http://www.brettschulte.net/ACWBooks/newOrleans.htm
The Night The War Was Lost. Charles L. Dufour. Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press (1995). 427 pp. 1 map.
This is a review and summary of Charles L. Dufour’s book on the fall of New Orleans, which is entitled The Night The War Was Lost. Dufour’s book remains the best account of the fall of New Orleans in April 1862 to Admiral David Farragut’s Western Gulf Blockading Squadron and (after the fact) troops from Gen. Ben Butler’s Department of the Gulf. This is surprising considering the book was initially published in 1960. Dufour does an excellent job describing the preparation (more accurately the lack of preparation) for the defense of New Orleans from the declaration of secession to the eventual fall of the South’s greatest city. He also describes the preparations in the North to subdue New Orleans, from the Department of the Navy to David Porter’s mortar fleet to the naming of David Farragut to command the Western Gulf Blockading Squadron which took the city. Dufour has a very readable style and I was able to finish the book over several evenings. The book contains 354 pages of text, with the bibliography, notes and index filling the remainder of the 427 pages. Scanning through Dufour’s sources, he has made good use of primary records in the form of diaries, newspaper accounts, and especially of the correspondence between the Confederate Government in Richmond and Gen. Mansfield Lovell, the commander at New Orleans. The lack of maps is a major flaw though, IMHO. The book contains only one map of the area around the two forts guarding the city (75 miles south), and it is not a very good one. You will want to have other maps of the area present when reading the book to have a proper grasp of the relationship of various places to one another. And the last shortcoming is the lack of any kind of Order of Battle. Dufour does give the number of guns in Fort Jackson, Fort St. Philip, and some of the ships in the text itself, but he does not go into any kind of detail.
Dufour’s early chapters deal with Louisiana’s (and by extension New Orleans’) role in the secession movement. He is of the opinion that Gen. David Twiggs, the first commander of New Orleans at 72 years old, was simply incapable of the energy required to build the necessary defenses for the city or to adequately provision the troops in southern Louisiana for the coming struggle. Dufour also describes how a general sense of apathy surrounded the defense of the city, with internal and petty struggles between such men as Gov. Moore of Louisiana, the more prestigious citizens of the state and city, and the members of the Confederate Army and Navy sent to defend both New Orleans and the surrounding coast.
In the middle chapters, Dufour describes the appointment of Gen. Mansfield Lovell to the command of the defenses, his tireless efforts to make the city ready for a possible invasion, of the preparation of the formidable ironclads Louisiana and Mississippi, and of the constant interference and ignorance from the authorities in Richmond, including President Davis and Secretary of the Navy Mallory. Lovell had come originally from Massachusetts, and he had not offered his services to the Confederacy until after First Manassas. Due to this, writes Dufour, some people in New Orleans were suspicious of Lovell, especially after the fall of the city. But he defends Lovell, and provides correspondence between Richmond and Lovell to back this point up. Lovell repeatedly asked for heavy guns, ammunition, and supplies of all kinds, and Richmond failed to provide for him in his time of need. During late 1861, the ironclads Louisiana and Mississippi were started near New Orleans, and much was made of their potential to disband the blockade, not only in the area of Louisiana but all along the Confederate coast. Many delays, which eventually proved costly, are described. Ultimately neither vessel was able to move under its own power, and only the Louisiana was able to contribute to the defense, and then only as a floating battery. Both ships were destroyed to prevent their capture after Farragut captured the city. Lastly, Dufour mentions that throughout the fall of 1861 and the early spring of 1862, valuable troops were being stripped from Lovell’s department and sent to other places by Richmond. In addition, a good half of the gunboats at New Orleans were sent upriver to Memphis because the Confederate Government believed the Union River fleet there (hundreds of miles away) to be a greater threat than Farragut’s blockading squadron (barely over 75 miles away) near the Confederate forts guarding the city!
