treat for the surrender of the forts and other public
property. It proved to be a very inauspicious time for such a
negotiation.

Our garrison were up betimes on the morning of the 27th, to inspect
their new quarters. The soldiers thronged the parapet in such numbers as
to attract the attention of the troops on board the _Nina_. That vessel
steamed up to the city in great haste, and communicated the startling
intelligence that Fort Sumter, in some inexplicable manner, had been
fully re-enforced.[7] The chagrin of the authorities was intense.
Messengers were at once dispatched to all parts of the city, to ring the
door-bells and arouse the people.

While this was going on in town, Anderson, who was very punctilious in
regard to settling all debts due by the United States to citizens,
determined to send a detachment, under Lieutenant Davis, back to Fort
Moultrie as a guard to Captain Foster, to enable him to pay off the
claims of the workmen he had left behind. Doctor Crawford went over
also, to look after some of his medical property. As the guard-boats had
been withdrawn, they reached the fort without difficulty, and found it
deserted. The people of the little village, to all appearance, were
still ignorant of our change of station. Soon after their arrival, the
party, in accordance with instructions from Major Anderson, set fire to
the gun-carriages bearing on Fort Sumter, and destroyed all the
ammunition and military material that could not be brought away. The
guns had been spiked the night before, and the flag-staff was cut down,
either at that time or in the morning.

As I have stated, the major took great pains to see that all bills,
even those of a private nature, due in Charleston we're fully paid by
the officers and men of his command; but many leading merchants in the
city were not so scrupulous. They gladly took advantage of the war to
repudiate the claims of their Northern creditors. I was also informed by
one of the pay-masters that a number of officers of the army who
resigned to join the rebellion first deliberately drew their month's pay
in advance, and then left the pay-master, as a penalty for his kindness,
to make good the deficiency from his private funds, in order to settle
his accounts.

Foster and Davis, finding Fort Moultrie still deserted, made good use of
the occasion by loading up with supplies and ammunition one of the
schooners which had been previously chartered to carry over the women