Virginians in Charleston: Wigfall and Beauregard

All that day the assault continued, and all that night, which was dark and stormy, a sluggish bombardment of the fort was kept up; and when, on the following morning (April 13, 1861), on which the sun rose in unclouded splendor, it was renewed with increased vigor, the wearied garrison of not more than seventy men, found their supplies almost exhausted. In three days they must be starved out. On that morning the last parcel of rice had been cooked, and nothing but salted pork was left to be eaten. Red-hot shot were making havoc among the wooden structures of the fort. The flames spread, and the heat was intolerable. The fire threatened the magazine, and ninety barrels of powder were rolled into the sea. The smoke and heat were so stifling, that the men were often compelled to lie upon the ground with wet cloths over their faces to enable them to breathe. The old flag was kept flying until a shot cut its staff, and it fell to the ground at a little past noon. It was caught up, carried to the ramparts, and there replanted by Sergeant Peter Hart, Major Anderson's faithful servant and friend.

When the flag of Sumter fell, the insurgents shouted, for they regarded its downfall as a token of submission. A boat instantly shot out from Cumming's Point, bearing an officer who held a white handkerchief on the point of his sword as a flag of truce. He landed at the wharf at Fort Sumter, and, hurrying to the nearest port-hole, begged a soldier to let him in. The faithful man refused. "I am General Wigfall, of Beauregard's staff, and want to see Major Anderson!" he cried. The soldier said, "Stand there until I can call the commander." "For God's sake," cried Wigfall, "let me in! I can't stand out here in the firing." He ran around to the sallyport, but was there confronted by its blazing ruins. Then the poor fellow, half dead with fright, ran around the fort waving his white handkerchief toward his fellow-insurgents, to prevent their firing; but it was in vain. At last, out of sheer pity, he was allowed to crawl into a port-hole, after giving up his sword, where he was met by some of the officers of the fort. He told them who he was; that he had been sent by Beauregard to stop the firing, and begged them piteously to raise a white flag. "You are on fire," he said, "and your flag is down." He was interrupted by one of the officers, who said, "Our flag is not down," and Wigfall saw it where Peter Hart had replaced it. "Well, well," he said, "I want to stop this." Holding out his sword and handkerchief, he said to one of the officers, "Will you hoist this?" "No, sir," was the reply; "it is for you, General Wigfall, to stop them." "Will any of you hold this out of the embrasure?" he asked. No one offering the service, he said, "May I hold it there?" "If you wish to," was the cool reply. Wigfall sprang into the embrasure and waved the handkerchief several times, when a shot striking near him, he scampered away. He then begged some one else to hold it for him. At length consent was given to hoist a white flag over the ramparts, for the sole purpose of holding a conference with Major Anderson, who was sent for. Wigfall repeated his false story that he had come from Beauregard, and on assuring Anderson that the latter acceded to the major's terms-the evacuation of the fort on the 15th-that officer allowed the white flag to be hoisted, and Wigfall left. Seeing this, a deputation came from Beauregard, who informed the commander of the fort that Wigfall had not seen their chief in two days. Indignant because of the foul deception, Anderson declared the white flag should immediately come down, but he was persuaded to leave it until a conference could be held with Beauregard. Wigfall was a National Senator from Texas, and was one of the most insolent and boastful men on the floor of Congress. Soon after this ridiculous display of his mendacity and cowardice, he disappeared from public life, shorn of the confidence and respect of his more honorable associates. He was on Jefferson Davis's staff for awhile.

The conference with Beauregard resulted in an arrangement for the evacuation of Fort Sumter; and on Sunday, the 14th of April, 1861, the little garrison, with their private property, went on board a small steamboat that took them to the Baltic that lingered outside the bar, in which they were conveyed to New York. Major Anderson evacuated the fort, but did not surrender it; and he carried away with him the garrison flag, which, just four years afterward, tattered and torn, was again raised by the hands of that gallant officer (then a major-general) over all that remained of Fort Sumter-a heap of ruins.