| From the Raleigh Standard |
| |
| July 24, 1861 |
| |
| Brilliant Action of Florida Volunteers -- Recapture of
Prizes -- United States Lieutenant and Nineteen Sailors Taken
Prisoners |
| The New Orleans Delta of July 12th,
contains the following: |
| We had the satisfaction today of hearing
from the lips of Capt. N. H. Smith, of the schooner Olive Branch, the
full particulars of one of the most successful and gratifying
incidents in the history of the blockade, which an insolent foe is
attempting to maintain on our coast. The telegraph has already
announced the recapture off the Florida coast of four small schooners,
which piratical Massachusetts stole in the Mississippi Sound, and bore
off as prizes, to divide as booty among the hirelings of Abe Lincoln,
including those sentimental and patriotic young officers of the United
States Navy, who profess so much fraternal feeling fro our people but
do not shrink from the most petty stealing which even a barbarous
tribe would scorn to employ in a regular war. |
| The four schooners captured in the Sound,
before even any formal announcement of a blockade had been made to the
authorities of Biloxi, are the Fanny, the Three Brothers, the Basilide
and the Olive Branch. There was also a Mexican schooner taken at the
same time, the name of which we could not ascertain. They were all
small vessels, of fifty or sixty tons, and were employed in the lumber
and carrying trade along the coast. |
| After making the haul, the Massachusetts
towed the prizes to the Brooklyn, when the four named were placed in
charge of Lieut. Selden, and nineteen U. S. sailors as a prize crew,
with orders to take them to Tortugas. The captains and men are all
refused to aid in the navigation of the prizes, and Lieut. Selden,
left to his own resources of sailorship, made a sad mess of it in
trying to get to Tortugas, and after a great deal of blundering and
casting about turned up quite unexpectedly off Cedar Keys, which is
about 300 miles from his destination. Here the vessels were becalmed
within sight of the land. The Floridians, of which there happened to
be an encampment in the vicinity, soon descried the becalmed fleet,
and having been annoyed by the piratical craft of the enemy,
determined to look into the matter. The steamer Madison, plying upon
the Suwanee river, was therefore engaged for the occasion, and being
armed with two small pieces, and manned by sixty Florida volunteers,
proceeded towards the fleet. As the Madison approached, Lieut. Selden,
who was on board on the Fanny, displayed the U. S. flag and had his
sails up. As soon as this was done the Madison fired one of her pieces
at the Fanny, whereupon Lieutenant Selden, in a childish display of heroism,
fired his revolver, which caused his men to jump into the hold of the
Fanny in terrible fear of a destructive fusillade from the Madison.
But the latter quietly steamed up, and Major Widsmith, who commanded
the Floridians, called out to the Fanny to haul down her flag and her
sails, or he would blow her out of the water. Lieut. Seldon not
obeying the order with sufficient promptitude, the Captain of the
Fanny did it for him. She was then boarded by the Floridians, was
taken possession of, and Lieut. Selden and party were held as
prisoners of war. The other vessels were also taken possession of and
carried into the Suwanee, where they now are. The prisoners are in the
hands of the Florida authorities, by whom we hope they will be held
securely for further orders from the Confederate Government. |
| {The Fanny was carrying railroad
iron} |
|