g fire in mutual support and
defense. These works, together with the three others mentioned by
General Scott, namely, Fort Morgan in Mobile harbor, Fort Pulaski
below Savannah, and Fortress Monroe at Hampton Roads, were all,
because of their situation at vital points, not merely works of local
defense, but of the highest strategical value. The reenforcements
advised would surely have enabled the Government to hold them until
further defensive measures could have been arranged; and the effect of
such possession on the incipient insurrection may be well imagined
when we remember the formidable armaments afterwards employed in the
reduction of such of them as were permitted, without an effort on the
part of President Buchanan to prevent it, to be occupied by the
insurgents.

But the warning to the Administration that the Southern forts were in
danger came not alone from General Scott. Two of the works mentioned
by him as of prime importance were Forts Moultrie and Sumter in
Charleston harbor. There was still a third fort there, Castle
Pinckney, in a better condition of repair and preparation than either
of the former, and much nearer the city. Had it been properly occupied
and manned, its guns alone would have been sufficient to control
Charleston. But there was only an ordnance sergeant in Castle
Pinckney, only an ordnance sergeant in Fort Sumter, and a partial
garrison in Fort Moultrie. Both Sumter and Moultrie were greatly and
Castle Pinckney slightly out of repair. During the summer of 1860
Congress made an appropriation for these works; and the engineer
captain who had been in charge for two years had indeed been ordered
to begin and prosecute repairs in the two forts.

[Sidenote] Report, F.J. Porter. W.R.[4] Vol. I., pp. 70-72.

[Sidenote] Craig to Floyd, Oct. 31, 1860, with Floyd's indorsement.
W.R. Vol. I., pp. 67-8.

Captain J.G. Foster, the engineer to whom this duty was confided, was
of New England birth and a loyal and devoted soldier. He began work on
the 12th of September; and not foreseeing the consequences involved,
employed in the different works between two and three hundred men,
partly hired in Charleston, partly in Baltimore. There were in the
several forts not only the cannon to arm them, but also considerable
quantities of ammunition and other government property; and aware of
the hum of secession preparation which began to fill the air in
Charleston, Captain Foster in October asked the Ord