EXPEDITIONS. 



291 



shrubs. On the east end, however, there are 

 live oak and other trees and grass. Excellent 

 water can be obtained in abundance by sinking 

 a barrel anywhere on the island. On the west 

 end is a fort and light-house. The fort was 

 commenced by the U. S. Government in 1859, 

 and iu May or June, 1861, was burned by the 

 Confederates, who also destroyed the wood- 

 work of the light-house. The U. S. steamer 

 Massachusetts visited the island on the 28th of 

 June, and found it unoccupied, and captured 

 rive Confederate schooners in its vicinity. Be- 

 tween this date and the 4th of July the Massa- 

 chusetts was absent at Fort Pickens, but on her 

 return from that it had been visited by a Con- 

 federate force, who, however, were not then 

 on the island. On the 8th July the Massachu- 

 setts found a considerable force there, who 

 were throwing up intrenchments and had 

 mounted some heavy guns. An attempt was 

 made to dislodge them, but unsuccessfully, and 

 they were allowed to remain in possession till 

 the 16th of September when, under the appre- 

 hension that a large naval expedition was coming 

 to attack them, they abandoned the island and 

 escaped to the shore, taking most of their ord- 

 nance with them. During the two months of 

 their occupation they had re-built the fort, con- 

 structing eleven fine bomb-proof casemates and 

 a magazine, and had. mounted 20 guns. They 

 named it Fort Twiggs, On the 17th Sept. the 

 Massachusetts landed a force on the island, who 

 took possession, and having been reenforced, 

 have continued to hold it. They mounted can- 

 non on the fort and strengthened it still further 

 by the addition of two more bomb-proof case- 

 mates, and a formidable armament of Dahlgren 

 9-inch shell guns and rifled cannon. They also 

 erected barracks for troops, with brick, left on 

 the island by the Confederates, and lumber cap- 

 tured from them. On the 19th October, Com. 

 Hollins, in command of the Confederate gun- 

 boat Florida, appeared in Mississippi Sound, 

 and challenged the U. S. gunboat Massachusetts 

 to a naval battle. The challenge was accepted, 

 and after a sharp engagement of forty-five min- 

 utes the Florida retired, seriously disabled, and 

 put into Pass Christian, apparently in a sinking 

 condition. Four of her crew were killed. The 

 Massachusetts was injured, but not seriously, 

 by a 100-lb. shell, which struck her 5 feet 

 above her water line, but was repaired in a few 

 days. None of her crew were killed, and only 

 one slightly wounded. On the 21st Nov. the 

 gunboat New London arrived in the sound, 

 and in the course of a fortnight captured five 

 Confederate vessels. 



The expedition to Ship Island was projected 

 in September, almost immediately after Gen. 

 Butler's return from the expedition to Hatteras 

 Inlet, and he was authorized to enlist troops 

 for it in New England. Coming into collision 

 with Gov. Andrew of Massachusetts, in rela- 

 tion to the appointment of persons as field- 

 officers for the regiments he raised in Massa- 

 chusetts, whom the Governor regarded as unfit 



for their posts, and refused to commission, the 

 expedition was delayed for a time. The first 

 instalment of troops for it were embarked at 

 Boston, on the 19th of November, on the U. S. 

 transport Constitution, and sailed at first for 

 Portland, Me., and thence for Fortress Monroe, 

 which they reached on the 26th Nov., and 

 sailed the next day for Ship Island, where they 

 arrived on the 3d Dec. They consisted of 

 the Twenty-sixth Massachusetts Regiment, Col. 

 Jones, the Ninth Connecticut, Col. Cahill, and 

 the Fourth battery of Massachusetts artillery, 

 Capt. Maiming, and were under the command 

 of Brig.-Gen. John "W. Phelps, a native of Ver- 

 mont, and graduate of West Point, in 1836. He 

 served for 23 years in the army, but resigned 

 in 1859, and was living at Brattleboro, Vt., at 

 the commencement of the war, when he was 

 called to the command of the First Regiment 

 of Vermont Volunteers, (three-months men,) 

 and in July was appointed brigadier-general. 



Having completed the debarkation of his 

 command, Gen. Phelps issued a proclamation 

 to the loyal citizens of the southwest, for 

 which there seemed no occasion, as his superior 

 in command, Maj.-Gen. Butler, had not arrived, 

 and there were on the island none but U. S. 

 troops, and no invasion had been made upon 

 the territory claimed by the Confederate Gov- 

 ernment. The tone of the address was also in- 

 judicious, and Gen. Phelps was stated to have 

 been'reprimanded by the U. S. Government for 

 issuing it. He announced in his proclamation 

 as among the principles by which his command 

 would be governed, that every slave State 

 which had been admitted into the Union, since 

 the adoption of the Constitution, had been so 

 admitted in direct violation of that Constitu- 

 tion; that the slave States which existed as 

 such, at the formation of the Constitution 

 were, by becoming parties to that compact, 

 under the highest obligations of honor and 

 morality to abolish slavery ; urged the claims 

 of free, and especially of free foreign labor, to 

 a share in the occupancy and cultivation of the 

 soil of the Southern States, and the importance 

 and absolute necessity of the domination of 

 free institutions to the prosperity of the Cau- 

 casian race on the continent. He then pro- 

 ceeded to discuss the position and claims of 

 slavery as a social and political evil, and the 

 necessity of its overthrow. In illustration of 

 this necessity, growing, as he avowed, out of 

 its want of adaptation to modern times and 

 free institutions, he drew a parallel between 

 slavery and the condition of the Catholic 

 Church in France before the Revolution, and 

 asked whether they ought not and could not 

 revolutionize slavery out of existence. In con- 

 clusion he bestowed a high eulogium on free 

 labor, as the basis of free institutions ; as the 

 right, the capital, the inheritance, the hope of 

 the poor man everywhere ; that it was especially 

 the right of five millions of our fellow-country- 

 men in the slave States, as well as of the four 

 millions of Africans there, and declared that 



