.

The Confederates did not have to go far to find another spot suitable for a defense of the river. Sixty miles below Columbus at island Xo. io—so called because it was the tenth island below the mouth of the Ohio—they already had a fortified position of great natural strength. This they now proceeded to develop. (See map on page 71.)

At Island No. 10 (he river makes a sudden northward turn of nearly iSo degrees, and here the Rebels had erected ten batteries, five of them on the island, the remainder on the Tennessee shore. About a mile above the bend was a redoubt containing six heavy guns. Because of the high water at this time the redoubt was partly Hooded. Along the thirty-foot bluff rising above the bend the other four batteries were spaced a quarter-mile apart. Together the shore positions mounted twenty-four guns.

The emplacements on the island were all located along the north shore facing the Missouri swamps, for the main channel for river traffic lay on that side. The one at the head of the island was the largest, with seven guns; the other four, spaced at short intervals along the shore, mounted a total of thirteen. All of the island batteries stood from twenty to thirty feet above the river. A formidable reinforcement had been added in the form of a sixteen-gun floating battery moored against the island midway along its length.

There were no batteries on the Tennessee side of the island. There the channel was obstructed by snags at low water, though it may have been passable when the river was in Hood. A single heavy battery was under construction at the tail ol the island to cover the river in the direction of New Madrid, Missouri, seven miles below at the reverse bend. A large fortification was also being built on the mainland behind the island, as a protection against an attack from the rear, and to cover the landing place used by the fleet of light craft that shuttled between island and mainland. Guns in this work would also command the lower end of the Tennessee channel. Finally, to discourage any attempt to cross the river between Madrid Bend and Tiptonville. six miles south as the crow (lies, twentyone by water, batteries had been erected to cover each of the landing places.

Located on and about Island Xo. 10 were an estimated y.Hoo Confederate troops, including several thousand in an entrenched camp at New Madrid. General John P. McCown. G.S.A., was in command until March ay, when he was relieved by General W. AV. Mackall, former assistant adjutant general for Albert Sidney Johnston.

Immediately after the Union occupation of Columbus. Koote headed down the Mississippi toward Island Xo. 10 with the Benton, the Carondelet and five of her sister ironclads, ten mortar boats, and a small Meet of tugs and transports. At the same time a Union army of about so,o(X) under Major General John Pope was working its way southward through the Missouri swamps toward Xew Madrid, which Pope proceeded to outllank by occupying Point Pleasant, on the western shore of the river, eight miles below. Thereupon the Confederate force encamped at New Madrid withdrew across the river, out of reach. Next day Pope occupied New Madrid and sat down to “estimate the situation.”

He at once perceived that he was stalemated. So long as he was unable to cross the river the Confederates were secure, and because their light gunboats and batteries controlled the Mississippi below Island No. io there was little prospect that he could do so. In particular, he had no craft for mounting an amphibious assault, although there were plenty upriver. The solution would be (o have Foote run a number of his ironclads down to New Madrid, drive off the Confederate mosquito fleet, and destroy the batteries at the landing places. The gunboats would then be available to ferry Pope’s troops across the river. In this event the Confederates would be trapped, for the flood made impassable the semicircle of swamps, lakes, and bayous that separated the Tennessee shore from the hinterland. Nor, with Federal troops both upriver and down, could the Confederates make a withdrawal aboard the fleet of large steamers which they had moored behind Island No. 10. Surrender or capture was inevitable unless the river dropped and the swamps dried up, allowing escape by the back door.

At 9 A.M. on March 15, Foote and his flotilla arrived above Island No. 10. Leaving his transports and supply barges in the vicinity of Island No. 8 twelve miles above, he dropped down with the gunboats and mortars within range of the Confederate defenses. Within a few days he received a request from Pope that he run several of the ironclads past the island to New Madrid at the earliest practicable moment. Well informed as to the disposition and strength oT the enemy’s defenses, and remembering the hammering his gunboats had taken at less formidable Fort Donelson, Foote declined to send even one, convinced (hat the undertaking “would … result in the sacrifice of the boat, her officers and men, which sacrifice I should not be justified in making.”

Instead, beginning on March 17, he attempted to reduce the Confederate stronghold by bombardment, hammering away at the Rebel batteries all day, every day. At times the Confederates had to scramble for their dugouts, but the damage was insignificant. Something very near a direct hit was necessary to destroy an enemy gun, lor they were small and the range was nearly three miles. Defiantly, the large Confederate guns would lob a few shells upriver, with alarming accuracy. For the most part, however, the Rebels were content to save their ammunition so long as the ironclads kept their distance.

