At this critical juncture Lieutenant William B. Cushing, a
very young but a very bold officer, proposed a daring plan;
no less a one than to attack the Albemarle at her wharf,
explode a torpedo under her hull, and send her, if possible,
to the bottom of the Roanoke. He proposed to use a swift
steam-launch, run up the stream at night, and assail the
iron-clad where she lay in fancied security. From the bow of
the launch protruded a long spar, loaded at its end with a
100-pound dynamite cartridge. The spar could be lowered by
pulling one rope, the cartridge detached by pulling another,
and the dynamite exploded by pulling a third.
The proposed exploit was a highly perilous one. The
Albemarle lay eight miles up the river. Plymouth was
garrisoned by several thousand soldiers, and the banks of
the stream were patrolled by sentinels all the way down to
the bay. It was more than likely that none of the
adventurers would live to return. Yet Cushing and the crew
of seven daring men whom he selected were willing to take
the risk, and the naval commanders, to whom success in such
an enterprise promised the most valuable results, agreed to
let them go.
It was a dark night in which the expedition set out,--that
of October 27, 1864. Up the stream headed the little launch,
with her crew of seven, and towing two boats, each
containing ten men, armed with cutlasses, grenades, and
revolvers.
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