f such an attempt, although much anxiety was felt by General
Emory, in command of the station, and confident expectation was plainly
discernible on the faces of the towns-people. The Confederates, however,
did for a season control the west side of the river, appearing before
Donaldsonville and Plaquemine, where were posts of United States troops.
These were saved by the prompt appearance of gunboats, which followed
the movements of the enemy; but the report of them brought Farragut down
in person, and elicited from him a remonstrance to Banks for leaving
upon the west bank, inadequately sustained, heavy guns which, if they
fell into the hands of the Confederates, might convert a menace into a
serious embarrassment. A few days later, at midnight of June 27th, the
enemy attacked Donaldsonville in force. The storming party succeeded in
entering the works, but the three gunboats which Farragut had stationed
there opened so heavy a fire upon the supports that these broke and
fled; and those in advance, being unsustained, were made prisoners.

A few days later Farragut summoned his chief-of-staff, Captain Thornton
A. Jenkins, to relieve him at Port Hudson, as he felt his own presence
necessary at New Orleans. Jenkins started up in the Monongahela, a heavy
corvette commanded by Captain Abner Read, having in company two small
transports with needed supplies. The enemy, despite the repulse at
Donaldsonville, remained in the neighborhood, and had established a
battery of field-guns a few miles below at a bend in the river. By these
the Monongahela was attacked and pretty severely handled for a few
moments. Her captain, an officer of distinguished courage and
enterprise, was mortally wounded, and Captain Jenkins slightly so. These
two affairs sufficiently indicate the character of the enemy's
operations on the west bank of the Mississippi at this time. They did
not in the least succeed in shaking the grip of the Union army before
Port Hudson, nor did they entirely cease with the surrender of the
place. That they did so little harm, with the enemy in nearly undisputed
command in the regions west of the river, was due to the navy, whose
mobility exceeded that of their troops.

Vicksburg surrendered on the 4th of July, 1863, and its fall was
followed by that of Port Hudson on the 9th of the same month. Farragut
then wrote to Porter, and turned over to him the command in all the
Mississippi Valley above New Orleans. On the 1st of Augu