On May 5, 1862, Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton asked Brigadier General Egbert Viele to meet him at the navy yard later that day under the condition that he not speak to anyone of the meeting. When Viele arrived there, much to his surprise, they were met by President Lincoln and Secretary of the Treasury Salmon P. Chase. The men walked down to the dock where the Treasury Department’s revenue cutter Miami was anchored and boarded. The group would be headed for Fort Monroe, at the tip of the Virginia Peninsula.

The purpose of their trip would be to personally observe the situation there and see whether “some further vigilance and vigor might not be infused into the operations of the army at that point.” The Miami was a 115-foot long, 213-ton twin engine steamer also outfitted with 10 sails on double masts. It mounted three guns (24-pounder, 12-pounder, and a pivot gun) and was captained by Douglass Ottinger.

The ship left the navy yard and anchored for the night around 10:00 PM just below Mount Vernon in order to change pilots. After dinner the men discussed the overall situation and the best approach to retake Norfolk and the Gosport Navy Yard. From the Navy’s perspective the yard there which contained the largest dry dock in the country was invaluable. It had been lost to the Confederates when Virginia seceded from the Union and seized it in April of the previous year. Lincoln was disappointed in the slow progress Major General George McClellan was making toward Richmond during the Peninsula Campaign and thought things could be aided by a move on Norfolk. McClellan’s 29-day siege of Yorktown had just ended the day before. What Lincoln could not have know at the time was that the Confederacy was stretched thin and needed reinforcements to defend Richmond. Jefferson Davis had decided the Confederacy could no longer defend both Norfolk and Richmond and preparations were already underway to evacuate Norfolk. Once Yorktown fell it now became even more urgent to move as many men, cannons, ammunition and powder to Richmond.

At 3:00 AM on the 6th the Miami weighed anchor and continued downriver reaching Fort Monroe between 8:00 and 9:00 PM. General Wool, the commanding officer, and his staff were unaware that the president was coming. They met him on board at 10:00 where Lincoln asked General Wool if he could take Norfolk. Wool replied he could take it in three days if the Navy neutralized the ironclad CSS Virginia so that his wooden transports could land. The president first wanted to speak to the area’s naval commander, Flag Officer Goldsborough. Despite the late hour the group boarded a tug and traveled to Goldsborough’s nearby ship the USS Minnesota. Goldsborough wasn’t very enthusiastic about having the Monitor take on the Virginia again. Instead the plan agreed upon was to lure the Virginia out into open waters and have the Cornelius Vanderbilt ram it. The meeting ended around 1:00 AM. The following day the 7th was spent outfitting the Cornelius Vanderbilt for the task. President Lincoln toured the ship in the morning. The Vanderbilt was the largest vessel at Hampton Roads (340 feet long, and 3,360 tons). After the tour Lincoln had breakfast at Wool’s headquarters (the Quarters Number One building shown below).

Next they visited the water batteries on the beach outside the fort for a firing of the “Lincoln Gun” (shown below), a 15-inch smoothbore cannon, toward Sewell’s Point.

This was followed by a visit to Fort Wool on the Rip Raps, a small man-made island. Fort Wool is now a bird sanctuary but is visible from Fort Monroe. If you look carefully, you can see the birds in the pictures below.

Here Lincoln was impressed by a large cannon, the Sawyer Gun, mounted outside the walls. It was an experimental gun capable of accurately hitting a target up to three miles away. When Lincoln heard this he asked Lieutenant R. M. Shurtleff for a demonstration. The crew complied landing several shots within the Confederate works on Sewell Point about three miles away.

At noon the president visited the Monitor and its commander, Lieutenant William N. Jeffers. After stopping at the USS Minnesota for another consultation with Flag Officer Goldsborough, Lincoln spent the afternoon touring camps and meeting with soldiers between Fort Monroe and Newport News. In the late afternoon a meeting was held at Wool’s headquarters that was also attended by Lieutenant Jeffers where Lincoln relayed a request from General McClellan that gunboats be sent up the James River in order to assist his advance and harass Johnston’s retreating army. Goldsborough sent the ironclad Galena and two gunboats up the river the following morning the Aroostook (screw-driven steamship with five guns) and the Port Royal (side-wheel steamer with eight guns).

At 5:00 AM on the morning of the 8th Confederate Captain James Byers sailed a small tug, the John B White, with its entire crew and some local civilians fron Confederate lines to Newport News and surrendered the vessel to Brigadier General Joseph Mansfield, commander at Camp Butler. The ship was taken to Fort Monroe where Captain Byers reported that the Confederates were evacuating Norfolk, troops were being hastily withdrawn, and there were plans to destroy the Navy Yard. Time was now of the essence and Lincoln wanted to accelerate the timeframe of his plan. Another meeting was quickly called. Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Cram, chief topographical engineer, reported that the water around Sewell’s Point was too shallow for a direct landing. The men would have to wade through 3.5 feet of water for one half to three quarters of a mile from the drop point. In addition, cavalry and artillery could not be landed there. Major General Wool felt that he could take the city with infantry alone.

