The troops on those ships that were sent to reinforce Ft. Sumter. I can look up their names and how many troops they were carrying, but I don't remember that information right off the top of my head. I believe PeaRidge probably knows exactly where to find it, but I would have to look for it.
And as for Ft. Sumter, the presence of it's guns, and the threat to use them, would preclude the establishment of a low Tariff port in Charleston. The continued occupation of it by Union forces would have put off the trade that they were expecting which would allow it to becoming a heavily trafficked low tariff port.
On the twenty-ninth of March, he (Lincoln) had ordered that three ships — the Pocahontas, the Pawnee, and the Harriet Lane — together with three hundred men and provisions be made ready to sail for the Charleston harbor. Lincoln to Cameron, in Official Records: Armies, Series I, Volume I, page 226; Inclosure No. 1, op. cit., page 227.
These orders were all marked private. On the first of April, he sent a message to Commandant Andrew H. Foote at Navy Yard in Brooklyn, New York to “fit out the Powhatan to go to sea at the earliest possible moment under sealed orders.”Lincoln to Andrew H. Foote, in op. cit., page 229
These instructions were confirmed with another telegram which contained these words: “You will fit out the Powhatan without delay. Lieutenant Porter will relieve Captain Mercer in command of her. She is bound on secret service; and you will under no circumstances communicate to the Navy Department the fact that she is fitting out.” In all, consisted of eight warships, carrying twenty-six guns and one thousand, four hundred men.
This was a gigantic issue husbanded by the people of South Carolina while being bullied by Washington.
One week before South Carolina seceded:
“I am authentically informed that the forts in Charleston harbor are now being thoroughly prepared to turn, with effect, their guns upon the interior and the city. Jurisdiction was ceded by this State expressly for the purpose of external defence from foreign invasion, and not with any view that they should be turned upon the State.”
Governor Pickens to President Buchanan, December 17, 1860
Three weeks after Maj. Anderson took control of the unfinished building and three days after the Star of the West had attempted to run into the harbor:
In his letter of introduction to President Buchanan of January 12, Governor Pickens of South Carolina said,
“I have determined to send to you Hon. I. W. Hayne, the attorney-general of the State of South Carolina, and have instructed him to demand the surrender of Fort Sumter, in the harbor of Charleston, to the constituted authorities of the State of South Carolina.
“The demand I have made of Major Anderson, and which I now make of you is suggested because of my earnest desire to avoid bloodshed, which a persistence in your attempt to retain the possession of that fort will cause, and which will be unavailing to secure to you that possession, but induce a calamity most deeply to be deplored.”.
Major Anderson, after the Star of the West, asserted his military strength in correspondence with the Governor, saying circumstances might cause him to fire upon all vessels coming within range of his guns.
Imagine driving your wife and family around downtown Charleston in your carriage while this was going on.
There were some troops aboard Lincoln's resupply ships.
But Lincoln's orders to them, and his promise to South Carolina Governor Pickens, was that no attempt to land them would be made so long as the resupply mission was not opposed by Confederates.