lonel Isaac S. Burrell, were sent from New Orleans without
disembarking from the little _Saxon_, on which they had made the
journey from New York. With them went Holcomb's 2d Vermont battery,
leaving their horses to follow ten days later on the _Cambria_,
with the horses and men of troops A and B of the Texas cavalry.
Protected by the flotilla under Commander W. B. Renshaw, comprising
his own vessel, the _Westfield_, the gunboats _Harriet Lane_,
Commander J. M. Wainwright; _Clifton_, Commander Richard L. Law;
_Owasco_, Lieutenant Henry Wilson; and _Sachem_, Acting-Master Amos
Johnson; and the schooner _Corypheus_, Acting-Master Spears, Burrell
landed unopposed at Kuhn's Wharf on the 24th, and took nominal
possession of the town in accordance with his instructions. These
were indeed rather vague, as befitted the shadowy nature of the
objects to be accomplished. "The situation of the people of
Galveston," wrote General Banks, "makes it expedient to send a
small force there for the purpose of their protection, and also to
afford such facilities as may be possible for recruiting soldiers
for the military service of the United States." Burrell was
cautioned not to involve himself in such difficulty as to endanger
the safety of his command, and it was rather broadly hinted that
he was not to take orders from General Hamilton. In reality,
Burrell's small force occupied only the long wharf, protected by
barricades at the shore end, and seaward by the thirty-two guns of
the fleet, lying at anchor within 300 yards.

Magruder, who had been barely a month in command of the Confederate
forces in Texas, had given his first attention to the defenceless
condition of the coast, menaced as it was by the blockading fleet,
and thus it happened that Burrell's three companies, performing
their maiden service on picket between wind and water, found
themselves confronted by the two brigades of Scurry and Sibley,
Cook's regiment of heavy artillery, and Wilson's light battery,
with twenty-eight guns, and two armed steamboats, having their
vulnerable parts protected by cotton bales.

Long before dawn on the 1st of January, 1863, under cover of a
heavy artillery fire, the position of the 42d Massachusetts was
assaulted by two storming parties of 300 and 500 men respectively,
led by Colonels Green, Bagby, and Cook, the remainder of the troops
being formed under Scurry in support. A brisk fight followed, but
the defenders had the concentrat