On March 20 Foote, under repeated urging by Gen eral Pope to send a gunboat clown Io New Madrid, instructed Commander Roger Stembel of the Cincinnati to sound out the other gunboat skippers, informally, regarding an attempt to run the gantlet. All of them said it was too risky—all, that is, except Commander Walke of the Carondclet, who said that it could and should be done. Foote was not yet ready to change his mind, however, and the bombardment dragged on until it had become a subject of ridicule in Pope’s army. To the question, “What is the Navy doing today?” the standard reply was, “Oh, they’re bombarding the State of Tennessee at long range, as usual.”

On March 27, after ten days of steady but fruitless shelling, Pope was almost frantic with impatience, certain that the river must soon begin to fall and open an escape route for the Confederates through the swamps. He therefore composed a telegram to General Henry W. Halleck, his superior, who was showing signs of restlessness over Pope’s long stay at New Madrid. “I will take Island NTo. 10 within a week. Trust me,” it read. “As Commodore Foote is unable to reduce and unable to run his gunboats past it, I would ask, as they belong to the United States, that he be directed to remove the crews from two of them and turn the boats over to me. I will bring them here.”

Halleck responded by wiring Foote to give Pope all possible assistance with the gunboats, but pointedly made no reference to turning them over to the Army. One wonders whether Pope really expected this drastic suggestion to be taken seriously; perhaps he hoped that some word of it would get to Foole and stir him to action. At any rale, within the next two days Foote took the step that was to lead to the Carondclet’s famous exploit.

He summoned the gunboat commanders to a council of war aboard the Benton. As on the occasion of the informal interview with Stembel, all but one of the officers insisted that it was impracticable. Again Walke dissented, arguing that it could be done “under favorable circumstances” and that in any case it was the only way around the existing impasse. When Foote asked him if he would undertake the mission with the Carondelet, Walke said he would.

Foote replied that a great load of responsibility had been lifted from his shoulders. He would never, he said, have countenanced an attempt except on a volunteer basis. He promised to issue written orders immediately.

Walke received them in a letter of instruction on March 30. “You will avail yourself of the first fog or rainy night and drift your steamer down past … Island No. 10 until you reach New Madrid,” the letter said. It concluded by commending Walke “to the care and protection of God,” but evidently Foote doubted that the Almighty would favor the enterprise: he added a postscript giving instructions for destroying the Carondelet in the event of grounding and imminent capture.

Work was immediately begun to prepare the Carondelet for the ordeal. Planking from a damaged barge was used to cover the hurricane deck, and heavy chain was laid over it as a protection against plunging shot. Hawsers and chain cable were wound around the pilothouse to a depth of eleven to eighteen inches, and a stout barricade was erected about the boilers and engines. To silence the puffing of the exhaust steam as it discharged from the stacks while under way, the lines were disconnected and redirected into the paddle-wheel housing. Gradually, as Walke later wrote, the ironclad took on the appearance of “a farmer’s wagon, prepared for market.” Finally, arrangements were made to lash a barge, loaded with coal and piled with baled hay to a height that would cover the gun ports, alongside the unarmored portion of the casemate.

A few days before, two projects had been carried out with a view to improving the prospects lor success. The first was a boldly conceived and executed “commando” raid on the Confederate redoubt, already slightly damaged by Foote’s bombardment. On the night of April i, Colonel George W. Roberts of the Forty-second Illinois Regiment, with fifty men in five boats, dropped silently down river, stormed ashore with fixed bayonets, and effectively spiked all six guns before making a leisurely withdrawal. The second project was the elimination of the floating battery: the mortar boats concentrated their fire on it, and reconnaissance the following morning disclosed it anchored about midstream three miles below the island.

By April 4 the preparations were complete. The day was humid and cloudy, and it appeared that conditions might be suitable tor a run down that night. Commander Walke notified Foote that if they were, he would make the attempt at 10 P.M., by which time the moon would have gone down. First Master William R. Hoel of the Cincinnati, whose twenty-one years as a Mississippi pilot had made him familiar with every twist and turn of the river, now came aboard as acting master. His first move was to call a meeting of the pilots to discuss the problems of navigation.

An extensive sand bar extended from the apex of the Missouri peninsula out past mid-river. (See map opposite.) When the river was at normal stages, this compelled descending traffic to stand over toward the Tennessee shore and pass within close range of the batteries along the bluff. It was then necessary to turn abruptly to starboard in order to continue down the Missouri channel, thus coming within easy range of the guns on Island No. 10. During the passage a vessel would be subject to both a raking and a cross fire. As an alternative there was a narrow channel across the sand bar, navigable only at high water, that would allow a vessel to pass at longer range from the Tennessee batteries, but this passage was enfiladed throughout its length by the battery at the head of the island. An irregular though navigable “chute” existed close along the Missouri shore, but the Confederates had blocked it by sinking a steamer in its lower end. The decision was to go down the Missouri channel.

