Sail to Fort Sumter for barrage of history

An excursion to Fort Sumter National Monument brings much more than a walk through the site of the first shots that plunged this country into the Civil War.

It’s boat ride round trip through Charleston Harbor and full of U.S. history, to and from the storied site named after a Revolutionary War patriot who settled in South Carolina: Army Gen. Thomas Sumter, and later lived to age 98.

The whole outing takes about 2 hours and 15 minutes with an hour in the middle allotted to explore the fort. Such an easy, inexpensive getaway will provide special memories for families, school and scout groups, and anyone who wants a full taste of an instance that gave Charleston an only deeper, wider dot on the map.

Welcoming an entourage from the fort docks on a Sunday afternoon earlier this winter, Sarah Martin, a National Park Service ranger, regaled the guests by summarizing the fort’s background, one of 44 Pentagon-shaped sites commissioned by the Madison administration after the War of 1812. Standing on its battery, added in 1899, she said the first bricks were laid in 1840, the first of 7 million assembled to make it 55 feet tall, with walls 5-7 feet thick, in a total fortification boasting about 70 tons of granite and other materials from New England.

Martin said if completed before the Confederates’ assault in 1861 – when 33 stars occupied Old Glory – Fort Sumter would’ve housed several hundred soldiers. Yet, at the time, it stood way short on provisions of food, people (only about 130 on hand), and cannons (only 15 of the 135 planned were mounted and ready).

No one died on either side during the rebels’ final aerial bombardment, spanning 34 hours, April 12-13. The first death, Martin said, injecting irony, occurred April 14, after a truce from terms negotiated with Confederate Brig. Gen. Pierre Beauregard by Maj. Robert Anderson. Pvt. Daniel Hough perished in a cannon explosion during a planned 100-gun salute planned by Union forces for their own evacuation.

A park service brochure shows the drastically different phases of the fort after its near leveling in 1861, with details and maps that might consume anyone hungry for history for at least an hour, especially after the tour.

Besides touring the grounds at one’s own pace and choice, and soaking in the landscape – including Fort Moultrie, one mile northeast as the pelican or gull flies, and built in 1776 to help thwart Royal Navy fleets – head inside the formal museum for a barrage of relics and other instructional aides to understand the nation’s state of affairs from more than 150 years ago.

A highlighted quote from President James Madison to Congress in 1815 applies as equally today, two centuries later: “Whether to prevent or repel danger, we ought not to be unprepared for it.”

Another recounting sums up Varina Davis’ reaction to her husband Jefferson Davis reading by telegram his election as Confederate president in 1861: “ After a few minutes’ painful silence, he told me ... as a man might speak of a sentence of death.”

Walking through the interior, follow your eyes to two impressive, beautiful historic flags.

The Palmetto Guard Flag, faded, but preserved under glass and still so striking, measures 6 by 9 feet, with a red star high at left of a palmetto tree. This flag was first rasied over Fort Sumter after eviction of federal forces. Hours later, the “Stars and Bars” was raised with a blue circle of seven stars in a circle at upper left – for the first states to secede – and two wide, red bars split by one white stripe.

Nearby, the 10-by20-foot tattered U.S. flag that flew April 12-13, 1861, commands its own display. Beauregard had allowed Anderson to take it upon surrendering the island, but exactly four years later, the latter raised the same flag again, after Charleston had fallen back into Union hands, amid Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman’s march north from Savannah, Ga.

Walking this fort, a sacred monument to everyone who fought and died there, take home a chunk of Charleston history in knowledge and newfound appreciation. Remember also that this Holy City not only was ground zero for the Civil War; it’s part of the beacon to remind everyone of how South Carolina bore more battles than any other state as our nation won the war of independence against the Red Coats, thanks to leaders with such as Gen. Francis Marion and Capt. Robert Conway, whose respective namesakes adorn the university on the east end of Florence and the seat of Horry County.

This story was originally published February 18, 2016 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Sail to Fort Sumter for barrage of history."