Capt. James G. Holmes, Charleston, S. C., writes:
In reply to inquiry, in the February Veteran, of Mrs. E, Brown, Historian of Barbour Chapter, U. D. C., as to who fired the first gun in the bombardment of Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, April 12, 1861, it may be authoritatively said that this "signal shot" was fired by Capt. George S. James (later lieutenant colonel commanding Third Battalion South Carolina Infantry) from the mortar battery on James Island, a few hundred yards east of Fort Johnson. Capt. James was in command of said battery, and as this signal shot was to begin the war between the Confederate States and the United States, he fired it, instead of the lanyard man, No. 4, of the gun crew. Capt. James was a man of high character, and probably fired this first shot that he might be held responsible if need be, though, after all, it is the man who gives the order to fire, not the man who pulls the lanyard, that is held responsible. This shot, I learn from an eyewitness, being a signal shot, was aimed to explode over the water and seaward, or east, of the fort. The same eyewitness informed me that he had seen in the North
a piece of shell which the owner valued at $250, because he thought it was a piece of the signal shell.
The second shot, and the first at the fort it is claimed, was fired from the Stevens Iron Battery, on Morris Island, and the lanyard was pulled by Edmund Ruffin, of Virginia, a courtesy accorded him by Capt. George B. Cuthbert, of the Palmetto Guard, because Mr. Ruffin volunteered to fight for the Confederacy before Virginia had seceded.
Cadet George E, Haynesworth, of the first class of the South Carolina Military Academy, pulled the lanyard of the first gun firedon the United States flag, January 9, 1861 (three months before Sumter was bombarded), from the Vinegar Hill Battery, on Morris Island, manned by the cadets of the South Carolina Military Academy, and commanded by Maj. P. F. Stevens, the superintendent, who is now Bishop Stevens of the Reformed Episcopal Church, and resides at Orangeburg, S. C. The writer, in January, 1861, was a member of the fourth, or youngest, class, which was kept at the citadel, as the barracks of the South Carolina Military Academy is locally known, to do garrison duty, hence didn't take part in firing on the Star of the West (January 9) that prevented the reénforcement of Fort Sumter. This first shot, fired by Haynesworth, was also a signal shot, as it was fired across the bow of the United States steamer transport. Both Vinegar Hill and Battery James have been washed away by storms.