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Site of the Night Attack, September 8, 1863
Where a Federal boat assault was repulsed in the dark, with a dismounted gun tube among the rubble.
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On the night of September 8, 1863, the Federals tried to take Fort Sumter by storm, in boats, in the dark. This is where they landed.
The reasoning was that the bombardment had done its work. The fort's guns were largely silenced and its walls were rubble, and it was assumed the place was held by a token force that would give way to a rush. A landing party of sailors and marines — something over four hundred men — pulled for the fort after midnight.
They were expected. The Confederates had the range registered, the garrison was stronger than believed, and Sumter's supporting batteries across the harbor opened on the boats. The assault was broken at the base of the wall. The attackers lost heavily in killed, wounded and captured, and the fort was not taken. It never was taken; it was evacuated, seventeen months later.
The iron in the foreground is a gun tube dismounted by bombardment, lying where it fell among the broken masonry. Any assault that got over this ground had to climb it.
Also at Fort Sumter
