A Day at Fort Sumter with Abner Doubleday, 1861
You Are There - Graphic History Series
You Are There… Graphic History Series.
Historical Backdrop
In the spring of 1861, the United States was breaking apart. Seven Southern states had declared themselves out of the Union, and the new Confederacy demanded that federal troops leave Fort Sumter, a brick fort guarding Charleston Harbor in South Carolina. Inside the fort, a small Union garrison of about 85 soldiers was running low on food. Their commander, Major Robert Anderson, hoped to avoid a fight. His second-in-command is our subject — Captain Abner Doubleday, a 41-year-old artillery officer from New York.
3:30 AM · April 12, 1861 · Officers’ Quarters, Fort Sumter, Charleston Harbor, South Carolina
You stand in the dim brick room as the candle gutters. Confederate officers have just rowed out under a white flag and handed Major Anderson a final note: the bombardment will begin in one hour. No one shouts. You feel the cold damp of the harbor in your bones and hear only the scratch of Anderson’s pen and the distant slap of water against the fort’s walls. Your mouth is dry. You check your watch.
4:10 AM · April 12, 1861 · Upper Parapet, Fort Sumter
You climb the stone stairs to the top of the fort and stare out across the black harbor. Cold wind pushes at your coat. In the dark you can just make out faint orange specks — the cooking fires and lanterns of the rebel batteries on Sullivan’s Island, Cummings Point, and James Island. The water is invisible below you. You wait, listening, knowing the hour is almost up.
4:30 AM · April 12, 1861 · Upper Parapet, Fort Sumter
A streak of fire climbs from Fort Johnson and bursts in a flash high above your head. The signal shell. A heartbeat later guns roar all around the harbor and shells whistle toward the fort. The first blasts shake the brick under your boots. You duck, then hurry for the stairs as iron screams overhead and slams into the walls.
5:30 AM · April 12, 1861 · Lower Casemate Bombproof, Fort Sumter
