Comte de Paris, History of the Civil War in America. Vol. 4.
Henry Coppee , LL.D., Ed.

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[546] rear, who with three gunboats of light draught had overseen the departure of the last transports loaded with the material and commissary stores of the army. These vessels arrived safe and sound at Alexandria, but Porter was making but little headway, owing to the Eastport, which frequently grounded in spite of all that was done to lighten her. Finally, on April 25th she stopped in the very middle of the channel for want of sufficient depth of water: it was necessary to blow her up the next morning. But precious time had been lost; only half the distance between Grand Écore and Alexandria had been traversed, whilst Banks' whole army had already passed Bayou Cotile in spite of A. J. Smith's protestations against this abandonment of the fleet. Prince Polignac, not being able to follow the enemy's army any farther, had sent parties to the shores of the river which had already harassed Porter and hastened the destruction of the Eastport. The principal detachment, comprising two hundred sharpshooters under Colonel Caudle and Cornay's battery of four pieces, awaited the Federal vessels five miles above the mouth of Cane River. These vessels were three gunboats—the Juliet, the Cricket, and the Fort Hindman—overloaded with the material taken from the Eastport, and two towboats, the Champion and the New Champion. On the afternoon of the 26th they had just passed an elbow of the river when the Cricket, which with the admiral on board led the advance, was saluted by the fire of the enemy's battery. It replies to the best of its ability, but Cornay's guns, more rapidly served, are soon dealing death and destruction on the deck of the Cricket, whose hull is pierced at every discharge. The gunners, the engineers, the pilots, are killed; the vessel is disabled. Finally, Porter, who is at the helm himself, succeeds in getting her past the enemy's battery, and continues down the river till he meets the Lexington, another gunboat which had just had an engagement with the enemy's sharpshooters below the mouth of Cane River. But the rest of the flotilla, checked by Cornay's fire, could not follow him; the New Champion was sunk, and at nightfall the other vessels remained above the battery in order to repair their injuries. On the morning of the 27th their turn is come to run the gauntlet. At the first volley they are riddled with shot, to which they can make no effective reply. The Fort Hindman,