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I was searching for some sources regarding Battery Beaulieu to the north of Savannah when I found this interesting collection of accounts regarding garrison duty in and around Savannah. Since Ft. McAllister is considered to be the largest southern bastion of Savannah's defenses I thought participants find this of interest:
From: http://www.sip.armstrong.edu/Forts/Essay.html
"Conditions of Duty
Until Sherman's army arrived, life behind the palisades of Savannah was difficult on troop moral. With the exception of the occasional harassment by the Union gunboats life was generally boring. With the gunboat blockade travel to and from the inner waterways was unsafe. All avenues of approach to landfall necessitated constant surveillance. Morale declined in the remote posts. Lieutenant Charles Jones Jr. of the Chatham Artillery stationed at Isle of Hope wrote his father saying, "It has often seemed a little less than rediculous, this idea of endeavoring to fortify every avenue by light sand batteries, which must be silenced so soon as the heavy metal of the Lincoln gunboats is brought to bear. The day belongs to the past when open earthworks and palmetto forts can successfully contend with heavy batteries of modern fleets... [W]e must expect that these open batteries must yield whenever confronted by the heavy guns of the Lincoln gunboats."
Union gunboats and pickets constantly badgered the Confederate forts and batteries. After Federal troops had established their own batteries at Venus Point and Bird Island, attacks were commonly reported at Turner's Rocks, Wilmington battery, Skidaway, Wassaw and others. August 19, 1863 Josephine C. Habersham recorded in her diary, "...rain all day... Bombarding of the forts as usual. Heard 14 heavy cannon, but we never mind them now." South of Savannah on Friday, November 7, 1862 a gunboat ascended the Little Ogeechee and harassed Camp Houston and the Coffee Bluff battery. Doing little damage it sailed away giving the troops a few days of conversational topic.
To improve observation of enemy movements Federal troops burned off the marsh. Consequently inspection of the outposts by the Confederate commanding officers was also hazardous. Colonel Edward C. Anderson recorded in his diary Wednesday, March 5th 1862, "The Yankees are burning off the Marsh below, and apparently have set fire to the grass on the lower end of Elba island, pushed a picket across from Rockwells company and burned off the Western end...." As a result even small boats were at risk. He wrote, "Thurs. 13th. At 7 this morning Com[madore Josiah] Tattnall came down in his vessel accompanied by Gen [Alexander] Lawton and staff... we stood down South Channel in search of Major Knights party... The enemy immediately opened fire upon us, but his shot fell short... Steamed down to within a mile and three quarters of the enemys gunboats when he opened up on us from three batteries, the shell passing over us, or bursting shot, some 50 yards from the steamer. On this occasion I witnessed some very profound dodging on the part of a Confederate Brigadier General... We returned fire... but on the second or third discharge the shell became jammed in the gun and could not be sent home. We drifted out of range with the flood tide... Returned to the Fort at 5 ock. Nobody Hurt."
Boredom and sickness were not part of the glory of the battle expected when in fall of 1861 John W. Hagan joined the Confederate service and was appointed a third sergeant for Company "D," 29th Georgia Volunteer Infantry. For almost two years his duty consisted of working on, and standing watch along, the coastal defenses of Savannah with a short assignment at Wilmington, North Carolina. He wrote home in 1863, "We are doing picket duty at Whitemarsh and are keeping up a picket at Capers Battery which makes our duty very hard. We furnish 10 & 11 men every day exclusive of the extra dutymen & we have no hopes of getting Furloughs." Tired of the tedium he later wrote, "I am [heart]sick, I cannot get a pass to visit Savannah and when I go I have to run the blocade and risk getting caught, but I will manage...."
To pass the time the men would organize a game of marbles "...or some other game of hazard to pass away the time..." in an effort to ease the dullness of the watch. Disease was a constant threat, "E.W. Roberts has got sick furlough at last," Hagan happily wrote home. "I am glad he got one for it looked as if he was doomed to die at Whiteville."
Describing the working conditions of the artillerymen Josephine C. Habersham wrote after visiting Rose Dhu Island battery, "We went into the dark excessively hot magazine. How it must exhaust the men to be in the bombproofs, of a hot stifling day with all the miserable accompaniments of the bombardment- wounds, death, perhaps worse, disaster and defeat."47 Not only the enlisted men grew weary of the near "intolerable" conditions. At Fort McAllister Alfred L. Hartridge, a 24 years old lieutenant of the Dekalb Riflemen wrote home of his societal plight, [we have] "only government rations to eat and nothing to keep [away] the mosiquitoes, red bugs, etc... I need a servant very much, and have been trying to get a boy but so far have not succeeded-- otherwise I am well situated."
