Wood formed the cutters into two columns and eased forward, straining his eyes for the prey. They rowed past the town, staying near the opposite bank. They reversed and came back, closer this time. They could not be certain: was the fog obscuring the gunboats, or were they simply not there? This time the flotilla moved in among the wharves, so near that the seamen could hear the sleepy voices of the sentries. There were no gunboats at New Bern!

Subscribe Today

• Did you enjoy our article?
• Read more in Civil War Times magazine
• Subscribe online and save nearly 40%!!!
 

Just before dawn, Wood ordered his men to row about three miles back up the Neuse to a small island in Bachelor's Creek, where they could rest. There, the sailors pulled the boats from the water and hid them in the bushes and tall marsh grasses. Those not selected as sentries simply collapsed, ignoring the cold, muddy ground and wet grass. They had rowed sixty miles down a foul river; they had been awake for almost twenty-four hours; and they had been on edge, expecting a fight. They were exhausted.

As the sun rose and the fog dispersed, the Confederates were astounded to see a tall crow's nest with a Yankee lookout in plain sight of their camp. Miraculously, the observer did not spot them the entire day. The men made as little movement as possible and anxiously ate their pre-cooked rations; campfires were out of the question. Meanwhile, Wood went off in search of Pickett to coordinate their efforts.

The plans for the land attack were good ones. Pickett would make a frontal assault against New Bern with the mass of his 4,500 troops; he would send Brigadier Seth Barton with cavalry and artillery to cut the Atlantic & North Carolina Railroad from Morehead City to check the arrival of reinforcements; in the meantime, Colonel James Dearing would attack Fort Anderson across the Neuse, also preventing reinforcements from that quarter; and lastly, General Lee would order a diversionary demonstration at Morehead City to keep the Yankee nervous.

Things were going much as planned. By late afternoon on February 1, the enemy had been driven back inside his works in front of New Bern, but Pickett was getting edgy. He heard nothing from Barton, whose operation was absolutely essential. If he did not cut the rail line, New Bern would become a tap for the Confederates.

Meanwhile, Gift's command had been rowing down from Kinston all day. If Wood had trouble maneuvering the small cutters through the congested twists and loops of the Neuse, Gift with his heavy launches must have had hell. Although they embarked only an hour after Wood, they failed to link up with him until almost sundown, about fifteen hours after the first group arrived.

Early that morning when Wood heard the guns opening Pickett's offensive, Lieutenant G. W. Graves, commander of the three gunboats in the New Bern estuary and captain of the U.S.S. Lockwood, heard them too. Signaling Acting Master Jacob Westervelt of the U.S.S. Underwriter and Acting Master Francis Josselyn of the U.S.S. Commodore Hull to stand by, Graves waited for a message from Brigadier I. N. Palmer, chief of the Federal land forces. At about 6:30 a.m., it arrived; the Rebels were attacking in force, and Palmer needed the gunboats to repel them. Graves ordered the Underwriter to steam up the Neuse and anchor about 100 yards below Fort Stevenson to command the cleared plain outside the Union works. The Hull would take position above her. Although the Underwriter arrived on station at 9:00 a.m., the Hull drove so solidly aground as she got underway that she could not even be moved by tugs. Notified that the Rebels were erecting a battery near Brice's Creek, off the Trent, Graves steamed up that river as far as the shallow channel would permit.

Near sundown, Loyall and Wood scouted downriver near New Bern to see if a possible prize had turned up. It had. The Underwriter, a side-wheel steamer of 325 tons, one of the largest in North Carolina waters, lay riding at her mooring. She was 186 feet long and 35 feet wide. Mounting two 8-inch shell guns, and a 30-pound and a 12-pound howitzer, she carried a crew of eighty-four. Wood told Loyall that they would attack her sometime after midnight. Ironically, she was scheduled to leave for duty off Hatteras the following morning.

Help HistoryNet by bookmarking to