Flag Officer Goldsborough agreed to support the landing. Wool ordered his men to board canal boats for the trip across Hampton Roads. A tugboat took Lincoln, Chase, and Stanton to Fort Wool where they would watch the action. Around 11:00 AM a flotilla headed toward Sewell’s Point to bombard the works there and try and draw the CSS Virginia out into open water so she could be rammed. The ships included the E. A. Stevens the Monitor, the Dacotah, the Seminole, the San Jacinto, and the Susquehanna. The guns from Fort Wool would also participate. Federal fire was primarily concentrated on the Sewell’s Point Fort but some shells were directed at Craney Island, and other smaller waterfront batteries. The Union shelling lasted about four hours with several thousand shells fired at Sewell’s Point, while the Rebels only fired 60-80 in return. Despite this the damage was minimal. President Lincoln boarded his tugboat at the Rip Raps and sailed toward the action to get a closer look. Finally, around 2:45 PM the CSS Virginia steamed out of the Elizabeth River. She was late getting underway because the ironclad was under repair to improve her armament when the Federals attacked. In addition, the ship was facing the wrong way in the dock and had to be turned using cables and winches. Goldsborough ordered his ships to back away slowly trying to drawn her out into open water but the Virginia would not take the bait. The plan had failed.

About 4,500 of Wool’s men from Camp Hamilton had marched to Fort Monroe’s wharves. A major problem with the troops at Camp Hamilton was the flawed command structure. The regiments there were not organized into brigades and had never seen action. This would make command and control difficult for a water-crossing operation and march. Despite this Wool knew his Confederate counterpart well, General Benjamin Huger, and felt he would evacuate rather than stand his ground. Many of Wool’s troops were already aboard their boats when the Virginia appeared. It would be impossible for the unarmed wooden transports to cross with the Virginia acting solely on the defensive in its present location. Many of the infantry remained in the crowed transports all night. For the Confederates, the threat of a looming invasion meant that General Huger had to rapidly speed up his timetable to get his soldiers to Richmond and move as much of his war material as possible.

On the morning of the 9th, with the CSS Virginia still near Sewell’s Point and Craney Island, General Wool pulled his men off the transport boats. Lincoln wanted the Monitor to reconnoiter the effects of yesterday’s bombardment and assess the current state of Confederate defenses at Sewell ‘s Point and along the Elizabeth River. At their peak the defenses there were formidable with more than 230 guns guarding Sewell’s Point, Craney Island, and the mouth and banks of the Elizabeth River. In addition, the river channel was narrowed by sunken ships and obstructions driven into the bottom. After clearing it with Flag Officer Goldsborough the Monitor headed there between 9:00 and 10:00 AM. The CSS Virginia got underway but quickly grounded on a sandbar. Over a 2-hour period the Monitor fired about 50 shells with no response even though the works appeared occupied. Once the Virginia got off the sandbar she still did not engage the Monitor because their commanding officers Flag Officer Josiah Tattnall and Lieutenant Catesby ap Roger Jones, were not on board the ship. They were at a meeting in Norfolk with General Huger discussing the evacuation. There Tatnall informed Huger that with three Union gunboats now up the James River, he could not move any more supplies to Richmond. Nor could he get the unfinished gunboats in the Gosport Navy Yard to safety.

Given that the Confederate works were still occupied and the Virginia still in the Elizabeth River, President Lincoln and Secretary of the Treasury Chase were anxious to find another place to land in order to march on Norfolk. One possibility discussed in previous meetings was a small coastal community called Ocean View. Secretary Chase, Brigadier General Viele, General Wool and chief engineer Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Cram set out around 9:30 AM on the Miami to examine the area more closely along with a small tugboat, the Lioness. They anchored off Ocean View and its 10 homes and moved closer to shore on the tugboat. About 100 yards off shore a few of the men took a small rowboat and landed. General Wool declared he had seen enough and this was where his infantry would land along with cavalry and artillery. They returned back to Fort Monroe at about 2:30 PM and Secretary Chase went off to brief the president on their trip. Lincoln and Stanton had been visiting troops in a military hospital nearby. Chase found the president looking over navigation charts. He was interested in visiting a potential landing spot that he had discussed with a local pilot that was closer to Fort Monroe than Ocean View. So off went Chase, Lincoln, and Stanton on the Miami to inspect the Norfolk area shoreline. On the way they stopped at Fort Wool to pick up a tugboat and an escort of 20 soldiers. As they got closer to the shoreline the party transferred to the tugboat. The soldiers rowed ashore and encountered what were thought to be enemy horsemen who quickly rode off. Around 6:00 PM the president came ashore himself, illustrated in the sketch below. As it turned out Lincoln’s landing site was about three quarters of a mile farther down the beach from Ocean View.

Ultimately Ocean View was chosen as the landing site because a good road from there led to Norfolk nine miles away. Once ashore, the men were to march to the Indian Pole Bridge over Tanner’s Creek. If the bridge was destroyed a longer alternate route to Norfolk would be used which was about 3-4 miles longer. Brigadier General Weber, the commander of the 20th NY, would lead the mission, which would also include the 10th, 20th, and part of the 99th NY, 1st DE, 16th MA, 58th PA, 1st battalion NY Mounted Rifles, cavalry, and three batteries of light artillery. In the early evening Fort Wool’s guns opened on the Sewell’s Point batteries, which were evacuated that evening. Before abandoning the fortifications, the barracks were fired and the magazine blown up. All but seven guns were removed and sent to Richmond. The invasion was about to begin.

Next- The 1862 Union Reoccupation of Norfolk (Part 2)- May 10, 1862

Sources

Lincoln Takes Command The Campaign to Seize Norfolk and the Destruction of the CSS Virginia by Steve Norder

A Trip with Lincoln, Chase and Stanton by Egbert Ludovicus Viele (link)