Position of Company "C" of the 20th Iowa Infantry

Completed on August 18th, Battery Lincoln was located near the northern end of the Federal siege lines of Fort Morgan. Company "C" of the 20th Iowa Infantry Regiment, under the command of Captain Mark L. Thomson, was detailed to serve as sharpshooters on the siege line.

Near daybreak on August 22nd, the last great bombardment of Fort Morgan commenced. Private Samuel Crawford of the 20th Iowa detailed the accurate shelling of the mortars in a diary he penned during the operations on Mobile Point.

"The Navy & Mortars commenced and such a steady stream of shot and shell I never saw. It beet (sic) anything they ever had at Vicksburg on one fort for so long?They kept up the fire from all side until about 8 o.clk. Then the mortars alone were left at the work. After about an hour?they got the range so that they thrower every shell into the fort. Captain Thomson said that with the mortars they had charge of they throwed 40 shells in an hour & 15 minutes that is about as fast as they could use four pieces."

Private Rufe Dooley of the 1st Indiana Heavy Artillery described the deadly spectacle of the bombardment in a letter to his mother.

"All the artillery opened at daylight and kept it up all day...night closed in and our breastworks were just begun but now came the most beautiful sight I ever saw. The mortar shells had set something on fire in the fort which made a terrible sight, then they doubled their firing...and the shells rolled in with a thundering roar that shook the sand peninsular to the waters edge..."

After Fort Morgan's surrender, Captain Thomson, as well as Lieutenants R. M. Lytle and W.M. Johnson who each commanded a section of two mortars, received the personal thanks of General Gordon Granger for the "gallant manner" in which they handled the operations of the their guns during the siege.

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