The end of the Civil War left the troops at Newport's Fort Adams with little to do, and like bored soldiers everywhere, they often found relief at the bottom of a bottle. One day in February 1866, three drunken warriors were returning to the fort from Newport where they had celebrated, no doubt for the 100th time, the victory of the Union. Spying a skiff, which, as it happened, belonged to the Lewis family, the three decided to take a shortcut across the harbor to the fort. One of the soldiers sang while his buddies pulled at the oars, and stomping in time with his sour notes, put his foot right through the bottom of the boat. The oarsmen managed to swim to shore, but the tipsy singer would have drowned had not the arms of a strong young woman looped a stout rope under his armpits. Unable to lift the man into her boat, Ida Lewis towed him to shore. There she left him to face the ire of his officers and the inevitable torments of a Civil War-size hangover.