JANUARY 26TH
CSS Alabama captured and burned bark Golden Rule off Haiti in the Caribbean. Semmes noted that it had masts and sails intended for the USS Bainbridge which had been lost in a gale earlier.
JANUARY 27TH
Ironclad Montauk and other ships engage Fort McAllister, Georgia, on the Ogeechee River. This was a test of the ironclads to see how they would stand up to heavy artillery fire in preparation for the attack on Charleston. They had to fire from a distance because of obstructions and possible torpedoes in the river.
Commander John Worden observed that the confederates were quite accurate, striking his vessel "quite a number of times, doing us no damage."
Du Pont wrote: "The monitor was struck some thirteen or fourteen times, which would have sunk a gunboat easily, but it did no injury whatsoever to the Montauk-- speaking well of the impenetrability of those vessels-- though the distance was greater than what could constitute a fair test.
But the slow firing, the inaccuracy of aim, for you can't see to aim properly from the turret [were a problem]. I asked myself...if one ironclad cannot take eight guns-- how are five to take 147 guns in Charleston harbor."
CSS Alabama captured and burned brig Chastlaine in the Caribbean.
Finally Caught Up. --Old B-R'er
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