Several boats of the northern blockade have been mysteriously destroyed. Again, a ship was sunk without its commander including anything. These losses have the gift of worrying the president and his Major State: Would the Southists have invented a secret weapon? If they manage to harm the northern blockade, the Confederates will be able to refuel themselves more easily and the war may eternize. Meanwhile, on the forehead, nothing goes any more for Chesterfield. This stubborn Blutch refuses to make his apology for disobedience and he is about to be shot... But after a parody of execution that Blutch has put to a blow by these sarcasms, this one is postponed to the next. Meanwhile, the state-Major receives an order of mission to go to Charleston, in the south, in order to discover an explanation on "the secret weapon" of the Southists. A suicide mission, in other words. A suicide mission that Chesterfield, and especially Blutch, is worth the life, and will hardly have the choice of a civil sergeant to refuse it.