Brigadier-General Ellison Capers, Confederate Military History, a library of Confederate States Military History: Volume 5, South Carolina
Clement Anselm Evans, Ed.

On quitting the Stono, after the repulse of the ironclads on April 7th, General Hunter had left a brigade, under Brigadier-General Vogdes, on Folly island, with light artillery and some cavalry. This brigade had orders to conceal its encampments among the sand-hills, and in the dense woods and behind the growth of the island, and so effectually carried out the directions, that the force on Folly island baffled the attempts made to locate it or determine its strength. The island was unassailable by the Confederate forces on James island, and there were no troops in the department to spare for an attack from Morris island, across Lighthouse inlet. General Vogdes was known to be on Folly island with some force, but what he was doing, or what he was there to do, was a matter of frequent discussion, and was certainly never determined until Gillmore developed his force on Stono inlet, when Morris island, Battery Wagner and Fort Sumter were seen to be his objectives.

The department commanded by General Beauregard had been stripped almost bare to reinforce other points. Against this depletion of his infantry, General Beauregard, the governor of the State, the mayor of Charleston, and numerous prominent citizens had remonstrated, but the reply of the secretary of war was both inevitable and unanswerable: ‘It cannot be helped, however much it is deplored.’

Gillmore's force of all arms amounted to 10,950, supplied with field batteries and siege guns of the highest capacity, supported in the Stono and on its left flank by a flotilla of gunboats, and on the right by the admiral's armored fleet. For the immediate defense of the city, General Beauregard had in position, on the islands and in the forts and batteries, a total of 5,841 men: On Morris island 927, on James island 2,906, on Sullivan's island 1,158, and in the city 850.