The preparation of the Federals is described in the next part of the book. Dufour describes the initial ideas for an attack on New Orleans which he credits to Assistant Secretary of the Navy Gustavus V. Fox in the latter months of 1861. President Lincoln, Gen. George McClellan, and Secretary of the Navy Gideon Welles all not only approved the plan but were excited about the possibilities which could result from it. Dufour goes on to describe the thoroughness of cooperation which resulted from this enthusiasm. David Porter (who Dufour admits was a very good leader but who he also describes as a stretcher of the truth for personal gain) was appointed to command a powerful mortar flotilla which was outfitted in New York City. The United States government did everything in their power to get this flotilla outfitted as quickly as possible, going so far as to continually urge the iron works in Pittsburgh and elsewhere to spare no cost to get the required mortars and ammunition produced quickly. In a spirit of cooperation, the U.S. Army even allowed the Navy to take some mortars initially earmarked for McClellan’s siege train. David Farragut, although only numbered in the twenties in terms of seniority, was appointed to command the Western Gulf Blockading squadron, including Porter’s mortar fleet, due to his aggressive nature. Lastly, and not unimportantly, Lincoln was looking for a way to get the incompetent political Gen. Benjamin Butler away from the important theaters of war, and found an ideal solution by appointing him to command the new Department of the Gulf with 15,000 men to take New Orleans.
The last fourth of the book deals with Farragut’s running of Fort Jackson and Fort St. Philip, the Confederate militia’s evacuation of New Orleans, and the capture of the city not by Butler’s Army troops, but by Farragut’s squadron. Farragut encountered some issues in getting his ships to their rendezvous point at Ship Island near the mouth of the Mississippi River, but these were smoothed over by the again unprecedented spirit of cooperation which existed between the Federal Army and Navy. Gen. Butler provided Farragut with tons of coal designated for Army use, without which Farragut could not have proceeded, according to Dufour. The Confederates, on the other hand, were squabbling not only between the Army and Navy, but amongst the ships designated to defend the Mississippi River themselves. The River Defense fleet was assigned to the Army, and as such, they were unwilling to take orders from the Navy. The Richmond Government refused to allow Lovell to have any control over the naval forces near New Orleans, and he was hamstrung by this at the time of Farragut’s attack. Porter’s mortar fleet bombarded Fort Jackson for many days before Farragut grew tired of waiting and decided to run the gauntlet between the Forts and force his way to New Orleans early on the morning of April 24, 1862. Farragut succeeded in running the guns of the Forts, and only three ships of his fleet had to retreat downriver back to Porter’s mortar ships and Butler’s troop transports. Lovell had only militia on hand to defend the city due to all of the other troops being sent to other departments, and he made the decision to abandon New Orleans without a fight. Dufour contends that this was the proper thing to do under the circumstances, as the city did not have any defenses facing the river, and many civilians would have perished in any ensuing fight. Dufour goes on to describe the destruction of the two ironclads since they were unable to get under way under their own power. He also details at great length the ensuing odd deliberations by the mayor of New Orleans and the prominent citizens of that city with Farragut and his fleet during surrender demands. Eventually Farragut’s squadron took control of New Orleans after Porter accepted the surrender of the Forts 75 miles downriver.
As I stated in the introduction, Dufour writes in a very smooth style, and his story of the fall of New Orleans is a very interesting one. He uses the words of the men who were there to describe the action in many cases. He has a very favorable view of Mansfield Lovell and David Farragut, while tending to portray David Porter in a neutral light for being too self-promoting, and castigating the Confederate Government in Richmond, specifically President Davis and Secretary of the Navy Mallory for their role in the debacle. In fact, he goes do far as to accuse Davis of deliberately making a scapegoat of Lovell to cover his own culpability in the affair. As Dufour’s title implies, he believes the loss of New Orleans prevented the South from being able to win the war after that date. He includes 8 separate reasons, including the irreparable loss of the two ironclads being built in the city which could have ended the Federal blockade, failure by foreign powers to recognize the Confederacy after such a devastating blow, and of the importance of the control of the Mississippi River to the Confederacy, among others. The one map was pathetic to be honest, but you have to take into account that the book was written in 1960 at a time when not many histories of campaigns had the astounding level of detail we see today in many books. As I said before, have other period maps handy. Also, readers might wish to do some research of their own regarding the forces available to either side. The naval Order of Battle was described in the text, but any land forces were briefly mentioned, if at all.
In conclusion, I thoroughly enjoyed this book, and although it is by no means a definitive study of the fall of New Orleans in April 1862, for now it is by far the best book available on the subject. The story described within the book is an important one in the history of the Civil War, and anyone interested in that War, from beginners to veteran buffs would benefit from reading this book. I await a more modern and definitive study containing numerous maps, even more access to newly discovered primary sources, and an extensive Order of Battle, but this book is solid throughout and has served admirably thus far as the standard history of this Campaign. Most students of the War will not be disappointed after reading this account.
427 pp., 1 map.
© Copyright Brett Schulte 2005. All rights reserved.
-Brett Schulte
HPS Playtester
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