Many died due to disease and accident. The soldiers of Camp Sam Crump on the Isle of Hope purchased an ad in a Savannah newspaper saying, Expressed "the regret of the Company at the death of Nelson Gibbs." The members of Capers Light Guard went on to "mourn the untimely death of our late member..., who by accidental discharge of a gun, fell in the full vigor of manhood's prime....
Camp Defiance, two miles below Savannah and two miles from the Savannah River, illustrated in name, the spirit of the soldiers of the city in the war's beginning. But as the war dragged on the tropical heat, mosquitoes, sand gnats and mundane life of standing guard took its toll in mental and physical abuse. Especially in the outer posts. A few miles north of Camp Defiance, in the marsh and rice fields of South Carolina was Camp Despair. Located twenty miles from Hardeeville, separated from Bluffton by 2 and one half miles of river and marsh, with four times that distance to Savannah, it was the middle of nowhere to a young military man. Life in camp must have lived up to the name. At Battery Cheves, just three miles from Camp Defiance a group of Irishmen, a sergeant, corporal and seven men joined the multitude of southern soldiers who grew tired of defending the planter ruling class. In the dark of night the group stole a battery boat and deserted. Other enlisted men were in agreement.
In the winter of 1864 at Rose Dhu Battery there was a conspiracy among the troops awaiting Sherman's army. Three companies planned to desert with arms and win over the troops at Beaulieu battery, then march to the camp of the 57th Georgia Regiment. Tired of war, they planned to make their way to the interior of the country, thinking that one way to end the war was to set an example other troops could follow.
Though the perpetual dullness of a soldiers life was obvious, life in the coastal defense was not always desperate. Closer to the city entertainment and diversion was easier to attain. "Camp Fanny H____" near the Thunderbolt Battery was named for a young Savannah lady who enjoyed visiting the young men of the camp. Her virtue is protected through history by the discreet records of a signal corps enlisted man. Specific pleasures were available, at least to the men of the inner defenses."
From: http://www.sip.armstrong.edu/Forts/Essay.html
"Conditions of Duty
Until Sherman's army arrived, life behind the palisades of Savannah was difficult on troop moral. With the exception of the occasional harassment by the Union gunboats life was generally boring. With the gunboat blockade travel to and from the inner waterways was unsafe. All avenues of approach to landfall necessitated constant surveillance. Morale declined in the remote posts. Lieutenant Charles Jones Jr. of the Chatham Artillery stationed at Isle of Hope wrote his father saying, "It has often seemed a little less than rediculous, this idea of endeavoring to fortify every avenue by light sand batteries, which must be silenced so soon as the heavy metal of the Lincoln gunboats is brought to bear. The day belongs to the past when open earthworks and palmetto forts can successfully contend with heavy batteries of modern fleets... [W]e must expect that these open batteries must yield whenever confronted by the heavy guns of the Lincoln gunboats."
Union gunboats and pickets constantly badgered the Confederate forts and batteries. After Federal troops had established their own batteries at Venus Point and Bird Island, attacks were commonly reported at Turner's Rocks, Wilmington battery, Skidaway, Wassaw and others. August 19, 1863 Josephine C. Habersham recorded in her diary, "...rain all day... Bombarding of the forts as usual. Heard 14 heavy cannon, but we never mind them now." South of Savannah on Friday, November 7, 1862 a gunboat ascended the Little Ogeechee and harassed Camp Houston and the Coffee Bluff battery. Doing little damage it sailed away giving the troops a few days of conversational topic.
