The Battle of Fort Fisher, N.C.

Monday, April 25, 2011

First Casualty of the War was Irish-- Part 2

Major Abner (Baseball) Doubleday was at Fort Sumter and witnessed Daniel Hough's death. He wrote, "It happened that some flakes of fire had entered the muzzle of one of the guns after it was sponged. Of course, when the gunner attempted to ram the cartridge down, it exploded prematurely, killing Private Hough instantly, and setting fire to a pile of cartridges underneath, which also exploded, seriously wounding five men. Fifty guns were fired in the salute."


From Wikipedia.

One Confederate soldier bled to death during the attack after a cannon misfired.

Besides Private Hough, another soldier was mortally wounded during the salute (the only two Union deaths). Private Edward Gallway (another Irishman?) was mortally wounded and taken to a hospital in Charleston where he died a few days later.

Union Lt. Norman J. Hall permanently lost his eyebrows when he was burned while risking his life to put the garrison flag back up when it was shot down.

The troops were rowed out to the steamer Baltic after the surrender and from there taken north.

Stuff You Didn't Know. --Old B-R'er

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