ates troops in Fort
Moultrie, hastily removed, on the night of the 26th of December, to
Fort Sumter, a much stronger but unfinished fortress in the middle of
the harbor, hoping to maintain his position there till reinforced. But
before this could be effected by President Lincoln, who had plainly
advised Governor Pickens of his intention, a formal demand for the
surrender of the fort was made by General Beauregard, commanding the
rebel forces, which being promptly refused by Major Anderson, the
order to reduce the fort was given by the Confederate government. On
the morning of Friday, the twelfth of April, 1861, at half-past four,
the first shot was fired upon Fort Sumter, which aroused and excited
the nation, and begun the war of the Rebellion. For two days the
assault continued, when after a most gallant defense by the little
garrison of eighty men, Major Anderson was compelled to accept terms
of evacuation. On Sunday afternoon, April 14th, he marched out of the
fort with colors flying and drums beating, saluting the United States
flag, as it was lowered, with fifty guns.

There was great rejoicing in Charleston. Thousands had assembled at
the Battery, excited spectators of the scene. They exultingly beheld
the banner of the Republic lowered, and the flags of South Carolina
and the Southern Confederacy raised defiantly over the ramparts of
Fort Sumter.

Governor Pickens, the bustling and blustering State executive, thus
addressed the populace:

"We are now one of the Confederate States, and they have
sent us a brave and scientific officer, to whom the credit
of this day's triumph is due. We have defeated their twenty
millions. We have humbled the flag of the United States
before the Palmetto and Confederate, and so long as I have
the honor to preside as your chief magistrate, so help me
God, there is no power on this earth shall ever lower from
that fortress those flags, unless they be lowered and
trailed in a sea of blood. I can here say to you it is the
first time in the history of this country that the stars and
stripes have been humbled. That flag has never before been
lowered before any nation on this earth. But to-day it has
been humbled, and humbled before the glorious little State
of South Carolina."

But Governor Pickens little dreamed that the discharge of his guns
upon the United States flag at Fort Sumter would awaken such an
outbu