A claim made by someone not there.
Porter’s ships were within the range of the big guns at Fort Fischer. His ships pound the Fort to rubble. His ships were not seriously damaged during the battle.
How experienced were the Charleston gun crews. How much practice had they had at hitting a target moving at 7 or 8 knot.
The ships would have lied off the coast within their gun range, and sailing a speed of 7 or 8 knots fired to suppress the batteries opposing the resupply boats.
Shore batteries have a difficult time hitting a crossing target. They have to manually traverse the gun to keep it on target. If it not practiced on a routine basis, it is not an easy task to accomplish. Naval gunners on the other hand practice hitting moving targets all the time. This is not to say that the batteries couldn’t hit those ships or that the ships could hit the batteries.
Was the Sumter expedition a risky venture. Yes it was.
Was it doomed to failure, maybe, maybe not. The Confederates firing on Sumter made the resupply mission a moot point.
But someone considered an expert for his era.
Porter’s ships were within the range of the big guns at Fort Fischer. His ships pound the Fort to rubble.
58 ships? I think that's more of a reasonable force than five, don't you think?
As I said, five ships make it seem like they had no intention of really doing what they claimed they were going to do.