y would have seen the negroes running about in the fort
yard in a confused state, seeking places of safety from the missile sure
to bring death to one or more of them. Another five minutes, and again
the cry of the sentinel, "Look out," means a parrot shell, which is far
more deadly than is the mortar because it comes so quickly that one has
no chance to seek a place of safety.

The next moment the survivors of us, expecting that it would be our turn
next, would be picking up, here and there, parts of the severed bodies
of our fellow negroes; many of those bodies so mutilated as not to be
recognizable.

DEBURGH, THE OVERSEER.

Deburgh, the overseer, of whom I have spoken, was a small man, of light
complexion, and very light hair.

If my readers could have been in Fort Sumter in July, 1864, they would
have seen Deburgh with a small bar of iron or a piece of shell in his
hand, forcing the surviving portion of the negroes back into line and
adding to these, other negroes kept in the Rat-hole as reserves to fill
the places of those who were killed and wounded.

They would also have heard him swearing at the top of his voice, while
forcing the negroes to rearrange themselves in line from the base of the
fort to the top.

This arrangement of the negroes, enabled them to sling to each other the
bags of sand which was put in the baskets on the top of the fort. My
readers ask, what was the sand put on the fort for? It was to smother
the fuses of such shells as reached the ramparts before bursting.

After the bombardment of Port Sumter in 1863, by the Union forces, its
top of fourteen or sixteen feet in thickness, built of New Hampshire
granite, was left bare. From that time all through 1864, the shells were
so aimed as to burst right over the fort; and it was pieces of these
shells which flew in every direction that were so destructive.

The fuses of many of these shells fired on Port Sumter did not burn in
time to cause the shells to burst before falling. Now as the shells fell
on the rampart of the fort instead of falling and bursting on the stone,
they buried themselves harmlessly in the sand, which put out the fuse
and also kept them from bursting.

But while the destruction of life was lessened by the sand, it was fully
made up by the hand of that brute, the overseer. God only knows how many
negroes he killed in Port Sumter under the shadow of night. Every one he
reached, while forcing the slaves back into worki