Page:Historic towns of the southern states (1900).djvu/369

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

R. M. CHARLTON, POET, JURIST, U. S. SENATOR.

back in defiance the message to Governor Brown: "I go to illustrate Georgia." He was killed with several of his command at the first battle of Manassas, so that Savannah received the baptism of blood at the very beginning of the Civil War. In November, 1861, General Robert E. Lee made his headquarters in Savannah and inspected its defences. He pronounced Fort Pulaski impregnable, and said its walls, which were seven and a half feet thick, would withstand the heaviest cannon. The rifled guns of large calibre, however, had not then been tested, and their penetrating power was unknown. As a matter of fact, the fort was breached by Union batteries from Tybee Island in one day. On the 11th of April, 1862,