Farragut At Mobile Bay 150 Years Ago: "Damn The Torpedoes!" - Fact or Legend?

Farragut At Mobile Bay 150 Years Ago: "Damn The Torpedoes!"  - Fact or Legend?

The ironclad monitor leading one column into Mobile Bay hit an underwater mine, exploded, and sank in under a minute.  The "unsinkable" wooden man-o-war leading the other column reduced speed to avoid striking similar "infernal machines" -  all while gunners in Fort Morgan and two other harbor forts began ranging in on the remaining 13 Union warships.  His ships being pounded, and the mighty Confederate ironclad ram CSS Tennessee and her consorts steaming toward the fleet, Admiral David Glasgow Farragut ordered his captains to "Damn the Torpedoes" and go "Full speed ahead."

That, at least, is how the legend goes.

Or maybe that is not exactly what happened, says Civil War historian, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and professor emeritus at Princeton James McPherson.

As he noted in his latest book, War Upon the Waters, and reiterated in a talk at the New York Historical Society two years ago,  Farragut might - or might not have said exactly those words.. Even if he did, says McPherson, the "damn" part might very well have been an exclamation of surprise (or a curse).   

Other source report that Farragut remained extraordinarily cool, and that "Damn the Torpedoes" Full speed ahead" is an abbreviated version of a a much longer statement, a clear set of orders to the captain of the USS Hartford (Captain Percival Drayton) and the commander of the gunboat USS Metacomet, James Edward Jouet, which was lashed to the far side of the larger warship to give it some protection from the Rebel shore batteries.

"Damn the Torpedoes! Four bells, Captain Drayton! Go ahead. Jouett, full speed!"

Again, there are conflicting reports about whether the "go ahead" was part of the command to Drayton or to Jouett, although it seems more likely that command was meant for the later, as it directed him to separate from the protective shield of the USS Hartford, thus freeing him for action.

Then, again, as McPherson muses, it might all just be a combination of what officers and men present on the deck THOUGHT they heard - and with mines exploding, ships sinking, shells blasting overhead, engines churning and guns roaring on both sides, who can be certain what anybody said?

Whatever he really did say, or how he phrased it, Farragut did get his fleet moving from underneath the batteries and into the bay, where they could engage the Rebel flotilla and direct their broadsides at the Confederate ships and forts.   The attack started out looking bad for the Union, but by the end of the day, Farragut had won the U.S. Navy's greatest victory of the American Civil War.

Rebel Raiders on the High Seas allows players to recreate this epic fight at the strategic level, with ships and cards and counters for the forts, ironclads, warships, admirals and even the "torpedoes" that Farragut allegedly damned that day 150 years ago.

A "Rebel Raiders" Homage Admiral David Glasgow “Damn the Torpedoes” Farragut!

A "Rebel Raiders" Homage to Admiral David Glasgow “Damn the Torpedoes” Farragut!

On this day in 1870 David Glasgow Farragut passed away.   The admiral appears in Rebel Raiders on the High Seas not only as a Leader counter but on TWO Union cards (USN Card 1 – “Damn the Torpedoes…Full Speed Ahead!” and USN Card 33 – The Grand Fleet).  The first card gives Union ships extra dice when firing on Rebel batteries – but only after they take a round of fire from the Confederates, thus mimicking the Navy tactic of directing fire at Rebel gun positions that have exposed themselves, and the second allows the Union to amass a larger stack of ships (10 vice the normal 6 allowed in the rules) when making an attack – which represents Farragut’s accumulation of a massive force to hit Mobile Bay.

Farragut was one of the first admirals in the U.S. Navy – attaining the rank of rear admiral as a reward for taking New Orleans in 1862.  Nine such rear admirals were authorized by act of Congress in 1862  (among these were Samuel Francis DuPont – USN Card 54,  John Dahlgren – USN Card 31, David Dixon Porter – USN Card 2 and Andrew Hull Foote, who appears as a Leader in the game).  Farragut later became the nation’s first vice admiral – promoted by Lincoln for his storming of Mobile Bay, and its first full admiral (four star rank), an honor he was given a year after the war in July 1866.

Farragut, though born in Tennessee and married to a Southern belle, stayed loyal to the Union – so much so that he told his wife that he was going North even if she and the family stayed South.  He and Confederate Admiral Franklin “Old Buck” Buchanan (a Confederate leader in the game) were among the senior officers in the Navy, and just as Buchanan felt Farragut had betrayed the South by coming North, so did Farragut believe “Buck” had betrayed his oath to the Union by going South.   The two men quite literally fought eye-to-eye at Mobile Bay,  Farragut supposedly uttering his famous “damn” not so much because of the torpedoes, but because from his perch on the rigging of the USS Hartford (USN Card 37) he could see Buchanan looking up at him from the pilot house of the ram CSS Tennessee (CSN Card 86), as depicted in the famous painting of that action by William Heysham Overrend (see below).

The Ships of Rebel Raiders - The Ironclads

Rebel Raiders on the High Seas is a strategic game of the Civil War which focuses on the role of the navies on the rivers, along the coasts and on the oceans.  While most ships are represented by generic counters for Ironclads, Blockade Runners, Gunboats, Screw Sloops and, of course Raiders, there are cards and corresponding counters for many individual vessels.  This series presents those cards and offers a glimpse into the history of these storied ships.

Part III – The Rebel Ironclads: CSS Manassas  - Dewey and the 1st Rebel Ironclad

The cigar-shaped turtle-shelled iron-sheathed ram CSS Manassas (CSN Card 71 in Rebel Raiders on the High Seas) “amounted to the war’s first ironclad,” says Princeton professor and noted historian James McPherson in his new book, War Upon the Waters. 

The former Mississippi River towing boat was one of three ironclads the South was hurriedly constructing at New Orleans in the late winter and early spring of 1862.  When the Union fleet began to steam upriver, however, only one – CSS Manassas – was ready for action.  (CSS Mississippi was under construction and although CSS Louisiana was fully armed her engines were not working properly – so she was towed downriver to serve as an armored floating battery). 

On April 18 the Union began bombarding Forts Jackson and St. Philip, and on the 24^th the West Gulf Squadron under Farragut (USN Card 1) aboard USS Hartford (USN Card 37) made its move.  The CSS Manassas went out to meet them, supported by half a dozen little gunboats and rams and some fire rafts.  Farragut saw the fearsome monster and signaled to Captain Melancton Smith aboard USS Mississippi (the largest ship in the U.S. Navy, and USN Card 23) to “run her down.”

In their game of “naval chicken” the commander of the ironclad blinked first, and as he veered off the mighty USS Mississippi riddled her with a broadside at 50 yards.  The solid shot pierced her boilers, and CSS Manassas caught fire and sank.

Little Known Fact:  conning the USS Mississippi was a young, 24-year-old lieutenant – George Dewey, of “You may fire when ready, Gridley” fame at Manila Bay in 1898.