Conditions were still favorable as darkness approached. Commander Walke assembled his crew and passengers—among the latter a volunteer detachment of sharpshooters to repel possible boarders, and a reporter from the St. Louis Democrat—and issued his instructions. The guns were to be secured and the gun ports and other apertures firmly closed against the escape of light. Absolute silence was to be maintained. Acting Master Hoel was to take station out on the hurricane deck, where he could best observe the river and direct navigation. Pilots Daniel Weaver and John Deming were assigned to the wheel.

At 8 P.M. the Carondelet moved upstream about a mile to where the loaded barge was held in readiness. Promptly at 10 P.M. the lines were cast off and the ironclad, with her clumsy appendage lashed to her port side, moved out into the current.

Heavy clouds had been gathering to the southward all evening and a line squall, backed by violent lightning and heavy rain, was advancing rapidly upriver. As the Carondelet drew abreast of the silenced redoubt the storm broke over her with great violence. To those watching i’roni upriver she was clearly visible in the almost continuous lightning, and it seemed incredible that she was not discovered by the Confederates. She was holding toward the Missouri side of the river, indicating that Hoel intended to follow the channel across the sand bar, the location of which would be apparent to his experienced eye from the nature of the current. Aboard the gunboat Boatswain’s Mate Charles Wilson was now sent forward to take soundings, and Master’s Mate Theodore Gilmore was stationed forward on the hurricane deck to pass this information 10 the pilothouse.

The Carondelet had entered the channel and was abreast of Mattery No. 2 on the Tennessee shore when (lames suddenly shot high into the air from her twin stacks, lighting up the entire scene. Word was hastily passed to Chief Engineer William H. Faulkner to open the flue caps. He dit! so, and the flames died down. The incident had not been observed on shore, and the expected gunfire did not come. A few minutes later, to everyone’s consternation, the stacks flared again. The soot that collected inside them and was normally kept moist by the exhaust steam had become incandescent; loosened by the sudden drafts caused by the passing squall, it had poured llamelike into the open air.

This time the light was seen. Rebel sentries fired their rifles, and signal rockets soared upward from positions on the mainland and the island. A gun was fired in Battery No. 2, followed by a brief silence as the Confederate gunners worked frantically to load and aim their pieces. Within moments firing became general and the low-hanging clouds were illuminated by the (lashes of many guns as the Tennessee shore blazed from end to end. The batteries on Island No. io now went into action, placing the gunboat under a heavy cross fire.

The Carondelet cast all caution aside. “Full steam ahead!’ came the order, and as the engineer opened the throttles the rhythmic pounding of the paddles increased to the maximum. Excitement, suspense, and dread gripped the one hundred or more human beings shut within that dark, ill-ventilated floating box. Overhead, thunder cracked and rolled, cannon boomed, shells shrieked by, and bullets “pinged” against the casemate. The torrential rain drummed on the deck above. Each time a furnace door swung open, the glare of the fire danced luridly amid black shadows over gleaming guns and huddled men. The moment the leadsman’s report indicated they were clear of the shoal, Hoel put the Carondelet hard to starboard and took her down the Missouri channel, ft was a demonstration of cool judgment, for as Walke later wrote, “The Carondelet being one ol the slowest vessels of the Meet, was diiliculi to manage, on this occasion particularly she was very hard to steer or turn.” A few seconds’ delay would have been disastrous. As it was, whether by design or good luck, they just scraped clear, and with the lull force ol the current behind them, ran down the north side of the island, close under the guns that thundered on the bank above.

The island’s guns had not been—perhaps could not be—depressed sufficiently to meet this unexpected maneuver, and as the Carondelet rushed by, the shells Hew harmlessly over the hurricane deck. Enemy sharpshooters were active, and it was an added miracle that none ol the men exposed on the topsides was hit. Four limes the ordeal was repeated as the gunboat passed one battery after another. Not one shot hit them: the speed of the gunboat, ten knots or better with the swift current, made it difficult to load and swing the heavy guns in time lor a second shot, and the blinding downpour prevented effective aiming.

