Destruction of the United States Navy-Yard at Norfolk, Virginia, by Fire, by the United States Troops, on April 20, 1861
A correspondent of the New York Times thus describes the scenes presented by the destruction of the vessels and other U. S. property at Gosport Navy Yard, on the night of the 20th :
It is impossible to describe the-scene of destruction that was exhibited. Unweariedly it was continued from 9 o’clock to 12 during which time the moon gave light to direct the operations. But when the moon sank behind the horizon, the barracks near the centre of the yard were set on fire, that, by its illumination the work might be continued. The crackling flames and the glare of light inspired with new energies the destroying marines and havoc was carried everywhere, within the limits of orders. But time was not left to complete the work. Four o’clock of Sunday morning came, and the Pawnee was passing down from Gosport harbor, with the Cumberland, the coveted prize of the secessionists, in tow – every soul from the other ships and yard being aboard them save two. Just as they left their moorings, a rocket was sent up from the deck of the Pawnee. It sped high in air, paused a second and burst in shivers of many colored lights. As it did so, the well set trains at the ship-houses, and on the decks of the fated, vessels left behind, went off as if lit simultaneously by the rocket. One of the ship-houses contained the old New York, a ship thirty years on the stocks and yet unfinished. The other was vacant. The vessels fired were the Pennsylvania the Merrimac, the Germantown, the Plymouth, the Raritan, the Columbia, the Dolphin. The old Delaware and Columbus, worn out and dismantled seventy fours, were scuttled and sunk at the upper docks on Friday.
I need not try to picture the scene of the grand conflagration that now burst, like the day of judgment, on the startled citizens of Norfolk, and all the surrounding country. Any one who has seen a ship burn, and knows how, like a fiery serpent, the flame leaps from pitchy deck to smok-shrouds, and writhes to their very top around the masts that stand like martyrs doomed, can form some idea of tho wonderful display that followed. It was not 30 minutes from the time the trains were fired till the conflagration roared like a hurricane, and the flames from land and water swayed, and met, and mingled together, and darted high and fell, and leaped up again, and by their very motion showed their sympathy with the crackling, crashing roar of destruction beneath. – But in all this magnificent scene, the old ship Pennsylvania was the centre-piece. She was a very giant in death, as she had been in life. She was a sea of flame, and when “the iron had entered into her soul,” and her bowels were consuming, then did she spout from every port-hole of every deck, torrents and cataracts of fire that to the mind of Milton would have represented her a frigate of hell pouring out unremitting broadsides of infernal fire. Several of her guns were left loaded, but not shotted, and as the fire reached them, they sent out on the startled and morning air minute guns of fearful peal, that added greatly to the alarm that the light of the conflagration had spread through the surrounding country. The Pennsylvania burnt like a volcano for five hours and a half before her main mast fell. I stood watching the proud, but perishing old leviathan as this sign of her manhood was about to come down. At precisely o’clock, by my watch, the tall tree that stood in her centre tottered and fell, and crashed deep into her burning sides, whilst a storm of sparks flooded the sky.
Daily Intelligencer, Wheeling, VA (WV)