Confederate forces attacked Donaldsonville, Louisiana, on June 28 as part of an offensive designed to relieve Port Hudson by disrupting Union river traffic along the Mississippi and threatening to recapture New Orleans. After the Union garrison repelled the assault, the Confederates set up artillery batteries along the levee about ten miles below the town. Lieutenant Commander George Hamilton Perkins, a Union naval officer, commanded the New London, a wooden screw steamer armed with five guns. When Port Hudson fell on July 9, the New London was sent downriver carrying dispatches reporting the surrender. Perkins described his encounter with the shore batteries to his sister. The capture of Port Hudson caused the Confederates to withdraw from the river bank, and on July 16 an unescorted cargo ship from St. Louis safely arrived in New Orleans.
JULY 29, 1863.
Since I wrote you last I have been through more excitement, and it seems to me as if I had been in more danger, than ever before in my life; and I am going to try and describe to you my last trip in the New London.
I had passed the Whitehall Point batteries in her successfully five times, but on the sixth trip, when the New London was returning to New Orleans, just as she was passing those batteries, at about quarter past one, on the morning of the 10th of July, the enemy discovered her, and opened with artillery and sharpshooters. One shot struck the New London’s boiler, which exploded, severely scalding six men, and another shot penetrated the steam drum. This disabled the vessel, and I ordered her to be run towards the eastern bank, but the escaping steam made it impossible for the helmsman to remain at the wheel, and the ship grounded within range of the battery. The gunboat Winona, which had been ordered to escort the New London, past Whitehall Point, ran away, at the first shot, and was out of sight by this time. I fired rockets to inform her of my danger and to summon her to my assistance, but received no response.
We were at the mercy of the sharpshooters, and every shot dealt death and destruction. My first lieutenant was shot through the head, and the men now became so terrified that they began to leap overboard. I then ordered a boat to be manned and kedged off the ship astern, till she drifted down stream out of the way of the upper battery. But the most powerful fortification of the battery was still below us; so I towed the ship to the eastern bank and made her fast; but danger pursued me here, and it was soon plain that I had only gained a respite from the murderous fire, for I could see the enemy cutting embrasures to move their guns down for a better range, and I knew that daylight would seal the fate of my ship and crew.
I determined to save them if I could. I sent the ship’s company ashore under the protection of the levee, where they could use their muskets to repel an attack, and stationed pickets along the road. I then despatched messengers by land to Donaldsonville, where General Weitzel was, for assistance, and sent a boat by the river to the Monongahela and Essex with the same request. These two ships were stationed some miles below on the river to protect an encampment of our troops on the eastern bank.
The messengers returned from Donaldsonville saying no assistance could be rendered; while, with regard to the success of those I sent by the river, I felt very doubtful, so much was the passage of the Whitehall Point batteries dreaded. Just at this time information was brought me that a force of rebel cavalry—five hundred strong—was only a few miles in the interior. I felt desperate, for I realized the whole peril of the situation, and I was determined that my ship and crew should not fall into the hands of the enemy. I resolved to follow the dictates of my own judgment. I knew that upon a personal application Weitzel would at once grant me anything I wanted. I went ashore and, capturing a horse that was tied to a fence, I rode back to Donaldsonville. Arrived opposite I signaled to the Princess Royal to send a boat for me, and, to save time, I first demanded assistance from her senior officer; this he thought fit to refuse.
The Princess Royal was one of our gunboats stationed at Donaldsonville to protect and help Weitzel. I immediately hastened to him, and without delay he started a body of troops down the river for my assistance. But when I returned to the spot where I had left the New London, I found her gone, and I concluded—rightly, as it afterwards proved—that the boat I had sent early in the morning had succeeded in reaching our ships, and that they had come up and taken her off. I found afterwards that it was the ironclad Essex, and it towed her directly to New Orleans.
This was a great relief to me, for now the lives of my men were safe, and the ship was still under its own flag; but I began to realize that my own position was now one of considerable danger. I fastened the horse I had so unceremoniously borrowed, to the spot I first found him, and then hired a negro to drive me, in any sort of vehicle he could get, down the levee road to our lines. This proved to be a carry-all harnessed to a mule; but it was the best he could do. I took the back seat and laid my loaded pistols by my side close under my hand. At the negro’s earnest entreaty, I put on my uniform coat wrong-side out, that it might not attract attention, and so I started—a Union officer, miles from our troops—on my passage through the enemy’s country, along a road where rebel troops, bands of guerillas, and sharpshooters were usually in constant movement. Yet by some rare fortune it happened, just at this time, that my chief danger—except the overhanging peril of the whole situation—was not incurred until I approached our lines, except that around a grocery shop, which I passed, there were lounging a group of armed rebels. My driver was terribly frightened at this, and kept saying, “Set back, massa, for God’s sake, set back! Mebbe dey won’t see you!” And then whipped up his mule till we were safe beyond their reach.
But I had been seen and suspected by the rebel troops on the other side of the river, and they had sent a boat and some soldiers across to capture me. They reached the bank on my side, landed, and came up the road to intercept me, just as I was nearing our lines. Fortunately all this was perceived by our troops, and a body of cavalry was sent out, which captured the rebels, and conducted me in safety to the camp by one and the same proceeding. Here I found one of our ships—the Monongahela—and I went on board of her in a perfectly exhausted condition. Flinging myself in a bunk I slept soundly for hours, undisturbed by the fact that a short time before, while lying in that very same place, the Captain of the Monongahela—Abner Read—had been killed by a rebel shot which penetrated the ship’s side and struck him, and that his dead body was then on board, being conveyed to New Orleans.
I roused myself very early next morning in order to continue my journey to New Orleans in a commissary wagon, but when daylight dawned, I saw a gunboat coming down the river in command of my friend Captain Cooke, and I went on board of her, and made the rest of my trip by water.