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ee

444 Chronicles of the Cape Fear River

my great delight jumped into their boat, and away they rowed
as fast as they could, taking all our crew, with exception of the

second officer, one of the en

‘ gineers, four seamen, and myself,
as prisoners,

“We chuckled at our lucky escape, but we were not out of the
woods yet, as we had only a boat half stove in with which to
reach the shore through some 300 yards of surf, and we were
afraid at any moment that our enemies, finding there was no
gunpowder on board, might return. We made a feeble effort

to put the fire out, but it -had gained too much headway, and
although I offered the men with me £50 apiece to stand by me

and persevere, they were too demoralized and began to lower the
shattered boat, swearing that they would leave me behind if I
didn’t come with them. There was nothing for it but to go, yet
the passage through the boiling surf seemed more dangerous to
my mind than remaining on the burning ship. The blockaders

immediately opened fire when they knew their own men had left
the Night Hawk, and that she was burning; and Lamb’
shells hurtling over our heads

fleet bursting all around us formed a weird picture.

the hail of shot and shell and the danger of the boiling surf, we
reached the shore in safety, wet through, and glad I was in my

state of exhaustion from fatigue and loss of blood to be wel-
comed by Lamb’s orderly officer.

“The poor Night Hawk was now a sheet of flame, and I
thought it was all up with her; and indeed it would have been

had it not been for Lamb, who, calling for volunteers from his
garrison, sent out two or three boatloads

ei of men to her, and
when 1 came down to the beach, after having my wound dressed

and after a short rest, I was delighted to find the fire had sensi-

vas extinguished. But what a wreck she was!
with the rising tide she had bumped over the bank
and was now lying on the main beach much more accessible wad
sheltered. Still, it seemed an almost hopeless task to save her;
but we were not going to be beaten without a try, so, after haves
ing ascertained how she lay and the condition she was in, I

resolved to make an attempt to get her dry, and telegraphed to
Wilmington for assistance,

“Our agent sent me down about 300 negroes to assist in
bailing and pumping, and I set them to work at once. As good

luck would have it, my finest steamer, Banshee No. 2, which had

Blockade Running : 445

just been sent out, ran in the next night. She was a great im- |

provement on the first Banshee, having a sea speed of 15144

knots, which was considered very fast in those days; her length

was 252 feet, beam 31 feet, depth 11 feet, her registered ton-
nage 439 tons, and her crew consisted of fifty-three men in all.
I at once requisitioned her for aid in the shape of engineers
and men, so that now I had everything I could want in the
way of hands. Our great difficulty was that the Night H awk’s
anchors would not hold for us to get a fair haul at her.
“But here again I was to be in luck. For the very next night
the Condor, commanded by poor Hewitt, in attempting to run
in stuck fast upon the bank over which we had bumped, not
one hundred yards to windward of us, and broke in two. It
is an ill wind that blows nobody good, and Hewitt’s mischance

proved the saving of our ship. Now we had a hold for our
chain cables by making them fast to the wreck, and were able

gradually to haul her off by them a little during each tide, until
on the seventh day we had her afloat in a gut between the bank
and the shore, and at high water we steamed under our own
steam gaily up the river to Wilmington.

“Considering the appliances we had and the circumstances
under which we were working, the saving of that steamer was
certainly a wonderful performance, as we were under fire
almost the whole time. The Northerners, irritated, no doubt,
by their failure to destroy the ship, used to shell us by day and
send in boats by night; Lamb, however, put a stop to the latter
annoyance by lending us a couple of companies to defend us,
and one night when our enemies rowed close up with the inten-
tion of boarding us, they were glad to sheer off with the loss of
a lieutenant and several men. In spite of all the shot and shell
by day and the repeated attacks at night, we triumphed in the
end, and, after having the Night Hawk repaired at heavy cost
and getting together a crew, I gave May, a friend of mine, com-
mand of her, and he ran out successfully with a valuable cargo
Which made her pay, notwithstanding all her bad luck and the
amount spent upon her. Poor May! he was afterwards gover-
nor of Perth gaol, and is dead now—a high-toned, sensitive
Sentleman, mighty proud of his ship, lame duck as-she was.

“When she was burning, our utmost efforts were of course
directed towards keeping her engine-room and boilers amidships

intact, and confining the flames to both ends; in this a ig
Successful, mainly owing to the fact of her having bunkers