ow in the side of the fort. The Washington wiseacres
set great store on this new mine of theirs. It was, of course, to
end the war. But naval and military experts on the spot were more
than doubtful. On the night of the twenty-third of December the
_Louisiana_ was safely worked in near the fort by brave Commander
Rhind, who fired the slow match and escaped unhurt with his devoted
crew of volunteers. A tremendous explosion followed. But, as there
was nothing to drive the force of it against the walls, it simply
resulted in an enormous flurry of water, mud, sand, earth, and
bits of flaming wreckage.

Next morning the fleet bombarded with such success as to silence
many of the guns opposed to them. But on Christmas Day General
Weitzel reported that an assault would fail; whereupon General
Butler concurred and retreated, much to the rage of the fleet, which
thought quite otherwise.

In a few days General Terry arrived with the same white troops
reinforced by two small colored brigades, making a total of eight
thousand men. To these Porter, strongly reinforced, added a naval
brigade, two thousand strong, that volunteered to storm the sea
face of Fort Fisher. These gallant men had only cutlasses and
pistols--except the four hundred marines, who carried bayonets and
rifles. They were a scratch lot, from the soldier's point of view,
never having been landed together as a single unit till called upon
to assault the most dangerous features of the fort. Yet, though
they were repulsed with considerable loss, they greatly helped
to win the day by obliging the defenders to divide their forces.
As Terry's army was, by itself, four or five times stronger than
Lamb's entire command the military stormers succeeded in fighting
their way through every line of defense and compelling a surrender.
They did exceedingly well. But their rear was safe, because Bragg
had withdrawn the supporting army for service elsewhere; while,
in their front, the enemy defenses had been almost torn out by
the roots in many places under the terrific converging fire of six
hundred naval guns for three successive days.

When Fort Fisher surrendered on the fifteenth of January (1865)
the exhausted South had only one good port and one good raider
left: Charleston and the _Shenandoah_.

CHAPTER X

GRANT ATTACKS THE FRONT: 1864

On March 9, 1864, at the Executive Mansion, and in the presence of all
the Cabinet Ministers, Lincoln handed Grant the Lieuten