Civil War Letters of First Lieutenant David R.P. Hibbs: 104th Regiment, Pennsylvania Infantry, Company F, 1863-64

A collection of four letters by Union solider David Hibbs, written from March 1863 through February 1864, when his Regiment was supporting the Atlantic Blockading Squadron at Beaufort and Charleston Harbor, South Carolina. All four are near fine, densely written in a neat, legible hand. The letters are addressed to Hibbs’ 10-year-old nephew and two siblings back home at Hulmeville in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. He writes with affection for all three, and includes descriptions of the military stand-off between Union and Confederate forces, with several references to "those little Monitors, looking like cheese boxes on the water." In the final letter from February, 1864, he gives a vivid, eye witness account of the destruction of a "blockade runner" that had slipped past the Union fleet at night, but then ran aground off Sullivan’s Island at the mouth of Charleston harbor: "… She lay hard aground, with a low tide, just a little below Ft. Moultrie … a fine target for our Monitors and batteries … she was discovered by the garrison at Gregg [on Morris Island]; as soon as the fog lifted which was about sunrise they at once opened on her with the 30 pounders and afterwards with the 100 and 200 and 300 pounders. The rebels were busy unloading her till our guns opened when they thought it time to leave which they did in a hurry after our shot had pierced her stern and exploded … ." The vessel was the English Clyde steamer *Presto* which had come from Nassau loaded with blankets, salt beef and shoes: "About 8 o’clock the Monitors opened with their 15in. guns … and soon they were all four in line and firing at the steamer … She was a splendid vessel and a fast runner from her build. Only a few shots were fired [by Confederate forces] at the Monitors, they were mostly fired at Gregg and Wagner. The firing is being kept up tonight … ." Hibbs first saw action at the Battle of Fair Oaks in 1862: the 104th Regiment fired the first volley that opened the battle in May, and at one point Hibbs was put in temporary command of his Company before the end of the battle in June. A compelling small cache of letters, that give an historically important first-hand account of the Union blockading squadron at Charleston. A detailed list of all four letters, including extracts, is available.