To improve observation of enemy movements Federal troops burned off the marsh. Consequently inspection of the outposts by the Confederate commanding officers was also hazardous. Colonel Edward C. Anderson recorded in his diary Wednesday, March 5th 1862, "The Yankees are burning off the Marsh below, and apparently have set fire to the grass on the lower end of Elba island, pushed a picket across from Rockwells company and burned off the Western end...." As a result even small boats were at risk. He wrote, "Thurs. 13th. At 7 this morning Com[madore Josiah] Tattnall came down in his vessel accompanied by Gen [Alexander] Lawton and staff... we stood down South Channel in search of Major Knights party... The enemy immediately opened fire upon us, but his shot fell short... Steamed down to within a mile and three quarters of the enemys gunboats when he opened up on us from three batteries, the shell passing over us, or bursting shot, some 50 yards from the steamer. On this occasion I witnessed some very profound dodging on the part of a Confederate Brigadier General... We returned fire... but on the second or third discharge the shell became jammed in the gun and could not be sent home. We drifted out of range with the flood tide... Returned to the Fort at 5 ock. Nobody Hurt."
Boredom and sickness were not part of the glory of the battle expected when in fall of 1861 John W. Hagan joined the Confederate service and was appointed a third sergeant for Company "D," 29th Georgia Volunteer Infantry. For almost two years his duty consisted of working on, and standing watch along, the coastal defenses of Savannah with a short assignment at Wilmington, North Carolina. He wrote home in 1863, "We are doing picket duty at Whitemarsh and are keeping up a picket at Capers Battery which makes our duty very hard. We furnish 10 & 11 men every day exclusive of the extra dutymen & we have no hopes of getting Furloughs." Tired of the tedium he later wrote, "I am [heart]sick, I cannot get a pass to visit Savannah and when I go I have to run the blocade and risk getting caught, but I will manage...."
To pass the time the men would organize a game of marbles "...or some other game of hazard to pass away the time..." in an effort to ease the dullness of the watch. Disease was a constant threat, "E.W. Roberts has got sick furlough at last," Hagan happily wrote home. "I am glad he got one for it looked as if he was doomed to die at Whiteville."
Describing the working conditions of the artillerymen Josephine C. Habersham wrote after visiting Rose Dhu Island battery, "We went into the dark excessively hot magazine. How it must exhaust the men to be in the bombproofs, of a hot stifling day with all the miserable accompaniments of the bombardment- wounds, death, perhaps worse, disaster and defeat."47 Not only the enlisted men grew weary of the near "intolerable" conditions. At Fort McAllister Alfred L. Hartridge, a 24 years old lieutenant of the Dekalb Riflemen wrote home of his societal plight, [we have] "only government rations to eat and nothing to keep [away] the mosiquitoes, red bugs, etc... I need a servant very much, and have been trying to get a boy but so far have not succeeded-- otherwise I am well situated."
Many died due to disease and accident. The soldiers of Camp Sam Crump on the Isle of Hope purchased an ad in a Savannah newspaper saying, Expressed "the regret of the Company at the death of Nelson Gibbs." The members of Capers Light Guard went on to "mourn the untimely death of our late member..., who by accidental discharge of a gun, fell in the full vigor of manhood's prime....
Camp Defiance, two miles below Savannah and two miles from the Savannah River, illustrated in name, the spirit of the soldiers of the city in the war's beginning. But as the war dragged on the tropical heat, mosquitoes, sand gnats and mundane life of standing guard took its toll in mental and physical abuse. Especially in the outer posts. A few miles north of Camp Defiance, in the marsh and rice fields of South Carolina was Camp Despair. Located twenty miles from Hardeeville, separated from Bluffton by 2 and one half miles of river and marsh, with four times that distance to Savannah, it was the middle of nowhere to a young military man. Life in camp must have lived up to the name. At Battery Cheves, just three miles from Camp Defiance a group of Irishmen, a sergeant, corporal and seven men joined the multitude of southern soldiers who grew tired of defending the planter ruling class. In the dark of night the group stole a battery boat and deserted. Other enlisted men were in agreement.
In the winter of 1864 at Rose Dhu Battery there was a conspiracy among the troops awaiting Sherman's army. Three companies planned to desert with arms and win over the troops at Beaulieu battery, then march to the camp of the 57th Georgia Regiment. Tired of war, they planned to make their way to the interior of the country, thinking that one way to end the war was to set an example other troops could follow.
Though the perpetual dullness of a soldiers life was obvious, life in the coastal defense was not always desperate. Closer to the city entertainment and diversion was easier to attain. "Camp Fanny H____" near the Thunderbolt Battery was named for a young Savannah lady who enjoyed visiting the young men of the camp. Her virtue is protected through history by the discreet records of a signal corps enlisted man. Specific pleasures were available, at least to the men of the inner defenses."
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