STORY OF THE STAR OF THE WEST.
BY H. M. CLARKSON, A.M., M.B., FORMER SURGEON C. S. A.. Charleston, with its beautiful harbor, always a point of historical interest and naturally defensible, was in 1860 guarded Castle Pinckney, a shoal near the
by four fortresses. built on
city, was ungarrisened and of minor importance; Fort Johnson, on James Island, was comparatively of little use; Fort Moultrie, on Svilivan's Island, three or four miles from
Charleston, was built on the site of the little fort of pal-
metto logs made memorable in the war for independence by General Moukrie' defense against the Britist fleet in 1776. Fort S was most important, rising apparently out of the sea in the miédle of the entrance to the harbor about a mile from Fort Moultrie and three and one-half miles from the city. It was built of brick and concrete masonry, and its walls, sixty feet high and from eight to
twelve feet in thickness, were pierced for three tiers of guns, the first tier for forty-two pounders, the other two for eightinch and ten-inch Columbiads
fateful 1860 Colonel Gardiner, of the
During the year of
United States army, who kad been in command of Charleston
Harbor, |
with headeuarters at Fort Moultrie, being unjustly suspected of sympathy
with the secessionists, was removed from his post on November 20 an# was succeeded by Maj. a brave and gallant officer, himself in the with Mexico. found all the harbor defenses in poor conAdjutant Cooper, of the
States army, calling special attention to Fort Moul-
Robert Anderson, of Kentucky, who had distinguished Major tion, and so United
trie "as inviting attack by its weakness."
war Anderson
wrote to General
Anderson's positios was delicate and every day apparently more and more threatening. Although the Carolinians allowed a continuance of mail facilities between Charleston and his headquarters at Fort Moultrie, and while he witnessed the seemingly warlike preparations going on around him, he could hear of nothing encouraging to him from his government at Washington. Consequently on the night of the 26th of December, just before the rising of a full moon and after spiking his guns and burning everything of consequence, he moved secretly by means of small boats the little garrison of seven officers and sixty-one artillerists, with a few women and children, Fort Moultrie to the more defensible stronghold of Sumter. Early next morning, as the dawn was breaking over the waters of the harbor, the smoke of the burning material revealed to the astonished people of the city this change of base. The secret was out, and great was the The citizens looked upon this movement as an
from
indignation. overt act of war and as a direct violation of a compact which they claimed had been made on December 9, 1860, by Mr. 3uchanan, who was then President, with the State authorities of South Carolina to the effect that "no reénforcements should be sent into those forts, and their military status should remain as at present."
John B. Floyd, of Virginia, then Secretary of War in Buchanan's Cabinet, claiming that the solemn pledge of the government had been violated, insisted that the national troops must be withdrawn from the harbor of Charleston. President Buchanan refused to do this, on the advice of General Scott, the commander in chief of the United States army. Thereupon Secretary Floyd resigned from the Cabinet, and at the
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