After this promotion, Cushing took command of the admiral's flagship, the "Malvern," and in December was engaged in the operations at Fort Fisher, where in various attempts to capture that stronghold, so many failures had been recorded against both our army and navy. In an open skiff there, he performed a service as perilous as before, although less spectacular. This was the buoying the channel for the fleet, which task occupied him for about six hours under a shower of shot and shell from the fort.
On January 12, 1865, the bombardment was resumed from sixty vessels, and after three days of that exercise an assault was ordered, in which Lieutenant-Commander Cushing was permitted to take part. It proved to be one of the bloodiest little affrays of the war. Two of his classmates at Annapolis, Lieutenants B. H. Porter and S. W. Preston, were killed by his side; which caused him, he said, the bitterest tears he had ever shed. No other officer being near him, he rallied a few hundred men and was about to resume the assault, when he received orders to join the land forces under General Ames. He then had the satisfaction of witnessing the surrender of the fort before midnight.
After the works had been taken, Cushing proceeded to round up all the pilots in the vicinity, and by threatening to hang them procured all necessary information about the signals used for the guidance of the blockade runners who were in the habit of coming in at that point. Within four or five days, one of that class, the "Charlotte," commanded by a British ex-naval officer, steamed up to her anchorage, bringing two English army officers as well as a valuable cargo of arms and ammunition. Gratified at their successful trip, the officers were enjoying a banquet in honor of the event. Cushing, who liked surprises, stepped into the cabin and informed them that they were prisoners, but that he would join them in a glass of the champagne with which the table was loaded. The Englishmen made the best of the predicament, but the feast was interrupted by the announcement that another steamer, the "Stag," was coming up the river, whereupon their young captor excused himself to attend to the fresh arrival.
The war was now practically over, and during the few additional months of its continuance no further adventures appear to Cushing's credit. In 1867 he was given command of the "Maumee," and attached to the Pacific squadron, where life was no longer strenuous. On January 31, 1872, he was made full commander, and in July, 1873, placed in charge of the "Wyoming." In November of the same year he heard of the execution of several of the crew of the insurgent vessel, "Virginius," at Santiago de Cuba. Steaming for that port without orders, he stopped the executions, pending instructions from Spain by which they were entirely discontinued.
The following year, and the day before Cushing's untimely death (at Washington, December 17, 1874), the "Virginius" was handed over to the United States authorities. For three days, without medical attendance, the young commander had suffered indescribable tortures from sciatic inflammation. The servants in the house at last recognized the serious character of his ailment, and called a physician. Soon the inflammation reached the patient's brain, and he was removed to the government hospital for the insane, where, universally lamented, he expired some days later.
Of this young hero's personal appearance we have his own statement. In an early letter to his cousin he says that he was "tall and slim." In one of his published letters the poet Longfellow described his face as of a beauty resembling Schiller's. Since all of the foregoing was written, however, I have received from the widow of Commander Cushing (still living with their two daughters at Fredonia, New York), a letter containing a description of him so admirably lifelike that I am glad to reproduce it in full. For reasons appearing elsewhere, however, it would seem that her recollection of what she heard forty years ago as to Alonzo's stature is not so perfect as her remembrance of her husband. She writes under date of January 1, 1910:
Mr. Theron W. Haight,
My Dear Sir: Your letters of kind inquiry regarding Commander Cushing's personal appearance, height, etc., have unavoidably remained too long unanswered. I trust you will pardon the delay, and that the information I send will be satisfactory and not too late for your use.
I met Mr. Cushing for the first time in the late spring of 1867—a few months before I acted as bridesmaid at his sister's wedding.
Mr. Cushing was tall, slender and very erect. His movements easy and graceful, at the same time indicating force and strength. His head was well poised, his look clear, direct, and steady. His features were regular and clear cut, with a fascinating expression about the mouth when he smiled which attracted one's attention to that feature. His hair was of a medium brown, soft, fine, dark, and straight, without a suggestion of curl. His rather delicate mustache was of a lighter brown, suggestive of golden lights, never of reddish tints.
His animation and enthusiasm in conversation lent a glow to his light, blue-gray eyes that made them seem dark. His brilliant mind was expressed in choice and facile diction—he was a fluent and charming writer. All his impulses were fine, noble. He was generous to a fault, tender and affectionate, and exemplified the sentiment,
What he achieved and lived through in the Civil War, the perilous tasks he assumed and accomplished for his country in her time of greatest danger, form a background from which his figure stands out in vivid relief. It beams with his indomitable courage and is gilded with his heroic character.
I have often heard Mr. Cushing speak of his brother Alonzo, who was two years his senior and two inches taller. My husband was exactly six feet without shoes. They were as intimate and devoted as girls, and quite the opposite in manner and speech, I should say.
Alonzo and Howard I never saw, but the picture of the former stands out in my mind as a tall, gentle, dark-haired, reticent man (he was only 22 when he died), as against the younger, more lively and more impressionable brother.
When I became acquainted with Mr. Cushing, he seemed to have become the head of the family. I mean that he assumed and bore the responsibility of the family. He had been more fortunate in financial matters and was therefore in a position to help all the others, which he did on occasions with the most open-handed liberality.
William Barker Cushing
From oil portrait (1865) by A. Bradish.
See Mrs. Cushing's letter, p. 87.
Alonzo died at Gettysburg in '63, long before I knew the family. Howard was killed by the Apaches after I was married. I well remember what a shock it was to my husband, and how he grieved for him, and tried to comfort his mother, obtaining all possible details of his brilliant service and lamentable death in Arizona through correspondence with the commanding general and officers, and with the War Department at Washington.
I wish to thank you most cordially for the fine photogravure you sent. It arrived in excellent condition. It is an admirable copy of the Bradish portrait, which we have, but the portrait itself does not seem correctly proportioned on the side turned away, being a trifle too broad under the eye, and so represents the face as too pointed. The photo shows it more clearly than the painting. My criticism of the portrait, however, does not affect your fine copy or the kindness that prompted you to send it. I thank you sincerely for it.
I wish also to thank you for the work you are doing, and trust your history of the Three Wisconsin Cushings will be admirable in every way, and fully meet your own expectations, as well as receive the merited reward of the approbation of the State Historical Society and of the public.
Respectfully yours,
Kate L. Cushing.
Forest Place, Fredonia, N. Y.