There was now a brief respite as the Carondelet dropped down toward the end of the island. As she passed and drew clear of the battery that faced downstream, her new momentarily expected the Hash of heavy guns astern, Nothing happened—no guns had been mounted in the work! The powerful floating battery still lay ahead, however, and the Carondelet now stood over toward the Missouri shore to pass at long range, concealed against the dark profile of the tree-lined shore. A light was visible aboard the battery as they came down, but no guns were fired until they were drawing out of range. Then came eight shots in rapid succession. There were no effective hits, although one ball was later dug out of the hay aboard the barge.

Now that the Carondelet was apparently out of danger, silence was relaxed and mutual congratulations were being exchanged, when someone thought to inquire if there was a recognition signal that would identify them to the Union batteries at New Madrid. It would be too bad. after having survived the enemy’s guns, to be mistaken for a Rebel gunboat and sent to the bottom by their friends. The batteries at New Madrid were, in fact, expecting to sec a signal of red and white lights, but either Walke had not been informed of this, or in the excitement had forgotten it.

Fortunately, Footc had arranged a system of signal guns by which he might learn whether the gunboat had got safely past the island. The Carondelet now fired these, and the Benton was heard to fire an acknowledgment. This exchange was correctly interpreted at New Madrid, btit Walke must have worried, lor as the\ drew inshore before the town, he called loudly through his speaking trumpet. “This is the U.S. gunboat Carondelet.” At that moment, a mistake in signals between pilothouse and engine room put the boat hard aground fifty yards from the landing. All hands immediately went to work to shift the heavy guns aft. It took an hour to lighten the bow sufficiently, and it was 1 A.M. before they backed off and went alongside the bank at a spot that a lighted fire indicated as the landing place. They had taken three hours to make the trip down. During thirty minutes of that time they had passed through the fire of some sixty guns and had emerged unscathed. Grog was issued to all hands.

Events now began to move rapidly. General Pope requested that Walke destroy the battery of 64-pounders located at Watson’s landing. He also notified Walke that another gunboat would soon be sent down, if conditions were favorable. An early morning thunderstorm provided the opportunity, and the Pittsburgh ran down past Island No. 10, starting at a A.M. April 7 and arriving at New Madrid three hours later. One would expect the Confederates to have been on the alert this time, and to have given the Pittsburgh a very rough time indeed. They did their best, firing as rapidly as possible with every gun that could be brought into action, but failed to register a single hit.

The presence of the two Union ironclads on the lower stretch of the river altered the complexion of affairs for the Confederates, who now deployed their troops in the woods back of the landing places. They were not seriously worried, however, as Pope did not appear capable of mounting an attack of real importance with only two gunboats to ferry his troops across.

But the Rebels had underestimated Pope’s cunning. Some days before, one of his divisional commanders had suggested that a canal be cut across the peninsula formed by the bend opposite Island No. 10 so that light-draft transports and supply barges could be brought down to New Madrid out of range of Confederate guns. Pope had approved the scheme, the canal had been cut, and its existence kept secret.

Now, suddenly, the surprised Confederates saw four transports, crawling with “bluebellies” and bristling with bayonets, steam out from their hiding place in St. John’s Bayou and head for Watson’s Landing. The Rebels were now boxed in on both flanks, with the river in front and the swamps to the rear. Word was hastily passed up and down the shore—“Every man for himself.” A few hundred managed to make their way through the swamps, or to float down river on planks and hastily made rafts, but the bulk of the Confeder ate troops surrendered on the spot without resistance.

The bag included General Mackall and two other general officers; troops estimated at nearly seven thousand; seven thousand stand of small arms; about one hundred guns, half of them of heavy caliber; and a vast quantity of ammunition and other supplies. The Union also acquired a fleet of handsome river steamers. Pope’s casualties totaled fifty-four.

The sudden collapse of a position that the Confederacy had confidently expected to hold out indefinitely brought consternation to the South and indignation at the manner in which the affair had been conducted. It was universally considered that at the least the store of ammunition and supplies should have been prevented from falling into the hands of the enemy. An effort was made to save the floating battery—it was cut loose with its crew on board and drifted down river exchanging shots with Union batteries—but it ran aground at Point Pleasant, a total wreck and an object of curiosity to the Union troops.

The Carondelet served honorably on the western rivers throughout the war, her last great action being to reinforce General George H. Thomas’ assault at Nashville in December of 1864. She and the other Union ironclads helped prove the feasibility of combined land and naval operations against entrenched land forts—a strategic concept which eventually won the Mississippi and split the Confederacy in two.

Phillips Melville, a retired Air Force colonel, is now a freelance writer and illustrator. He contributed “Eleven Guns for the Grand Union” to the October, 1958, issue of AMERICAN HERITAGE.